Band Aid Only Covers the Bullet Hole

Juliette and I were on the road; we had been for nearly six months now. You know, just passing through the odd town every now and then, whenever we felt like it. It was pretty cool, actually – the two of us were twins; non-identical, of course, but we’d grown up together and always said that one day we’d like to travel. So now we were.

We’d constantly wanted to live away from everything. Cities just didn’t appeal to us. They were too busy, or too noisy, or just… unattractive. Activity in a city was simply excessive, and Juliette and I had always wanted to escape that. New York City had been a great place to grow up, don’t get me wrong – but it was just too much of a city at times, and it made us grow tiresome of the same day to day routine. The typical nine to five; ugh, don’t remind me…

So there we were, just outside El Paso on one late summer’s night. We’d been travelling for the most part of the day, and were pretty tired by now. Hitch-hiking can be hard work, you wouldn’t believe, and when we turned up at some shitty, run down motel in the middle of pretty much nowhere, we were relieved to see it. We’d stayed in places even dirtier before, so Juliette and I barely exchanged a questioning glance before proceeding through to the main reception, out of the suns penetrating rays and into the cool shade of the downcast and neglected building.

“This place is a shit-hole…” Juliette muttered to me, as we took a look around the insides of the establishment. The faded grey wallpaper was peeling from the walls, and a couple of armchairs that looked like they’d been pulled out of a trench from World War Two were left rotting in the centre of the room.

“Isn’t it?” I mumbled in reply, taking in the carpet that couldn’t have been cleaned for at least three years; you could almost see small clouds of dust rising from it as you exerted pressure onto the floor with each step, and there were several patches of dark red-black stains that I didn’t even want to question where they’d come from.

Still, it was somewhere to stay. So Juliette and I went to get a room key from the receptionist, who looked a hell of a lot like an emaciated skeleton. She fitted in perfectly with the current decomposing state of the reception area though, and even more so with the rooms Juliette and I had been assigned to. Our two rooms were next door to each other, yet identical in the fact that the furniture was all grey and ragged, and that the bed sheets were covered in the most unappealing coloured stains I’d ever seen.

“Fucking dump…” Juliette sighed, not bothering to knock on my door as she walked straight over to the cracked mirror in the far corner of my room, checking her hair quickly. “Ah well, nobody even half interesting is gonna be in this shitty place – wanna go get a drink?”

I nodded. Motel bars were more fun than regular bars, in that you could always get a drink off a guy - providing you knew how to treat them right, if you get what I mean? And added to that, was the fact that Juliette happened to have a strange talent for picking pockets, and knew exactly how to take money from people without them noticing.

So we left the decaying wasteland of my room, and headed down the hall to what we took to be the bar. Yet surprisingly, although it still wasn’t a place you’d ever choose to go if you could afford not to, it was in a lot better state than the rest of the ‘fucking dump’, to use Juliette’s exact choice of words. I mean, sure, the place was smoky, dull, and pretty much deserted apart from a guy sitting on one of the barstools, and a couple of old men sitting in a booth on the far side of the room, but you couldn’t really complain; it was all to be expected.

Juliette nudged me, indicating the guy sitting at the bar. He looked fairly young, perhaps twenty, twenty one; only three or four years older than ourselves. He had jet black hair that fell over his eyes, and the smouldering cigarette that he so often brought up to his lips made it appear that he had a permanent fog surrounding him. His hunched over stance made him look like an easy victim for us though, so after receiving a quick nod from me, Juliette darted around the back of the room, unnoticed by the young man, and leaving me to my task of distraction.

I walked confidently over to the bar, taking the place next to our victim. He shot me a quick glance through his cloud of smoke, and I simply raised my eyebrows with a small, secretive smile in return. The man raised his eyebrows back, and then leant in closer to me, blowing a long breath of smoke out into my face. When I didn’t flinch, he cocked his head to the side a little, a smirk appearing on his lips as he murmured in a strangely deep yet hushed voice “Wanna drink, sugar?”

I played along with his little game; I could already see Juliette approaching subtly from behind the man, and knew I had to keep him distracted if we wanted his money. So I gave the man a sly smile, nodding as I told him “Sure, if you’re buying.”

He smirked again, and indicated for the barman to get me a drink. The man himself then turned back to me, shooting me a look with his deep hazel eyes as he questioned “So what’s a cute little girl like you doing fuck all in a place like this?”

“Travelling.” I replied shortly. Juliette was now right behind him, reaching tentatively into the man’s pocket, and attempting to pry something out. I couldn’t look at her for more than a split second though; the man would get suspicious. So I quickly glanced back at him, asking “And yourself?”

