Why couldn't the car ride be silent? The atmosphere was fertile for a tall standing silence, a far reaching silence. The interior of the car was dark, the lights from outside buildings - the ground where noise flourished - would glint off of the windows, sometimes sweeping over the occupants.
Despite these contrasting atmospheres, the outside world appeared to be silent, peaceful, while the small space within the car reverberated with sound, rippling the air, buzzing and building where it funneled into the mind. Vlad was hunched, his elbow on his knee while his hand covered his right ear, exposing the left for the sake of not showing his moment of weakness. Emotions had built around his barriers and had risen to the peak of his limits, ready to pour into him as a rushing, drowning, destructive flood.
There was music, but it was music Vlad didn't know. He didn't like any of the songs. None of them were soothing. None of them were familiar and comforting. He hungered for familiarity, grasping for it, dying for the broken fragments of his life. Here in this car, he was unwelcomed. He was constantly rejected.
Now, as the blondes in front of him chatted, even mentioning the 'charity case' in the backseat that was ridiculed and insulted without a thought about the gangster's feelings, Vlad struggled to hold his tongue. His free hand shook with feeling, his head spun with it. His chest ached, his stomach churned, flipped, and twisted. It was anger, anger and so much more. Building, pulsing. He felt that a flood was coming. He was helpless against it, helpless as always. No aid. No allies. No mercy. No, not for one so different, for one so dehumanized from a misfortune carried from birth, brought further from the pedestal of the ideal man, perfection, by what life had developed on the side of this misfortune like an ugly growth. Red eyes shut to the darkness of the floor, the pit before his seat that was unable to catch the outside light from the passing buildings, and a sigh left his chest.
Light flashed across Casey's face, illuminating a smile. A piece of the light touched the emerald eyes beside him. Anderson's mouth was an open grin, a finishing laugh, genuine happiness within him that was rising to the surface of his features. The laugh was carried back to hover above Vlad's head, hanging like smoke flirting with the surface of the roof of the car.
Voices carried too.
"Well, you know some people just have no common sense when it comes to interacting with others in a civilized manner- in a public place, coming close to using filthy language - we know people like that."
"Common sense isn't found in everyone." Casey chuckled at some personal recollections.
The blonde teen let out a laugh as a thought came to him, amused. "You know how people are dyeing their hair rainbow colors while other people get tons of lip and eyebrow piercings, and all sorts of freaky stuff?"
"Yeah, mmhm." Casey's head nodded as he hummed, feeling that Anderson would continue listing examples. He hoped to crop the length. "So? What's your point, Alex?"
"What would you think about me suddenly dying my hair black and tattooing my eyes red or something?" It was the jab of a hot poker.
A violent cringe, like a choking gag, seized the boy hunched in the backseat behind Casey, the left ear that was exposed, picking up on Anderson's voice with far too much clarity. In desperation, pale hands that shivered with the swelling emotion, clamped down on Vlad's ears, trying to defend his already rattled core.
The eyes that had opened with shock and had glimpsed a skewed view of the back of Anderson's shoulder, were shut. Quickly, Vlad threw his hood over his head, and then buried his hands in his hair to protect his ears, bent over, struggling…struggling. Endure! Endure it! You must!
But it shouldn't last long.
They were dropping Casey off. It should only be a few minutes before he's gone, before there's silence.
Hurry up you fucking stupid car! Hurry the hell up! Go faster! Get us there now! Fuck this! …God, this… I hate it. I HATE it!
I wanna go…I wanna leave..I-
The pale hands clamped harder as Vlad's teeth were revealed in a wince.
Please let me go…please let me go…
The thoughts never picked a where or how, existing only on the desire to escape, to find the missing familiarity Vlad needed.
Soon the car parked by the dorms, quieter tonight than the last time the car had stopped there, and Casey leaned over to place a peck on Anderson's cheek, grasping a wrapped gift that had been sitting on his lap. And then the man left the car. Anderson watched as the well-shaped, slender but not feminine, back disappeared through a door, and then he turned to look out his window as he backed up to leave, not seeing the hunched form that clung to the shadows beneath his gaze, trembling slightly with its continued struggle for control.
Then silence branched out and filled the car, and Vlad's turmoil lessened with the aid of this shade of peace.
*~*~::..+..::~*~*
In the house, the many empty rooms of a crypt storing the useless, lifeless wealth that could offer no companionship or love made the walls dark and the floor icy with the chill of unavoidable isolation. Anderson went his way, disappearing into his room, and Vlad, filled with his tumultuous sea, the brimming flood, burrowed into the bed he was only borrowing. He was always borrowing. Always borrowing beds and roofs and food. He hadn't had his own room, his own bed, his own home since his parents' deaths. He burrowed to hide, to find something – something like warmth, the warmth, the soft heat that resembled love, the phantom of an embrace – soft, soft like a caring mother.
He didn't care who it was, but he wanted someone – someone who was warm, a warm and accepting person. Someone who would wish to comfort him, even if they made no attempt to, as long as they had the thought or feeling of wanting to help him. Instead of these people that left him so entirely alone, estranged, separated.
Oh God… Oh God… It was painful.
His eyes burned. His nose stung. Eyes, wet, brow furrowing, a whimper that escaped his lips and made him feel all the more ashamed as he buried himself in the warmth and softness of the comforter, hiding, hiding. Seeking help, help from a comfortable place. But he was not shedding tears. It was merely dampness, dampness – the condensation of bottled misery.
