Your Guardian Angel

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When I see your smile
Tears run down my face I can't replace
And now that I'm strong I have figured out
How this world turns cold and it breaks through my soul
And I know I'll find deep inside me I can be the one

For six years, he was my everything. He was the reason why I looked forward to coming to school, why I felt the need to be absolutely perfect in his eyes.

Because to me, there could be no one as flawless as him.

Everything about him made my life fit together. His laugh, his smile, the confused look he'd always wear during political discussions. There was absolutely no possible way for me to explain how amazing of a person he was.

One major problem? He was completely unreachable and on the opposite side of the social spectrum. While he had everyone there for him in school, I lacked that sort of comfort from the majority of my class.

Asides from my three friends.

But truthfully, it hurt to watch him from a distance. He was in three out of my four classes this semester from what I heard. We've always sat in the same room, one row away; yet he still felt an entire world away.

Every time I saw him smile, I felt my heart tear apart. It hurt to know I cared so much for him, and yet he couldn't even give me a minute of his life.

Just once is all I'm asking for.

But with my senior year of high school kicking off, I, Becky Harowitz, refused to let him do this to me, even if it was unintentional. I knew I didn't have a fighting chance; so what was the point in even trying? I had already made up my mind to make the best of my senior year.

And at this rate, there was no way he was going to help me. Sometimes to succeed in life, it's just necessary to let go of some things in order to accomplish that goal.

And Mark Callahan was one of them.

I will never let you fall
I'll stand up with you forever
I'll be there for you through it all
Even if saying you sends me to heaven

Alison Beret, my best friend and neighbor, was quite fond of the cliché 'last party before senior year' scenario. So could I refuse? Not exactly, it's not exactly as if I had much of a choice.

I wasn’t much for the idea, but Alison managed to push me towards agreeing. "It'll help you get over him, anyway. Have some fun and let yourself go. Who's it going to hurt anyway? Everyone gets too drunk at these to remember any faces."

That's actually what made me half scared to death. One could say that I'm not exactly fond of drinking. In fact, I'm allergic to one of the ingredients in beer. I believe it's wheat, or something along those lines. Last time I had some, I ended up in the hospital because I couldn't breathe and hives were erupting everywhere on my skin.

Not a pleasant scenario.

I wasn't into this scene, so I just made myself blend into the walls. No one took the time to approach me, and vice versa. Drinking, dancing, and regular teenager acts were something I never indulged myself in. I preferred to watch from the sidelines and mock them later when things become so complicated for them that the traditional high school drama becomes involved.

Never was I going to ever turn to those ways, ever.

So how much do you think it shocked me when I saw that very guy stumbling down the stairs, a Corona in hand? Not very, to be bluntly honest.

I was standing against the stairs, a plastic cup formerly filled with water in my hand. Mark merely walked past me, slowly planting one foot in front of the other. I shook my head at the scene developing in front of me. How could I have ever liked him so much? I mean, really, look at him. He obviously had a drinking problem, he was apparently a sex addict and I've heard rumors of him doing cocaine.

But for some reason, that made me want to reach out to him more. I wanted to be able to help him, I wanted to pull him out of that dark abyss he was slowly falling into. And it pained me not to be able to do even that.

What made me ever think I had a chance?

But then the unexpected happened. As I was shaking my head in disgust at Mark, he turned his glare upon me. His brown eyes seemed to see right through me, as his lips slipped into a frown. "What the fuck are you looking at?" were the only words coming from his mouth before he disappeared with his friends.

As much as I wanted to punch him in the face and cry my brains out, I couldn't bring myself to do it. As much as it pained me to hear those words come from his lips, I showed nothing. The first words coming from my crush of six years that weren't school related were… "What the fuck are you looking at?"

I've made amazing progress in these six years.

Instead, I turned in the opposite direction towards the back porch where I knew not as many people were hanging out. With every step I took, more sorrow overcame me as I watched everyone else around me.

What if I was more like them? What if I was slightly more "sociably acceptable"? Would that completely change my relationship with Mark, bringing it up from nothing to… something?

I slid out the sliding door, hoping to get away from the masses of people. In this entire night, I hadn't seen any of my friends. Ali was away playing hostess and getting piss drunk. Candace James had to leave early and abandoned me with Yenna Lewis. As for Yenna, what happened to her? Last time I saw her, she was engaged in a major… "discussion" with some kid in our class.

Supportive of her, is it not?

As I stood against the banister, taking in the image of the night sky, I heard the door slide open again. As usual, I took the extra effort to not turn around and greet the newcomer. For all I care, they could be bleeding from a shotgun wound and I probably still wouldn't say a single word to them.

