Many Words In Silence

Chapter 9

“Can I get you some dinner to say thanks?” I asked Timothy as he stood in the door of the hotel room. It wasn’t like the hotels I was used to. This one was nowhere near five stars, but it had a cute little living room, a huge bedroom with a queen size bed, and a bathroom with a tub I could probably drown in. I could see how much effort had been made with the hotel, but with a town this small they probably had to downsize on service.

“Sure,” Timothy said as I threw my shopping down in front of the couch.

“Then come in,” I said as he still just stood there like some puppet of whom the master had forgotten to work the strings.

“I’ve been here before,” Timothy said as he slowly entered the room.

“Yeah? When?” I asked.

“Last week. The bed is really comfy,” he answered as he lowered himself onto the couch.

“Well it’s nice to know that you get to sleep somewhere decent every now and again,” I said, trying to put the question of how he could afford this room on tips out of my mind. “So where do you actually sleep if you don’t have a home to go to? What’s your story?”

It wasn’t that I wanted to be nosey, but somehow this kid intrigued me. There was something about the mystery that surrounded him that I found interesting. At the same time I didn’t really want to know either. I could remember a time where I wasn’t to different from him. Hiding a terrible secret of my own, which I know now, would have been best to have kept hidden forever. Too many people got hurt the moment my secrets came tumbling out of the closet.

“I stay in a shelter, mostly. But I don’t want to talk about it,” Timothy said. The air of sadness was around him once more.

“So why are you working at the coffee shop?” I enquired further. I didn’t want to push too hard, which is why I found that changing the subject would’ve been a bit better.

“I want what everybody wants. To get the hell out of this f*****g town,” he said as he stood up and walked toward the balcony. He sounded bitter.

“And do what? What would you do when you leave this town? You don’t even have an education,” I said the logical thing that came to mind. I was all for running away from problems, but there needed to at least be a plan, or a Lucy in your life that would catch you when you fell.

“I’ll survive,” Timothy answered. “The way I have always survived.”

“Look, we can talk in circles, but if you don’t want to tell me your story, that’s fine. Would you mind ordering us something for dinner? I would love to have a shower,” I said as I bowed down to take off my shoes.

“There’s a roadhouse across the road. I could go and get us something there. The food is fast, but it’s good.”

I could swear that this kid was bipolar. The one moment he sounded bitter and the next he wanted to go and buy us food with the biggest smile ever on his face.

“Sure,” I said uncertainly. Somehow I had this feeling that if I gave him the money to go and get the food it would also be the last I would see of him. Maybe I was just cynical, but I have met the worst kind of humans in my life, my father being the worst of all by far.

I took out a $50 note and pushed it into Timothy’s hand. “I would like a burger if they have.”

“Cool,” Timothy said. “It won’t take long. I’ll be back before you are even out of the shower.”

I watched him walk out the door and into the night, hoping he would come back, and on the other hand hoping I would never see him again. Just as much as I wanted his story, I knew how stories like his could potentially break my heart as well.

“Everything is exactly the way it’s supposed to be at any given moment in time,” I sighed as I picked up the packets from the shop and made my way to the room, closing the door behind me.

It took me less than five minutes to strip down to my birthday suit and get myself under some running hot water.

The bruise that Fynn had gave me the morning when he hit me was already a blue/black colour. I touched it and almost squealed. It might not have been bothering me all day, but touching it was definitely out of the question.

Fynn…

I just couldn’t believe how much he made me think of Blake. And now that I think about it, it wasn’t even that they looked that much alike. They just had similarities, like the eyes for instance. But then again, just after Blake died, any person with those cool sparkle in their eyes made me think of Blake. No matter where I was, or who I met, it made me think of him. I could explain away all my feelings about him, but what I could not shake was Lucy’s reaction. At first she was seeing what I saw, maybe even rooting for me to flirt back with him like she always did with almost any man that came near me. And then everything just changed. What had happened? From where does she know him? How could she change her act so quickly from not knowing him to knowing him in the space of a few minutes? And the biggest question of all – how could she leave me here in the middle of nowhere?

