The Kiss of Death

As I walk down the cold stairs I look at my watch: 1:36. It's so quiet I can hear my own heartbeat. It's eerie how quiet this old rickety house can get at night.
I slip quietly into my mom's room to make sure she is still asleep. The blue light of the television is reflecting off her face. She is out like a light.
I creak open the front door and step out into the cold winter night, the wind chilling my bones. By now you are probably wondering who I am, what I'm doing, and where I'm going, right? Well I will gladly answer those questions.
My name is Simone, and I'm 14. And here in the town of Shadow Creek, I'm considered anything but normal.
I'm mute. By choice. I haven't said a word since the age of 5. My father abused me and my mother until he left us and basically dropped off the face of the earth.
Shadow Creek is your stereotypical suburban neighborhood. Every lawn is cut too the same height, every house has the same row of flowers, all the women stay at home when the men go to work. It's like it was back to the 1950's again. The only thing that is different is that there are guards on the outskirts of town, to make sure no one leaves or comes in.
This might sound militaristic but they don't want anyone disturbing their perfect society. It has always been this way, and I don't see a change coming in the near future, and I can't stand for that.
I hate it here, people are all the same, and if anyone is considered different in their eyes, they treat them like filth.
But where I'm going, I can be anything I want, an astronaut, a zoo keeper, an acrobat, anything my heart desires. Or so I've been told.
As I approach the edge of town, I quickly turn to make sure that I'm not being followed. The other three times I've tried to escape this hell of a town the guards have been called to come "retrieve" me. Then I was put into the local holding cell until my mom came to pick me up.
I can never manage look her in the eyes when she comes. I can see the pain in them, the disappointment. I know it's selfish to leave after my father abused us and then left, and now for me to leave. But I can't stand it here.
I take a good long look and make sure I don't see anyone. After I searched for 3 minutes, I throw my bag over the gate and start climbing.
"Hey, wait for me!"
I spin around to find Peter. Peter is the closest I've ever come to having a friend. He understands me, to say the least. He knows I don't talk anymore, but I write down what I want to say and give it to him.
I step down from the old rusted gate and wave for him to run faster.
"You didn't think you were going to leave without me, did you?" he asks. I shrug my shoulders and point at the watch on my wrist, letting him know we need to go.
He flings his satchel over the gate and we start climbing. The rule is that once you get over the fence you can't come back into Shadow Creek, and believe me I am more than fine with that. Also once you get over, the guards can't get at you.
When me and Peter are about half way up the fence I hear shouting.
"Hey get down from there!" a guard yells from about 100 feet away. His white armor is matched by the shiny white pistol attached to his holster.
I start climbing as fast as I can and Peter catches up. The farther we get up the fence the closer the guard gets to us. By now I'm sweating like it's the middle of July.
We are almost at the top when I look behind to see the guard lunge himself at us. He misses us only by a couple of inches. I hear a chuckle escape from Peter's lips.
The guard quickly recuperates and prepares to attack us again. But he is too late. By now my legs are already over the prehistoric gate.
"Damn it" I hear the guard mutter under his breath.
"We did it!" Peter wraps his long, muscled arms around me. I nod at him.
I catch a look at his bright, blue, beautiful, eyes.
"Why did he choose me? Why is he here with me?" I think to myself as we collect our few belongings and start walking down the dark, winding, dirt path. This path leads into a morbid forest, which eats every bit of light it can get it's hands on, just like Shadow Creek does with every bit of individuality it can find.
We come to a fork in the road and Peter stops.
"Which way?" Peter asks. I motion toward the left. Mainly I get a feeling that it's safer than the right, for what reason I don't know.
Peter grabs my hand and leads me down the dirt road. I feel safe around Peter, he is almost like a security blanket for me.
If people were mean to me in school, he would walk right up to them and punch them in the face. He knew he was going to get in trouble, but I guess it was worth protecting me. He got in trouble a lot.
Peter has dark brown hair and the most beautiful blue eyes you will ever see. He is 16 and almost a foot taller than me.
I look at my watch again: 2:48. We have been walking for almost an hour.
"We should take a break, we've been walking for a while." I smile and nod.
We find a small patch of clear land a few feet down the road. I thought about this when I packed a bag, so I brought a sleeping bag and some food and water. I have no idea where or how far this magical place is going to be, but I hope we come upon it soon.
We lay down and Peter puts his muscular arm around me, and I curl up next to him. I am beginning to have some feelings for him. After all he has been by my side since I was practically born. And he did always protect me, but what if he never felt the same.
I decided it didn't matter.
"Thank you." I whispered as I kissed his cheek.
"Did...did you just say something? Did you, the girl who hasn't said one word in 9 years just say 'thank you' and kiss me on the cheek?" he asked, you could hear the shock in his voice.
"Yes, yes I did. And I'm gonna do it again." I kissed his cheek again.
"Shhh, go to sleep." He gently kissed my cheek and stroked my hair. I slowly fell into a deep sleep.
I woke up the next morning to find that we were in a different place.
"Where are we?" I asked a little startled.
"I moved us to a new spot to speed up the trip." He answered back. I looked around and saw a blue gate with a sign above the gate. It was in a language I couldn't understand. As we walked toward the gate I got a sudden urge that what I was doing wasn't right.
I usually go with my first instinct, but since I had finally found a place where I could be myself, I threw caution to the wind and flung open the gates.
I could smell the beautiful smell of the ocean. As I walked toward the smell I realized I was on a cliff, I look back to see Peter coming towards me. He grabbed me and pulled me back.
"We have to go, now!" He screamed.
"What we just got here! I think we should call it Utopia. It's perfect, can't you just feel it?" I asked.
"No you don't understand, let's go, now!" He threw me over his shoulders and started running.
"Stop it! Stop it now!" I was flailing my arms and legs, kicking and punching him as he ran through the thick brush.
He set me down after he ran for ten minutes.
"Those guards didn't want us to leave because they knew what was out here." He said.
"Oh yeah, and what's that?" I asked.
"Me." He said as a devilish smile crept onto his face. Before I could say anything he kissed my lips.
I closed my eyes as I fell into a never ending sleep. I never got to see Utopia again.