Jack ran, the chill wind buffeting him and icy rain soaking his clothes. Water splashed up every time his feet hit the pavement and soaked through his trainers, numbing his toes. His mind though, was quiet, his thoughts calm as he enjoyed every moment of running through the early morning darkness.
Falling in behind another early riser, he passed her with a polite nod of greeting. She responded in kind, sharing for the brief moment their gazes met, a sense of solidarity, of understanding. It was a certain kind of person who would be out jogging at five in the morning through the streets of Leeds.
The sounds of the city awakening were distant to his ears, as he fed dance music from the early nineties into them. His music of choice when exercising.
A sudden movement to his right, as he passed beneath the trees surrounding his tower block, caught his attention and he veered to the left as a man stumbled out onto the thin pavement. Empty eyes stared out at him from beneath straggly grey hair.
An inarticulate sound came from the strange man’s throat and Jack gave him a wide berth, averting his eyes from what he assumed to be a homeless man. The city seemed to be full of them of late and the daily news was full of reports of people being attacked.
His lips twisted in distaste at the thought. Likely addicts getting high and fighting others or turning to robbery to find the money to pay for their fix. A sad way to live a life and not something he wanted to be part of.
A high-pitched yell from behind pierced the barrier of dance music and he slowed, head-turning to look back. The woman he’d passed was struggling in the grip of the homeless man. His hands gripped her arms and he looked to be trying to kiss her.
“Hey!” Jack called, turning and jogging swiftly back towards the struggling pair. “Get away from her!”
No response from the man, but the woman yelled, “help me!” just before the homeless man lunged at her, mouth pressing against her cheek. She screamed, a sound full of pain and fear and jerked her head away from him.
“The fuck’re you doing?” Jack yelled, skidding to a stop beside them.
Blood ran down the man’s chin and he turned those dead eyes to Jack who reached out, pulling at the man’s hands to try and free the sobbing woman.
“Get off her!” he snapped, prising one hand free.
He only received a snarl in response, animal-like grunts coming from the homeless man’s mouth. Pulling back his arm, Jack curled his hand into a fist and slammed it forward, striking the homeless man square in the nose.
Another sound, a howl of pain as the homeless man’s face twisted in fury, before he released the woman and turned his full rage on Jack, lashing out at him with both fists and growling like some rabid animal.
Jack kicked out and heard a crunch as his foot connected with the homeless man’s knee. His leg bent sideways and then he was down on the wet path, limbs flailing.
The woman stumbled back one hand pressed to her cheek with blood seeping from between her fingers. There was a look of shock on her face, eyes wide and mouth agape.
“Come on!” Jack snapped at her, grabbing her arm and pulling her away from the homeless man who was struggling to rise.
Pulling her along, he began to trot and then run away from the man. A quick glance back over his shoulder had him increasing his pace while the woman seeming to understand the need, was managing to keep up.
Behind them, the homeless man began to chase them, limping along on his injured leg and soon falling away as they neared the block of flats where Jack lived.
He almost slid into the glass panelled door as he skidded to a stop, reaching into the pocket of his hoody for the key that would let him into the building. With only a little fumbling, he had the key in the lock and turning before pushing open the door and ushering the woman inside.
“Hey,” he said as the door closed with a solidly reassuring thud. “Hey, I’m Jack. You’re okay now, yeah? You’re okay.”
“Ah, y-yeah,” she said. “H-Helen.”
“Okay, Helen. Let’s get you upstairs. I’ve got a first aid kit and we can clean you up while we call the police, yeah?”
“Okay, yeah, sure.” She trembled as she looked back at the door.
With the lights of the small entranceway shining brightly, everything beyond the door was just black and they couldn’t see anything from where they stood. With a wary look, Jack hurried over to the lifts and stabbed at the call button.
A heavy hand slammed at the glass door, making them both jump and they turned together, to see the homeless man's dirty face pressed up against the glass as he slammed his balled fist against the glass once again.
The lift door opened, and Jack pulled Helen inside with him before hitting the button for the fifteenth floor. His last sight, as the door slid closed, was the animal-like snarl of the homeless man as he continued to bang against the glass.
“W-what the hell was that?”
Helen trembled and as Jack turned to her, he realised that he had no answer to give. So, he shrugged his shoulders and waited for the lift to reach the top floor. He tried to calm his breathing, but his heart was thundering in his chest from the adrenaline.
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A light ‘ding’ announced their arrival and the doors slid open. Once more, Jack led the way out into the narrow corridor, turning right towards his flat door. He led her inside, hand flicking on the light switch as he stepped inside.
“Take a seat,” Jack said, waving at the leather couch against the wall. “I’ll get the first aid kit.”
“Should I call the police?” She asked as he headed into the small kitchenette.
“Probably a good idea.”
He reached up to the top of the kitchen cupboards and pulled down the green plastic box with the white cross on it. While not having ever been a boy scout, he had still taken their motto to heart and ensured he was prepared should an accident happen.
As a result of that preparation, his first aid box was fully stocked with bandages, gauze, antiseptic and a whole host of other bits and pieces that could be used for everything from a splinter to slicing your hand while cutting vegetables.
“No answer,” Helen said, looking down at her phone in consternation. “Just getting a busy signal.”
“At this time in the morning?”
She shrugged and set the phone down as he seated himself beside her, placing the first aid kit on the couch between them. Jack reached up and gently pulled her hand away from her cheek. She winced and looked at him with wide, brown, eyes.
“How bad is it?”
“Looks worse than it is,” Jack lied.
