A Love Story in San Francisco

Chapter 2: Hurting for Love

Emma Wood is Lucas's girlfriend. They've been in love since they met in college. Fresh out of college, they live in a relatively inexpensive apartment in San Francisco's Tenderloin for only $2,500 a month.

When Lucas heard Emma's screams, his heart skipped a beat. He rushed up the stairs and pushed the door, and the sight before him made his blood instantly freeze. Two masked robbers were preparing to brutalize Emma, Emma's clothes were being torn, her hands were tied up by one of them. The other bandit had torn off Emma's white t-shirt, leaking out her ample breasts, and was pulling at Emma's pants, as Emma's tears and despair covered her face. They entered the door to rob money, but after seeing a beautiful lady they also wanted to rob s*x.

Lucas's eyes burned with rage as he let out an earth-shattering roar and pounced on the nearest robber like an enraged lion. His movements were swift and sharp, and a heavy punch struck the opponent's face with a dull thud. The robber stumbled at the sudden attack, but quickly steadied himself and backhanded Lucas, hitting him in the face and making him momentarily dizzy, while at the same time the other robber rushed forward with a right hook.

Lucas sidestepped and dodged, followed by an elbow strike that hit the robber's ribs hard. The robber let out a cry of pain and fell to the ground. But the other robber had already reacted, he drew a dagger with a cold light from his waist and stabbed at Lucas.

Lucas's pupils shrunk violently, and he barely managed to dodge the fatal blow, but he still got a b****y cut on his arm. He clenched his teeth, ignoring the pain, and backhanded the robber's knife-wielding wrist, twisting it with force. The robber let out a cry of pain, and the dagger fell to the ground. Lucas took advantage of the situation to hit the robber with a knee strike, hitting the robber's abdomen, knocking him back.

Emma witnessed all this from the sidelines, her eyes filled with fear and worry. lucas turned back to her, gave her a comforting look, and then turned to face the rest of the robbers. The three men fought fiercely in the small room. The two robbers obviously realized that they couldn't do it alone, so they stood apart in a Y formation, ready to pincer attack, Lucas was in great danger. He realized that he could not defend himself against two men, so he took the initiative to rush towards one of them and tried to knock him out with one or two punches. The bandit did not expect Lucas to suddenly rise up and froze, and then received a heavy blow to the face, and his mouth immediately filled with the taste of blood - his mouth was bleeding from the blow. The other bandit rushed up, a heavy sweeping kick toppled Lucas over, Lucas' back fell to the ground, bringing the back of his head crashing down. Luckily it was a carpet, otherwise he would have fainted for sure. Before he could react, there was another kick to the ribs, and Lucas curled up in a moment of pain in his abdomen.

Just then, the sound of sirens in the distance became clearer, cutting through the quiet of the night sky. It seemed that a kind neighbor had called the police, and the robbers looked at each other and decided to retreat. They quickly got up from the ground and fled the apartment, disappearing into the night.

Lucas was gasping for breath, his body was covered in bruises and blood was pouring out of his arms, but he couldn't care less about himself. He hurriedly turned towards Emma and held her tightly in his arms.Emma's whole body was trembling and tears were streaming down her face, her cries conveyed despair and she couldn't be calmed for a long time.

'Luckily it's okay', Lucas thought to himself. The police soon arrived the apartment. Lucas and Emma were rushed to the hospital, while a looming problem occurred to them - the Tenderloin was not safe. They needed to move, immediately, to be able to ease Emma's psyche - she was already afraid to go back to that place, and every time she thought of the apartment, she had flashbacks of having her hands tied by her rapists and their dirty hands all over her body. She's got PTSD.

Lucas sees Emma as the love of his life and is will marry no one but her. He knew there was no way they could continue to live in Tenderloin, so the day after he was released from the hospital, Lucas made an appointment with a housing agent to start looking at apartments, with the first constraint in mind: the rent. The rent for a tenderloin apartment was $2,500 a month, about 40% of Lucas's salary. If they were to move to a satety area, the rent would be $3,500 or more. In order to have a better environment, Lucas had no choice but to rent a two-bedroom apartment in the Marina District, which would cost $4,300 a month. He felt they could still afford it, but he couldn't lose his job. He still had student loans that he had just begun to pay back. Lucas felt his life sucks.