Yeah, maybe – except I was the regular john.
“Where’s she stay when she’s not here?”
I had to give the whore fifty dollars to talk, which she slipped inside her shirt while watching Melvin out of the corner of her eye. I figured out what building Bridgett lived in by Candy’s description, and it only took a minute to drive there.
There was only street parking, so I drove around the block twice before I found a spot. The sky was pretty much dark by the time I pushed open the door, found her apartment number on the mailbox, and went down a handful of stairs to the lower level units. I looked down at the daffodils in my hand and wondered just how ridiculous I was – apologizing to the chick I paid to fuck me – but I needed to sleep before I went completely over the edge.
I knocked.
I had to physically force myself to not tap my toe on the ground, stare at my watch, or start whistling. There was no way I was going to pull off any kind of casual encounter anyway – it was obvious what I was here to do. The daffodils kind of gave it away.
I knocked again.
There was that distinct feeling moving slowly up the sides of my spine that I had rarely felt outside of combat. It was a completely irrational knowing that came from nothing other than gut instinct, but it had served me many times in the past.
It was a gut instinct I trusted.
My mind and the memories within took over for a moment, and I felt the dry, stale heat of the desert air around me. It had been mid-summer in the desert, and the heat was absolutely unbearable. I had walked around the corner of a small building to reach just a bit of shade to relax a moment and take a piss when it all started.
One hand had touched the wall of the building as I leaned against it, while the other loosened my fatigues and pulled out my dick. There had been a noise from the other side of the building that I couldn’t identify – something that didn’t sound quite right. The hair on the back of my neck stood up.
There was something very, very wrong. I was sure of it.
“Bridgett?” I called as I brought myself out of the memory and banged harder against the door. “Bridgett – open the fucking door!”
Still no answer.
I didn’t think – I just leaned back and kicked the handle. I had to kick twice before the shitty lock splintered the weak wooden doorjamb and the apartment was open to me.
I took everything in.
It was a small place – one room efficiency with a small cubby bathroom off to the side. There was a little half window with a view of a brick wall. It wouldn’t have let any light in at any time of day and was probably too small for the fire marshal to allow without some kind of bribe involved. The stove looked like it might have worked well in the seventies, and the fridge was one of those half-sized ones you find in college dorm rooms.
Despite the size, the room was neat and orderly. Everything seemed to have its place, including a small shelf with books and an aloe plant, a box for mail, and a small candle. No pictures – none at all. There wasn’t much in the way of furniture – just a card table with four plastic chairs, the book shelf, and a futon along one wall. It wasn’t pulled out into a bed, though there was a body lying across it.
I knew she wasn’t dead – there was no tell-tale smell of death, and the slight rise and fall of her shoulder made it obvious. Her back was to me, but I didn’t need to see her face to know she was unconscious. The lack of reaction to having her door kicked in was evidence enough that she wasn’t just asleep. Hesitating only slightly, I moved across the room and knelt next to the futon.
With my hand on her shoulder, I pulled her body towards me. The black and blue bruises that covered her face and shoulders were maybe a day and a half old, not much more than that. There was a cut over her lip, and her chin was streaked with blood.
As I pulled her closer to me, her arm fell away, and I could see the bruising on the rest of her naked body. Clear hand prints in purple circled her wrists, and the circular bruises on her thighs were clearly fist marks. The scent of stale semen on her was unmistakable.
“Bridgett?” I said and felt her jerk in my arms. My hand touched the side of her face where she wasn’t bruised. “Open your eyes.”
They fluttered at my order, and the lids parted. Her expression quickly moved from fear, to shock, and then to sadness. Sobs began to shake her body as her forehead pressed against my shoulder.
“Evan,” she croaked. Her voice didn’t sound right – it was rough and scratchy. I tilted my head to get a better look at her neck and saw the finger-shaped bruises there as well.
“Can you hold on to me?”
Her fingers gripped my shoulder as I wrapped the sheet back around her and lifted her up into my arms. I held her against my chest as I walked out the door, crushing the dropped daffodils as I left. I got a few looks from the bums on the street as I carried her off and lay her down in the passenger seat of my car, but no one said anything or tried to stop me. I was carrying a beat up girl, naked and wrapped in a sheet, and no one cared.
Nice fucking neighborhood.
Back at my apartment, I was a little more concerned. Since I was in the parking garage, it was easy enough to get to the elevator without anyone laying eyes on me or what I was carrying, but being in the elevator had me on edge until we got to my floor. Luckily, there was no one else around. The elevator doors opened, and I glanced quickly down the hall before carrying her to my apartment.
I dropped the sheet in the hallway, figuring I’d come back in a bit and throw it out. It stank of sweat, beer, and semen.
“I’m going to get you cleaned up, okay?” I said as I carried her through the bedroom door and into the master bathroom. “Can you stand on your own?”