Sleepless: Callum And Harper - Sleepless: Callum and Harper Part 15
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Sleepless: Callum and Harper Part 15

The song was over all too soon and we reluctantly pulled away from the other, realizing this meant there could be no more pretending.

"I think I'm fa..." I started to say but was cut short by the howling of my friends.

They teased us incessantly, embarrassing us both but I just held tightly to her hand to let her know we'd be talking, extensively, much later.

I enjoyed the rest of the music with everyone and was so freaking proud that they included Harper like she was one of us now. Well, everyone except for Sam but I was hoping that with time she would come around. I knew I was nothing more than a forbidden novelty to her. By the time it all came to a halt, we were all sweaty and full of smiles. All of us walked back to The Ivories' trailer where my bike and the gang's van was.

The alcohol was poured freely that night. It seemed everyone around us were drunk including some of our group but we lived in New York City for crying out loud. No need to worry because there was always a taxi available.

We sat on the concrete around the trailer, getting to know a few of the bands around us. Charlie had a keg on rollers that he spilled from the back of the trailer as a surprise. A million hands lifted in cheer and the after party had begun.

"God, what time is it?" A drowsy Harper asked.

I peeled my pocket watch from my jean's pocket and checked. "Twelve fifteen."

"It feels like four," she said laughing, laying her head on my shoulder.

"That's because the past few days were exhausting pieces of crap that no person, no, people, should endure."

I felt more than heard her chuckle in response.

"I need to talk to you, Callum," she said suddenly.

"And I need to talk to you. Badly," I said, looking at the top of her beautiful head.

Just then, Sam came up.

"Can I speak with you?" She asked.

"No," I said and I meant it.

"Please, it's...I just want to apologize. Please?"

I sighed. "Fine. Harper, excuse me."

She lifted her head and bit her bottom lip. I could tell she didn't want me to go.

I kissed her neck and whispered in her ear, "It's not her I want."

She nodded and I stood, following Sam to a dark space near the other side of the trailer. She wanted me to follow her farther away but I felt sick leaving Harper where I couldn't see her so I froze there, crossing my arms and waiting. Sam seemed to understand and came back up to me.

"I just wanted to apologize for earlier this morning," she began. "I overstepped some boundaries. I knew how much you wanted her and it scared me. I always thought you'd be there, waiting, and it just freaked me out that you weren't there when I wanted you."

"That's the lamest apology in the history of apologies, Sam."

"What? Why?"

"Sam, are you really this dense?" She had the decency to act embarrassed. "You just admitted to using me. Listen, I know you strung me along and before Harper I was just pathetic enough to endure it because I thought I loved you but since meeting her I realized something about myself. I'm worth more than what you think of me. I shed some crazy when I met her, took off my blurred visioned glasses and saw what you really are...not meant for me."

"Callum!" Sam yelled, showing a bit of crazy herself. She reached for me in desperation but I was distracted by yelling on the other side of the trailer. I ran into a crowd gathered in a circle around Harper and Charlie.

"I told you! She wants nothing to do with you!" Charlie said to a rather large man in jeans and a stained t-shirt. Harper clung to Charlie, her body visibly shaking.

"And I told you! That girl is coming home with me. She's mine," the man said with slurred speech.

"You've had a lot to drink, John. Let's just leave," a sensible friend of the drunk said, pulling him away from the circled crowd.

I finally reached the circle and broke through, wrapping Harper in my arms and trying to drag her away but the guy became enraged.

"Stay away from her!" John, the drunk, said.

"It's John Bell," Harper barely whispered, her lips quivering, her body shivering in fear.

I searched her face. John Bell, John Bell. Why does that name sound so familiar? That's when I realized, John Bell was the sick psychotic who tortured her at her foster home.

"Oh my God," I said, sucking in a breath. I scooped her up by her knees and carried her to my bike. "Charlie don't let that man follow us," I said and he nodded.

By then, the rest of the group caught on to what was happening and circled around John Bell to prevent him from coming after us. I set a shaking Harper on the ground, started the bike then began to pull the helmet onto her head but a roar of anger came from within the circle that contained John.

Before I could even turn around, Harper yelled for me to watch out. I tossed Harper and I away from the direction she screamed and saw John barreling toward us, a crow bar in his hand. I could see Charlie, Aaron, Nat, Jared and Josiah running after him. He edged toward Harper, a crazed look in his eyes but three police officers caught on to the commotion and started running toward us. John saw this and not wanting to get caught, picked up my bike and hopped on, gunning it into the crowd around us.

