Can't Resist His Charm

What Spare?

“You took off my pants?”

Those were the words that woke me up the next morning. I squint in the darkness as my eyes adjusted, looking at the neon hands of the clock.

5:05 am. What the hell?

I pull my blanket back over my head as I swallow the little saliva I feel pooled up against my tongue, on one side of my mouth.

When the words registered in my brain, I opened my eyes, pulled the thick covering down to expose only my face and I see Damian standing folding the sheet I had covered him with last night. I'd forgotten he was here.

Last night came back to me. The blood. Damian. Hospital. Ahis messed-up parents to him being so exhausted that he’s fallen asleep on the floor without so much as a bath even. Of course, I couldn’t leave him to smell and breed germs like a vagrant in my room…so I wiped him off with hydrogen peroxide I’d found in the medicine cabinet down the hall. I shudder now, to think of the horde of germs that had multiplied during the course of the night in places I refused to wipe on his body.

And the stitches he had gotten.

His body was illuminated by the light I had left on in the bathroom and I see he's in his boxers still. I felt weird taking his jeans off, so I left that on. I figured that if he got sick that was with him, God, and his vitamin intake.

‘Go shower.’

“Uh, yea. They were soaked and I didn’t think you would want a cold on top of that injury you have,” I mumbled as I got up into a sitting position. He threw the folded sheet on my bed and grabbed the towel from the floor. “Are you crazy? Why are you up this early?”

‘Oh, thank goodness.’

He looks at me as he makes his way to the bathroom with the towel over his shoulder, “I’m used to it.”

'He's used to getting the cold or being up this early?'

I shiver as I wait for my body to adjust its temperature to the cold and being awake this early too. Heck, the sun wasn’t even on its way up yet and my parents won’t be up for almost two more hours. I shiver some more so I took the A.C off and literally felt myself thawing out. I don’t get how I could sleep in the cold but shiver when I am up- oh yea, my body heat beneath my quilt. This is the first time ever I’ve been up this early since I was small and had set my alarm at 4 am to catch Santa Claus when I was maybe eight.

Let’s just say that I saw no Santa but my parents traumatized me that morning for a few Christmases.

Damian exited the bathroom a few minutes later and flip the light switch on in the room, sucking in a harsh breath when I see his bruised face. His wet hair is rumpled as he towel-dries it then he throws the wet towel at me, but I catch it. “I used one of the spare toothbrushes and I’ll keep the clothing as I saw my pants in the trash,” he says and I see he was wearing the same t-shirt from last night and the sweats pants.

I figured this is a situation where I should not say ‘eww’ and also should not ask if he wanted a pair of clean ones, so I just bobbed my head.

"What spare? I use all," I probed. My joke was worth the horrified expression as he looked like he was about to puke. It took him a few seconds to realize that he had taken the brush out of a contained plastic and that I had indeed not used it.

“Hah, good one, assh*le,” he chided and I see him looking around on the floor as he made his way to the dresser. I know he’s looking for his shoes. I had put the smelly things next to my laundry basket for they were soaked and in need of a wash before they dried. I felt my stomach churn when I remember the filthy water from last night. I was tempted to place them in the trash.

This is a good opening to suggest the clothing change I figure. “Hey, you can take a fresh pair of clothing… if you want. You can take a pair of shoes if you want to, for I think yours might still be wet," I say testing his pride level as I am a bit curious. I really wanted to ask about his father but I know that would be a sore topic so I am just checking how far he was willing to trust me in confidence.

People usually rather not let anyone know about their embarrassing situations. Even painful- mum told me once that a young mother died because of some rupture she had internally and because she had to take care of her sickly son, she refused surgery on herself just to care for her child…but who was that helping when she died in agony…both from her actual pain and the knowledge that she was leaving her child behind. And that same child is now motherless?

Pride. There are also those without it. I'm wondering which one, is my companion here.

Damian bends with his legs parted as he fixes his hair, slowly. Hissing when the hair roots pulled at his stitches. “No thanks. Lucky you to have the luxury to give away clothing.”

