Royce laughed but his face told nothing of that. He really wanted to go away. He felt worthless and wasted and was fine saying it out loud. Yes, he really was but nothing was never nobody's fault. The wind was prevailing and nobody could keep their clothing down. Royce had taken the joy in watching girl's skirt flap up and frustrated girls trying to trap their hair. I had smiled to but soon remembered the reason we decided to venture into the streets late at night. Royce wasn't the kind of person to handle emotions. Most of the time he would rather play truancy and get high on anything he could get hold of. Plus he has had more disappointments than we ever did and did a better job at surviving heartbreaks even from his family.

"Beth."

I looked up at him. "Yeah."

"You ever wanted to go home," his tone had dropped drastically and suddenly became sincerity. The type of sincerity you don't see in Royce.

I shrugged and smiled. "Oasis's home for me."

He ignored that for an answer and decided to stop, leaning on the side of a shoe store. The lights from the see-through glass luminating the golden price tag shoes luminated on his face. I scarcely saw what his expression held but I could feel it. He was angry, frustrated and anxious at the same time. What more was he meant to be, disappointed?

"Do you ever think we would ever be considered important?"

I simply looked up into his eyes. We both knew he meant because we both, alongside the others, cried about the same thing. In a few months, the orphanage would disown all six of us meaning we would be left for fate to decide. It was scary and discouraging. On some nights, we wondered whatever would be our futures. Sometimes we hoped to be lucky and sometimes the world proved its impossibility. The truth burned and we decided to ignore it all, now it was eating at us and then finally it was at the verge of coming to pass.

I took my gaze of his and shaked those thoughts away. "Come on Royce, we always find a way don't we." The word 'we' felt stupefyingly uncomfortable to say for me and I guessed Royce noticed because he smiled in a way that questioned my hope.

We?

Nevertheless, we continued to find our way down into the streets still making jokes and holding hands. It felt good to talk to someone and it was better to talk to a friend.

The moment we parted ways, I found myself heading to the wrong turn. And it didn't take long for me to slide into the familiar human-sized space. Catching my sight first was a silhouette rather The silhouette. Everyday the streetlight got dimmer and everyday Devon came here too. He had more and more to deal with everyday but he had better and better ways to hide them. I jumped down and he turned back abruptly. His grin was wide and comforting as usual. His left wrist was bandaged and yet again the pinkish bruise on his knee was peeking through the threads of his ripped jeans. I smiled back too as usual biting the edge of my lower lip.

It was dark. Dark enough for me not to see the signatory scar on the side of his forehead. But the grafittis on the walls stood out fighting the darkness whichever way. I smiled slightly and pulled my hands out of my hoodie. Devon was soon quick to point a flashlight at my face then down at my butt. I scrunched up my face trying real hard not to laugh but who was I to decide that around him. He moved the flashlight again this time down my thighs. He enjoyed what he did and would have begged to just sit on cold grafittis assaulting me with a flashlight. I left him to it looking around at the masterpieces around us.

The flashlight went off then came back on.

I looked down at Devon and smiled. "I think you should mar graffiti for a living."

He looked around casually and stood up. "I could and.. I mean I wasn't planning to graduate anytime soon either."

I knitted my brows at him and smiled. Devon was unusually without a hoodie and a cigarrete leaving him in a dark green tightskin shirt. He wasn't much of a muscular guy but he was enough to be attractive. He was watching me too - like a hawk with a glint of mischievousness. But I had learnt to ignore those looks, simply waiting for his hands to grab my waist from behind. It was a great feeling yet it managed to remind me that what we were having was merely short lived.

"We ran out of paint, so I got us new ones."

I put my hands back in my pocket and kicked an imaginary pebble. "That's great--" I paused and walked towards him. His eyes flickered with naughtiness. I smiled and poked his chest with my finger. "-- but this place is my life and whatever you do here needs my permission."

He gently, slowly, pushed my finger down and grinned widely. "What if I was here to vandalise it --" he paused tilting his head probably to watch my reaction then he put his head back in place and put his hands in his pocket. "-- to vandalise your life."

I frowned quizzically at him. "You realise that you make no sense at all."

He nodded in acceptance and I laughed. In return he smiled naively at me and sat on the floor. I joined him, first bending to pull off my shoes. We just really loved to stare out into the dark skies talking about trash until we felt it deem right enough to talk about deeper stuff like his parents and myself; just me. Most times we ended up on each other, the other times he tried not to cry and I tried not care just as much. But we had simply tried in vain.

The atmosphere was tingly and my toes curled up each time the cold air came blowing through them. Devon's hands were suspended on his knees and from the look on his his face, as he had told me, he was counting the stars. I laughed softly and leaned back on my elbows. He didn't look away from the sky instead he scrunched up his nose and sniffed.

"So how many are there?"

"Too much to count." He looked towards me and grinned. "What? I'm being realistic."

I smiled and shook my head. "You have a message." I nodded towards his beeping phone at his side. He took it and then I laid down on my back equally trying to count the stars.

Too many to count. Too many for all to survive.

"Beth." I sat up and saw Devon already on his feet. His hand gripped tightly around his phone and his words seemed forced. The look on his face wasn't normal either and the look on his face was worrisome.

I frowned quizzically. "Yeah?"

"I need...to go."

"Something wrong?" I stood up on my feet dusting the back of my laps.

"No." He forced a smile. "I'll be back soon."

And with that I watched him leave, climbing the dumpsters to the top before slipping out. The cold air tingled my toes this time but there was much more to worry about than that. I sat down and pulled my knees up to my chest before looking back up at the human sized space. As much as I tried to hide it, I cared about Devon and in the worst cases wanted to be there for him. I sighed and laid back down.

But all I could do was watch for as long as he refused to open up to me.