Oh God…
Thin shoulders, cold as always, shivered and the boy curled up tighter. He held onto the fabric of the comforter, tighter. His teeth bit down, tighter. His brow knit and puckered, his throat constricted, his heart, his chest – tighter.
Vlad whined a name, and then was quiet.
Anderson was on his laptop in his room, just as silent.
The house contained no sound.
And then the garage door opened… But the boys did not hear it when it opened, when the car's motor hummed and then shut off, when the garage closed, or when the trunk shut and the door to the hall creaked closed. Footsteps, heavy with a side bag slung over a shoulder, large in size, unbalancing, so that the steps were harder on one leg than the other – a man walked down his hallway and passed his kitchen. He moved on to his room and stayed there for a time, but eventually he emerged and soon those footsteps, relieved of their burden and made lighter, climbed the stairs.
They stopped. The polished sheen on the black shoes slipped over the leather, light shifting as the shoes turned in a new direction, standing still for a moment, sensing that the usual emptiness of the room had been disturbed. No, not so much disturbed, but filled. The door to the bathroom near the spare bedroom was open, and on the usually untouched carpet, feet had trodden on the threads.
The man's son never entered that room, never used that bathroom – he did not know much about Alex's habits, but he knew that unused rooms remained unused. His son had no need to branch out and take up more space. It was against the human habit of establishing a frequented territory, a certain bathroom, a certain room and a bed that were called their own because they used it, despite whether or not they owned it.
The footsteps appeared again, hushed by the threads, pressing down where other feet had left faint moldings of their shoes. Without further thought, but assuming the role of a lawful owner who had the right to investigate how his property was being used, he opened the door, looked to the bed and saw, immediately, the mound created by the bunched comforter. The altered appearance of the bed suggested that it had been used. The shoes cast off on the floor beside the bed stated that it was currently in use.
And the mound was much too small to belong to his son.
Mr. Anderson was not alarmed, he felt nothing at all. Only the compulsion to discover what it was, what had been going on, and what was going on. He did not frankly care who his son brought into the house, the boys… Casey… he was well aware of their frequent visits. He did not care. He ignored it, cut it off from his shallowest measure of attention, just as he tended to cut off his son whose life was simply beside his own, not intertwined, not connected, nowhere was it intimately fused with any feelings of affection. He did not care for a child he had never wanted. He began to care less when the embarrassment of the boy's sexuality had been thrown upon his head, earning the returned scorn from his father, humiliation elsewhere – created for the most part in his own mind with false perceptions.
As he approached the comforter, he expected to find a boy, maybe a girl – someone, a friend who had been invited over to stay the night.
Through the comforter, Vlad picked up on the quiet footsteps and pulled the comforter closer to himself, burrowing – burrowing where he could go no deeper to escape.
"Anderson," the muffled voice, complaining and wholly displeased, paused the man who now knew that the mound was indeed male, "Anderson, just leave me alone… leave me 'lone… I don't want anything to do with you right now."
A foreign hand grasped the comforter. Vlad attempted to maintain possession of it by tugging when the hand pulled. The teen hissed at the aggressiveness. "Go away! Anderson! Why do you have to-!" A groan of frustration as the comforter was pulled away, and then Vlad remained curled, his knees tucked in to his chest, his eyes shut and his face partially nestled into the mattress. He huffed and grumbled like someone who had just been rudely awakened, though it was clear that he had never been asleep. "Yer jus' a bully…Anderson. …And dammit, now I'm cold." Pale feet twitched to echo the complaint. Vlad gave another huff of displeasure and then a left eye, the only one not blocked by the mattress, glared up at the one who had stolen his warmth and dim comfort.
He saw a man, tall, blonde, light skinned, with uncaring emerald eyes that shone with no light of focus, judgmental in a distanced - arrogant way, lidded as if observing something tedious or undeserving. The single red eye was round, staring, gaping in horror as Vlad lay rigid, hardened by shock. Goosebumps were already rising as the stranger continued to stand over him, not dissipating like a hallucination or transient ghost should. The man was solid. He was real.
Fumbling, without a hint of grace and with an overwhelming amount of panic, Vlad half rolled, half threw himself from the bed, skinning the wall before he hit the ground with a grunt and then scrambled to his feet to flee – green eyes watching. Not in the slightest were they amused by this awkward spectacle.
"Anderson! ANDERSON!"
The other door opened-
-and then partially closed as Anderson attempted to shield himself before Vlad dove at him, almost as if to grab the jock, but Vlad settled with squeezing through the door and under Anderson's arm to seek sanctuary in the bedroom, sufficiently hidden while the blonde teen was distracted by the appearance of his father. The man left the spare room and approached his son, stopping before him, looking up a miniscule degree due to the difference in height.
And the quiet returned for a brief visit, giving false hope of a swift reappearance of peace. But peace rarely comes in anything but fractions divided by time.
Mr. Anderson's lips frowned just enough to mark a faint crease under the corner of his mouth. "That's the ugliest one you've brought home yet."
Anderson, alarmed as well as ashamed and embarrassed, coughed to clear his throat and then shrugged his shoulders when they itched with apprehension. "No. No- no, he's not- It's nothing like that at all. He's just-" Anderson looked at the floor and, apparently to adjust his footing, fidgeted a bit until he could take a full breath of the comforting gas called oxygen to recover from the surprise. Afterwards he calmly met his father's unaffected gaze. Only seconds had passed during this change. "No. I want nothing to do with him. Just- under the circumstances…I took him here because he was sleeping at the school… And he begged me."
The last detail fed Anderson's superiority which had wavered for a moment, making the detail overly important. The father's brow twitched but showed no further reaction while his response was delayed.
