Bruised Innocence

Chapter 38

*This one's for meaninglessSelf *

Everett Fern was a tired man. It has been a rough couple of days for him. Ever since he had left home, he scarcely had any sleep.

He had been crashing on the couches of one or other of his mates from work.

Unfortunately, the thing about couches is that most of them are small, narrow things, not really suited for a man of his stature to sleep in.

Most nights, he got cricks in his neck and that was when he was able to sleep. Every morning his body would protest about being cramped in small spaces.

He sighed and rubbed his chin. A sharp stubble had grown over his face but he didn't feel like shaving. After putting on his shirt, he walked out of the house.

There was a pile of big concrete pipes arranged beside each other not far away from his friend's house.

A golden brown dog's head looked out from one of the pipes and barked happily at him.

Although his friends had happily volunteered to shelter Everett, their generosity didn't extend towards Lacey.

Everett even tried to send it back home but it resolutely refused to leave his side. Even when Everett went to work, it would stay outside the factory, exploring the grounds till he came back.

Della often brought treats for it but Everett wasn't even spared a cursory glance.

"Come boy! Let's go on a walk!"

As they walked for the day, he thought about the circumstances that had brought him here and cursed those uppity assholes.

After their walk ended, he went back to his friend's house and got ready for the day.

They walked to the factory with his friend, Lacey leading the way like everyday, no changes in his routine.

But today, something changed. On their way, they came across two teens arguing on the road. They had almost blocked the road with their cars, one of the cars was parked in front of the other one.

It looked like one of them had overtaken the other to force it to stop. The cars made a giant T on the road and as they looked at them from a distance, Lacey started growling at them.

Everett frowned and picked it up. He didn't want Lacey going on biting kids but then he heard a name which completely changed his mind.

"Okay Grant! If you insist on being so difficult! I will leave you to it!" One of the boys shouted, walked to his car, backed it out of the road and then drove off.

It took a while for Everett to process it.

Grant!

It really was Gloisen Grant in person, right in front of him, that too with his ugly monstrosity that he drove that day. If there were any doubts about it, Lacey growling at the boy confirmed it.

Everett's palms stung and he realised that he had been digging his nails in his palm. He let Lacey go who promptly started barking at the bastard, making him look over at them.

As soon as he saw Lacey, his eyes widened in recognition and then he looked up at Everett. There must have been something in Everett's eyes because the bastard appeared unsettled.

Everett walked over to him with rage clouding his eyes, Arwin's broken face lying in the hospital, him waking up screaming at nights, Dell's pain streaked broken face, all of them flashed in his mind.