Vagabonding.1 [COMPLETE]

8. Derailed

Surge and I made our way down over to the local park. It wasn't the prettiest place, but it sure beats looking at sand all day.

Dry patches of brown grass spread out among the healthier patches, the trees stood weakly in the soil, and occasionally I spotted rusted playground equipment paired with sun-bleached plastic slides that could be seen in shambles. Nothing was unusual or sticking out, but Surge was scanning the ground and area for anything that seemed to be sticking out. Sooner or later, we came across park benches but they also appeared to be damaged and splintered apart while some of the other tables were worn with graffiti and carvings.

I could see why I had been warned to not come here at night, this place wasn't appealing in the least. The random spotting of hypodermic needles sprawled on the ground made my skin crawl and made my mouth go dry, this just got a little too real.

After a half hour into the journey walk through the park, we finally came across two kids around our age from a block's lengths away.

From what I could make out, the two boys were playing with cards against each other. The smaller one of the two was the louder and rambunctious one, his face far too skinny and covered with one too many pimples over his hollow cheeks. The heavyset one was perfectly round in every way, even the hairstyle managed to look spherical. He had soft eyes and an even softer belly.

They were seated at a lone picnic table that had too many splinters to share between the both of them, but they didn't seem to notice or maybe they just didn't even care. A broken side of the table faced us with tiny carvings etched into the rotting wood with rough doodles of hearts and stars, along with traces of random curse words scrawled on it. Lewd character drawings came into focus as I tried my best to ignore it and make a good first impression.

The closer we got, the more obvious we became and with that came a new interaction that soured before it had time to fully culture and form.

"Hot dang!" The thinner of the two boys yelled from a far distance as he spotted us, "Is that Queering Waters over there? Looks like he bought his boyfriend with him too!"

Surge stomped forward a little too heatedly before I quickly grabbed his arm to stop him. He turned around to look at me but I still used all of my strength to keep him from charging.

"Relax, I thought these were your friends," I said under my breath.

"I thought so too," Surge hissed at me as he tried to shrug himself out of my grasp. He roughly mumbled at me, "Let go, I won't do anything stupid. You holding on to me is making it worse."

Surge shook my hand off of him quickly before he straightened up to his full height. He let out a forced chuckle as he continued his way towards the worn wooden table, "Hah, clever... I was coming here to ask you out on a date but it already seems like you're already on one."

"I wouldn't joke around like that, unless you want to end up like your friend, Kid Jones," Phil stated with a smile that was missing one too many teeth for a kid his age. "Unless you want to be set out on display like the disgusting animals you both are."

"I'm guessing you won't tell us where you're keeping her, then?" Surge asked before pointing a finger at Phil as he ignored the other one at the table completely. "The moment we find you out, we're going to—"

"—To what?" Phil said as leaned forward on the broken picnic table. "You're going to get your crack team of detectives and send me to jail? This whole town knows that Rotem and you are worthless to us. This town's had to do everything on our own and things worked out fine without you acting like you're some makeshift superhero! We're just doing what we're told, just as yourself."