Page 3 of Tempting Sebastian

“Hey man, do you have ten dollars I can borrow?” I was startled by a guy who snuck up on my shoulder. It was four o’clock in the morning. He was about my height, but dirty fromhead to toe with scraggly blonde hair, missing teeth, and baggy clothes. The old military jacket he was wearing had a name tag sewed above the chest pocket. It read,Smith. I wondered if it was his real name.

I sounded more nervous than I intended when I replied, “I…um…no, I don’t have anything.”

“Oh, come on. It’s just ten bucks. I see you leave here every morning in a suit. Anicesuit. And look at this hoodie.Nike-eee.” He put emphasis on theeand drew it out. “Fine, I’ll take five,” he tried to compromise.

The idea of him watching me leave every morning and taking mental notes of me to size me up, creeped me the fuck out. Giving me even more reason to hold my ground, I said, “Idon’thaveanything.If I did,I wouldn’t behere.”

The guy chuffed in disbelief, got up, and walked away. I was unnerved and ready to go. I didn’t even want to get changed, just wanted to grab my shit and leave so that’s exactly what I did. After watching the guy disappear into the hallway, I got up, grabbed my suit from under the mattress and rolled it up, stuffing it into my bag. My pillow was small, very small, like an airplane pillow, so I had room in the bag to shove that in, too. I looked around to make sure I hadn’t forgotten anything, then made my way downstairs toward the exit. I was wearing grey sweatpants, my sneakers, and a black hoodie, but decided I could just get changed in the bathroom at work before anyone else arrived. Thankfully, the city bus ran twenty-four hours a day, seven days, a week, so I knew I would only need to wait a short time before it came around.

As I got near the exit, an eerie feeling that I was being watched came over me and I couldn’t shake it. I worried if the weird guy was following me until I finally reached the exit. It was still dark outside, so I searched the shadows extra hard for anyone who might be up to nothing good. I didn’t see anything,so I made a right to head toward the bus stop. A favorite coffee shop of mine was open twenty-four hours, too, and near the antique store, so I figured I could sit in there for a couple of hours before heading into work and still clock in early enough to change. In my mind, I could smell the scent of fresh baked bread and hot coffee wafting through the air.

That’s when I heard footsteps running up on me. “Hey, Nike!” Someone yelled from behind me. It wasSmith, but ignoring it, I walked faster. “Hey! I just needed five bucks!”

I turned to face him as someone yanked my backpack, making me fall backwards and land on my ass. His grip on my backpack broke as I fell, so I scrambled to get some space between me and them. Smith was getting closer while the other guy hollered, “Gimme your pack!”

“N…no. It’s all I have! I don’t have any money!” I put my pack between the wall and my back, hoping I could keep them from taking it. Everything I owned, including all of the money I had saved, was in it. I would die if it meant holding onto it and not having to start over.

Smith kicked me in the stomach, knocking the wind out of me, making me feel like I was actually going to die right then. As I tried to catch my breath, the other guy started ripping my bag off my back. It took all of my strength and me keeping my elbows bent to keep him from pulling it down and off my arms.

Smith stiffened his upper lip and whispered, “Give methefuckingbag, Nike!”

When I didn’t, he punched me in the face, making my head hit the brick wall behind me. I bit my tongue sustaining the blow and I could feel my face swelling. The salty, metallic taste of blood pooled in my mouth and the pain shot through my entire head. I felt woozy and finally lost the battle. They pulled my pack off my arms and started opening it up. Everything I had worked for was in the hands of someone else.

Suddenly, I heard someone yell, “Hey! Get the fuck off him, NOW!” My vision was blurry from the double hit, but there was a man, I didn’t know who it was, but he was fighting my attackers off. I heard him yell, “Get the fuck out of here now! If you ever put your hands on him again, I’ll kill you myself.” The guys bolted, leaving me to wonder,did they take my bag? Did they take the money?I wanted to die.

“Jackson,” a calm voice said.

