(This is a lightly edited role play story co-authored with Pissyprincess, based on a storyline we created together.)
Anna didn't care that it was pouring rain and her sweatshirt was soaked. She didn't care that she had been biking at least forty miles without a helmet, on a bike that wasn't hers. She didn't have a phone. She didn't have ID. All she had was $20 in her pocket, the clothes on her back and a stolen old ten-speed bicycle. But that stolen bike was her ticket out. That was just how it had to be.
Anna had taken her window of opportunity when she had it. There wasn't time to plan. There was only time to go.
She was exhausted. It felt like she'd been going for hours--she must have been because she knew the distance she'd covered would have been an hour drive in a car. She'd stayed off the main roads as long as she could but eventually had been forced onto the only highway that went to the next town. As soon as she had made it into town, she had veered off the road again, finding a path where motorized vehicles weren't allowed. If he was looking for her, it would be in a car.
Anna didn't have a watch and didn't know what time it was, but she could tell the sun would start setting soon--and didn't have a plan for what would happen when it did. She knew only roughly where she was, and the path she was on was following the river on the outskirts of town where there were more homes than businesses.
The adrenaline from fleeing had worn off but a new wave surged in her as she wondered how she would find shelter that night. $20 wasn't enough for a hotel, and she wasn't sure if the town was big enough to have a shelter. What could she do? Knock on someone's door and hope for their pity? It seemed so dangerous. But if she didn't do that... would she have to sleep outside? That's when the full gravity of the situation hit her. She was homeless.
Tears of fear felt hot as they mixed with the cold rain on her cheeks. "Fuck," she muttered, wiping snot from her dripping nose on her shoulder.
Seeing she was approaching a bend in the path that she had no business taking at that speed in the rain, she started to break quickly. Too quickly. And she hadn't seen the large bump where the cement had cracked when she'd looked away momentarily to wipe her nose.
The wheels started to slide as they hit the uneven ground. Anna just had time to realize what was happening before she hit the cement and everything went black.
****
Something Alex almost always did, whether it was raining, snowing, or whatever, was take a talk in his local park. Since losing his wife and grown daughter two years ago in a car accident, he had barely held on to life, but he had. Part of how he did it was routine, including exercise every day, no matter what. When the weather was really bad he did push-ups at home, and walked up and down his stairs over and over while listening to an audiobook. But the weather wasn't that bad today, since it was just pouring rain.
He had a compact umbrella in his coat pocket, but he liked feeling the rain on his face and didn't even use it. He could feel the rain cleansing his soul, just a little, as he walked in his small city's big central park. When he and his wife had chosen their house a quarter of a century ago it had been in large part because it was adjacent to the park. No need to cross a street even, because his fenced back yard opened onto the park through a gate.
The park was beautiful, in part because it was designed by the famous Olmsted firm, founded by Frederick Law Olmsted, who had helped design New York City's Central Park. Their park was like a smaller but still spacious version of that--with wilder areas, mowed picnic areas, bridges over streams, and paths through the woods. It also had a bike path that went through it, and even connected with the neighboring big city to the north. As the rain eased Alex saw some ducks out, playing in the pools of water caused by the earlier downpour.
And then he saw the body--lying crumpled next to a tree and a turned over bike. Running over he saw that she was a beautiful young woman.
"Oh God," he said in shock, even though he wasn't really religious, as he knelt down and gently felt her pulse on her neck.
She was totally out, but he could see that she was slowly breathing.
Reaching for his phone to call 911, he immediately felt that it was missing from his left front jeans pocket where he usually put it.
"Damn!" Of all the times to forget his phone, he cursed himself--the one time he truly needed it.
The park was completely empty because of the storm, and so there was no one who would hear him even if he yelled. Since the temperature was only in the 40s, he felt the cold was a real danger. Her cheek already felt so cold. Wondering if he was doing the wrong thing, he gently lifted her into his arms and started carrying her home.
As he held her body against his and walked, he could feel one of her breasts pressing against him. Trying to ignore that, he looked over her injuries. She had a bump on her head and a red spot, but it didn't look too bad. The worst were her hands, which she'd clearly put out to brace her fall, and which had apparently scraped hard on the rough old cement of the path. Both hands were cut and bleeding slightly.
What was a beautiful woman he'd never seen before doing riding a bike in the rain in what he thought of as "his park"? He knew many of the regulars at least by sight, but she was a stranger, maybe in her mid-20s. And she wasn't even wearing a helmet? As he clutched her, and was now breathing heavily as he walked back to his house, even though she probably weighed maybe 130 pounds or a bit less, he looked at her lovely black hair, wet with the rain--and then he felt her stirring.
As he carried her to his backyard gate, he saw her eyelids flutter, and then even saw her beautiful blue-grey eyes for a few seconds, and heard her moan, as he finally got her into his warm house.
Alex said, while still holding her cradled in his arms, now in his nice warm living room, "Oh good, Miss, you're waking up. I'm sorry that I took... liberties...with you, but you had an accident and bumped your head. You were unconscious, and I'd forgotten my phone. No one else was in the park, and it was so cold, and so I carried you to my home. I'm just going to call 911 now. So I'm going to put you down gently on my couch if that's okay, and then go get my phone. Are you in much pain?"
****
She moaned a little, trying to process the words she was hearing. Her head was throbbing and she wanted to keep her eyes scrunched closed from the light, but he was asking her questions, she realized.
The pieces weren't fitting together in her mind. Cold. Wet. Pain. Someone carrying her. An unfamiliar man's voice. But the only thing she really picked out of the words he said was 911.
"No," she begged, her voice sounding weak and helpless even to her own ears. "Don't call. Please."
His hold on her shifted as he lay her on a soft couch. The movement, though slight, made her realize her shoulder and neck ached.
