Ideals and Realism

Paisley

     The icy cold wind itched at the back of his mouth with a slight bitterness. The 5 members behind him followed closely behind his steps in the middle of the malls parking area.

     Each member is detailed with several pieces of printed clothing. One with a paisly print cloth tightened around his mouth and leather tight pants with a plain v-neck shirt. The second has blue sweatpants and a tight black muscle shirt. The third with a paisly printed shirt and skinny jeans. The fourth has a leather jacket and black pants with a long chain. The fifth has a loose, drop-shoulder, navy colored shirt and black shorts.

     Angst leads the group with a watchful eye. His face scans the foreground like a soldier and his face is as stern as a stonecold killer.

     He spots a teenage boy, who looks around the age of 16 or so. He flicks his hand towards the strangers direction and the gang leads in front of him with a slight quickness. Angst watches them walk towards the boy with a heartless look in his eyes.

    In the distance, the man with a navy paisly cloth over his mouth taps the stranger on the shoulder. The stranger turns around quickly and stares at him for a few seconds.

     "Who are you?" The stranger says quietly.

     The member answers with a punch to the lower gut.

     The other members join in with violent kickes and punches to his body.

     The strangers looks at the man with the cloth over his mouth with young, fragile eyes. The gang member takes his fist and plunges it into his ribcage. The action forces a crack in his rib bone.

     Angst quickly runs to the scene, chuckling to himself.

     "Hey bitch," Angst yells, "Why are you starting trouble?" he spits out with a sarcasting tone layered over his voice.

     "I didn't do anything!" The stranger yells while coughing up red thick liquid.

     Angst takes his hands and grips them around his waist and forces the man to the ground. He punches him right across his pale white face.

     "You fucking Asian bastard," Angst yells to his face while punching him a second time.

     "Stop!" The stranger screams,"Help me,"

     "Stop bleeding," Angst screams to him.

     The stranger drives his fist into Angst's face with great force. He stands up and throws his body onto him, throwing him to the ground.

     "Who are you?" Angst spits out through a laugh.

     Angst kicks his leg into the boy's stomach as the gang stands still next to him.

     "What's going on? Why are you attacking me?" He says with a shaky voice, attempting to walk backwards away from him. His eyes widen from panic, due to the fact that his breath has become increasingly short and painful.

     Angst responds by getting off the ground and walking quickly towards him as if he were to destroy the Earth at that very moment. He almost looks like a villain in a movie about to attempt to pummel the hero. In a dizzy haze, the 16 year old boy opens his eyes and braces himself. Just as Angst draws his fist backwards, a security guard tackles him, seemingly out of nowhere. The guard pins him on his chest and holds his wrists tightly together while pedestrians begin watching. The rest of the gang quickly ran away into a field just around the mall by the west side of the parking lot, making their escape.

     The teenaged boy pulls out his phone from his skinny jeans, struggling to even move his arm and grab things. Kind of like when you're so weak in the morning that you find it difficult to close your fist. The glass is shattered, yet the inner screen somehow survived. He can't see the screen quite well because of the cold sunshine beaming down behind him, so he covers the device with his hand for some shade and finds the emergency button on the lock screen. He yells to the phone in a daze about needing an ambulance and that he was attacked. He talks so fast out of anxiety due to the fact that his lungs feel even tighter now. Every time he breaths or even talks it feels like something is puncturing his chest.

     As soon as he comes off the phone a security guard approaches him and questions what happened. All the boy replies with is, "Please get an ambulance I can't breath, help me I think I'm dying." 

     "Help is on the way, stay calm and slow your breathing, who started this?"

     "Please! It hurts so bad!" He screams while grabbing onto his ribcage.

     "Just please tell me who threw the first punch. Slow your breathing, these short breaths will make it worse."

     "His gang," the boy says.

     "Gang?"

     "Yes, gang. They wore that western flower print stuff that you see on bandanas."

     "Paisley?" The guard says.

     "I don't know, I can't remember it exactly," he says while coughing in between words.

     In a very short amount of time the ambulance comes with screaming alarms and horns. They load the boy in the truck and they set off to the hospital.

     Ideals walks past the clean rooms that smell of detergent. The white walls pierce her eyes as she walks forward. She wears a worried look on her face and she carries a melancholy emotion within her like a baggage.

     She stops for a moment and looks at her hands that grip onto a wrinkled paper that reads "room 317". She looks at the nearest sign which reads "room 309" on a pale board hanging from the ceiling by silver chains.

     She keeps walking until she reaches her destination. She turns to the right into a small room. A window opens to the snow covered landscape below, which leaks natural light that fills the room like water in a bucket. Innocence lays in the hospital bed with bruises painted on his face.

     "Hey," The boy croaks between a  breath.

     "What happened to you?"

     "I was jumped by a gang of like, four guys."

     "Are you okay?"

     "Internal bleeding. They also said something about my rib but- I don't know I'm just so tired."

     Ideals responds with a quick inhale of oxygen.

     "Who else is coming?"

     The boy responds with a shrug of his shoulders.

     "Do you want me to call your mom?"

     "She's on her way," he breathes.

     Ideals bites her lip hard and sighs. She looks around, studying the medical posters on the walls. A faint beeping sound is heard on a moniter in the distance.

     "I'll be right back Innocence, I need to deal with something. You'll be okay, right?" she says to the boy in the hospital bed

     "Yeah, the nurses have me." The end of Innocence's sentence trails off as he halfway closes his eyes in a drowsy spell.

     She whips out her phone and texts Realism. She inputs the words "My cousin was jumped by a group of men please come to the hospital." the text reads 'Realism is typing' for a few seconds. Then he stops. The message shows a small 'R' next to it, signing that he has read the message. He doesnt text back.

     She texts him again, "Are you going to come or not?"

     The message is read but not answered.

     "Please answer," she messages again.

     A single response is sent back from him. "I don't like hospitals."