Eric and Nick Ch.02

I wake up around eight o'clock in the morning, a nurse comes in and takes my blood pressure and checks my I.V. She asks me what I want for breakfast and I tell her just some cereal and toast. She nods and heads off to do other things. I decide to watch some T.V. while i'm waiting for my breakfast to come.

About ten minutes later my breakfast comes, about halfway through my breakfast doctor Shields comes into to check on me.

"So Nick, how are you feeling today?" he asks smiling at me

"Im doing good, my back still hurts a lot" I say grimcing while i'm trying to get situated better on the stiff hospital bed.

"Well depending on how your healing goes you should be out of here in a couple of days," he says, but the look on his face tells me he doesn't want me to go,"now lets have a look at that back of yours."

I try to sit up but I end up falling back because of the pain,"You might have to help me up Doctor Shields"

"No problem," he gets behind me and starts to help me up,"take it easy I know this hurts."

I gasp as I get about half way sat up. The skin on my back feels like its about to be ripped apart. Finally i'm sitting all the way up and i'm sweat is running down my face.

"Here, use this" Erik hands me a paper towel to wipe my face off with, I smile at him and thank him.

"I know this may make you feel uncomfortable but i'm going to have to ask you to open the back of your gown."

I nod at him and open the back of my gown, shivering at the blast of cold air on my back and butt. I can feel Erik's hands on my back peeling away the dressing from my cut. The tape is pulling at the edges of my cut and I wince at that but other wise make no other notion that it hurt.

"I'm going to change your dressing while I already have it off, alright?" he asks me

"Yes thats fine, how does my cut look so far?" I ask

"It still has a bit of healing to do , but so far its do good. Do you mind if I ask you a question?" Erik asks, seeming a little bit shy

"Sure, go ahead"

"I'm a bit shy asking this but, are you ears and tail real?" I turn my head to look at him and he's blushing.

"Yes they are, would like me to tell you how I got them?" I ask him, sensing he's curious about how I got them.

"If you want to...You don't have to tell me if you don't want." He replies hesitantly

"Well, my mother was a beautiful lady, she was short with long white hair and a small frame. You would swear up and down my mother was human if you didn't see her cat ear's and tail. So when I was born with the cat gene, my father would keep me and my mother in the house when he would go anywhere. He would keep us locked up like we were some kind of freaks," I paused to look up at Erik's face for a second and what I saw surprised me, his bright green eyes had unshed tears in them. For the first time I didn't see hatred in someone else's eyes besides my mothers.

"Go on," I barely heard Erik whisper the words to me.

I nodded to him and pushed on with my story,"Finally my mother and I got up the courage to try to runaway from my father. We waited until my father passed out from all the drinking he did like always. We didn't grab anything, just the clothes on our backs and we made our escape." I paused for a second to take a deep breath and continue.

"We were sneeking out the front door and heading to the car, my mother got into the driver's side and I was walking around toward the other side to get in. My father came running out from the garage and grabbed me by the arm jerking me to his side. He started yelling at my mother to get out of the car but she didn't she just kept on looking at us. She then looked into my eyes and I knew she was going to run and leave me there with that monster. she put the car into reverse and floored it, she tore out of the drive way and never looked back," I looked up into Erik's tear filled eyes and asked,"You sure you want the hear the rest of my story?"

"Yes, please go on"

"Well my father let my mother get away, for what reason i'll never know. He yanked me inside, slamming the door and started yelling at me,'Why did you try to run away? Why?' I didn't answer him because I was to afraid to. 'Answer me!' he yelled and then he back-handed me across the face ordering me to go to my room. I ran to my room slamming the door and flung my self on my bed and started to cry like I never had in my life.

"In the morning my father had me make breakfast for him, so I did without complaint knowing that if I didn't listen I would get hit again like last night. So I went on obeying my father and everything was alright for a while. Then he started coming home drunk and would start to yell at me again,'Why did you make her leave? It's all your fault!' Eventually it progressed to actual hitting, punching, and sometimes he would even pushed me down the stairs. It never got really bad until this last time..." I pause for a second ashamed for what i'm about to admit.

"He came home drunk like any other time but this time he seemed worse. Every time he got drunk he would get violent so I would try to prepare myself to get hit or something but I never expected to be cut like this. He started chasing me down the hall yelling the usual things, I was ignoring him until he started calling me a Fag and a fairy and stuff like that. My mother and I were the only ones about my attraction to the same sex. So as soon as he said that I knew tonight was not going to be like the other nights,so I tried desperately to run and get out be he ended up cornering me in the bathroom.

"I tell him i'll runaway and never bother him again and he pauses for a second to think it looks like so I try to make a run for it. I start going down the stairs and I feel a hand on my back and then I feel myself falling down the stairs landing at the bottom. I try to crawl away from him but my vision is blurring from the pain. The next thing I know my head is being yanked back by my hair and I scream in pain. I plead with my father to let me go but he tells me I know he can't do that. The next thing I know his knee is on the side of my face and the other is on my butt holding me down and he cuts away my t-shirt from my back. He pushes the tip of my blade into my should and I still, he asks me if i'm going to bed good and I politely respond 'Never you lunatic, your not my father!' and leans down and whispers 'Wrong answer' then he cuts open my back and I black out," I look up at him and tears are falling down his face,"You know the rest."

He pulls me to him and we cry together, it feels good to be able to cry with someone, knowing that i'm safe.