FicWad

Chapter Nineteen

I ached all over; from my fingertips to my toes, I was in sluggish agony as I tried to move. I managed to arch my back enough to feel and hear it click almost satisfyingly back into place. I rolled over, assuming I would roll further into the softness of the hotel's crisp white pillows that I must be lying on. However, as my body moved uneasily in search of the comfort, my brain clicked in the same way as my back had done only seconds earlier; there was no hotel, it had been burned down, and the gravel like surface I was laying on was most definitely not a luxurious bed.

My eyes snapped open as I felt a hard splash of cold liquid descend on me, seeming to come from nowhere. However, as my eyes adjusted to the bright daylight, I realised that I was lying by the side of a road, right next to a large puddle of water and I was soaked to the skin; obviously, as I was passed out, all the cars driving past would have covered me in the pool of swirly brown tinted, muddy rainwater and god-knows what else. It was then that my mind started racing, attempting to understand why I was there.

Another car passed drenching me and then another and then another as I lay there taking in my appearance; my shirt was unbutton and thrown on me hastily, my trousers scuffed at the knee as if I had fallen multiple times, and the fly was unzipped, the button undone. "What the fuck?" I asked myself, finally standing as the spray from yet another vehicle became too much.

Bob's water was poisoned, I tried to get him to another hospital on my own, he passed out, I panicked and phoned Gee who then came and drove us to the next nearest hospital, we took Bob to the emergency room where he was wheeled away on a gurney, Gerard and I sat and waited then Gee left me on my own...but, then what? I played the events of last night out in my head, zipping up my trousers and fastening the button at the same time, confusing myself as I tried to work out why I woke up on the edge of a strange road. I began walking -to where, I do not know- buttoning up my shirt and muttering to myself.

"Mikey?" I spun around, wincing at the sharp pain that pounded through my head, to see Ray staring at me from the other side of the street quizzically, trying to decide if the guy across the street that he was shouting to really was Michael Way. "Mikey!" he shouted again when he mentally confirmed it was me and began crossing the busy road slightly carelessly.

"Oh, thank god you're all right!" he flung his arms around me and hugged me tightly, a hug that made breathing difficult, once he had thankfully made it safely across the flow of traffic.

"What?" I asked through a yawn, my back clicking again.

He released me and stared at me, "You disappeared last night, and we were all worried about you!"

"When?" I asked, fighting with my memory for some kind of clarification; nothing, and remembering about how I felt almost the same now as I had done when I'd thought Sara had raped me. Oh god, I couldn't have been raped could I? Or rather, I couldn't have been raped...again, could I?

"Well, Gerard said that you and him fell out." Ray, looking perplexed, started and I began creating a mental list of events, I marked the fall out with Gee, outside the hospital, off with a great big imaginary green tick. "Then you walked off somewhere, but you obviously went back to the hospital because the next thing Gee said was that you phoned him asking him to take you and Bob to a different town, to a different hospital." I marked that with a tick also.

"Then what?" I asked, rubbing my head in circles, easing away the pain.

"Then a call from Gee woke me, he said that he'd left you so he could take a call and when he came back, you weren't there. He said that somehow he knew that something bad had happened, he was really upset." Ray finished, his face wrinkling in concern.

"Where did you go Mikey, we were all really worried about you? I was out walking about everywhere trying to find you." He stared into my tired eyes with his own equally tired ones, pleading for an answer I just couldn't give; there was a big red 'X' on that part of the night.

"I don't know." I answered, smiling sadly at him, still racking my brains for something...anything. "I remember Gee leaving me and shouting something, then...." A light flashed in my mind, "...I talked to this girl, there was something odd about her but I can't remember what, then everything goes blank."

"What girl?" Ray asked me, his face remaining scrunched in concern.

"I can't remember anything about her, it's weird." I shook my head and yawned, "Look Ray, I just woke up 'n all but I'm still exhausted; sleeping on the side walk ain't that much fun," I laughed a little, the noise sounding strange and unfitting to the situation, "Could you take me back to the new hotel?"

"Eh, We're kinda already there." He pointed to the side of the street he just came from and, sure enough, there was the hotel. "Sorry, but I kinda gave up looking for you and came back here." He explained sheepishly "That was when I saw you across the street, I couldn't actually believe it was you...sorry."

"It's fine, don't worry about it man." I lifted my stiff arm up and patted him reassuringly on the shoulder, "I just need sleep."

We walked across the street and up to the entrance of the hotel, but as we were about to walk through the doors to the reception area, I stopped and looked back across the street thinking about how I ended up right outside my new hotel, and a sick feeling began creeping over me. Whoever was responsible for my lack of memory from the night before knew a hell of a lot more about me than I did about them; I'd never been to this hotel before so I couldn't possibly have found my way back and it was very unlikely, considering I had been in a different town, that I could have walked back here randomly. They must have left me here.

Shaking a little at my realisation, I turned back to the door where Ray was waiting with his hand on the handle. However, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a hooded woman, her purse hanging loosely from her arm, smoking a cigarette while leaning against a wall on the opposite side of the street near where I'd woken, she waved and then disappeared around the corner while a cold shiver ran down my spine chilling me to the core.

I had sunk into the soft bedding and warmness of the king size bed as soon as I fell through the door of my room, fatigued and aching beyond belief. I fell straight into a heavy dreamless sleep.

"Mikey! Mikey!" I groaned and rolled over, trying to ignore the thuds on my door and the shouts coming through the cracks.

"Mikey, fucking let me in you idiot!" the voice shouted once again and I pulled myself up off the soft, comforting mattress and mumbled to myself as I walked lethargically toward the door. I unlocked it and walked back to the bed without waiting to see who it was.

My eyes had closed and I was about to fall back into sleep when I felt something hard hit my head and I opened my eyes while my hand shot to the spot where the object had connected. I was met by Gerard's angry face only inches away from mine, he was breathing hard and shooting daggers into my face with his stare. "You fucking idiot!" he snarled as I looked around for the thing that hit me.

"I fucking told you!" he seethed as he leant across me, groping the bed for something, which he eventually found, without his angry eyes ever leaving me "Only - drink -your - own - drinks!" he said slowly, hitting my forehead with an empty plastic bottle, the item he'd been looking for, as each word fell from his livid lips. "I fucking told you, and still, you go and take this!" he threw the bottle at my head one last time before walking away from my bed side and staring out of the window.

I clasped my hand to my head, as I replayed his words and remembered what he had said to me before he left for whatever-reason. I'd nodded in understanding at the time, but then...that girl. I had taken a drink from that girl and then, I swear, I think, that's when my memory went blank.

"Dammit, I shouldn't have left you! I'm a fucking idiot as well!" I heard Gee mutter to himself, angrily, as he gazed absently out of the window.

"She seemed pretty decent," I said softly, as I listened back to the one small part of our, mine and the girl's, conversation that I could remember. "I didn't think it would matter."

He turned to stare at me sadly, "Mikey, not all bad people have 'FUCK' tattooed across their faces. There isn't a sign that they all have to carry around that reads 'hey look at me! I'm gonna hurt you!'"

"I know!" I snapped back, slightly offended which made Gerard sigh and shake his head then turn back to the window.

After a short silence, he began walking across the room to the door again. "Mikey, the world's a fucked up place. Please be careful and listen to what I have to say from now on."

"Gerard, what the fuck is going on?" I demanded to know, tired of all the confusion.

"I love you Mikey and I'm really sorry." He didn't look at me as he walked out of the door, closing it with a soft 'click' behind him ignoring me yet again.

Kind of a random chapter, not much happened. Thank you everyone for the reviews :)