Vlad, uncomfortable - and so, numbed for a minute - wandered around, wobbling with his anxiety held close in his crossed arms, holding himself, bobbing his head, sometimes straining to look at the stranger he now assumed to be Anderson's father and then deciding against it at the last moment. His indecision kept his feet moving, kept him wandering in the room behind the blonde teen.
"You can't bring in homeless people, Alex. You don't know what they have. If they have lice, fleas, other filth, or illnesses that-"
Vlad cut in at this, his chest bloated with sudden indignation that falsely inflated how much he valued himself. "I am very clean and very healthy, you jackass!" He spat out each word, expelling the built up outrage in bursts.
Taken aback by the abrupt eruption of feeling, Mr. Anderson didn't make any effort to finish what he had been saying. The man stared at Vlad as Anderson turned to glare at the gangster, the loathing returning to his eyes, burning, scowling - all of it hatred.
"He's stupid too." The cool, older eyes remarked, observing the pale teen who felt that his core had been struck a second time in one night.
"No!" Vlad snapped, snarling with the emotion - swelling, dangerous.
Anderson's scowl quivered as his eyes blazed, and large hands curled into fists, crackling unintentionally. "Shut up, just Shut. Up. Do yourself a favor for once and shut up. God! Why can't you do something so simple? Why do I have to ask?" With a heave of a breath, he saw that Vlad had backed off and now stood near the desk in front of the window. Uneasiness!- screamed Vlad's body language, making the Andersons content once they knew they were in control, that Vlad - like a wild animal - had been rightly subdued.
Now three reflections were shown in the panel of glass that acted as Alex Anderson's window: one reflection that was large and standing close to the window for some hope of escape, and two smaller ones that were the more daunting figures. Vlad placed his hand on the desk for no other reason than to feel the wood beneath his fingertips, creating the illusion that some type of shield stood between his weakened body and the two healthy Andersons. The anxiety made him sick as the restrained flood of emotions sloshed, threatening to spill, to allow some of the raw emotion to dribble down into Vlad's fragile form – a form with no ability to control itself.
The rain had returned and the window was crying. Tears rolled down behind the scene the glass reflected, mute while voices filled the room.
The crease beneath Mr. Anderson's mouth had deepened and stretched farther. What Vlad saw was two cold, extracting eyes. They seemed to pull answers from him, stripping him down – baring his wounds. "It's not my responsibility to take care of a ward of the State. Your parents are dead. You aren't my son. And you disrespect me in my own home and expect me to allow you to stay here? Are you a fool? A complete and total fool?"
"N-no." Vlad stammered out with a voice that sounded like a yelp of pain on top of a groan - a groan for the injuries that were being inflicted, strangely coagulating in deeper wounds while scratching at shallower cuts, allowing them to bleed freely.
While Vlad vibrated, trembling with rage and fear, from the last clanging insult and piercing threat, Mr. Anderson paused to assault the boy with his distaste ridden stare. And then, unexpectedly, he looked to his son and asked blankly, "Is he also a homosexual? Or gay, whichever is the politically correct term now."
This caused Anderson to flinch, and his mouth opened with no reply which was held back by the way his father had asked the question. The teeth gritted together briefly and then let the answer loose. "Yes-"
"-ANDERSON!" What was meant to be a roar blew out as a howling shriek as Vlad's face contorted, becoming ugly with wrath that could not be properly expelled through a body as incapable of destruction as Vlad's skeletal frame. Heaving ribs hidden under the oversized jacket held back the boy's fury, which wished to puncture what confined it so that it might fly at the blonde jock and strangle him – to hurt him, to almost kill him - but, in all ways, to make him pay. "YOU- YOU SON-OF-A-BITCH! YOU MOTHERF-ING WHORE! YOU DON'T TELL! YOU DON'T FUCKING TELL NOBODY! YOU STUPID GODDAMN FAG!"
Mr. Anderson watched, impressed by the pale boy's anger, having seen few other displays of the emotion that competed with Vlad's voice and swinging hands. It was what a span of accumulating stress seemed to be amounting to, though, the flood had yet to come. Vlad only teetered over the brink as his vision blinked, blind with anger.
Anderson's eyes had grown large to hold his powerful, outraged glare, nostrils flaring, a breath held in – growing hot as blood pumped hard in his veins. His head pulsed.
Mr. Anderson spoke to halt the step his son had already made towards Vlad. "Alex, no. …Stop." The command seemed like a bark, but the voice had been even with a reasonable volume. He switched his gaze from his son to Vlad when he saw that his boy would obey him. Amusement, or some thought, finally flittered over the man's expression, giving him an odd smirk that made Vlad snort and prepare another barrage of shrieking obscenities. "Homeless, homosexual, penniless, and stupid." Vlad's eyesight darkened as his head clotted with passion, but Mr. Anderson cleared the boy's vision gradually with his slow and gradual speech. "Tell me why I should feed you, keep you, or in other ways satisfy your needs. And with that…I could consider letting you stay in that room back there-" a hand lifted and vaguely motioned something that suggested a direction, "but at this point, you give me no reason to let you stay. 'Why?' is what I've been asking you kid, again and again. Tell me why." His head shook, rejecting anything that implied the effort would be too great.
