Light 003

Danny trudged through the muddy streets of Amity Park, feeling awful and vile, both inside and out.  Muddy watered covered him from head to toe, dripping from his bangs into his blurred eyes.  He was in ghost form, his suit thin and torn and not a barrier for a chilling rain that was pouring down.  He didn't have the energy to fly, and when he was in ghost form he didn't notice the cold as much, so he stayed in that form, trekking from one side of town to the other.
Being a hero wasn't as great as everyone thought.  He knew it when he first got his powers and he was painfully aware of it now.  Darkness swallowed him up everywhere.  He was an insomniac now because of his ghost half.  He would stare out into the ink-black sky and will himself to sleep, but he wouldn't find any until the buttery light of dawn arose, when he had to get up for school anyway.
His grades were not helping in the engulfing darkness.  His parents lectured him, his teachers, Jazz.  Sometimes he just felt he should drop out of school.  It would give him more time to patrol.  And maybe he'd get some sleep.
But he knew he couldn't do that.  It wasn't possible.  As long as he turned in a homework assignment or two, his grade would stay average and he'd pass.  And once high school was over...
More darkness.  The same old thing.  Get up, hunt ghosts, go to work, hunt ghosts, go to sleep.  It was a constant that he should be accustomed to.  But he wasn't and feared he never would be.  This would be his life, damned to the life of a hero, a foot deep in mud at one in the morning, just trying to get home to repeat the whole process.  
Danny shivered, a rare occurrence in the ghost form.  The rain was downright icy and he mourned the fact his home was a half-mile away.  But then he looked around, realizing that he recognized this street.  Sam's street.
He looked up, the rain beating down on his already beaten face.  And smiled.
Sam's room was not bright, not dark, just a soft glow of a flickering flame.  He watched the still curtains and wondered what she was doing.  Was she writing a poem?  Was she listening to music?  Was she thinking about him?
Danny smiled wistfully as his mind wandered.
Sam was the wild card in all of the norm.  She was the sweetness in the sourness of life.  She was tough and unrelenting and stubborn.  She was soft and sweet and caring and you never knew what to expect, but when you did you knew it was going to be great because she was just Sam.  
Danny hardly noticed he was hovering outside her window, some of his energy restored just thinking about her.  He could slightly see through her thin curtains.  She was just laying on her back on the wrong end of the bed, arms behind her head, her hair splayed out, just staring at the ceiling thoughtfully.
Danny's heart swelled and he rubbed his chest at the ache.  All of a sudden Sam turned her head and saw him.  He felt guilty and shoddy in her presence.  She was like a beautiful princess and he was a lowly peasant, gazing at her from afar in the alleyways.  
But when she opened the window, despite the chilling rain and looked at him with those soft violet eyes, he gained the strength of ten men and felt like he could climb mountains.  
"Hi,"  She said softly, into the velvet darkness.  Danny smiled, but it didn't reach his beautiful green eyes.  "Hi."
"What's wrong?"  She murmured, taking one of his hands and holding it loosely on the windowsill, intertwining their fingers.  He nearly felt like crying at the rightness of it.  
"I'm just..."  He paused, mused for a minute.  Then their eyes locked.  "Tired of the darkness."
She smiled and chuckled, breaking the connection.  "And you came to me to get away from darkness?"
He slid his hand on her cheek and reveled in the tremble that went through her body.  He then turned her face to his, something special and amazing shimmering between them.  "Yes, I came to you."  He replied softly, "Because you are my light."