Chapter 5 Accident

Previously

Hopefully I can talk to him tomorrow and figure out what his issues are so that we can start resolving them. I also need to make sure he stays away from the cliffs, hopefully I can warn him about them before he inevitably ends up at them.

Present

Slowly opening my eyes, looking around at the unfamiliar surroundings, I remember everything that has occurred in the last twenty-four hours. I knead my face, my hands clenched in fists. This is a bad situation. I am in a different country, with a man whom I barely trust who just so happens to be my father. Oh, and before I forget, I met my grandparents last night, or at least two of them. Neither of whom I remotely know well enough to trust yet. This was not the best thing to wake up to. I was already in a bad mood.

Standing up, I notice my duffel laying on the floor by the door. Well I did need to change out of these clothes. After changing I quietly make my way downstairs. At the bottom, I notice the kitchen to my left and Snake sitting at the table.

"Come, sit down." I'm walking over towards an empty chair at the table before I can even think of saying no. What was this going to be about? I didn't feel like dealing with this so early.

"How did you sleep?" His question is so relaxed and normal sounding, in fact it's one of the most normal things that I've heard in a while. It was nice. Nicer than my awakening.

"Fine." There wasn't much to elaborate on. Has anyone ever answered that question with anything other than fine?

"For today the plan is to relax, unpack our stuff since we'll be here for the foreseeable future, and then you can go look around the house or the property around here. Don't wander out too far, there will be people looking for you by now and if the wrong person sees you then, well, I can't tell you what would happen. " He looks up at me for the first time since I sat down. He doesn't look so great; weary and tired. Just like me.

"I'll be careful." I say, if not just to satiate him.

"There are apples and bananas over on the counter if you want one for breakfast. Glasses are in the cabinet and juice is in the fridge. If you want something to drink, help yourself. Alex, please just remember that this your home."

"I will." I won't. This isn't my home. This is a house. Simply shelter.

I get up out of my chair and grab and apple before heading back upstairs to my room without another glance directed towards Snake. Once I'm in my room I let out a breath that I didn't even know I was holding in, setting the apple on the dresser after taking a bite out of it. I'd have to remember to grab it when I went for a walk later. I wasn't in the mood for dealing with all of this, and honestly needed to get out of the house, or at least stay away from any human interaction except those inside my head. Though I generally tried to avoid those, too. I pick up my bag from the floor and toss it on my bed. From there I begin unpacking, wondering whether this is what is was going to be like the entire time. Unpacking takes all of ten minutes. It's a pity. I wanted to waste more time. Sitting on my bed I contemplate what I wanted to do next. Running sounded like a good option.

I change into shoes that are more appropriate for running and race out of my room and downstairs, before I can get out scot-free, Snake stops me. Great. Just who I had attempted to avoid.

"Where are you going?"

"Out, to look around. You said I could." He squints at me a bit and gives me a suspicious look, but sighs and steps out of my way.

"Be back by 1:00 pm for lunch." He says glancing down at the watch on my wrist, as if telling me that I won't have an excuse if I don't come.

"That's fine, can I go now?" With a nod from Snake, I'm out the door and I can only just hear him call out for me to be safe. I'll be fine, he shouldn't be worrying about me. He should know me by now.

There's a nice trail leading out from the backyard, I saw it out my window earlier.

I run. The area is surrounded by thick trees and that makes me all the less worried. This place could easily be my heaven as of now. It was exactly what I needed; a place where I can be at peace, not have o worry about anything, and a place to wear myself out. Especially the last one. I wanted to get my mind off of all that was going on, and the only way to do that was to make myself lose focus of everything in my mind. If I got myself to only concentrate on running, then I couldn't concentrate on everything going to chaos around me. I couldn't do this normally, it made me lose focus of my defenses as well, made me panic if I was in a tight spot. I couldn't be myself around anyone. Almost ironic, the way it works. But I realize that I was in a happy place. The only things I have to worry about here are low hanging branches and roots coming out of the ground. A couple of breaks are made. Once to retie my shoes and another to check the time: 11:30.

Suddenly I come to a halt. I thought I saw movement from my left. There shouldn't be anyone this far out. Not randomly in the woods, there was no way any human could have found me. Looking around I take in everything looking for any sign that would show that something or someone was following me. Not noticing anything I start running again, this time though I am much more aware of my surroundings, glancing around me, aware. That's when I hear it. A loud, threatening growl coming from behind me. Well then, there really is no human who followed me out this far, just some wild animal who wants to eat me, is all. I see an opening up ahead and know that getting through that might be the best option in this scenario. Thinking back on it, I probably should have listened.

I take off running faster than before, adrenaline is now pumping through me as I race towards the ever closer parting of the trees. When I break through it I see that it's a dead-end with a cliff's edge being the only escape. I go to the edge and turn facing the animal, which looked kind of like a lynx or some type of larger than average cat. It slowly makes it way closer, continuously growling. I look behind me at the cliff and notice that the there is a ledge right below it. Of course. This would happen to me, wouldn't it?

Without a third thought I quickly scramble down to it, hitting my head on the way there, and just as the lynx runs toward me ready to make their kill, my feet touch the ledge. I am successful and will not be killed today. Not by some big cat. I can hear the lynx above growling. After about five minutes of staring up at it, he walks away.

Testing the cliff, I sit down, deciding that its best to wait for Snake to hopefully come looking for me. It might have been a good idea to bring some sort of communication device. It is going to take forever for someone to find me. Since I can't jump because I would likely be impaled by rocks and I can't go up because when I tried to grab the edge, some of it gave way which means that should I attempt to put most of my body weight on it then I would fall and still be impaled by rocks. So I think that I will just sit here instead, nice, calm, and not impaled by rocks. Sounds like a plan.