Vlad's hands still shivered with emotion - his head rung with it - and this made his tone rough and biting. Some parts of his sentences were smooth while the ends were given a barbed tail that would snap back to prick the listeners. Vlad told them what Anderson already knew and what Mr. Anderson did not know, but throughout the speech, behind each responding expression or experienced emotion from Mr. Anderson, thoughts were kindled and they preserved details about Vlad and Mr. Anderson's opinion of the boy bright in the back of his mind, where a separate agenda was shaped. Mr. Anderson was disgusted by Vlad. He despised him, more than he had ever been repelled by the pregnant wife he had been forced to keep or the part of his life that was in some way infected with the disease- the family that had spawned from an unplanned pregnancy and a college girl that should never have continued to exist beyond one night. Yes, the misery the wretched red-eyed creature before him inspired was greater than anything that had ever resulted from the tie that linked Mr. Anderson to his resentful, callous wife who disliked the man as much as he disliked her. Despite these separate thoughts, he paid attention to what Vlad was saying.
"I am part of a band of merry fuckin' guys who I bet you and all the other damn stupid bastards in this goddamn world see as turds. -You're all shit, you know it. -And these guys are my friends. But we jus'…jus' got in a bit of a fight. There's trouble between me and them, and them- they ain't too merry or friendly anymore. Alright?- you stupid son-of-a-bitch- I,- goddamn it- I would be able to talk nice if you hadn't gone and said so much fucking shit about me! It's your own fault! And well- And anyway- And, yeah, so, hell. They wanna go on an' hunt down another stupid, dirty fag- And yeah, I am a dirty, goddamn freaken faggot like that asshole right there! You got me, bitch, you got me! Secret's wooo-! Outta the bag! And because of all that, they aim to somehow get to me, and then end me. Because stupid faggot son-of-a-bitches get thrown down dead in ditches, 'cuz that's how the rhyme and the rule an' law of life works folks. That's how it fucking works! THAT'S HOW, BITCHES! That's how! And now are you gonna throw me out?- cuz you might as well shoot me up now and toss out the body. That's all that's gonna happen if I have no place to go. You throw me out-" a white finger, boney and shaking, stabbed at the Andersons, hoping to spear their consciences, "I'm gonna die. …I'll die like a rat thrown on the ground and stepped on an' then torn up by a freaken horde of mangy-bastard cats and dogs and shit. And then the rat gets eated- It's gooone. I'm gone." A sick smile curled up the slope of Vlad's cheek as he paused. His voice lowered, almost crooning at points. "But you fuckers would like that, wouldn't you? …Ya would looove to see me get eaten and shat out- You'd all throw a fancy, rich-ass party here in yer rich-ass house with all yer rich-ass friends, all disgusting and fat and greasy wit' all their goddamn fucktard money. …" Vlad's head bent down, eyes narrowing and growing more resentful within their glower. The teen snorted, his mouth a scowl. "You people-" he spat the words again, twisting them with a tone rank with ill feeling, "You people- You make me sick." The pale hands quivered, holding onto the stomach of the black jacket, clutching the extra cloth- cloth, warmth, a shelter that traveled with him- given to him by his best friend. The one that had the strongest incentive to kill him.
Anger made time faster for Vlad as his head swirled, so it seemed that the four words were given immediately, but the man had waited a significant amount of time. Mr. Anderson was scowling.
"I don't want you." It was silent as the sentence tolled.
Vlad was silent… because he was empty. His mind was blank. He couldn't consume the enormity of the statement that had only taken a second to be voiced. And then Mr. Anderson went on.
"You can leave. My son will drop you off at whatever crack house you crawled out of, kid. You're crazy, and I don't want you. Talk to whoever you pissed off. Those scumbags are the only ones that will help you. You're nuts, the way you talk- the way you ask me for a favor. I want you out of my house." And he turned, leaving Vlad as a staring shell, and gestured to his son, communicating permission, freedom. "Alex, get your car keys and bring your cell phone. Go."
Go…
Vlad said nothing, did nothing. He moved when Anderson touched his shoulder and led him in the direction of leaving the room, of getting the teen's shoes, and then Anderson stood beside him to make sure Vlad continued to walk down the stairs, and then over the tiles, down the hall, through the door, into the garage and eventually the car. Anderson was just reflecting on how quiet the gangster was, the absence of resistance, when he recalled the stuffed cat and the weed. Green eyes took a moment to look at Vlad in the backseat, and found him dejected and gazing blankly into space that happened to be filled with the back of the passenger seat.
Anderson was gone for a few minutes and then returned with the brown cat. He handed it to Vlad but received no response. He jingled the cat, making the beads ring, and red listless eyes shifted to it. When Vlad didn't take it and Anderson had run out of patience, the jock draped the cat over a boney knee and then turned around. The car started. The garage opened. Rain hit and beaded down the windows. The window that reflected Vlad streamed tears.
Thunder pummeled the air in the distance as rain was parted by the windshield wipers, waving back and forth, back and forth- thunder- no lightning. The car continued to drive, heading for the city.
The rain fell harder. The thunder grew louder. The windshield wipers sliced sheets of water. And then thunder cracked and white flame lit the clouds and daggered down to strike some distant ground.
Behind the colossal crack, the walls protecting Vlad's core splintered and then crumbled. And the flood came in, pouring in- pouring, unceasingly welling and running from his eyes- to escape. Anderson noticed after a while and pitied Vlad a little, now that he was getting rid of the freak. His words were meant to be helpful.
"Maybe no one cares anymore? It's been, what… two weeks? And what makes you so sure they're all angry, or that anyone would even notice you? I'll drop you off at some friend's house. You have other friends, right?"
Vlad only sobbed.
Anderson moved his hands over the steering wheel, pressing his thumb into the hardened leather. Vlad was making him uncomfortable. The freak was just overreacting. It had never been his responsibility to take care of Vlad anyway. He was just getting rid- …letting the freak go. The little freak would go off and find out what he should do on his own, like he should. Like he should.
