Growing Pains | BOOK 2

1:7

April 13th, 1994. 8:59 A.M.

I slugged awake from the ground, straight away blocking my eyes from the direct sunlight that sat right at eye level. My face was planted against the surface of dirt and grass, I push my body up in disgust, wiping any excess grub from my cheek. As I glared around Dally was no where to be seen, and my head hurt like a wild pained hangover even though I hadn't touched a drop of alcohol. The pity of my stomach mumbled in either hunger or fear that he had ditched me, and ran off.

 I was guilty of having no faith in him at the moment, with his erratic behaviour, but had nobody else to turn to. I held the wall and wobbled onto my feet, and attempted to step around the corner. Only to trip over one of my limp legs, and plummet back into the dirt, heel over head right onto my knees. I shagged the bristled hair from my face, and turned my head to see his legs in front of me. He holds a hand out, allowing me to finally stand up, "I thought you ditched me." I cried, steadying my body against his own. He held me tight, not saying a word, but I felt my tears overwhelmingly dripping down my cheeks and onto his back. This whole experience was too much for my sensitive emotions to bare, I pulled back finally getting a real glance at him.

His under eyes swollen red and skin pale like a ghost, it looked like all he ate was cigarettes and had no blood circulating. All I wanted was him to speak to me, to hold me again and make everything better. He reached up to my cheek with one hand, wiping the wetness with a thumb, he breathes deeply, squinting his eyes off into the distance before rolling the tension off his shoulders, "I have a plan. We need to find another car somewhere and head West, I've got a friend." My face brightened up for once, "A friend?" I repeated with a spark of enthusiasm, "Will he help us?" I added. "Yeah. Maybe. Hopefully. We'll have to ring them before we get out there." A grin moved across his mouth for the first time since, in the distance his eyes caught an outline of a building, "Over there." he points to it.  

We both begin to stagger towards it, hoping that it was the nearest town. Although I hadn't walked much in the last day or two from being stuck inside the car, my feet blistered just the same as a marathon and my legs ached all the way down. It only took ten minutes, but we found a diner bustling with cars and morning life. It was a relief to say the least, Dallas began to stalk up the rows of vehicles in the parking lot, I was more set on the food that my mouth watered with starvation. He knocks his knuckles on the hood and sides of the cars, trying to find a nice one.  That's when an vintage, gleaming mustang in navy rolls into a parking space across the lot. His eyes never left it, and he starts to move very wearily to it. The driver inside was a man dressed in a suit, he appeared successful and probably would be able to buy the car again, that was the only way I could justify our next actions. 

Dally stares at me with big eyes, his mouth slightly parted that I could see teeth and I knew what the look was. He gave it when he saw something he liked, and had, just had to steal. I nodded to him, knowing the plan without speaking. The driver climbed out, as he walked towards a large building near the diner, I could tell he was a lawyer of some sort. This is was risky, but I raced over to him. Probably looking like a homeless person, I hadn't showered in days and I slept in practical dirt. Unfortunately he was fast paced and I missed him, he walked straight into the office. There was no use in going in, we could steal the car without the man seeing now. As I turned to walk back to Dallas, I notice a police officer sitting inside his vehicle. Now I had to distract him instead.