I go to lean back on the wall behind and I place one hand behind my head for support, I feel something wet, and I pull my hand back to see what it is and notice a burgundy stain on my hand. Blood. Suddenly, I feel dizzy, all the adrenaline and blood loss combining into a maelstrom of confusion and pain. I quickly pull off my jacket and fold it, then place it behind my head applying pressure hoping that I can slow down the bleeding until I can get some help.

Glancing down at my (bloody) watch I notice that it is almost 1:00. This means that hopefully Snake will start looking for me soon.

My head is starting to hurt more than before, the pain is noticeable now and I am starting to feel tired. Blood loss, I've suffered through it plenty times before. It doesn't get any easier, though.

I doze in and out of a sleep like state when I hear my name being called. This makes me a lot more alert then I was a couple of seconds ago.

"ALEX!" Hearing my name once more, I realize that the voice behind it is Snake. Though, to be honest, there isn't much of a chance of it being anyone else.

"Snake!" I call out his name as loud as I can but at this point, it's not very loud. everything is blurry, and it hurts my own ears to shout.

I hear the pounding of his feet against the ground as he gets closer. He stops and yells my name again.

"Down here." I attempt to yell.

"How the hell..."

"Hello to you to Snake." By now I have stood up on my wobbly legs and unclear vision. Snake sees my jacket in my hand with the blood that is now close to soaking through it.

"What happened?"

"Well this crazy lynx cat looking thing decided to attack me and this was my only option, so I came down here and when I did I must have hit my head. I would really appreciate it if I could come up there, the world is spinning and I'm pretty tired."

Snake gets onto his stomach on the ground and offers me a hand. Slowly he pulls me up as I bring one of my hands up to brace myself so that I can pull myself the rest of the way up the land gives away and I fall the only thing keeping me from falling off the edge is Snake's grip on my hand. A good thing Snake has a strong grip, I'd be dead from dizziness. I can feel him bring his other hand down to grip the back of my shirt as he slowly pulls me back up.

Once we are both safely on the ground, I can hear Snake ask me to sit up. I do and then I feel a sharp pain in the back of my head where Snake is looking at my wound. I jerk away.

"I need to see how bad it is Alex." Reluctantly I move back to where I had been and let him look at it. It hurts. A lot.

"How do you feel right now Alex?"

"Tired, head hurts. A lot."

"Okay, from what I can tell by just looking at it you could have a concussion. When we get back to the house I'm going to need to clean the back of your head so that I can see if this is a deep cut or not. Until then I need you to stay awake for me, can you do that?" I nod my head. Ow. Why did I do that?

"Do you think that you can stand to walk on your own or do you need help?"

I stand and after a couple of steps that are a little to unsteady Snake wraps his arm around me and helps me walk the rest of the way back to the house. It's a bit more like dragging me back, but that's alright. He had to hold my nose to get my attention when I would start to go to sleep, but it was otherwise fine.

I was thankful for the silence of the walk. The silence, until we got home, at least, was golden.

The second he set me down on my bed and got out his first-aid kit and started working, he also started talking. I was not very pleased with this development. Especially this particular topic. But, I gotta say, the conversation started off great.

"Cub. We need to talk."

He called me Cub. Not Alex, or Collin. Cub.

So that was nice, but talking? Not so much. But hey, I could deal with it, he called me Cub.

I was still skeptical, of course.

"Cub... Cub we really need to figure this out. This issue of yours."

"What issue?" I didn't have any issues. Nope. Not at all.

"Cub, Cub you have to take me seriously. This has been going on for far too long, and it needs to be settled." I still wasn't quite positive what he was talking about, and, to be honest, was still dizzy from the walk here. I didn't want to discuss anything to do with escaping in this condition.

"Why don't you trust me?"

Oh. Oh, well that was something completely different. That was something that shouldn't be discussed while he was on the verge of going to sleep. Though maybe that was Snakes plan-to get him while he was down. To accost him while I'm weak. To confront him when he didn't have any defenses up. And did Snake really even think about what he was saying? It should be obvious by now why I don't trust you. The only thing you've done is make my life a million more times complicated than it already was, and that's a pretty hard thing to do. You've taken me away from my family, introducing yourself into that position, stealing it even. Then you go ahead and believe that just because we are biologically related, meaning that the only thing we have in common are some genes, means that you can go ahead and take over my life, giving me confidence that I never had before, only to steal it all away again. You keep giving me hope, and then taking it all away. You, to me, are scum. Not that greatest of scum, no, you may not deserve that title, but scum none the less. You are a hope-stealer, and that is all you are to me.

I thought I was just going through thoughts in my head, but, as it would appear from the shocked look on Snakes face, and the stopped movement of his hands on my head, that I talk aloud when my defenses are down. Oops.

"Oh." Oh? Oh!? What did that mean? He was silent while his hands started to move again, finishing what he had been doing: wrapping up my head wound. As it would appear, no concussion, but a lot of blood loss. He didn't say anything while doing this, just finishing, and then cleaning up. When he appeared to be done he came and sat down beside me, hands wrung together, and head down staring at them, saying nothing. Once again. Normally I would appreciate this, but I had just spewed my thoughts to him in a way that I had never meant to, and I didn't know how he or I was supposed to react. This had never happened before, and I was clueless as to what to do now.

He looked up from his hands, and straight into my eyes.

"I'm sorry."

Then he left.

Oh.

Then I flopped down, closed my eyes, and went to sleep.

I needed a nap.