Anderson glanced up at his rearview mirror again and then swallowed and looked at the road, moving his fingers uncomfortably. Vlad was hunched over and it was dark, but the dark, obscure shape coupled with the sniveling, whining sounds were too much. Anderson could deal with them separately, but not together. He couldn't look at Vlad, so instead he watched the rain fall through the beams from his headlights as the yellow divider markers glowed and rose out of the black road as soon as light hit them.
"Where do you want me to take you? I'll take you wherever. Do you have a friend to go too?"
Anderson was forced to fidget in discomfort and switch on the radio for a few minutes, but eventually a croak reached the front of the car and a tan hand turned down the volume on the radio. He asked Vlad to repeat himself.
"Yeah." Sniffling and filled with a sob. Anderson shuddered internally, shaking off a chill by shaking his head, clearing it.
"Who- or I mean, where do you want me to go? I need some directions in order to do anything. We're close to the exit we want. Where do I go from there?"
The crying had faded. Only sniffing, nose-on-sleeve wiping sounds were heard. "Um-" Anderson's eye twitched as he heard Vlad smear more snot into his sleeves. "Um, um ummm." Sniff. Vlad gasped but a shudder that ran up from his spine made another gasp necessary. When he found his voice, he sighed and leaned back. For the first time since he'd entered the car, his head touched the back of his seat. Red drifted to the streaks of water running at an angle from his window, which was his because he was sitting beside it, the only one using it, and the only person partially reflected in it.
Staring into the rain, his breathing came under his control again and he managed to breathe with one nostril and then his mouth. The teen sighed, recognizing how close they were to the exit, how close they were to the city.
"Yeah, um-" His voice cracked, so he cleared it and then swallowed. Anderson waited, watching the road quietly. Vlad wiped at his nose again. "Um, can- can I just tell you where to go when we get off the highway?"
Anderson took a breath, unaware that Vlad had taken a similar breath at the same moment. He moved a stiff shoulder. "Yeah. That's fine, but tell me so that I know before I get to an intersection that I have to turn right or left or whatever, clear? You understand what I mean?"
A black sleeve was wiping at a pale nose so the reply was delayed ford was calmer now that he had been drained. For now, a form of hope had numbed his reason, dulling what told him to be afraid. Thoughts came to him, influenced by what both of the Andersons had told him. So he pondered. "Hey, Anderson." The driver glanced at the rearview mirror to see Vlad watching his lap, but the gangster didn't wait for the blonde to speak. "You think if I really go and just talk to my- a friend….that…that it'd jus' work out? I mean, like I apologize and other stuff. Since- since," he seemed hurried for a moment to expel the explanation jammed in his throat, "Since him and me have been friends for a long, long time. A long time. And…and he's been all…like my closest friend for most of my life, I think. And he's helped me out so many times and all. He gave me food, a place to sleep and stay, and- and- and he even gave me his old clothes and got stuff from other people too. Like- like this is his jacket here." Vlad knew that Anderson couldn't see it, though he had pulled up some of the excess cloth to display it. "The one I'm wearing- and it's my favorite." Vlad's chin fell to his chest, his eyes picking up the details of the plain black jacket, picking out threads he imagined seeing or saw in the light from buildings outside. Where he held it in his hand, a pale thumb rubbed the cloth, small circles, coaxing out memories.
"He was the first guy to ever help me out after my parents died, and all that…" Vlad trailed off when Anderson interrupted his reverie. The pale face looked up.
"Hey, are you keeping track of where we are? I'm driving blind here. Remember, I have no idea where we're going. You need to tell me where to turn."
"Um…" Vlad looked out the window and determined, from a collection of restaurant names, where they were, and he instructed Anderson to turn at "the next-next light, the one after this next one you see up there" and then risked examining his jacket again.
The driver and passenger sat in silence. Anderson broke it for a moment. "If you were close to your friend and you really believe that you guys had a strong friendship, I'm…I'm sure it would work out- that it will work out between you two."
Vlad was slumped in his seat, his mind going quiet. He spotted the brown cat on his knee and decided to stuff it in his pocket for safekeeping. Then, red stared out the streaming glass beside him.
It was not long before the car stopped, pulling up to a sidewalk where red paint marked the curb and kept it free. Vlad sat in the car and stared out the window, spying a specific door. Anderson had twisted around in his seat and was watching Vlad, waiting for the boy to go.
"Well, this is it then. Adios. Everything goes back to normal now. When we go back to school, you'll be with your people, I'll be with mine…you won't talk to me and I won't talk to you- All the good stuff." Yeah. Tan hands patted the steering wheel.
Vlad still did not move. His fingers massaged the end of his jacket as he watched the door. Rain beat down while Anderson frowned and his eyes narrowed as he heard his windshield wipers continue to sweep.
"Do I have to drag you out myself?" There was no response. Anderson decided to take a shot at Vlad's pride. "Well," a sigh seemed to lift up a tremendous, though imaginary, load, "I guess I'll have to drag you out. Damn, but you're a real coward, Freak. And I drove you all the way out here, and now I have to get out, in the rain, get all wet, and personally drag you out of my car. I mean, come on now. Who-"
The door opened, a sound that made Anderson smile. A hand seemingly grabbed at the air, a wave sending Vlad off, a quick 'Bye-Bye' for the teen who entered the rain and then shut the door slowly, hanging onto the handle. Vlad stared at the car, feeling the cold sap his precious warmth at an alarming rate, icy fingers holding onto the door, refusing to release it even after Vlad heard the door lock.
