Feed the Flames

..::^~Ronan~^::..

I wiggled my toes in the warm sand as I lay down in the sand. I played the events of the long and exhausting day over in my head, despite the fact that I wanted to forget them completely. We were able to rescue Mikey and Mason, even though Mikey hadn’t been chained to the basement as Mason, and later on Cell, had been. We all watched as Mason impaled Donald; it was obvious that Mikey and Gerard were upset, but at the same time, they seemed to have been relieved. I kept the disturbing images of Rhys out of my mind, knowing that what Donald had been doing was the exact reason Gerard and Mikey had felt relief.

I rested on my elbows as I looked out to the sea, the sun setting off in the horizon. I’d never been to the beach before, and I was completely captivated by the image it had given me. The sun was a large orange orb floating just above where the sky met the water, and painted different hues of orange, yellow, and pink onto the sky. The water itself was a dark blue – almost black – but reflected the same colors as the sky on the top of the small waves that passed through. Everything else in the city reflected orange; the sand, the buildings, the cars, the people.

I was able to find a somewhat private enclave of the beach away from the bustling tourism. After today, I didn’t think I could handle the stress of a large crowd. I closed my eyes and tilted my head back in order to bask in the moment. I didn’t know the next time I would be near a beach, but I knew I would come back to this exact spot.

I was disappointed when the sound of footsteps in the sand closed in on me, and I wasn’t even sure if I wanted to open my eyes and see who it was, anyways. The sand around me moved around as that person sat down, and the nervous aura from them told me who it was. Being as conflicted as I have been recently, I didn’t know if I was happy or even more disappointed with their presence.

“I didn’t think I’d be able to find you,” Gerard’s voice was quiet, nearly being a whisper. He sounded completely spent, even though I doubted he’d ever admit it. The fact that he hadn’t started yelling about something yet sent a feeling of relief through me and eased the tension that I was feeling. However, there was still tension there; I wasn’t sure what my feelings were. I was used to not being okay with Gerard being around, I was use to him being harsh and condescending; I was very in touch with the fact that I didn’t like him as a person. Now…now, I almost thought I felt the very opposite.

“You have a direct line to my brain, Gerard. It shouldn’t be that hard to find me,” I teased. I still hadn’t opened my eyes yet, and I was still taking in the moment of being on the beach. Despite this, I could still feel his eyes on me.

“I try to respect the fact that it is your brain, Ronan,” he clarified. The fact that he tried to stay away from the weird telepathic connection caused me to ease up to him a little bit more.

“Which I appreciate,” I responded, finally opening my eyes. I could see him in my peripheral vision, noticing he was also looking out into the ocean.

“That view…it’s something, isn’t it,” he breathed the words, as if it were more of a thought than something he meant to say, “It’s got to be one of the top five more breathtaking views in Rome.” My knowledge of Rome was just as extensive as your average American teenager that has never left the country. I’ve read about Italy many times, but Gerard was from here, and I couldn’t help but wonder what places he liked the best.

“What would the other four be?” I was expecting him to simply list off these places, but instead he stood up and held out his hand in order for me to take it. I simply furrowed my eyebrows as to question what he was doing.

“You wanted to know, so let’s go,” he said, his hand still reached out. I looked back to the sunset, taking note of how late it was. I would have protested, but I had read a lot about how cities were far more beautiful at night when they were lit up in different multitudes of colors. The idea excited me, and pushed me to grab Gerard’s hand.

“Where are we going first?” I asked, noticing that he hadn’t let go of my hand as we started walking.

“It’s a surprise,” one of the corners of his mouth turned upwards, and he quickly looked at me from the corners of his eyes.

“I hate surprises,” I mumbled, and I did. In my experience, surprises were not a good thing. My mom and brother dying had been a surprise, getting dropped off at Bal Voyeux had been a surprise, getting turned into a fucking vampire had sure as hell been a god damned surprise. Gerard stopped walking, and turned to me. He let go of my hand, but instead gently grabbed my just below my shoulders.

“Just trust me, please,” it had been half a request, and half an order. He looked into my eyes, something I also wasn’t used. The amount of times he looked away from me in the past had completely hidden how large and bright his hazel eyes were.

“Fine,” I sighed lightly. His hands slid from the top of my arm to my hands. He brought them up to him mouth and placed a kiss on my fingers, causing the color to flush from my face. He began walking again, regaining his previous possession of my hand. We walked down nearly empty streets that were lined with tall buildings.

Eventually, we came upon a very tall gray wall, which had a very small archway around a door in the center. Above the archway was a statue I had recognized from textbooks. The statue had Michelangelo and Raphael, sitting around the coat of arms for Pius XI. Below the statue, MVSEI VATICANI was engraved into the stone.

