Chapter 19_I am Kate
He was back in his room now, ruminating over the thoughts of burnt haven owners. They were nine, four females, five males. They wanted him over for dinner tomorrow night, it was a friendly invitation until it suddenly felt like it wasn't when the black man amongst them mentioned that he should come with answers.
What answers?
Were this people trying to be friendly or trying to use him for something?
He felt like there was a something fishy, hidden and important he was missing. Something about them, something he should know. The feeling was tightening his chest and making it hard for his bronchi to send air to his lungs, he felt suffocated as if he was drowning in a river except he was in his bed, in his room and it was as dry as a bone.
He should sleep. It was his first day being back from the hospital and like Duncan said, it should be all jolly and lively with a welcome party thrown for him where all his family and members would smile and party with him whilst holding their own welcoming gifts to be presented to him.
How stupid of Duncan to think that, LSR scoffed.
Maybe that could happen to some normal boy his age but not him. His life had been shapeless and distorted right from when he was able to decipher right from wrong. No family, nothing, except for Zakariah, and now, he was losing Zakariah too.
Where was Zakariah now? It is past 10 PM now and he should be back from work. One minute he was in the house with him and the next, he was not.
He turned in his bed and decided he would sleep now and worry about his troubles the next day.
The worst had already happened to him, how bad could life get again?
He was sleeping on an empty stomach too, his situation was hopeless, he knew it and everyone knew it too.
.
The chirping of the birds that have made the upper still of his window their home was the alarm that woke him up the next morning. He found some instant oatmeal in the freezer and was wowed at the well-stocked freezer which was filled with different ready-to-cook meals, precooked rice, and other grains, frozen pizza amongst others well-stocked and neatly arranged staring back at him with happy eyes. Their freezer hasn't been so full and so.. So... In place since like ever!
It was as if Zakariah had made a wild shopping of groceries for him since he knew he wouldn't be walking around anytime soon. Well, it was the obvious though, there was no guessing it. Zakariah had stocked the freezer for him so he wouldn't starve.
He ate his breakfast with a happy heart after a much-struggled battle to shower. It was uncomfortable and difficult but he did it, he bath himself.
He was done now and had nothing else to than to sit in front of his window and glare outside for any sign of burnt haven owners or any other interesting thing that could catch his eye. He wished along with the provisions, Zakariah had gotten him a new phone too. He dared not ask his brother even though he was the only hope he had for a new phone now. If Zakariah did not talk about getting him a new phone later, he would take part of his savings for his artistic training to get himself a low budget cellphone.
Right about when he thought his day was going to be like every other day in the hospital, boring and normal, he heard the front door creaking, and someone was getting inside. Something different to show him he was back at home and not the hospital " Zakariah?" He called.
It could only be Zakariah, only him have the other spare key to the house.
" Hello..!" A voice called out . It was the voice of the person who opened their front door and it was the voice of a woman.
" Who..?" LSR muttered to himself and set his hands on the wheels of his wheelchair and took himself to the siting room. There, he saw the owner of the voice. It was a short slim girl with chocolate wave hair. She had a cute face and he wasn't even interested in analyzing her appearance for too long. She wasn't beautiful, she was just a pretty little thing. " Who are you?" He asked, making sure his voice was balanced. He didn't want to sound rude.
She was holding a small bag along with some other nylon bags and she placed them on the floor before replying him. He watched her outstretch her hands to him and a smile formed across her face " I'm Kate" she glanced down at her hand that was still outstretched and he realized he hadn't been polite to accept her handshake.
" Hello Kate" he shook her hands " I haven't seen you around before, Have I?" he asked her even though he thought her introduction should have been 'hello I'm Kate from..' instead of wasting time trying to shake his hands.
" Yes," she beamed again and went to sit on one of the sofas in the sitting room.
Her guts!
It was his damn house why would a stranger come in and make themself comfortable without his permission?
Okay, maybe it wasn't his house but his brother's. Still, he had a right!
He was not pleased by her actions and he made sure his facial expressions shouts it " How did you get in?" he queried.
" I used the door, please I carried all those stuff now I'm tired" Kate answered him and stood up. He watched her walk across the sitting room and went straight to the kitchen.