A moment of doubt and panic- A wet palm pounded on the window, the dark mirror showing Vlad's stricken expression, the sudden terror. "Ander-!" Vlad was jerked forward roughly and made to release the handle as the car drove up along the curb, splashing puddles and splitting the stream running down the side of street. It returned to the road with Vlad's troubled stare trailing it, watching two red lights disappear with the car, the lights that disappeared with Anderson. Rain washed over Vlad's face, soaking his clothes that began to cling to his body for warmth. Warmth…
Vlad looked back at the door, noticing details such as the rain that struck the sidewalk and leapt back into the air, falling again and failing to rise. The surrendering water losing its spirit… Warmth came to Vlad's mind in pleasant waves of memories, some of which had been placed in the apartment that rose behind the sidewalk he stood on. This was his friend. His best friend, who cared for him and looked out for him. The friend he…he loved. Yes, it- it could all work out just fine. Just talking to him would make stuff better. It had only been a kiss…it could just be called an accident…a misunderstanding. It was easy. He had been high. He hadn't been thinking clearly. …And there it was…the perfect excuse. It would work out. It would be easy.
But taking a step towards the door was hard. Vlad's hand snuck into his pocket to squeeze and then hold onto the brown cat named Brownie, which was funny because it reminded Vlad of pot brownies- And with these thoughts going through his head, he walked across the sidewalk, up a few steps, and stood before the door, his hand lifting to reach for the doorbell.
When it opened, a deafening thrill blotted out Vlad's mind; his heart, which had already been racing, beat like mad, beating out of his chest, blocking off his throat so it was hard to breathe and impossible to speak. And Vlad greeted the surprised, towering figure with an awkward grin, fear in his eyes, and his left hand squeezing his stuffed cat desperately.
It took a while for the man to process what he was seeing, and then his brow pinched, his mouth became crooked, and he leaned down slightly as if to get a better look at his visitor. His eyes squinted and then returned to their normal size, blinking. "You?" A deep voice asked, amazed and disturbed.
The voice, something familiar- A familiar face! He was so happy and so scared. So scared, so happy, he wanted to hug the man as much as he wanted to run away, dive under a car, and hide. All Vlad could do was make his grin bigger, adding a flare of hope, a touch of happiness in one indented cheek. His eyes glinted with hope, hope that yearned to change into relief.
But then the eyes, dark brown, so familiar…they darkened, pupils constricted, the eyes narrowed…a glare. Vlad's smile fell and he cringed back and away from the expression. His own eyes now widened with only fear and pain.
Those eyes. Those eyes- his eyes. So much hatred! So much hatred, it could kill him!
And then a hand caught the excess cloth of the jacket, a jacket it itself had once placed on its own body, and with a strength that ripped Vlad's feet from the ground and the air from his lungs, the hand tossed him into the hallway to fall beside the sheen of fake tiles that marked the kitchen floor. The door shut with a crack like thunder, and the giant's glare pierced the teen like lightening. The footsteps continued the rolling thunder as sparks shot from the stormy black eyes; Vlad, at first frozen in shock and awe, was gaping from the floor. When another large hand reached down to grab him, the skinny teen finally attempted to escape and crawl away, but by that time it was already too late. As the same strength that had thrown him brought him to his feet, Vlad's lingering strand of hope glistened for an instant.
"Jake."
The giant paused, meeting the red gaze, and then his eyes glanced down to his hand. He noticed the pale fingers holding it, cold and clammy, holding his hand. The anger returned in a faint low growl. Vlad's last bit of hope was snapped in half as he was pushed half of the way and then dragged into the living space beyond the kitchen and then crammed down into a corner beside a cage. While Jake glowered from his immense height with hatred and disgust, causing Vlad to forget any plans he had about claiming the kiss was a misunderstanding, little snouts and curious eyes appeared between the bars of the cage. The friendly little rats had come to investigate all the commotion and now they watched, oblivious of the mood, as their owner spoke to the pale one who had so often brought them food and held them and petted them. They liked Vlad, and were now trying to get his attention so that he would play with them.
Jake's fist twisted the black hair he used to pull Vlad's face up so that the wincing, dread filled eyes would look at him. He prepared to speak, but Vlad's voice came first. It was a murmur that quickly became a whisper that caused the man's glare to recoil. "Jake…? … …Jake…? … …Jake…" With a full view of the white face, the fear, the fear of him- Jake forced the head down into the carpet, meaning only to hide it. He couldn't look at it… He couldn't look at the kid's face…Hell Dog's face when the kid was saying his name like that…like he was…was it begging? Was it-? He didn't want to think about it. He tightened his grip on Vlad's hair and didn't stop after the boy yelped and told him it hurt.
"Jake, stop. Jake, stop! Stop!"
No, that wouldn't do either. The rumbling voice shook the teen and Vlad's body cowered into the carpet, panicked whining noises coming from thin lips while the giant of a man spoke. "Don't move. Stay here. Don't say a word, do you understand? -You understand punk? -Do you understand?"
