The unfamiliar male checked up on the young girl, going into the spare room and seeing her awake in amongst the bedclothes. "You've been asleep for quite some time," he explained softly, "how are you feeling now?"
"A lot better," she replied thankfully, her fear mounting when she realised who had found her was someone she'd never seen before. Her eyes widened and she shrank against the bed's headboard in fright. "Who are you? Where am I?"
"Hey, sweetheart," he placed a hand over her forehead to see if she'd cooled down from her mild fever. "It's ok now…you're looking a lot better since I found you outside. Don't you know it's dangerous to be alone out there at that time of night? I hope your parents knew where you were."
"I don't know," she replied icily, "and I don't care."
He frowned from her retort. "Things between you aren't good, are they?" He assumed. "I can always send for a doctor. Maybe they'd be able to help you…"
"They might be able to help someone else," she answered back curtly, not completely appreciative of the stranger's help.
"It's ok," he placed his hands on her shoulders to make her lie back down in bed, "it's ok now. I won't let you leave till you feel better. You're just confused, that's all. And you had a couple of bad dreams. The doctor can help you with that, you know. They can make it all go away."
She looked to see that her belongings, minus her underwear, were folded up on the chair next to the bed. Her bag had been opened, and she inwardly hoped that she hadn't been mugged whilst she was out. "M-my medication…I need it."
"You mean these?" He assumed, showing her the empty casing to one of the injection vials. "I thought it might help if you took one. You might've ended up seeing a doctor a lot sooner than we would've wanted, so I topped you up with one you had. You still have some left over in case you need to stay here for longer."
"I don't wanna stay here," Clara protested, "not when I have to tell someone something."
"What is it you wanna talk about, love?" he asked softly "Is it what had happened between you and your dad? Is it something I can help you with?"
She felt the tears come and she found it hopeless to hold them back.
"I know you don't know me and I don't know you, but I wanna help you, really I do." He took hold of her hands.
She lay back down in bed, feeling her strength get sapped out of her from the intense sadness.
"The sooner you tell me what happened, the sooner you'll feel better and maybe I can put you in contact with your parents."
She shook her head, blinking a tear away. "I don't think my dad wants to see me anymore," she drew in a small sigh, "not since what I told him has probably hurt him."
"I'm sure that, really," he squeezed her wrists comfortingly, "your dad loves you."
She swallowed back a sob.
"I'm going to call someone, ok?" He went on. "I won't be gone long."
XXXX
"…And then I just left her," Chris explained to Janeece as she'd sat through their talk, "I don't know why I did it, but I felt so angry…and I feel bad for leaving her."
"Would she have known her way back?"
"Up to a point," he admitted, "she would probably have gone so far and gotten lost. She could've ended up anywhere and ended up sick…"
"You can't think that," she rubbed his back softly, "if there was anyone about they wouldn't have left a girl at her age lying unconscious on the ground late at night. She might've been taken to hospital, but she wouldn't have been alone."
She heard her mobile go off and she answered it. She was surprised to find that it was Tom on the other end.
"How is he?"
"He's better," she took the call in her hallway, "a little mixed up but pretty much back to normal."
"Good."
"He's told me about what happened last night," she went on, "but I think we should start searching for Clara, Sir."
"Why?"
"W-well, she's gone missing," she noticed the young male's posture come over more weighed down, "and he's freaking out about what might've happened to her."
"I think the last thing anyone should do is think about looking for her," the stockier male answered.
"But she's missing," she reiterated, "and she's poorly. If she doesn't take her medication when she's meant to…"
"What concerns me the most is the way he's feeling," he went on, ignoring her protest. "He's not going out there any time soon, sifting every side street he comes across. Not in his state."
Janeece resignedly hung up, realising she wasn't going to get anywhere with the conversation. Why had Tom suddenly not wanted to help searching for Clara? If she wasn't found, Chris certainly wouldn't be feeling any better and he probably wouldn't ever.
"Who was that?" The younger male asked, sitting back against the sofa. He couldn't get over how comfy it was to sleep on and he was worried he would've put his back out after lying on it overnight and into the morning.
"I-it was Mr Clarkson," she told him weakly, seeing him perk up a little.
"What did you tell him?"
She didn't want to break the bad news to him and instead decided to make them both a drink. At least then it would've given her time to think up a reasonable answer for him.
Unfortunately he followed her, not content with receiving no answer or explanation from her. "J-Janeece, you must've told him something," he went on shakily, "he knows as well as anyone that she means everything to me."
"He doesn't want us to look for her," she eventually managed to explain.
"But we have to," he protested. "She's poorly. She takes medication."
"He knows that," she replied, looking to him carefully, "but he's more worried about you."
"I'm fine," Chris lowered in eyebrow in suspicion, "it was just a chill I had and I slept it off."
She stirred the milk into both cups. "Wherever she is she wouldn't be alone."
"I have to look for her." He suddenly stated. "No one else will, so why can't I?"
"I think you should do what he suggested," Janeece told him firmly, "you aren't going to be doing yourself any favours by going back outside, not if you've just gotten over a bad chill. What if you get sick again?"
Realising he wasn't getting anywhere with her, he could no longer keep his defences up and he found himself being hounded back to his temporary home on the sofa.
"Now you stay there and rest." She disappeared back out of the lounge and reappeared with a hot cup of tea.
It wasn't as milky as the one she gave him the previous night, but she knew that the best place for him was bed or some other alternative. "Maybe he has a point."
"Maybe he doesn't," he retorted, preferring to stare into the depths of the cup.
She got her drink and sat on the other sofa. "He does have your best interests at heart, you know, Chris…"
"Then maybe he should go out there and look for her."
She cast her gaze away before looking back at him. "He wouldn't have wanted you to stay put if he felt it wouldn't benefit you."
"I blame myself for all of this," he noted blankly to no one in particular.
She leant further forward, but she felt so badly for him that she chose to sit on the same sofa as him only the other end of it. "No…don't do that. You were angry. And everyone gets angry, don't they?"
"But the way I got angry," he felt a wave of guilt crash over him, "I shouldn't have let it get in the way."
XXXX
Clara gradually started to feel tired, achy, hot and feverish quarter of an hour later.
The unfamiliar male administered another cool cloth to her forehead to push the fever out of her system, before someone came to his front door. He answered it and let in the doctor he called out.
"She's upstairs in the spare room," he explained as he led him to where the poorly girl was resting, "she's got one hell of a fever at the moment…" He closed the door and took him to the room.
"She's been drifting in and out of her senses since the symptoms started…I'm trying to get the worst of the fever down up to now."
"Is she your daughter?"
"No, she's someone else's…she crashed out on our threshold last night and she's been kept here ever since."
"Do you know her name?"
"Unfortunately, no," he rifled through her bag in hope of finding some form of identification on her, "I only administered her a shot that she had on her. I can only guess she takes them now and again."
"If I decide to take her to hospital, we would have to let her parents know…" The doctor lifted up one of her eyelids, seeing that everything seemed pretty much untoward. She hadn't slipped into a feverish convulsion, but she was very hot and sweaty. "Can you hear me, love? If you can, squeeze my hand…"
No response.
"I can't get any response from her," the doctor looked to the other male worriedly, "so I'll have to let her parents know. Did you manage to find some identification on her?"
"I found this," he handed him an alert card Clara carried on her.
