CHAPTER 6

“So you are telling me that you hung out with Cody?” Derek said covering the large table mirror that stood in between Arlene and Olivia’s bed with a cloth.

“Really?” Arlene asked raising a brow at Derek.

She had narrated her ordeal with the ghost girl and the lady in the mirror, and the only thing he could pick out was the fact she was out having dinner with Cody.

“What? That’s something interesting too, he wants something from you but I’m not really sure what it is,” he said in defence.

“But then back to your ghost friends, you said you noticed a similar symbol on their cloaks, can you remember what exactly you saw?” he asked again.

Arlene nodded and reached for a paper then she proceeded to sketch down the symbol she had seen. It was a triple upside down triangle which Derek said he hadn’t seen in any of the books he had read.

“It seems strange but I think I can still pull it off, I just need to research more,” he said.

Arlene thanked Derek for helping and coming over to take care of her while her roommate was absent. It wasn’t like Olivia would be willing to help if she was present any way, she had been cold to Arlene since her nightmare started.

WAIT TILL SHE LEARNS ABOUT THIS ONE, Arlene muttered taking a bite off the salted cracker biscuit she had in her right hand.

“Olivia needs to chill really, but then you shouldn’t let her get to you. It’s rare to find people who understand us, it’s your problem so you have to deal with it without listening to anyone,” Derek said trying to comfort her.

“Thanks Derek, I don’t know what I would have done without you,” she said hugging him for a while.

“Of course I know I’m cool and awesome,” he said and she hit him lightly with her elbow while cursing him.

Derek stuck around for a long time that they didn’t know when they fell asleep. After a while Derek woke up while Arlene was still asleep, he checked his time and it was already evening and the next day was Saturday. His mother would kill him if he wasn’t home on Saturday morning because the house wouldn’t clean itself. While Derek was packing up he heard a knock on the door, MUST BE OLIVIA, he muttered, but then a familiar masculine voice followed after the knock. CODY YAN, he said to himself in a surprised tone, he couldn’t believe Cody was here to see Arlene. He wondered what literary content he wanted from her that made him follow her everywhere. At that moment, Derek realized he wasn’t only supposed to help Arlene solve her ghost problem, he had to keep an eye on Cody.

When Derek was done, he slung his rucksack on his back and opened the door for Cody who was already getting impatient.

“Is Arlene in?” he asked Derek when the door opened.

“Yes but she is asleep, she’ll be up any moment from now,” Derek answered and left narrowly brushing shoulders with Cody.

Cody walked into the room and shut the door behind Derek, then he sat on Arlene’s bed where she lay fast asleep. Derek who was on the hallway kept looking back to be sure he didn’t hear Arlene screaming for help because her work was been stolen, there was no way he was going to trust Cody even though he looked up to him. The fact he was Mrs. Ekoro’s favourite student made things worse, the woman was very petty so it was possible Cody was a spy.

“But not today, “Derek muttered and kept walking to the parking lot where he left his car.

“Derek you are still here?” Arlene said trying to open her weak eyes as she peered at the figure laying half way with their legs on the ground at the foot of her bed.

Cody sat up on the bed immediately and waited for her to fully open her eyes. CODY? She asked herself in a low tone before sitting up a bit with her pillow as support for her back. That was very thoughtful of him to check up on her after he dropped her off n school in the morning. Before she could say a thing he started apologising for convincing her to go out with him, he inquired about her current health status and when she said she was better, he heaved a huge sigh of relieve.

“I was so scared when I didn’t see you in school today,” he said.

WAIT HE WAS EXPECTING TO SEE ME IN SCHOOL AFTER WHAT JUST HAPPENED YESTERDAY EVENING? ARLENE SAID TO HERSELF.

“Not like I was really expecting to see you, I was somehow praying for a miracle. You also got me super worried this evening, I called a hundred times and you didn’t pick up,” he said again and Arlene checked her phone to see a lot of texts and calls from him.

