Boots & Slippers

Chapter ten

Rubin's POV

I turn the corner at break neck speed and keep running. I had no choice but they won't understand that, they just see a thief. I can tell the security guy is getting tired so I pull all my resources and bolt. A few turns later I've lost him and I fall against a wall and slip slowly downwards until I'm panting heavily on the side of the building. Without even waiting to catch my breath I rip open the lid from the can of cold beans and dig my fingers in eating like an animal. Well I'm as hungry as one might as well eat like one.

I feel the food hitting my completely empty belly and it hurts but it doesn't stop me. As soon as they're gone I look at myself and sigh. This is what I'm reduced to, eating cold, stolen food on the side of the road. If Pip could see me now, even better if my mother could see me now... it wouldn't be pretty. Anyway I can do nothing about it because as horrible as this life is I will never, ever, return to the controlled environment I was in. Couldn't if I wanted to anyway, I'm far from home and I'm penniless. After I ran from bighead's house I used the last ten dollars I had and hopped on a bus from San Diego to Phoenix.

It was so easy just hop on and live free, yeah that was the dream until I tried to actually live. Still in the clothes I ran in, a T-shirt and ripped jeans, it was next to impossible to find work. People looked at me like I was dirt. Why? Beats me but I found that the more days passed the dirtier I got and the lower I ranked in the world.

Five weeks of grime and no means of feeding, clothing or housing myself has left me feeling like the bottom of the barrel. No point in sitting here spewing this depressing shit to myself, might as well see if I can find a place to lay my filthy head for the night. The first place I try already has a few men and they don't look like the sharing kind so I move on. I come upon an abandoned house that's fully boarded up, no hope of getting in there. Just for shits and giggles I try the back and it turns out I'm in luck. There in all it's glory is a shed. It might as well be the Taj Mahal with the happiness and relief it gives me, especially because the door is unlocked. In I climb and I make a bed in the corner. It's damp, it's smelly but it's home for the night.

Just as I close my eyes my last thought is of fucking Bruin, I hate that I cannot stop fantasies from taking over every bloody night. Why am I so stupid, how could I fall for the guy. One, I don't know him. Two, I was in his company for all of an hour. And three, the guy hates my guts. How fucking thick am I?. Makes no difference now anyhow, he's at home living happily now I'm gone, I'm pretty sure. I finally drift off.

It's still dark when it happens, I feel a sharp pain in my leg, I hop up and pull my pants leg up. With horror I realize there is a squashed spider on my leg. I must have moved and disturbed it then squashed it. Fuck! It's already swelling and I know in my bones that that's not good. It has what looks like two fang marks and once I go out the door into the moonlight I can see that the fucking thing is a Brown Recluse spider. Well shit!

I need a hospital and now. I go straight back out front of the house and knock frantically on the next house I see. What I didn't expect was a gun pointed straight at my nose as the old man opens the door. "What do you want punk" he rasps in a 'I've just been woken up' voice.

"Sir, I'm really sorry for waking you up and I mean no harm but could you please call an ambulance for me, I've been bitten by a deadly spider" I beg him and hope that the bite is the least of my worries right now. I'm starting to feel more and more ill at the thought of what's to come.

"How do you know it's deadly. Might have  been harmless" he states like I'm some stupid kid annoying him by whining. So I slowly raise the dead little bastard and show him. A look of pure panic comes across his face as he lowers the gun and shouts "Margery! Get out here quick and bring the phone". An old woman rushes out and he immediately dials. Margery must've been listening as she doesn't even flinch at the call he makes.

They bring me in, ignoring my scent and all, and we wait. Ten minutes later I'm starting to feel nauseous but it's mild. Jack, as Ive learned is his name, an Margery are watching me like I'm a ticking time bomb and it's making me feel like one. Eventually the EMT's are at the door and administer a shot of anti venom into me and we are off to the hospital. I thank my saviors as I go and they wish me well.

I'm nervous because I think it will be a long road ahead but I'm not sure how this works, will I still get ill or does the stuff ward off all of that? Also there the issue of the bill, I'm fucked. I'll have to get out of there as soon as I can. I'll eventually pay them back. How? Fuck knows. I can't stay like this forever so when I do get back on my feet I'll pay my bill.

"I'm going to give you something to help you sleep whilst the anti venom is working it's way through your system" the woman tells me as she's feeding it into my body. It works within minutes and I don't even remember getting to the hospital. I don't realise I've been put in a ward. I don't wake when I'm checked over several times. Unfortunately that also means I don't register when the nurse at the front desk makes a call.