THE WORLD DEVOURED 2/4 (the bad romance series)
THE WORLD DEVOURED 2/4
Beta: gwencarmichael
The hospital was an experience he wanted to forget, too. Nurses cleaned facial wounds, x-rays and CAT scans were done, a doctor asked him health related questions that Adam didn't have the brain power to answer. Then they had turned him over. It was so humiliating that Adam wanted to die.
A police man was allowed to be present. Adam wore nothing under a flimsy white sheet and was now laying on his side in a flat hospital bed. A doctor with soft eyes asked Adam about the nature of the penetration. The cop had a pad and pen in hand, taking notes. Adam had a hard time talking through his tense tears.
There were flashes and each one brought fear and memories about his anxiety regarding Tommy. But finally he told them he had a feeling that he wasn't raped, not by a living body. The doctor wanted to confirm that it was some kind of object then. Adam could only nod after hesitating. So the doctor knew that if this was true, they might not have to worry about diseases, but a full panel of tests were ordered, just to be sure. Results would later come back negative.
Scared and still anxious to know about Tommy, Adam kept asking, but couldn't get a straight answer about the other boy who was found at the scene. They said information would come, but they needed to concentrate on finishing with Adam before they could find out about Tommy, wherever he'd been taken.
A nurse asked then if there was anyone Adam needed her to call. Adam could only cry and whimper that he didn't want to see anyone. He was shaking, and the nurse put her hand on his bare shoulder. She seemed to assume that he didn't want anyone to see him this way. So she said she could delay the call until later, but he would have to give a phone number eventually.
That was when they let the cop take over, saying he had ten minutes, but could continue questioning later after that.
The cop wore the typical blue uniform with badge and walkie, but must have had to check his gun at the lobby. He was bald, older than Adam, and he had a 'down to business' look on his face. "Mr. Lambert, I'm Officer Daugtry. I know you're tired, but I don't have a lot of time, so I'm just going to ask you what happened. Do you know the person or people who did this to you? Do you know their names?"
Adam so fucking didn't want to talk about this, and his memory was a bit fuzzy. He knew he wouldn't be much help anyway. There was a feeling he'd be doing something wrong though if he didn't start telling what he did know, so he did his best.
Adam whispered because he couldn't manage a normal speaking voice, and he explained that he didn't know full names. He just knew a couple first names and couldn't remember the others. He gave up Vic, Chad and John.
"How many of them were there?"
Adam couldn't remember.
"More than six?"
Adam didn't know.
"How did they come into contact with you? How do you know them?" asked Officer Daughtry
"W-we were at a party."
"At a house? What's the address?"
"I don't know. It was Tommy's home..."
"Who's Tommy?" Daugtery kept writing down everything Adam was saying.
"I met...I met him last night. They...I think they were going to kill him!" Adam almost mouthed the last two words as his throat closed up and fresh tears streamed his face.
"He was the other victim?"
Adam nodded.
Daughtry wrote very important notes on his pad, his plan no doubt to have as many people in attendance of that party questioned as soon as he found out the address. Then he asked, "Ok, let's start from the beginning. What happened between arriving at the party and arriving at the scene of the crime?"
Adam tried to summarize, and really couldn't remember a lot anyway. He said the guys at the party were teasing him - for lack of greater detail - and that he'd made friends with Tommy, but conveniently left out that they'd pretty much fallen in love and had sex.
"We were in Tommy's room alone and my brother..." Adam caught himself, buttoning up with a sick feeling that made him think he'd just fucked up royally.
"Mr. Lambert? What about your brother? Was he at the scene?"
Adam shook his head fiercely in response, but knew Officer Daughtery would not leave the 'brother' thing alone so easily.
"What's your brother's name?"
"He didn't do anything..."
"What were you going to say about him?"
Adam said, "He was just drunk and pissed, and him and Tommy started fighting and then his friends..." Damn it! How was Adam going to explain this without making Neil sound like he was part of it?
"The attackers? Your brother knows them?"
