Another world

Elijah pulled gently on the cigarette that he just set on fire outside the big building of the airport of London. He inhaled the nicotine, keeping it long in his lungs, until it burned; then he exhaled the smoke through his nose.

England.

Not his first choice for a temporarily place to live, especially as an American it felt hard for him. But his sister had married here – and she would be happy to have him here for a while. Well, he hoped so.

The people around him were hectic, some carried a rushed expression on their face. They carried suitcases, bags and umbrellas. Elijah chased these people hidden with his glances. His big, blue eyes were fascinated by new world that surrounded him.

After another few pulls from the cigarette he looked up to the grey sky, who began to get darker even more in every minute. He sighed – even by now he hated the weather in England. Where was the sun?

A friendly call stopped his inner worries.

"Lijah!"

Elijah turned into the direction where his sister's voice came from and smiled, when he saw her walking straight to him with big grin on her face. She was pushing a stroller.

He let his bag falling down from his shoulders and hugged her tight when she was close enough. He smelled her perfume. So familiar, although they haven't met for about four years now.

"You're finally there! How was your flight?", she said, and Elijah saw little tears of happiness rolling down her cheeks. He grinned and wiped the tears away softly.

"The flight was hard and the jetlag is killing me,but I'm fine. So, this is Jason? He's so cute..." he answered and watched the stroller in front of him, where a small, dark haired boy of one year was sitting and watching Elijah with wide, blue eyes.

"He has your eyes, Shanon."

"Our eyes – you know that these big eyes were always in our family."

"That's right. He's coming after you, isn't he?"

"Not at all, but mostly, yes."

Elijah replied her smile and hold one finger to Jason – the small one took it and laughed squeaky.

"So, let's go. Mark is still at work, but I think you might be very hungry, right?", Shanon said and walked to the parking lot with Elijah which was just nearby.

They didn't talk much during the drive home. Elijah stared outside the window for most of the time and watched some of the dreary areas they were driving through until they reached better places. And as if he didn't know it, it began to rain. Thick and heavy drops were falling down on the car and window.

"Argh, I knew it. Just when we're finally there."

Shanon moaned while Elijah was laughing a little.

"It doesn't rain that often in the states, but you were going here voluntary, sister heart. So don't complain about it!", Elijah giggled and went out of the car when it finally stopped.

It was a beautiful, old house, not too big and not too small, just right for a small family. The area seemed nice and friendly, and it was clean. There was even a little garden in front of the house. Elijah blew his nose when a cold drop of the rain was falling in his neck. The drops were ice cold.

"Come on, let me help you.", he said when he saw Shanon struggling with the stroller.

"Thanks, Lijah."

Both went on quite fast with all the things they had to carry to the house, and finally entered. Elijah nodded impressed, when he realized that the furniture and the whole inside of the house was not the cheapest stuff. The floor in the hallway was out of expensive stone, and even the small sideboard was made out of polished real wood.

"Mark earns good at work, hm?"

Shanon grinned. "He's not earning bad, that's right."

She went to the kitchen and rummaged a bit, while Elijah took the small Jason out of the stroller and carried him in his arms. The little one smiled and held Elijah's shirt collar with his small fists.

"I'm gonna make you something typical English, alright?"

"God, Shanon, no! Only do something easy. No big deal. I'm not that hungry!", Elijah laughed and walked through the beautiful living room with Jason. The sofas were soft and comfortable – these would be better days than in his small student's apartment.

His heart got heavy – his booting out came to his mind. By now he haven't told anyone about it – not Shanon, nor somebody else. He doesn't wanted to, now when these thoughts came back so violently. He felt a big lump in his throat. But it didn't go away, although he was trying to swallow hard.

The food was good. Even tough Shanon had wrestled down all of Elijah's protests and made him something typical English: ham and eggs. It tasted well to him even tough he watched the food with uncertain feelings. But hunger won.

He talked about a lot of things with Shanon, but not about university. Not now, he thought, because Shanon was so happy that her little brother was finally visiting her. She told him about her life as a mother, about Mark and of course about England – even she still worried sometimes about being here as an American.

Elijah just wanted to answer her question about his studies – he studied journalism – when the door turned open and a tall man came in, wearing a black suit. He was well built and had a striking face – but he was very attractive. Elijah suddenly recognized why Shanon had married this man.

With a sweet "Hey, Darling!" Shanon welcomed and hugged him tight.

Elijah was sitting in the background first, but stood up when Shanon and the man turned around to watch him.

"Mark, this is my younger brother Elijah – he is visiting us for a while. I said that he could stand as long as he want to."

Elijah smiled friendly and said "Hey!" when Mark came up to me him and was shaking his hand. The hand felt rough.

"Hey, nice to meet you finally! I'm glad you're here. Hope you feel well at our home!"

Shanon smiled and left to go to the kitchen for making some tea – Mark smiled, but took Elijah at the shoulder, lowering his voice.

"Listen, Lijah. I planned something really nice with Shanon tonight, we even have a baby-sitter. Do you mind if we're not home?"

Elijah was shaking his head.