“I’m just glad you are okay, here” he said handing over her a pair of glasses.

“My glasses!” Arlene exclaimed taking the pair from his hand, but then it looked off.

“They are not mine,” she said still examining them.

“Actually it is, the frames got spoilt yesterday when you fell down in the restroom. I had to save you before thinking of the glasses, but then I got it fixed today,” he said.

Arlene hugged him immediately, and she pulled away quickly unlike when she hugged Derek. Hugging Cody was different, the moment her bosoms grazed his chest, she felt a warm fluttery presence in her stomach which she didn’t like.

When she pulled away from him, she noticed he stared at her in a strange way, so she was forced to ask him why.

“I don’t know, but something seems off about your look and I can’t place it.” He said.

He took her eye glass from her hands and fit them on her, but then she still looked very different from the Arlene he knew.

“Do I look better, or something?” Arlene asked waiting to know if he was among those who hated her natural afro hair.

He nodded to her question still focused on finding what was off about her.

“You are looking for my curly brown hair,” she said in a bid to stop him from staring at her.

“Oh the hair, what happened to your hair?” he said running his hands through her thick black afro hair which she put in a messy bun.

“Cody this is my hair, I told you before, I’m African. I’m mixed, half-caste whichever way you want to put it,” she said removing his hands from her hair.

“So let me get this straight, you are half-caste, you look white and you have normal black girl hair and you hide it every day?”

“yes,” she replied immediately hoping he wouldn’t push further.

“Why? I mean it's beautiful on you, I was dazed for few minutes, I was about to say you should pass out frequently if that’s the secret to all these beauty.” He said to her.

Arlene felt her face about to heat up from his compliments, she hadn’t been understanding her body lately because of the way it reacted when Cody was around.

“It’s really late, aren’t you supposed to be at home?” she asked in a bid to change the topic.

“Uhmm.. actually I kind of wanted to sleep over to make sure you were okay and all, but if you want I could go,” he said to her waiting on her reply.

I REALLY SHOULDNT BE SPENDING A LOT OF TIME WITH HIM, IT’S TOO EARLY TO FALL IN LOVE AND I DON’T KNOW WHAT IS WRONG WITH MY LIFE AND ALL THESE GHOSTS. I’M STILL HURTINGFROM MY PAST, BUT THEN IF CODY GOES, THE CHANCES OF MY OTHER WORLD FRIENDS APPEARING IS HIGH. MY BLOOD PRESSURE WAS REALLY HIGH YESTERDAY, I MIGHT AS WELL BE DEAD BEFORE TOMORROW IF THEY COME AROUND.

“You can stay; my roommate won’t be coming back tonight. You can use her bed,” She said finally after weighing the consequences of being left alone and the chances of falling in love with Cody.

“Great,” Cody replied.

After that, an awkward silence fell in the room; it was like the both of them had run out of words. In order to break this silence, Cody spoke first asking about dinner.

“I don’t think I’m hungry” Arlene replied.

“This is not about you being hungry, you need to eat well. Just look around Arl, you’ve been snacking the whole day,” he said pointing to the heap of empty biscuit packets sticking out from the waste bin.

ARL? WHEN DID THIS START? She said to herself.

“I was too tired to stand up to get food, and...”

“You could have asked me to,” He completed before she could finish.

Cody stood up immediately and informed her he was going to get food for the both of them at the school Cafe which was open till about 11pm.

“I’ll come with you,” Arlene said immediately because she feared the consequences of being left alone.

She threw on her hoodie on top of the pyjamas she wore, then she put on her fancy rubber slippers and took some money with her, and then they headed to the cafe together.

The Cafe was about five minutes walk from Arlene’s dormitory, so in no time they were there, in the warm but noisy environs of the cafe. There were a lot of students in the cafe, it was one of the favourite spots for couples who didn’t want to leave the school at night, or those who wanted to meet briefly, It was also a place for normal friendship hangout. The room was large enough to contain 2/4 of the school population.

