Chapter 36|Do you kiss all your friends?

Guys, I'm a terrible person. I promised @ellacx that I would mention her in my next chapter, which was like three chapters ago, so now I'm mentioning @ellacx as much as I can because I feel like a useless human, and hopefully you guys will get sick of this explanation and just go to @ellacx and read her stories.

Sorry @ellacx, I didn't mean to forget to mention you in my chapter. Forgive me?

I still feel bad.

Damn you conscience!

~*~*~*~

The funeral was devastating.

I barely knew Joseph Martinez. I mean, the only times I had seen him, he was in a coma, on the verge of death. You could say that the conversations were a little one sided. By the time I left the church I felt as if I really had known him. His friends and family had shared stories that told me a lot about what kind of person he was. I learnt that he was a firefighter, he liked country music, he was a practical joker, a happy drunk, he and Stella had been high school sweethearts, he was an easygoing guy who loved to spend every free moment with his wife and three boys.

Kyle was there, standing in the back of the church. Most of the times I saw him, he was wearing a fairly neutral facial expression, but I saw him shed a tear during the service.

Stella seemed rather relieved as she spoke to the crowd. She talked about Joseph being in better hands, that he was with the angels now. I wasn't so sure, not that he didn't deserve to go to heaven, because of all people he definitely deserved it. The afterlife always perplexed me. Was there a heaven? Or do you come back in another life as a completely different person? Maybe you just dissolve into the earth, turn into grass, and get eaten by cows. Who knows. I guess you can't really be the judge of that until you die, but each to their own.

Ryan's speech wasn't well rehearsed. He didn't have a sheet of paper to read off, and he didn't even try to pretend that he was coping, which I admired. It's easier to put on a brave face, than to admit to a whole crowd of people that you're not okay and you won't be for a while.

He cleared his throat before he started speaking. "My dad is my hero, the fact that he's no longer here will never change that." He looked at his mom who was sitting in the front row, and she gave him a watery smile, encouraging him to carry on. "I don't know how to live without him, I've never had to do it before, but I guess that's life. I hate that he deserved to live more than anyone, and he wanted to live, yet people commit suicide every single day and that's seemingly okay. I just don't understand how a perfectly good life can be waisted so quickly." I tear rolled down his cheek and he didn't even try to wipe it away. "I know that he was in pain, and most likely wherever he is now is better than here, so I'm glad for that. It just sucks that he's going to miss my graduation, all of Archie's kid birthdays, he's going to miss all his future grandchildren." He briefly glanced at me. "He deserved to see all that." He shook his head, another tear sliding down his cheek. "I just hope that one day I'll be half the man, husband, father, and friend that he was."

He left the microphone, but instead of walking back to his seat, he continued striding towards the back of the church, yanking open the heavy wooden doors and then closing them with a slam that echoed through the whole building.

People were looking at each other with worried glances, but nobody actually moved to do anything. Even Kyle remained standing stoically at the very back of the church.

I sighed, scooting out of the pew I had been seated on. People made disgruntled noises as a shuffled past their legs, falling on a few laps as I passed. My shoes on the wooden floor was the only sound that could be heard as I speed walked up the aisle. I grabbed Kyle by the arm.

"You're his friend," I hissed. "Why didn't you follow him?"

"He won't want to talk to me," he whispered coarsely, yanking his arm from my grip.

I huffed, using all my strength to open one of the doors at the back. It creaked under the strain, but inched open wide enough for me to squeeze through the gap.

Ryan wasn't difficult to spot. He was sitting on the hood of his truck with his back to me.

I wandered over to him, kicking off the heels I was wearing, and jumping onto the hood next to him. He didn't look at me, or even acknowledge my presence, but I remained patient.

"Hey," I said quietly.

"Hey," he replied.

"You gonna go back in there?"

"No."

I nodded. "Okay."

He quirked an eyebrow, turning his head to glance at me. "You're not going to try and talk me into going back in there?"

I shrugged nonchalantly. "It's not my place."

"Why are you here?" He asked curiously.

I frowned confusedly. "Because you invited me."

"No, not the funeral. Why did you follow me out here?"

"Well nobody else had the balls to."

He grinned. "You have balls?"

I rolled my eyes. "It would make you gay if I did."

He shrugged, seemingly unaffected by my comment. "Do you wanna go on a date?"

"When?"

"Right now."

"No offence, but this is a pretty crappy date," I replied, glancing behind us at the stone church with a steady stream of people pouring from the doors. They all wore black, making them look like bees leaving a hive. Well actually, they looked more like flies, but that's probably impolite to say.

He smiled, rolling his eyes. "No, we can drive somewhere else."

"What about your mom? Will she mind?"

He shrugged again, jumping off the hood of his truck. "I guess we'll find out soon."

He walked around the side of his truck and climbed in, buckling his seatbelt. He wound down the window and stuck his head out. "Are you coming or what?"

"Oh, you're actually serious."

"Sunshine, I will leave with you still sitting there," he warned.

"Okay, I'm coming. Geez, no need to make rash decisions," I muttered, jumping onto the pavement and almost breaking both of my ankles because I was wearing heels. I bet the devil invented those. Actually, it was probably Crowley.

I recovered from my almost double ankle break, and yanked the death traps off my feet. I really was making being barefoot in public places a habit.

I jumped in the passenger side, throwing my heels in the backseat. Ryan turned the key in the ignition and almost immediately my ears were met with the soft sound of-kidding, kidding, let me rephrase that. Almost immediately, my ears were attacked by the sheer volume of the radio. The truck may have been old, but the radio worked just fine. Ryan scrambled to turn it down. I think we were both a little stunned.

