What Have You Done? - The Darkest Minds Fanfiction

Chapter One

Chapter One– The week before It  happened

Elise's P.O.V

I'd used to think that the universe rewarded people without them even realising. I thought that good things happened to decent people every day, small blessings in disguises, where people forgot to look. I didn't believe in karma, none of that 'you get what you give' crap, but I thought that every person got a handful of tiny miracles to give them just enough hope to get through life unscathed. I thought that it was the universe that gave me Liam Stewart.

It was before the world turned to shit, before everything I knew crumbled around me. No children were dying, no children could bend the rules of reality with powers nobody could comprehend. It was nothing but the blissful simplicity of a normal afternoon.

"Hey Darlin'."

He was behind me and ruffling my hair, his fingers disturbing my curls as he plonked beside me on the sidewalk.

"Don't you Darlin' me," I teased, but scooted over for him to sit "I have a perfectly good name"

"You love me really Elise" Liam said, pushing my shoulder playfully as he opened a bottle of soda. It took everything I had not to splutter.

Love you? You really have no idea.

He grinned at me as I tried and failed to fasten the zip on my jacket. I tried to ignore the wave of warmth hitting me like a tonne of bricks, remembering a time when I wasn't utterly debilitated by a single smile from Liam Stewart. Your heart isn't supposed to skip a beat when your best friend smiles, it wasn't platonic emotions that made my stomach bubble with butterflies.

"You having some trouble there? I thought those things were supposed to be dummy proof" He nodded towards me aggressively ragging the zipper up and down without success and trying to supress his smile as I glared daggers at him.

"Has anybody ever told you you're bloody hilarious Liam" I said in a tone that meant the exact opposite. He guffawed as I pulled it a final time and the whole thing seemed to rip away from the hoodie.

Great.

"Just take mine." Liam laughed peeling off his own sweatshirt "I've seen four-year old's more competent than you"

"You're an asshole," I said but my eyes were laughing, and I pulled it over my shoulders. It still smelt of him, lemon body wash that had lingered on his skin, and I took a deep breath before adding. "By the way I spoke to- "

"Oh, good what did she- "

"She thinks it's brilliant,"

"Great!" He said before grinning.

A lot of our conversations were like that then, overlapping sentences and half-thoughts and shorthand. I didn't need to spell out: 'I spoke to my mom about going on that road trip this summer' because he already knew. We were by no means psychic, we just tended to sense what the other was going to do next. We were practically attached at the hip and that was perfectly fine by us.

"Oh, and we need to talk about your sister's- "he said, sipping his drink.

"I know. I thought we could go from- "

"You just read my mind!"

Again: we didn't need to spell out that he was going to help me pick out party supplies with me for my two younger siblings birthday and how we could go straight on from his football practice. We both already knew. Just like I knew he was going to rake his hand through his hair.

He raked his hands through his hair.

Just like I knew he was going to comment about me stealing all his clothes.

"Do you ever wear anything of your own?"
But I knew he was going to call me cute almost immediately. Platonically.

"You are cute though"

And then take it back

"Don't go thinking your special though"

And then because Liam Stewart was the Liam Stewart I grew up with and was secretly in love with I knew he was going to hug me.

He loops his arm around my shoulder and I bend into him, allowing myself to slump against his chest. It's the same position we'd contorted ourselves into since we were seven years old, even in the summer when I was half a foot taller than him. The Position. It was the kind of hug that meant 'Life is great'and it was. Life was normal, just the same as it had always been. Just like Liam was the same Liam he had always been, chewing on the inside of this lip like he did sometimes when his mind was drifting. I knew then that was going to ask me a question.

"Do you think it'll be like this forever?"

Not what I was expecting. I thought he was going to ask me something meaningless, something dull, like whether I'd let him copy my physics homework because he'd fallen asleep watching cartoons again. Not that.

"What?" I said, shuffling away from him

"Us. Do you think we'll always be this forever?"

What the hell is this? Our friendship? Youth? Lack of complications? I was momentarily speechless. I didn't have an answer, he'd thrown me a curveball. Obviously, I wanted more, I was in love with the boy, but did I want to trade my solid sturdy friendship for a risk that huge.

No. 

No, I didn't

"Do you want us to be?" I managed in the end, not really sure what answer I wanted. Liam looked back at me with a strange intensity.

"I think," he said "This is pretty goddamn golden darling'"

Then my mom called me back into the house and I forced myself up from the sidewalk. I waved Liam goodnight and we swore at each affectionately, saluting as we walked into houses opposite each other. We were completely unaware that we were nearing the end of predictability, the end of normal.

The world was going to go to shit. But first enigmatic, kind, brilliant Liam Stewart would break my heart.