In Love and Death

Darkness. Pain. 

Those were the main two things Sam was aware of. But there were also other things, other sensations, small at first but getting more distinct all the time. As he started to process them, he was able to arrive to certain conclusions: the only ones his half-numb brain was able to come up with. 

He was being moved, he was sure of it. But where? Where were they taking him to? Who were "they"? He probably knew the answer, but his thoughts were too confused to try and look for it among them. 

He was slowly aware of a slow rocking rhythm underneath him - like he was being carried. Each small jarring motion shot unbearable spikes of pain through his body, and he'd have cried out if he'd been able to figure out how. 

Couldn't they just have left him where he was? Why was all this necessary?

However, soon he felt whatever was carrying him slow to a halt. An indistinct tangle of voices reached his ears... but before he could even begin to figure out what they were saying, his body was flung to the ground and he was plunged into a merciful, all-encompassing darkness again. 

***

Where the hell has Sam gotten?

Jake frowned at the clock, slightly worried, despite himself. How come his boyfriend hadn't come around yet, or called him, at the very least? Usually, at this time Sam would already be at Jake's house, or they'd be hanging around the park together or something. If Sam didn't want to for some reason, or wasn't allowed out, wouldn't he at least have texted him? Jake checked his phone again, just in case he'd missed something, but it remained still and quiet. 

He chewed on his bottom lip anxiously. According to Sam, he finished his extra Biology at four, and it was quarter to five already. Sam usually arrived at four fifteen, sometimes a little sooner, sometimes later, but he'd never taken so much time to arrive without calling or texting him. Besides, Jake had sent him a few texts already, and he hadn't replied to any of them. 

So where was he, then?

Jake sighed. He'd have to call Sam's house, then. It was very unusual for Sam to have forgotten to warn him he wasn't coming that afternoon, but everyone makes mistakes, right? So he pulled out his phone and quickly dialed Sam's house number, crossing his fingers. 

Ring. Ring. Ring.

No answer. 

The phone rang on and on, and eventually merged into a beeping sound that could only mean one thing - there was nobody in. Jake rang a second and third time, with the same result. 

He knew both of Sam's parents worked in the afternoon, so there was no possibility of him having gone anywhere. So where was he? Still at school? On the way home? Jake had never been one to just sit and wait patiently, and he could feel the anxiety start to dig its way in. Maybe something's happened, it whispered. Maybe he's been run over and he's lying in the gutted somewhere, half-dead, waiting for you to find him, and here you are doing nothing...

Jake tried to ignore it, but the vision of Sam lying somewhere, bloody and unconscious, refused to leave his mind. 

He sighed in exasperation. Fine! I'll go and look for him, but now shut the fuck up, okay?

He checked his phone one last time, just to make sure, and then headed towards the door to go and find his boyfriend. 

***

Two and a half hours later, Jake was still on the streets, fruitlessly looking for Sam. It was getting dark already, and the increasing darkness only seemed to heighten his already-soaring feelings of anxiety and despair. 

He'd checked the school, but it was locked. So he'd spent most of this time wandering around the narrow, slightly menacing allies the neighborhood was made up of. And now here he was, exhausted, and maybe a little bit lost, too (his sense of direction wasn't the best someone could hope for).

But still he checked street after street, calling Sam's name the whole time. 

Another half hour passed, and Sam was nowhere to be seen. 

Maybe he should just give up now. Maybe he was just being paranoid and Sam was at home or something. In any case, if he really was somewhere around here, he turn up soon enough, right? Someone was bound to find him sooner or - hold on a second.

He skidded back to the last street he'd walked across, heart galloping.  He could have sworn he'd seen something... or someone... there, but what he'd seen couldn't be Sam, it couldn't be-

But it was, and for a second Jake could only gape, horrified. It was like the paranoia-induced visions he'd been having before had sprung to life before his eyes... but it was worse than that, much worse. 

A small, pale figure with dark hair lay, curled up and unconscious, on the dirty ground, and Jake knew, without a doubt, that it was Sam. His face was bruised and there was blood running from his nose - but that wasn't the worst of it, absolutely not. He was naked from the waist down, and Jake didn't even have the mind to blush or look away. Because the inside of his boyfriend's legs was covered in blood, blood that also stained the ground, and Jake knew, with total certainty, what had happened to him. 

