Love Lies Bleeding, Chapter Four

Something else had a hold of him. Something besides.

Hands.

Even as Joe marvelled at that, he was drawn close to a warm yielding body which for a moment sent his mind wheeling back to Neetra.

Except Neetra didn’t smell of chocolate cake.

The next sensation wasn’t quite so pleasant. It was akin to being pulled in two, an especial concern for our hero since his middle had already seemed to him the part most likely to give.

Then –

Thud.

A body-jolting impact which took away what little breath Joe had left. Yet afterwards, all of a sudden, the living room door was tearing at him less. Only a slight difference, but perceptible. It was as if he’d bumped a little below the landing, out of the path of that roaring vacuum and into some sheltering lee.

Joe kept his eyes shut, because of Lot’s wife, but he braced himself. For our hero had gathered what was next. Nor was he disappointed.

Thud.

Thump.

His uphill labours had been a stroll along Parliament Street to this.

Thud.

Mini-Flash Pseudangelos was prevailing though, and that awed our hero. She had old chains against which to heave, huge corroded adamantine links forged from self-accusation and loss, a legacy spanning all but the first years of Joe’s awareness to moor him to that living room. Somewhere in there was a diabolic navy-yard winch, revolving implacably through turn after turn, because by right and reason Joe was its to claim. But Mini-Flash Pseudangelos stood her ground and hauled, and she was snapping those chains, for all that each break threatened to break Joe too. Every tufted bloodstained step he hit knocked a little more blame out of him.

Joe had known the second gender was strong, but never had he felt more for the likes of Mini-Flash Robin and Flashtease. Every boy he knew these days had his work cut out.

Thud.

Thump.

Crash.

Tackling the hallway stairs in this manner was a sure means of impressing on your memory just how many of them there were. Mercifully though, the living room was nothing more than a brisk breeze by now. They were going to make it.

The last horizontal drag. So soon? Joe heard the kitchen door open.

His chaperone didn’t so much settle him on the tiles as bowl him along them full force, a final expenditure of effort to equal all that had gone before. Our hero squeaked at length to rest somewhere alongside the table, as Mini-Flash Pseudangelos slammed the door on the last howling protests of his earliest nightmare.

There Joe lay.

At the start of a new road, or commencing the unexpected continuation of the old one, which hadn’t ended after all?

Either way, talk about beginnings. This first furlong Joe wasn’t likely to forget.

Too weak and wounded for movement, he rejoiced in being alive.

As best he could, our hero mouthed instructions to Mini-Flash Pseudangelos on where the first-aid kit was. Not that he set great store by the practical aptitude of a girl who couldn’t get down off a stepladder unassisted, but it would give her something to do.

Then Joe’s face was touched by a small wet nose and a whiskery muzzle, brightly inquisitive.

And purring.

It was Mush.

And that was Mush for you. If the fight had alarmed her, she’d have forgotten it by now. Nor did it matter to Mush what Joe might have been doing, there on the floor in a pool of his blood. Human beings were put on this Earth for the sole purpose of making a fuss of her.

So Joe raised a hand and caressed the friendly head. Mush was to be obeyed.

Oh, they were all here! Padding into the kitchen to see what the commotion was, and maybe drop a hint or two that it was getting on for feeding-time. Mush’s sister and son and his cousin and her big boy and girl, plus Bella and Peach who weren’t of the same lineage but belonged to the family regardless. With noses and forepaws they set about a thoroughgoing investigation. Elsewhere were the comforting clatters and clangs of Mini-Flash Pseudangelos hurling saucepans and the like out of the cupboards in her search, while Joe rested, a feline host attending on him.

His hat had stayed on throughout.

Good news.

Joe didn’t plan on facing what remained of his destiny without it.

THE END