“Holy crap!”
Dean stood in front of me,
rubbing his head. I should have probably been scared, but instead, I was
smiling.
“What the crap was that?” he
continued.
“I think they call it karate.
Or self defense. Something like that.”
Dean stared and blinked at me
a few times before responding.
“You know karate?”
“Three years strong,” I said,
flashing him a grin. I was really proud of my karate.
“So…”
“So I could probably outrun
you right now and get the gun I just kicked out of your hand, yes.”
“Don’t forget, your little
roundhouse also whacked me in the head after knocking the gun across the room,”
Dean grumbled, still rubbing his head.
“I haven’t forgotten.”
He stopped rubbing his head
long enough to stare at me.
“I hate running,” I said as I
casually walked over to his gun, took the barrel out, and tossed that out the
broken window.
“You know, you can’t really
threaten me with an empty gun,” he said, still just staring at me.
“Who says I want to threaten
you? That was your job. But seeing as the gun is now in my hands, you did a
pretty poor job of your job.”
“Okay. Okay,” Dean said,
rubbing his hands together. “So what is your plan now? Because if it’s to call
the cops, that’s fine, but I’ll be out of here before they arrive.”
“If I wanted to call the
police, I would have five minutes ago when I first heard you breaking into my
apartment. But I think the police would do us more harm than good.”
“Us?”
“You’re Dean Scoulders, the
man who robbed the richest bank in the state, then killed your partner, right?”
Dean’s shoulders stiffened.
“That’s what they say.”
“But you were framed.”
Dean’s eyes snapped up to
mine when he heard me say this.
“Of course you were,” I said
with a wave of my hand. “Nothing exciting ever happens to me. I know
that sounds dorky or lame, but whatever. It’s true. The most exciting thing to
ever happen to me ever was this one time when my mate’s ex-boyfriend tried to
punch me in the face but ended up slamming his fist into a wall because he was
so drunk. I lived off that for years. I’m not a thrill seeker by any means. I
get an adrenaline rush just by going to the market and interacting with other
human beings. I’m that cat lady that every apartment complex has to have. I’m
pathetic. The most exciting thing in my life now is that I go to karate lessons
to get myself out of my apartment. And then you stumbled in one day, with your
shiny gun and brazen story of hitmen and chases and the danger of death lurking
behind every corner.”
I paused before continuing. I
wasn’t sure if I was making any sense to him or not. I couldn’t look at him to
see; I had to get through this without looking at him.
“I could have said no. I
could have walked away.”
“You mean you could have
knocked the gun out of my hand. Which you did.”
I looked up at him when he
said this. I needed him to really hear what I was about to say.
“No. I knew you weren’t going
to shoot me. I could see it in your eyes. You were more scared of that gun than
I was. No, I knew you weren’t going to shoot me. I knew I had a choice. I made
a choice. It was conscious and real, and I made the choice to believe you were
better than this life and that you deserved out of it. I had no idea how me
going along with you was going to get you out of it, but I made a choice to
trust both of us anyways.”
Dean kept my eye contact,
never looking away. “I could shoot you now. I could grab the barrel you just threw out the window and easily insert it into my gun again, and shoot you down right now.”
“I know you could. I know you
can. I know you could find something inside of you that would allow you to be
capable of killing me right here with no remorse.”
Dean began to breathe
heavily, agitated and confused. “Then why stick around?”
“There’s always a risk when
you deal with humans. I’d like to give you the chance to prove you’re better
than that.”
I knew he might never
understand why I was there. But in that moment it didn’t matter if he
understood or not.
It just mattered that he didn’t shoot me.
No comments:
Post a Comment