But for a second, he refused to believe it. There was no way his boyfriend had just been raped here. No way.

Even though the evidence was looking at him in the face. 

He stood there, glued to the spot and eyes wide in shock, until the urgency of the situation finally kicked in. Shit! Shit, shit, shit! What do I do? Do u call someone, do I try to get him to wake up, or what? But he knew he couldn't leave Sam lying there helplessly while he went and looked for someone, even though his conscience was screaming it was the right thing to do. So instead, he stumbled up to Sam's unconscious figure, still in a daze, and dropped to his knees beside him. 

"Sam...?"

Okay, that had been more than stupid. He obviously wasn't able o hear him. But it was almost an instinctive reaction - what else could he do?

Very gently, he took hold of Sam's limp shoulders and started shaking him. His mind was drawn to this very morning, when he'd done the exact same thing, worried out of his mind. Now, for some reason, an unnatural, eerie calm had taken over him, maybe to do with the fact that he was trying as hard as he could to block the images that were worming their way into his mind. But despite his best efforts, they stayed there. Sam being cornered. In his mind's eye, he could see the exact shape his eyes would have formed - the gentle, almond-shaped orbs widening in terror. He could hear Sam's screams of agony, ringing in his ears as though he was actually witnessing it. He could see the other person, whoever it was, laughing, jeering as the dark-haired boy lay motionless on the ground, bleeding, broken, seemingly lifeless...

The edges of his vision started blurring, and soon, tears were making their steady way down his cheeks. Jake didn't notice. The only thing that mattered right now in his eyes was Sam. Everything else was meaningless and too distant for him to notice - and would continue to be until the second his brown eyes fluttered to life again. 

"Sam," he choked, over and over again. And each time, he got no response. 

What do I do now?

He started talking again. Rambling, most of it. He didn't particularly care what words left his mouth - but hearing his own voice was reassuring, a way to try and keep his head clear. "Sam, you can't do this to me, goddamn it. Don't leave me like this. Just... please, open your eyes. Do it for me. Please. Please."

Jake's eyes were welling up with tears again. His hands shook uncontrollably, and Sam slipped to the floor again, completely unresponsive. 

"...please," he pleaded one last time, in barely more than a whisper. 

He was on the edge of breaking down completely when he saw it. 

A flash of brown, and Sam's eyes cracking open: disoriented, fearful, confused... but conscious.

In barely a second, Jake had scooped him up and was holding him to his chest, trying to give him love, comfort, anything he possibly could. 

"It's okay. It's okay now. I'm here." 

Sam's eyes were wide with terror and pain. "Jake, it... it hurts..." he whimpered, a sound that reminded Jake of a wounded animal. He watched helplessly as Sam's eyes filled up with tears to match his own, and soon, he was holding a shattered, sobbing boy, and there was nothing he could do to help except caress him clumsily and try to soothe him.

And, right then, that was all that mattered. The present, not the future. Undoubtedly, there would be an aftermath of this... but in that moment, the only thing that existed was Sam and his pain. And Jake could only help as best as he could, and hope it would be enough. 

***

The aftermath did come, though. 

Sam told nobody about the rapist's identity. He pretended it was a stranger who'd found him in the street, and everyone seemed to believe it. Of course, Jake took him to the hospital - apparently, he blacked out again along the way - and he woke up in a white room with his distraught mother in a chair next to him and a doctor saying something he was too confused to hear. 

The physical damage healed soon enough. It was the mental one that refused to go away. 

There were nightmares, obviously. Every single night. But there was also the paranoia, the depression, the refusing to eat, drink or communicate for hours at a time... and, above all, the completely rational fear of the day he'd have to go back to school. 

But, as the emotions came in and refused to leave, they eventually turned into something darker, something a million times more dangerous. The twisted seed of it was planted into his mind and preyed on him, and he couldn't have escaped even if he wanted to. 

What was it?

Revenge.