Jesus gets out of his bed, throwing the covers aside. I am so glad he doesn't sleep naked, that would be awkward. I slide through the rest of the window and stand before him in the darkness of his room.
"What the hell are you doing?" He whispers as he steps closer to me.
"I needed to get back in." I say stepping past him away from the window.
"No shit. I mean what are you doing coming through my window?" he says reaching past me as I move and shutting the window before more rain enters.
"Everything was locked." I shrug.
He glances at the clock. "Really? Who would've thought at 4am things would be locked," he yell whispers.
I calmly begin to walk to the door trying not to act any different than my usual self, although I was still a bit upset from earlier. "Ok, ok, sorry. I'm just going to go to my own room and let you ge-"
Jesus grabs my wrist to stop me from opening the door and I wince. I guess my wrist must have been a bit bruised by Ty's physicalness. I hadn't noticed till now.
"Wait," he leans over, my wrist still in hand, and flips on the lights, "you're not getting away that easily. Why are you getting back so late?"
I turn around and look at him. What did he want me to say? Yeah well see Jesus, I just went out for a fun night in the city with my my old friend Kayla, who wants to kill me, to have friendly conversation with my former boss, drug dealer, and murder, Kenny. Unfortunately Kenny couldn't make it because he was being held up elsewhere so I met his new main man Ty who smells like cheap cologne and beer. After Ty payed Kayla a nice amount of cash to resolve a debt of some sort she left me hanging which lead to myself and Ty having a thrilling conversation to say the least. Unfortunately for him, it ended abruptly when I had to force him to stop trying to rape me. After that fun time I went to a bar where I proceeded to puke my guts out in a nasty bathroom. I later made friends with the bartender who called me a taxi and I rode home. Using my emergency twenty dollars I had, I made it 15 minutes from here. I walked the rest of the way home in the lovely rain we are having. I arrived and decided that your room was the best way to get back inside before I caught phenomena or was caught by Lena or Stef. Time just got away from me,Jesus.
Yeah, I was totally going to tell him that.
Not.
"I just went out with a lost track of time." I say quietly.
"Is this friend that girl from before? Kayla?" he asks, but I say nothing. "That's the one you got into a fight with a few weeks ago right?"
I'm stunned, "how-" he cuts me off, "Callie told me because she was worried about you. I see you more of the time at school so she asked me to keep an eye on you because she was worried you could have had a concussion from the punch she slammed into your face."
"Nice to know people can keep a secret around here." I mumble and decide to sit down in the chair to my left. My hood accidently falls off, revealing my disheveled state. He squats down in front of me.
"What the hec happened to you?" He whispers looking me in the eyes. The only physical sign of trauma was the bump and cut on my head, but that was buried within my hair, I am pretty sure it was only visible if you were looking for it. He must have been seeing the defeated look I had seen before plastering my face back at the bar in the bathroom. That or I actually looked more beat up than I thought.
"Nothing happened Jesus." I say and get up from the chair making my way towards the door. He grabs my wrist again and I wince.
"If you don't tell me I'm getting moms," he said sincerely, but forcefully like he really meant it.
I turn around to face him once more, "Look Jesus I'm okay, there is no need to tell your moms."
He shook his head at me. "No Cori. You don't look ok to me."
He only had known me for what? A little more than a month? How could he possibly know when I'm good and not good. I shouldn't have come to his room, he was making this whole thing a bigger deal than it needed to be.
"Jesus, I am fine." I was getting a bit angry now,but I continued to keep my voice a whisper level.
"No you are not."
"Yes I am."
"No you're not." In one quick step he goes past me and opens the door about to walk through it himself. Crap. I pull him back in the room and quietly shut the door. He was just about to tell the moms.
"Fine, fine you really want to know?" I was going to have to make up some stuff on the spot because I couldn't really tell him what happened tonight.
"Yes." He sits on his bed and I begin to talk.
"Um so you were right about Kayla, she came over today to tell me some people I know needed to talk to me." Off to a good start, that's not a lie. Susan the therapist did say I should try to stop lying to people.
"So I decided to go with her, I thought we were just going to meet up somewhere local, but instead she said we had to go talk to these guys in the city. She drove me there and we went and ahh talked to them."
"So yo-"
"Can I finish before the questions?"
He nods and I resume talking as I sit down in his chair.
"So we go and talk to these three guys and after a while the conversation gets pretty heated and ahh Kayla got really mad and she stormed out. One of the guys went after her, to try to fix something he said, but my guess, she was probably long gone. The other two guys I was left with, started to get really pissed at each other and they started like fighting. They looked like they were trying to kill each other so I decided to um try to break it up. When I went to go push one of the guys away from the other, he accidentally pushed me into a wall pretty hard. The fighting stopped though when he saw um what he had done. They tried to say sorry and stuff and ask if I needed a ride home because Kayla was gone, but I told them to forget about it and I left. Umm I then got a taxi, but I only had a 20 so he only could get me close to here. I walked the rest of the way and you know the rest."
