Bloodlines

"I'm not the bad guy."

Avalon

I wake up, gasping for air.

"Are you okay?" Theo walks in, shutting the door behind him as he carefully walks over to me.

I turn him and take a deep breath. "Yeah uh, sorry... it was just a bad dream."

He shakes his head. "Don't be sorry. I get them a lot... like really bad night terrors. They're not fun at all."

"I've never had one like this before." I say in disbelief. "I rarely get nightmares nevertheless wake up screaming."

He pushes his eyebrows together in confusion. "Have you had anything stressful happen recently?"

I try to form words. "Actually... yeah." I pause. "I walked into one of my kids house. There was blood everywhere from the abuse, it smelled so bad from old food and just a dirty house. The kids were severely beat and had so many illnesses... it's been haunting me. We won the case obviously, but it's horrible."

It looks as if realization comes across him. "You took them away?"

"Yes." I nod. "They were badly neglected and abused by their drug addict mother. We won the case and they now live with their father. We do our hardest to not put kids away from family, it's not that often we do actually. Often if it's both of the parents, we send them to close relatives or people they're close to that they chose." I explain.

"Oh." He clenches his jaw.

"You get it now?"

"I'm not the bad guy." He says, defensively.

"I didn't say you were—"

"Whatever." He snaps and storms out of my room, slamming the door behind him.

I sigh while running my fingers through my hair.

****

"You okay?" Noah comes up behind me, massaging my shoulders.

"Yeah... uh, I have a question." I look up at him.

He nods and sits in the seat next to me. "What's up?"

"Theo." I say and instantly see the aggravation on his face as if he knows exactly what I'm talking about. "How do you know him? If he's only rude to you guys, why do you let him live with you?"

"We met Theo on campus before he dropped out. We were all actually pretty close and cool until he just flipped a switch. He's only staying here until he can afford his own place and we're only letting him stay here because we feel bad for him. He lost his parents and well... his brothers too." He replies.

I stand there, loss of words. "He lost his family?" I ask and he nods. "And you wonder why he's the way he's acting? Noah, he lost everyone he's grown up with!"

"Honestly Avalon... he's a lost cause. It's like he has no damn soul in his body. He doesn't have to act the way he is. He could easily get therapy to support him and then we wouldn't have as big of a problem with him living here. You can't even look at him a certain way. It's better off to let him stay by himself." He continues folding his clothes.

I shake my head. "It's not that easy, Noah." I grab his attention. "Has he tried to talk to any of you about it? Has he said the story?"

"No. He came in and just said his parents died. That's it. That's when he basically turned off his humanity."

I sigh. "Well I'm gonna go into town. Do you need anything?"

He shakes his head and walks over to me. "Stay safe out here." He kisses my forehead.

I smile and nod. "I will. See you in a bit!" I grab my keys and skip out of the apartment, leaving the complex and getting into my car.

I feel so bad for Theo.

Don't get me wrong, Noah is my bestest friend, but it wasn't really cool to stand there and just call someone grieving, a lost cause.

It doesn't sit right with me and I'm definitely gonna talk to him about it later on.

After a twenty minutes of driving, I finally reach town and stuff my hands into my jacket pockets as it's heckin COLD!

We live in the mountains up North so that's inevitable.

I accidentally, without looking, bump into a man.

"Hey!" he shouts.

I regain my balance and look at him, shocked by his attitude. "I'm sorry, sir. I wasn't—"

"Paying attention? YEAH. I NOTICED!" He puts his hands on my chest and shoves me backwards.

"HEY!" A familiar voice comes up from behind. "DON'T YOU EVER LAY A FINGER ON HER AGAIN!" Theo grabs the man by the neck, swinging a right hand and shoving him harshly onto the ground.

I gasp and the man looks up in pure shock. "T-Theodore—"

"YOU BETTER MOTHER FUCKING WATCH YOURSELF, BUDDY!" Theo stomps on his stomach, causing the man to hold it in pain. "I NEVER WANNA SEE THAT SHIT AGAIN!" He grabs him, pulling the man back up and repeatedly throwing punches at his face, causing a nose bleed and black eye.

"I-I'm—" The man coughs up blood. "Sorry!"

"GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE! YOU BETTER HOPE I NEVER SEE YOUR ASS AGAIN!"

The man runs off and Theo turns to me.

I take a harsh gulp.

"You okay?" He asks in a tone that you can tell he's trying to calm himself in.

"Yeah..." I say in confusion. "Thank you..."

"Everyone in this part of town are dipshits today. Where do you gotta go? I'll follow you." He says.

I try to form words. "Yeah uh, I'm just going to grab the candle at bath and body works that I've been waiting all year to come out." He nods and walks with me towards the store. "You don't have to come with me if you don't want to, Theo."

"I have nothing else to do anyway." He shrugs, opening the door for me. I give him a soft smile. "What? Don't smile at me."

I chuckle and walk into the store.

He walks in behind me.

"Ah yes! There it is!" I grab the second to last marshmallow candle. "I'm obsessed!"

"You came all the way into town for a... candle?" Theo looks at me with a raised eyebrow.

"I sure did!" I grab the last one as well. "And I'll happily drive the twenty minutes back home with my marshmallow candles." I cheekily smile.

I notice him form a little tiny smile that quickly goes away... still a smile!

"Is there anything else you need?" He asks.

I shake my head. "Nope!" I walk my happy self up to that register where the cashier scans the candles. "Ooo." I get distracted the smell of the sample lotion. "I just love Fal—"

I turn and see Theo paying for my candles.

My jaw slightly drops.

"Here," He hands me the bag "don't say I've never got you anything."

He walks out of the store, holding the door opened for me. "You didn't have to do that for me." I say as I walk out.

"Well you were too busy looking at lotion and personally, I'd rather not wait so I just got it for you to minimize my waiting time." He says like a smartass.

Just as I was about to praise him for being nice.

"Right." I sigh.

But honestly,

I feel like I'm getting a bit closer to Theo.