Sunglasses and Scarlet Lipstick

After tossing and turning for hours and relentlessly chasing sleep, Claire fell into a coma-like state of unconsciousness. Despite her deep sleep, she was startled awake by an incessant thumping on the oak of her bedroom door. Gray sunlight streaked through her bay windows and flooded the slightly cramped and cluttered room. Groaning, she flopped onto her stomach and threw a pillow over her mess of brunette hair.
"Go away," she grumbled into the mattress.
"Claire!" Julia Brisbane shouted from the other side of the door, "Claire, honestly!" She threw the door open and stepped to the side of the queen-sized mattress with three long strides. "It's time to get your hungover ass out of bed, Claire."
"Jules," Claire groaned, "you know I was out until past four last night. Hell, it took me a good two and a half ours just to fall asleep."
Julia snorted and ripped the comforter off of her friend's barely clothed body. "It also took you fifteen minutes to stumble down the hallway to your room, neither of which were my fault."
"Yeah, yeah," Claire grunted, "I know. You told me I would regret going, and I almost do."
"Almost, eh?"
Claire shrugged as she pulled a pair of shorts that came to an uneven stop just below the curve of her bottom and a sleeveless shirt of a neon color that left little to the imagination. She glanced in the mirror momentarily before sighing and twisting her hair high up on her head. "Well, there was one guy who I found direly attractive. And, don't even give me that look; I didn't speak to him."
Julia released a sound that was meant to convey exasperation and threw herself backwards onto the bed that was still warm with body heat. "You know for an eternally single twenty-year-old, your sex life is pretty nonexistent."
"Aren't you supposed to be like my mentor, coaching me to push forward through all the worlds' negatives? Instead, you're chiding me on the fact that I don't find an interest in the opposite sex. I just haven't met someone.. perfect."
"Perfection doesn't exist, Claire."
"Believe me, I know. But after all the supposed heartbreak and drama that comes with seemingly meaningless sex, I just have this feeling deep in my gut that the only guy truly worth my time will just fit for me, you know? It sounds stupid, but I would rather be alone than with someone who isn't more than I could ever ask for."
Julia stood as her sluggish friend finished her dramatic eye-makeup and sighed, striding out the door and down the hallway. "It doesn't sound stupid, Claire. But, what about that attractive young man you mentioned?" She was giving her friend an exaggerated grin as they slid into their shoes and stepped out the front door.
"Oh, please, Julia. I am not going to spend my time obsessing over a man whose name I don't even know; that is just silly. Besides," she inhaled a breath of smoke of a Newport non-menthol and finished her statement with an air of ending the conversation, "I was drunk and may have very well imagined the guy."
"Whatever you say, but I still think it's a shame you don't hunt Mr. Right down."

Though Rian did not know who the girl with the rouge lips had been, he was determined to find her somehow. After all, in a town he had lived in his whole life such as Baltimore, how hard could it be to track her down? Unfortunately for him, he had not taken into account the fact that she may very well not live in Baltimore, but who in their right mind would travel a large distance just to go to a rich kid's house party? Rian was crouched down in front of the poetry section in possibly the third bookstore so far that day when Claire walked in. At first, he didn't realize that she was whom he had been searching for without her red lipstick and her hair pulled into a messy bun, but when she laughed and said something humorous to the older young woman by her side, he was sure of it.
"I don't even see why you would take the time out of your day to make your way all the way out here to Baltimore, just for a party. It doesn't make much sense to me, Claire." Julia was smirking despite herself and reaching for a thick romance novel as she said this.
Claire simply rolled her eyes and bent downward to pluck a paperback off one of the lower shelves, all the while Rian's eyes watched her bare legs and plump rear as she bent at the waist. "It's mostly the excitement of knowing that no one there knows you. It's, like, a total head rush. One moment, I can be chatting up some sleazy girl about something completely redundant and the next I will be working my way up a deserted staircase, making eye contact with some incredibly handsome man for a few seconds."
"Yes," Julia said with a quirked eyebrow, "then you wake up in the morning, knowing there is almost no possible way you will run into said mystery man in a normal and every day setting."
"That doesn't matter to me," Claire admitted with a hopeless sigh, "I don't believe in love, anyways."
"It is a sad, sad world you live in, Claire. You should give your emotions a shot."
"Emotions are a weakness," she muttered in response as they made their way to the glass counter top to pay for the novels of their choice. "I would rather play drums than spend my time reading sappy love poems and books."
A few feet away, Rian was watching her with such an intensity that Julia looked up and gave him a inquisitive look. She then attempted to make Claire take notice of his steady gaze, but the statement of her being watched was waved off and the two stepped out into the cool air with a chime on the door, signaling their departure.
"Now come on, I need to buy a new pack of cigarettes; I'm in the mood for menthols." Claire clutched her dear friend's arm and began trudging down the sidewalk towards the closest convenience store.

It wasn't until much later that evening that Rian would run into this girl of his deep interest, and by then, he had lost almost all hope of discovering who she was. The purple sky of twilight was quickly spiraling into the darkness of midnight and after-hours. Though the porch steps of whomever's house were steady beneath his feet, he felt his head spin in a dizzying way. As he sat and placed his head between his knees, the back door opened with a hushed sound and clicked shut a moment later. He could feel someone standing a few paces behind him before she sat down beside him.
"Feelin' a bit woozy?" a soft but even voice asked as she pulled out a pack of cigarettes and a yellow lighter from her jacket pocket. "Do you smoke, man? I only have menthol left, but it would do wonders with your queasiness."
"No, I don't." He looked up a moment later, and despite his reservations to cigarettes, he took the Newport from her unpolished fingers. "Thanks. You can call me Rian."
"My name is Romance," she smirked at me and lit the cigarette between my lips.
I cracked a grin as I inhaled the mint of the smoke, picking up the reference to the Breathe Carolina song that was amazingly managing to blare through the closed sliding glass door. "I'm impulsive."
"I'm Claire, but most people don't know or remember my name." She let out a laugh that was both soothing and full of bottled-up excitement. "Have I seen you before, Rian? It's terribly dark, so it's hard for me to read your face, but I have this strange and pressing feeling that I've met you.."
Rian looked up at her and pulled out his cell phone, lighting up the screen and shining it on both of their faces. He froze and Claire plucked the cigarette out of his trembling fingers with a quirked eyebrow. She ran her eyes all over his face before smiling and pulling a glass bottle of Captain Morgan out of her jacket pocket as well. She put the neck of the bottle to her lips and downed five or six shots before tipping it towards him.
"Want some?"
With unsure fingers, he took the bottle out of her hand and followed suit, his eyes never once leaving her face. "You're that girl.."
"Well, I am technically female, yes. But, what do you mean?" Claire was giving him a large smile as she twisted the cap back onto the bottle and finished her cigarette, putting it out on the top step and flicking it across the yard.
"I saw you the other day, at a party. You had the exact same lipstick, but you were wearing sunglasses indoors. I made eye contact with you at the top of the stairs.."
The last statement caused a look of confusion to cross her face as she leaned over to him and pursed her scarlet lips. He smelled of Axe shave gel and Curve Crush cologne, a deadly combination.
"May I kiss you, Rian?" she asked lightheartedly, her lilac skin coming dangerously close to his mouth. He never responded, however, because a moment later, her lips were crushing onto his, smudging red stains onto his mouth and her own. His hands were slipping up the back of he shirt and undoing her bra, quickly sliding his hands to cup her breasts as he groaned into her mouth, her hands on his pulsing scrotum. And the next second, everything was black and she was no longer the skin under his.