"Were these guys drug dealers?" He asks. I shrug.
"Yeah, umm they offered me a job, but I told them no. I told them I couldn't and I wouldn't because I was done with that crap."
"What did they say to that?"
"Ahh you know they just like tried to convince me because I was the best and they wanted the best back."
He nodded.
"Then they started fighting about some stuff that I didn't um completely follow and that was the end of it."
"Did they hurt you?" He asked getting up from the bed.
"Na, not really." I tell him shaking my head.
"They threw you against the wall and you're trying to tell me you came out unscathed?"
"I just have a bruise on my shoulder. That's it."
He gives me one of those I don't believe you looks and stands in front if me without saying anything. He wasn't going to give up. I sigh and slip my hoodie off my shoulders and swivel around so he can see my bruised shoulder."
"Crap," he whispers and pokes it.
"Don't poke it!" I whisper yell and turn back around.
"Sorry sorry, it just- it looks bad. Your shoulder looks like a hamburger."
"Oh nice. Thanks Jesus." I say, rolling my eyes. He laughs a little.
"Can I go get some sleep now?" I ask him. He nods and opens the door for me.
"Just promise you won't go out again with them."
"I promise...and your not going to tell Stef and Lena?"
"Nope."
"Thanks."
I go back to my room and lay down on my bed. I barely have enough energy to get undressed, but I slip of my shoes and socks, placing my fosters dads badge on the nightstand, and take off my jeans and hoodie and throw them somewhere in my room. I crawl under the covers and fall asleep and for once I had no nightmares. I guess that's just how exhausted I was.
The next morning my alarm clock woke me up with those annoying screeching beeps.I shut it off and proceeded to get up out of my bed. Then my body remembers what it went through last night. My whole body feels sore and my head hurts like crazy. I groan and fall back unto my nice soft pillow. I lay there for a while until my alarm clock goes off again telling me I really need to get up. I pretty much literally roll out of bed and grab a towel and clothes and go to the bathroom. I knock on the door and nobody was in there which was good because I had no patience to wait. I go in and shut the door. I take off my tank top and realize I never took of my necklace from last night. I take it off and place the wedding rings on the sink and I turn on the shower. As it gets hot I look in the mirror. I turn to see my bruised shoulder. Jesus was right, it did look like a hamburger. Thanks Ty. I lean closer and part my hair so I can see the bump on my head. The bleeding had stopped last night, so there was just a leftover cut and bump, concealed by my dark hair, thankfully. I look down at my legs. My thighs had two round bruises on them, one on each leg from where Ty dug his knees in to keep me from moving. I turn away, strip off my remaining undergarments and hop into the shower. The hot water stings my body at first, but then its all right. I let the water beat down on my shoulder and after about 15 minutes in the shower I get out. I throw on a bra and underwear, dry my hair with the hair dryer and begin to put on my makeup. As I reach in the cabinet to grab my makeup stuff I notice the bruises on my wrist from Ty's strong grip. They were nowhere near as bad as the one on my back, but they were definitely visible. It was just going to be another thing I had to hide. I continue on with what I was doing and as I lean into the mirror to put on some eyeliner the door opens and I jump a little. I see Callie through the mirror and I immediately turn around trying to hide my back from her, but then realize it was no use because of the bruises on the front of my thighs.
"Oh! Sorry Cori I," she stops for a second, "I didn't realize you were in here. I'm sorry I'll come back later."
"Ok." I tell her, not really knowing what to say. She leaves the bathroom and shuts the door. This time I lock it after her and go back to finishing my makeup. I didn't need someone else barging in on me. I hope she didn't see notice my bruises, even though it was a slim chance. I felt like Callie would definitely tell Stef and Lena considering how she already asked Jesus to watch out for me. This was not going to be good. I finish my makeup, throw on the rest of my clothes (a long sleeved light shirt and jeans to cover everything) and my wedding ring necklace and leave the bathroom. I go back into my room, dropping my old clothes and towel in the laundry bin. I grab my backpack and head down stairs. As I head down stairs I pass Jesus' room. I hear voices as I pass and decide to listen in, it was Jesus and Callie.
"Why does Cori have all those bruises Jesus?"
Callie was always so protective. Especially of her little brother Jude. I didn't really get it, well I got the Jude thing but I mean why was she so protective over me? I'm not her sister or anything.I can fend for myself.
