Chapter 6
Martha was finally coming to terms with her new home and had given up trying to escape. She'd made friends with Callum, Christie and Ryan, which improved the terrible living situation. All 3 of them had been living there together for a while now, Callum was the first to arrive, then Christie, then Ryan. Each one had chosen to jump, unlike Martha. They explained why to Martha, and she was deeply saddened by their stories of hurt, rejection, and fear. Callum had jumped due to his wife's death. It was their wedding day and his wife was involved in a car accident on the way to the church, he'd tried to cope, but everything in his life reminded him of her, so he chose to end his life. Christie was a victim of abuse, by her boyfriend. She'd tried to get away, but had nowhere to go as her parents had died when she was young, and she had no siblings. The only way she could escape was to die, and she felt that that was better than to suffer the abuse any more. The last one of the three, Ryan had jumped because his life was a total wreck, well he thought it was anyway. He had had a run of bad luck, starting off with his parents death, then his split up from long-term girlfriend Reanne, and he was then unable to get a job, resulting in him living on the streets.
"It was all too much, I couldn't bear to wait for the next bad thing to happen, so I decided to take some action to prevent anymore hurt and rejection." Ryan explained, "And look what has happened! I'm held in some place that's run by a nutter! My bad luck will never end.." He said. Martha frowned sympathetically.
"I'm so sorry guys, it sounds like you all had a pretty rough time." She said, in an apologetic tone.
"So, how was your life before you got landed with us!" Ryan enquired. Martha started to fiddle with the bottom of her jeans.
"I don't really want to talk about it just yet, it's a bit too soon, sorry." The other 3 nodded.
"It's fine, we understand." Christie said, putting her arm around Martha. "None of us wanted to talk about it when we first arrived. You take as long as you like, we're always here."
"Yes.. ALWAYS here.." Everyone laughed, they'd learned to laugh at their problems, because when they didn't and tried to run away from them, they ended up worse. They all went quiet as they heard the door slowly being unlocked, giving them the option of the second room, the lounge. This was Martha's favourite room of the house, as it had a comfy sofa, music, and video games. It was like a youth club really, at first she thought it was quite weird to give the people you are kidnapping luxuries such as video games and stereos, but now on her third day, she'd decided to stop wasting time and bothering herself by thinking about it, and just have as much fun as she could.
Jack was in his room, preparing himself for his first day back at work. He was praying for a big case to get his mind of Martha, but he knew that it wasn't going to happen this soon to his last undercover case, and he would also probably be assigned to paperwork for a while too. He walked out into the lounge, picking up his key's and jacket.
"Cya!" He said to Lucas and Tony, who were both getting ready for school.
"Have fun!" Lucas said, a mouth full of cereal. Jack went over and couldn't resist ruffling up Lucas' masterpiece of a hairstyle. "JACK!" He said, nearly choking on his cereal, he then ran to the mirror and tried to fix his hair. Jack laughed.
"You're so vain, you probably think this song is about you, don't you?.." Jack sang as he left the house. Tony and Lucas looked at one another.
"Well, he's certainly feeling a lot better this morning." Tony laughed, Lucas was too busy correcting his hair to comment.
