Chapter 6: Is this Karma?

An ear-piercing noise of a clock continuously hammers her ears ruthlessly, the pillow that is pressed firmly on both sides of her ears was in vain as the irksome sound echoes through the pillow. She abruptly sat up like a child in a tantrum and glared at the annoying clock on her right before she balled her hand into a fist and slammed the clock with intentional force, nearly cracking the glass.

Valencia threw the sheets to the side and leapt out of her bed, after her feet touched the floor she winces at the coldness of the ceramic ground flaring on the bottom of her bare feet ’Cold! Cold!’ she made a little hop as she immediately slips her feet into the slippers beside her.

She turns around to face her messy bed and began fixing it before walking across the room towards the brown wooden cabinet.

She pulled it open and started foraging for clothes to wear, ’I’m so sleepy.’ her little head bobs and half-open lids are the results of the drowsiness and lack of sleep emulating in her but she suppresses the temptation to go back to bed because of the agenda she planned yesterday whom she promised herself to commit seriously.

Valencia slaps her cheeks 'till a shade of red dusted against her fair skin, "Wake up. Valencia!, you promised yourself yesterday, Remember? I must find that book!" she said with a lace of determination in her monologue after halting her hands.

Valencia pulled out a black sleeveless turtleneck then a brown vintage wool skirt that reaches above the knee before she pulled out her last piece, a dark brown cropped jacket. She ambled to the left where a grey door leading to the bathroom is located, she went inside with her clothes stacked in a pile on her arms before closing the door with a creak.

A couple of minutes passed and a screech echoed in the room, it was Valencia coming out of the bathroom wearing her outfit with a white towel wrapped on top of her head.

She went to her bedside table on the left to grab her phone, and when she leaned her hand towards the gadget her cellular screen suddenly lit up. It was a notification message from her friend, Cherry, she tapped the screen and began reading Cherry's message.

‘Hey, Lency! how was your scavenging hunt yesterday? Did you find it? Oh! and I have some news to tell you later btw.’ the message stated. Valencia's began tapping the screen with haste, typing the words that came into her mind without a second thought.

‘No, Unfortunately, I have to wait 3 months for the re-stock and I don’t have enough time to wait for it. News? can't you just tell it now?’ she tapped the arrow pointing upward, sending her official message to Cherry. She placed her phone back on the desk and turns her back to walk around her bed on the right side where the vanity table is placed.

She pulled the chair and sat down while taking off the towel on her head before she starts scrubbing her hair with the towel and then placing it on her lap. She pulled the drawer in front of her and took out a dryer and a hair comb, she bent down on her hips to insert the power plug in the socket on the wall before she turns on the appliance.

Valencia finished drying her hair as she pulled the plug from the socket and put it aside on the table. She started applying light makeup to hide her haggard look with only a minimal amount of cosmetics applied before moving on to style her hair. She slipped a pair of black hairpins on both sides before grabbing her towel that was sitting on her lap and then elevates from her seat.

She pushed the chair towards the Vanity table and went back inside the bathroom to put her towel back. After she placed them back she went towards the shoe cabinet at a semi-fast pace, she pulled the handle revealing several shoe boxes, She stretched her arms on the upper right side to grab the dark brown box.

She opened the box disclosing a pair of black closed heel sandals, she pushed the cabinet door closed and wore the sandals then placed the now empty box on the ground and proceeds to grab her phone once more.

She walks in a hurtle towards the door to leave the bedroom but before she left she grabbed a coffee-coloured sling bag that is hanging on the coat rack along with her other bags.

She sprints down the stairs not caring about the type of shoes she was wearing as she dashed towards the door, leaving her penthouse.

She was inside the elevator currently occupied on her phone until the door slid open unveiling a woman and a little boy who seems to be around the ages of 4-5 holding onto the woman's hand.

However, after the two figures arrived in the elevator Valencia couldn't brush off the uncomfortable feeling of being watched while she was looking through her phone, so, her pair traced down at the child who is staring at her with his doe eyes, their visions were interlocked for a short moment before Valencia mouthed a ‘What’ towards the child yet, the boy responded with a head tilt.

Valencia feels discomfited the longer she tried to disregard the boy’s gawking stare, eyeing her as if she was a rare species. She turns on her phone and opens her photos apparently searching for something. Her thumbs paused from scrolling through her phone and looks back at the kid with a dubious grin, the boy was eager for a brief moment until Valencia showed her phone towards the boy.

The boy bursts into tears, Both the child’s Mother and Valencia jostled in their spot at the sudden noise the boy is making, the woman bent on her knees and tried to calm the boy in frantic. While the woman was patting her son to simmer down she shoot a glance at Valencia with a suspicious look before diverting her attention to the crying boy.

Valencia could almost glue herself on the metal wall in the corner of the elevator from what she has caused, her eyes were unwavering on the phone’s unlit screen, pretending like a fool who is looking through her offed cellphone, trying her best to look unbothered at the situation she had made.

She wasn’t expecting an outburst from the boy when she showed him an image of a text that says ‘I’M GOING TO TAKE YOU AWAY’, ‘Perhaps it’s my expression that gave it away?’ She asks herself.

Valencia's eyes caught the door opening and without a second thought, she dashed her way out of the elevator without looking back at the Frantic mother and the crying boy.

Valencia could feel the guilt consuming her while she was walking towards the exit, she only intended to stray the boy’s attention away from her because of the congestion of getting stared at, “Calm down Lency, We’ve dealt with this before. The past is in the past, Be confident….Be confident…Be-!” her occupied thoughts made her unaware from her surroundings thus, she collided against the glass with a loud thud making her stumble a few steps backwards.

"F*ck!" She crouched down on her knees and bit her lips while releasing a low painful groan, "Is this my karma for making that boy cry?" she rubs her forehead to ease the pain but a moment later she felt a hand on her shoulder she raised her head to see who it was.