But as soon as I heard the sound of someone throwing up the gunk in their stomach, that caught my attention. Call me softhearted (in this situation), but I feel horrendous whenever someone ends up 'blowing chunks'. I know for a fact that after I throw up, I feel the need for comfort and whoever this was definitely sounded like they needed some tender love and care.

I turned around and noted the figure on all fours, wrenching out their guts onto the patio floor. Man, do I feel sorry for Alison. All love to her for cleaning up this mess. When the noise quieted down slightly, I knelt down beside the person and laid a hand on their back. "You okay?" I whispered, looking down at them.

The person turned his head to look up at me, his blonde hair falling carelessly in front of his eyes. As soon as I recognized him, I removed my hand from his back as if though I had just touched fire.

Mark Callahan, of all people. What more should I have expected, knowing my great luck in life?

"Yeah, I'm fucking fine. I'm throwing up everything I had just eaten in the past twenty four hours. Of course, I'm perfectly great." He spat, moving the stray bangs out of his eyes. "Who the hell are you anyway?"

I bit my lip and looked down towards the ground. "That's not important right now. Right now, you should probably clean up and get home."

Mark scoffed and pushed himself off the ground so he was sitting on his calves. "Home, sure. Whatever the hell you want to call it, they'd never let me come home in this condition."

I merely stared at him, beckoning him to continue. I don't know what made me want to listen to his story. I had already forced myself not to focus on him anymore, yet I was being sucked back into it just as quickly as before.

"I'm not discussing this with you. I may be sick out of my mind and drunk like no other, but I don't know you. I'm not spilling my guts to some complete stranger I've never met before. Life doesn't work that way, babe."

His words stuck through me like a cold blade. How could he not know me? He's been sitting right next to me in every single one of his classes for the past three years. Had he not even taken the time to look to his left and even pay attention to me?

Yes, I have talked to him. Yes, he has responded. And yes, I'm pretty sure he recognized me. But something was telling me that he frankly didn't give a shit about who I was. No matter how many times I let him cheat on AP US History tests, he always viewed me as "that chick who let me copy her answers".

Nothing more, nothing less.

But no matter, the way he was glaring at me made me want to reach out to him. To tell him that everything was going to be okay. As much as I knew that was impossible, I felt as if though I had to. Already from what he had told me unintentionally (most likely), I figured that there was something not so perfect about his so called unblemished reputation.

So much for forgetting about Mark Callahan.

It's okay. It's okay. It's okay.
Seasons are changing
And waves are crashing
And stars are falling all for us
Days grow longer and nights grow shorter
I can show you I'll be the one

"But it doesn't mean that I can't worry about it. You can call me whatever the hell you want to, but I care about other people, if you haven't realized." I spoke softly, my voice barely audible. I looked down at the ground, keeping my eyes focused at the leaf being blown around by the wind. I could feel Mark staring at me, which was partially the reason why I refused to look up in his direction.

I don't think I'd last a minute looking into his eyes.

"I've realized that." He responded a few seconds after I had stopped talking. "You know, at this rate, you're going to end up dying in the hands of some rapist."

Gee, thanks a lot.

"No, I'm serious." Mark shook his head, his attitude doing a complete three-sixty. It was hard to imagine only a minute ago, he was basically telling me to fuck off. "You're too soft. You help too many people, even if you know nothing about them. If someone asked you to clean their car at three in the morning, you'd probably do it. Next thing you know, you're discovered dead in a garbage disposal. Just like that." He snapped his fingers to emphasize his point. "You're nothing. Just because you trusted someone you shouldn't have."

"Is that a bad thing?" I asked as the wind started to pick up, blowing my bangs into my eyes. "At least then I'd know I died trying to help someone. I helped them with something, and in return, it was my own fault. But I died for a cause. A petty cause, but still a cause at the same time."

Mistakenly, I looked up at Mark, only to discover him staring sharply at me. "Do I know you?" he finally asked, a look of realization upon his face. I nearly wanted to scream in joy when he said those words. He remembered me; he truly did. Though his memory was probably blanking out on him, he could still place my face somewhere in his brain.

And that's all the mattered to me.

However, I have no idea what possessed me to shake my head. "No, you might have me confused with someone else."

"Oh." Mark shrugged, brushing off his 'mistake'. "I thought I recognized you. There's this girl, Becky Harowitz, who's in almost all my classes who looks exactly like you. I don't know why I brought that up actually."

"It's fine." I responded, pure bliss running through my spirit. He knew me, he really truly did. "You're just drunk right now. Go home and relax."

