Kidnapped

Hopeless

The chock of seeing his beat up face took away the pain for a little while. I just couldn´t believe it. James Johnson. The one and only, right there in front of me. As I watched him his expresion changed from concerned and freaked out, to relieved and guilty. I don´t know how you can combinate those two expressions, but somehow he managed to.

His hands were touching my face, softly, and I flinched as he examined the cuts and bruises. I had no idea how I had gotten the injuries on my face. From what I could remember, my face had been fine when I passed out. Memories started to come back to me, mostly of darkness and pain. I knew that I had just been tortured. But I still didn´t know why. I didn´t know if Mr. Superfamous had the answers I was looking for either but he seemed to be better informed.

He examined me with soft hands while I was looking at him with big eyes. I probably looked like a puppy or something. Thoughts were racing through my head at a million miles an hour. It was very confusing since I couldn´t grasp a thought before it was replaced by a new one. It was all too much for me and the sight of him made me so nervous I could hardly breath. Oh my God, James fucking Johnson!

"Do you think you can sit up?" he asked me and I blinked at him.

His voice was low and sweet and somehow it made me feel safe. Maybe it was because I knew him as the good guy from all the movies. I nodded and with his help I slowly sat up. My ribs were very bruised and it hurt like hell to move. I realized that I could only see through my right eye, the left one was so swollen I couldn´t see a thing. My lip was cracked and I could feel the taste of blood in my mouth. Other than that I felt just fine. Like I was walking on fucking sunshine.

I turned to look at him again and noticed that he was still watching me with those green eyes. It felt weird somehow. Even when his face looked they way it did, swollen and blue, I could still see beauty behind it all and it made me blush. Maybe it was just because I knew what he really looked like.

"Are you okay?" he asked me. "You were out for quite some time. You really scared me." 

I didn´t know what to answer. I had been kidnapped. I had been tortured. I was far from okay. But as I looked in to his eyes I could see that he had been through just as much as I had, and there was no point in moaning about it.

"Yeah, I´m okay", I told him and tried to smile but it must´ve looked odd with the bruises and everything. He just looked even more worried. After just looking at me for a while he offered me his right hand.

"I´m James", he said and gave me an almost-smile. I took his hand and shook it, trying to mimic his smile but, of course, I failed.

"I know who you are", I said simply, blushing a bit. "And I am Amanda. I would say it´s nice to meet you, but I think we can agree on that the circumstances could have been better."

He laughed then, a quiet and soft laugh, that made me smile even though smiling hurt my face. And when I stoped smiling so did he and looked concerned again. It was actually kind of cute.

"Are you sure you are okay?" he asked me one more time and I just nodded.

I broke our eyecontact and started to look around. We were in a different room now, that was clear. This one was much bigger and obviously a basement of some sort. We were sitting next to each other on a small bed that stood towards one of the walls. Over our heads there was a staircase that led up to a door. I could bet my life on that that door was looked. There was nothing more to see really. In the ceiling hung a single light bulb that made it possible for us to se each other. That was about it. Everything was grey and like taken from a scary movie.

"Mr. Johnson?" I said suddenly and turned to face him again, where he sat next to me on the bed. "Do you know why we´re here?"

I know that I had already asked him that question but I just had to ask again. Everything about that situation was just absurd and I had a hard time dealing with it. Besides I had a hard time remembering certain things as well ... 

"Call me James or Jamie, Amanda", he sighed and stroked his hands over his face. "Money. They want money, and lots of it. They have been keeping me here for a day, maybe two, trying to force me to tell them who to contact. I thought I was alone, and then all of a sudden there you were. They tortured you in front of me to get the information out of me."

His eyes filled with guilt and pain as he looked in to mine. "I´m so sorry, it´s because of me that you´re here. I´m so sorry." A tear slowly rolled down his cheek and I thought that my heart were going to break. He was so sweet.

I couldn´t really argue against it though, because it was true. I was there because of him but it wasn´t his fault. He had had nothing to do with it, so that´s what I told him to calm him down a bit. It seemed to work because just moments later he leaned his back against the wall and slept like a baby. I just looked at him for a while, trying to figure out what had happened for the past twentyfour hours.

I had woken up early, and ate my breakfast down at the beach, before it was time to get to work. I was working at a coffee shop to earn some extra money while I was away from home. There was a lot of customers and I had to skip my lunch brake because Erin never showed up. My boss, Carl, finally gave me about ten minutes off around noon and I stepped out for a while. I remember how I thought that the alley behind the coffee shop was dark even when the sun was up. That was when I saw someone walk in my direction. I couldn´t see his face, but he was wearing a denim jacket. Then something hit me in the back of the head and I blacked out.

Next thing I knew I woke up, tied up and had that bag over my head. And from what James told me, they had kidnapped me to pressure him in to telling them what they wanted. To get money.

I hadn´t really thought about how serious the situation was, until that moment. I hadn´t let myself fully understad what was going on. The walls seemed to close in on me and I had trouble breathing.

What if I die in here, I thought. The door is locked, there are no windows. No one will hear me if I scream. The guy in the denim shirt will come down here and take my body, bury it so no one can find it.

But right then, in my panicked state, I saw my brother´s face in front of me. Like I had seen him in my dream. How he must wonder why I never call. And then after a while he would understand that something was wrong. My family would come and look for me. Even grandma, who was afraid of airplanes. They would all look for me. But after a while when they don´t find me, one after one, they´re gonna give up hope. All exept my dear Jonas. He would never give up on me, even if I was dead.

I cried, there in the gloomy basement. But I cried silently, so that I wouldn´t wake up James, who was sleeping next to me. After a while I drifted off to sleep, leaning against the cold, stone wall behind my back. I didn´t sleep that well though. I woke up now and again from nightmares and my entire body was aching. Next to me, James was crying in his sleep.