“Jackson, stay awake. I’m going to pick you up.” I wanted to stay awake, but I couldn’t. My head felt like it was going to explode, and before I could respond to the stranger, everything around me went dark.

*

Sebastian

When I saw those two guys kicking and punching Jackson, all sense of restraint left me, and I saw red. I would’ve killed them if I needed to, but I was more worried about Jackson losing consciousness. If I had just shown up a few minutes sooner, he might’ve avoided the situation entirely. Something in me told me something was wrong, and I was glad I followed my gut instinct to go check on him.

Once I got the two shitbags to run, I turned to Jackson, who was bleeding from the back of his head and mouth. He was groaning, but nothing coherent was coming out, and he was in a lot of pain. I tried to keep him awake, anyway, saying, “Jackson, stay awake. I’m going to pick you up.” I wasn’t sure if those guys had taken anything from Jackson’s pack, but it was open and lying on the ground, so I grabbed it and tossed it over my shoulder before scooping him up. He was much lighter than I had expected. His arms went limp letting me know hehad passed out. “Jackson. Jackson, wake up.” I worried about a concussion and rushed him to my car.

Before crossing the street to my car, I looked around and noticed that there were very few people outside that early in the morning. While I opened the passenger side door to my Blazer and sat him inside as gently as I could, I wondered why he was out so early in the morning. I also wondered how long an ambulance would take to get to the shelter. Something told me they wouldn’t be in too much of a hurry. After buckling him in, I put his backpack in the back seat and decided it would be faster if I took him, myself.

He was groggy while I searched for my first aid kit. I’ve always made it a habit to keep one handy. You never know what can happen while you’re out and about. After pulling some bandages out, I went back up to Jackson’s side, opened the door and leaned him forward just enough for the seatbelt to lock and catch and hold him in place. I gingerly dabbed gauze pads to the back of his head to stop the bleeding, being careful not to apply too much pressure, and wrapped some bandages around his head to hold the gauze pads in place. I cleaned up the blood from his head and neck as much as I could, knowing I needed to take him to the hospital, fast.

I still didn’t know why he was there. Was he hiding from someone? It didn’t matter. I shut the hatch, got in the car, looked over at Jackson and got angry all over again. Jackson was slipping in and out of consciousness.

I wondered out loud, “Jackson, what happened to you?” but got no response. My foot hit the gas pedal, and we were on our way to a long morning at the hospital.

***

I brought the Blazer to a stop at the emergency room doors, got out, opened Jackson’s door, and lifted him up as carefully as I could. I carried him in, spotting the on-duty nurse and told her that he’d hit his head. I didn’t want to tell her about the fight until I knew more about Jackson’s situation, both at the shelter, and his condition. The last thing he needed was to be surrounded by police officers asking a bunch of questions. The nurse rushed two other nurses over to help get Jackson on a stretcher and back to a room so they could x-ray him and run some tests.

It killed me to have to wait in the waiting room while he went through everything. I spent most of the time pacing and wondering what I could do to help him once he was out,ifthey said he was okay. He would at least need to regain consciousness first. I told the nurse that I was his employer and to let Jackson know that I was there waiting for him once he woke up. She smiled and nodded her head, as if to say, “of course.”

“Mr. Moore, do you know if Jackson has health insurance or where he lives?”

I was stumped, so I handed her a business card and said, “No, not off hand, but here’s my information and you can use the address of my store, on the card there. I’m Jackson’s employer. I’ll cover his expenses.” It was the least I could do to help.

She smiled and said, “Okay,” then asked me a few more questions about Jackson. I answered the best I could without knowing much about him.

After about an hour and a half in the waiting room, the nurse told me that he was awake and that all of his tests had come back fine, but that he’d suffered a concussion. The cut on the back of his head was small and wasn’t deep enough to require stitches. He would need a few days to rest and someone to watch over him, though, just to make sure he didn’t lose consciousness again, and that he could leave whenever he wasready. I breathed a sigh of relief and followed her to Jackson’s room.

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