Standing on the Edge of Summer

So much stands in the way of young love and attempts to tear it apart, but it will always, always fight back ten times as strong.

Cara and Riley's romances are far from perfect. Cara Tearraven is nineteen years old, four months pregnant with her boyfriend's child, and disowned by her family. She and he [he being Bryan Donahue] are living with their best friends, Riley and Paul DiGiovanni. Riley Syrl is absolutely in love with Paul DiGiovanni. He is in love with her. But the term 'relationship' doesn't exist to these two. They can never seem to make it past the 'friends with benefits' stage.

These four are the epitome of misfits. They don't fit in anywhere. When they wander the streets people stare. Whether it be at young Cara's rounded belly or Riley's bright blue and black hair, people stare. Normally a person would feel insulted. These four? They drink it in, thrive off of it. Especially Riley and Paul. The world is their stage, and the people in it their audience. But they are still human. Each has their own faults.

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Cara almost never smiles, unless it is for Bryan.

The New Age store where Cara earns her living smells heavily of patchouli, cinnamon, and thyme. Riley often spends her time sniffing at oils and candles while Cara sits behind the counter and flips slowly through different reading material. Newspapers, books, magazines, almost anything with words held Cara's attention.

"What are you going to do when the baby is born?" Riley asks this while lying down in the middle of an isle full of crushed herbs, a book by Silver Ravenwolf propped up on her knees. The door jingles and an older woman wearing a long dress covered in silver pentacles shoots Cara a smile. She nods in return and turns her attention back to the Beatrice Small novel in her hands.

"I don't know. I don't want to settle down or anything, y'know? And marriage just isn't my thing. Bryan and I will stay together of course. Maybe even get off of you and Paul's backs. Don't want to continue adding to the burden."

The older woman returns and walks up to the counter, setting down a red candle and two bottles of rose oil. She hands Cara the amount owed with one hand and with the other points at Cara's belly and says, "The child. A gorgeous addition, it will be. Samhain eve will be the day of its birth."

Riley looks up from her spot on the floor as the woman leaves. "Care to explain?"

Without even looking up from her page Cara replies, "Name's Epona. Comes in all the time. Samhain is Halloween, except now it's been totally commercialized. I prefer Samhain. Perfect time for the baby to be born."

Patchouli makes Riley sleepy, so she merely nods and continues with her reading, but not before saying, "You're not a burden, you know."

After about ten minutes of silence, Cara becomes slightly agitated. Then again, it was Lammas. Most of her customers were off celebrating. She glances over at Riley, who now has her nose poking into a jar filled with dried hyacinth petals.

"Riley, when are you and Paul going to become a couple?"

The hyacinths lay abandoned and have been replaced with fresh honeysuckle petals. Back in the seventh grade, Paul had once given her a bouquet of honeysuckles for no reason. She'd thanked him and said, "I don't believe in love, y'know."

"That's alright," he'd replied, "I don't either."

Riley smiles at the memory and looks up at Cara. "Never, really. I may have changed my views on love, but relationships aren't real."

"Whatever you say, Riles."

The door jingles once again, this time revealing Bryan. He sends Riley a warm wave and leans on the counter in front of Cara. She uses one of the stores' business cards to mark her spot and looks up at him. "Hey."

"Hey yourself," he slips a hand into his hoodie and pulls out a copy of the second book in the Land Of Hetar series, "I know you were looking for it, so I picked it up."

Cara smiles. "Thanks. The baby is coming on Samhain, by the way."

Bryan strokes his hand across her cheek and kisses her nose. "Perfect."

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Bryan keeps thinking that someday Cara might fall out of love with him.

Riley and Cara have a habit of cuddling with one another [when the boys aren't around to keep them warm that is.] Cara's swelling belly provides a perfect pillow for Riley's head when they're watching television. Which is what they are currently occupying themselves with, seeing as the boys aren't home.

Bryan is dumping his emotions on Paul while they are walking through the jungle known as the parking lot, attempting to find Paul's car, their senses sleepy and dulled from the warm end of summer air. "Honestly though, it happens. She doesn't want to get married. I respect that. But what if it means she just doesn't want to so she could leave me at any time?"

