The first time Kairi heard “Opened My Eyes” by Buckcherry, she was sitting on a stone bench outside of the mall, twirling her hair wound her bubblegum-pink manicured fingers while waiting for Onyx to arrive, listening to the newly added songs in her i Pod and occasionally bobbing or moving her snow white, cyan-streaked head to the beat of the music. At the time she wasn’t really paying attention to the lyrics, too busy looking around to see if she could find Onyx. She tried to distract herself, so she applied some of her signature bubblegum-pink lipgloss onto her pouty lips, avoiding the piercing on her bottom lip. Impatient with waiting for him, she walked up the sidewalk on the west side of the parking lot to get to the bus stops, where Onyx was to show up sooner or later.

Conveniently enough, Onyx had just rounded the corner of the mall’s north-west parking lot, where a huge wall separated the back and front lots. He noticed Kairi, and seeing as she hadn’t seen him yet, he jumped behind one of the big ornate bushes, planning on scaring the color out of her. Or at least the cyan out of her hair, he thought, snickering.

Looking through the leaves, he saw that she was almost close, but planned on attacking her once she passed his location, so he could come up and scare her from behind, not realizing what a bad idea it was.

He popped up out of the bush, and quickly covered her eyes, which surprised Kairi, and being as reflexive as she was, her body couldn’t help but spin around and punch him smack in the face. His cheek took the impact of the blow. He staggered backwards but kept his balance, feeling the stinging begin to spread around his cheek piercing.

Kairi blinked twice, getting frustrated and exclaiming: “You know not to sneak up on me like that!” She sighed, smacking her palm to her forehead. “You’re so--ughh.” She also noticed Onyx hadn’t bothered to tame his unruly black hair, the ends of it waving up and spiking out at the sides.

“I was just trying to play around,” he said innocently, rubbing his cheek, “but it’s fine, it’ll stop hurting in a little while anyways. At least you didn’t tear out my piercing or knock out my teeth,” Onyx grinned, making Kairi blush at his absolutely idiotic cuteness. “So what were you listening to? Have you listened to the songs I put on there?”

“Yeah, I was listening to, uhh--” Kairi checked her i Pod and went back one song, ““Opened My Eyes”, by Buckcherry. Though I wasn’t really able to pay attention to the song because I was so preoccupied in looking around for you,” she said, rolling her heavily lined eyes and crossing her colorful bangled arms across her chest.

“Well, I’ve waited for you many times before, and I only took a little while: you’ve taken an hour or more before,” he frowned, trying to get even, concluding with “in the heat.”

“It’s not my fault you absolutely love to wear dark colors, especially black.”

“At least I don’t look like a vanilla ice-cream cone that a rainbow vomited on,” Onyx retorted, waving his hand up and down to point out her rainbow bangles, pink skinnies, blue tutu, hair, and colorful makeup. “Or that Tinker Bell attacked me with pixie dust,” he added, giving her a devil’s smile.

“Whatever, you’re my boyfriend, you have to wait for me anyways.” Kairi rolled her eyes, though she was really only kidding.

He knew that, too. “But of course, your majesty,” he said as seriously as he could, bowing, “ may your loyal dark knight also offer you a piggy back ride to the mall entrance?”

“Yeah!” Kairi giggled, jumping onto his back.

“By the way, I love that you look like a vanilla ice-cream cone covered in rainbow and glitter sprinkles; you brighten up my darkness,” Onyx admitted, making her smile.

She actually payed attention to the song while it was replaying, realizing it’s significance to their relationship. She didn’t say anything to him about it since she didn’t want to be cheesy, though he was cheesy with her plenty. He had dedicated more than a hundred songs to her already, most that seemed like they were written just for them.

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Kairi had thought about the song for the next two days, and she thought she might dedicate a song to Onyx for once. It would be the first song she dedicated to him in the seven months that they had been together.

She still couldn’t believe how much he’d changed her; he’d made her a much better person, and more respectful towards her mother in particular, who she used to just treat like a friend rather than a mother. He had a big impact on making her grow up and that’s what the song mostly spoke of--opening her eyes.

