It took a while before AJ was capable of moving. He lay there, waiting for it all to start back up again, not believing that they were really gone. After ten minutes passed and nothing happened, he opened his eyes and looked around the storage room. They were gone. They were really gone. He felt numb, mentally. One thing clicked into his brain and one thing only. He needed to get out of there, and fast. The room still smelled of blood and sex, and it made him sick.
On trembling feet he finally managed to stand. His backside felt as if a million razors had been shoved deep inside of him, and his legs felt no stronger than noodles, but he managed to stay standing. When he tried to move his arms, though, the one shoulder screamed loudly in protest. AJ remembered the popping sound, and knew what had happened. He also knew, from years of being in fights in school, what was needed to do to fix it.
Mechanically he moved, finding an empty space of wall. He put his back to it, ignoring the pain that flared back to life. He took a deep breath before he pulled forward, then slammed himself backwards. With a loud, sickening pop, his shoulder slid back in to place.
AJ moaned and almost went down under the wave of pain, but somehow he managed to keep his feet. How he got through the process of cleaning up, he never really knew. A part of his brain shut down, and he went into autopilot. Mechanically he cleaned up the best that he could, not noticing how red the towel had turned.
He dressed again, mindful of all the sore spots on his body. Since the buttons on his shirt had been popped he wasn’t able to close it. But if he was careful, you couldn’t see the bruise that was forming on his side. He disposed of the towel in a garbage can and turned to make his way out of the room.
As soon as he opened the door the music was pulsing in his mind again like a wakeup call. Some of the haze lifted from his mind, and he stared down either direction of the hall, panic licking at him. What if they came back? What would he do then? He had to get the hell out of there, and fast! He could barely move faster than a stroll, though, or else the pain throughout his body had him gasping. Still, he would have dealt with it to get the hell out of there if a familiar voice hadn’t caught his attention. “J, there you are!”
Surprise and gratitude filled AJ to the very brim when he recognized the voice. Nick. Sweet God, it was Nick. Sure enough, Nick came strutting his way down to AJ, a mile wide grin on his face. “Hey man, where you been? I just got back out there and Bri said you’d been missing for like, ever. They just started last call, so it’s time to bail.” As usual, Nick rattled on without any need of input from anyone else around him. “I told Brian you were probably off with a chick somewhere, and that you’d find your way home, but he insisted on waiting.”
AJ had yet to be able to find words. He didn’t know if he could speak at all, his throat was so sore. He needed something to drink, and fast. But when they reached the main area of the club, AJ stared at the crowd of people and couldn’t force himself to walk through them. The very thought of pushing through that many people had the panic rising again.
His skin beaded with sweat, and he couldn’t quite draw air in. To his left was the main door, the only easy escape. “I’m going to smoke. Meet me outside!” he managed to call over the music before he was darting as quickly as he could move toward the door.
He burst through the doors into the cold night air, shivering slightly. It was freezing outside, but he could breathe again. With as sore as his throat was, and as hoarse as his voice sounded, he had no idea of Nick had heard him, but he knew that his friends would soon follow.
Staring around him, AJ realized that he was standing outside, at night, by himself. The panic came back again, clawing its way through his stomach, leaving him nauseated. What if they were watching him and waiting? Waiting to come back, to do it again, or to kill him? The man with the knife had been serious, that much had been plain in his eyes. Given the right reason, he would have no problems finishing him off.
Just as he was prepared to bolt back inside, Brian and Nick strolled out, chatting with one another. Nick was deep in some story about the girl he had been with, which effectively kept Brian from asking AJ where he had been. But, as Brian listened to Nick, he took his coat off and draped it over AJ’s shoulders. Surprised, AJ looked at him curiously, wondering what was going on.
“You look cold. Take it, I’m fine.” Brian whispered behind Nick as they started to walk down to the hotel.
AJ shivered and pulled Brian’s jacket tighter around himself. There was no way to tell Brian that he wasn’t shivering from the cold. He couldn’t stop his body from shaking. Every noise around them had him jumping, his eyes darting this way and that. They couldn’t get to the hotel fast enough.