The car is located and the two are finally on their way back to the women that love them. Paul nonchalantly flips through radio stations until he settles on something playing Tegan and Sara. Riley loves Tegan and Sara, almost as much as Cara does. He knows Riley loves him as much as he loves her. But why just stay at intimate touches here and there and the occasional kiss? Perhaps they were scared? Paul flips his hair out of his eyes when the breeze coming in from his open car window blows it in his face.

"Nah. She's so in love with you right now. You're in a relationship. If she doesn't want to get married, fine. Don't. Just stay boyfriend and girlfriend. You two are having a baby Bryan."

They pass under a maple tree and loose leaves come in through the window, scattering across the floor and in Bryan's hair. He picks them out slowly and slips them into his pocket. Cara would want to press them in books later. "Well what about you then? Why haven't you and Riley gone and called yourselves a couple? You made one another believe in love again. It's almost sick, really."

Paul stares at the leaf currently fluttering on the dashboard. Maybe that was like him, fluttering about, not sure what to say to really get things going between Riley and himself. At a stoplight, he snatches it up and clips it onto a string of beads hanging from his rearview mirror. "She loves you, Bryan."

Bryan sighs and looks out at the dying sun, sinking behind green hillsides. "Yeah, she loves me."

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Riley never really had the best examples of good relationships when she was little.

Cara is stirring a pan full of pasta sauce while Riley sits on the counter, painting her nails with white-out. Cara grabs a container of basil and sprinkles it in the sauce. "Okay, give me an example."

The white out is now dripping onto a paper towel while Riley picks at the skin around her nails and chews on her lip. "Well, my parents. They only stayed together for my brother and I. When I turned seventeen my mother filed for divorce and they left the house to my brother. Then when he and his girlfriend thought everything was peaches and cream for them, her family found out about how fucked up my family is and wanted them apart, lest their little girl turn out like my mother. Her parents forced them apart. Not to mention watching relationships fail all throughout high school."

Using her worn old wooden spoon, Cara scoops up a spoonful of sauce and holds it out for Riley to taste. She does, and then grabs the spoon from Cara to lick away the rest. Cara inherited her mother's amazing cooking skills.

"That doesn't mean those kinds of things will happen if you tried being in a relationship with Paul. Kisses on the necks of best friends just doesn't cut it Riley."

Riley hops down, tattered ballet flats hitting the floor roughly, hair flopping. "Quoting lyrics will get you nowhere."

"It's worth a shot."

Riley tosses Cara a box of noodles, which Cara then proceeds to pour into the now boiling water beside her sauce. Of course, Cara is right. Just because Riley has seen one failed relationship after another doesn't mean she's going to be one of them. Still, it took her fourteen years to believe in love. Relationships might take a while.

"You love him Riley."

"Yeah," Riley replies, watching the noodles contentedly as they soften and swim about in the bubbling water, "And he loves me right back."

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Paul can't keep his mouth shut.

With the end of summer comes the end of summer heat. The girls are sporting tank tops and shorts, their hair up in messy buns. The men are wearing short sleeved shirts and their boxers. The only conscious members of the house are Riley and Paul. Bryan and Cara are asleep in front of the TV, having drifted off while watching re-runs of Cowboy Bebop and Blood+.

Fanning herself with an issue of Vogue, Riley asks, "Paul, do you ever think about what it would be like to believe in relationships?"

The aforementioned man runs a hand through his sweat-dampened hair and stares out of the window at the dusky sky. "I guess we'd be like Bryan and Cara."

"I never mentioned it being about us."

Paul reaches out and twirls a feather dangling from Riley's earring between his fingers. Perhaps now was the time to change things. It wouldn't change much. They'd still be the actors on a stage of their own, putting on their brilliant performance of life for everyone to see. Except now they could do it together.

"No, you didn't. But I did. Wouldn't that be something, Riles? Look at them. Asleep, and their arms are still tangled around one another. That's a relationship. Sounds nice, doesn't it? Wouldn't it be great to believe?"

Riley is too into what Paul is saying, into what Cara hasn't been able to stop talking about for the past few weeks, to not do something. She's been alone for way too long and Paul is just there and there for her. She tangles her hand in his and stares out at the sunset with him.

"Yeah, being a believer sounds pretty good right about now."