WANTED MAN SPOTTED

THIS IS AN INDEPENDENT ORIGINAL CHARACTER “GRAYSON CRAWFORD”  | semi-selective && low activity.  |  21+ preferred as some content might be triggering. | Penned by Stevie.

Also find me here:@ashenbled

Morgan half considered sliding across the hood of Grayson’s car like a bad ass en route to the driver’s side door. Ultimately she decided against making an absolute twat out of herself, fearing that it might have been inappropriate timing to show off all things considered. Instead, she frantically scrambled into the car seat beside Grayson and turned the keys in the ignition until the ancient vehicle rumbled to life with an ugly metallic rattling. 

Despite the noise, she much preferred it to the sound of the Karen still screaming after them outside. Breathing a sigh of relief, Morgan put her arm around Grayson’s headrest and turned around halfway in her own seat to look out the rear windows as she backed out of the parking lot. 

The heel of her foot slammed onto the gas and clouds of smoke and gravel sediment manifested around the car as they drove out onto the main street like a bat out of Hell. She gave a shout once or twice as the car jumped into mid air due to the bumpy exit and pot holes in the street, but despite her nerves, being the escape driver in any circumstance always gave her a little bit of a thrill. A secret guilty pleasure of hers, really. 

Once they were on the road, Morgan wouldn’t speak to Gray until the shopping center, Jeffery, and his crazy bitch of a wife were long gone from the review mirrors. When she did finally acknowledge him, she cast a side glance at him via the review mirror on the roof of the car before refocusing her gaze back on the road ahead of her. 

“Don’t be,” she shook her head and gave Grayson a soft smile, “That asshole deserved to get a smack across the mouth. Besides…God knows I’ve dragged you into uglier scrapes before.” 

She didn’t say anything after that for a while. Then, when she felt like Gray had had enough ample time to cool down, she looked at his busted up hand. “We’re gonna need wrap that up when we get home. Lucky for you I make an excellent nurse, if I do say so myself.” Her tone turned playful and reassuring once again, still trying to alleviate whatever negative emotions that must have been swarming around inside Grayson. 

“Just…try to never get shot, okay? I’m not as good as stiches as big brother is,” Morgan grinned sheepishly, “I’ve seen him patch up bullet holes with just a little bit of dental floss and a Bobby…pin…oh my God.” 

Her own shock and horror cut her sentence short. It wasn’t a very long drive back to Gray’s aunt’s place from the supermarket, so when they did finally arrive, Morgan wondered how in the hell what happened could have happened with the two of them being out for such a short amount of time. 

“Uh, Grayson…?” she started up again, gradually pulling in front of the main house, “Who’s that woman on the front porch? Should we call the police?” 

Grayson hasn’t looked up from his damaged hand the whole time Morgan drove, her words washing over him while is own inner monologue ranted in the echo of his mind. A simmering anger remained, most aimed at himself, the scraps still harboring resentment for this town and the unhappy people. 

It’s the tone of her voice that pulls him from the mental bradding he was giving himself. The first thing he sees is his aunt pressed against the house with a washrag, her age showing in her slow movements. The words sprawled across the siding came second. 

Those words again: Brother Killer.

“That’s my aunt.” He says getting out of the car. A new mix of guilt flooded his system. Despite the rocky relationship the two of them might share, Grayson didn’t want her to be another casualty. She turned at the sound of Gray’s footsteps, her features pinched in pained annoyance. 

“Little fuckers. Saw this gettin’ the mail.” 

Grayson said nothing, walked up to Kris and gently pulled the rag covered in the red stain from her grasp. “I got this.” He stole a glance at Morgan, “I’m sorry about this, Kris.” 

The older woman shrugged. “Yeah well, I wouldn’t have taken you in if I didn’t know the risk. Just get this shit off my house.” She offered a half-baked smile at Morgan. “She stayin’ with you for a bit?” 

“Yeah, that’s Morgan.” 

Kris just grumbled something in her old-lady way and began her slow tread to the house. “We need to get some cameras.” 