Harper and I stood, staring in shock as John drunkenly tried to weave through the people but he wasn't fast enough and the cops almost reached him. We watched. My eyes wide in disbelief, Harper's hand covering her mouth, tears streaming down her face. John turned around to check his progress and saw that there was no way out. I expected him to slow down but instead he gunned it more and we were forced to watch him hit a woman, driving over her after she'd fallen before losing control and crashing my bike to the ground.

Panicked, we all run to the woman, laying still on the ground. One of the police officers grabs John, turning his unconscious body onto his stomach, cuffing him while he calls for an ambulance standing by. The woman was still, too still and Harper screamed when she realized the woman was dead. I bent, immediately beginning CPR. Count thirty quick compressions, breathe twice, repeat. Time seemed to flow so slowly. The woman was unresponsive but I refused to give up. It was my bike that killed her. The paramedics arrived and began where I left off. We all stood, dazed, praying she came back to life but we all knew that would never happen. The paramedics stood and called it as it was. Harper turned from me and vomited all over the pavement. I held her body up to keep her from falling. Cherry, Charlie, the band, the rest of our group, even Sam surrounded the two of us, keeping us both standing upright. I couldn't believe how quickly the night had turned.

"He killed her!" Harper screamed at the ground, doubling over. "That woman is dead because of me!"

"No! No you don't, Harper! Stop! Just stop it!" I screamed at her, hugging her closely. Hands came from everywhere it seemed, comforting, warm hands were placed on our shoulders, backs and heads, telling us we weren't alone.

"Oh God!" Harper wailed. "That poor woman!"

A police officer came up to our group and we noticed that they'd already begun to tape off the scene. We were asked to step aside to give statements as they brought John to an ambulance and it drove away, sirens screaming toward the hospital.

Harper and I sat on the concrete, watching as they took pictures, pulled my bike into a police trailer, and when they were finally ready for our statements, it was almost two in the morning.

While I recounted everything that had happened, I saw two firemen hose the woman's blood off the wide concrete driveway and couldn't believe she was dead. While Harper gave her statement, I stood next to her, her hand in mine and watched the scene around us. Charlie came and stood quietly next to us as did Cherry.

My stomach was queasy and I felt like vomiting every five seconds. And just when I thought things couldn't get any worse, Charlie and I noticed a man about Charlie's age running up to the scene, screaming the name Erica over and over. Two policemen intercepted him and the man fell to his knees when he saw them hosing off the concrete.

"No!" He kept screaming over and over, his hands tucked into his body, he face red at the effort of his screaming.

I prayed that Harper couldn't see him but when her body seized, I knew my hope was for nothing. She looked at me and tears began to stream down her cheeks. I shook my head at her, a silent 'don't'.

The cops told us that Harper needed to come to the station to give a written statement. Charlie and Cherry agreed to meet us there while everyone else agreed to go to Charlie's and wait. It was in this unfortunate moment that I realized that these people were my family. They truly loved me and wanted to be there for me, to support me.

Harper and I climbed into the back of a police car and silently watched the harrowing scene around us. There's something the lights on emergency vehicles do that make an already anxiety filled moment that much worse. As we drove to the station, the radio buzzed with static and updates on calls.

We walked up the steps to the station, Cherry and Charlie quiet citadels behind us. The station was busy despite the late hour. Phones ringing, loud booted feet stomping the linoleum floor. We sat in benches, waiting to be taken to another room. The double doors to the station opened in a rush, the wind swirling our hair as they brought a cuffed man in.

A cuffed John Bell.

He recognized us immediately.

"I told you I'd find you one day!" He screamed at Harper, struggling to get away from the officers' grips. Instinctively, I hovered my body over hers. "You think to run from me?! I'm gonna' to get out of here and when I do, I'm coming after you! Just wait, Harper! Just. Wait!" One of the officers yelled for him to shut up as the other violently tugged him into a nearby hall through a door labeled 'Processing'. "I'm coming for you, Harper!" His voice echoed down the hall. "You're mine! Never forget that!"

Cherry and I covered Harper as her body began to wrack with sobs. An officer from earlier that night named Torres signaled for me to bring Harper into a nearby office. I sat her down and pulled up a chair myself.

"I'm sorry, son, but you have your own statement to write," Officer Torres said. He grabbed an official looking blank document and sat it in front of Harper with a pen. Another female officer sat in a desk opposite her as Officer Torres lead me out and into an adjacent office.

"I'll be right next door, Harper. I'm not leaving you," I said, as she reached for my hand. She nodded.

When both statements were written, we were asked to stay in touch since we didn't have a contact number in case they needed Harper or even my testimony at the trial, if it went that far.

