Bullet Wound
The following is yet another short story written on the spur of the moment. The story starts off in the rising action so you'll have to just infer as to what exactly happened. Im pondering adding more so if I get anything encouraging I just may...
Have fun.
There was a man there. He continued to remind me to look out, for what I did not know, perhaps I had forgotten in my haze. I did not trust him and he smelled off. A scent I couldn’t quite put my finger on but still made me think poorly of him. He was dressed terribly in nice clothes. That for some reason registered in my mind every time I looked at him. His beard and hair was grown out and untrimmed, tangled and matted. He had on a long coat that went right above his knees and looked like it had once been in a high class store for a high class price once. I pondered if he had stolen it. Beneath it he wore an off white dress shirt he did not have tucked in. His pants where tattered at the ends but still in good condition. I just wanted to find where that girl had gone.
The man’s eyes looked shifty and his occasional tug on my shirt to remind me to “Look out” did not give me a new outlook on his character. I realized I had been pushing myself against the alley way wall. My left arm felt wet, the bullet had lodged itself in my shoulder blade; at least that was my assumption. Everything felt out of perspective. The man shouted at me, it was something new this time. I tried to listen but the words melted past my ears. I didn’t care much at the time. Funny thing; my mind wasn’t on the small hole in my arm either. Everything blurred and hummed. I hadn’t slept at all in 4 days, the blood loss wasn’t helping. The man stepped away from me, pulling out something from his back, too fast for my eyes to take and suddenly there was a loud crack. The noise rippled into my head, reverberating off my skull like a great echoing cavern.
Staring deeply into space my vision grew dark until I heard a shriek from down the alley. The noise was just a whisper amid the resounding gunshot. My accompaniment yelled another thing at me and exasperated with my despondency ran off toward another shadowy figure. The two met with a thud and a few more loud noises where emitted. I found that I had been lying on the pavement next to a trash can and stumbled up to track where I had heard the noise. Standing had become a new trick to master as with each quick movement or odd step my head pulsed with a seemingly excess amount of blood to my forehead. I clutched my wound tightly and stumbled to a street corner. Back in the alley a flash and another terrible crack assaulted my head.
The noises of the city intermitted with hiccups of blood rushing past my ears and the general roar of pain that the ever worsening wound brought. The streets where empty except for the occasional car that muffled by. Down the sidewalk one figure dragged the other whom seemed unwilling to go. I followed behind as best I could. The figure noticed me and tried to speed up. The second one being dragged was indeed the girl I was looking for. I stumbled up as fast as I could and grabbed the back of the man’s neck. He swung around and elbowed me in the face. I fell the ground, reeling as blood now issued from my nose and lip. I climbed up and grabbed his arm and swung a fist into the side of his face, a rather pathetic impact met his ear. The man cursed at me as best I could hear and clipped me in the forehead with his fist. I grabbed his arm again and held as tight as I could, half on my knees. The young women took advantage of this moment and shoved the man away and hit him in the face. In the blur of the moment I took notice of how lovely she was. Her red hair smoothly ran down her face, and her dress fit her just right; it’s odd how much someone can appreciate aesthetic things even in the worst conditions. My mind traveled back to the moment as a boot caught me in the ribs. No longer with the strength to stand I fell over and tilted my head enough to see the pretty girl had found a knife somehow and the odd smelling man had accompanied her in shooing off the captor. The two victors stood over me, which created a rather dizzying effect of perspective. As a last conscious action I managed to move my eyes to meet theirs with minimal pain and whisper out “Good job”. I let my eyes fall and looked down at the concrete. Red pooled around my left arm, I had lost a lot of blood, it seemed irritating at the moment, but it didn’t last much longer since I chose that moment to pass out.
Tell me what you thought.
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