3. The Name's Chan

The sun was awake from its eastern cradle and was already taking its baby steps to the west when a sleek BMW pulled up at the at the curb of a two-storey house. The car occupants remained inside for some minutes drawing the attention of a young lady who had spied on the car from a room upstairs. The woman furrowed her brows wondering what the car wanted and went downstairs to find out. 

She'd just closed the front door after her when the car opened and a man stepped out, went around to the other side, then reappeared, bearing a woman in his arms. She gasped as she realised on closer inspection that the woman was Taissa. What had happened to her? She looked pretty dead to the world. She quickly moved forward to open the gate and made to take her but the man shook his head. 

'Let me,' he said in a husky voice that sounded suspicious to her. Who the heck was he? She couldn't see his face. It was cast in a shadow by the black baseball hat that covered most of his face. It had a C.C logo on it. How did someone working at a C.C company get hold of Taissa? 

'Who the hell are you?' she voiced her thoughts. 

'The name's Chan, ma'am,' he said, inclining his head. 'She was pretty stoned out and slept over at our club, so Boss asked me to bring her over, ma'am.' 

She uttered a shocked gasp. What'd Taissa been thinking. Gotten herself drunk? She'd worried her head to pieces when her friend hadn't arrived last night. She'd tried her number multiple times but got no reply. She'd panicked at first but had later decided Taissa was an adult after all. So she'd had to babysit her kids overnight which wouldn't have been possible had she had a morning shift. 

She opened the door for the guy called Chan and led him through the hallway to the loungeroom where he gently laid her on a sofa. 

He stood up and adjusted his cap to cover more of his face. She'd long assumed he was just a fan of C.C. 

'Thank you very much, you have no idea how you've saved me from going through a lot of trouble.' She rested her hands on her hips as she ushered him out casting a worried glance at her friend sprawled on the sofa. The idiot! 

'No p, ma'am.' He stopped at the front porch and dug in his pant pockets for something and finally came up with a car key. 'Her key, ma'am.' 

'Thanks.' She still looked shocked but took the key from his hand. 'I'm so so sorry, please extend my apologies to your boss, you see she normally isn't like that, I don't know what the heck got into her.' 

'Oh, actually Taissa stops at our nightclub frequently.' 

'I know,' she said, her face still full of worry for her friend. 'Thanks again.' 

'I'll take my leave now,' the man said as he pulled back the cuffs of his suit to check his wristwatch and started walking to his car. She followed him. 

'Thanks again,' she said. 'By the way I'm Marlee.' She extended a hand. 

'Pleased to meet you, ma'am.' He took the hand. 'Bye.' He got into the car and drove off. 

Lots of things had felt off about the guy that she couldn't quite place her fingers on, but three things registered to her as she watched the champagne-gold car disappear. The first was that he'd called her Taissa as if he knew her personally; the second, he exuded an aura of a wealthy upper-class dude; and the third, the car looked way too expensive to be owned by a lowly guy like him and his gold wristwatch was actually one of the most expensive C.C Wears. 

Marlee shrugged. She wasn't going to worry her head over that when there was a certain someone inside who needed worrying over. God help her, she was going to pick that idiot friend of hers to pieces. She closed the gate and headed inside. Then she managed to half-drag Taissa upstairs and dump her on the bed after which she headed to Naima's room. She had to get the kids ready for school before dealing with the mother. 

The young girl was sat at the vanity unit, combing her hair, when Marlee entered. She looked up and went back to combing her hair albeit she kept her eyes on Marlee, who had started tidying her bed, in the mirror. 

'Is Mommy back, Marlee?' 

'Hmm-hmm,' Marlee hummed in response. She was grateful the girl's bedroom wasn't facing the front yard or else she would've seen her wasted mom. 

Naima's hand holding the comb dropped to her side. 'Really?! I wanna go see her. Is she alright?' 

'Yeah,' Marlee lied as she finished tidying the bed and gave it a pat. 'But she's super tired as she's had a very long night, so she's asleep. And you don't want to disturb her now, do you?' 

Naima shook her blonde curls. 'But, Marlee, I was really worried when she didn't come home yesternight. Are you really sure she's fine?' The young girl looked very worried as she stared at Marlee in the mirror. 

'Positive.' Lying again. But she wasn't going to let Naima worry over her mother's stupidity. The girl always seemed to want to shoulder her mother's burden, which wasn't possible, it'd crush her. She was just eight. Taissa had enough on her plate already. 'Now be quick, I've made breakfast already. Since your mom can't take you to school, I've called the school bus and it's coming in sixteen minutes.' 

'Okey dokey. I'll be down in a jiffy.' 

'By the way, your mommy's coming for you guys in the afternoon as always.' With this Marlee left the room and crossed over to the third room to Taissa's. A boy was sprawled awkwardly on the bed with one foot on the headboard and the other hanging at the edge of the bed. His arms were tucked beneath him and his mouth was opened in a soft snore. The duvet was somewhere on the floor. 

Marlee shook her head smiling and crossed the room to adjust the position of his legs, opened the blinds to allow the sun rays filter in, then went to shake him awake. He opened his eyes for a second and a half then had it shut back. 

'Wakey wakey,' she cooed. 'Sun's up, vampyrs are off to their coffins and school is starting.' 

The boy opened his eyes and twin green orbs stared at her. 'Vampyrs?' 

'Yeah, so get up, it's time for school.' 

He groaned and turned his head to the other side. 'Five minutes more. Please, Marlee.' 

Marlee chuckled at this. Yannis's five minutes was fifty minutes understated. 'You know you've got school, darling. School bus is coming soon.' 

That got his attention and he wearily sat up, yawning and stretching. 'School bus?' Then he seemed to remember something. 'Is my mommy back?' 

'Yaps, and you've gotta get up, Yannis. Go brush your teeth and take your bath and come for breakfast before school bus arrives.' She stood up, hands on her waist. 

'Hmm,' Yannis said after covering another yawn. 'Sounds . . . interesting. Can I go see Mommy?' 

'No, darling. She's very tired. Now you don't want the school bus to leave you behind, do you?' 

'Okay, okay, I'm coming.' 

'Good boy.' She made to leave. 

'G morning, Marlee,' he said suddenly. 

'Good morning to you too,' she said and pulled his cheeks playfully. 'Now be quick and come down.' 

'Okey dokey.'