Shot in Love and Crime (DNF)

Chapter 21: Cleaning

George POV.

“Stupid fucking mafia, needing me to clean up all their shit because they can’t hire a fucking maid to do the same thing.” I mumbled under my breath, wiping down the large oak table in the meeting room for the second time today.

After cleaning the entire room to the best of my abilities this morning, and cleaning the entire dining room to the same degree after that, I began wandering around aimlessly, just trying to think of a way to escape. That worked for an hour or so until Karl tracked me down, telling me that someone had been shot in the meeting room and now I had to clean up the blood.

Thankfully when I had turned up the body was gone, since I was certain that I would have had a panic attack if there was a dead body in front of me. The only remains of whatever had happened in here was a blood splatter on the table and floor, but I had managed to convince myself that it was anything and everything other than blood.

So here I was, wiping the oak table with a cloth until it was clean enough that I could see my reflection in it. My agitated frown staring back at me, however I ignored it as I continued, deciding I may as well wipe down the whole table instead of the stain. All the while I was mindful of where I had left the cleaning supplies Dream had me use so that I didn’t spill anything.

By the time I had made my way around the whole table my back was facing the large floor to ceiling window. Today had been quite warm, based on the bright sunlight which had been bathing the mansion and its endless expanse of gardens for most of today. However inside it was as cold as the Arctic, with whatever powerful air conditioner this mafia owned.

I decided to take a break, since all I had to do after wiping the table was wiping the blood stain off of the floor, and turned my attention towards the window. It was facing towards the city, which was a view to marvel at, especially since the sun was disappearing between the skyscrapers, making it seem even more surreal to look at.

Without even realising when it had happened, I began thinking of my school friends again, mainly Clay. And I couldn’t help but wonder if they were all seeing the same beautiful view that I was seeing right now.

Maybe they were having dinner with their families in front of a window like this one. Or maybe they were heading home from work while bathed in the warm light. Or they might not even register the magnificent sight at all. They could have moved far away from here and I could have no way of ever finding them again.

But I hoped that wasn’t the case. As selfish as it sounds I hoped that all of my friends: Clay, Nick, and Darryl, all stayed here in L’manburg. And I hoped that I would be able to find them as soon as I got out of here.

“Hey George, what are you doing?” I jumped as I heard the voice beside me since I hadn’t heard anyone come in. Once I turned however I saw it was just Karl, giving me a curious look.
“Nothing,” I responded. “I was just cleaning up this… spill.” I paused for a moment as I motioned over to the crimson puddle on the floor. “And I just took a break to admire the view.”

“Oh,” Karl responded, smiling at me. “That’s nice. You just seemed to be lost in thought. Is everything okay?”
“Everything’s fine.” I reassured him. “I was just thinking about some of my old friends, it’s nothing too important.”

I walked back over to where the stain was, wanting to finish cleaning and then return to my room for the night. “You used to live in L’manburg, right?” Karl suddenly asked, catching me off guard. I just answered with a ‘yes’ as I continued to scrub the stains. “So do your friends all still live here?” He seemed even more curious as he asked each question.

“I hope that they still live here,” I responded. “That was the main reason that I had moved back here. My parents made me move suddenly, it was hard for me to have to deal with my friends and so I thought it was easier to block their numbers.” There was a moment of hesitation before I continued. “Leaving this place was the biggest mistake of my life.” I almost sobbed as I spoke.

Karl just listened, and I felt a mix of both self-hatred and guilt. I shouldn’t be telling this person who was practically a stranger about my childhood, especially since he was working as part of the mafia group that kidnapped me. Plus, this was just me telling him about what I did wrong when I was a teenager, he wouldn’t want to hear about this.

So I apologised, dumping the cloth into a bucket of water before lifting it up to leave the room. I didn’t pay attention as Karl attempted to call after me as I just began hurrying to the closet where I was told to return the cleaning supplies too. After I had emptied the bucket and dropped everything off I went back to my room, since I had nothing else to do.

However as I opened the door and walked over to my bed I froze, seeing Karl standing in there watching me. “Karl?” I questioned, “how did you get here before me?” The brunette rolled his eyes and I tried to pretend that I didn’t notice them, especially since he began talking immediately after.

“Who are the people in these photos?” Karl asked as I sat down on the edge of the bed awkwardly. “Are these some of your old friends?”
“Yeah, they are,” I answered with a nod, moving over to look at what he was looking at. I was unsure as to why he was asking me this since we’d already talked about them yesterday.

“Who is this?” He continued on, pointing at Nick. It was a photo of my friend group at the school prom. Nick, Clay, Darryl, and I, took a photo in front of a silver backdrop. We had our arms around each other as we all smiled at the camera. Even though Clay and I were dating when we had taken that photo, we just went as friends, not as a couple.

“That’s Nick.” I replied with a smile. “He was one of my best friends back when I used to live here. He was really into fire, and video games, and pandas for whatever reason.” Karl nodded and so I kept talking. “Last time I saw him, he was dating a girl called Stephanie who was working at the news station.”

“Interesting.” The only response Karl had was a nod before turning away, seemingly not knowing or not caring about the other people in the picture. He walked to the door, before pausing, seemingly in thought.

“Hey George,” he spoke with a smile as he glanced back over at me. “Wanna go watch something in my room?” The brunette offered, and after a moment of pondering the question I decided to give a nod of yes.

After all, there was nothing to do in my bedroom and I didn’t want to get yelled at if I tried going anywhere, so being invited to another person's room means that I won’t get in trouble. So I pushed myself up and off the bed before following after him.
_________________________________________
1295 words