"No, don't worry. I'll go early to sleep, I'm tired because of the jetlag... "

Mark knocked his shoulder friendly.

They had a nice cup of tea when there was a hard knocking on the backdoor. It was an energetic knocking: Elijah shrugged and spilled a bit of the hot tea on his jeans.

"Naw... We all know whose knocking that is..." Mark grumbled and twisted his eyes. He stood up and went to the kitchen, where one could enter the house through the backdoor. He opened the door and muffled a less friendly "What do you want?", which was countered with a loud "Ay, just visiting my bro heart!", and a tall guy entered the kitchen just by pushing Mark aside.

He was tall, taller than Elijah, even more than one and a half head. His dark blonde hair was very short – but it flattered the rough, but very, very attractive face contours of the man. Same as his brother, the young man was well built and trained – Elijah thought about this, although the man was wearing a quite bigger, black nylon jacket with a collar.

Without asking the man went to the fridge and took out a beer. Elijah frightened a bit when the man opened the bottle of beer with his teeth and spit the cap careless in the sink.

Mark twisted his eyes and hit him on the back of his head, then he turned to Elijah and Shanon. The kitchen was open to the living room.

"Pete, this is Shanon's younger brother from the states, Elijah. Elijah, this is Pete – my little brother."

Elijah mentioned a small "Hey", when Pete came across him, winked at him and said: "What's up, son?",when they shaking their hands - but he kept watching Elijah with a strange look; his grey eyes were not friendly.

Pete went to his older brother again, who was watching Pete with crossed arms.

"He, Marki – the boys and me, we had a drinkin' session last night. Lost my wallet. A hundred's been in there, probably."

"Don't rip me off, Pete, what have you done? You lose your wallet every week, I feel like."

Pete was having another sip of the cold beer and smirked. "I went on with that guy from Matthew Mannon – knocked him out through a phone box with his head first – might be that I lost it there."

Pete's grin was mischievously, naughty, but Elijah just found it uncouth how the young man was behaving.

Mark watched Elijah and waved at him.

"Just come over here, Elijah.", he said, and Elijah stood up nervously. He was trying to hide the last drops of his spilled tea.

When he was standing next to Mark in the kitchen, he tried to ignore the condescending gaze from Pete; but the grey eyes seemed to drill through him. Elijah smelled the beer and blew his nose.

"Listen, Pete", Mark said and lay down a hand on Elijah's shoulder; "I'll give you a hundred... if you take Lijah to the match."

Pete swallowed his beer.

"What? Oh fuck off...You know I can't take a Yankee to the match! Are you drunk or something?"

"If you want to have the goddamn money then you take him to the match. Or you stop coming around whenever you need money again." Mark's voice was forceful – and Elijah, who knew this from his older sister, knew that Pete was thinking about it now. Or maybe not?

He watched Pete with an uncertain gaze. He looked everything but happy with the situation. His mouth was pulled down a bit. He snorted and put the meanwhile empty beer on the counter.

"Fucking shit..." he muttered, ran his fingers through his short hair and bit his lip softly. "Well then..." he said quiet.

"And dare you something is happening to him! You will be at your best behavior. You listen? He's Shanon's brother." Mark said and watched Pete with strict eyes; Pete snored again and kicked the counter.

"Damn Pete, pull yourself together!", Mark ranted, and when Pete went outside the door, he turned to Elijah.

"Listen", he said and lowered his voice when he gave Elijah the hundred pounds; "don't give him the money, no way. Okay? He'll behave, you'll see. Get the boys some beer."

Elijah nodded and went to the hallway to get his jacket. When he had it on, he followed Pete through the door and went outside.

Pete was standing near the house leaning against a wall; he was smoking. When he saw Elijah coming towards him, he waved roughly. "Com'on, hurry!", he grumbled and walked around a corner. Elijah followed him, but as soon as he was beyond the corner, he was feeling the pressure of two strong hands that were pressing him against the brick wall.

Pete pressed him tight against the wall, hands so firmly buried in Elijah's collar that it hurt – Elijah whimpered nervously.

"Listen to me, Yank – whatever my bro said, I won't take ye to the match. No way I would show up there with a fuckin' American... Gimme half of the money, scat and do a fucking tour or something. And you won't tell my brother!"

Elijah gasped, tried to move a bit; but then he said: "I won't give you the money, Pete."

Pete snored and deepened his grip.

"What was that?"

Elijah swallowed, but he didn't give up.

"I said I won't give you the money. I promised it."

Pete's grip wasn't getting loosely, although Elijah moved and tried to escape.

The steel grey eyes narrowed a bit.

Elijah took advantage of the opportunity and wanted to kick, he took all of his force and was sure that he would kick Pete right between his legs – he was just about to grin, but suddenly something grabbed his leg so fast he couldn't react; the leg was fixed before he kicked.

Pete prevented his kick and laughed.

"Serious? Aw, you fucking stupid bitch... Now we're having a big problem, Yank."

And with a hard pull he snatched Elijah's leg, and the next thing Elijah felt was a hard punch in his stomach and the cold stone of the asphalt under his aching body.