Who in the world was this girl?!
He followed her suit. Was it him or was everyone stepping on him as they please after getting back home?
By the time he got into the kitchen, he found her gulping down a glass of water. How did she even know to make her way into the kitchen?!
" You haven't answered my question!" he stated sternly, damn politeness!
The kitchen metallic desk made a clanging sound as the bottom of the glass cup settled on it " Oh, pardon me. Thirst is powerful, it can make one go to lengths. Your throat goes dry and then you sought dearly and damn all consequences to quench the thirst that might end your life if not satisfied" he heard her say to him. Her words sounded like gibberish but what looked serious were her distinctively small eyes that had a small opening as if her lids were formerly in a battle with the eyeballs themselves and won. She had more of flesh in her eyes socket than the real eyeballs themselves.
He felt unsettled by her boldness and gloomy demeanor.
" You should have branched a store on your way and gotten yourself a bottle of water if your thirst was so.. Serious"
" I did but my thirst remained still"
What is wrong with her?!
" Okay, okay, how did you get into my house?" he asked impatiently, she was starting to irritate him.
To his surprise, Kate or whatever in the bloody hell she said she was walked past him and returned to the sitting room.
Again, he followed suit.
"There" she was pointing at the front of " Through there, I entered " she said firmly and sat down on the sofa she was previously sitting on.
Her black polo t-shirt had writing on it and it said ' Let's go back to hell' and LSR wanted to scream it out to her to return to her hell and let him have peace in his own.
It was getting too much, sitting in this wheelchair and not being able to do anything. He was being bullied by whoever cared to notice him now!
He would do anything and absolutely anything to get back running on his feet once again.
" How did you get in through the front door when it was locked?!" he almost screamed, barely having any energy left to keep his voice in check.
Again, her voice sounding ever so clueless, Kate answered him "I have the key, I used the key to get in"
" How? Who gave you the key? There are only two of them and I have one with me, the other is with my brother so what key have you used?"
" Your brother's"
His brother's? Zakariah's?
Did that mean something had happened to Zakariah and this woman had found the key somewhere?
" Where did you find it?" he questioned again and her reply was not what he expected.
" He gave it to me"
This girl!
" Just go on and explain yourself. Do you have to make your replies so short and not helpful?" he was raising his hands along with his voice now. She burned all his control, the girl!
" I am to take care of you till he finishes his urgent duty at the corporation"
Finally!
Something meaningful.
Why should Zakariah send such an unwitting and mannerless girl to take care of him?
His brother was safe all along?
Thank God, he had been worried something bad had happened to Zakariah because of him. Something like what happened to detective Cabal and his partner.
The relief that settled on his heart almost made him hug the Kate he found annoying.
" So how did you know where to find the kitchen?" he questioned her again. For some reason, he felt like she was very far from being trusted even though she just explained to him her reason for being there.
Her sigh and eyes rolling made him want to spank her so hard. She looked like someone who had just finished high school. How dare she roll her eyes at him.
" Your brother showed me the map of the house and would you care to know that while you were sleeping I have made some provision shopping and stocked up the freezer with them? I was returning from grocery shopping now" she pointed at the nylon bags she dropped earlier " I would have taken those to the kitchen and made you a nice lunch since you chose to wake up in the afternoon and everyone would have been happy" she ranted like a mother scolding her erring child.
He did feel like an erring child though, she was the one who stocked the freezer?
It was afternoon? And he thought he was having breakfast.
Oh, those burnt haven owners had made his day yesterday tiring and he must have overslept.
That explains how she located the kitchen.
He was short of words now. He was yelling at her like the boss of the house now, it turns out she knew he wasn't. " Well, you can skip making lunch. I've eaten" he managed to say.
" Okay" she replied without looking at him and headed back into the kitchen to offload the goods she purchased.
Her small frame body baffled him the more " I don't know how such a young girl could take care of me". Zakariah is crazy, fuck him!" he muttered to himself making sure his favorite anthem were his last words. but she seemed to hear him when she stopped in her tracks and without looking back at him...
" Don't be deceived by what the eyes shows you, I am more older than you think" she purred.