My Plushie (SeaChaos)

Part 21 - A Broken Family

~Nanners' POV~

"Chilled and Ze came back to town," Gassy suddenly says over the phone making my every nerve freeze just by the single one syllable word that, to anyone else, just means a state of temperature. I hesitate for a long time before a loud noise catches my attention, making me glance back at the large man yelling at the smaller man who is shaking while holding the bread in his hands. Thieves are an extremely common thing here, it's not rare if you see someone being yelled at for being a thief, though personally I've never been yelled at.

"That's nice," I say into the phone before hanging up, reluctant to hear anything about the man who had clearly rejected me. He went on a trip with Ze, he knew the strangely large amount of jealousy I felt whenever Ze is involved and he still went without a word said to me. If that's not a big announcement of his feelings for the other person rather than me then I'm messing up big time somewhere here. I banish Chilled from my thoughts, having avoided thinking about him for the past few weeks I had begun hoping that I'd forget about him completely and finally deciding to accept a call from Gassy it's the first thing he brings up? I sigh as I glance back at the fat man refusing to stop the ruckus until it begins to annoy me.

"Excuse me? What's the problem here?" I interuppt, shocking everyone around who usually picture me as the thief. The man becomes ten times more cautious when he sees me approach and holds the bread behind his back, taking every precatuion against a well known thief like me. He clears his throat before pointing towards the little boy who now clings onto my leg only making my job a bit harder, not that I'm going to tell the kid to let go of me.

"This brat stole from me, not that you would see what's wrong with that," the man mutters bitterly but I just shrug with my usual carefree attitude. I turn to the little boy and pat his head, kneeling down to his eye level and look at him seriously.

"Listen kid, you don't want to turn out like me. I'm completely alone in the world without much to be thankful for, so you don't wanna be like me," I explain and the kid nods slowly with a pitiful gaze. So he doesn't usually steal, huh? If he did he wouldn't be pitiful at all and just spit in my face, and believe me, there are kids like that over here.

"Listen to the man, brat," the man grunts before turning and leaving as I just watch him walk away, having had his angry rant of the day I suppose. I turn back to the kid and kneel down by him again, making him make eye contact with me again.

"Why'd you steal, man?" I ask and the kid looks down and away, seeming embarrassed and nervous at the same time.

"Mommy said daddy lost all of the money to some scary guys, and my little sister is sick. We need food," the kid says with the most pitiful look in his eyes I just sigh and present the loaf of bread from behind my back, making the kid's eyes glow as I show it to him.

"Don't steal kid, I have a feeling your mommy is going to run into some good money soon," I say as the kid nods dramatically and hugs the loaf of bread as if it's his life and dashes in the opposite direction. I feel plenty pairs of eyes on me, all with their own judgement on what I just did. Some looking to me like I'm some sort of hero, which I'm not, and some looking to me like I'm some sort of devil disguised as Jesus. Like usual I just ignore the stares and follow the kid carefully, making sure he doesn't notice me until we reach the front of a small hut with adults clearly yelling at each other from inside. The boy flinches before pushing past the door and instead of happiness from the other side it only becomes silent. I feel myself grow worried and I slowly enter the hut and widen my eyes at the sight inside.

The man is holding the kid by the collar while the mother is kneeling on the floor holding her hand to her darkened cheek. You've got to be kidding me, no matter how bad life gets violence is never something you turn to.