Good and Evil [Esme/Annuzzi]

[Annuzzi]

Days like today were held with bated breaths. A sick anticipation of what was to come that very night. What hadn't been stopped in over two hundred years. Fearful parents gathered supplies, barred windows, pulled children into the town square.


Mason waited quietly, watching it all from a pale pink shingled rooftop. His mother was more worried about his younger siblings, than himself, and as he watched them get shuffled out of the house down below, he realized solemnly, she truly didn't care if he was taken or not.


He shook his head, a red curl fell in front of his eyes. He'd missed the first round, four years ago. When the two girls had been taken. No one had waited for them to come back, they weren't going to. No one else had.


Their faces never appeared in a book though. They had waited for it for three years, before the thought that this time, their book keeper didn't have a copy to transfer fully settled in. There was nothing coming of their fate.


They failed.


The voice in his head cooed. A shiver ran down his spine. Pulling himself back into his room through the open window he had left, he landed softly on the floor. Glancing across the room, the full length mirrored version of himself stared back.


Red hair, curled faintly, falling in soft waves. Tanned skin, fit, but not muscular nor scrawny. Clean clothes, blemish free. Girls loved him here, didn't they? Said he was different than all the others. He didn't care, they were just silly girls holding silly fairy tale endings to close to their heart.


Didn't they realize that if they were taken together, there was no way he could be theirs? All the stories proved it.


His thoughts turned to another, and he wondered silently. Would he be able to leave her on her own if they wound up together ?

 

[Esme]

A chilling air swept across the town as the sun grew high. He was coming tonight, there was no doubt. Ducking from behind her spot, she darted forward, narrowly avoiding a parent rounding up children. No, she was not going through that again. Once had been enough, and who cared if he chose her? It wasn't like she had parents to worry about, or any one to really miss her.


Well, one person would miss her, she hoped.


Slinking down an alley way, she looked up. The flash of red of a moving figure was a wonderful sign. Reaching into her coat her fingers curled around the small object. Pulling the pebble and paper out, she grinned. Now, while everyone else got hair sheared, faces covered in mud, groomed, and set proper, whatever they thought would spare the children, these two had a date.


Alex threw the pebble, sending it through the open window.

 

[Annuzzi]

A soft, quick series of thumps brought around Mason's head. A small corner of a grin cracked out over his face as he picked up the note. Untying it from the rock, he shook his head, reading the words quickly. The grin grew wider.

Of course he was packed. Every year since they'd both hit their 12th, he'd been packed and ready to go a week prior. The point of a tradition was to keep it going, right? Snagging the two fabric bags from under his bed, he slung one over his shoulder, the other gripped tight in his right hand. Shooting a thumbs up out the window, he darted down the stairs, shoes clomping loudly in the quiet.


Almost crashing out the door, he stopped, staring at her. The grin had spread full force across his face, excitement racing in his bones.


"We're getting out of here. Tonight."