issues ⇉ central cee.

innocence, sweet little hair bows and ninja turtle t-shirts.

Oakley and Michaela shared quite the past, to say the least. They'd known each other going on nineteen years now, having met aged three and four in a playground. The boy had already developed his tough shell-like exterior with his life beginning to snowball before it had even started and the girl, well she was in for quite the childhood. The corruption hadn't started yet in her family but she was heading straight for it by her fourth birthday in the November of '04. The day they met though, he knew somewhere deep down in his young soul they were gonna stick together for life. Their first encounter was Kayla struggling to climb the rope ladder to a slide - being only three and a half - and Oakley already at the top.

"Do you need help Miss?"

The small girl nodded and beamed up at the boy with the curly hair and the scar through his eyebrow whilst he reached out his hand to pull her up. He was always so polite when he was young and insisted on calling her Miss for the first six months of their friendship. Though it was hardly out of much persistence: Michaela hadn't grown the wits to notify him of her actual name until then so he really had no choice. But even once he knew and had developed the nickname of Kayla he still called her it once in a while, because it made her smile and get all giggly. He loved when she smiled and giggled and went all red in the face, she just looked so beautiful; he couldn't get enough of it.

Almost every Wednesday and weekend the pair would run along down to the local park and meet each other to play for the few hours their parents let them. The park where so many of Oakley's early memories took place actually, was situated in between the estate he lived on and the row of council houses where Michaela lived. Though probably irresponsible, because of its closeness their parents never seemed to care to supervise. On occasion one of the boy's brothers or cousins would walk him down on their way out and laugh in awe at the way the pair would run and hug as soon as they were in sight of each other. But it was never that frequent. He had gotten used to just taking himself to places by then; everyone was always too busy for him. He missed when the pair were all innocence and sweet little hair bows and ninja turtle t-shirts.

Oakley recalled a time back in 2006 when he had just broken his arm being a goalie and he wasn't allowed down to the park the following weekend. He had no other means of communication with Michaela at the time other than talking in person and he missed her a lot. He wanted to tell her all about what happened and show her the cool blue cast he got and let her sign it with the cute little squiggles she had drawn all over his hand once. The boy cried for a while, and then a little longer. She was probably waiting all alone for him at the park and that just made him sadder. So he continued to cry and rub harshly at his cheeks to clear the tears until his mum (who had swiftly returned after hearing of his injury) had swatted him with a magazine and told him to shut up disturbing her. 'Teach you aye' she had muttered as she walked away and retreated to the living room only a wall away, leaving the boy in a strop. What if little Miss hated him now? What if she couldn't smile anymore because he didn't come to make her smile and giggle and get all red like he always did? It was quite possibly the worst day of his younger life. An out of this world exaggeration of course, but back then he didn't know how bad it really was and all he truly cared about was the sweet girl two roads over and when he could next make her smile.

Michaela remembered a time in that park back when she had just turned thirteen and Oakley was fourteen with all their friends from school. The local park became a hangout spot for their group when they joined secondary school; it just became the default, not that they had anywhere else to go. After school, every day they would all run home and change from their uniforms then meet back at the park for a few hours to hang around and occasionally drink or smoke. Oakley and Michaela were always the first to arrive seen as they lived the closest and were waiting rather impatiently for their friends on the bench. It had been a while since they'd just enjoyed each other's company with no one else around. She was always tagging along with her girlfriends and Oakley was always with a new distant cousin she'd never heard of so it was pretty hard to catch alone time these days. So now that they actually had they didn't know what to do with themselves.

"So how've you been Oaks?"

The boy simply shrugged with a solemn heaviness to his shoulders and threw her a mildly normal face; the girl simply stared at him. She had noticed he was getting skinnier and there was a tattoo on his chest he had definitely tried to hide and the bruises across his arms were endless. Now she regretted ever asking but at the same time, she was desperate to know. She decided against pressing on when she saw the glossiness of his eyes and the way he kept running his hands through his hair. This boy never cried, never showed any emotion at all to anybody and it oddly made her feel special and welcomed in a way she couldn't explain. But it was still odd.

"Please don't ask that"

His voice had wavered and she could tell he was mentally beating himself up for that so she acted like she never noticed and just nodded; she understood he wasn't going to tell so what's the harm in just letting it go aye?
The pair had subconsciously shuffled rather close to each other on the metal bench to the side of the park. Though it was one of the warmer nights it still was cold outside this time of year and Michaela was shivering.

"Oi come 'ere"

Oakley had wrapped his lanky arm around her shoulders and pulled her tightly into his side, wincing as she pressed into his ribs which held concealed bruises and a graze or two. She didn't need to know about that, but she did. So now she was tucked into his side snuggly and though there wasn't much to him nowadays he radiated a comforting warmth, heating her right into her core. It was safe and welcoming, unlike anything that he was, a strange phenomenon one might say. And now her lips were pressed snuggly against his too but she didn't know how that happened. He was rather experienced and she had never done this before but he didn't seem to care. Oakley caressed Kayla's jaw with his cold hand whilst he shared this messy armature kiss with his best friend. Both were confused and unknowledgeable of how they even got in this position but neither were denying the normality of its feeling. The display of young love on a random park bench was quickly - and rudely might I add - interrupted by their friends finally making their arrival at least twenty minutes late and absolutely laughing their heads off at what they had just witnessed.
Their friends were laughing and spitting jokes at the pair but there was not a care floating in either of their young and empty brains. Because this was it. This was them. They were meant to be. Oakley was the one. Michaela was the one. But both were too young to even consider that properly.

Now, full-grown adults, the pair could barely work this out. They were reminiscing on the same beautiful moments of their past though in completely different places and it was a strange phenomenon but very real.
Michaela gasped, so hard that she nearly winded herself in the process. And Oakley gulped as he stared up at the blank ceiling of his bedroom. They were meant to be, weren't they. She knew. He knew. But who was going to take a chance on them, hey?