Good Company

Chapter 18

~August 19th 1974~ 

Why does my head hurt? This doesn't feel like a headache. Then again, I don't really know what headaches feel like when I'm not feeling it so it could be one. Wow, now I definitely have a headache. Wait, where am I? 

Roger opened his eyes and immediately knew he wasn't at home. He tried to get up, but his hands were tied to a ring on the floor, making it impossible for him to stand up straight or even sit or lie down comfortably. The room he was in was small and hardly decorated. No lights shone, but his eyes were already adjusted to the dark. Damn, I should have brought my glasses. I can't see shit in the dark without them. He squinted his eyes, but he could only see the dark silhouet of a closet, or was it a door? Whatever it was, it seemed to move, and another figure appeared. 

'You feeling better now, Roger? You took quite a blow. Here, I got you some water.' He put the wayer just outside the other man's reach. 'You are probably wondering why you are here. Have you got any questions so far before I start?'

'Yeah, what happened to John and Freddie? John acted like he is suffering from memory loss and where the hell is Fred? Laundry? I don't buy it. Explain yourself, Prenter, or I swear I will break these ties and come after you!' Roger spit at Prenter's face, but graciously missed and hit his shirt. 

Paul wiped the saliva off of his shirt and stared at it as it slowly dripped off the top of his finger.'They are alright. They always have been. I put John in that room to let him calm down a bit, for he and Freddie had a small fight over the toy cars and gave him a pain killer, for Freddie hit him on his head pretty hard. If he isn't feeling better by the end of the day, I'm taking him to the hospital to check if he might have a mild concussion. Freddie had to blow off some steam in order for him to return to his happy self, because he has been troubled with an easily triggered anger ever since they both moved in.' 

'You mean, ever since you forced them to leave their family to live with a creep they'd never met.' The man bound to the ground interrupted him, but he soon wished he hadn't. Paul yanked the ties and made Roger tumble and fall face first on the floor. 

'You bastard. Why are you keeping me here?' He grunted while trying to scramble back up to a relatively comfortable sitting position. 

'Easy now, I was going to get to that. Let me begin by sketching an image for you. It's 1970, around June or July. The birds are chirping and the streets are filled with people who are excited for summer. There's a market place on one of London's squares, and many stalls are loaded with colourful goods, varying from fruits and vegetables to vinyl records and books.
Somewhere in that crowd of buyers and sellers is a young man, barely nineteen years old. His laugh echoes throughout the entire market and he manages to get just a few more people to his stall with his sales pitch than the other vendors. He sells second hand clothing, nothing special, but he sells it like it's high fashion, he makes everyone feel special. Seen. Loved. His golden hair was loosely put up and a brown hat decorated his glowing face. Another man was at the market that day, but he wasn't the kind of man the blond would fall for; older, grumpy, not good-looking. The man felt ignored by that ray of sunshine, but he promised himself that, one day, he and the stall guy would share their lives together.' 

Paul paused and looked at his hands, as if he was experiencing some kind of memory recap in his mind. 

What the actual fuck. This dude has been following me around since 1970? Creepy much. He could have just come up to me, right? I am not the guy to reject every single person who asks me on a date just because of some minor faults. I would have let him down easy after one date, it's as simple as that. But why? One doesn't just fall in love with someone and stays in love forever, without having any contact with that person... Love needs tending, a little effort from both sides to make it work. He should have moved on years ago. Unless... No, let's just ban that thought. No thought here. What thought, I never think! 

Roger was snapped back into reality by Paul's raspy Irish accent resuming the story. 

'I believe you might have put two and two together and figured out that you are the stall guy and I am the other one. Who knows, you might feel the same way, but I can't risk it. I couldn't, and I still can't, and, to be honest, I don't think I ever will. I may be a coward, but I have been around the block before. I have connections, ways to get exactly what I want when I want it. You are the ultimate evidence of my power, as of my love. Now, my darling, we can finally be together. How long have I yearned for you, and here you are. Shining as bright as you did four years ago, just for me. You are mine now, and I am going to take very good care of you. I promise you now that we will never be parted again, my love. Nobody will ever get in our way again.' 

Heya guys! 

I know it's been a while. I don't have a reasonable explaination for it, except for procrastination and no inspiration for the storyline, but I fixed that and now here we are! 15 days is a long time to wait, and I hope some of you have stuck around to read this. If you are indeed reading this, thank you for putting up with my laziness ;) 

Also, I realised that my chapters are quite short, around 1000 words per chapter. Would you guys like longer chapters or it this fine? If I keep them at this length, I will probably update more frequently, and with the longe chapters, I could add some detail about other characters instead of writing different chapters for that, and perhaps some letters from Brian to Roger, Freddie and John? I am planning to update some letters but it might be nice to make him write memo's or a diary, maybe? Anyway, let me know how you feel about that, and if you have any suggestions, feel free to tell me so I can spend more time on Wattpad and less studying. 

Byeee