Mark merely laughed at my words, before looking up towards the clear night sky. "Like I said before, what home? I'm not going back there, not tonight, not ever. I'm staying with Lukas and we're probably moving out of this state forever. My best friend, if you want to know." He said, looking back down at me.

I nodded, already knowing that. Lukas Adler was a quiet kind of a guy, a person I never expected to ever give Mark a moment of his life. But I guess they sort of evened each other out in their own special ways. When they were together and hanging out, it seemed as if though all the imbalances in our world were… gone.

"What's wrong with going home though?" I prodded, hoping I wouldn't reach the point where Mark would enter one of his infamous scream matches. "No matter how badly they treat you-"

"They still fucking love me." He quickly cut me off, his voice obviously dripping with sarcasm. "I know. I've heard that phrase about twenty times a month. Half of that from the guardians themselves. I know it, you don't need to start either."

"Sorry." I muttered, standing up to leave. "You don't have to be an ass about it."

Oh shit.

At that, Mark stood up just as quickly and grabbed my arms before literally flinging me against the wooden banister. Mark held onto me as my back hit the wood, probably just to make sure I didn't flip over it. I stared at him defiantly, letting him know that I wasn't going to take back what I had said.

But deep inside, I was absolutely terrified. I don't know what had taken over my body to make me act this way. This was Mark Callahan for crying out loud! The man I had been basically desperately in love with for six years! Six years! And now, I was definitely throwing that all away for what reason?

Just to get closer to him? If that's the case, it's definitely not working at all!

"What makes you think you have the right to start dictating how I act?" he spat, his face literally two centimeters away from my face. "You don't know anything, so don't pretend you do. Fucking bitch." He said, spitting on the ground before turning around to walk away.

Despite the tears that were now threatening to spill, I conjured up all the courage I had. But personally, I don't know what had happened to me. What happened to the silent Becky who sat in the corners, unheard by everyone else? What happened to the soft, kind-hearted Becky who was always willing to help everyone? And what had happened to the Becky who had sworn never to get involved in anyone else's drama?

Especially with Mark Callahan?

Apparently, she had lost all sense of rational. And instead, now in her place… was me.

I will never let you fall (let you fall)
I'll stand up with you forever
I'll be there for you through it all (through it all)
Even if saving you sends me to heaven

"I'm not dictating anything." I replied, not daring to look at his retreating back. I was almost positive I would be greeted with the sound of the patio door slamming shut, but it didn't. "I'm not telling you to do anything. I know I shouldn't be, after all, like you said. I barely know you, isn't that right?" I laughed bitterly and turned away. "Go do what you want. It's not like anyone ever listened to me in my life before. What makes you think that you should as well?"

"Fine." He heard him say from behind me. "I'll take your word for it."

"Fine." I retorted, sarcastically mimicking his words. "Do whatever the hell you want. It's not like anyone's ever been able to stop you from doing that anyway."

"Don't push me, chick." He said, his voice suddenly becoming threatening and low. "Don't make me do something that I'm going to regret in about five minutes. Don't."

"Whatever." I sighed and turned around. I opened my mouth to say something else, but I decided against it. What was the point in trying to change this guy's methods? There was nothing. Why should I even consider trying to help him?

Pushing back the urge to shake his shoulders and scream at him for being so idiotic, I quickly brushed past him and walked back into the house. I heard him yelling something at me, but I had already slammed the door shut.

I didn't even look back.

Immediately after doing so, I ran upstairs to Alison's room, knowing that there would be no one there. Her door was locked and off limits. I had specifically asked her to leave me the key so in case something happened, I could go in there and wallow in my sorrows.

And it looks like that came in handy.

I slammed the door shut and laid down on her bed. I was sure to shut the door and turn off the lights, just so that no one else would come here for… other purposes.

Looking up at the glow-in-the-dark stars stuck to the top of her ceiling, it brought me back to the reality of the events that had just happened. I had just talked with Mark Callahan, the one and only I had refused to allow to change my life this year. I had just discovered that not only was he putting on a façade about his true personality, he was running away with Lukas Adler to some other state. And to top it off, I had managed to piss him off like no other.

And now, I was starting to cry over Mark Callahan, one of my main goals for my senior year.

God, I am such a fucking failure at life.

Only at that moment did I realize that I really truly did want to help him. It wasn't only because I wanted to get closer to him, but because I realized he was truly a troubled soul. As stated before by the one and only, I was soft-hearted. I cared too much. I was too sympathetic. I was basically everything but hard and bitter.

And to him, that was apparently a turn off.

