Someone just screamed.
That’s never a good sign.
I break into a sprint, rounding the corner from Bryce to Anglesea Street. This is my fucking city. I know the roads.
A part of me hopes that this isn’t her. Just to know that anything has caused Kelly to scream like that, tears me apart. I can only imagine what would go through the mind of her dad Randy. On the other hand though, if this is her, I’m so fucking thankful that she’s smart enough to make as much noise as possible when she’s in trouble.
Another scream. A lot closer this time.
God, if you let me get there in time, if you let me save her, I promise you that I’ll be at church next week. You can sit there with my mother and be proud that I’m one of your disciples now. But I need a miracle here.
“No!” There it is! I can hear it! But it sounds like it’s coming from behind me now. I quickly turn, and here another scream as I pass by the dark alleyway to my left. “No! Lee!”
“That’s Mr. Lee to you, bitch. Now let’s see that cunt”. Motherfucker! As soon as I heard her voice, as soon as I heard my name, I knew I’d found her. And I’m just in time. I tear into the darkness, ready to rip some poor sonofabitch’s head off. Scratch that, the word ‘poor’ implies some sort of feeling of pity or remorse on my behalf. That ain’t the case. This fuckstain deserves a hell of a lot more than whatever I dish out, even if I fucking kill him. I grab at the nearest silhouette I see, and toss it towards the wall. In a flash of light, I see Kelly’s face, and I see the look in her eyes. It’s something I’ve never seen before. Sheer terror. With a sound that would disturb most normal people, the head of the bastard I threw aside, hits the wall. Then it hits the ground. As odd as it is of me to think this, especially at a time like this, I really wish I had a cheesy one-liner to bust out here.
“What the fuck?” A dull, deep voice says from behind me, as I foolishly admire my handiwork on scumbag number one. I turn around to be met with a huge fist to the gut. Kelly gets biffed into the darkness. With a scream, I hear her hit pavement. I can’t go check on her though, as a haymaker comes swinging at my head. I only just get out of the way in time.
Two people! How could I not have seen this? Tons-of-fun in front of me, charges. What he’s trying to accomplish, one can only guess, but it’s not going to work on me. Not with my past experience, and not with my hatred of all other people in this world amplified to immeasurable levels as it is right now. I just want to break him open, and spill his fat ass all over the ground.
I act quickly, sidestepping the lardass and kicking him in the back to use his own momentum against him. He crashes into the wall, but it doesn’t put him down. He turns, but I’m right there, reigning in right fists to his nose. I heard it break after the first one, but I’m not satisfied with just one punch. I then direct my attention to his jaw. You see, guys this big don’t have a lot of trouble putting their weight into their punches, but usually that’s not because of any particular skill on their behalf. So once you manage to dodge his slow strikes, and have the upper hand. always aim for the face, more specifically the jaw. Hit it a few times and the force won’t just be hitting the fatty chin, it’ll be hitting the bone. And the thing about that bone, is that it’s so used to being protected by that layer of lard, that it really can’t handle much trauma at all. Glass jaw motherfucker goes down in agony quickly. I didn’t get the knockout I was wanting, but a broken jaw and nose will have to suffice.
He scuttles off to join his pal, who is crawling his way towards the street. I consider chasing after them, and giving them the full scale hell storm that I want to lay into them with, but then I remember Kelly. I jump further into the darkness, and almost trip over where she lays sprawled out on the ground on her stomach, crying. I drop to me knees, and gently try to roll her over. My night vision, which in my fury feels as if it has already fully adapted in what usually takes a whole thirty minutes, reveals a graze on her cheek, and one large one on her arm. Aside from that, there are no discernable major wounds. I can’t begin to speculate what’s going on in her head though. I help her to bring her torso off the ground, and she burrows into me. I hold her there as gently as I can, but making sure I do a good job to wrap her up entirely in my arms.
Here, she’s safe. Here, I provide the barrier between the darkness and her. And nothing is getting through me.
I don’t ask questions. I don’t try to reassure her. Maybe I should be doing something else to make her feel comfortable, but all I can bring myself to do is sit here in the dark with her as she soaks my shirt with her tears.