FREEDOM
Her pulse quickened as she slipped on her trusty sneakers. It was about quarter after midnight, yet nothing but adrenaline coursed through her. With expert hands, she pulled her hair back into a clip, then grabbing her CD player, she slid out of the room she shared with her older sister, Storm.
Silently, she walked through the house, as she placed her earphones into her elf-like ears and hit play. Approaching the kitchen, she heard movement from her destination, the back door. Frowning at the distraction, she detoured to the fridge, reaching in for a Wild Cherry Pepsi. She clicked open the top, nudging the door close with her foot.
Aurora recognized her brother's silhouette as it stalked past her, the familiar smoky scent following. "Just Grant coming in from a smoke." she assured herself under her breath as she placed her Pepsi back into the well-stocked fridge, and continued her "journey". Her eyes, now well-adjusted to the dim interior of the house, found the lock with ease and flicked it, slowly pulling open the door.
A warm breeze greeted her as Aurora closed the door behind her. Taking a deep breath, she bounced down the porch steps and cut across the bark-filled garden bed to her left. She darted out of the blinding porch light's reach, and stood for a moment in the shadows, making sure she hadn't been heard.
Smiling with satisfaction, she walked towards the driveway; which was bathed in a sickly light from the towering streetlamp. She turned to her right, marching up the dirt driveway, her keen eyes distinguishing shadows from trees.
The night symphony tried in vain to soothe her, as she continued on, leaving behind the light. Aurora's fingers pressed her earphones in further, and she concentrated on the sweet music pouring into her elven ears.
She sang along clearly, her haunting voice piercing through the surrounding darkness. Looking around, she paused for a moment, and lifted her face to the heavens. "Please tell me my love is safe," she whispered to the twinkling stars. A balmy breeze entwined itself around her, dancing along her bare arms, caressing her capri-clad legs and tickling her childish face.
Aurora smiled to herself, as she lay down on the cool grass. The stars above her were dancing to their own unheard music, and the sight brought unwelcome tears to her eyes. She thought of her boyfriend who was also under the same sky, yet he was half-way across the country. She thought of Mike, who she had recently gotten into a huge fight with, and was struggling to regain as a friend. Blinking, she whimpered as her friends back home came to mind. Here she was, lying under the velvet sky in South Carolina, on her sister's front lawn, yet all she yearned for was home.
"This is what I wanted." she reminded herself. "I wanted to come here to get away from...everything." she finished. But what Aurora had never thought of was how much she'd miss her friends. Marci, Mandi, Amanda, Joey. She longed to talk to them all again, hear their voices, laugh over silly jokes, see them, hug them. Gods, how she missed them!
"But this is my freedom. This is all the stars will grant me...the freedom to lie under them and wish and wish 'til my heart is full of nothing but wishes. And watch them never come true." Aurora murmured. She stood slowly, cracking her sore neck with ease, and she walked back towards the house, thinking to herself "Freedom, can't live with it, can't live without it
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