“The Vatican?” It had come out as a question, but I knew it was the Vatican, “Isn’t it closed to the public this time of night?” He smiled in response, and dragged me to the door underneath the archway, leading us to be standing right on the outside of St. Peter’s Basilica, and more than that, it was day. Cardinals walked right past us, not acknowledging the fact that we were there. This feeling had seemed very familiar, “Is this a memory?” I asked, even though I already knew the answer.

“From when I was fourteen years old, four years before I was turned,” he answered, staring up at the Basilica in awe. I did the same, looking at the statues that were on top of the building. I could feel his eyes on my again, as I looked up, “This is the only way I’m able to visit this place.”

“What do you mean?” I looked back at him in question.

“This is where the Holy See is, Ronan. The Pope lives in that building,” Gerard pointed a building nearly opposite in the direction of the Basilica, “We’re vampires, creatures that were created by Satan. Shit, we go to school on the grounds where Lucifer fell, where we can’t be harmed. Do you see where I’m going with this?”

“Wait, what?” I hadn’t known that about the school ground, and it sort of deterred me from wanting to go back there.

“We can’t go into holy areas,” he explained, but not what I was referring to, “we are the very essence of evil.”

“Yeah, I got that. Go back to the part where we go to school on what could be considered the most evil place on Earth,” I said, my hands going onto my hips, “Why didn’t you tell me about that?”

“Because you wouldn’t even look in my direction, Ronan. How was I supposed to tell you? Shouldn’t you be getting mad at the six other vampires that fucking knew about it?” To my surprise, he still sounded calm. I couldn’t deny the fact that he had a point.

“The idea just scares me, what if we encounter some demonic shit, Gee?” I pursed my lips.

“I’m surprised you haven’t figured it out,” he laughed lightly, “all of that evil shit that people are scared of? Those creatures that bring horror and terror into people’s life? Those demons? That’s us, Ronan. We are the demons.” I could feel my world flip upside down; I hadn’t ever been really religious, but I grew up learning about God and the Devil, Heaven and Hell, and I watch a lot of fucked up movies like the Exorcist. We were programmed to be scared of it, primarily due to the media. It was like a punch in the face to figure out that I was exactly that. “So that’s two down,” he changed the subject, “On to the third most captivating place in Rome.”

Gerard grabbed my hand and led me through one of the arches that surrounded St. Peter’s Square, and we ended up outside of the Vatican City Entrance. Once again, it was evening as it had been before we entered Gerard’s memory. We took our time as we walked around the wall of Vatican City, and I stopped to admire the other side of St. Peter’s Basilica once we were on the opposite end of the sovereign territory. Gerard lightly tugged on my hand, and led me down a small road until we ended up near a circular building that was surrounded by a wall. I knew it was Castel Sant’Angelo, and on the other side of it was the Ponte Sant’Angelo, which was a short bridge that ran across the Tiber River. The bridge held twelve statues of angels, six on each side. Because it was the evening, the outsides were lit up, giving the statues special attention. He walked me out the middle of the bridge and grabbed my shoulders so that he could turn me to face out to the river. My breath caught for a moment as I looked at the buildings and statues in Rome, lit up by manmade light.

“It’s beautiful,” I whispered. Gerard wrapped his arms around me and rested his chin on my shoulder as he stared out into the city with me. I didn’t protest; I couldn’t find the will to. As I looked on, I noticed that the noise had gone down. Not even a few minutes ago, there was a cloud of noise from tourists, nearby cars, birds, and the river. I looked around, and everything was still as if it had been frozen. However, Gerard and I were able to move freely. I looked back at him, knowing he had something to do with the phenomena. “How are you doing that?” The question had earned a snort from him, as well as a smile.

“I can fuck with time, Ronan.” That explained why he was able to take me back into his memories. Then, and small amount of anger rose inside of me.

“Wait, you’re saying you have the ability to control time, but you still dragged us here to Italy to save Mason and Mikey instead of just going back into time and preventing the whole situation?” I could help but feel a little annoyed at that.

“I can’t go back in time, or forward, for that matter,” he clarified, “I can go to places in my memory, and I can pause time for a little bit,” he stopped to think for a moment. “I wanted to stop time for you, just for a moment, because you stop time for me every day,” he looked into my eyes again, and just for a second I thought he was going to kiss me again. He took my hand and pulled me along instead, and at the same time, people began to move around again. We walked in silence, but this time it was comfortable instead of being thick with tension. This walk was longer, and we passed by buildings that I had recognized such as the Parthenon and the Santa Marian Maggiore, and we continued walking until we were outside the very familiar Colosseum.

