Page 28

Alina:

I’ve been so fucking anxious that I’ve been a bitch to my family all night. I barely ate dinner and have been hiding out in my room, waiting for Bash to call me. I’ve literally just been staring at my phone, replaying every awful moment from earlier with his dad. And hoping to fucking god that nothing else has happened this evening while he’s been back home.

I’m chewing on my nails nervously and watching the black screen of my phone. It’s unchanging. It feels like it’s mocking me, sitting there all dark and silent. I’m pacing back and forth, my stereo softly playing Breaking the Habit by Linkin Park as I do a fuck-ton of nothing but worry.

It’s getting later and my parents won’t let me out past a certain time. I decide to lie and ask to go to a “friend’s house”, even though I really don’t have any friends. Not ones I’d want to spend the night with willingly anyway. The only person I ever want to be around anymore is Bash. So, I pack a bag and get the ok from my parents, leaving my house as quickly as I can before driving into town.

I pull into a Walmart parking lot and wait. An hour goes by, so I finally decide to text him. It’s been way too fucking long. It’s dark outside and I have nowhere to go. I need to find out if he’s ok. I wait another twenty minutes and start to cry. Fucking nothing . I’m about to start my car and drive to his house when my phone rings and his name flashes across my screen.

I answer it immediately and scream his name into the receiver. “ BASH?! ” I ask uncertainly. There’re a few seconds of silence through the phone until I hear him swallow.

“Lina Girl?” His voice is so faint. I begin to cry harder. Something isn’t right . “Where you?” he asks me strangely.

“Baby, I’m at Walmart. I’ve been waiting for you! I left my house so I could come check on you. You didn’t call me!!” I say in a rush. There’s another long pause. He takes a shaky breath.

“Uhm… Lina Girl?” he repeats again. I’m beginning to panic. His tongue sounds heavy, like he’s having trouble speaking.

“ Bash ,” I try to say as calmly as I can, even though I’m freaking the fuck out inside. “Where are you, baby?” The pause is longer. I hear him breathing, but he’s not responding. “BASH!!” I scream, so fucking tense. He makes a sound like I’ve startled him. “Stay awake for me, baby! I need to find you. Are you at home?” I ask frantically. He moans before there’s another pause. I feel like I’m breaking into a million tiny pieces.

“I’m home, where you?” he finally answers lazily. I start my engine, driving for his house while putting Bash on speaker. My heart is racing out of control. I feel like I’m going to die. If something terrible happened to Bash, I’ll never forgive myself for leaving him there to fend for himself.

“I’m coming, Sebastian! Stay on the phone with me!!” I plead as I speed down the road. The pauses are so long before he responds that I swear I’m going to be pulling up to a dead boyfriend. I hope with everything I am that’s not the case.

I park away down the road, walking up to his house while staying hidden by the shadows. I keep trying to ask Bash where he is, but he’s not very responsive. I also have no idea where his room is in conjunction to the layout of the house. He’s still on the phone with me though as I quietly jump the low fence out front and crouch down to sneak around the side of the house. As I near the back on the right side, there’s a large window that opens up into the kitchen. I can see a woman cleaning dishes at the sink, quiet tears rolling down her face.

I furrow my brow, my heart sinking in my chest. Her eyes look empty, hollow. Like she isn’t seeing much of anything. I realize she’s only washing the same dish, rubbing it with a washcloth in an absentminded circle. I hear the shout of a man, and my body starts to shake as Bash’s father’s irate face flashes through my mind.

“Why the fuck are you taking so long to wash the damn dishes, Carol?” he yells as he approaches the window. I sink back further into the shadows, deathly afraid of this man.

“There were a few extra things with Sebastian-“

“ Don’t say that fucker’s name ,” he threatens as she squeaks, rubbing at the dish harder. He grips the back of her neck in his fingers and squeezes as she opens her mouth and falls forward into the water in the sink, clearly in pain. “That boy is dead to me. And you should give up on him too.”

“He’s our son!” she wails before he smacks her on the back of her head.

“He’s nothing . Now, hurry the fuck up and get upstairs so I can fuck you before going to sleep. I have to get up early,” he says with a growl. She nods, silently crying. This woman is completely broken.

“Lina Girl?” Bash asks in my ear. I’d forgotten I was on the phone with him still. I’m frozen, waiting for his mom to leave the kitchen. She does so quickly, I’m assuming to make sure she doesn’t further upset his dad.

“Bash? I’m by the kitchen in the back. Where are you? Where’s your room?” I ask quickly. The light in the kitchen window goes out and darkness takes over. My eyes need a moment to adjust. Bash breathes heavily, struggling to talk.

“Shed,” is all he manages. I’m beyond confused until I turn around in emotional turmoil and see that there’s a detached shed in his backyard. It looks like a fucking tool shed. With spiders and a lawnmower and shovels and probably a rat or two…

“Like, at the end of your yard by the fence?” I ask shakily, looking into the dark corner of the yard where the shed is sitting ominously.