Once they stepped into the cafe, Cody took Arlene’s hand into his; they walked past the tables in the cafe straight to the counter.

Arlene who was dying from the death glares she got from some of the female students couldn’t wait to get to the counter, good thing Cody held onto her, because at a point she felt like she couldn’t move her legs. If not for Cody, she would have probably fallen on the cold German flooring of the cafe from their glares.

While they stood at the counter, Arlene’s phone vibrated multiple times in her pocket, she tried to ignore it but the person wouldn’t stop buzzing her. After a while she took it out, and it was Derek disturbing. He sent her a lot of messages talking about Cody. He told her of his suspicions of Cody either being a spy of Mrs. Ekoro or he wanted to steal some information from her. Arlene was confused at appoint as she read the messages, she didn’t know how Derek knew Cody was still in school with her. She lifted her head a bit from her phone and scanned the cafe for a moment, and then she saw a table. A table filled with her male course mates and Derek’s friends, they must have snitched on her, she thought.

I WAS HUNGRY AND HE OFFERED TO BUT ME FOOD, INSTEAD OF SNACKING ALL DAY..... She typed into Derek’s Dm in a bid to reply him, but then she felt the need to delete the last statement.

Not only would it hurt Derek, but she would be seen as immature, and at this point in her life she needed Derek so much, because he was the only person that believed her without thinking she was insane.

“Here,” she heard Cody say handing her over a nylon which contained the plate of food he had purchased for her.

After that he turned to leave and she followed him. When they got to the door of the cafe, a bunch of guys were walking in and they stopped immediately to greet Cody, they were his course mates. Most of them didn’t live inside the school premises, they gathered at night at the cafe looking for young and gullible female freshers. Arlene sighed and rolled her eye then she stepped out of the cafe to give way to Cody’s friends. He appeared few seconds later, and then they walked back to her room.

They ate their dinner talking about the most random things they could think of, the awkward air slowly began to drift away and Arlene was grateful she didn’t let Cody go. If she did, by now she would have probably been battling her demon alone and who knows what they had in stall for her. As soon as they were done eating, she put away the empty plastic plates in the dustbin. After that she walked over to Olivia’s bed and put away the littered notes on the table, and then she arranged it properly for Cody.

When she was done, Cody left her bed to Olivia’s bed. He pulled off the dark blue stripped shirt he had on, to reveal his singlet which he intended on sleeping with. Arlene turned over from where she lay and watched him without uttering a word until he lay down and covered his body with Olivia’s thick woollen blanket.

“You are planning to sleep with a single on?” she asked.

“What’s wrong with that?” he asked.

“Cody the weather is very cold, you’d probably get pneumonia in the morning or you’d wake up with a cough,” she said.

He laughed at what she said, and then he placed his phone on the wooden bed stead and closed his eyes to sleep.

“I’m serious, I won’t allow you go to bed like that,” she said again.

Cody sighed and requested for a spare cardigan since she wouldn’t let him be. At his command, Arlene stood up and searched through her wardrobe for a spare cardigan. While she searched for a cardigan, she remembered that she hadn’t done her laundry in a week, so they were probably in her laundry bag. She suddenly remembered her purple extra large cardigan which had unicorn horns attached to the hood, Cody wouldn’t want to wear it but she didn’t care.

She quickly pushed her clothes on the wardrobe rack to the left end to reveal the hoodie which was hung at the right end. Pulling it out of the hanger, she took it to Cody who had been waiting.

“What the hell is this?” Cody asked when she handed it to him.

She explained to him that it was the only clean cardigan she had when he kicked against wearing it.

“And purple is your best colour,” She said with a mischievous grin before walking over to her bed.

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The next day, Arlene was woken up by a loud knock on her door. She ignored it because she wasn’t expecting a visitor and it was rather too early for one to show up. Its 6 am in the morning, she said faintly putting her blanket over her head. Moments later, she heard the person fizzling with the lock and seconds later the door of her room was opened ajar to her utmost surprise

.