give up my most important and precious dream.
The tears stopped as soon as he left, strangely enough. Maybe I had cried so many over the past year I didn't have any left. He'd had his quota, now all he'd get was numb. Because that's all I felt. So numb and cold and alone and desolate. I was saving my dream, but somehow I didn't feel at all happy about that. But I couldn't allow myself to dissect the emotion, if I did that, it could jeopardise my dream. And I wouldn't let anything do that.
Greeny knocked on the door an hour or so later. Short, fat, balding guy in his forties, I'd say. How the hell Brett got mixed up with him, I did not know nor want to know. He had ginger hair, and a ginger beard, and beady little bug eyes in steel grey. Freckles dotted what you could see of his cheeks and tomato sauce - or blood, I thought distractedly, my blood - splattered over a faded Levis T-shirt and denim jeans. The thought that he had got close enough to be smeared in my blood was not comforting. I wondered how hard Brett had wrung them out. Not hard enough, I was sure.
"You want some food?" he asked in a surprisingly high pitched voice for such a big guy. I couldn't stomach a thing, the room had only just stopped spinning, but my head and nose still hurt like fuck. I shook my head once to say no. He didn't hang around, just shut the door and locked it I noticed, from the loud click that followed.
I got up, waited for the world to tilt - it didn't - then walked to the window. I don't know why I bothered, I'd decided to stay, to save my dream I'd take Brett back again. So trying the window to see if I could climb out of it was a waste of my time and energy. Both of which could have been used up curling in a ball on the bed and staring into space. But something made me do it, some part of me buried deep that refused to accept this was my life now.
It was useless, a useless thought or emotion, but it still made me check the damn window. Which ended up being bolted shut anyway. Even though we were on ground level and if I broke the glass I could get out. Then what? Greeny would chase me, maybe more blood would smear on his T-shirt and it would only piss Brett off. No, I had to lay low, be smart and only ever give Brett the numbness I now felt and nothing more. He didn't deserve it.
More time passed and I watched the sun getting low in the sky outside the window. Greeny didn't come back in, neither did Lofty, who would have received, at the very least, a scowl. And neither did Brett. I didn't switch the TV in the bedroom on. I didn't want anything to eat. I just lay there, numb. The word numb was becoming a permanent fixture in my head.
Then I heard a thud and a crash, which sounded just like the pottery lamp did when I broke it, then a few curse words shouted by Greeny - I'd recognise that voice anywhere - and a few more sickening thuds and then finally silence. I was back at the head of the bed, knees to chin, feet to butt, part of the broken lamp in my hand. God alone knows what I was intending to do with the lamp, but if some of those bad guys Nick had warned me about, had caught up with Brett and his merry bunch of men, then I would use it.
The door handle shook, then an ear splitting sound followed as the door was torn off its hinges and almost wrenched from its frame. I sucked in air at what met my eyes.
Dominic stood inside the room looking like he wanted to kill someone. I was hoping it wasn't me. His eyes flowed over my body and flicked back up to my face, and then he went entirely still. I didn't realise someone could do that, go so still the air around them looked more animated than they did. He was no longer in his expensive looking suit, he was wearing jeans that hugged his muscular thighs and a T-shirt that had the same honour with his chest and shoulders. The jeans looked so well worn I thought they'd start to unravel, the shirt had an emblem on it I couldn't quite decipher.
He looked fantastic. If not a little
The tears stopped as soon as he left, strangely enough. Maybe I had cried so many over the past year I didn't have any left. He'd had his quota, now all he'd get was numb. Because that's all I felt. So numb and cold and alone and desolate. I was saving my dream, but somehow I didn't feel at all happy about that. But I couldn't allow myself to dissect the emotion, if I did that, it could jeopardise my dream. And I wouldn't let anything do that.
Greeny knocked on the door an hour or so later. Short, fat, balding guy in his forties, I'd say. How the hell Brett got mixed up with him, I did not know nor want to know. He had ginger hair, and a ginger beard, and beady little bug eyes in steel grey. Freckles dotted what you could see of his cheeks and tomato sauce - or blood, I thought distractedly, my blood - splattered over a faded Levis T-shirt and denim jeans. The thought that he had got close enough to be smeared in my blood was not comforting. I wondered how hard Brett had wrung them out. Not hard enough, I was sure.
"You want some food?" he asked in a surprisingly high pitched voice for such a big guy. I couldn't stomach a thing, the room had only just stopped spinning, but my head and nose still hurt like fuck. I shook my head once to say no. He didn't hang around, just shut the door and locked it I noticed, from the loud click that followed.
I got up, waited for the world to tilt - it didn't - then walked to the window. I don't know why I bothered, I'd decided to stay, to save my dream I'd take Brett back again. So trying the window to see if I could climb out of it was a waste of my time and energy. Both of which could have been used up curling in a ball on the bed and staring into space. But something made me do it, some part of me buried deep that refused to accept this was my life now.
It was useless, a useless thought or emotion, but it still made me check the damn window. Which ended up being bolted shut anyway. Even though we were on ground level and if I broke the glass I could get out. Then what? Greeny would chase me, maybe more blood would smear on his T-shirt and it would only piss Brett off. No, I had to lay low, be smart and only ever give Brett the numbness I now felt and nothing more. He didn't deserve it.
More time passed and I watched the sun getting low in the sky outside the window. Greeny didn't come back in, neither did Lofty, who would have received, at the very least, a scowl. And neither did Brett. I didn't switch the TV in the bedroom on. I didn't want anything to eat. I just lay there, numb. The word numb was becoming a permanent fixture in my head.
Then I heard a thud and a crash, which sounded just like the pottery lamp did when I broke it, then a few curse words shouted by Greeny - I'd recognise that voice anywhere - and a few more sickening thuds and then finally silence. I was back at the head of the bed, knees to chin, feet to butt, part of the broken lamp in my hand. God alone knows what I was intending to do with the lamp, but if some of those bad guys Nick had warned me about, had caught up with Brett and his merry bunch of men, then I would use it.
The door handle shook, then an ear splitting sound followed as the door was torn off its hinges and almost wrenched from its frame. I sucked in air at what met my eyes.
Dominic stood inside the room looking like he wanted to kill someone. I was hoping it wasn't me. His eyes flowed over my body and flicked back up to my face, and then he went entirely still. I didn't realise someone could do that, go so still the air around them looked more animated than they did. He was no longer in his expensive looking suit, he was wearing jeans that hugged his muscular thighs and a T-shirt that had the same honour with his chest and shoulders. The jeans looked so well worn I thought they'd start to unravel, the shirt had an emblem on it I couldn't quite decipher.
He looked fantastic. If not a little
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