Streetwall

“Listen, listen, hey! Calm down, Chris. We will talk about this later okay? Bye.” 

I hung up the phone briskly. A whirlwind of emotions travelled inside me channelled in a single pane through agony and elation. 

Chris was my best friend. We have been together as far as I could kick the walls of remembrance. Rolling down the gradient, stealing icecreams, dancing in rain, midnight sneaking… we had done it all. He was the fuel to my car who had now sped all across the dark clouds, finally pulling its brakes in front of a well-established university in New York. After receiving his reaction to what happened today, my overwhelmedness and gratitude weren’t far from the surface. 

I stared blankly at the wet streets. A thick cloud of moisture and daze fixed around me besieged by bowing faints of streetlights. Barely two or three cars passed down the road. I looked down at myself, doubting if even one would halt. My knee-length skirt had been torn off from the left, revealing handsome bruises shaded in colour of pink and blue. Thick drops of blood trickled down the open cut on my left knee. My tattered tank top offered no better with the scattered marks of nails being dug in. The left side of my face had been torpefied but I could tell it was swollen adversely with frozen blood stuck to the side of my nose. I knew I could’ve fought better. 

At a bar, when it all started. A clean glass of Spanish Albarino glistened in between my fingers. I was still unaware of her presence when she hypocritically walked towards me in her little green dress, laughing with her minions. 

“Wait a second, bitches. Did I ever introduce you to the lamest person in my university?” She taunted, pointing her long nails at me. “Meet Sia Wangde. So the name, so the personality.” And all her stupid minions bursted into merciless laughs. 

“Why don’t you go and polish your long nails, Jaycee? After all, that’s what you’re worth.” I snapped back, having enough of that day. 

“Huh really? Seems like the little mouse got a big mouth. Girls, do you know, a few days back, this creature puked on one of our professors!” She derided emphasising more on ‘this creature’. 

I knew she had reached the brim but I tried to suppress the boiling anger. But the kismet figured out something else. 

She continued to bicker. “And oh my god, that day, She tore her pants in front of the whole school!” She mocked and was even joined by a few eavesdroppers. 

That was it. The dam had been broken. I balled my fist and the next thing the cheering crowd saw was a bleeding nose. Instinctively her minions grabbed my arms and here I am, going through the consequences. 

Chris was out of town so he couldn't pick me up. 

Two strong beams of light dominated the gloom. Two beams of hope. I struggled to take a step forward and kick my senses to finally hang my arm in mid-air. 

“Lift please,” I said with the last breath I had. 

Surprisingly, the car halted in front of me. It was a sleek Chevrolet coated with black ink. The car door opened invitingly. Being too drunk to give it a second thought, I jumped in. 

“Thank you. Spring Street please.” I mumbled and received a polite approval in return. 

Jaycee was once my best friend. We had been through middle school together. When the final semester of the ninth grade was round the corner, Jaycee had started to behave really weird - blowing my and Chris’ phones, avoiding hangouts and even her grades began to demean. It was like she was hiding something which was unlike her. At the end of the year, she got transferred to Connecticut and was never then heard of. Finally, in my university years, we met as batch mates but appallingly, she had changed a lot. She had been really mean to me lately, eventually upsetting Chris too. 

The link of reverie had been broken with a sudden screeching of tires. I swiped the fog covered window with the back of my hand and peeped outside. The surroundings unfamiliar. 

“Uhm sir, we have not reached-” I was cut off by the tip of a gun rested on my forehead. 

Waves of aghast swept through my face leaving nothing but crumbles of fear. I was shuffled out of the car and pinned against the streetwall by two strong pairs of arms. My trembling lips were noted as a boost to their intentions. A loud shriek got captured in the bottom of my throat trying to find its way out through the sudden shift of scenes. The few that toppled down got dissolved in the tension. 

A man completely disguised in black stepped forward, his bloodied eyes filled with hatred and greed. A knife was shoved in his rough hands.

“Madam Jaycee would be really impressed.” A deep sore voice escaped his throat, completely catching me into spools of horror. What?? Jaycee??

“J-Jaycee s-send you h-here?” I stammered. 

“Yes, sweetheart. Now be ready to be gone.” He sighed a few curses afterwards and lunged at me. 

I closed my eyes. The pain was too much to take. I could feel the excruciating pain in my right thigh as that bastard carved his knife deeper and deeper. Yet useless screams were released as he twisted it even further letting a deep wound shed painful tears. Blood travelled down my leg surrounding me with a small puddle. I had never felt so helpless. I wriggled between the strong arms holding me uptight, shaking my hands vigorously but the silver line kept on fading. 

What happened next is still blurred in my memory. The next moment I knew, I was free. An exhausted figure stood in front of me, a few scratch marks digging its skin.

Jaycee

Her long hair stuck to her skin awkwardly, her green dress shredded at the ends. The narrowed eyebrows reflected pure disgust as she stared at my wound but nevertheless helped me stumble on my feet. My brain scuffled to accommodate the abrupt changes. She drove me home safely tucked with silence the whole way. 

*** 

Jaycee is sitting in front of me uncomfortably with her leg on top of another. 

“How are you now?” She finally asked. 

“Better. Though, thanks for yesterday” I replied sensing the lumbersome environment. 

“Uh, no problem. I-I was just passing by and saw…you know.” 

“Yes. But-” 

“But?” 

“But why did you save me?”

“What do you mean?”

“The men, those who tried to attack me, they said…uhm” 

“What did they say?” Her tone was tinged with sudden gravity. 

I hesitated, not knowing how to convey it. “They said you ordered them to do so” I blurted at last. 

“What!!?” She stood up. As if the quota of shocks had not been over yet, she pulled me in a tight hug. “Sia, I-I would never do that to you.” She broke into light sobs. 

Involuntary crystals of tears cornered my eyes. “But then why… why have you been acting so weird...so different?” 

She instantly pulled away. 

“What happened?” I pushed. 

She looked away, her eyes tracing the floor. 

I gripped her arms compelling her to look at me. “What is it Jaycee? Please, tell me.” 

Our eyes fixed on each other. 

“Fine!” She said and sat down with a thump.

 “You really want to listen? So here it is.”

I nodded in agreement. 

“You know your father was a bastard?” 

“Jaycee!” I yelled accusingly. 

“Will you let me finish? You’re the one who wanted to listen.” She raised an eyebrow at me. 

“You wished to know the truth, huh? The truth is, your father was a drunkard. He used to get drunk every weekend.”

Her words took me back to the days when my mother used to scoot me in my bedroom when the clock struck nine and lock it from outside. 

“One day” Jaycee continued “He was driving down the highway, consumed so much in alcohol, that he didn’t even notice a car approaching. The due happened, your father luckily survived but not the one in the car. Do you know who she was?

She was my mother.” 

I stared at the sobbing girl in front of me with utter guilt. That explains everything, the years of bullying, the broken friendship. Everything. I remember my mother talking about my father getting minute injuries and being admitted to the hospital for a span of a few days but the ‘minute injuries’ had a whole new story behind them. 

“I-I never knew that. I am so sorry Jaycee.” I wept. We both embraced one another which felt like forever. 

“Uh, and Sia, there is something I need to show you.” 

“Hm?” 

She pulled out an old cell phone covered in patches of blood. My back straightened up. 

“I found this in the pocket of one of the assailants. Here.” She said and handed me the cell phone.

Trembling hands took the phone and I opened the call log. Multiple calls from the same number had been recently received by the murderer. My eyes met with Jaycee’s. 

“Chris?”