Promise I Will

12

Strong arms. That's how it felt. The soft hands touch my face and take hold of my arms and pick me up. My legs hand over their arm, and my head hangs over the other. Wet hair clings to my face and I sob out a groan when the anonymous person sets me down on some type cushion.

"Are you all right?" Sounds near my head, my eyes open a crack and I sigh, allowing a tear to slip down my face, and join the others gathered on my shirt. I pull it down to cover my stomach and look at the boy.

"Does it look like I'm all right?" I snap. I groan when I feel my muscles contract and the pain shoot up my side.

"Sorry." The blonde-haired boy speaks.

"I know you." I squint and see his sculpted face, and bright eyes.

"Yeah, I promised..." He jokes.

"Yeah, I remember..." I spit, "Can you not say anything..." I plea thinking of the people he could tell.

"Um. But..." He protests.

"No....promise me, you'll zip it." I cut him off.

"But."

"No buts..."

"Fine."

I sigh and hold out my hand. "Help me up?"

My side feels like an elephant had joined stomp and their stage was my body.

I'm sitting in the back seat of a car. It looks old, but it's cute. He gently takes my hand in his and helps me upright. My back lays on the fabric covering the seat. "Thank you."

"I'll take you home to get cleaned up." Carson says not meeting my eyes.

"Thank you." He sighs and lifts his hand in a swift motion, holding my cheek in his hand he gives me a half smile. "Stop thanking me."

I twist my mouth, making a 'sorry' face.

"Here." He reaches over my body and pulls the seat belt over my body and buckles it in. He pulls on it, reassuring me that its buckled and smiles.

Sitting in his seat he huffs out a breath. "I'm taking you to the hospital." And he starts up the car without my response.

"What? No!" I refuse to go to the hospital. What are they going to do to help me? They can look at me and tell me what's wrong, but I already know. I'm broken. You can't help a person who's broken on the inside.

"You're bruised badly, and you need to be treated. You can barely move for goodness sake." He mutters, but doesn't obey my command when I say, "Stop the car! Let me out!" My arms flail and I shout.

My body aches but my mind is too numb to tell myself to stop and just listen to him. He's only trying to help, but it bugs me. Why is he trying?

My head pounds and all these words spin around in my head. "Why are you doing this?" I ask.

"You're bruised-" I stop him with my hand not feeling like yelling over the top of his voice.

"Why are you helping me? Why not just bring me home to sulk? Why even bother stopping them?"

"Because no one deserves this kind of treatment."

"Yeah, but what about all the other times it's happened. This isn't the first time this has happened to me."

"I don't want to talk about this." He sighs and keeps his head facing the road.

"Fine." I say after a minute of silence. I wiggle in my seat and get comfortable for the ride.

"Fine what?" He furrows his brows in confusion and tilts his head to the side and gives me a side glance, quick to recover and look back at the road.

"I'll let you take me to the hospital." I say.

"It wasn't up for discussion." He says, making a smile form on my face.