In truth, it looked pretty damned awful. The teeth marks were clearly visible in her cheek and blood was still seeping from the puncture marks. The skin around them was raised and angry looking, while the area just around those marks was darkening.
She would likely need surgery, he reasoned, the cosmetic type at least. Not that he wanted to tell her that, so he cleaned it as best he could with the antiseptic. Once he was assured it was as clean as it would get, he stuck a gauze pad over it and fixed it in place with some medical adhesive tape.
“All done,” he said with a kind smile. “Try the police again and I’ll get you some painkillers. Just paracetamol I’m afraid but better than nothing.”
“Thanks.”
Jack shook his head as he returned to the kitchen, replacing the first aid kit and filling a glass with water. He’d been hearing more and more on the news about random attacks on people and had dismissed it as media click-bait.
Apparently, he’d been wrong.
“Still nothing,” Helen said as she came back into the living room. Jack handed her the glass of water and two small tablets. “Thanks.”
“No problem.”
He unzipped his wet hoody and pulled it off, revealing a lean torso and firm muscles beneath the light t-shirt he wore. His athletic form along with a not unattractive face had often allowed him to gain the attention of women without much effort.
It was attention he rarely reciprocated though, being a little dense when it came to such things. More often than not, it was his flatmate who pointed out women’s interest and then opened up a conversation long enough for Jack to feel at ease.
“We can keep trying the police,” he said as he headed across to the bathroom. He reached into a cupboard and returned a moment later with two clean towels, one of which he passed to Helen. “Here, to dry yourself off.”
“Thanks.” She smiled then, though it clearly pained her. “I seem to keep saying that.”
“Don’t worry about it.” He gave his own self-deprecating smile. “We’ll keep trying the police but if we don’t get through do you live nearby?”
“Next tower block.”
“Ah, not far at all then,” he said with a short bark of laughter.
Jack’s flat was on the top floor of one of three tower blocks that sat beside the A58 road that ran through Leeds. While not the cheapest place to live, they were not luxurious in any way. Two bedrooms, a bathroom, living room and kitchenette were all the living space they had.
The walls were thin enough that he could hear every shouted word of his neighbour’s arguments which seemed to occur every other night. The insistent thump, thump, thump of the music from the students just below him and the scream of the baby, from the neighbour across the hall.
Each of the blocks of flats formed a rough “H” shape, with four flats on each floor, one for each corner of the block. There was a central stairwell and beside that, a single elevator. The buildings themselves were well maintained and in the year and a half he’d been living there, he’d had no real issues.
Even so, being aware of people around him all of the time could soon become quite oppressive which was why he enjoyed his five AM morning runs so much. Though, something told him that he might be best avoiding those for at least a little while.
“My friend told me her boyfriend got attacked last week,” Helen said. She had one hand pressed against her cheek and the other held the half-empty glass of water. “He died.”
“That’s rare, though, right?” Jack said in as comforting a manner as he could. “It must have been bad for him to die.”
“Yeah, some crazy bitch bit him on the throat and he bled to death.”
“Jesus!” There was little he could say to that. “I mean, that won’t happen to you.”
“No,” she tried to smile, but the movement made her wince and she reached for the towel again as sweat beaded on her forehead. “Is it warm or is it just me?”
Jack glanced at the thermostat mounted on the wall beside his bedroom door. It hadn’t been changed from the comfortable twenty degrees Celsius that it was always set at. Not too warm, but certainly not enough to be raising a temperature.
“Do you mind?” he asked, reaching out a hand.
Helen shied away from his hand for just a moment before realising what he intended and gave a sharp nod. He placed the back of his hand against her forehead and his frown deepened.
“Okay, you’re definitely warmer than you should be.”
“What the hell’s going on?”
The two of them turned to the bedroom door as it opened to reveal an irritated and extremely naked Declan, rubbing at his eyes with one pasty white hand.
“You know what bloody time it is?” he snapped, blinking at the two people in the living room. “Who’s this?”
“Dec, mate, you wanna put some clothes on?” Jack said, sharing an embarrassed look with Helen.
“Nah, I’m alright. Who’re you, love?”
“This is Helen.” Jack lifted the towel he’d used to dry off and threw it across to his flatmate. “She was attacked.”
Declan, taking the hint, wrapped the towel around his waist and strolled into the living room. His slim frame could only ever be described as scrawny and he had the pale skin of someone who rarely ventured outside during daylight hours.
His black hair stuck out from his head, badly in need of brushing and the few wispy patches of hair on his chin could only laughingly be called a beard. He looked, much like a scarecrow from a story, with a long, crooked, nose and large ears that stuck out from the sides of his head like handles.
Wonky teeth and mismatched eyes, one bright blue and the other hazel, were the first thing people noticed and many would glance away until he spoke. He had the natural charm that many would kill for and he could walk into a room and within minutes have everyone laughing and talking like old friends.
“Who attacked you?” Dec asked, glancing at the gauze on the woman’s cheek. Jack, briefly, filled him in and he nodded before asking, “you called the po-po?”
“Busy signal,” Helen said, holding up her phone as if to prove it.
“You’re looking a bit peaked, love. Maybe you should just go straight to the hospital and get it checked out.”
“What about that nutter downstairs?” Jack asked.
“Ah, he won’t be a problem, mate. There’s two of us.”
Jack gave him a sceptical look but one glance at Helen was enough to tell him that she did need to get checked out. Her skin was pale and despite her using the towel, she was sweating heavily, which surely couldn’t be a good sign.
“Alright, get dressed,” he said. “Let’s get her to the hospital.”