𝙡𝙚𝙩𝙩𝙚𝙧𝙨 𝙛𝙧𝙤𝙢 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙨𝙠𝙮 | ᴋᴜʀᴀᴘɪᴋᴀ ᴋᴜʀᴛᴀ

𝙴𝚙𝚒𝚕𝚘𝚐𝚞𝚎

"What? Just nine letters? Shouldn't there be one more, or two, or more?" I muttered under my breath as I get on all fours, searching on the floor for the missing letters that I must have forgotten to pick up. It's just that there's no way the letters from this Kurapika man end here. He must have sent more, right?

I dragged the box sitting idly by the box that was toppled over when I stupidly fell from the chair. My ankle was probably bruised as the stinging pain vibrates throughout my body. I did pay it no mind as I wanted to continue whatever I was reading.

I looked at the box that I dragged near to my left side and peered inside. I was disappointed to see it was just a bunch of old clothes from my grand-mommy's younger days. The clothes did look pretty fashionable, but they probably wouldn't look good on me because they're obviously outdated.

I didn't hear footsteps slowly ascending the stairs to the attic, until I heard the door open abruptly. 

"Amelia!"

I quickly turned around to the worried voice of my grand-mommy who has taken all of the energy in her body to climb up this place and see if I was alright. She was breathing heavily, possibly because she has never been to this attic for years and that meant she has never climbed the stairs to this place ever since God-knows-when. I felt guilty seeing her sweat a little and shake from the sudden strenuous activity that she forced herself into just to check if I didn't perish to the other side of the world.

We locked gazes and I can tell with the way her brows furrowed and the wrinkles on her forehead lined up like the illustration of radio signals on school textbooks, that she was extremely anxious. "Darling, what happened to you? I heard a loud thud below and I thought something must have hit you in the head, or you must have fallen unconscious, since you did not respond to me when I was calling you," her voice strained with the tension that she must have felt when I didn't respond to her. She spoke in a hurried fashion, wanting to get her message across right away.

I felt even guiltier. I have forgotten to use my ears as I delved myself deep into the letters that I was reading, thus, I was not able to hear her call me. The pain from my ankle didn't subside. I winced a little causing my leg to shift sideward, lightly tapping the box next to my foot. The movement of the box caught my grand-mommy's attention. Then, her eyes panned to the letters that were on the floor. They weren't messily scattered, but it was clear from the way they were laid down that someone has picked them up and read them. That someone is me, of course.

Her eyes widened a little bit, but she recovered just as quick. However, I almost saw a glimpse of fear and sadness before she blinked them all away. I wondered why she reacted that way to seeing a bunch of old letters.

There was a long pause between us. The air was hesitant to pass through the distance between my grand-mommy and me, but I encouraged myself to ask her the question I was yearning to learn the answer of. 

"Grand-mommy, where is the tenth letter?"

She looked at me, her expression unreadable, as she tried to weigh the consequences of letting me know what the tenth letter contained. She, then, averted her gaze as though trying to regain something she lost, just to put her eyes back on me and smile sadly.

"Are you okay? Are you hurt somewhere?"

I instinctively hid my bruised ankle away from her view, "No, I'm not. I just fell from the chair, but that was all," I said trying to convince her. She breathed a sigh of relief. She bought my alibi, though that was barely a good alibi.

"Let's go to the dining hall. I prepared some nourishments. You must be starving," she slowly exited the door she just came from, ushering me to follow her down the stairs. I picked the letters and my heavy self up. I carried the letters with me as I forced myself to not limp while walking. My ankle is definitely very bruised now, and I'm not sure how I would be able to lie about this to my parents later when I get home.