Pulse

Ivy closed her eyes, instantly closing herself off, a survival instinct mostly. She felt a faint ‘pop’ as one of her fingernails pierced into her palm. The blood trickled down to her knuckles.

She had no idea what happened for the next five minutes. They were a blur. All she remembered was seeing a dark car suddenly whip around a corner and nearly hit Harold.

Then, Daniel stepped out of the jolly rancher-mobile. Visibly shaking, he strode over to where Harold had Ivy pressed against the side of her truck and punched him in the face.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing, you fucktard?!” He screamed, pushing Harold to the pavement. Daniel’s face was dark, deadly. “She obviously wants nothing to do with you, so why do you keep-”

Harold cut him off with a hard jab to the gut. He hopped up quickly as Daniel doubled over, and Ivy snapped out of her trance. Quick as lightning, she reached over into the bed of her truck and pulled out her fire extinguisher. Harold, with his back to her, was kicking a writhing Daniel on the street, so he didn’t see her come up behind him until she tapped him on the shoulder.

He turned, grinning evilly, and Ivy whacked him in the nose with the fire extinguisher. He fell to the concrete, unconscious. Ivy kneeled down beside Daniel, who was gasping, laid her still bleeding palm on his shoulder, and spoke. “You okay?”

“That was embarrassing…” Daniel said, sitting up and rubbing his jaw. “And here I was supposed to sweep in and save you from certain doom…” He said.

“Well, you can’t always get what you want.” Ivy smiled, quoting her mother’s favorite song.

“Daniel looked over at his shoulder, and Ivy’s hand still resting on it. “You’re bleeding on me.” He finally said, shrugging out from beneath her slimy red hand.

“Oh.” Ivy said, glancing between his ruined shirt and her freely bleeding hand. “I don’t have a first-aid kit, and it would appear I’ve hit a blood vessel…” Ivy complained, trying futilely to stop the bleeding with pressure.

“Shoot, me neither…” Daniel muttered. “But I have a pocket knife!” He smiled brightly, pulling a knife out of his back pocket. He stood up.

“I don’t see how that’s going to…” He flipped open the blade and sliced a hole in his stained T-shirt.

He took the strip of fabric that was once his sleeve, and turned to Ivy. “This is only going to hurt, um, a lot.” He said, placing the fabric over her wound. “I’m going to tighten it on three. One…” He pulled the cloth tight.

Ivy let out a stream of unrolemodelish words.

“I’m so sorry, but you know that if I’d waited till three you would have been tense and it would have hurt more than it did. I’m sorry.” He feverently apologized.

Ivy took a deep breath so her voice wouldn’t shake. “I’m fine, just let me go home. I think Stupid is waking up.” She gestured towards Harold with her good hand. He was lying on the pavement, groaning and clutching at his probably broken nose. She got into her truck and pulled away from the curb, where she had parked to be a Good Samaritan towards Harold.

When Ivy looked back in her rearview mirror, she saw Daniel following her. It was kind of sweet, in a creepy sort of way. Ivy was glad Daniel was there for her. She was glad he seemed to care as much or more about her as she did about him.

Ivy smiled as she pulled into her driveway. She stopped her truck and jumped out, only to watch Daniel drive by, not even looking at her. Her eyebrows knotted together in confusion. Shaking her head, Ivy slowly trudged up the steps to her front door. As soon as she was inside, she went straight to the kitchen. It just happened to be the closest place with a sink. Groaning, she peeled the makeshift bandage off of her hand. The blood had halfway dried, making the bandage pull at the wound when it was removed. Which, of course, caused it to start bleeding again.

Ivy rummaged around her cabinets for some alcohol. She finally found a bottle, and she opened it. The stench invaded her nose, causing it to wrinkle in distaste. She took a deep breath, anyway, and clenched her teeth together, determined not to scream when the alcohol touched her skin.