"He didn't see anything."
"Mr. Lambert I'm gonna need you to tell me how to find your brother. If you can't help with identifying the criminals, then it's going to have to be up to him."
Adam was apprehensive. He didn't have to wonder why there was such an instinct to protect Neil who always treated him like shit. Neil was his brother...and he couldn't bring himself to imagine that he wanted all this to happen to Adam. But if the cop only wanted to use Neil for information, then Adam hoped it would be ok.
"If I tell, can you keep my folks out of it? I'm not ready for them to come here and see me."
Officer Daughtery said, "I can't promise anything...but I'll do what I can."
Adam proceeded to give the policeman Neil's address, phone number and place of employment. Then a nurse came in with a tray on rollers saying it was time for the officer to go, Daughtry said, "There'll be more questions later, so try to remember what you can before then. I'll try to keep the issue with your family as sensitive as possible." They didn't exchange 'thank yous' or farewell. Daughtry was just guided out of the way and the curtain around the hospital bed was securely closed.
Adam was told everything that was wrong with him. He suffered a partially collapsed lung from the beating, but was told the best thing to do was let him heal on its own. Recovery for that would require rest and supplemental oxygen. Trauma to his cheekbone caused swelling of his eye and the side of his face. They said the pain and strange sensations in his face would be temporary. There was multiple bruising on his face, abdomen and back. Discomfort in his shoulder alerted them to strained ligaments, and they began heat therapy. There was tissue swelling on his other eye. Other signs of battery marked his forearms with swelling from the force of being held to the floor during the attack. His IV would administer a proper amount of pain killers and antibiotics. He was told a counselor would be assigned to him to talk about the attack. Adam was pretty sure he wouldn't want to talk, though.
They said they would want to watch him for a while, but he was expected to make a full physical recovery in time.
When that was done, Adam had never been so uncomfortable. His hair felt grimy. His neck and the back of his head were still sore from the brace they put on him in the ambulance. The IV made a tangled mess on his hand with tape as well as a device for monitoring something or other clamped to his index finger.
He was left alone in the room they'd taken him to. It was small, but private. They'd given him something to help him go to sleep...like he needed it. In spite of having no idea what time of the day it was or what the fuck was going on with Tommy, Adam finally drifted into the deadest sleep.
-TIME HAS STOPPED BEFORE US. THE SKY CANNOT IGNORE US
-NO ONE CAN SEPARATE US, FOR WE ARE ALL THAT IS LEFT
-THE ECHO BOUNCES OFF ME. THE SHADOW LOST BESIDE ME
-THERE'S NO MORE NEED TO PRETEND CAUSE NOW I CAN BEGIN AGAIN
Thank the universe...Adam found out that his parents heard what happened, but he was still asleep and couldn't be roused when they came because of the pain medication. By the time he woke up, Officer Daughtry had come by for a more detailed account from Adam's perspective.
Drowsy, Adam declared, "I'm not saying anything until someone tells me about Tommy."
Daughtry sighed and went to get a nurse to help him out. In the next twenty minutes after figuring out 'Tommy who?' and which doctor was responsible for him, a woman with short brown hair and a stethoscope around her shoulders took a minute to pop in and give Adam a brief recount of Tommy's condition. There had been broken ribs and jaw, contusions, forced entry causing tearing, a broken wrist and fingers, facial gashes, a broken collarbone, and he was starting to regain consciousness. His wallet - found inside a pair of jeans by responding paramedics - identified him as Thomas Joseph Ratliff. His family had been notified and were with him.
"Is...he going to be ok?" Adam asked with horror at hearing about all those injuries.
"Recovery will take a while, but he's not critical," said the woman who was then paged and had to go.
Officer Daughtry wanted to ask more questions...but Adam didn't have much to say. At least he found out that witnesses from the party were being tracked down. They were still working on gathering names from Tommy's sister and trying to find kids who weren't too drunk to remember seeing Adam and Tommy being bodily removed from the house. They would get closer to making arrests, the cop assured.