Cause you're my, you're my, my, my true love, my whole heart
Please don't throw that away
Cause I'm here for you
Please don't walk away and
Please tell me you'll stay, stay

As I lay there, I heard the door slowly open, but again I paid no heed. Instead, I kept my eyes on the top of the ceiling and blatantly ignored whoever was at the door. I had a nagging feeling about who it was, but I refused to believe it.

Of course, tell that to my beating heart, which was now going out of control as the possibility of such a situation was sinking in.

Not until the person turned on the light, blinding me completely, did I fully sit up and glare at my intruder. And as I had guessed… Mark.

"What the hell do you want?" I snapped, glaring at him.

But he said no words. He merely took a few steps closer to me until he was standing next to the bed, me lying down on it. "Why do you want to know so much about me?" he whispered, so that only I could hear him. "What is it about me that makes you so interested about every aspect of my life? Why me?"

I couldn't bring myself to look at him. I continued to ignore him, hoping he would leave. I couldn't just tell him that I had loved him for so long. It was not physically possible, especially for myself. There was no way I could confess such a feeling.

He'd probably just laugh at me anyway.

"Seriously. I'm not joking around here, and I swear, I won't laugh, no matter how hilarious I find it."

Way to make things better, Callahan. Way to go.

I sighed and turned on my side to look up at him. "You want to know why? You really want to know?" I asked, looking straight into his eyes. When he nodded, I merely groaned and rolled onto my back again. "I know this might sound weird, but it's just because I want to. When I talked with you earlier, it sounded as if though you were completely distraught. It seemed that only Lukas was the only one that knew anything about you. Sometimes, you have to tell more than one person to feel complete. And I wanted to be that other person."

Mark cocked an eyebrow at me. "And why would you want to be… "that other person" as you so kindly put it?"

I frowned at him. It wasn't because I was mad or disgusted at him for asking the question, but because I wasn't exactly intending on telling him the answer. The answer was something I was hoping to keep to myself. And as of this very second, I wasn't capable of thinking of another reason.

Sensing my discomfort, Mark sat down on the bed next to me, but far enough so we still had quite a bit of distance between our bodies. "Fine. Scratch that question then." He shook his head. "I just came up to say that I'm leaving tonight for good. I'm never coming back. Lukas and I… we confirmed the details. We're moving out of the state permanently. There's no way in hell anyone can keep us here."

I shook my head, still baffled by everything that was happening. What had made Mark want to start confiding in me. I opened my mouth to ask, but Mark quickly cut me off. "You wanted me to tell you, so I'm fucking telling you right now. It's not like you can stop me. It's not like reporting it to the police is going to bring me back. I doubt they'd even put up a missing persons report. Plus, I know you'd be too scared to talk to the police about it."

Again, I chose to ignore him and allowed him to continued talking. Except he didn't. Instead, I felt his lips upon mine and instantly sent me into a state of ecstasy. I never knew that any guy could have done this to me, but it was possibly because I never gave any guy a chance.

Except for Mark, and he had never taken it.

Until now.

Without a second's hesitation, I kissed him right back, allowing him to do whatever the hell he wanted. After all, I had waited for so long for this very moment, and it was happening. I didn't care that it was probably all for the wrong reasons. I didn't care that he didn't know who the hell I was.

All I cared about was that this was Mark Callahan.

Do I need to emphasis that point anymore?!

He was propped up by his elbows, which were situated on both sides of my body, along with his knees. I wrapped my arms around his waist, pulling him closer to me, not wanting to lose contact with the warmth of his body. When he felt my urgency, he instantly prodded my mouth open with his tongue.

Unwillingly, I groaned as I felt him try to get closer to me. Never had I seen myself in this situation. Here I was in Ali's room, making out with the most popular guy in the entire school.

The most popular guy who had only minutes ago spilled out most of his troubles to me.

And I never wanted it to stop.

Slowly, I took the initiative and started to play with the bottom of his shirt. Sensing what I wanted, Mark quickly backed away from me and yanked off his shirt. I nearly fainted for that quick second. Orgasmic, anyone?

But before he could even react, the door was thrown open with an angry Ali standing in the hallway. "What the hell are you doing, Becky?!" she shrieked at me, after seeing Mark shirtless literally lying on top of me. "I thought you said you weren't going to interact with him at all, starting today!"

Oh God, Ali.

I shut my eyes, not wanting to see the confused look Mark was giving me. Slowly, I opened them only to see Mark picking up his shirt from the foot of the bed. "I thought I recognized you. Taking advantage of a drunk person, is that what you do for fun?" he snapped, pulling his shirt over his head. "And what the hell was Ali talking about, 'you weren't going to interact with me'? Do you mind explaining yourself, Becky?"

