To the hospital.

I got scolded by the police officer. I get where he was coming from. Civilians shouldn’t get involved in stuff like this because it’s dangerous and we can risk causing trouble for ourselves. But what was I supposed to do, huh? Just let him run away while I was right there? Thankfully, I got off scot-free due to all the other witnesses.

When I looked, I saw Mila helping the woman to her feet. She was shaking, holding her own nose. Some blood was dripping from it and tears ran down her cheeks.

“Th-Thank you…” she told Mila.

“You need to go to a hospital, ma’am,” Mila said. Her own hands were shaking, too. “We can take you there, if you want.”

“There’s one like 15 minutes away from here,” Thomas said after checking his phone.

The woman sobbed, but that seemed to cause her more pain. “P-Please. I’m s-sorry…”

“Nothing to be sorry about,” Mila told her, gently rubbing the woman’s back. “Oliver, can you bring the car?”

I had finished talking to the officer, so I took Mila’s car keys and went to the place we’d parked, leaving her and Thomas to look after the woman. They later told me the officer briefly questioned her while I was away.

I… had to stop for a moment before getting into the car. My entire body was still trembling, my heart didn’t stop racing and the whole scene kept replaying in my head over and over. That could’ve gone so very wrong. What if he had pulled out a knife, or a gun? What if he was stronger than me? None of that went through my mind when I saw it all happen. I was just… livid that someone would hurt another person like that. What if… that had happened to Mila? I needed to calm down a bit before I drove back to them, but I also couldn’t take too long.

What a fucking mess.

I picked them up in front of the store and the three got in the car, this time with Thomas next to me and Mila comforting the woman in the back.

“The officer questioned her briefly,” Thomas told me as I drove. “But she was a little too shaken to answer, not to mention it’s hard for her to breath and speak with a broken nose. They offered to take her to the hospital, but she wanted us to take her.”

I nodded. I don’t know why she’d choose us over the police, but I wasn’t about to leave matters half-finished.

“P-Please, can you… call someone for me?” the woman asked, her words hard to understand.

“Of course,” Thomas said, taking the phone he was offered, already unlocked. “Who should I call?”

“Honey,” she said. “M-My boyfriend. His n-name is L-Luke…”

Thomas nodded. “Should I tell him the hospital we’re going to?”

“P-Please…”

Thomas made the call. The phone’s volume was high, so we could somewhat hear the other person’s voice.

“Hello, dear,” said a gentle, cheerful voice.

“Hello, sir. I’m calling on behalf of…” Blinking, Thomas realized we didn’t know the woman’s name. He looked back at her, wordlessly asking.

“J-Jennifer.”

“...on behalf of Jennifer.”

The man’s tone suddenly changed. “Who is this?” he asked coldly, almost threateningly.

“Thomas Pierce, sir. Jennifer asked me to call you. She’s okay, but she was attacked by a thief who broke her nose. My friends and I are taking her to a hospital right now.”

…A little too blunt, but I’m not sure I could’ve done any better.

“Where!?” the man demanded, his voice now filled with worry.

Thomas gave him the address, and the man said he’d be there in ten minutes. Was he close by, then?

Mila chuckled softly. “He sounded really worried,” she told Jennifer. “Have you been together long?”

Jennifer managed a smile. “T-Three years now.”

“And he’s the first person you called, huh? He means a lot to you.”

Jennifer giggled, even though she winced from pain. “Yes. A lot.”

I smiled. Mila was trying to take her mind off the previous events, calm her down. Thank god she was here.

We arrived at the hospital and helped Jennifer get seen. She was taken into the ER and we waited outside. Not five minutes later, a group of three people drew our attention. A man and two women walking down the hallway as quickly as they’d be allowed to in a hospital.

“Ah, it’s Jennifer’s boyfriend,” Thomas said. When Mila and I looked at him in confusion, he explained, “I saw his profile picture on her phone.”

“Ah.” Mila and I nodded.

Thomas approached the man, deep worry clear in his brow as well as in his two other companions. “Mr. Luke, yes?”

“Mr. Thomas Pierce, then? Where’s Jennifer?” the man asked, looking around.

“She was already taken into the ER. Don’t worry, she’s fine and conscious.”

The three people let out big sighs of relief.

I took a moment to observe them. There was… something off about Mr. Luke, though I couldn’t tell you what it was. He was tall and slender, about as tall as Thomas, at least. It was hard to pinpoint his age, as he looked young, like he was in his mid 20s, but had an air of maturity around him. Thirty years old, maybe? He was wearing a black business suit with a red tie. His eyes were gray but his hair, short, bulky and half of it swept to the side, seemed dyed blonde. He had fair features and even I had to admit he looked handsome. Again, I couldn’t tell you what I thought was off about him. It was nothing more than a feeling.

One of the women behind him also called my attention, if only because of her darkish skin and dark brown hair that made me think for a split second she was the girl from the coffee shop, but no, This woman was older, probably close to her 30s. Similar figure, though, busty and curvy.

The other woman was younger, maybe close to 25 or something like that. Clear skin, thin frame and modest chest. Long, chestnut colored hair and greenish eyes bordering on gray.

“I’m sorry for sounding so cold over the phone,” the man said, now with a friendlier smile. “I’m Luke Allen, Jennifer’s boyfriend.” He gestured with his hand behind himself. “This here is Natalie, also my girlfriend. And this is Cecilia, my girlfriend as well,” he said, introducing the clear skinned woman and the dark skinned woman respectively.

…

Wait. Three girlfriends?

I blinked, perplexed. I looked at Mila and Thomas, expecting to see similar faces, but… they just nodded along. Was I the only one surprised? I guess that, considering that I was the guy with five girlfriends, that someone else freely admitted to having three shouldn’t be so strange, but…

…

Why did something tell me that it was?

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