Pitbabe S2, Chapter 5 pg5

 pg5

   The guy who bumped me was a man, not too tall, wearing a black Nike cap and a matching black face mask. His navy polo shirt seemed like a uniform from some office or shop, with an unfamiliar logo on the chest. Not that it mattered—I just wanted to pay and get back to Charlie.

   “Thanks,” the clumsy guy bowed twice after we’d gathered everything and placed it back on the counter next to my stuff. He seemed pretty guilty. I just nodded lightly, not saying much.

   “This is mine,” I said, using my hand to separate my items from his, worried the cashier might mix them up and charge me for his stuff too, especially since we happened to pick the same brand of mineral water. I didn’t want to be unreasonable, but after he’d already annoyed me once, even drinking the same water brand felt irritating.

   The cashier girl worked so efficiently I wanted to tip her, but that’s not really a thing at convenience stores. She rang up my items, tossed them into a bag, carefully handed me my change, and sent me off with a friendly smile and thank you. I smiled back, my irritation reduced by nearly half as I left the store.

   “Here,” I said, but the moment I saw Charlie staring at me from the bench, my irritation dropped to zero. He hadn’t even touched his phone while waiting, just sitting there like a puppy told to stay, watching people pass by. But the second he saw me, puppy Charlie broke free from his command.

   “Want some?” I offered him the convenience store bag with the extra water bottle, but the mysterious Charlie shook his head lightly, saying he’d pass for now. Then he grabbed my hand and led me out of the outpatient building toward the parking lot.

   When he saw me trying to open the water bottle, Charlie took the bag from my hand. His expression seemed a bit off, like he was in a bad mood, but I chalked it up to his one-eyed vision probably making everything feel weird and frustrating.

   Pop!

   But Charlie startled me when he suddenly slapped the water bottle out of my hand, just centimeters from my mouth. He knocked it away with full force, sending the entire bottle flying far enough that not a single drop splashed on me. It hit the ground, rolled clumsily, and the water inside spilled out, pooling across the parking lot. I stood frozen, speechless, not understanding what just happened, while Charlie rushed to the bottle as if he was worried about it, even though he was the one who’d attacked it.

   “What the hell, Charlie?” I followed him, a bit annoyed by his weird behavior, while he just kept staring unblinkingly at the bottle lying pathetically on the ground.

   “Really, though,” Charlie muttered, as if talking to himself.

   “What?” I pressed, but Charlie didn’t respond. I had no choice but to follow his gaze, and that’s when I started noticing something off.

   The liquid spilling from the bottle frothed white when it hit the concrete floor, as if it was reacting to something. It reminded me of pouring strong acid onto a surface, causing corrosion—an impossible reaction for plain water.

   I nearly swallowed it, but thankfully Charlie caught the anomaly in time.

   “What… is this?”

   “Not sure yet,” Charlie replied, his face tense, brows knotted in what seemed like anger. “But if you’d drunk it, you’d be dead.”

   Charlie pulled a handkerchief from his pants pocket, handed it to me, and said softly, “Cover your mouth and nose.” Probably because a strange smell was starting to emerge, and even he didn’t know what it was yet. He told me to cover my face as a precaution. As for himself, he seemed to hold his breath. He poured the convenience store’s saline solution into a plastic bag, then used the bag to cover his hand. He picked up the bottle with a little liquid left, slipped it into the plastic bag, tied the bag tightly, and sealed it with practiced precision. His careful, deft movements reminded me of a cop or a forensics expert. I knew this wasn’t the time, but I couldn’t help thinking how cool my boyfriend was.

   “Won’t the bag melt?” I asked, curious, as we walked back to the car.

   “If it can be stored in a plastic bottle, the bag should be fine.”

   “But it corroded the floor white.”

   “It probably only reacts with certain things.”

   “Does that include my insides?”

   “One hundred percent.”

   I was speechless. Not because this was the first time, but because I’d lost count of how many times I’d faced people trying to harm me in various ways. Sometimes, I even wondered if I’d killed someone in a past life. That thought popped into my head almost every time I narrowly escaped death. I knew I wasn’t exactly beloved by everyone—sure, I had plenty of people who loved me, but just as many who hated me. I’d accepted and learned that this was an inescapable truth, no matter how virtuous one might be. And speaking of virtue, I was far from it. I was a deeply flawed human, trying my hardest not to cause trouble for innocent people. But that didn’t seem to make those who hated me like me any better.

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