Scarred

Chapter 27.

Theo

I painfully gather myself together, my steady breaths still haunted by his doing. Did he burn her? Is the only question that attacks my mind, and the fury dancing in my blood comes more alive at the fact that I do not know the answer. I run out of the room, and out of the building, where I search around agitatedly for something to get to where I need to be. My eyes finally stop on a man with a helmet on sticking the keys into the ignition of a motorcycle.

"Hi, um, there's a woman down there. Around that corner; she said she has a surprise for the guy with the red helmet on the all black motorbike, and that I should call you over to her."

"A surprise?"

"Yeah, she looked very excited. I'd get down there if I was you. I offered to look after your helmet and the bike, so you don't have to worry about that."

"Oh, I wonder what she has planned for me," he smiles widely. "Alright, man, thanks a lot. I'll just leave the keys here with the engine off, but thanks, man, I appreciate it," he says, taking his helmet off, and placing it on the seat, before tapping me on my shoulder.

"No worries, man," I respond, as he begins running in the direction I pointed him in. I desperately pick up the helmet and abruptly fix it on my head, before jumping on the seat of the motorbike, and turning the ignition on. I don't look back as I begin driving faster than I used to drive motorbikes back when I did it in high school. My eyes are so fixed on the direction that I am going in, that I can feel them beginning to steam with liquid of rage. I can't let that allow me to lose focus of my destination, I say to myself. It is an undeniable fact that I will return back there. Despite the amount of times I told myself I wouldn't.

Eliza

"Oh, you're awake," I hear my mom speak softly, as she stands next to me after walking in the room. No words form in my mouth that are directed to her; everything I want to say is to him. But he is not here. "You've been asleep for quite some time," she continues. "I went to go and get your test results earlier. And I had to make sure that none of it is infected. But, it's not. And then I just went to the house to get a change of clothes for you. How does it feel now? Is the pain better or worse than before?" Her sudden silence speaks much louder than mine.

"Eliza, who did this to you?"

"I told you, I don't know," I finally voice, realising the excruciating impact it has on the pain.

"So, some random person just came up to you and... Did that to you?"

"I didn't see him."

"Eliza... When I went to the house... This was on the floor," she says, and from the corner of my eye, I can tell she is holding up a piece of crumpled paper. "What it says... Tells me that it wasn't just a random person."

"What does it say?"

"Your girl's in hospital... You didn't think I wouldn't come back for you, did you?" She pauses. "It's to Theo, isn't it?"

I breathe out softly, closing my eyes in the process to try and drown out the picture of reality staring me in the face. "His step-dad," I finally admit.

"What? His step-dad? How did his step-dad know where you live, or where he lives for that matter? And why would he hurt you?" I can hear a change in her last syllable, the syllable of realisation. "Oh, no. Your... Girl. No. Eliza, please tell me you- Please tell me you haven't-"