Stories I Never Finished

Blue

▬▬ι══════════════ι▬▬

I͢..... I͢..... I͢..... I͢..... I͢

p r e v i e wI͢..... I͢..... I͢..... I͢..... I͢

Neon lights flashed in slow waves, a blue glow illuminating the ancient arcade within glass walls and concrete panels, the space open for all to gaze in and waltz through unlocked doors late within the weary night.
Air as stale a winter's heart, the night was warm with unsung love lost to the deadened breeze; cars rolling through empty streets, houses silent in their slumber.

Ashton listened to the sound of video games echoing theme songs and game play around him while he stood at the base of a simple arcade box. One hand wrapped around a joystick, silver rings like tiny vines around his fingers, and the other resting waiting over big red buttons, he played more and more with each coin deposited into the slot; carrying his player through levels almost every night.

The sound of shuffled footsteps stopping beside him, worn out boots laced up and scuffed now standing by his side, barely tore his attention off the game as his mouth continued to chew mindlessly on what was once a strawberry stick of gum, now tasteless.

"Ash..." the sound of his friend's voice breezed through his ears, and he knew what Michael would say next.

"He left."

Ashton stopped playing, watching his character die on screen as he pulled his hands away and rest them against the edge of the machine.

"And took Calum with him."

"Calum too?" Ashton cast his eyes upon the face of his friend.

Pierced brow, pierced tongue, hair as black as the night and skin almost as pale as the moon, Michael was a chaotic type of man embodied with the darkest night in layers of black and grey.

Michael nodded and Ashton's brows furrowed.

"Why?"

"They burned the house down." Michael explained. "They're not coming back this time."

"Then we find them and we bring them back." Ashton stated, determined.

Michael's left hand, both tucked in the depths of his baggy jacket's pockets, pulled out a set of keys with a small skull key-chain looped through them and palmed a car key within his grasp.

"I don't know where they would've gone." He said.

"The city." Ashton began to follow his friend out of the arcade, fingerless-gloved hands now tucked into the pockets of his pants.

Black long sleeved sweater with a white shirt underneath whose collar tucked over the top, black skinny jeans and canvas shoes, Ashton was the Raven to Michael's Edgar Allan Poe.

"Luke used to tell me he dreamed of city lights." Ashton explained, approaching the old vehicle Michael called his own.

Twenty eight and choosing to live out of his car, Michael was an odd type of man Ashton truly knew little about.
He would pull suspicious money from his pocket and pass it to Ashton, bidding the man to waste time in the arcade before Ashton would eventually return the next day to find Michael in the arcade parking lot waiting on a lean against his car.
Never smelling like dirt, always hit with an odd aroma of honey and beeswax-scented soap, Michael lived in a strange world far beyond Ashton and often the younger man wondered what that strange world was like.

Ashton climbed into the front passenger seat, the backseat of the wagon left to be home for blankets, bags of food and random goods, while Michael made quick work of buckling his seat belt and starting the car.