Nineteen

by E. S. Carter

  I ignore the possible noise and resume my seemingly futile task of getting out of here as quickly as possible, without being decked.

  I only take another two or three steps when I feel the overwhelming urge to stop. I can’t say what comes over me exactly but the need to stop makes me do just that.

  Turning slightly, I look back to the side of the club where, I had seconds before thought, I heard a scream. A narrow, dark hallway that leads to a fire exit catches my attention and all my instincts pull me to go in that direction.

  A burst of cool night air blows over the heads of the clubbers surrounding me and seems to be coming from that area.

  Had Scarlett given up trying to get out the main doors and thought an escape into the alley better? Didn’t she realise that opening those doors would set off an alarm and alert security? Obviously not, it had to be her.

  Still clutching her shoe (well at least I think it’s her shoe, I’m going to look really stupid if it’s not!), I stride towards the narrow hall and the reflective FIRE EXIT signs that glow neon from the lights in the club.

  The door is shut tight, maybe she didn’t go this way.

  If I open it, I will be the one facing down security and the wrath of Nate for pissing about in his club but if I don’t open it, it will take me ages to get to the main exit doors and then around to the side alley to see if it is her, plus I do not like the thought of her wandering through a dark alleyway alone.

  Forcing the push bar down I open the doors wide, the cold and slightly damp air hits me immediately and it takes a second to gather my bearings.

  Noises that sound like muffled grunts come from the area I cannot see, to the right of the opened doors.

  I step out and around the door and what I see knocks the air from my lungs, forcing me rigid to the spot.

  Sprawled across the floor is a man, who has what looks like a woman pinned beneath him. His jeans are pulled down exposing his bare arse and he is struggling to remove her underwear or at least I think that is what he is doing.

  I cannot see much of the woman, as his body is completely covering hers but she doesn’t seem to be moving at all and he has yet to notice that I have joined them in the alley.

  This doesn’t look good, I can’t tell if she is consenting to this at all, I could be reading this situation wrong and she could be a willing participant but something tells me she’s not . . . and that’s when I spot the shoe. The partner to the one I still hold in my hand.

  Pure rage bursts through my veins as I slam the door behind me and lunge towards the man still aggressively trying to mount the prone body beneath him.

  Using one hand to grab his head and the other arm to wrap around his neck I pull with every muscle in my body to launch him away from whoever is beneath him.

  He tumbles away, surprised for only a second that he has been stopped before staggering to his feet and diving towards me.

  His jeans are still around his hips, his dick still out and poised for action but the tight fabric bunched around his legs impedes his movement and gives me a split second to kick the fucker straight in his dirty, disgusting, fucking nuts and he goes down like a sack of shit.

  But I do not stop there, all I see is red.

  Gripping him by his hair I yank his head up, line it up with my knee and bring it down full force to connect with his jaw. He falls back in a slump, not knowing whether to curl into a ball or attempt to fight me off but the pain in his nuts and jaw forces him down for another few seconds, giving me enough time to swing my leg as hard as I can and kick him square in the ribs.

  The loud crack when my boot hits its target echoes around the alley, as does his sickening groan as the pain shoots through him but I’m still not done.

  Standing over his twisted and grumbling body, I lift my leg as high as I can, ready to bring it straight down on this rapist fuckers head.

  ‘JAKE STOP!!’

  Nate’s voice booms out across the alley seconds before my boot begins its decent towards that Fuckers temple.

  I hear a woman sobbing and that is what actually stops me from using the full force of my rage to split this piece of shit’s skull.

  Looking behind me towards the now fully open fire exit doors, Nate is holding back a sobbing Miss Pretty in Pink, while H stands statue still behind them.

  Then it hits me . . . Scarlett!

  I’m scared to turn around and see what exactly this fucker has done to her, it takes everything I have inside me to walk towards her still lifeless body.

  Miss Pretty in Pink’s sobs get louder the closer I get to her friend.

  Scarlett’s hair is matted with blood from a wound on the right side of her head, her lip is split and thick, blood trickles from her nose and it looks like one eye is already closing and turning black.

  Her metallic dress is ripped down under her breasts, her bra has been torn open and I can see at least three bite marks marring her once perfect skin.

  I feel like I’m going to throw up, I cannot believe I have caused this to happen to such a beautiful and innocent person.

  Me and my ‘couldn’t give a fuck who I screw’ attitude has caused someone to get very badly hurt and not just someone . . . her.

  Unable to stomach looking at what else has happened to her, I instruct Nate to call for an ambulance and the police.

  He tells me they are already on their way and Miss Pretty in Pink is now screaming at Nate to let her go so she can be with her friend.

  ‘Keep her away from this Nate’ I warn over my shoulder.

  ‘No-one is to see her this way . . . do you understand?’ Nate nods and begins to whisper soothing words to the utterly distraught girl he holds in his arms.

  I can see H coming closer and I hold my hand up in a warning, he doesn’t meet my eyes but hands me the shirt he has just removed from his back in order to cover Scarlett up a little.

  I give him a quick nod of thanks and turn back to her, gently placing the shirt across her bare breasts and the wounds that fucking piece of shit has made all over them.