“The exact same, sugar,” he nodded to himself. He stubbed out his cigarette, allowing the smoke to rise slowly upwards in small spirals from the ashes, only to light up another almost immediately, before whispering “And all in between.”

I had no idea what that meant, but fuck that: this guy was getting us money. Without realising, of course.

“So… err, what do you do for a living?” I asked him almost too eagerly; Juliette was having trouble removing his wallet without him noticing, but this guy was so thick I’d have been willing to bet she could have taken his skin-tight black jeans away and he wouldn’t have realised.

The man smirked. “Wouldn’t you like to know.”

I frowned subconsciously. This guy was weird, way too weird – kind of mysterious, only more dramatic than that. He had an air of ambiguity that surrounded his words and his appearance, and I was sure that it didn’t come from that cloud of cigarette smoke. The man caught me staring at him in puzzlement though, and gave a dry laugh. “Don’t worry about it, sugar, I’m just as fucking sane as the next guy… what about you? What do you do for a living?”

Pick-pocket.

“Err… I’m kinda in between jobs right now…” I mumbled, distracted when Juliette shook her head at me ferociously. I had no idea what she was on about, but continued to the guy “I’m sorta… free. I don’t work.”

“It’s alright for some.” He nodded again, taking a deep draw in from his cigarette, and closing his eyes in apparent ecstasy. He looked calm for a moment, almost serene, and he lay his head back in complete bliss. But then all of a sudden the man snapped back to reality, staring right at me as he demanded almost sharply “You smoke?”

“Not really… I have done in the past.”

“You should do; it works fucking miracles.”

“That’s a matter of opinion, I suppose.”

“Well then, in my opinion,” he laughed dryly again, clearly mocking me. “I think that everyone should fucking smoke, because it lets you fly free of all your normal restraints. It’s relaxing. I don’t get why the fuck people would choose against it… fucking retards, don’t know what they’re-”

“Excuse me,” a different, sharper and clearer voice said from behind the man, making the pair of us turn the face it. “But what do you think you’re doing, young lady?”

It was a cop. Talking to Juliette – which basically meant, that we’d been caught out. Her face was panicked; she’d never been caught before, yet even as she stood there, frozen to the spot, her hand was still in our victim’s pocket. She shot me a panicked look, her mouth in a permanent ‘O’ shape, and the man to whom I’d been talking shot a look between us, his pocket, and then the cop.

“What the fuck…?” He began slowly, an uneasy frown appearing on his face as realisation flooded into him. I noticed him glance at Juliette for a moment, surveying her in some sort of way, and then scowl up at the cop “Why the fuck are you talking to her like that?”

“She’s obviously trying to take your money, sir,” The cop replied, his voice sounding slightly uncomfortable now. “… Along with that other girl there, distracting you.”

The man shot me a look. I shrugged; I’d been busted by that point, there was no fucking use in denying it. It’d only get us into deeper shit, and I really couldn’t be fucked to deal with that.

The guy surprised me though. He glared back up at cop, and said “For fucks sake, I asked her to get my wallet for me. Go find a real fucking crime, dumbass – and don’t call me sir.”

I think he could have been arrested for that, but apparently the cop was so dumbfounded by this reaction that he simply nodded and backed away. Juliette and I exchanged a glance of complete disbelief, and the man who’d just got us out of trouble gestured for Juliette to take the barstool on the other side of him to where I was. He didn’t say anything more, but the three of us sat in silence for what felt like a long time, until Juliette plucked up the courage to ask “And you didn’t turn us in because…?”

The man shrugged, arching a single eyebrow at her. “I don’t like cops.”

He didn’t elaborate, so we just left it at that. The guy ordered Juliette a drink, before shooting me a quick glance and murmuring in his deep tone “What’s your name, sugar?”

“Hannah.” I replied dutifully. This guy was weird, but there was something really intriguing about him at the same time, that made me want to find out as much as I could about him.

“And that other girl’s?” He asked again, apparently not bothered enough to ask her herself.

“Juliette – my twin sister.”

The man nodded slowly, sucking deeply on a cigarette before he replied. “Ah, right.”

Silence fell over the three of us again, until the man asked “You not gonna ask me my name, sugar?”

I nodded quickly; I didn’t want this man to get the wrong impression of me – he seemed like the sort of guy that always got what he wanted, and caused trouble like hell if he didn’t. “What’s your name?”

“Frank.” He replied simply, stubbing out yet another cancer stick. “How nice of you to ask.”