Well, I've finally done it; I hope you enjoy, the next chapter will be much more action packed, I promise, haha.
Chapter XI
Mike brought the ambulance to a stop at the end of his
driveway. Bert slept the entire trip
using some bandages as a pillow; he couldn’t tell if it was day or night
because of the thickness of the clouds.
Bert heard Keits jump out the back door, so he undid his
seatbelt and opened the door into the pouring rain. Keits was looking in the distance in a daze “I’ve
always loved the rain” he said without the slightest sign of a smile.
Bert had only been out in the rain a few seconds and he was
already soaked “Why the hell would anyone love the rain?”
Keits let out a sigh, still staring at the clouds “Not sure,
I’ve always liked the darkness, and I suppose perhaps the rain washes
everything away so that we can see what’s really there.”
Mike suddenly ran past “Well all I can say is rain is wet
and my coffee pot is calling!” he didn’t slow in the slightest as he ran up his
walkway and ran into his door, Mike needed his coffee to remember that he’d
locked the door. He hastily pulled his
keys out of his pocket and unlocked the door, only to find he’d locked the bolt
to.
Bert looked over towards Keits, but he was still staring at
the clouds, not the slightest sign of a smile.
Keits finally looked towards Bert “I’m going to go see Mrs. Grant and
help her pack her things” Then he started making his way across the street.
“What should we do?” Bert shouted.
Keits took a few more steps and said “Take it easy for the
night, get whatever you want from your house, we’ll head to Port Baker in the morning”
without slowing.
Bert stood in the rain and watched Keits walk to the door
and knock, Mrs. Grant answered and invited him inside, seeing that Keits wasn’t
ambushed Bert went to check on Mike.
Mike’s house had opened to a hallway with two rooms on both
sides only a few feet from the doorway, both had two entrances that were
parallel to each other, on the left was the living room and on the right was
the kitchen, further up the hall on the right was Mike’s bedroom, the washroom
was right across from there and a spare bedroom was at the end of the
hall. Bert heard Mike making coffee in
the kitchen.
Bert took off his shoes and his soaked shirt, he was glad
that he always wore a water resistant sweater underneath, and then made his way
into the kitchen.
As unorganized as Mike seemed outside of his house, inside
everything was always tidy, Bert didn’t know if that was just so Mike knew
where to find everything or if he was just a clean freak. Mike immediately handed Bert a cup of coffee
and they walked into the living room.
Mike wasn’t one of those people that had to have all the
fancy gizmos, like surround sound, HDTV, and all that, his TV actually came
from a pawn shop and his couch and chair came from a cousin of his that moved
away over a year ago. Bert sat down on the
couch to hear a squeak; Mike froze partially standing partially sitting. Everything went silent and they both started
looking around, Bert’s eyes widened in horror when he looked at the end of the
couch.
Staring at him was Mike’s cat, one of the friendliest
looking cats any had ever seen, but the cat was usually the meanest when he
looked the friendliest, and he looked to be in a pretty good mood. Bert knew that the cat would attack anyone
that even touched his toy mouse, and hearing that squeak meant that he was
going to need his bandages soon.
The cat just stared at him though, there was no attack; Bert
didn’t risk moving thinking that perhaps the cat didn’t know he was sitting on
the mouse. Mike then said “What the
hell? It sounds like he’s purring”
Bert let out a sigh of relief, which also resulted in him
shifting his weight just enough to set off the mouse again, the cat didn’t
flinch. He just sat there purring. Bert and Mike looked at each other and said
together “What the ***?”
Mike set his cup of coffee down and walked up to the end of
the couch with the cat “Hey Bert there seems to be something on the side of his
neck” He move the hair a bit and pulled out a small dart. Tears came to his eyes “Somebody tranqued my
cat....who’d do such a thing?”
Bert let out a slight laugh “Look at the bright side, at
least now he’s friendly”
They drank a few cups of coffee and then made a quick trip
to Bert’s apartment, which was pretty tidy since he only seemed to go there to
sleep; which also made it easy for him to gather the stuff he needed, which was
basically just his clothes, toothbrush, toothpaste, shaver, and deodorant.
Bert took his car, a Grey 1986 Honda Accord, and Mike drove
the ambulance. They parked the
ambulance back at the hospital and drove away in Bert’s car without being
noticed, it seemed kind of odd for nobody to be around, but that suited them
fine. They decided to head to the bar
and relax for a while.
“Is Kenneth alright” Was the first thing Mrs. Grant said to
Keits.
“Yes, he’s in a very safe spot and he’s just worried about
you”
Mrs. Grant let him in and led him to the kitchen, where she
had a kettle boiling and a teapot ready. Mrs. Grant poured some water into the pot “So
I guess this means we’re leaving right?”
Keits sat down and let out a sigh “Yes, we’re leaving to
Port Baker tomorrow morning.”
Mrs. Grant brought two coffee mugs to the table and set the
teapot on top of a small stack of napkins “What about Ken?”
“He’ll meet us there; do you want to talk to him?”
Mrs. Grant didn’t have to say anything, Keits grabbed the
cell phone from his pocket and hit the dial memory number 1 and handed it to
Mrs. Grant, a piece of paper fell from his hand, it was the girl from the parks
phone number. Mrs. Grant was too busy
with the phone to notice, Keits picked it up and stared at it for a moment
before putting it back in his pocket.
Mrs. Grant walked into the other room, Keits could hear her talking on
the phone but couldn’t tell what she was saying, so he poured himself a cup of
tea and waited.
A few minutes later she came back in and handed Keits the
phone “He says he needs to talk to you”
Keits put the phone to his ear “How you holding up?”
“You should have brought me some food when you came here, I’m
getting sick of all this frozen stuff, anyways, I’ve patched into the lab, but
everyone is busy with tests at the moment.
If I’m not at the Port when you guys get there make sure my mom leaves
alright, I don’t know if anything will even happen, but just in case.”
“I promise”
“Thanks, well I’ll let you go, I’ll call you when I get
through to the lab” and the phone went silent.
Mrs. Grant seemed pleased from her talk with her son, she
poured herself a cup of tea “I’m sure you’ve got things to do, I can pack up my
things myself”
They finished drinking their tea in silence. Keits gave Mrs. Grant a hug "Don't worry, he'll be there" and left.
He walked out to the sidewalk and
pulled out the cell phone and the phone number.
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