The song is so cliché, he’s going to probably laugh at me or something, Kairi thought. I wonder if he thought the same the first time he dedicated “Just A Little Patience” to me?
Kairi began to reconsider, and she was suddenly listening to the song on her iPod again. She’d heard it so much over the past two days that she knew the whole thing by now. That made her come up with an even cheesier idea--cheesier than a cheddar-attack Frito pie; singing it to him. No way! I’m not that crazy! she thought, making herself turn red--neck to face--and she immediately turned off her i Pod, sighing.

“Why am I such a romantic?” she whined to herself, wanting to slam her head on the wall for the moment. Why am I being so shy? I’ve been with Onyx for seven months. I should be over my stupid shyness. Why can’t I be more brave? She continued to beat herself up for her timid ways until her train of thought was broken by her ringing phone.

It was Onyx’s caller ID, and when she picked up the phone, he was singing “Just a Little Patience”, by Guns N’ Roses, like he usually did. See? Why can’t I be more like him? Kairi thought, sighing.

“Hey, what’s wrong?” Onyx asked, hearing the obvious sigh.

“I hate you,” Kairi said bluntly, but then corrected herself before Onyx took it the wrong way since he kind of overreacted when she said things like that to him. “I mean, I hate that you’re not afraid to be yourself around me,” she paused for a second, “and stuff like that. I wish I was more like that, y’know?” she sighed again, pacing around her room.

“Kairi,” Onyx said in a sing-song voice, “you have no idea how difficult it is for me to that. What is it? Is there something you want to tell me but can’t?” he asked softly.

“You’ve dedicated a lot of songs to me,” Kairi started.

“And, you want to, too?”

Kairi nodded, then smacked herself on the forehead for it since he couldn’t see her anyways.
“Yes,” she murmured, still being overly-shy with the whole song dedicating idea.

“Well, what is it? You can tell me.”

“No, I can’t!” Kairi complained, “It’s embarrassing and cheesy.”

“Kairi, get over it. C’mon, chicken, who’s it by?”

“Not telling.”

“Tell me.”

“No.”

“Kairi,” Onyx repeated, beginning to get impatient.

She sighed. I should get over it already. Well, I don’t necessarily have to tell him. Kairi thought, turning her i Pod back on and setting the volume at its highest, putting Onyx on speaker and setting her phone down next to her i Pod, playing “Opened My Eyes” by Buckcherry and leaving the room.

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Onyx arrived at school early the day afterwards to get there before Kairi, so she wouldn’t be able to run away, happy about the song but a little sad that Kairi had left him hanging. It had been on shuffle, so he’d listen to a second song before hanging up, convinced that she really wasn’t going to talk to him again as long as she could help it. That was the first time Onyx had heard the song “The Reason”, by Hoobastank, sitting alone in his room, wondering what to do about Kairi, and thinking it really matched what he and Kairi had been through for the past seven months.

Even though it was extremely cold and dark outside he waited for her; there was no one at school yet, but he knew her mom had to drop her off at least by 6:45 AM in order for her to get to her job on time. He finally saw the ‘89 crimson-red Mustang pulling up to the school’s parking lot, and waited until Kairi got out to approach her.

“Hey, what was with that yesterday?” he asked.

Kairi glanced up, looking like she wanted to make a run for it. “I don’t want to talk about it,” she sighed, looking down.

“I liked the song,” Onyx grinned, putting his arm around her shoulders while they walked towards the pavilion. “It was cute,” he chuckled, poking her in the ribs and making her turn red.
“Shut up!” she whined, trying to get out from under him; he wouldn’t let her; he spun her around so that he had both his arms around her. “Let me go, d***it. I’m going to kick you.”

“Why? There’s nothing wrong with dedicating a song to your boyfriend.”

“It’s embarrassing.”

“I’ve done it for you over 50 times,” he pointed out, “get over it. It’s not embarrassing, it’s sweet, and adorable, and it makes me want to pinch your cheeks and kiss your forehead and--” he trailed off, leaving her clueless.

“‘and’ what?”

“I can’t, ‘it’s embarrassing.’” Onyx laughed.

“Onyx!” Kairi whined.

“And, I love you,” he said.

“Me too,” she looked down and then back up at him, sighing, “I’ll get over it.”

“Works every time,” Onyx murmured, smiling.

“What?”

“On, nothing, just talking to myself.”