"Can you tell me what their motivation was?" Daughtry asked.
Adam had suffered so much pain and humiliation already. Did he really have to tell the truth about this too? "I don't know..." he mumbled as if to say 'are we done yet?'
Officer Daughtry wasn't buying it. "Come on, Mr. Lambert. They didn't victimize you for no reason, so tell me what it is."
Adam's lip trembled before he managed to say, "They didn't like me..."
"I need more, son. If I don't get it from you, I might get it from some witness who doesn't have all the facts."
Who gives a shit?, Adam thought. He didn't want to answer any more questions. "I can't remember, ok?"
Daughtry sighed. "It's not ok. Listen, when you feel like being straight with someone, your doctor has the contact info for my precinct. The detective assigned to this case will be by soon, and I suggest you tell him what he wants to know. I've seen too many cases where the victim was scared to talk, and the suspects just happen to have loads of witnesses attesting to their innocence, and the bastards get off for lack of evidence." Daughtry hadn't raised his voice as he talked, but he was stern, and it made Adam see him as a bit of a prick for a minute. He knew the guy was just doing his job, but he was so sick of answering questions. He just wanted it all to be over.
Later, Adam's parents returned and although he didn't want to see them, he would have felt like a cruel jerk if he'd refused their visit. It would be ok to see a familiar face for once, but he just knew that they would freak out. He didn't have the strength to comfort them. He just wasn't close enough to them to care anymore. It was like his heart shut off to everything but Tommy.
Then, to Adam's shock and horror, his mom had started pleading for him to tell her why he went with those boys. By the time their conversation ended, he found out that they'd made an assumption based on what they thought they knew about Adam. He had thrown Jell-O cups and a bed pan at them until they went away. A nurse had to come in and give them something to calm down; he was so furious.
The Lamberts had assumed that Adam went with his attackers along with that young blonde man in order to proposition sex from them...just because he was gay. They thought he lead those men to the house. They thought, after revealing what Adam wanted, the attackers had become insulted, issuing the attack on him and his 'friend'. His parents didn't have all the facts - no doubt - but still...how not well could they know their own fucking son?
Adam didn't know if he'd ever forgive them, even if the only reason his parents asked was so they could confirm they were wrong. He wouldn't permit them to see him for the rest of his stay. The doctor agreed, wanting to limit Adam's stress level as much as possible.
Later that night, a man named Detective Anderson came in to gather more of Adam's official statement, and Adam was in a position where he had to tell everything. What Officer Daughtry had said before stuck with him, and Adam decided he wanted the motherfuckers to pay for what they did to Tommy...and him. He was somehow willing to talk about what happened.
He recounted everything he could remember, from Neil picking on him until he agreed to go to the party, to his forced encounter with Gina, the goth chick, to meeting Tommy and sleeping with him. (The detective didn't really react to this bit. It appeared that it didn't come as any surprise. He just made notes and listened.) Adam could only assume that someone outside the room heard them and word got back to his brother. This sparked the altercation in Tommy's bedroom, and Adam insisted again that Neil may have fought with Tommy, but didn't have anything to do with the kidnapping or what took place after.
He still had a hard time talking about what he remembered happening in the house. Tommy had been fighting for his life and Adam was at his attackers' mercy.
"They...raped me!" Adam sobbed. "They may not have used their dicks but that's what they did. They knew it would hurt...and they did the same to Tommy!" Adam hid his face carefully in his hands, unable to stop crying even when it made him hurt worse. The man he spoke to didn't offer comfort with touch, only with words.
"We're going to make sure everyone of them goes to jail for what they've done, Adam," said Detective Anderson. "We're getting a lot of information about what happened the night of the party, and we're getting closer to finding these criminals. Hate crimes cannot be tolerated, and I'm not about to let it start. You just take it easy and have someone call me if you remember anything else." The detective left, and Adam cried some more. It hurt his face and stomach to do so, but he couldn't stop, not until he fell asleep.
tbc w/ Chapter 3