I felt like crying. Too much had happened in the last twenty-four hours. I was having an emotional overload. Just a little over twenty-four hours ago I was blowing out the candles on a cake. I was celebrating my 26th birthday and Lucy gave me the most precious gift that anybody had ever given me – the locket with Blake’s hair inside which I gave to Llaluna after a fight. I had lost Sam because I wanted to die again. I had lost Lucy because of my obsession to do something for myself to get better again. She was gone for good. I was sure of it. Maybe they all just finally had enough of me. And oddly, in this moment I didn’t want to kill myself. What I did however wasn’t to do was cry. Not just cry with my eyes. I wanted a blade so that I could make incisions all over my legs and allow the blood to flow out of me, wanting to release the pain that I was finally feeling now that my day was calming down.

I tried my best to stop the tears from coming when I heard the door open and close, telling me that Timothy did indeed come back.

Not many people surprised me, but somehow Timothy did. Maybe if he told me his story I could heal. Knowing that I was not alone in not having parents anymore. That life wasn’t just unfair for me, but for more people around me. I knew it sounded selfish, but maybe that was what I needed to survive. Maybe I needed that confirmation that I wasn’t the only one in the world that walked around with this pain inside that just wanted to escape no matter the cost. It had been nearly ten years since Blake had died. I still had the memories. I had time with me that did not heal, but at least the actually trauma was over. Certain people, like Timothy, was still smack bam in the middle of it, trying their best to escape the destiny that the unfairness of the world had bestowed upon them.

I waited until the warm water started to run cooler before I finally closed the taps and stepped out of the shower. Not drying my hair but trying my towel around my waist I opened the bathroom door to step into the room where my new clothing was waiting for me.

What I saw I could not have anticipated in a thousand years. No matter how much time would go by in the future, I was sure that I would never have the shock that I had at that moment in time. Certain things you come to expect in life, but others catch you by such a surprise that you cannot fathom how it happened in the first place.

I expected Blake to die. I knew he would after all his injuries. I hoped for the best. Off course I hoped. How could I not? I would not have been human had I not been able to hope that he would open his eyes, and even with time walked out of that hospital, holding my hand. Still it wasn’t the reality which I expected with my logical mind. It was a shock to my system, but it didn’t shock me at all, because I had played out the scenario in my head over and over again before it even happened in real life.

I expected my mother and father to land up in jail. I actually expected both of them to get the electric chair, which in the end didn’t happen, since my father got a lifetime sentence where my mom got only fifteen years for being a conspiracy to murder. It didn’t shock me when they told me I would be going into the foster system. It didn’t shock me either when Sam van Leer became my legal guardian. I was already living with him, and it was easier just leaving me there than looking for another family willing to take in a sixteen year old who was the son of a murderer, just tried to commit suicide, and barely talked through the black cross over his lips.

Nothing was ever truly a shock to my system, because I have learned in my short life that I needed to always be prepared for the worst thing possible, but that I could still hope for the best every now and again.

This was different. It was a shock because nothing could have prepared me for what was on my bed when I came out of the shower.

“What the f**k?” I said loudly. It was a question just as much as what it was an exclamation of shock and horror.

Timothy smiled at me from the bed.

As my eyes traced over him I could see he had a good body. The six pack had already set in and his chest was already that of a young man. He was gorgeous. Every part of him from his head where his brown hair was messy like he just got out of bed, to his feet that crossed one another as he laid on the bed, propping himself up with one arm. It was however his other hand that I could not keep myself from staring at. The one that was playing with his hard self, showing me what he really wanted to have me do to him.

“Come on over lover boy,” Timothy said with a smile, letting go of his shaft in order to pat the bed, inviting me over to it.

“You’ve got to be f*****g kidding me,” I said as I finally got enough willpower to stop looking and turn my back to him.

“No baby. I am here for the taking. Whatever you want to do…” he said behind me. I could hear movement on the bed, but I refused to turn around.

“Get your f*****g clothing back on,” I said through clenched teeth. I was angry all of a sudden. I could feel the blood boiling in my veins. Maybe I was bipolar now, because less than five minutes ago I was crying. Now I wanted nothing more than to break the bathroom mirror.

“But Elijah… You know you want it,” Timothy whispered as I felt him put his hand on my shoulder.

“Get your f*****g clothes back on!” I yelled loudly as I stormed back into the bathroom, slamming the door behind me.