Possessed Soul

Chapter 13

Chapter 13

"Stop!" the policemen yelled.

I thought robbing a supermarket would distract me from thoughts of Sage. It hadn't. I had strolled in there, unable to push her to the back of my mind. What was happening to me? This insane beating of my heart was foreign and to be honest a bit uncomfortable. Ever since I met her, I had become careless. I wasn't fast enough when I had attempted to steal the cash register. A couple of weeks ago I would have been able to do it. The cashier had stepped away for a couple of moments and I had taken that opportunity to grab the tray from the cash register and stuff the money into a bag. But my hands were shaking, and a few coins fell to the floor. The cashier had peeped his head out from the staff only area. Having never been caught before, it was no surprise that I had frozen and that gave the cashier more than enough time to phone the police, who ironically were just around the corner. And now I was being chased by an oversized police officer.

I darted past a woman walking a dog. She was kind enough to step well out of the way. The buildings of London blurred around me as I raced for my freedom. My strides were long, and I rarely faltered in where I set my feet.

I looked behind me to see how far away the policeman was. His potbelly jiggled wildly as he tried to catch up to me. I smiled at his feeble attempts: there was no way he would catch me.

Suddenly my chest collided with someone else's. I stood face to face with another officer. This one was younger, muscular and lean. Under his cap I could see a thin line of black hair. One of his eyes was surrounded by a purple circle; it looked like badly done makeup, but from the way his eye was slightly squinted, it was evident that it was really a very painful bruise. The small silver plate on his left pocket read Stark.

"Good. You caught him." Potbelly stopped behind me; he was panting heavily, and his body was bent forward so that his face was almost parallel to the ground. "He was robbing a supermarket," he explained with a slight shake of his head, as if just the mere thought was revolting.

The ride to the police station was slow and quiet. Officer Stark drove the cruiser while the other officer rode his motorcycle. If you ask me, it should have been the other way around, Officer Stark looked like he was more equipped for riding a motorcycle. Long lines of muscles stuck out from either side of his arms; the fabric of his sleeves looked like they were about to burst, with the amount of force he was gripping the steering wheel with. He looked like he was concentrating on the road, but at the same time his mind seemed to be elsewhere. It was clear from the bandage that bulged on his shoulder and his blue eye that he had been in a fight recently, but he didn't seem to be in pain. He seemed like he had experienced so much pain in his life that he considered theses injuries minor.

When we arrived at the police station it was deserted, except for one man who sat at a desk. He looked like a teenager, sitting in a very carefree manner, with his feet propped up on the desk. He immediately straightened up when we walked in and I noticed that he was in fact very young: probably in his mid-twenties. His eyes were the colour of steel and his hair was strawberry blond. His tanned skin was spotted with acne scars in multiple places, giving him the appearance of a leopard. He was skinny and his ribs jutted out from his sides, this was clear even though he was wearing uniform made out of a hard fabric.

The officers were discussing something among themselves, so I continued to look around the place. The walls were painted a dull grey, to match the dreary mood of this place. There was a picture of a man on one side of the wall. His thick moustache was curled at the ends and he looked like a younger version of Hitler. Only when I looked to the side did I realise that he might have actually been Hitler. There was a line of gas masks that were carefully hung on the wall. Jeez, this place looked like a Holocaust Museum.

I was so caught up in surveying the place that I hadn't realised Officer Stark had opened one of the cell doors, and before I knew it he had thrown me in. My body collided with the floor, causing my jaw to hit it first. I rubbed my throbbing jaw with my handcuffed hands, it was tender but thankfully didn't seem to be broken.

I was the only prisoner in here, which surprised me since Croydon was known for its criminal activity. Plus, I couldn't possibly be the worst thing out there: serial killers existed, so why would the police waste their time with petty thieves like myself? But I guess a crime is a crime, no matter how small it may be.

***

I should have been used to the whipping, from my time in the Orphan Asylum, but I wasn't. Officer Stark looked like a decent man, and he probably was, but even I could see that something was playing on his mind. It was clear in the way he set his jaw, and his eyebrows were constantly furrowed. His breath reeked heavily of cheap tequila and his black eye seemed to be getting worse instead of better, probably because he didn't sleep. He left during the day, but always came back just before dawn, looking more tired than when he had left. The way he hit me was both sloppy and hard. I was strong enough to withstand the whip, and each time I only winced slightly. I knew that if he was at his strongest, I would have probably been dead already. It wasn't that I wasn't strong enough to fight him, it's just that it wasn't possible for me to fight him: the other officers would gang up on me. Flynn had taught me to never intentionally pick a fight with a policeman; they grouped together like a pack of wolves.

Officer Stark's fist collided with my stomach. All the time he muttered something about Angela. Probably his girlfriend who had dumped him. I couldn't blame her, not if this was how he treated people when he was drunk. A couple of times I heard his colleagues tell him to leave me alone, but he always brushed them off. Stealing hardly justified this kind of torture, especially for a minor. He didn't know how old I was as he hadn't asked, and I did look older than I was; but I was still only a teenager at 17.

I watched the back of Stark's head as he left the cell, I had assumed that the heavy stench was radiating off his unwashed body, but I had been wrong. The entire station smelt like dust. It wasn't like a stink that hung in the air for a long time. I couldn't even stop the smell from reaching me by blocking my nose. It was a heavy smell that couldn't be associated with anything besides dirt. It was almost as if the dust had imbedded itself in my nostrils and stuck there, fooling me into thinking I was smelling something foul.

It was well into the day before I managed to get to me feet and wrap my fingers around the iron bars that held me captive, and pulled. I knew it was useless, but I couldn't sit around and wait for Flynn to show up. There was no way he would know where to look; for all he knew I was lying dead in a ditch somewhere. The handcuffs had dug into my wrist, not hard enough to break the skin, but hard enough to leave swollen red welts behind. I pounded my fist against the concrete floor in sheer frustration. My knuckles ripped open, and my blood looked grey from all the dust that mixed with it.

Officer Johnson, the one who hadn't been able to catch me, watched my actions in amusement as he bit into his Krispy Kreme donut. To be honest I thought cops and donuts were a movie stereotype. But I guess his huge appetite would at least explain his unfitness. I glared at him, trying to intimidate him. Emma had often said I had something called the death glare, but if I did it didn't seem to be working right now.

I sighed heavily as I gave up and laid my head against one of the concrete walls. I allowed my mind to wander to all the girls I had kissed, those who let me do more than kiss them and collectively all the girls whose hearts I had broken.

I heard the unmistakable sound of metal scraping against concrete, and a tray of food was passed my way. It was simple food, rice with an unidentifiable green goo. When you haven't eaten for a day, the most disgusting food seems appetising. I only got one meal a day. I wondered how long I'd have to stay here; it couldn't be much longer. I used my dirty hands to shovel food into my mouth, not caring about the dirt and grime embedded in my nailbeds. The food was half raw, but it satisfied my hunger. 

Please vote and comment if you enjoyed this chapter.