Bella

“You couldn’t have possibly bought this many stuffed animals in one day,” Acel remarked. He furrowed his brow and ran a hand through his hair. I set the bags down, the inanimate objects tumbling out of the plastic bags as soon as I did so. “Then again, it’s a large possibility.”

I stayed silent and sauntered over to my bed, taking a seat. I had never really observed him before. After all, his existence has only been known to me as of yesterday. He had a slim figure, but you could tell that underneath the plaid button down that he was quite in shape. His eyes were a deep emerald, his lips were soft peach, and his hair was just a really dark brown. He had bangs that were swept across his face, in which made it harder to see both of his eyes. I blinked and looked down at the dark area of my carpet, where some of the ashes refused to come up.

“It was a real bargain. I got majority of those for about a dollar per plush animal, so that makes just about ninety of them, if not more. What is that you needed my help with?” I asked, curiously. I looked up at Acel to see him looking around my room, casually shifting his weight to the other leg. “Huh?”

His movement ceased and he looked dead at me. “Are you sure you want to help me?” I shrug. “Right, you don’t even know what I want your help with.” Acel retrieved his hands from his pockets and turned around, pulling the back of his shirt up. There were gashes across his back, some of them straight as a ruler and inches long. He then turned around and showed me the front side of his torso. Again, there were gashes. “Could you possibly help me bandage these? I can’t do it on my own.”

Acel’s eyes were squeezed shut and he was biting his lip, most likely to kill the burning sensation. I was applying rubbing alcohol to his wounds with a washcloth he’d given me. We were in his upstairs bathroom and since he was much taller than me, he allowed me to sit on the counter to do this process. I’d be lying if I said there weren’t a million questions going through my head. “How the hell did you obtain these? Especially so many of them?”

He opened his eyes and blinked at me. “I think it’s better off if you didn’t know.” I shrugged and continued to clean his wounds. Unexpectedly, he placed his hand on my knee and practically dug his nails into it. I winced, though ignored the pain he was causing me. “Fuck. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine. Turn around,” I instructed. He did as he was told and faced his back to me. The incisions on his backside appeared to be deeper than the ones on his chest. “Just a heads up, this is going to hurt like Hell.” I grabbed the bottle of rubbing alcohol and poured more on the towel, proceeding to press it onto the wounds. He flinched away from it. “Be still.”

It took roughly an hour for me to finish cleaning all of his wounds and applying all bandages that were needed. I had never bandaged such lengthy notches before and that took a few times to perfect. “You’re done, correct?” Acel turned around just in time to see me nod. I hadn’t noticed how close we were the whole time I’d been helping him. I flushed a bright rubicund and he chuckled lightly. “Thank you.” I nodded again. Acel picked me up easily and lifted me off of the counter. He cleared his through. “Let’s not make this a habit. I shouldn’t need your help anymore.”

“That’s cool.” I bit my lip and waved to him, leaving him in the bathroom. I trudged down the stairs, making sure to be aware of the unpacked boxes at the end of the staircase. His house was nearly empty, except for the furniture that they’d placed in scattered areas. I took a last look around and let myself out of the front door. Let’s not make this a habit. That was his warning for me to keep my distance, even though he was the one who came to me first.