We Protect Each Other

Chapter 6

Scott's pov

I woke up and just like yesterday, Mitch was still asleep. I stretched my arms and slowly moved out of the crawl space and went into the alley. When I stood up, I could feel every spot that I was hit in yesterday, there was at least 3 painful spots on my head and countless on my torso. I slowly lifted my shirt to reveal my badly bruised stomach. I brushed my fingers over a small bit and winced at the pain it caused. Doing anything while I'm in this condition is going to be nearly impossible.

"Not any better?" I turned and saw Mitch peeking out from inside out small space. He made his way out and over to me.

"How would you know if it is better?" I asked, curious to see how he knew what it was like before.

"I uhm.. I had to see how bad it was somehow." He said quietly. I nodded and we both continued examining my torso. "Does it hurt if it makes contact with anything?"

"Other than my shirt, yeah. Don't worry, I will be fine."

"I'm sorry." he said this quietly and looked down at his feet.

"Why are you sorry?" I don't know what he had to be sorry for, he helped me get inside after I was hurt and made sure that I had food and water.

"I should've at least tried to help you. They were hurting you and I just stood and watched, like a coward."

"Oh Mitch, listen to me. You have nothing to be sorry about, okay? Not one thing. You probably made the best choice possible in that case because one broken person is better than two."

He nodded a bit and looked up at me and smiled shyly.

I was going to hug him but my movements hurt every part of my body. He must've noticed me clench my jaw when I moved, I tried to hide my pain but it was rather obvious.

"Go sit down inside and rest."

"I need to get us something to eat."

"There are 2 apples, a bag of chips and 2 and a half bottles of water in there, eat." He stated.

I looked at him and noticed a large bruise on the right side of his face and his eye was slightly swelled too. I must not have noticed this before since it was so dark. I lifted his chin with my hand so I could see it better. "What happened."

"Oh um nothing." he moved his head away and tried to cover the bruise with his hand.

"It's clearly not nothing. Was it the same guys that hurt me?"

He nodded slowly.

"Are you okay Mitch? It looks pretty bad."

"I'm fine. Just go in and rest, I'll be back."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes."

"Where are you going?"

"Just go inside."

"Are you going to do another performance and magically appear with more food again?" I asked and did air quotes around the word 'performance' since I still don't know how he got us stuff.

"What if I am?"

"Don't do anything stupid." I said sternly.

"I won't, mom." he smiled and I jokingly rolled my eyes at him.

"Okay I get it. Just be careful, really."

"I will. Go eat a bit and rest some more."

I nodded and headed back towards the entrance. I got in and turned to look at him, he smiled at me then started fixing the scrap metal so it was blocking the entrance. I moved back to my spot and found the apple and half a water bottle he left for me. I am gonna be pretty bored sitting here alone, I can't even go for a walk or go see Kirstie and Alex. Ugh, it's gonna be a long day.