A whine said yes, which allowed Jake to let go of the matted hair, glare at the pathetic creature on the floor, and then hurry off to another room. Along the way, he realized that something was caught in his fingers. When he inspected the foreign thing, he realized that it was a collection of black strands of hair. Hell Dog's hair…long…black…pulled from his scalp…
With unexplainable fury, Jake threw the hair away from himself, wishing to see it crash into the wall and shatter into countless tiny splinters he would never be able to see again though the strands could only sift down to land on the carpet in his room - the beige threads that did not hide the black strands. No, not in the least bit were they hidden. Damn. The giant stared, glowered, and then grit his teeth. His stride was swift across the room. A violent motion ripped out a drawer, pulling it free from the dresser so that the contents scattered over the floor. Jake snarled at the mess, too angry to do anything but feel yet more anger, to land heavily on his knees and to snatch up a bundle of cloth and tear at it, unwrapping it savagely with a fearsome snarl.
There was frustration in his anger. Much frustration, coming from what had happened, coming from the drawer, from the cloth that wouldn't unwrap fast enough, from what he would have to do to a kid he'd watched grow up over the years, a kid he'd stuck his neck out for countless times, who he'd done favors for, who he'd treated with patience and generosity and-
Goddamn that little bastard! GODDAMN HIM! A homo! All these years, all these years, when he'd given the kid his old clothes…other friends' old clothes… That twisted, disgusting little fag! Damn him. Damn him! Why? Why did it have to be this poor, stupid bastard? Damn it!
Jake had folded, sitting on his heels, his hands holding the cloth, his forehead touching the cool metal of his pistol, an old, unused gift from his father… Wincing as he recalled the need to be quick, Jake reluctantly found the bullets. He shoved what was necessary into the gun, kept the safety on, and left the room.
Vlad who had been forced to lie in an uncomfortable and unnatural position on the floor, his body twisted oddly, flinched and moved away from the cage without thinking when a tiny, four-fingered hand pulled at his hair. He stared, face to face with the rat that had just attempted to make his hair into a snack. Little feet and little paws were holding onto the bars, another rat peering up at him from the floor of the cage. His mind empty with fear, incapable of formulating an escape or even sustaining the will to run for the door, Vlad lifted an unsteady finger and gently petted the friendly rodent's tummy. Petting the little rat, petting it, petting it, saying goodbye, gently, without words, without conscious knowledge of what he was doing.
Jake's anger escalated when he returned to find Vlad playing with his rat. He shoved the gun against the boy's head, hurting him, pulling him up, telling him to walk to the door. Jake opened it and then lowered the gun so that it hovered in front of Vlad's spine. He ordered the boy to go to the car. "Don't do anything." The deep growl hunched the teen's shoulders which reacted with fear. "Don't make a sound."
Vlad was led to Jake's car where he waited for it to be unlocked and then failed to resist or struggle when he was shoved over the driver's seat, into the passenger's seat, and then down on the floor beneath the glove compartment. Vlad moved, crushed, afraid and sore. His head hit the glove compartment after Jake got into the car. The giant growled at him and then slammed the car door shut. The gun rested in Jake's lap as the car entered the road.
Still stunned and not taken in completely by what was happening, Vlad shook but did little else. At one time he managed to look at Jake and find his voice. "Where are we going?" Numbness was still affecting his reason.
"Shut up." The low voice snapped from above.
Vlad couldn't stop. His head was light, his mind was floating away, like a balloon, a little red balloon in the sky- where was his string? "W-where're we going, Jake?"
Blunt teeth ground together while hands crushed the lack of life out of the steering wheel, a vice that could not be loosened for a few seconds. Luckily the road was straight here. "I told you to SHUT UP! You don't talk! You don't make a sound! -And you don't fuckin' move around, goddamn it!"
Vlad had hit the back of his head on the glove compartment again. It was obvious to Jake that the setup was sloppy, rushed, unplanned. He should have tied Vlad up and stored him in the trunk. This…this was just stupid on his part. If it had been any other person, someone who actually possessed a working mind, they could have escaped…or done something… Jake felt that everything he was doing was being done too quickly, in a panic. Vlad was skinny, but he still had a hard time fitting into the space Jake had stuffed him into. The man was tempted to invite Vlad to make himself more comfortable by adjusting the seat so that he would have more room on the floor, but that seemed foolish, stupid, dumb, and idiotic. He didn't give a damn about what the fag wanted. He was just a little confused because he was used to seeing Vlad as his little buddy, the little kid that followed him around and hung out with him…who'd been fun to be with sometimes…
Vlad hit his head again when the car dipped and then rose with the uneven road. Jake barked curses at him and Vlad shrunk down, but he couldn't help it when another bump made him hit his head again.
A gun was pointed at the white face as Jake drove with one hand, a snarl on the murderous giant's lips. …It was a nice gun. …It was a shiny gun. …And Vlad had admired it at one point. Now his heart knocked brutally against his ribs at the mere sight of it, all previous feelings discarded. The teen bent his head to avoid having the gun directly in his face as Jake raised his voice again, yelling- yelling some more, all things and words Vlad could not comprehend right now. There was a gun and they were driving somewhere and he didn't know where and Jake was going to kill him. And Jake was going to kill him. And Jake was going to kill him. And-
Vlad imagined a wet forest. The walk. The shot. The hole that would bleed. The hole he would be buried in, forgotten or hated forever. Though he didn't hear the words, the yelling voice added to the teen's stress. Emotions built. They welled and spilled out in tears and new sobs, new shudders, much stronger than those he'd experienced in Anderson's car.
Anderson… He had no thoughts of the jock. He had faded completely from Vlad's mind.
All Vlad thought about was the gun, Jake, where they were going, and where he would be buried.
Jake shouted and threatened to shoot the boy if he didn't shut up, but Vlad continued and Jake knew he couldn't shoot Vlad in his car. Hell, he wasn't sure if he could shoot Vlad at all… A mess. This was all a big fucking mess.