I point to the left drawer on the dresser where my hair accessories are when I see him finger-combing his hair but he ignores me after a mere glance inside it. “Well, yours are too messed up to-"

“Gosh, I’m too embarrassed to take my pants out of someone else’s bin or I would have scrubbed the filth out and reuse it,” he returns as he looks at me in the reflection on the vanity mirror, making me want to grimace. I ended up with a small furrow as I think about what his life was like for him to be accustomed to getting up early and scrubbing stained clothing clean. “I would not be returning this to you, just so you know,” he adds as he finishes grooming his hair and turns to face me.

Feeling a bit relieved that he was honest with me about his clothing, I pat his shoulder. This means he trusts me a bit. I like the fact that he also refused the shoes even though his could and should befriend the bin. It means he isn’t out to take free things. Why am I even analyzing him?

Damian could actually have a pair of sneakers. Mum had us collect our old clothing almost yearly, to give to the people in need and I had my eyes on two pairs of sneakers to toss her way.

“Breakfast?” I simper when his stomach gives a very unhuman-like growl and he grinned, nodding not even fazed a bit. Had my stomach made a noise like that in the presence of anyone, I might have died right there from embarrassment.

We both had burnt toast with scrambled eggs and horrible coffee for neither of us could cook. I made a mental note to learn when I was done with my studies.

Damian told me he had two sisters. But that was all he said about his family- that and what he had said previously about his father. I could tell he was tight-lipped because he was embarrassed but I could also tell that he was deeply pained. My brain tried to come up with the reason he was up early- was it because he got beaten up often? How huge was his father that a man of Damian’s built couldn’t handle?

I look at him. Who would want to hurt someone like him, anyway?

He had checked his phone constantly while we sat in the garden, enjoying the tea the cook had given us when she arrived and shooed us out of the kitchen to clean up our mess. He was nervous and biting on his nails as he texted the other person. I didn’t ask him who he was chatting with. I’m guessing it was his mother.

Mel came around after eight which was pretty normal and when she saw Damian, sitting opposite me on the outdoor table, she halted her step a few feet away and looked at us. “Is everything okay?” she asked me, looking at Damian’s bandaged head and me as she spoke. Damian’s phone rang then and he answered walking away. “Oh my goodness- is he the reason-”

I shake my head, yes, and her jaw slackened as she stared at him as he limped to a tree and leaned on the trunk. We looked as Damian scratched his head then ducked away from his own hand as he flinched. He had scratched his stitches. He told me he had gotten three and he had to return on Monday to get them cleaned up at the hospital.

“Is he okay?” she whispers to me wide-eyed.

Before Mel asks me anything again, I say, “He was in an accident last night.”

“Oh my goodness. He’s okay, right? Oh my. I came over because I was worried,” and seeing me frown she adds, “Yes, I know you said- still I was worried, babe.” She holds my hand on the table as she sits where Damian was before. “Goodness your mother is waiting for you Gloria said.”

I knew she would have been a busy brain that’s why I didn’t say anything to her about him last night. I should have called her this morning or even texted her. But I had left my phone in my room, earlier. “Yea I took him to the hospital…he was robbed,” I explain to her for I wasn’t sure if Damian wanted her to know the depth of what actually took place. “No, he doesn’t want to make a report,” I add as I know she was about to say the obvious.

“Why? Oh- does he know them? Is he being bullied?” Mel’s eyes are wide as her grip tightens a bit on my hand. She was bullied in her old high school before she transferred to our school. Mel had been hospitalized too and was too scared to say anything about it. She had told her parents she couldn’t remember anything.

That is a lie- my beautiful, internally scarred Mel, remembers every painful detail.

I hate that my girl had to face something like that...anyone as a matter of fact. I loathed scum that took advantage of anyone...children or not. I think even if you are a kid yourself but you were sick enough to inflict pain onto another then you should be charged as an adult.

Staring at Damian, deep in thought, his words about his father beating him and even robbing him of his money, grate at my brain. His scum father had to be a drug addict to do that. Mum had said drug addicts even rented their own kids out as s*x workers for drugs.

No, I don’t think that applies to the man in front of me whose lean body, I had seen, near naked earlier. Even last night when I had wiped him off- he’s too athletic to be beaten this way unless his father is a professional fighter or something. He was too packed with muscle, his body was just too built to be overpowered just like that.

Even if he allowed his father to hit him, he will defend himself against anyone else.