Chapter 2 #3
Denny froze. Sense was kicking in, showing her the situation for the serious danger that it was, but it was too late. The figure on the ground let out a weak groan. Denny realised it was a woman, long dark hair scattered around her.
“Step back from her!” she ordered the man.
He let out a guttural sneer. “Get lost or you’re next.”
The woman was still on the ground, curled on herself. Denny decided it was worth a shot. Stepping forward, she adjusted her grip on the hairspray, pointer finger slipping on the button, but kept her hand down. Predictably, the man fell for her provocation and launched forward.
Denny had taken multiple self-defence courses, particularly after taking over Grandma at the shop.
Without hesitation, she crossed her arms in front of her face to fend off the guy’s attempted strike, then jammed a knee into his crotch.
Before he had any chance to react, she pointed the aerosol at him and, turning away, pressed on the trigger.
The hairspray went straight into his eyes.
His screams filled the silence of the empty street.
Denny left him to writhe on the ground. She rushed to the woman, coughing through the cloud.
“Hey. Are you alright?”
There was blood on the ground. Not much, but enough to concern her. Horrified, Denny turned the woman around and came face to face with a mask of smudged dark makeup and blood. She was just a girl.
Denny gently patted her cheek to check her responsiveness. A feeble moan reverberated in the girl’s throat; slowly, her lashes fluttered and the most luminous blue eyes drowsily crawled up to meet Denny’s.
“Are you alright?” she asked again, but the girl’s gaze remained absent. Her breath reeked of beer.
“Do you understand me?” Denny tried again, with no result. The girl’s mouth was bleeding, Denny couldn’t tell from where. She had been heavily beaten and was wounded in multiple spots.
As a last resort, Denny pointed her hands to her chest and then outwards into two thumbs up, hoping the sign for ‘How are you?’ also worked for ‘How are you feeling?’. Her BSL was rusty and very basic.
The girl seemed even more confused than before.
No sign language, then.
“I’d better take you to the hospital,” Denny reasoned out loud, not really expecting a response, but, to her surprise, the girl’s eyes went wide. A strong hand clawed Denny’s arm. At least the girl seemed to understand English.
“No hospital?” No answer, but the grip on Denny’s arm loosened just a tidbit. “Are you sure?” The girl squeezed. Denny took it as a yes. “Did you hit your head?” The grip relented. “No?” The grip relented some more. “Alright.”
Communication barrier aside, the girl appeared alert and lucid, no obvious signs of a possible concussion.
The grip on Denny’s arm intensified. The begging look in the girl’s eyes convinced her to give up.
“Fine, no hospital. Okay?”
Squeeze.
Denny helped the girl up. After a bit of swaying, they managed to find a balance. Denny wrapped her arm around the poor thing’s shoulders, urging her to follow her to the van.
“Let’s get away from here, yeah? Questions later.”
That seemed to relieve the girl, who limped along without remonstrations. She felt heavy and shockingly solid against Denny’s side. Her aggressor was still writhing on the pavement, hands clawing at his face, yelling insults at them through the intensifying rain.
Denny opened the van’s passenger door, knocked some litter off the seat and helped the girl into it.
Under the overhead light, her skin was deadly pale under the drying blood, but, other than that, she didn’t seem in life-threatening conditions.
Albeit worried, Denny climbed into the driver seat.
Fastening the girl’s seatbelt was no easy feat: she was in a lot of pain and winced when the belt touched her side.
“Sorry. Okay, wait.”
Denny took off her cardigan, balled it up, and jammed it between the seat and the belt so that it cushioned the pressure. She glanced up tentatively. “Yeah?”
All she got as a grunt, which she decided to take as an affirmation.
She sped off towards home with shaking knees.
Now that the rush of adrenaline was wearing off, she was beginning to see things more lucidly.
Things could have gone very, very wrong.
There hadn’t been any time to think it through: if she’d had to call and wait for the police, the creep would have beaten the life out of the poor girl.
She looked bad enough as it was. At least the bleeding had stopped.
Denny found her a packet of sanitising wipes for her mouth.
“So, what’s your name?” She turned, only to meet the same blank stare as before. No reaction. Just bright, sky-blue eyes watching her inexpressively.
Denny pursed her lips.
As the minutes ticked by, the tension gradually melted away from her limbs. They were safe. They’d soon be home. Everything was going to be alright.
“I’m Denny, by the way.”
She had the nerve to be disappointed when the girl’s expression stayed as flat as ever. Something in her eyes changed, though. It was subtle, nearly imperceptible, but Denny caught a flash of light in them and decided that, for now, that’d be enough.