  Looking back up at her face, I swear that her eyes have opened slightly but on bending down closer to her, I can see they are still sealed shut. A single tear escapes from one and I can do nothing but gently wipe it away.

  Every single cell in my body wishes I could wipe away this whole fucking nightmare for her.

  But it has only just began. . . .

  Darkness.

  I’m aware of it all around me. I feel like I’m suffocating in it, drowning in an abyss of nothingness.

  I can hear nothing, see nothing, feel . . . nothing.

  Is this what death feels like? Just nothingness?

  A faint, yet repetitive beep is the first thing to break through the void that encases me. So faint that I’ve probably been aware of it for ages, yet still oblivious to it, consumed by my emptiness.

  I try to concentrate on the beep¸ try to follow it in the hope that something accompanies it, praying that this one sound will be my escape from this desolation.

  Other, muffled sounds now mingle with the beep, taking the edge off its sharp tone.

  I still feel nothing, god how I wish I could feel something.

  Then the blackness engulfs me again, the beep gone.

  Thirsty, why do I feel so bloody thirsty?

  At least I feel something right? I mean I remember begging the darkness to let me feel something but this feels like a thousand shards of glass are embedded in my already parched throat.

  I will myself to swallow but the command gets ignored, my body disobeying what my mind is asking of it.

  The beep is gone. I found comfort in that small sound and now it’s gone.

  I attempt to focus my senses on picking up something . . . anything ….and then I feel it; the tiny awareness of touch.

  Something warm and soft trails over my hand in a repetitive, yet gentle, motion.

  I focus harder, I can now pinpoint exactly where my hand is being touched, the soothing motion of s
omething grazing back and fore over my knuckles is like a balm on my fractured soul.

  Until the darkness claims me once more.

  Light.

  Through my heavy, sealed eyelids I can feel brightness.

  Not wanting to return to the dark, I fight against it. I crave the light.

  The muffled noises return. A distant sound at first, like the squeak of a chair being dragged across a tiled floor, then a cough, followed by low whispers I cannot make out.

  I follow the light, I beg my lazy eyelids to open, the effort almost too much but I do not want to go back into the dark.

  Light seeps through in a blur, stinging my eyes, forcing me to slowly blink past the painful dryness. It feels like my eyelids have been coated in sand, sand that I now drag slowly over my eyes with each forced blink.

  It’s bright, too bright. I try to focus, to gain some awareness of my surroundings but all I see is a startling whiteness.

  Shapes begin to come into vision, shadows at first, claiming some of the stark white of my view.

  The shapes move and come towards me, swallowing more of the light.

  NO! I do not want to go back into the darkness.

  The outline of each shape blurs and moulds into something more recognisable. I force another slow blink hoping to clear away the haze.

  On re-opening, my vision latches onto a familiar pair of eyes, framed by a familiar pair of glasses, sat on a familiar strong nose.

  I cough trying to call his name, my parched throat chokes around the word.

  ‘Sssh, hush Pud, please do not try to speak yet. I’m here, Dad’s here’.

  The deep timbre of his voice both soothes and panics me in equal measure.

  ‘Thirsty . . . please . . . .’ I grate out the words over my dry, swollen, tongue. Within a second a straw is pressed to my lips.

  ‘Just a sip, don’t rush it baby, the nurse said your throat might be sore when you woke up because of the tube.’

  ‘Nurse?’ my weak voice seems terribly loud in the silence of this room.

  ‘Emma, Do you know where you are?’ the concern in my Fathers voice is obvious, the fact he also used my first name shocks me, he never calls me anything other than Pud. He turns to the side and speaks to someone else, I didn’t even realise there was anyone else in here with us.

  ‘Liv, can you go and get a nurse please?’

  ‘Liv?’ I manage to croak.

  ‘Hush Pud, give yourself time, don’t try and force the words, let me get you another drink’. He lifts the plastic cup to my mouth again, the small black straw presses into the seam of my lips and I take a slow draw of the tepid water. It does nothing to remove the scratch in my throat, in fact it seems to increase the raw, red, pain I can feel there.

  ‘Dad?’ I croak out his name, ‘What am I doing here . . . wh . . what’s happened to me?’

  Pain flashes across his face, he hesitates, not finding the right words to reply and slowly leans over me, placing a soft kiss to my forehead.

  ‘You’re in the hospital baby’ he whispers, tenderly stroking my hair ‘You were . . you were . . attacked and you’ve been here for over forty-eight hours. I thought . . . ‘ he chokes on a soft sob ‘I thought we had lost you Pud’ a single tear rolls down his cheek.

  ‘Where’s Mum?’ I ignore the information he’s just shared with me, I just can’t seem to register his words with my memories.

  ‘She’s at home Pud, it’s too much for her to be here but . . . she’s thinking of you, she’s been in pieces worried about you’.

  Yeah right, her absence speaks volumes.

  I try to sit more upright on my plumped cushions. The small movement causes a sharp, stabbing pain to the side of my head and a dull ache to my ribs.

