A Choice Of Abiding

↠regrets collect like old friends here to relive your darkest moments↞

Charlotte had swore to herself to not come back here, ever. Yet, she was standing in front of the enormous housing complex, she once had called her home. The sun was rising on the horizon making the sky look like it was bleeding. It was a pretty background for an ugly facade, that consisted of dilapidated buildings. Charlie took a deep breath.

"You can do this", she whispered to herself before entering one of the complexes. Being here again brought back memories, Charlotte rather had forgotten all together. What happened her still haunted her. It smelled the same way, as she remembered. Of cold smoke and piss mixed with the musty smell, most staircases had. Mechanically, Charlie made her way up the stairs. It was the 15th floor, she headed to. Of course, she could take the elevator, but she was stalling. She needed time to face, what was coming next.

Two more stories. She pulled a 50 euro note out of her purse. She had the plan to get in and check, if they had got Calum. She had no idea though, what to do, if they actually had him. Calling the police on them? They would know it had been her, and that would not end well for her. Maybe she could get Leon to be reasonable, but that was a shaky scaffold to build her plans on. He might have been as close to her as a brother, but that was in another time. She hadn't been talking to him, ever since he had gone into rehab, about a year ago. Things haven't had ended exactly well between them before that.

Twelve steps to the door. Charlie prayed for her phone to ring or at least that, when she knocked, Calum wouldn't be there. That he would have done some stupid ass shit and hanging in custody all night. She wished Ashton to be right and not her.

One step. Charlie's phone stood still. She hadn't come up with an escape plan. She would need to improvise. She formed a fist and knocked.

The first thing Calum noticed, when he woke up again, were unfamiliar voices talking in a language, he didn't understand. The second thing he noticed, was an immense pain in his neck, that was the result of sleeping on a chair in a very uncomfortable position. When he tried to get out of it, he realized his hands were immobilized.

'Fuck' he thought and with the adrenaline rush yanked open his eyes. He scanned his environment. He was in the middle of a room, that he had never seen in his live before. There wasn't much in it, two old mattresses without a bed frame, a table and some chairs. Not even a TV or anything.

The voices came from another room, but they were close. Calum took two deep breaths to calm himself down. He needed to remember, what happened. He could not panic now. He brought home Lucy. He went out to find a girl for a one night stand. He met the blonde at the bar. From there on his memories went blurry.

'That bitch roofied me.' he thought angrily, 'but why?'

He had no time to wrack his brain any further. The door to the other room was opened slowly. Calum decided, the smartest thing to do was to act like he was still asleep. Now he could understand the voices clearly. There had to be at least three people here with him and they all sounded stressed. He never wished like in this moment, that he would have learned German somewhen in his life. It would have helped him more, if he actually understood, what they were talking about. Like this he had to resort to guessing, judging from their tone.

The fighting broke of, when someone hammered against a door. Calum dared to lure through half closed eyes again. He was still not alone.

Cold metal was pressed against Charlie's throat the moment the door opened. The blade cut her skin open a little. She felt warm blood dripping from her throat to the ground. Charlotte's heart beat was racing.

"What are you doing here, Charlotte?", her assaulter hissed. It was not Leon, but Charlie knew the girl standing in front of her all to well. In another time she would have greeted her with kisses instead of knives.