Grayson didn’t have a lot of people on his side. The town labeled him a pariah from the jump, skeptical of how Bradley Crawford could do it all on his own. The town didn’t care about the facts or the police report, they saw what they wanted and ran with it. “In the end, Gray had two ‘friends’ he could reply on. Salma, the girl who made the police call who, the only other person who knew the extent of his parent’s abuse and neglect. Edgar or “Blue”, a childhood best friend who fought of bullies when Gray was too tired to. 

Upon his return, these two fell into the roles they left off. Salma now owning the cafe her aunts ran and the first person he sought out when he arrived.  Blue worked at the lumber yard, an executive manager who didn’t bat an eye when Gray asked for a job. The three of them were always “outcasts” even before the tragedy. Salma for her weird, eccentric aunts, Blue because he made it his mission NOT to fit in.

She helped Grayson swiftly bag up their groceries then ended up paying for all of them with her debit card. Before heading out for the day they had initially agreed to go Dutch but at the moment, Morgan just wanted to get the hell out of there as soon as possible. She knew from past experiences that the outside voices wouldn’t stop until her and Gray had left the vicinity. As the conflict between 

Jeff and Gray gradually rose and then depleted, the thoughts of the nearby onlookers grew more urgent and agitated, but she was able to fight back against them. Rigging the imaginary defense system inside her head, she took a much needed deep breath and put up the psychic barriers that she frequently relied upon to keep herself sane, particularly whenever the thoughts and emotions from others grew too distracting. 

As they headed out into the parking lot, Morgan noticed the individuals who had their phones out and were recording the two of them leave. If they post any kind of image or video of Him with me, the coven WILL find us. Her anxiety spiked and she felt it grip her by the throat until  tears were welling up in her big brown eyes and she could hardly breathe. 

Clenching her jaw, she brushed her index finger against her nose in a subtle gesture as her and Gray exited the building. As they moved out to the parking lot, a few people who remained inside started cursing out loud, confused as to how their phones were suddenly thrown down to the linoleum floor of the shopping center. Screens were shattered, cameras ceased to roll, but Morgan wore a faint smirk as she and Gray finally approached the car.

“We needed food and new toiletries, Gray,” she tried to reassure him as he popped the trunk. She didn’t wanna feed him some bullshit line like “don’t let the assholes get you down” or “just try to ignore them” because she didn’t know how thoroughly the abuse did affect Grayson. Any other attempt to try and soothe him just would have, in Morgan’s opinion, come off as patronizing. 

Every time a bad was carelessly thrown into the back of the car or something was slammed inside, she couldn’t help but flinch with her whole body. The noise alone from it was triggering enough, but she didn’t say anything. She just watched with a pained look on her face as Gray did all the heavy lifting, which he didn’t seem to mind at all. A silent rage was radiating off of him that was enough to turn Morgan’s stomach, she would never tell him as such but…it scared her. Questions burned on the tip of her tongue but she would wait to ask them until they were on the road again or at home. 

Fuck. She heard it inside her head at the same time she turned around to scowl at the same man from inside the shopping center who had tried to start something with Grayson. Morgan’s jaw dropped and she was about to say something only slightly less ladylike than from before when the sight of Gray stomping towards Jeff stopped her in her tracks. 

Everything happened so fast; the punch, the wide screaming bloody murder and running around the SUV packed with little snot-nosed brats to come and comfort her husband, who was now bleeding from both the nose and the mouth as he lay back on the blackened asphalt, clutching at his face. Morgan’s eyes widened and she immediately rushed over to Grayson, collecting the now wounded hand that he had used to hit Jeff with into her own smaller palms. 

“YOU MONSTER! YOU BASTARD!” Jeff’s wife screamed at the both of them, red faced, tears in her eyes, while their kids in the car began to cry and panic in their car seats, “ARE YOU FUCKING CRAZY? I’LL HAVE THE SHERIFF ON YOU FOR THIS, YOU FUCKING DISGRASE! GO! GET OUT OF HERE! LEAVE US! LOOK WHAT YOU DID TO MY HUSBAND!” 