He led me through one of the exterior archways, and we ended up on the stage in the middle of the interior. It was nearly pitch black, and the monument had been completely empty. Gerard sat down, and tugged my hand again, “Come here.” I did as he said, and sat between his legs with my back resting against his.

“Shh, it’s about to start,” I heard from my right. I looked over, but could barely make out any figures from the other side of the stage. Knowing that this was one of Gerard’s memories, I assumed that one of those figures would be an earlier version of Gerard. The most current version of him grabbed my chin and titled it back so that I was looking up. A few seconds later, I heard a high-pitched sound and a bright green light shot into the sky starting off a round of fireworks.

I rested the back of my head in the crook of Gerard’s neck as a watched in awe, fascinated by the colors. Fireworks had brought back many memories for me, primarily memories of the Fourth of July and New Years’ with my full family. When I used to think back to those memories, I would become really sad and upset, because I’ll never again be able to share those experiences with the people I’d lost. Tonight, I smiled at the memories, remembering how happy I was, and think about how happy I’d been at that moment in Gerard’s arms.

The show lasted about half an hour before he pushed me up, and grabbed my hand, “Time for what is without a doubt the most beautiful thing in Rome,” he smiled back at me as we walked towards the exit. I thought back to the sunset and how that had sparked off this little tour. I had to bite back my smile, realizing that I had never expected this from Gerard. After going through a doorway, we ended up on the outside of the Amphitheatre. It was just now turning from evening to night, and I knew that Cell, Mikey, and Ray would be worried about where we would be. I also figured that Gerard would have told Mikey not to worry about us, and that we were fine.

Well, I was more than fine.

I grew excited as Gerard and I walked, wondering where he could possibly be taking me. We’d gone to the largest tourist attractions in the city, so it must have been a personal spot he’d found through his youth when he was growing up here. The walk took a while, long enough for a full moon to rise into the sky. Everything that had glowed orange in the sunset now had a magical glow from the moon, preventing it from being dark outside.

Much to my surprise, Gerard took me back to the beach where we had started, and back to the alcove where I had been laying. Was I missing something? “Come on,” Gerard said as we walked to where the water met the sand. He took his shoes off causing me to follow suit, and we walked in to where the water rose just above our ankles. He grabbed me around the waist so that he was holding me with both arms, and rested his head on my shoulder.

“I’m confused,” I said bluntly. Was it the moon? I admit, it was beautiful, but did he think that this was the most amazing thing in the city?

“Look down,” I did as he said, but all I saw was our feet below the water.

“I’m still confused,” my voice was still blunt, but I’m not sure what he was getting at. My feet were not a sight worth seeing, and his feet were definitely not a sight worth seeing. I searched for something interesting, but I just couldn’t find anything.

“What do you see in the reflection?” His voice was soft as he spoke into my ear. I focused on the reflection and saw…I saw myself. My head straightened out and I looked over at him as my eyebrows furrowed together. I was a different kind of confused.

“Gerard?” I questioned. He didn’t drop his hands from holding me, but instead moved so that he was directly in front of me. He rested his forehead on my own, and looked into my eyes again, this time more intimately than he ever had.

“I told you I would wait as long as it took for you to love me back, Ronan, and I’m most definitely a man of my word, but…” he trailed off, and I gave him time to collect his thoughts before he continued, “But today, Celine and Mason almost lost each other. Not to mention, I saw my dad start to attack you, and I don’t think I could begin to describe the terror that went through my body when that happened. The truth is, I thought I would have all of the time in the world to wait for you; I thought I’d have forever, literally. After today, I feel like I could lose you at any moment, and that thought scares the shit out of me. I don’t want to lose you knowing that I didn’t do anything and everything I could to convince you to be with me,” he didn’t blink as the words flew from his mouth. It triggered something inside of me – I don’t know what it was – but it caused me to bring my hands up and hold on to his arms; I felt like I had to hold him.

“Gerard-” I tried to speak, but was cut off as he continued to speak.

“I know I’m not a great guy, trust me. I’ve done some shitty things in my lifetime, I treated you a way you should never be treated when we met, and I’m so sorry for that. I will apologize to you for the rest of my existence if that’s what it takes for you to forgive me, but I feel like I don’t have a reason without you.” The pain on his face was obvious, and it almost broke my heart in two.

“A reason for what?” I couldn’t break eye contact with him even if I had wanted to. The thing was, however, I didn’t want to.

“For living,” he breathed.

©Shannon

Notes