  ‘Dad?’ I half whisper half wheeze ‘Can you ta . . . take me home now please?’ My question comes out weaker than I want it to. I truly just want to get out of here. As each of my senses come back online I begin to feel nauseous at the smells, sights and noises that go hand in hand with a hospital. I can even taste the disinfectant in my chaffed throat, it threatens to make me gag with every single breath I take.

  ‘I’m sorry Pud, you can’t leave here just yet. You have been unconscious for over two days, there is no way I’m letting you leave here until you are better. I’m sorry. I won’t leave you either and your friends have spent hours here waiting for you to wake up, they are worried about you too’.

  ‘Friends? . . . Liv?’ who else could he mean, there is no-one else who would visit me here.

  ‘Liv’s only left your side once, to go home and grab a shower and some fresh clothes. The gentlemen who helped you have also been here a lot, it’s been so good of them to check up on you after all they did. I owe them the world for saving you’. He fights to hold back more tears and I avert my eyes from his face as I cannot bear to watch. The only other time I’ve seen my Father cry was when we lost James, the memory of that day bears down on me now, the sight of my Father’s tears making it feel like yesterday.

  Liv enters the room with a rush of air. ‘Oh My God Em! You scared me so much, I’m so sorry, I’m so so sorry Em’. Her eyes are brimming with unshed tears, she looks exhausted. Her hair looks like it hasn’t seen a brush in days and is pulled into a messy ponytail, her face is bare of any makeup and her eyes are red rimmed with puffy, black bags underneath. Yet she still looks pretty. How can she still look so pretty and yet look like death at the same time?

  I do not know how to reply to her concern, what can I say? I remember nothing about whatever is supposed to have happened to me. I do remember my Father telling me I was attacked but I have no clue as to what that means and in all honestly I do not want to even think about it. I do not want or need to know what has happened to me, I just want to go home and sleep for days.

  A nurse appears behind Liv, she looks too young to be a nurse. She is petite, with beautiful strawberry blonde hair, pale blue eyes and a face full of freckles. Freckles which look so appealing on her.

  She smiles at me ‘Hi Emma, I’m Kirsty, How are you feeling? Have you managed to have a drink since you woke up?’ Her friendly eyes assess my face as she proceeds to check a needle in the back of my hand that is attached to an IV.

  I hesitate, knowing that three sets of eyes await my answer.

  ‘I feel . . . sore. My head hurts a lot’ I pause to struggle down a swallow. ‘My side hurts a lot too and it h . . hurts when I drink. I’d like to go home now please’.

  A sympathetic smile crosses her face before she speaks again.

  ‘Your head feels sore because you’ve had a nasty bang to it but the swelling is subsiding, so the pain should get better soon. If the pain gets too much though you can use this buzzer here to call me at any time and I can up your meds accordingly’. She places a small switch to the side of my arm, indicating the buzzer it holds. She continues to talk never taking her eyes from mine.

  ‘Your side hurts because you have two fractured ribs, again these will heal over time but at the moment they are strapped up to offer you a little more comfort, try and keep your movements slow and steady but if you need to get out of bed please call someone for assistance. Try and drink little and often, that should help your throat. We had to pop a tube in there for a little while to help you with your breathing so that is why it feels a little raw’. She moves to check my charts at the end of the bed before adding, ‘The Doctor will be here to see you shortly but I’m afraid Emma, it will be quite a few more days before you will be able to go home. We need to keep an eye on you to make sure everything is healing as it should be and that the swelling to your brain keeps going down. Do you remember what happened to you Emma?’ a different expression takes over her face, its compassionate yet troubled at the same time.

  I softly shake my head, the pain that darts through me makes me wish I had used words to answer her and I flinch.

  ‘That’s ok Emma, do not worry yourself about remembering now. I’m sure your friends and family can talk through all
of it with you but we also have people here at the hospital you can talk to about it if you wish. Just let me know in your own time’.

  Her smile returns again and she clips the chart back to the end of the bed and proceeds to check the monitors that sit on a tall trolley to the side of me.

  ‘I’ve sent the two police officers away who were here waiting to talk to you about the incident, they will return tomorrow to have a chat with you about what happened but again, do not worry about it for now. Just concentrate on getting better and plenty of rest is going to make that happen’.

  She turns towards the door and adds ‘I’m just down the hall, please buzz me for anything you need at all, it’s too soon to let you eat anything right now so stick to sipping lots of water and we’ll see if we can try you with something light for tea later today’.

  Then she is gone, leaving me with just my Dad and my best friend. Both of whom haven’t stopped looking at me. Their faces seem a mixture of relief, pity and something else . . . something I can’t quite put my finger on . . . it looks like fear.

  The look on their faces scares me, it’s a warning of what must have happened to me.

  I want to hide from that look, I never want to see that look on their faces again. I want to sleep. I want to wake up and be in my own bed.

  ‘I’m tired’. I say the words without looking at either of them.

  ‘OK Pud, close your eyes, get some rest. You heard what the nurse said, that’s what is going to make you feel better. Lots of rest’ He motions to Liv with a tilt of his head ‘We’ll go and grab something to eat while you rest. I don’t think Liv has eaten a single thing since she’s been here and I don’t want her ending up in a bed next to you’ with that he places another small kiss to my forehead but my eyes are already closed.