Once they were at the hotel, AJ could barely make it through waiting for the elevator to take them upstairs. As soon as the doors opened, he passed Brian’s jacket back to him and made a beeline for his room. He didn’t want to take a chance that one of them would stop him, ask him what he’d been up to, anything like that. He wasn’t ready to answer it yet. God, he was never going to be ready.
His hands were trembling so hard he almost couldn’t get his key card into the door. Whimpering, he finally managed to shove it in, and the light turned green. He yanked on the handle, fairly collapsing into his room and slamming the door shut behind him. He dead bolted it, then simply leaned against it, trying to catch his breath.
God, he hurt! Every part of him just hurt. Walking in the cool evening air had forced his mind to wake up, and with it, sensation came back in spades. He felt sore, and exhausted, and absolutely filthy.
Suddenly he shoved away from the door. With jerky movements he shed his clothes, tossing them straight in the garbage can. Then he headed to the shower. After turning the water to an almost blistering heat, he climbed inside and stood underneath the spray. The water washed over him, across his face and down his body. He closed his eyes, so he was unable to watch as the water that pooled in the tub turned a bright red that slowly washed away, fading to pink, then to nothing.
When the tears started he didn’t know. But suddenly they were pouring down his face, washed away in the water. He wrapped his arms around his waist as the tears turned to sobs. Each one sent a shaft of pain through him, echoing up from his ribs, but he wasn’t able to stop them. His legs melted underneath him. He sunk down until he was on his knees, his body bent double with the force of his crying.
God, this wasn’t fair! It wasn’t right! What had he done to deserve this? What had he done to those men to earn that kind of a punishment? He had never even met them before! Their words echoed around him in the shower, seeming to bounce off the very walls. ‘Look at her! Isn’t she just a beauty?’
How long it took for that part of him to cry itself out, he didn’t know. But by the time he got out of the shower, the water had gone lukewarm. He wrapped himself in the robe that the hotel provided, and limped his way back out to the main part of his room. He went straight to the bed and climbed in, robe and all. Burying himself under the covers, he stared around the dark room, eyes wide, and mind alert. There would be no sleep that night, he knew.
~~~~~
When morning rolled around, AJ was still staring at the walls, his brain unable to turn off. There had been moments of broken sleep here and there, but they had been so full of nightmares that he had forced himself to stay awake as much as possible.
At some point he knew that he had to get out of bed. They had an interview that afternoon, and another one the next night. They had two more nights here at the hotel, and then he would be free to head home. The idea of going back to his house, all alone, was terrifying. How would he sleep? How would he function? He couldn’t even make himself get out of bed here, for fear that they would find him again if he left his room.
How long was he going to have to be afraid? Would it haunt him forever, always taunting him with what he had gone through and what could happen yet again? Or would he ever be able to find some measure of peace? He wondered about it the whole morning, never moving from his spot in bed.
Finally there was no choice left for him. He had to force himself to get out of bed. He dressed himself, choosing jeans and a turtleneck, needing the comfort of hiding inside of loose clothes as well as needing something that wouldn’t push against his bruises too much. A part of his brain seemed to not be working. He had no idea that he was in shock. But it carried him through the interview, allowing him to put on as good of a front as he could manage. He figured it worked, since no one was giving him strange looks.
But as soon as it was done, he was back in his room with the door locked, curled in the center of his bed. The only time he got up was to use the restroom, then he was back again. The trembling came and went, sometimes shaking him so badly that the whole bed seemed to tremble with him.
By the next day, he managed to regain some composure. The fear was there, but he could function around it in small ways. When it came time for the interview, he was getting ready to open his door when he heard music pumping from Nick’s room next door. Just like that his brain was back at the club. He could almost feel the ache in his shoulders like someone was jerking his arms up again. His breath came in and out in short pants, making him dizzy. God, oh God. He couldn’t do it. He just couldn’t! There was no way he could do the interview!
With a supreme effort of will he managed to re bolt the door. That will carried him back to the bed, and held him together long enough to grab his phone and text Howie. “Just threw up, fd psng, cant come. Talk 2 u tmrw.” Then he was buried back in the bed, gasping and trying to bring air into his lungs. The more he gasped, the worse the pain in his side became. Oh God, would this ever go away? Lying in his hotel bed, AJ prayed to God above to kill him, to take away his pain.