Healing process

After a year of living with her aunt, Wren ventures out into the real world

The two police officers were actually fooling the residents of the small town bar, for once. Gregory Harol and Osmund Kinsun were wearing posing as a pair of cowboys. Hats and boots that appeared sexy as first glance framed them. Flannel shirts that were buttoned wrong in some spots made their shirts look a little strange. Buckles that would make any rodeo groupie weap were covered in dirt and grime were on proud display of anyone who would look further down than the beer guts. Both men were in amazing shape and the extra 10 pounds on their stomachs made it uncomfortable and the urge to fidget was a running mantra thorugh their minds.

A sudden drop in conversations around them made them eye the door, thinking that maybe the reason they were undercover had finally paid off. It wasn't, instead being a small girl that held her hands in loose fists at her sides, her long, barely kept hair shading her facial features from all, though the small movements of her head made it noticeable that she was looking around the bar. She stopped in the middle of the bar and made no move to do anything else. Conversations took up again as she went from being interesting to being just another wallflower.

Both men exchanged looks with each other. Osmund got up and Gregory grabbed his hand, "Wiz, just let her be. She isn't important to the reason we are here."

Osmund pulled his hand back, "Just like you to think of nothing outside the box, Greg. I'm seeing an oppurtunity here. Having a girl with us will make us look even less suspious, if this is the night Cap comes in. Besides, she looks like she may need some protection, Who better than a couple of cops?" He turned and walked over to the girl.

"Hey there, sweetheart." He used his best Texas accent he could muster on her. "Why don't you come on over and join my friend and I? We won't bite." The girl nodded and followed Osmund back to where Gregory was sitting. Osmund spread his legs and pulled her to partly sit in his lap. Gregory thought hard, trying to figure out how to think outside of the box, deciding to take his hat off and gently put it on the girls head. Osmund smiled at him and then focused on the girl.

"What's your name, sweetheart?" He slowly pushed the hair surrounding her face back and tucked it behind her ears. "I would think something like you would have a very pretty name." He whispered something else in her ear, but the hat made her face impossible to see to Gregory, though she fidgeted a little.

She looked up then, and Gregory almost choked on his tonuge. She had to be jailbait, if their boss came in, he and Osmund would be fired on the spot. There was no way she could be over 16. And in a bar, none the less. Dear God, she was looking to get killed. He looked over at Osmund, who looked the way he felt.

"W-Wr-Wren." It sounded forced out of her mouth. "I'm called Wren." She sounded a lot more composed the second time talking.

"How did you come to a bar? Did someone drop you off?" Osmund asked, trying to sound casual, but the police officer interagator leaked through a little.

"Oh, no! I just got my license back a few months ago. My aunt said I should try something new, to help with the healing process, and this was something I thought I should try. I'm not of drinking age, though, so I just wanted to come in and see what it would be like."

Osmund and Gregory stared at each other the entire time she spoke. Key words flashed in their heads.

Gregory was the one who surpised the both of them by asking, "Wren, what happened to you?"

She looked over at him, and placing both her hands on Osmund's chest, as if she needed the support he could offer, she whispered in a voice that Gregory needed to lean forward to hear, "It's a very long story. The short version is that I'm the sole survivor of a car accident that killed my parents and brothers. The shock put me into an instuition for four years. I was released last year, into my aunt's custody. A few weeks ago, she said that I needed to start healing and the easiest way was by going and doing something I had never done with my family. The only thing I could think of was going to a bar, so here I am."

Her statement didn't give her a definte age, but Osmund beat Gregory to asking that question.

"I was fourteen when the accident happened." Gregory felt some tension he was feeling towards Wren disapate at realizing she wasn't jailbait.

Wren pulled her hands back from Osmund. She looked him over and then tilted her head. "There is something wrong with you... You have muscular pectorals, yet you support a big stomach. Do you have a tumor?"

Osmund and Gregory gave each other almost panicked looks. The one thing they had missed, yet she had come up with a rational explanation for it.

"Time to go. I'll walk you back to your car." Gregory gave her as a response, removing his hat from her head. Osmund paid the bartender and the three of them left, the men flanking Wren as if she was a prisoner.

When they were almost to the undercover car, Osmund pulled Gregory back and held up a fist, nodding to Wren's back as she continued to walk, not realizing they weren't behind her anymore. Gregory rolled his eyes as he held up his own fist, ready to indulge Osmund in this little game. A second later he had two fingers held as scissors compared to Osmunds flat hand as paper. Osmund simply shrugged and went over to the car to start removing the excess of his disguise. Gregory gave a sigh and jogged a little to catch up to Wren, who stopped and turned when she heard his footsteps.

"You run very well..." She said in a whisper as he reached her. She took a step back to be in the light of one streetlamp and Gregory felt himself gasp. Her eyes were big, her lips in a small pouty scowl, and a cute petite nose that somehow accented sallow cheeks. She was pretty, but he wished he could see what color her eyes were. She was too skinny, something that probably happened during her time in the instution.

"Osmund kind of abandoned me," His words made true by the sound of squealing tires as Osmund left the parking lot, "Could you possibly drop me off somewhere?"

"How could I say no to an officer." Wren said as she opened the door to a ford fusion.

"Officer? What are you talking about?" Gregory felt a small band of sweat go down his back.

"My aunt is Gina Bell. She has pictures of members of the force around her place. I recognized you from one. Don't worry, I won't go around telling people that you are undercover as a... what exactly are you supposed to be? An ex-cowboy or something?" She got into the car and Gregory followed her.

"Something. So you're related to Gina Bell. Wow, that's like being related to royalty around her. Do you follow the same thing she does?"

"The non-judgement pact that my family has done for generations? I'm the only member left in my generation that continued to follow it, so of course. Oh, please remove all that horrible looking stuff. It makes me feel a little weird to have seen your picture and then see this."

Gregory hesitated. He was a full eleven years older than her. He wondered if she had a boyfriend. He wondered if she would look at him when he was shirtless. He wondered if she would like what she saw. He wondered if she would kiss him. He wondered if he should invite her into his home. He hadn't had a girlfriend for five years. He hadn't had sex in seven years.

"You okay?" Her simple question brought him back down from all his crazy thinking. Of course she wouldn't do anything. He knew her aunt, so she probably saw him as an uncle or something. With a sigh, he removed his shirt and removed the fake stomach, looking over at her to see if she showed any signs of interest. She didn't even blink more. He wasn't sure if he should have been glad or insulted. He knew he had a great body, one that could have rivaled most models. Maybe she wasn't interested in men.

"My aunt pointed your house out once, but it wasn't dark at the time. Which one is it?" She asked, and he was startled to realize that they were on the street he lived on.

"Six more down on the right... Thank you." More crazy thoughts entered his head as she pulled up onto the driveway. It was now or never that he invited her in. Rational thinking finally slammed into his mind and he just nodded to her as he got out of the car.

As he reached the door, he heard her pulling out of the driveway. He still had time to turn and run to her... And do what?

 

The house was dark. He had inheritated it from some great uncle, who had passed over Gregory's older sister in favor of a male owning it. Gregory's sister. He thought about her for a few moments. She would have a heart attack if she had known what was going through Gregory's head. Eve was fifteen years his senior. She had a daughter, Jade, who was only eight years younger than him. He had grown up as her friend and then older brother of sorts. 

After getting pregnant and divorced by her husband in the same month, Eve had taken a very pious look on life. If she ever met Wren in the company of Gregory, she would have assumed all sorts of things about the petite girl.

He sighed and pulled out a bottle of vodka. After two glasses, he pulled himself from his thoughts and went to bed.