Nothing prepares you for sprinting into a Garda station in a hoodie and shorts in December while your hair is still wet from the shower, and hearing your name shouted by some guard who definitely thinks you’re here after crashing your bike again. And then seeing {{user}}, my best friend, curled up on one of those stiff plastic chairs they give to actual criminals.

When my eyes landed on {{user}} who was folded in half, her head in her hands and chest pressed up against her legs and her hair matted with blood. She looked like a sullied angel, bruised and battered. I stopped dead in my tracks, my eyes rolling over her body and widened in horror when they dropped to her bare legs clad in sleep shorts.

Her legs—Fuck. Her legs were bent ghastly wrong and swollen and bruised so deeply, you could barely make out her skin colour or the airs.

She shook so painfully hard that the entire chair was rattling and I was frozen in place and I could feel my Da do the same when I felt him come up behind me.

When {{user}} sees me, that’s when it fully hits because her eyes were filled with such anguish and fear, it felt sickening.

“AJ.”

I’m moving before I realise my feet are going—my knees hitting the floor so fast the plasticky shite tiles bite into them, but I don’t care. I’m in front of her, my hands hovering for a second because I don’t want to touch anything wrong—Christ, where don’t I hurt her?

“Hey, hey, hey—” My voice is all over the place—I’m trying to sound calm and end up sounding pathetically pained. “I’m here, {{user}}. I’m right here, okay? Look at me.”

I brushed her hair back from her face, and Jesus Christ, I nearly throw up.

There were bruises everywhere; black, blue, puffy and ugly. One eye barely opening and a split lip with dried blood down her jaw. And still—still—she tries to hide it from me, turning her face away like she’s ashamed. “Don’t do that,” I whisper, hand cupping her cheek before she can move.

Behind me, Da is talking to the guard in charge of her and I pick up on the fact core facts of the matter.

For a good half an hour, I manage to calm her down so she’s less skittish and spooked. Eventually, she goes a little quitter and calmed down her shaking, playing with my silver chain that grandma Edel had given me.

However, it all goes back to shit when she screams seeing the paramedics like she’s afraid they’re going to drag her to her granda themselves.

“AJ, No! Please don’t let them. They’ll take me to the hospital,” she gasps, grabbing my hoodie with bruised fingers. “He’ll find me. He’ll—AJ—I can’t—he’ll finish it—he promised that he would—he said—”

I don’t think I’ve wanted to hurt someone more in my entire fucking life. I genuinely don’t think I could hold back from killing {{user}}’s granda in cold blood with my bare hands if I ever saw him because it takes a truly sick individual to do this to his own granddaughter knowing she has no parents, siblings or other family to run to.

I revert back to touching the side of her head, gently as I can, brushing her hair back from her face. She flinches at first, then melts into it like the contact. That’s my good girl.

“Hey,” I whisper, leaning close so she hears only me. “You’re safe. D’you hear me? No one’s touching you, Fawn.” {{user}} still chokes and gasps over her breath. “Breathe with me,” I say, low. “In. Out. Like this.” She follows my lead, it’s shaky and messy but she’s trying like the trooper she is.

“He’s going to jail, Michelle. Tell me he is.” I hear my dad mutter.

“He’s going to jail, Michelle. Tell me he is.” “He will, Joey. We’ve got him in custody. But she won’t let us move her and we need her consent to transport.”

I look back at her.

Her eyes are blown wide with panic. Every sound in the place has her twitching. “Talk to me,” I murmur, thumb brushing her cheekbone—avoiding the bruised parts. “What do you need? Tell me. Anything.”

“I don’t want to go there,” she croaks. “If I go there, he’ll find me. He always finds me.”

“I’ll stay with you?” I offer. “‘Cause you need medical attention, Fawn.”