As a great big thank you to all the readers and reviews out there, here's the next chapter. Except, wait--it's shorter than the others? Aw, crikey.
Sam, his eyes fixed on the man lying before him, took a couplecautious steps into the room. He came to a stop and swallowed, letting the knife fall from his hand and onto the mattress of his bed. Then he spun around and left.
He only paused for a moment in the hallway before he hurried into the bathroom, fumbling for the first aid kit they kept in the closet. He'd never used it before, but he'd always been aware of its location. His fingers quickly closed around it and he yanked it out, toppling a pile of washcloths in the process. He grabbed one that teetered on the edge and ran it under the faucet.
Belatedly, he realized that maybe he shouldn't have left his knife behind, but two seconds later he was back in the bedroom and the man was still out.
The phrase what the hell? kept repeating itself in his mind.
Sam knelt carefully beside the man after clearing a space on the floor with his foot. He immediately went into first aid mode, an automatic setting that required no thinking. In fact, it let him push aside all of his thoughts, let him ignore anything that tried to distract him. As he tended the man's wounds, checking his body for other injuries, thousands of thoughts ran through his head, all of them starting with why or how or who, and all of them left unfinished, questions not fully formed.
His hands ghosted over limbs and chest, feeling for breaks and blood. He poked and prodded, his fingers searching and gentle, as he trained his ears to the steady rhythm of the man's breathing. To his relief, other than the ones visible on his face, he found no further injuries. The man was simply unconscious.
He did find a wallet, though, which he pulled out but didn't look at.
He also found two blades and a small knife. Sam took those away, too, with a weird feeling in the pit of his stomach.
The man flinched as Sam started to clean the gash on his forehead. Sam wondered if he should tie him up, call the police, or even just call Rebecca, but without exactly knowing why, he decided against each option. Instead, he wiped away the blood that had dried along the side of his face, using the wet washcloth to gently scrub it clean. Underneath the blood, he found the healing remains of another, older cut, reminding him of the sight of him at graduation.
He quickly and thoroughly disinfected the new wound and pressed a bandage against it. Within only a few minutes, he had finished treating the cut on his forehead as well as the split in his lip. He considered dragging the man onto his bed, but it was easier just to leave him on the floor. As an afterthought, Sam tucked a pillow underneath his head.
Sam stood up, distantly feeling his knees crack, and blinked his eyes at the floor.
He thought about sweeping up the broken pieces of the lamp, but he would need a garbage bag and broom from the kitchen, and he wasn't about to risk leaving again. Instead, he stepped over the bits of glass, shooing some of them out of the way with his sneaker, and went up to the fallen bookcase, which he quickly righted.
He then went about gathering all the books and other items strewn across the room. These he just stacked into loose piles around the base of the bookcase, rather than rearranging them upright in the shelves. He could do that later. Some of the little trinkets and figurines he put on top of the books, including the small mesh bags of herbs or potpourri he never noticed before. Anything broken, he left where they lay.
Once he finished, Sam clambered backwards on the floor until he met the side of his bed. There he settled, sitting cross-legged on the floor with his back resting against the bedframe. It wasn't very comfortable, but he didn't notice.
He didn't know how long he waited, staring at the man's face for signs of movement. It couldn't have been very long, just minutes, but it lasted too long and yet not long enough for Sam.
Eventually he picked up the stranger's wallet and played with it in his hand, turning it over back and forth, weighing it. He ran his fingers over the leather and stared at it for a long moment, his mind refusing to tell him what to do.
Then, with a burst of courage and nerve, he flipped it open, ready to see what it would tell him.
It was stuffed with cards. Credit cards, ID cards, business cards, all packed tightly into each pocket. Each card displayed a different name.
Sam felt a small twinge of relief, an insignificant comfort, that his friends hadn't lied to him, at least not about his use of multiple names. Billy K. Bonney, John Ford, Robert Plant – he counted fifteen different identities before he gave up.
Discouraged, he squeezed the cards back into the wallet and then tossed it onto the floor. He rolled his head backwards until it rested against the mattress and closed his eyes, pressing his eyelids against his eyeballs. The wallet told him nothing except the guy before him knew how to lie.
Then Sam let out a deep sigh and straightened back up so he could keep an eye on the man on the floor.
The man wore casual clothes, worn jeans with a long-sleeved, dark green shirt – the same kind of clothes Sam had seen him wear all those times he spotted him around town. The long sleeves were a strange choice for the summer, but it was made from a thin, cool material. While checking for injuries, he had felt muscles underneath the fabric, and he knew he had strength.
The skin around his eyes looked a little dark, and his cheeks a little hollow – not alarmingly so, just enough to tell Sam he hadn't been eating or sleeping quite as well as he should, at least not recently. Other than that, he seemed to be a healthy, regular guy.
Who snuck into Sam's room armed with three knives.
Just then, the man groaned and rocked his head. Sam's heart skipped a beat and he had to clench his jeans to stay calm. He leaned forward anxiously, waiting and watching.
The man's arm moved first, coming up off the floor to touch his head. Sam leaned even closer, sitting up off his haunches until his head hovered over the man's face. The man's eyes blinked open slowly and slid back shut with a groan.
And then his eyes jumped open wide.
He immediately started flailing, his arms and legs scrambling as he pushed himself upwards into a sitting position. "Oh, shit!" he said in a panic, scuttling backwards with his elbows. His wide eyes traveled wildly over Sam's face.
Sam stared back, waiting, his own heart calming in the face of the other guy's panic. "I bandaged your head," he informed him after a moment.
It took a few seconds before his words sunk in. Without taking his eyes off Sam, the man slowly raised his arm to confirm it, his fingers hesitantly touching the pad Sam had affixed there. "Uh, thanks..." he replied uncertainly, his eyebrows furrowing. He looked away, blinking at the books Sam had piled on the ground.
Sam kept his eyes on him. The man seemed to be in no rush to explain himself, and Sam couldn't decide which question to go with first. But he was too impatient to wait.
"What the hell happened?" Sam asked, his voice amazingly level. "What are you doing here?"
The stranger's eyes flicked towards him. "And what do you want with me?" Sam went on, meeting his gaze.
"I—I don't..." He stopped and cleared his throat. "I was walking by, and I heard some strange noises coming from your room. So I-"
Sam cut him off with a wave of his arm. "Don't start." The man was about to protest, but Sam wouldn't let him. "What are you trying to do? What do you want with me?" he repeated, slow and even and dark.
"Nothing."
"I find you my room with a couple of nasty-looking knives. You go through, tear up all my things...and you expect me to believe that?"
An angry, frustrated look came over the other man's face, and he started talking more earnestly. "I told you, I just happened by-"
"Stop it!" Sam finally cried. The man looked up at him, startled, worried. "I know you know who I am."
The man scoffed at that, tried to brush him off with a toss of his head and skeptical twist of his lips. "How would-"
"And I know who you are," Sam continued flatly, cutting him off.
The man paled instantly. "You...You do," he grunted after a moment, sounding as if he were trying to keep his voice under control.
Sam nodded and raised his chin and eyebrows defiantly. "Yeah. I do."
The other man turned his head slightly so that he was looking at Sam through the corner of his eye. "Who am I, then?" he asked, cautiously.
Sam swallowed and tried not to show any weakness. "You're the one who killed my brother."
Yeah, I know, that's not really a cliffhanger, since we already knew that's what Sam thinks. But I hope you'll stick around anyhow, because the next chapter's already on its way!