The Soldier and the Wolf

Chapter 9

It's been almost two weeks since the man and I went into "hiding" in my home. Like the man said, his injuries did heal rather quickly. He was no longer limping on his foot and all his cuts small gashes closed up and left no scars. However, I still continued to keep his arm wrapped up since it was the worst one of all. I also encouraged him to change into normal clothes. I was able to dig out boxes of my dad's old clothes from the attic, and fortunately they fit him rather well. For sleeping arrangements, I offered my parents room, but he just stayed in the living room. Then I offered the couch to him so he would at least be comfortable, but he slept on the rug instead. The one thing we both agreed on was to keep the lights on. He had his reason to have to lights on. My reason: after being in that dark room for two days, I was scared that if the lights were off, people were gonna come into my room and hook my up to machines and continue infusing me with mystery serums. It was silly, but I just had that fear now.

        Getting to know him however was much more complicated. I had to be careful not to ask questions that would trigger him, but I couldn't help but ask a a few questions. But he could never answer them. It was as if he had amnesia or his traumatic past with Hydra caused him to suppress the trauma and forget his past. It was hard to help him if he couldn't remember.  We spent most of our days staring at the TV and listening for any signs of the government looking for Hydra agents.

      One time, there was a story about Captain America's recovery in the hospital. It was a quick little segment, but the way it sounded, he had gotten beaten up pretty badly after that whole Hydra scheme. As they were listing his injuries, I sat there and listened, but the man got up and left the living room entirely. I knew better than to ask why he left, but I was left wondering why he left in the first place. It sounded as if talking about Captain America made him uncomfortable.

But at then there was another time when I was walking to the kitchen, and I would catch him staring at the picture of me and my dad at the Smithsonian in front of the Captain America exhibit. I never busted him because I didn't want to freak him out, but I really wanted to know what was going in on in his head.

That night, maybe one or two in the morning, I woke up to hear a faint moan from the living room. At first, I just thought that the man slept on his arm or moved his arm wrong, and I immediately fell back asleep, but then another moan came. This time it sounded more painful. I sat up in my bed and listened to the moans coming from the living room. Some were louder than others; some moans were aggressive while others were more agonizing. Slowly and quietly I got out of bed and crept towards the living room. When I peeked around the corner. I saw the man lying on the ground in his usual sleeping spot. He was on his side, using his right arm as a pillow, and his left arm was squeezing onto the rug. Even in the dark, I could see his figure moving restlessly. I turned on the light, making sure it was dimmed at first so it wasn't too bright, and there I saw him on the ground. Even with his eyes closed, he had this pained look on his face, and he was breathing heavily. A loud moan would escape his mouth once in a while as well, and his left hand would repeatedly grasp onto to the rug, like how a child would squeeze his mother's hand when getting a shot. I keep my distance from him, but also walked closer to get a better look. When I got closer, I saw that he was sweating like crazy. His long hair stuck to his face and wrapped underneath his stubbly chin and beads was sweating would rolled down his forehead.

"Shit, what do I do?" I whispered to myself as I watched this guy have his nightmare. Still keeping my distance, I walked to the side of the man and squatted down. I never had to deal with this before. Do I wake him? Or do I let him sleep through it until it dies down? A part of me wanted to let him keep sleeping. If I try to wake him up, he could spring out at me and kill me. But seeing him being tortured by his own dream just made me pity this poor man. Being trapped was the worse thing for a person, I had to wake him up. I looked up at the ceiling and prayed. "God, please let him know I'm trying to help him." I took whispered under my breath and looked back down at him. As I reached out my fingers to tap his shoulder, my breath and entire body became shaky, and repeatedly my conscience told me to back away. But I kept going. I couldn't bear to see him moan and thrash constantly. I was about two inches away, when suddenly the guy exploded from his "bed" and sat up straight. I screamed and fell back on my butt. I scooted back enough to where he couldn't immediately reach and kill me. We were both breathing heavy with fear, and when I looked into his eyes, they were wild and filled with fear and guilt. But he wasn't looking at me, he was looking past me. I looked back and just saw the outside behind me. Was there something there that I couldn't see. When I looked back to the guy, he was using his metal arm the support his torso up, and he was staring at me.