Feeling

Chapter Four

“You pickpocketed my knife, didn't you?” he asked her.  The woman ignored him, choosing to focus on the nail that she was filling.  He held his hand out in front of him. “Can I have it back please?”  For the first time since I'd seen her, the woman cocked her head to the side and looked up at him, exposing her face to me.  Underneath her curtain of curly black hair, her sultry makeup highlighted her perfect bone structure and brown eyes that were so dark I could barely see the difference between her iris and her pupil.  Her clothes were simple, but tasteful-- a black tank top and leggings underneath an immaculate white leather jacket.  Underneath the jacket and tank top, I could see an intricately woven chest tattoo, mostly black with a few splashes of color here and there.  One of her legs swung idly, flaunting high-heeled boots that ran up to her knees.  This girl seemed oddly familiar, but I was certain I'd never met her before in my life.

“You can't fool me.  I know that you took it.  Look, I'm not mad that you took it.  I just want it back so I can cut the ropes off of her.  Please?”  Without breaking eye contact with him, the woman reached into the inside of her jacket to pull out a small chrome switchblade.

“Here,” she said, slapping it into his waiting hand.  “But for the record, I didn't pickpocket it off of you.  You left it in the bathroom and I was waiting to give it back until after we were done here.”

“I'm so sure,” Dave said, rolling his eyes as he started to cut the ropes off of me.  While he did so, another member of the crew jumped up to his feet from his spot on the couch next to them.  The heavy frames of his glasses were askew on his face and imperfectly framed his chestnut brown eyes.  Based on his warm brown skin, he'd been the first arm that had stuck through the wall of my cell.  His hair stood-up like a shock of electricity, most of it golden blonde that contrasted against the dark brown roots that stopped an inch or two away from his scalp.   A tan bandage laid across his cheek and white butterfly closures lined up against his hairline and curled down towards his ear.

“Are you kidding me?  You told me she wasn't allowed to have knives in the house anymore!  You wrote it on the wall weeks ago.”  He swatted the shoulder of the person next to him.  “Dude, back me up here.”

Judging by the uncomfortable look on the new person’s face, this was not a conversation they wanted to be a part of.  “Fuck, man, I don't know.  You think I want her wrath pinned on me, too?” I heard as the person retreated further into an oversized brown sweatshirt.  This person seemed to be an enigma of things that didn't seem to be possible and yet somehow existed right before my eyes; dark red hair that was so rich in color that I wasn't quite sure if it was dyed or natural, eyes of such a dark turquoise blue that it was almost teal, a dizzying constellation of freckles dotting across a sloped nose… and to top it all off, I wasn't completely sure if I was describing a boy or a girl.  A scar stretched over the corner of their mouth, increasing the severity of the grimace they shot at the standing man.  “I am not getting in the middle of your feud with her again.”

“If you'd checked the wall recently, Helix, you'd see that it got crossed out a few days ago,” piped up another voice.  This one came from a girl who was sitting on the floor and who I'd almost missed when I initially took in the room.  Her hands were up in her hair, pinning the front of her blonde bob behind her head with a large bow that matched her pink sundress.  As they dropped back to her side, her round blue eyes glanced sympathetically up at the standing man...Helix, I assumed from the name the girl had used.  “I can't quote the message that was written below it directly, but it said something along the lines of ‘I checked and your name isn't on the lease, so eat your heart out’.”

“Damn straight,” said the dark-haired girl.  The standing man sat down in a huff.

It was at that moment that Dave finished sawing through the ropes around my wrists and ankles, the difficult task finally finished and myself finally freed.  “Thanks for that,” I said, rubbing my wrists as he stood back up.