"Well I don't really know if I should tell you."
There was a pause and then Jesus continued talking. "Look, she snuck out last night and she had to break up a fight after Kayla left her."
"Jesus, I asked you to keep an eye on her."
"Well its not my fault she got that bruise on her shoulder, don't get mad at me!"
"Jesus, she has more than the bruise covering her shoulder."
"What?"
"She has them everywhere."
"She said that the guy accidentally pushed her into a wall, she only showed me her shoulder. Are you sure? Maybe there from her field hockey or something."
"Jesus, those types of bruises, they don't get there like that." Callie says getting quieter.
"You don't think." Jesus says getting quiet as well. The stop talking for a minute.
"We got to tell moms." Jesus says.
"Before we do that, let me talk to her. Maybe I'm wrong, I hope I'm wrong."
"Callie" he begins to say but then goes quiet.
If they talked to Stef and Lena I could totally count on packing my bags tonight. Lena explicitly said no drugs whatsoever and then what do I do? I go out with Kayla, a druggy, to go meet a drug dealer. Pretty sure that crosses the no drug line and unfortunately there are bruises to prove it all happened. I was screwed.
"Just don't say anything yet Jesus ok?"
With that I decide to head downstairs for breakfast before they come out and find me snooping. I drop my bag at the base of the stairs and plop down at the table after grabbing some orange juice. I then realize that I had brought my bag down stairs for nothing considering it was a saturday morning.I look at the clock 8:12. I literally could have slept for another 2 hours if I wanted to.
"Your up early Cori. How do you want your eggs sweets?" Stef said facing me.
Stef and Lena have actually started treating me like I was one of their own daughters recently. I can't complain or anything because its nice be treated like that, but it was definitely different and it was going to make it that much harder to leave to go to a different foster home when I have to leave. At first I liked it here because it wasn't close to that part of the city where I used to live, but now I actually started to like it because it wasn't not only safe, but the people were really caring too. For the first time, it definitely was going to be hard to leave. I look back at Stef, to continue our mini conversation, almost blanking out o her for a second.
I shrug and take a sip of my juice. "Whatever is easiest." To be honest I actually hated eggs, but I always ate them because I didn't want to get on Stef or Lena's bad side. I get up from the table and go over to the medicine box. My head had been killing me ever since I woke up this morning, so I decided to try some advil to stop the headache. Steph glances over at me.
"What are you grabbing Cori?" She asks kindly.
"I just have a bit of a headache, so I'm grabbing some advil. I think I must be getting sick or something."
She walks over to me and places a hand on my forehead, which hurt even though she wasn't' actually touching the bump I had.
"You do feel a little warm, maybe you are coming down with a cold or something." Power of suggestion I guess because I didn't actually feel sick at all, just sore. She walks back over to the stove where she was making breakfast and I sit down at the table. I take my advil and then eat my eggs slowly and carelessly. We get into a conversation about school and field hockey and then she changes the subject to Kayla.
"So your friend Kayla, was it nice seeing her last night?"
"Umm yeah. It was good."
"She in the same foster home as you right?"
"Yeah." I go along with it cause honestly I didn't quite remember what Kayla had told Stef and Lena last night, but it sounded right.
"Um she was with me in my last one. It was just both of us with this older couple." In reality it was just me with that older couple,but Kayla could fit in for the purposes of the story.
"So you two must have gotten close then."
"Yeah, but it didn't last long because you know, I ahh decided to go back to the streets with my other friends. We kept in touch though."
"Why did you leave?" Stef asks turning around to face me. I could answer this one truthfully.
"They were both drunks. When they got wasted I had to be there. Instead of them caring for me, I cared for them." Stef nods, but I wasn't done.
"The mom, when she got mad or frustrated, she would throw everything. She didn't care if it went through a window or at my head she would yell and throw hairdryers, plates, cartons of milk, whatever." Stef sat down in front of me.
"The dad would pass out on the couch, but when he woke up in the middle of the night he would start storming around the house yelling at his wife about why she let him get so drunk. It was just a mess and I rather would have been on the streets with my friends and a family that actually cared then stuck with them."
Stef looked at me with those concerned eyes she gets.
"You know you will never have to worry about any of that stuff well you're ?"
"I know." I say nodding my head.
"Good." She gets up from the table and finishes making breakfast for everyone else who had yet to come down. I smile at her, but I don't think she notices.
That was usually the normal extent for conversations between Stef and I, which was nice. She wasn't overbearing, but concerned about how I was doing. She wasn't what I thought she was going to be like when I first learned she was a cop. Stef was a genuinely nice person and it was nice to have genuine people around me for a change. It really was.
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