"Well that was loud," He commented.

"Yeah," I agreed.

"At least it wasn't a crappy song though."

I nodded in agreement. I could agree that it was a good song, but I couldn't help thinking that it was a little ironic. He was listening to Back In Black, and we were at a funeral. God, that sounds terrible, I just used irony to relate a funeral to...Nope, not even gonna go there. Now I feel bad for using gods name in vain because we're at a church. But I didn't really say it, so does it still count? I don't think it does. Thank god for that. Holy shit, I did it again. Now I'm thinking about that awful Britney Spears song, the horror. Ugh, now I'm thinking about all the Britney Spears songs because they're all terrible. I kinda just wish my brain had an off switch, not like if I switched it off I'd go like jello, but just to switch off my imagination. Aw, now I want jello, and ice cream. Not together though, separately. But pie is good too, especially that blueberry pie at that diner-

"Sunshine, what is going on in that head of yours?" Ryan asked me, staring at the road as he drove. Wait, he was driving? When did we...? Never mind.

"You really don't want to know."

"We've been driving for like a minute, you can't have thought up anything too wild in that amount of time, right?"

"You'd be surprised."

"Try me."

"Well first I was thinking about irony, and then using the lords name in vain, then Britney Spears and how bad her songs are, then what it would be like if my brain had an off switch, then jello and ice cream, but not together, then blueberry pie."

Ryan blinked. "I underestimated you."

I grinned. "I forgive you." I looked out the window. "So where are we going?"

"To the moon," he stated casually.

I rolled my eyes. "Seriously, where are we going?"

"I was serious. We are going to the moon."

"Uh huh," I said skeptically. Sometimes people under mental and emotional stress get delusional right?

He continued driving, and he seemed to know exactly where he was going too, which was a little worrying. I mean, I'm pretty certain that you can't actually drive to the moon, it's physically impossible. And anyway, without a spacesuit your blood would boil and your eyeballs would explode, which I wouldn't imagine to be a very pleasant experience.

We turned down a sketchy looking street. It looked as though a plague had swept through the neighbourhood. It was deserted, for a start, and none of the buildings looked occupied. I couldn't see a single person or animal, there weren't even any birds which may have been due to the fact that all the trees were dead.

"What happened to this place?" I asked, still staring out the window.

"This one guy owned all the buildings down here, the businesses, houses, everything. He went bankrupt, left town, and this place has been deserted ever since."

"Huh," I said. I guess you learn something new everyday. "So what are we doing here?"

"You'll see," he said, turning right into a parking lot. Well, it used to be a parking lot, now the weeds were growing up through the cracks in the pavement. A rundown building also sat on the plot of land, grass growing from the spouting. I could faintly read the fading lettering that I'm assuming used to be painted red, but now was kind of yellowy. It read 'The Moon', well actually, it just read 'The Moo'. The 'n' was missing.

"So you're not delusional," I commented casually to Ryan.

"What gave you that impression?"

"Well, when someone tells you that they're taking you to the moon, it kind of makes you wonder."

He shrugged, a smile tugging at his lips. "Shall we?"

I nodded, laughing at his faux English accent, and putting on one of my own. "We shall."

~*~*~*~

"Are you sure this is legal?" I asked with a doubtful glance to the 'private property' sign, strung haphazardly across the slats in the fence.

Ryan glanced sideways at me. "Of course it is."

"Fine then, you go first," I said, crossing my arms over my chest.

Ryan smirked. "Why do I have to go first?"

"Just in case there's a rabid dog over that fence."

"So I'm the human sacrifice?"

"Yes."

"I thought we were friends."

I snorted. "Do you kiss all your friends?"

"Only the pretty ones," he said with a wink, before scaling the fence and swinging his legs over and landing with a thump on the other side.

I stayed standing there until Ryan popped his head over the top. "You coming?"

"If we get arrested, it's your fault," I grumbled, stepping up to the fence. It was a lot taller than me. I could barely reach the top with my fingertips. This was basically impossible, not to mention that I was barefoot and wearing a dress. I didn't trust myself to walk in public wearing a dress because it's dangerous. I mean what if it was windy, or there was the issue of the dress tucked into the underwear. Cringe, cringe, cringey, cringe. Let alone climbing up a bloody wall.

Ryan popped his head up again. "What's taking so long?"

"How am I even supposed to get up there?"

"Climb?"

I huffed, jumping up so that I could grab onto the top of the fence. By some miracle I managed to haul myself to the top of the fence, and sat there, unwilling to get down. There were tiny little sharp pebbles at the bottom. My poor feet were without coverings.

"How am I supposed to get down?" I asked.

Ryan looked up at me amusedly. "Jump, I'll catch you."

I narrowed my eyes. "You better."

I threw myself off the fence, scrunching my eyes closed. All of a sudden the air stopped rushing around me, and I peeped one eye open.

Ryan was looking down at me. "See, I told you I'd catch you."

I looked around at the overgrown plants in the backyard, then back to the building where I could see a hole in the wall. It looked as though done bricks had purposely been removed in order for people to get into the building.

"What is this place?" I asked curiously.

He put me down gently in the long grass, which tickled my shins, and then took my hand.

"Come on, I'll show you."

~*~*~*~

I also feel like Hazel knows a lot about Supernatural for someone who doesn't watch it. I've only realised that I've never actually mentioned her saying anything about Supernatural, it's always the narrative parts that have references...meh oh well.

Wherever you are, if it's summer, please eat ice cream. It always tastes better during summer.

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Until next time.