in another life, you still would've turned my head;
❛ POISONOUS CURE ❜
❝ you will forget everything ❞

▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬

Cleo could handle them taking anyone from her. They were the reason the teenage girl only talked to three people her own age. She could not handle getting close to anybody because she knew that they would just be ripped away from her and sent into the maze.

In a way, that was her own fault. She was the one who helped design it. Ava Paige asked a fifteen year old for help when she got stuck on creating the first stage of the trials.

Cleo just wanted to be a part of something big. She wanted to make a change. Her parents were already dead, and she did not want more people to keep dying. Until they tore her brother away from her.

When she woke up the morning after they took her and found out that Ava sent him inside, she was ready to burn the entire compound to the ground. Cleo did not care how many people had to die as long as her brother lived.

"I can't get her to bring him back up. She won't even listen to Teresa." Thomas told her. He was almost as frustrated as her, but there was sadness and compassion in his eyes as he rubbed her shoulders in a comforting manner. "What's done is done. But..." He swallowed, "there's one thing that I can do."

"What is it?" Cleo perked up, hopeful. "I'm ready to do anything."

Thomas took a step back and started pacing around her bedroom. He stared down at the doors of the vents that he opened to sneak into the bedroom. Cleo could tell that he already had the idea formed in his head, but he seemed hesitant to even suggest it.

"What is it, Thomas?"

"I can sneak you in next month."

Cleo froze, her eyes widening in surprise. That was never the plan. She was only supposed to enter the maze in two years. After him. She was supposed to stay in the lab with Thomas and observe their friends from the other side. But she did not think that she could spend two years watching her brother run around that place with the knowledge he could die if he entered the maze.

She thought that the people she grew up with would be smarter, so she expected the beginning to go smoothly. She was clearly an idiot because it made sense for them to not think things through when they had no memory of anything. The maze did not come with instructions. They had to figure everything out as they went, and they realized what they should not do when one of them would die.

It was painful to watch, but Ava assured her that it was for the sake of the human race.

First, George got in. (She could live with that. She barely knew the guy.) Then, Alby. (He was a silent kid, so she never knew him much, but he was a good friend of her brother's, and he lost his mind) Then it was Gally. (She clenched her jaw and tried to swallow down any emotion that might cause her to lash out at Ava). Finally, Minho. Him going into the maze caused her to have her first ever argument with her boss and the woman who took her in when she was a little girl.

("It's for the greater good." She said, and Cleo had to keep her mouth shut.)

Newt getting sent into the maze made her ready to betray WICKED in a blink. Because Ava promised that she would keep him out of it the second she found out that he was immune.

"I'm good with that."

Thomas did not seem surprised by her response, but the hope disappeared from his eyes. He just lost his best friend, and he was going to lose the girl he loved in a month, too.

The boy took a deep breath and then took a couple of steps towards her. He cupped her cheek, the intimate action causing her to blink in surprise. Thomas exhaled and gave her a barely there smile. "That means that, in a month, you will forget everything. You will forget why we did what we did. You will even forget that Newt is your brother. You will forget me, and the next time we meet, I'm probably going to have to fall for you all over again."

"What?" Cleo muttered, her eyebrows furrowing.

He ignored the question she asked and kept talking, "And if you forget me, then you probably won't remember how much you will hate me after this."

Cleo did not get the chance to open her mouth to question him because he was placing his lips on top of hers. She let out a low noise of surprise but never pulled away. When Thomas realized that she was kissing back, he smiled into the kiss and kept it going for a couple more seconds before leaning his forehead against hers.

"I don't hate you." Cleo told him, her frown from a couple of moments ago being replaced by a smile. "I bet that I will fall in love with you again, too. I mean, have you looked in the mirror?"

The giggle she let out only caused Thomas' grin to grow. He pulled her into his chest and wrapped his arms around her. He was going to soak in every minute he had with her during the next month because he knew things would never be the same after that.