Chapter Seven

Eliana Brown

~•~

After two weeks of sending out my resume to every possible fashion retail store, I was finally invited for an interview.

Going through my suitcase, I found a casual business outfit and dashed into the bathroom to change. Living with Catherine and Peter wasn’t just stressful for them, it was inconvenient on my end as well.

I couldn’t wear what I usually wore in my house. I had to be decent all the time and I couldn’t change as I pleased. I always had to change in the bathroom in case Peter suddenly came home.

I hated it.

I was trying so hard to find an apartment but it felt like I wasn’t. All the apartments I’d visited were either out of my budget or too small to contain anything I owned, which wasn’t much. Sometimes, I thought about settling for one of those small apartments as long as I had somewhere to rest my head, but Catherine told me to take my time with it as it was the place I was going to be living in the next few years.

I appreciated her. She was the best friend anyone could possibly ask for, but I hated troubling her. If I wasn’t so broke, I would have been staying at a motel, but as cheap as it was, I couldn’t afford to lose unnecessary money when I didn’t have any stream of income at the moment.

My money went into house agents and I was thinking of switching again since the current agent was taking me to the most luxurious places. Aside from that, I contributed to things in the house. I was already inconveniencing them by staying with them. I didn’t want to live off them as well.

It was a weekday, which meant Peter and Catherine were already at work and I had the house to myself.

Checking the mirror and making sure I looked okay, I stepped out of the bathroom and took the necessary things I needed before walking down to the subway.

The train ride was fast but coming out of it slowed me down a bit as the crowd was much. I managed to push through as fast as I could and finally exited the subway.

Walking a bit, I came across the street where the department store was. As I looked at the road, I sighed, knowing it was going to be quite a distance. My bad luck was that only private cars could enter. Should I have gotten a taxi? It was too late anyway. Not dwelling on it, I started the trek into the street.

Bringing out my phone from my bag, I checked the time to see that I only had five more minutes to be there so I hastened my steps.

I heard the loud sound of an engine and it sounded like it was directly behind me. I turned around so I could see exactly where it was, but before I could register anything, my bag was ripped from my hold.

For a second, I paused, trying to make sense of what just happened, but as the motorcycle zoomed away with two men on it, I realized exactly what was going on.

“Thief!” I exclaimed as I ran after the vehicle. “Help! They stole my bag!”

My screaming was in vain as there were only a few people in the street and we were all far apart from each other. Aside from that, no one was even looking in my direction or trying to help me.

I knew damn well I couldn’t catch up with a speeding motorcycle but that didn’t stop me from running faster. However, that only resulted in my falling over on the concrete ground. I let out a wince as my leg scraped against the ground.

My eyes stung with tears and I didn’t feel like standing up but people were beginning to look at me. I despised them. They didn’t give me their face when I was screaming for help. Now, they were looking at me with pity in their eyes.

Biting down on my bottom lip, I tried my best to stand up. My knee hurt badly but I managed anyway. My white shirt was dirty from the fall and I had a bruise on my knee. There was no way I was getting that job if I went in now.

Because of the running, I’d gone quite a distance into the street, which meant I’d have to trek out again.

“Fuck my life,” I muttered to myself as I turned on my phone to call a cab. My bag had been stolen but luckily, I had brought out my phone earlier.

As if it wasn’t enough already, my eyes were immediately drawn to the battery percentage.

“You can not be kidding me,” I said to myself as I quickly entered the app. Just like in the movies, it was at the most essential time that my phone battery decided to die.

I gritted my teeth, resisting the urge to curse out loud. My metro card was in my bag and I couldn’t even pay with my phone since it was dead. I was officially stranded. I had the strongest urge to throw my phone against the wall, but I wouldn’t be able to replace it. Besides, it was new and expensive and I couldn’t waste something I didn’t spend my money on.

I must have offended someone in my past life because the things currently happening in my life couldn’t be ordinary. So many bad things couldn’t happen to one person in the span of two weeks. I refused to believe it. It was either the world was against me or I offended someone and they were getting back at me.

I looked around and found somewhere to sit for a while before thinking of what to do next.

I couldn’t even start trekking out because my knee hurt badly. I had brought my charger with me but it was in my bag that just got stolen. It seemed like everything was going wrong in my life these days. Was this a sign that I had lived enough?

Lost in my thoughts, I was more than surprised when a black car stopped in front of me. I eyed the car warily. This was no place to park, was it?

The backseat window rolled down and I came face to face with my creditor. “Get in.”

I blinked. What was William Caddel doing here? Was it a coincidence that I met him again when I was in trouble?

“Are you going to enter or do you want me to carry you?”

I frowned. I didn’t think we were that close, but I was stranded at the end of the day and didn’t have any other means of going home.

With a heavy sigh, I stood up, wincing slightly when I applied unnecessary pressure on my bad knee. His eyes immediately traveled down there, but his expression remained stoic and he stayed seated, waiting for me to walk around and enter his car.

“Do you have bad karma?” He asked when I opened the door and sat down beside him in the backseat before signaling to the driver to start driving. “You look…” he gave me a once over, “pretty roughed up.”

“Thanks for the reminder.” I gritted out.

“There’s a crack on your phone.”

As he said that, I brought the phone closer to my face so I could see and truly, there was a crack on it, probably from when I fell. I hadn’t noticed it earlier because I was panicking but it was there. I felt like a careless little kid who was being scolded after breaking a new toy. “I’m sorry,” I apologized instinctively.

“Why are you apologizing to me for breaking your phone?”

“Well, you bought it,” I mumbled. “And it’s expensive. I feel bad.” I looked out the window, not recognizing where we were. “Where are we going?” There was a slight panic in my voice. Was he going to kidnap me?

He was a pretty well-known figure. He wouldn’t want to harm his reputation by doing something fishy to me, would he? Then again, he could be a serial killer for all I knew. I didn’t know the man and I only met him once two weeks ago.

“To the hospital.” He answered easily, making me relax. “You were limping and you have a bruise. It’s best to check it out.”

That was nice of him and while I didn’t want to owe him again, another thing bugged me. “Don’t you have to be at work right now?”

His eyes cut across to me sharply. “Should I turn around and drop you off where I picked you?”

I smiled sheepishly, feeling better for the first time since I left my best friend’s apartment.