Leaving "Home"

Tabitha whistled carelessly as she walked up the stairs to the one-roomed apartment crawling with bugs that she called home. It wasn't much but considering the way she had been living for the past 12 years this was great. She actually had a roof over her head and someplace to go to at the end of the day. She had been abandoned when she was a baby when her mother died in childbirth. A nurse had taken in Tabby to raise her as her own child but one day when she was returning home late after her grocery shopping she was mugged and killed. Tabitha had managed to survive on the streets for a whole day by herself before a homeless woman found her and took her in. She had spent the next 7 years with her new mother but her life wasn't exactly a luxurious one. She had to sleep on the hard street most of the time and if they got lucky they would find a bench in the park and they would spend a few hours of sleep there before they were woken up by the police and kicked out. Her adoptive mother had died when Tabitha was 7 in the winter. The winter had been a particularly harsh one that year and the deathly cold hand of pneumonia had touched about 50 of the homeless people one of them being her mother.

Tabitha had no idea how to survive on her own after her mother's death. But thankfully for her it was then that she met Lance. Lance was about a year or two older than her and he had helped her get food and find a relatively safe place to sleep every night. Soon after Tabitha turned 11 Lance thought her how to do some basic work at the diner where her worked and soon she had a job of her own. They had been friends for 9 years now and only recently after years of carefully saving money for the past years they were able to afford a decent meal every night and a roof over their head. They hadn't got money for two apartments and so Tabitha used the only room in the apartment and on the rare occasions that Lance was home he slept on the couch. Lance's deep brown eyes and his untamable hair that fell in locks on his forehead and his boyish charms ensured him a different bed to sleep in almost every night.

Tabitha opened the door of the apartment with her key and walked straight into her room. She had been out on a date with the cook of the place where she worked as a waitress and had had an awful night. He had just been looking for an opportunity to get into her skirt all night and Tabitha had ditched him as fast as she could. She changed out of her clothes and tying the string of the robe firmly and armed with soap, shampoo and some towels she walked into the bathroom to take a hot bath (if there was any water that day) and try to ignore the fact that the cook would definitely make her life hell when she went back to work. But when she walked into the bathroom what she saw scared her more than anything had ever before.

Tabitha stared at the sight in front of her but recovering quickly she dropped the soap and shampoo and rushed to her friend's side. Lance was on the floor trying to nurse a deep wound that extended from his shoulders to his wrist. It looked as if his whole hand had been ripped open and it was bleeding a lot. Lance was getting weaker by the moment due to the blood loss and Tabitha wrapped the towels around his arm trying to reduce the bleeding. After a while the bleeding stopped and Lance winced in pain as Tabitha tried to clean up the wound before an infection set in. She did not say a word as she wrapped a very amateurish bandage across her arm. She finally finished and made herself and Lance some food before she finally asked him what happened.

Lance explained "I lost my job last night ….."

"What why didn't you tell me?" Tabitha broke in.

"Because you would have worried and besides I had this amazing plan that would make us rich in a couple of hours and I really wanted to surprise you with it. A friend of mine bet on a horse at the races and he won 4000 dollars. Just like that. So I decided to give it a shot. Hell it is a lot more than I could have hoped to earn in even six months with the crappy job I had. So I figured I had nothing to lose and I made a bet of 700 dollars. And I lost and I did not have that much money to just hand over to him and so he gave me one day and when I didn't give him the money, this happened."

"What are you going to do now? Is he going to come after you again?" Tabitha asked

" Hell yeah." Lance replied managing a small smile.

" We need to get you out of here. " said Tabitha realizing that this was the only way that lance could possibly get away. Lance nodded in agreement "But I don't want you coming with me." He said.

"And why not?" asked Tabitha her temper flaring.

"Because Tabby I don't want you to give up everything you have worked so hard for and have to start all over again."

"Don't you dare call me that. Your charms won't work on me. They never have. And Lance it won't be starting all over again. We have all the money saved up we could survive on that till we find new job." Realizing that Lance was still not convinced Tabitha said in a low voice "Lance if you hadn't found me when I was 7 and helped me out since then I probably wouldn't even be here. I would probably be walking around town trying to find a bench in the park where no police officers would bother me or worse lying in some gutter dead and no one would even care. I owe you Lance and this is the only way that I can sufficiently thank you. For everything. And besides you just wouldn't be able to manage without me." She said her cocky grin back.

Lance had no idea how to react to all this and so he simply got up tousled her hair like an irritating brother would and just as he left the room he turned back and said "Pack your bags and don't take too long or I'll leave you behind." Tabitha smiled as she rushed off to put all her meager belongings in a bag. Lance kept all the money they had saved safely inside the bag and they set off towards the station.

Lance stared desperately at the schedules and tried to find a place that was far enough without being too expensive. Finally making up his mind he joined Tabitha at the line and as it was their turn he said "I would like two tickets for Venice please."

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plz R&R