Bulbs

The two girls burst through the glass doors, giggling. Outside, people quiet and wet with mist glanced up at them nonchalantly, a handful of them scowling before letting their heads sink back into their chest. Both girls remained blissfully unaware of their welcome.

"Caw! Caw!" one of them called, flapping her arms and swooping down upon her friend. She both looked and sounded a crow, adorned in black beads and cloth.

Her friend smiled, sitting down on the curb. Heavyset, she did all that she could to hide it -- her styled hair now clung to her face, though, and her make up had run off with the moisture in the air.

"Sit down, Sally."

"No!" Sally opened her arms to the skies and flapped her lips like a blowfish, trying to catch the rain.

"Who's picking us up, anyway?"

"I think Erin."

A moment of stillness followed, in which a nearby stranger leaned over a cigarette and lit it feverishly. Sally shook her head, letting her hair slap and cling to her face as she danced around the general vicinity.

"Hey, Beth?"

"Yes, honey?"

"Look up."

Beth obliged, glancing up nervously, eyes squinting against the rain. A thousand tiny lights covered the facade of the mall - each bulb flickered once and a while, though never together but often in odd clusters.

"It's pretty," she commented. It was only a second later before she had buried her nose in her jacket again.

"Excuse me," muttered the stranger with the cigarette. "Would you happen to have a lighter?"

Sally shook her head, over exaggerating every move. She flashed him a smile and was about to restart her prancing when he interrupted again.

"Do you come here often?" he asked. He came into the light.

Sally's face fell into sharp, skeptical lines, eyebrows low over her hazel eyes. The stranger was around twenty, attractive and clothed in black jeans and a band jacket. The white cancer stick in his fingers was soaking wet.

"No," she said stiffly. "And your smoke is wet. Might as well toss it."

He opened his hand and let it topple to the ground. Sally pursed her lips.

"Name's Zack." He held out his hand, nails painted black.

Sally considered letting it hang there, but simply shook it quickly and then stowed her hands in her pockets. "Sally."

"Well, the mall's still open. I mean...if your ride won't be here for a while-"

"No thanks. Nice to meet you, Zack. Good night."

Zack wrapped his jacket tighter around him, gave a curt nod and strode off into the evening. Just before he slipped away into darkness, he let out a very audible "fuck".

Beth twisted to face Sally, who was now tip-toeing down the curb, like it was a tightrope. "Why didn't you go with him? He was gorgeous!"

"Meh," Sally said softly. "He was like, twenty."

"So?"

Sally threw her friend a contemptuous glance. "So I'm fourteen. He'd just want a fuck, and it would be illegal, and personally...I like my dignity."

Beth rolled her eyes, which were lined in black. "I'd die to get offers like that all the time."

"GALILEO!" Sally called out, screeching and, for a moment, about to topple to the blacktop. But she swayed around and tumbled right next to Beth, who merely shook her head, slightly miffed.

"Galileo Figaro!"

Beth rummaged through her purse and checked the time. "That song makes no sense," she snapped. "How come we can never finish a topic?"

Sally cradled her head in her hands, which were child size with bitten nails. "Because...we're all unfinished in this world. And that song makes as much sense at life does."

Beth opened her mouth to the rain. She felt hydrated. Glancing up, the lights flickered, blazed brightly, and then they all fell dim or completely dark. Sally fell into blackness, invisible against the backdrop of the night.

"The lights are beautiful," Beth whispered.

Sally giggled. "They know. You don't have to tell them."