GONE GIRL » Billy Hargrove

0.9 » let me help you

hello there :)
first off sorry for taking so long to update but school has been keeping me busy, so updates might be a bit irregular in the future as well, so sorry about that.
anyway I hope you guys are enjoying the story so far♡

tw!blood mention

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I felt something hot drip down onto my cheek, running all the way to my neck. Little by little my senses awakened.

I heard heavy breathing from somewhere above me, the bright light of the lamp at the ceiling threatened to blind me once I had opened my eyes.
  I tasted blood in my mouth, and through my nose I took in the metallic scent of the same liquid as well.

When I made a second attempt at opening my eyes, the first thing I saw was a snout. A dogs snout to be exact.

  As soon as the seemingly huge Alaskan Malamute noticed I was awake, he began wagging his tail and jumped up to his feet. I was just about to get up as well, when I noticed the bookshelf which my legs were buried under, weighing heavily. Too heavy in fact, when I tried to push it aside it barely moved at all.

I managed to hold myself up on my elbows, studying my surroundings more closely, noticing a note on the dogs collar.
  Careful not to scare him away I removed it, reading.

'I didn't feel good leaving you all by yourself so I went and got the dog to protect you, just in case. You surely remember him, you used to walk him and other police dogs as a part time job just after you came here. Hopper said if anything bad happened I should just call and he'd give him to us.
  I hope you're alright. I'll be in touch.
  Love, Cam.'

"Loki?" I said, my voice hoarse. In response, the dog began wagging his tail even more, pacing around me for a while before sitting back down by my side.

So he did have things planned out after all, didn't he. Cameron never really talked about what was going on, yet he had a Plan A, B and C. I shouldn't have underestimated a Psychology major anyways.

Laying back down on the floor I stared at the ceiling, trying to organise everything that was going on at the moment, without success.

  Suddenly Loki jumped onto his feet, running towards the hallway where he disappeared. I quickly picked uo the gun that my father must've had dropped when he ran away. Shortly after I heard a car pulling up into the driveway, hoping for anyone except my father.
  I heard the dog barking loudly, the floorboards in the hallway creaked slightly when someone walked over them. Just as fast as he had disappeared, Loki came running back to me, wagging his tail from side to side. Man had I forgotten how much of a happy dog he was.

"Um … okay what the fuck," Someone said and when I looked up I almost yelped in surprise.
I was expecting Steve.
Maybe even Jonathan.
Or maybe Hopper.
  But I did certainly not expect Billy to show up.

"Hey ... um could you maybe help me out?" I asked, gesturing towards the bookshelf. He got closer, carefully lifting the shelf away before placing it back in its original spot by the wall. When I tried getting up on my feet he kneeled down beside me, gently placing his hand on my back to help me sit up properly.

"He didn't go back to Seattle?" - "He didn't."
I looked up at him, his face seemed different from the way he always looked at school. Softened. Maybe even a bit worried.

  "Let me guess? I look terrible," I said, awkwardly looking down at my hands. "I wouldn't put it like that actually. I mean, under these circumstances I'd say you still look quite dashing," He smirked and I rolled my eyes. "Oh you mean with a massive nosebleed and dog drool all over my face? That's what you're into?" Now he let out a laugh, I joined in but soon realised that had been a mistake.

I began coughing, my stomach twitching immediately.

  "Wait, let me help you get up," Billy mumbled, wrapping my arm around his shoulder, helping me get to the bathroom. I sat down on the edge of the bathtub, holding a towel up to my nose which had randomly decided to start bleeding again, as I watched Billy fill the sink with warm water.

"You've got shards of glass in your back, do you know that?" My eyes went huge and I shook my head slowly, careful not to make my dizziness worse than it already was.
  "Would you mind me helping you get them out of there?" He asked, and again I shook my head, still holding the towel up to my face. I didn't know what it was but something made me trust him right now.

  Handing him another towel I turned around, so that my feet were now in the bathtub. He rummaged through one of the cabinets, probably searching for something to sterilize the wounds and band aids or something of that sort.

Meanwhile I pulled my shirt over my head, only now noticing how much my back must've been bleeding during however long I had been unconscious.

  "Alright this is gonna hurt a bit," Billy said and I shivered when his cold fingertips met my skin. Either the shards weren't in too deep, or I was still in shock and didn't really feel anything yet - however, aside from a small tweak every now and again it seemed to be alright. Or Billy was just extraordinarily good at patching someone up, but I couldn't think of any reason why that would be the case.

  "Okay that was the last one," He concluded, sticking the last band aid onto my back helping me get back into my shirt.

"You alright?" I shrugged. How alright could I be? I'd quite literally just been beaten up by my own father who had stalked me all the way to Hawkins.

Mediocre I guess.

Without a word he guided me back to the living room, where I sat down on the couch, Loki had rolled himself up to a ball on the single-sofa next to the bookshelf.

"Can I get you anything?" Billy asked, inspecting my nose. "Some Painkillers maybe."
  Seemingly happy with no further blood coming from my nose he got back up and headed for the kitchen. I closed my eyes for a bit, focusing on my own breathing. Focusing on what I could hear and smell.

After a few minutes I opened my eyes again, staring at the flowers in between the broken glass scattered all over the floor. Would make a good design. I could add that to my pile of 'dealing with my fucked up past' drawings which I had locked away in my closet.

Billy returned, two steaming mugs in his hands.
  "No Painkillers, not with a concussion, which I am sure you now have," He said, answering the question I had just been about to ask. Eyeing the mug he had just given me I raised an eyebrow.

"You know how to make proper tea?" - "Hey, don't underestimate me like that. I'm almost offended," Billy chimed, his smile slowly fading away as he looked into my eyes.

"What's your story?"