“Mmm. Mmmhmm ,” he manages. It’s all I need to say fuck it and run into the abyss. For him, I’d run to the ends of the earth. One of two doors is cracked when I approach it. I open it carefully, not sure exactly where he is. I’m glad I was mindful, as he’s not very far in and he’s semi-lodged behind one of the doors.

“Bash?!” I whisper-scream as I crouch to go to him and see that he’s lying face down in the dirt. He’s covered in blood and breathing shallowly. “Holy fucking shit! Bash!!!”

I don’t know what to do. I don’t want to make things worse. I pull my sweatshirt off and use it to try and stop the bleeding on his brow. He winces as I apply pressure. His eyes look far off, but he recognizes me when he looks up finally.

“ Lina ,” he says quietly. I nod my head, doing my best not to hyperventilate in my anxiety. I pet his face softly and cry. But I say nothing, not just yet. He just needs someone to be here for him. Not make things worse. After about five minutes, his hand snakes up onto my thigh and I whimper, the warmth so fucking precious to me from his fingers. He’s lying here severely injured and he’s comforting me?

I grab his hand and kiss it repeatedly, it being the most special hand that’s ever existed to me. I lift up my sweatshirt to see how his wound is doing but it’s still bleeding. I sigh, knowing I’m going to need more than this to help get it under control. I find my phone by my feet somewhere and text my brother, knowing he’s at his best friend’s house this weekend. He usually spends every weekend there if he doesn’t have a game. I ask him for a first-aid kit and extra gauze. He texts back quickly, sarcastically asking me what I broke this time. I tell him it’s an emergency and that I’ll explain later. He agrees to meet me on the next street over and to text me when he gets there.

“Hold on, baby,” I say with a trembling voice as I stroke Bash’s face. “I’m going to take care of all of this. I promise.” Tears leak out of his eye as he looks up at me from the ground. His other eye is bruised and swollen shut. His lip is also busted.

I text my brother again and ask for water bottles too. He sends me a thumbs up emoji. I roll my eyes.

“So… sorry,” Bash manages to get out. I fall over his body, kissing his face as I hold him against me.

“No, no, no. I’m sorry! I never should’ve left you, Bash,” I sob as I bury my face in his neck. His hand comes up to hold me lightly before it falls. His strength is nonexistent, and it makes me feel so powerless. I don’t know how to help him. I know I can’t make it better right now, but it would be so much easier if I could.

“ Shhhh , Lina… Girl,” he whispers softly. I nuzzle his nose. Something suddenly scurries over my leg in the dark. I shriek to myself, repressing it because of his dad, as I fling a spider off of me. Bash pulls me into him as I shake, using my cell phone light to make sure others aren’t anywhere close to us. I do my best to forget about it though, turning back to dote on Bash.

He still seems too out of it to talk about what happened, so I just softly pet his head while I wait for my brother to arrive with the supplies. When he finally texts me that he’s here, I let Bash know I have to pee outside, and that I’ll be right back. I’m afraid that if he knows someone else is coming to help, he’ll get emotional and embarrassed, working himself up too much. I just need him to relax and start healing.

It feels creepy walking by the darkened house. I fling my middle finger up to it as I do, hoping his dad feels my giant fuck you from out here. I can’t believe Bash is out in their shed, bleeding profusely while he fucks his wife upstairs and abuses her too. I’m appalled. And now it suddenly makes sense to me why he’s been staying with me the last week. I wonder how long the abuse has been going on.

“Hey slut!” my brother says happily as I finally walk up to him, tiredly smiling. I give him a side hug as he hands me a bag before stepping back and looking me over. “What’s that?” He points to my face. I wipe at it and Bash’s blood smears over my cheek and mouth. I lick my bottom lip nervously, tasting the sharp copper as I try to come up with a lie. But I can’t think of any quick enough. I’m too traumatized to think on my feet.

“Uhm,” I fumble stupidly. He cocks a brow as his best friend furrows his own in the driver’s seat of the car.

“Yeah, why you covered in blood? You ok?” Cody, his bestie, asks suspiciously.

“ Alina ,” my brother says with force as I fucking scramble for an excuse.

“I’m fine, seriously!! I promise!! Look, honestly… I’m with a guy,” I start. My brother makes a face, as his friend whistles. They both react in different ways but end up laughing hysterically together.

“I don’t want to hear this,” my brother says as he turns away like I was hoping he would. “Unless you’re hurt. Are you fucking ok, Lina?” He stops, looking me up and down seriously. Even though he’s my younger brother, he’s still got a protective streak for his older sister. We’ve got each other’s backs.

“I’m fine! It’s not even my blood!” I assure them both.

“That doesn’t make it any better,” my brother says, but I shoo him away, feeling grateful for his help.

“Thank you for this!!” We all awkwardly exchange looks as he gets back in the car and Cody starts it up. They drive away quickly, their speakers blasting Taj-He-Spitz as I run as fast as I can back to the backyard and towards the shed Bash is in.