"What will he be charged with?" Harper asked the detective who took the statements.

"We're not sure. Most likely vehicular manslaughter but considering the circumstances around the death," He said, making Harper wince, "he may get second or third degree murder. We'll let you know. Like I said, stay in touch."

"Can he make bail?" I asked, worried about Harper more than anything.

"He can. Unless the judge decides he's a flight risk."

Harper began to shake beside me.

"It's okay, Harper," I said, rubbing the goosebumps that formed on her arms.

"He's going to find me," she said to no one.

"No, he won't," I said, we're not listed anywhere. We don't live anywhere," I humorlessly laughed. "Please, stop worrying."

"And the judge may consider his threat to you," the detective chimed in. "There is a chance he won't be given bail. Also, depending on the charge, his bail will be set fairly high. You'll just have to wait and see but you can't worry about things that haven't even happened yet. Go home, or wherever it is you go and get some rest. Call us tomorrow afternoon. We should have some answers by then."

"Thank you," I said, leading Harper toward the double doors of the station.

Cherry and Charlie stood on either side of us again but Cherry held Harper's other arm as we descended the steps. Charlie hailed a taxi van and we all climbed in.

Charlie's apartment was bursting at the seams when we walked in. A few had fallen asleep but most had stayed awake, the worry that lined the room was tangible.

"What'd they say?" Aaron asked, folding his arms.

"They took our statements," I answered him while setting Harper on a bit of couch that wasn't taken up by sleeping friends. "They aren't sure what charges will be given but they said we can call up their tomorrow to get a few more concrete answers."

"And who was that guy?" Nat asked. "Do you know him, Harper?"

"Yes," she said. "I used to live with him three foster homes ago. I thought he had been my friend until his insaneness started making an appearance. He's a psychopath." Harper looked up at me. "If only I had told someone about all that he'd done, that woman could be alive right now."

Everyone started to protest but I cut them short. "No, Harper. I told you, you can't blame yourself. You can't be responsible for his actions. Stop blaming yourself. Seriously."

"I can't help it," she said quietly. "I keep seeing her dead eyes staring up at me."

Those who were awake rushed over to her and soothed her with words and hands. I could visibly tell that her heart had lightened at their proximity. It was like they were absorbing her pain through touch. I loved them for this. They loved her for me. They loved her because she was amazing.

Chapter Nine.

For The Longest Time Callum Harper and I didn't sleep a wink that night but finally succumbed around five o'clock in the afternoon the following Sunday, which worked out nicely as we had an eight o'clock appointment with my advisor, Sylvia, Monday morning. Both of us woke at five in the morning, silently getting ready in Charlie's apartment. Everyone had left sometime after we'd fallen asleep. When I woke, I found a note from Charlie saying he was going to sleep at the studio so we could get some rest. He was so generous to me. Also, we hadn't thought about it before but were awfully grateful that Cherry had our bags brought from her flat to Charlie's.

"Are you ready?" I asked Harper.

"Yes," was her simple answer.

We locked the door behind us and rode the subway toward campus.

A minute into our ride, Harper asked me, "What about your bike?"

"Who cares about the bike, Harper. I'm just glad he didn't hurt you."

"I promise I'll make it up to you," she whispered.

"Absolutely not. You have nothing to make up for, Harper. You owe me nothing. Shit happens, babe."

She smiled slightly. "You're incredible, Callum."

"I'm really not. If I was, I never would have left you alone in the first place."

"I'm not an invalid," the old, sassy Harper said.

"Oh, got your tongue back, have you?" She smiled wider. "We'll figure it out. We always do."

"I can't believe the past few weeks," she said, shaking her head.

"I know. You, kicked from your home, us, working all those weeks just to have our money stolen." Harper shook her head. "That's not your fault either! Then, that psycho comes after you and kills that innocent girl."

"That poor woman," Harper said, shaking her head.

"Her name was Erica," I said.

"I know, the detective told me."

"Her husband," I said, shuddering. "I don't know what I'd do if...I mean, I just don't know what I'd do."

Harper grabbed my hand and squeezed hard.

At our stop, we got off the train and headed into the bright morning sun to Sylvia's office. The same punk chick from two weeks before stood up and waved energetically, like we were old friends and she hadn't seen us in a while. Harper waved back politely and she gestured for both of us to sit as she did the time before.

"Can I get you a water or anything?" She asked.

"I'll take a bottle," Harper said, surprising me.

The girl's eyes lit up and she bounded down the hall toward a kitchenette. When she came back she handed Harper a cold bottle of water and a napkin.