Chapter 26

As they were about to dig in their meals, the old woman looked around with a baffled look on her face.

"Hmm? Where's the cute, little puppy you were taking care of?"

Uriel thought the question was strange, so he just proceeded to eat his meal. "What puppy? Did I ever bring in a puppy?"

Olia Isema glanced at him with a surprised and confused look.

He thought it felt so real.

"I can't tell if you're just pretending, you're kidding, or you're actually serious."

Uriel drank a bit of water from his glass and faced her with a sincerely innocent look. "What are we even talking about here, grandma? What puppy are you saying? As far as I know, we never had one. At least, since I came here to you."

The old woman was obviously holding her breath. "Could it be... a short term memory loss?"

"What?"

"No, it's nothing, my dear," She said, regaining her composure. "Let's just eat out breakfast for now, shall we?"

Uriel just shrugged and continued eating his food.

Afterwards, the old woman proceeded doing her morning routine, while the boy was exploring around the house.

He didn't want to pass by the room upstairs again, but he got a bit curious about it.

He checked one more time the old woman busily doing her business outside, so he took the chance to go up and straight head to the luggage that had been bothering him ever since.

He tried breathing from his mouth to avoid the pungent, rotten smell that's lingering around the room.

The luggage had casual clothes for different occasions and purposes that eerily fit his size and preference. A little bit more digging around and he was astounded to see a piece of crucial clue that has been haunting him.

He saw the clothes that little Uriel was wearing in his dreams.

A horizontally striped blue and white shirt with a khaki brown short just exactly above the knee. The size and fabrics were perfect just as he saw it from his dream last night.

Before getting caught up with it, he returned everything back to the luggage and returned rummaging things around.

The drawer had no particular interest in them except for the lowest one.

There's a broken glass frame with a picture in it. It felt odd that it wasn't much of a surprise to him that he saw his younger self with both his parents behind him standing by a carousel.

Uriel couldn't help but let out a smile of relief.

"So you were able to go there even once, huh," He whispered with tints of envy. "That must've been the greatest day of your life, little guy. I hope you were able to boast in front of your friends too about being able to go there."

After staring at it for a while, feeling quite a bit of mixed emotions, he fixed the picture to fit on the frame and pieced the broken glasses together.

It couldn't return to its normal anymore after getting broken, he thought, but it could be cherished at the very least.

That's all he needed to think about.

Heaps of nostalgia and relief gushed over the boy's heart as he was finally closing the lower drawer. And when he looked behind him, Olia Isema was already standing there with a creepy blank stare from her eyes.

"G-Grandma," He stuttered. "I thought you weren't still done with your crops outside. I-I'm sorry for barging in your room without permission."

He bowed down to avoid her gaze, but she plodded near him and lifted his chin up. "It's alright, my dear," She said with a wrinkly, ambiguous smile. "And yeah, I'm not yet done outside. I just took a peek at you to see if you were doing okay. I thought you might be bored, but you seem to have taken quite a liking into snooping around. Well, take your time exploring around. I don't mind since I'm not hiding anything. Anyway, I have a proposal to tell you. It might help you recover your memories."

"Is that so? Then, I'll go downstairs to prepare drinks while waiting for you to finish up your business outside."

"Alright, then. I'll have my usual espresso and I'd like it to be as black as death."

Uriel docilely nodded and rushed back down. His heart was racing along with his hitched breath.

He knew those were hints of warnings, not permission.

The old woman must've been alarmed that something's up for her to get rid of.