Curiosity Book 1 ✔️

Chapter 6

I began coughing before I opened my eyes. I was drenched and in pain. I wanted to scream and cry and punch something all at the same time.

            "Jewel!" I yelled as loud as I could, which was more of a raspy whisper, "Jewel I'm so sorry!"

            "Yelling is pointless, especially with your voice like that,"

            "Wh-who are you?"

            "I'm Darren McCalle, can I take you back to my group?"

            "P-please do."

            He reached out his hand to me, which I grabbed almost immediately. My clothes were heavy from the water, my mind was heavy from the argument, my eyes were heavy from lack of actual sleep.

            The first step I took, I nearly faceplanted the rocky soil below me.

            "Woah, You okay.. Uh. What's your name?"

            "Cameira."

            "Friend of Jewel Cunningham right?"

            "Yeah, how'd you know?"

            "She talks alot."

            "Talked," I corrected him.

            "Oh, sorry. She talked alot."

            "Great," I attempted a weak smile, but I winced once I realised how much pain I was in. I had blocked out the pain from the shock, but now it was unbearable. There were defininitely some broken bones.

            "Oh dear lord, how about I just carry you. It's not that far and at this pace we'll get there by tomorrow."

            "Yes p-please."

            He scooped me into his arms. It was oddly warm and comfortable. He wasn't that bad looking. If I met him before F- Cam stop mentioning him. Now's not the time. It doesn't matter how well the disshelveled look suits him.

            I still prefer Farris over him. I'm not a whore, the thing with Farris was a few days ago. Yes Darren is a handsome man, but he doesn't have big green eyes, or that amazing toothy smile, or that cute dimple that likes to play peek a boo sometimes.

            Cam, stop. I closed my eyes and slipped into oblivion.

~+~+~+~+~+~+~

            I woke up, still in Darrens arms, he was laying me down on a really cheap mattress.

            "Hey," he smiled down at me with his brown eyes.

            "Uh, hi."

            "You looked tired so I got you a room to stay in."

            "Where are we?"

            "An old hotel. The group took it over, I got you a really good room, it's a single bed. And the great thing about this place is that we fixed the plumbing and lighting. So you can have a nice shower, and you can have the lights on between certain hours. I'll let you know your hours tomorrow. "

            "Does the water have certain hours too?"

            "Yes, but it's not as precise as the lights. You have to reserve a time slot. It's a really intricate process. I gave up my time slot for you, you seem like you need it more than I do."

            "Thank you so much, you didn't have to do any of this."

            "Yeah, but I wanted to. So I did," he smiled at me and sat next to me on the bed, "Your time slot for the water is coming up pretty soon, how about you go start getting ready for that?"

            "What time is it now? What even is today?"

            "It's 15:27 on August 24th in the year of 2023. It's Thursday."

            "What does 15:27 mean?"

            "It's 3:27 in the afternoon."

            "When's the water time slot?"

            "15:45. I mean, 3:45 until 4:00."

            "Okay. I'm gonna go get ready for that. I feel disgusting."

            "I would too after being in that river. I'll be outside waiting because I still need to dress your wounds."

            "Okay."

~+~+~+~+~+~

            At exactly 4:00 I shut the water off. I savored every minute of the shower. I hadn't had one in so long and it felt like absolute heaven. I let Darren in once I had dressed into clean clothes I found in one of the drawers.

            He started wrapping my left wrist up, saying that it was either broken or sprained. He dressed every injury I had from the fall. I explained to him what happened and he said that I was lucky to only have minor injuries.

            "Okay, you look absolutely exhausted, go to sleep. I'll bring you breakfast in the morning. We'll introduce you to the rest of the group tomorrow afternoon."

            "Thanks Darren."

            I crawled inside the blanket as if I were a bear getting ready for hibernation. I began to drift off as I heard a door close.