Regrets

Chapter 21 - Cool Kids

Song: Cool Kids - Echosmith

Thomas' mind was pacing like a caged tiger, and it had been ever since the call 5 hours ago. He still couldn't believe it.

Prison. What even for? Beating up those kids? No, they wouldn't go to the police judging by what they did to Thomas. They liked to solve problems on their own, no government involved.

But what other things had Marcus done? Or had he just made the wrong person angry?

Thomas felt so confused, angry, helpless, all at the same time. He was so distraught by the information that he hadn't even been able to leave the house for thieving, or even shopping for that matter. Maybe, rather than that, he was too scared to. Marcus had warned him about police. He surely didn't want to go back home, but did he want to stay with this apparent criminal? Was this kind of stress and fear endurable in exchange for bodily autonomy?

Thomas decided it was time to leave the house, for better or for worse. And if it only was so he wouldn't have to starve to death.

He grabbed his jacket from the old chair in his room and stalked over to the keyboard next to the front door. The spare key Marcus had notified him of on the first day hung in its place, just as it was supposed to. Thomas grabbed it and was about to open the door when the doorbell rang. His movements froze.

Another ring. Who could it be? Marcus didn't expect anyone, and no one knew Thomas was here.

A fist was knocking against the hardwood now. Not gently asking, but rather aggressively demanding Thomas to open the door. Now.

Thomas slowly reached for the door handle, too scared of what might happen if he didn't. In his experience, it was better to just comply quietly, without resistance.

And then his hand stopped, just as he was about to touch the handle. He shouldn't be so compliant, after all, the door was locked, wasn't it?

Thomas decided a look through the spyhole would be a worth a try, and so he stood on his tiptoes, attempting to find out who exactly was knocking on the door.

The culprits were two men clad in police uniform. One of them looked pretty harsh and cold, short and stocky as he was, with bushy brows and a Van Dyke beard that looked much cleaner than the rest of him. The other one was only marginally taller, but his figure seemed a lot more trained. He would be the one following if Thomas decided to make a run for it. He looked a lot friendlier than the other man, but maybe it was due to his somewhat aloof expression.

Another harsh knock, executed by the shorter man, whose name plate indicated that his surname was 'Dwyte', hit the door.

"Nobody home", Thomas could hear the taller man, 'Bruntley', according to his uniform, sigh.

"What did you expect? The only person registered here is sitting on a chair, chained to a table in our station", Dwyte grumbled as he stuffed his hands into his pockets. His gun was displayed at the side of his belt, secured by a leather strap.

"But they still sent us here", Bruntley sounded confused. Rightfully so, Thomas thought to himself. What were they doing here if they already had Marcus?

"Don't ask me. I was just told to see if someone would open, and to get the name of that person if they do", Dwyte shrugged, already in the process of turning around.

Bruntley looked over to his comrade and then back at the door before he followed Dwyte with a conflicted expression.

Thomas let out a breath he didn't know he had been holding. He turned around, leaning back against the door. His back slowly slid along the hardwood until he hit the ground.

Somehow, there was no energy left in him anymore to go out. There wasn't even though to just stand up.

His head tilted upwards towards the ceiling as he laid sprawled out against the door in somewhat of an upright position.

"Please come back, I can't do this", Thomas sniffled as he blinked back a tear. He would have cried if he had the energy to, but he had to save that for fixing his bandages; after all, he had avoided it for too long.

He slowly heaved himself up, leaning onto the door for support, before dragging himself towards the kitchen.

At first, he had been confused as to why Marcus stored medicine and the likes in the kitchen, but once he had seen the bathroom, he knew why that was the case.

He bent down and reached for the cupboard beneath the sink, pulling out the first aid kit Marcus had instructed him to use two days ago.

Thomas wasn't usually rough with other people's things, but judging by how he slammed the kit onto the counter, one couldn't be faulted for thinking he was that kind of person.

With a heavy sigh, he pulled out pre-packaged bandages, scissors, compresses and a few band aids that would later replace the ones on his fingers that were slowly coming off. Then, he pulled out a bottle of cheap vodka.

Thomas began slowly unravelling the bandages around his leg, revealing the stitched up gash, which seemed to have healed quite well. The thread had not yet grown in like Marcus had warned, but the skin around the thread was pretty much completely restored, and the bloody crust on it was clinging to the thread quite strongly, just begging for Thomas to finally remove the foreign object.

There was no way around it, Thomas told himself, as he cut off the knot that tied off the thread and began pulling the string out of the wound. The progress was slow and beyond painful, but this was what he had to do.

As he ripped out the last bit of thread, Thomas noticed that he had evoked fresh bleeding out of the small holes, but he decided not to mind it.

He quickly pressed a compress to the wound and began tightening a bandage around it. The slight pressure was relieving some of the pain, but to say Thomas was gritting his teeth in agony was still an understatement.

Moving on to fixing his arm wound, only one thought crossed his mind.

'Only two more to go'