Morgan cradled Grayson’s hand and winced at the site of the blood and the scrapped knuckles, “Grayson…Grayson!” She reached up and cupped the side of his face, forcing him to look away from the married couple on the ground and towards her instead, “Let’s. Go! Now, please!” she begged, though it came off as more of a stern command, “Come on, I’ll drive us back if you want, I just want to go home.” Her hand slid down the back of his neck and touched their foreheads together for a brief moment, despite all the screaming and the hollering and the influx of impassioned emotions. 

The last time Grayson threw a punch he was two years younger and only harboring half the rage pumping through his veins in that moment. His knuckles throbbed, head swimming from the adrenaline. The bastard glared at Grayson from the ground, his hysterical wife throwing her vile names at him. The bounced off his chest and clattered to the floor, not leaving a dent. He’d heard them all before. 

Brother killer stuck. One he hadn’t heard before, not blatantly to his face. That speculation, that rumor had twisted and morphed since he’d been gone. Without him to bat away the absurd lies, they bloomed into something worse. A carnal expression mangled Grayson’s features, his mind replaying his father sending a spray of bullets into Jesse. The blood splattering the wall, his brother’s dead eyes landing on Grayson cowering behind the wall. His fist formed again, wanting to slam the fucker’s head into the asphalt, make a permeant impression.

Morgan’s voice sounded distant, her touch a brush against his skin. Her eyes, frightful and concerned brought him back to that moment. His fist unclenched. His eyes fluttered closed as their heads pressed together and he took a deep breath. “Okay.”

The screaming turned into background noise as Morgan led him to the car. He slid into the passenger seat, buckled and waited. When she got in beside him, he turned to her. His lips were dry, mouth wanting to move but finding no words. How did he explain to her everything that happened? How could he talk about his father without out sounding crazy? The truth he’d told her had been satanized, redacted and smoothed over. A way to protect himself and her from the horrors of his past. 

He should have been smarter, shouldn’t have dragged her into this mess. The stain of his past marred on his skin, no amount of ink could cover. 

RELATIONSHIPS:

EDGAR “BLUE” HAMPTON: Grayson’s best friend from high school who now works as a labor manager for the lumber factory and pulled some strings to get Gray a job. He’s one of the few people who knew Gray had nothing to do with what happened to the Crawford’s. He stuck by Gray during the deep pits of his grief, didn’t falter when Gray lashed out of pure anger. Blue was the one who tried to keep in contact with Gray when Gray finally left but gave up after a year, always hoping he’d see his friend again. Blue was surprised to see Grayson standing in front of his desk with a thin piece of paper as his resume and a defeated look in his eyes -- he thought he’d never see his friend in the flesh again.  They fall back into their friendship as if a decade hadn’t passed between them.

SALMA DENBROUGH: The neighbor girl who heard the first shots and called the police now working at her aunt’s diner. They were never really friends, she had her own label of “weird” that didn’t mesh with Grayson’s label, but they had their moments. Sitting in the grass between their homes, waiting for the shouting between their houses to cease. His mom and dad fighting much more than her aunts. She’s the first person he saw when he stepped into town. One of the only few people who didn’t scowl at him and looked frightened. She becomes much more important in his adult life, another friend needed to survive.

KRIS BAKER: The aunt he lived with after the tragedy, his mother’s sister who hated him from since he spilled grape juice on her white curtains at age eight. (”You did that on purpose you little brat!”) She’s also the reason he was able to come back. Through a haze of alcohol and gritted teeth, Grayson called to ask for a place to stay. He fully expected her to say no, but in her old age and illness, she lets him ret the apartment above her garage under the condition he helps her.

Grayson forced his eyes away from Morgan’s, drawing his attention to his hands, rough and red and callused from years of manual labor. Intimacy on any level came at a price, chipping at his mind with negative thoughts bred from his adolescence. He’d been alone most of his life --- adapted to the loneliness, became friends with solitude. The idea of someone caring beyond a natural human level for him seemed impossible. Who was he but another sad man with more problems then he cared to admit?