He’s sleeping when I get there, so I wake him up. I use some of the water to clean him off and hold it up so he can drink from it. He does so in small gulps. I lie him back down and use my sweatshirt to prop him up, this time lying the bloody side in the dirt. Using gauze and medical tape from the first-aid kit, I finally get Bash patched up enough to feel like he’s going to be ok. I hold the cold water bottle to his eye, hoping it’ll help with the swelling and pain. He curls up in my lap. I cradle his fragile head, stroking him softly with my fingers. I wake him up every hour. Each time I do, he seems a little more coherent. At around three in the morning, he’s able to have an actual conversation.

Sebastian:

I cough, my throat feeling like sandpaper as I come to. She’s right there, opening a water bottle and handing it to me, holding it up to my lips. She pours a little down my throat, helping me to sip it slowly. We repeat this for a few minutes. It feels like I’ll never get enough water, but I’m suddenly ok as I look up into the most gorgeous pair of green eyes I’ve ever seen in my entire life.

“Alina fucking Timber,” I breathe as she collapses on me. I groan. Partially from arousal, even in this state, and partially from pain. “Baby, ouch ,” I say softly as she apologizes and releases me from under her body weight.

“Bash! Holy fucking shit! What happened to you, baby?!” She’s shaking. She looks like she’s been through hell, and she’s covered in my blood. She’s also freezing, dirty and looks exhausted. My heart drops into my stomach, my shame spreading throughout my entire body.

“How long have you been here?” I ask her quietly as she shrugs.

“I don’t know. I could probably figure it out from whenever you called me, but all night,” she replies. She cowers, thinking I’m mad at her. I’m not. How could I be? She saved me. She just knows my secret now. And it’s a lot to process with a concussion.

“Thank you,” I say quickly to make sure she knows that she is the most special girl in the world to me. I can’t help but cry as I do, and she trembles as she lies down and cuddles into my chest. I do my best to help her get warm. It smells like copper and moist dirt around us. “Get some sleep,” I quietly suggest but she shakes her head no. She looks extremely tired, so much so, she’s wired.

“Just… busy night and all,” she deflects. I nod softly, knowing she’s fucking traumatized. And it’s my fault.

“He hit me. With a bat,” I recount. I’m having trouble remembering the actual attack, but I do remember the bat and what it looked like coming at my face.

“Jesus fucking Christ, Bash!!” she wails into my chest. I just hold her, crying as well. There’s really nothing else to say or do. We can only be here for each other. She flings her leg over mine as we cuddle as close as we can in the cramped, dingy shed. Alina shakes the entire time. I kiss her forehead, and she moans softly, so vulnerable and tired and sad. I wish I could take it all away from her.

“Please don’t tell anyone,” I whisper. Her face tilts up. She looks at me for a long time, unspeaking. I have no idea what she’s thinking. Probably a million things. She doesn’t answer me. I can’t say that I blame her. If she had asked the same of me, I’d straight up refuse her. I don’t know what I’m doing or what this means for us. But she’s here and she’s not leaving me. This is probably the worst thing you could experience with someone and come out the other side still together.

I hope we’re still together.

*****

The sun has been up for a few hours and I’m starting to feel like absolute shit. A night on the shed floor did not help me. It didn’t do anything for Alina either. She has dark circles under her eyes, and she looks absolutely empty. I feel like the biggest piece of shit in the world. Especially when she had to pee and crouched right outside the door, too scared to go any farther.

“We need to leave,” she says suddenly. I look at her, not sure what to expect or do. All I care about is that she’s still using the word we . “You’re coming home with me, ok?” I can only nod, mute. She’s still doing shit for me after all I put her through. Now I’m the one crying as she gathers her things. I place my palm gently on her leg.

“Thank you,” I whisper quietly. She looks at me with all the love in the world, tears filling her eyes. She just nods silently. There isn’t much to be said.

Alina:

It takes us more than twenty minutes to get Sebastian out to my car. We have to keep stopping for him to catch his breath. His head is also spinning with every step. The proximity to his house is unnerving, although he’s assured me his dad has long since left for work.

He’s waiting for me on the curb, holding his head and the side of his stomach, splattered with blood and crusted with dirt. I unlock the door and then help him into my car. I look back at the house nervously and notice his mother watching me with her son from the porch. It’s hard to read her face. But she’s sporting a black eye that wasn’t there when I saw her in the window the previous evening. I move a little faster, needing to leave as quickly as possible.

Bash falls asleep once I lay him back in the seat, then take off. It’s a good fifteen minutes to my home from his house and he’s a little hard to wake when I finally get there. My brother disappeared back to his friend’s house and my parents are gone as I do my best to help Bash to my room. I clear out the bottom of my closet, throwing shoes everywhere. I had planned to help Bash shower when we got here, but he pushes me out of the way as he practically passes out, curling up into a ball in the corner of the closet. I cover him with a blanket and pull his shoes and socks off.

I make him let me change the bandage on his head though.

Then he’s fast asleep. I close my closet partially, watching him from my bed as he snores. When I’m sure he’s out cold, I cry my heart out. The house is silent around me.