Wanted

I had been clever enough to avoid him all day, but my wit ran out, because here he was standing in front of me. My breathing got faster by the second; my heart feeling like it was beating 50 beats per second. I started hyperventilating; panicking because I was scared of what he would do to me. I tried backing up, but with every step I took backwards, he took one forward. Soon my back was pressed against something cold and hard, the lockers. He came up to me and put one hand on either side of my head.

“I’ve been looking for you all day.” He said in a serious and angry tone.

“I know,” I whimpered, “I’ve been hiding from you all day.”

I started shaking and knew a panic attack would be starting soon if he didn’t back up. I don’t know why he was doing this. I barely knew him, I mean I know he basically saved my life, but I had already thanked him, well kind of. So why was he bothering me now? What did I do to him that I don’t remember doing? Did I make him angry and not realize it?

“P-please, don’t hurt m-me,” I stuttered, “I swear I won’t say anything, just please d-don’t hurt me.”

He started laughing, hysterically, actually. I wondered what was so funny; did he find humor in me? Was my fear amusing to him? Questions flew around my brain as he laughed. I just stood there for what felt like hours while he laughed. Finally he stopped and regained his composure.

“You honestly think I’m going to hurt you?” He asked.

“Well yeah, why not, after what you did to that guy. Why wouldn’t I be next?” I questioned.

“Look, I don’t want to hurt you. I saved your life, why would I save you if I wanted to hurt you?” He asked.

Good point, I thought.

“And besides, that guy deserved it; you didn’t deserve what almost happened to you.”

**FLASHBACK**

It was Sunday night, and I was walking home from my friend Kayla’s house. I had my headphones in to distract myself from the long walk, but I didn’t have the music too loud. As I was walking I started getting really into my music. That usually happens all the time, when the music’s so good you just want to focus on the music and the music alone. But I always overthink everything, so as the music played I walked along thinking about the artist and why they wrote those lyrics, and if they wrote about a personal experience. I wondered how they wrote the music and if they came up with different sounds on different instruments to test which ones sounded the best. As I was walking I noticed that somebody was walking behind me, I turned to look at them, and all I saw was a black hood pulled over a head with this face looking at the ground.

Creep, I thought.

So I crossed the street and turned my music off, but kept my headphones in to make it look like I was still listening to music. Three minutes later that same guy crossed the street as well.  That put my brain on red alert. I became aware of my surroundings and I focused on how fast that guy was walking and how his breathing hitched whenever I looked back at him.

Don’t worry Sofia, you’re almost home. I thought to myself.

I started to pick up my pace and I noticed that he did too. I rounded the corner at the end of the block and knocked into someone.

“Oh, sorry sorry sorry.”  I repeated.

“Hey, don’t worry about it, it was an accident.” 

I looked up and saw what I felt was the face of a true sex god. He was absolutely stunning, breathtaking, and I couldn’t keep my eyes away. But there was something about him, I mean by the looks of it he was probably a geek, much like myself. But there was also something else, something dark, like he knew how to stick up for himself and knew how to defend himself.

I wish I could look like I knew how to defend myself. I thought over.

“See ya around, and don’t worry, you didn’t hurt me that bad.” He smirked and gave a little wink.

He walked off and around my new, extremely creepy, stalker. But the creep just kept walking towards me, so I turned and kept walking. I heard his feet picking up the pace behind me and soon it turned into a run. I started running and gave out a scream when he came closer to me.

In a matter of seconds he was on top of me, he tackled me to the ground. I gave out a number of screams and tried fighting back. He started grabbing my arms and dragging me. I tried lashing out, but it was no use, his grip was too strong. I became very weak, still trying to get away. He kept dragging me; I looked like a rag doll. He dragged me down three blocks into this alleyway. I gave out more screams, hoping, no, praying that somebody, anybody would hear me.

He kept hitting me, punching me, kicking everything he could. I cried out in pain, tears spilling out of my eyes.  I just kept crying, I didn’t have the strength to scream anymore. He dragged me over to a garbage can and tied my hands to it. The rope was cutting into my wrists; I looked up and saw blood trickling down my arms. He got on top of me, putting a majority of his body weight on me. I whimpered underneath his body as he started shoving rope into my mouth. More tears spilled down my face as he began taking my sweater off. I saw his mouth move but didn’t hear anything come out. I couldn’t hear anything; I was in too much of a panic.

 He started removing my shirt and my body immediately froze because of the 40 degree weather. He began caressing my body and started kissing me from my neck down to my chest. I cried even more, terrified that I was soon to be dead. He began to work his hands down my body and tried to take my pants off, but before he got the chance, he was knocked off of my body. I looked over to see what happened but my vision was still blurry from my tears. I slowly started to gain some hearing back.

“What the hell is wrong with you!?” A voice slightly familiar screamed.

The next thing I heard was what I imagined to be the sound of a fist connecting with a face. And I heard that noise over and over and over again. Then it all went silent, and I thought I lost my hearing again, until I heard panting and footsteps getting closer to me. I started panicking again and squeezed my eyes shut, eyes burning from all the crying I’ve done. Somebody comes over to me and untied my hands and mouth.

“Here,” they said, “I won’t look.”

When I opened my eyes I saw him, the boy I bumped into on my traumatizing walk home. He was holding out my shirt and sweater and his head was facing the opposite direction, away from my half naked body. I took my clothes from him, put them on, and then backed away from him. I backed up against the garbage can that held me captive moments ago, and curled up into the fetal position, crying. When he heard me crying, he turned towards me and walked over. When he got close, I scurried further away.

“Hey, calm down, it’s okay.” He tried reassuring me with his hands in the air as if he were surrendering.

I looked behind him and saw my predator, blood surrounding his body. My eyes grew wide and I gasped, Is he dead? I thought. I just witnessed somebody being murdered.

The boy must have read my facial expression because he said, “No he’s not dead, just unconscious.”

I still backed away from the boy, terrified. I backed away further until I was far enough where I could get up and run. I heard the boy calling after me, but he didn’t bother to run after me. I ran until my feet collapsed on my front porch. Thankfully my parents were still at work, so I had time to clean up the cuts on my wrists and calm down before they came home. I was too terrified to say anything to them, and I never really got a good look at my predator’s face anyway. And besides, I didn’t want that boy getting into trouble. But I can tell you one thing, I never walked home alone again.

**END OF FLASHBACK**