With a little grogginess and pain in my back, I got up from the bed.
The sun was shining through the curtains, revealing more of the room decor I couldn't see yesterday - the walls were plastered with posters of some obscure rock bands, and among them were more pictures of Mr. Honasson’s son.
But before I could look around more I heard knocking on my door, so I approached it.
As expected it was Mr. Honasson, in his hands he had a pair of sandals which he silently gave me, he then said that he is expecting me to be hungry so he made some sandwiches downstairs for me to eat before we head out to town.
With that, he once again left me standing there and headed downstairs.
It took me a few seconds to process what happened, after that - I put on my newly acquired sandals and left the room.
With the squeaking of floorboards under me I approached the stairs, but before I could take a single step down I got startled by the sudden shout from Mr. Honasson
“The kitchen is gonna be to your right, don’t want you to waste any more time by walking around”
After that, I finally walked down to the first floor and turned my attention to the kitchen.
It was quite dark in there because the curtains on the windows were shut, only letting a few rays of light pass, themselves being colored blue because of the curtain color.
While looking around I noticed a wall clock, it was 3 PM already, no wonder why Mr. Honasson is in such a hurry.
Then, just like as he said, a plate with three cheese and ham sandwiches was sitting on the table.
Not wanting to take any more of his time I quickly gobbled up the sandwiches and left the kitchen.
Probably hearing my approach, Mr. Honasson soon met me near the stairs.
But instead of going outside right away, he turned to the large closet that was standing under the stairs, he then proceeded to open it and quickly took something out.
Before I could see what it was he just as quickly put a baseball cap on my head and then did the same for himself.
“Seeing how you reacted to light yesterday I decided that you're gonna need it, also before I forget…”
He then just as suddenly as before opened one of the drawers and took out a pair of sunglasses.
“Here, you can use these too for the time being”
With those words, he handed them to me.
Me - being my usual introverted self only managed to produce a single nod as a sign of acknowledgment.
Mr. Honasson then waited for me to put on the sunglasses before finally heading for the door.
As I was waiting for him to lock the door I got a much better look at the surroundings now that sun was in the sky.
The fields of grass from yesterday were waving in the wind, the scarecrow was looking slightly less creepy now that I could see it in more detail.
What didn’t look less creepy was the path from the house - it was still covered in my blood.
“Yeah, you are helping me with all of this later, don’t want Dave to think I started killing tourists”
As I stared back at him he had a grin that showed otherwise.
Noticing my stare he quickly removed the smile and started walking towards the forest, with me trying to keep up with him.
The forest was quite dense, and packed full of my sworn enemies - mosquitoes!
Those blood suckers terrorized me my entire life, no matter what kind of poisons I used for them - they still wouldn’t leave me alone.
And so the entire way to the town I was slapping myself all over,
and while I was doing that -
Mr. Honasson would sometimes help me to not go face-first into several trees.
It was agonizing, but I kept telling myself that it all will be over soon.
And it was - a few slaps later we were already out of the forest and out on the town’s main street.
Though it would be hard to call what I saw at that moment a “Town” - buildings were crumbling and a lot of them were boarded up, few people that were around at the time were whispering among themselves, I didn’t expect much from some town in the middle of woods but their situation looked pretty dire.
As if reading my thoughts Mr. Honasson began to speak.
“This was a normal town once, we didn’t have much but we didn’t need much either, but as time went by more and more people left for greener pastures, it’s mostly old folk and people who try to escape the city life”
Hearing that I looked around again, even tho the town seemed like it will crumble to dust with the slightest gust of wind - they were people who wouldn’t trade this place for anything else.
With all of this conversation, I didn’t even realize that we finally arrived at the police station.
As we opened the door and its chimes started ringing a head popped up from behind the desk - it was a female receptionist, she was totally sleeping on the job - because I could clearly see keyboard buttons imprinted on the side of her face.
She quickly realized that something was wrong because me and Mr. Honasson were struggling very hard not to laugh.
When she pulled out her pocket mirror to have a look at herself her face became tomato red from embarrassment.
After that little interaction, we finally approached the desk and Mr. Honasson took the lead.
“Hi Cassandra, quiet day?”
She was still fiddling with her handbag trying to get out her makeup kit.
“Yes it is, the last case we had was way back when your pickup smashed into one of the abandoned buildings in winter”
At those words Mr. Honasson’s laughing transformed into awkward coughing.
“Were here to see Dave, is he here?”
With seemingly better mood she stopped rummaging in her purse and put it down,
She then pushed one of the buttons on the panel beside her, and 5 minutes later a man arrived before us.
“I sure hope that it was more important than my tv show, you called me literally at the end of the episode!”
Cassandra didn’t even bother saying anything, only motioning with her eyes toward us.
When Dave finally looked our way his face instantly turned brighter.
“Jack! What brings you to us today? You know that I can’t pay you that bar check today”
With a happy sigh, Mr. Honasson spoke.
“I’m not here about that, yet, I’m here because of this young man here who became my guest for the night.”
After those words Dave’s turned to me with a serious expression and looked me over.
“And what do you want me to do with him? Did he steal something from you? Or…..?”
Mr. Honasson quickly interrupted him.
“No no, he did nothing wrong, but what happened to him is what I'm concerned about - he was completely naked, bloodied nose, and he is clearly not from around here”
Dave’s face quickly went pale, and he then looked back at me, with a look that by itself said ‘Im sorry’.
“Alright, follow me, let’s deal with this quickly so I can go back to my tv show”
And with that - we followed Dave deeper into the police station.
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