"Ali, get the fuck out." I said, glaring at her. As if getting the message, she quickly nodded and slammed the door shut. After seeing that distraught look on her face, I instantly felt guilty for snapping at her, but that was instantly quashed when I turned back to Mark's angry expression. "I don't take advantage of drunk people." I whispered, pulling at the strands of hair falling in my face. "I just didn't think it was relevant to the situation earlier. I didn't think you would actually follow me up here."

"Whatever." Mark shot back, messing up his hair with his hand. "I don't give a shit about that. What about the interaction though? Do you mind explaining that?"

I groaned, not wanting to tell him. But something deep inside my head told me that it really didn't matter. Mark was leaving, never coming back. Even if I did tell him, it would only be another weight lifted off my shoulders. And it wouldn't matter again in the future.

"Becky." He laughed quietly, more sarcastically than kindly. "I'm leaving. Even if it's because you want to kill me, it's not going to matter. I'm leaving. You know that already."

"Fine." I let out a breath, hoping my nerves wouldn't catch up to me. "I like you, alright? Can we drop the subject now?"

Use me as you will
Pull my strings just for a thrill
And I know I'll be okay
Though my skies are turning gray

"Okay. Fine." Mark shrugged. "You're not the first person to ever like me. Don't make a big deal about it. I'm cool with it."

But what he had said only angered me more. He was cool with it? Couldn't he say something more than that? I mean really, I had just told him I liked him! Was that how he reacted to every girl who had admitted a crush to him?!

"You're cool with it?!" I shouted, pointing an accusing finger at him. "What about me? Do you think I'm cool with it?! Does it look like it? Six years, Mark. Six fucking years, and that's all you have to say to it? Do you have any idea how long it took to make myself forget about you? Do you know how long I wanted to completely forget about you, but couldn't? Goddamn it, Mark! Have you always been this indifferent about other people's feelings?!"

"What do you want me to do? Tell you that everything is fucking okay?!" he retorted, with a glare as accusing as my finger pointed at his chest. "Fine then, I'll tell you that! Everything is fucking a-okay! But is that going to make anything change? No!" At that, I merely cowered backwards a little, but still solidly stood my ground. "Nothing's going to change, you know that Harowitz! I'm still going to leave, I'm going to be eventually forgotten. You're going to stay in this shit-hole of a town and go to some hot shot Ivy League. That's just life. I'm not fucking indifferent, so don't say that again."

At that, I sunk to the ground, the full impact of his words now absorbed into my brain. "God." I whispered, as I covered my face with my hands. "Why does life have to be so fucking complicated?"

"Life isn't complicated." I heard Mark say, pulling my hands back from my face. He yanked me back up to my feet and allowed his hands to linger at my waist. The mere touch of his fingers against me made my skin tingle with an amazing sensation as he stared straight into my eyes. "We as humans, make it complicated. We're the ones who make things the way they are. If things were a so-called utopian society, we'd never have a single complication. But where's the thrill in life behind that?"

As he spoke, a small smile was threatening to come through. "That's why we're leaving. We're leaving behind this town. We're going out to the big world by ourselves and living life to its fullest. And there's no other reason behind this."

He pulled away from me, his hands dropping back down to his side. By now, a full blown smile was plastered on his face. "Don't wait up for me, Harowitz. I'm not coming back. But it's always nice to know that someone else has had a crush on me for six years. Have a great life, Becky."

And with that, he left the room, with his laughter ringing down the empty halls.

I will never let you fall
I'll stand up with you forever
I'll be there for you through it all
Even if saving you sends me to heaven

How could I have been such an idiot and allowed Mark to get to me like that? How could I have even believed I could have Mark to myself? Not only was he leaving (as he had so kindly told me ten times), I should have known that he didn't go for people like myself.

I walked out of the room, completely distraught. I had been used, obviously used. All Mark wanted was one last screw before he left this place and went out into the real world.

And I had almost fallen for his stupid trick.

But something in the back of my mind was telling me that he wanted to tell me all that. He wanted me to help him. Lukas probably wasn't the best help in the world, and I was the first person asides from Lukas to ever display true concern about Mark's home life.

But what was the chance of that happening? Pretty small, huh? But I didn't let that bring myself down. After all, I still had my senior left to look forward to. And it was completely Mark Callahan free.

Guaranteed.

But deep inside, I was torn up. Not only had I managed to make him confess so much to me, I had shared my first real kiss and with the one I had loved. I didn't care that he was doing it for some other hidden motive. All I cared was that I had done it because I knew it was what I wanted.

I felt complete.

I felt fulfilled

I felt… relieved.

And I knew that no matter how far away Mark was from our little town of Pompton Plains, New Jersey, I'd always be his.

His guardian angel.