Jake returned the gun to his lap and fished a cellphone from his pants pocket. Vlad continued to cry, hiccupping now, with no idea of where the gun was, barely caring about where it was as he became consumed by the knowledge that at some point in time it would shoot him. It didn't matter if it was now or in an hour. The thought of his inevitable death tortured him. His sobs were not outrageously loud. They consisted of low whimpers, whines, hiccups, shudders, and sniffles. His eyes were shut. It took Vlad a while before he realized the car had stopped on the side of the rode while Jake was making more phone calls. The discussions were lost to the bewildered boy on the floor who hit another level of despair when he mistook the stop to be their final destination.
Here he let out a strangled, "Oh God!" and cried loudly, with a shameful wail that was beaten down by Jake's heavier roar for silence. Whimpers remained on the floor, easing when Vlad was surprised by movement as the car returned to the road.
"Jake- Jake, where're we going? Huh? Wh-where're we going, Jake?"
"Shut up! I told you to shut up!"
"But where? Wh-"
"Shut up! Damn it! Do I have to shoot you to get you to be quiet? Do I? Because I'm prepared to blast your fucking brains out if you don't SHUT UP!" The pistol was in the hand that beat down on the steering wheel.
Whines, weeping, and whimpers. "Jake-"
"For the love of God, shut up! I'll strangle you! I swear to God I'll reach down there and break your freaken neck, Hell Dog- faggot! Oh, you goddamn, disgusting fag!" He ranted to cover up the mistake he had made in calling the boy by his nickname. The man was overwhelmed, stumbling in a realm he had never entered before- flailing in a nature that was not his own. "All this time you've been being a faggot and doing fag things behind my back! You little bastard! You disgusting little bastard!" The ranting made less and less sense, but it didn't matter. It still broke Vlad, words thrashing him again and again until he began to cry for forgiveness.
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"
"Shut up! Sorry means shit! Shit, shit, shit! Shut up!"
They had stopped at a light. The pistol was in his lap. Jake managed to land a blow on top of Vlad's skull with the bottom of his fist. Vlad's vision darkened at the edges and squirming sparks speckled the rim - while he had become silent. The crying returned only once more, and was again silenced by a heavy fist to the head.
In the darkness, an unkept building came into view at the end of a private, gravel road that had sent Vlad's bruised head into the glove compartment more times than he could count…if he could remember how to count by the time the car stopped. The boy didn't even notice when Jake got out of the car and disappeared for a minute or two before returning. He didn't notice the other voices that reached him when the passenger door was wrenched open and he was pulled out to land roughly on the unsympathetic rocks that dug into and bruised his knees and whatever they touched. Rain stabbed at him from an angle. Thin, daggered spikes sharpened by the wind, instead of fat droplets.
Then…he saw them…all of them…the bodies…them. …And his fear grew to immeasurable proportions.
It was hysteria.
He screamed and begged as he was dragged into the warehouse, arching his back, writhing, shrieking - his pleading mixing with various laughs when they were inside, the emptiness providing a clamoring, building echo. Jake had passed him on to someone else. Someone kicked him. Someone joined in to drag him by his hair, another by his arm. Vlad was struggling. No thoughts. Instinct. Struggle. Scream. Bite. Kick. He was forced into a chair and tied down temporarily as the collection of faces Vlad found horrifyingly familiar, grouped together to get a good view of him.
One man stepped forward. A cane…or a bar…hard wood... Vlad's eyes stared, wide, unblinking- his lips parted, panting- his brow wrinkled- his eyes red, already a little puffy from tears- the bones in his shoulders shaking with horror as the large black shape became a familiar figure whose muscled arms held the bar of wood back -and then swung it forward faster than Vlad's eyes could track. It was as if the wood disappeared for an instant.
But there was no need to track it. Pain told Vlad everything that had happened after the blunt power of the blow slammed into him, rolling his head back, flinging his mind summersaulting miles away before the pain sucked it back into his head. That pain and the immediate flow of torrential blood that stained what it passed as it surged from his wounds, told him that the wood had landed across his teeth. He sagged forward, a gurgle in the back of his throat, gaging and choking on some of his own blood, red eyes, dripping tears. He stared at his lap where blood dropped from his mouth, where his tongue pushed shards that fell through vacant, bleeding spaces. He saw teeth, like white bits of bone, leave as the debris of ruin carried by the blood river that slipped off his lips or pearled on his chin. The blood was hot. The warmth scared him- he was losing his internal heat, the life kept inside his body. The flow slowed, and then crimson droplets fell steadily - dripping, splattering, the black jacket drinking the red and then allowing it to make a small pool - and a great moan of guttural misery and nauseating despair heaved in Vlad's rattling chest and churning innards, whipping and pitching the fragments of his heart beaten and broken down by the backlash of severed ties that had once connected him to these people, these people who had acted as his connection to the world.
Without looking up, while hearing laughs and praise for the gruesome damage, chains rattling in the background, his thoughts turned from his own wretchedness to the man who had just finalized the boy's desolation, his isolation on this Earth.
Jake's dad had never liked him. Vlad had always known that, since the first time he'd met the man.
It was kind of like how he'd always known Jake was special.
His thoughts moved back sluggishly, hearing chains as his head spun, unable to lift it for the pain. The pain. The pain. The agonizing pain. Throbbing, throbbing, sharp, biting, PAIN, IT WAS DESTROYING HIM! OHHH-! He screamed.
God help me.
*~*~::..+..::~*~*
Part two of this 14,564 word chapter will be posted tomorrow...unless I decide to add more to it.