Abditory [H.S]

33

Luella Jones

"What do you even buy kids? Do you think they'd like a blunt?"

I stop my movement and turn towards her, shocked by her statement.

"Liv!" I exclaim, smacking her on the shoulder.

"What!" She half-yells. "Do I look like I have kids laying around at my house?"

"You don't, but that doesn't mean you don't know what to buy them." I grab another teddy bear from the toys' aisle, putting it in my shopping bag.

"Do you not remember what you wanted as a kid?" I ask Liv.

"Mate, I barely remember what I ate this morning." She states, looking over at another toy.

I sigh, shaking my head as I go to put a few dolls and some box of a cooking game.

We got to Belgium a few hours ago and settled into our hotel rooms. Liv and I chose the last one on the last floor like the usual, having the perfect view of the city underneath us. We had some iced tea as breakfast, along with some fancy scrambled eggs with a croissant and all but I didn't really eat any of that.

What was really shocking this morning is when I saw Harry in the hall when we were getting ready to head to our busses, and he actually smiled a bit when we made eye contact.

I had to rub my eyes after that to check if it was real or not.

But then I saw Cassy walking towards him and reality set back in again, so I just turned my head and stepped back on my bus.

We're in some sort of a toys' shop in a mall here, just getting everything done before we head to the orphanage.

I'm wearing some white tight turtleneck, matched with black flare trousers and a light brown coat over my shoulders because of how cold Belgium is during December.

Liv is wearing the opposite, a rose colored crop top with some black trousers and high leather boots that arrive just shortly above her knees. I asked her earlier if she was cold, and she said the boots help keep her warm, and I didn't even bother to question her more after that.

My shopping bag is fully filled with different colored toys now, while Liv just has chocolate around in her's and some sour candy because she said "the only way to a child's heart is through their stomach." which is kind of true.

"Come on, let's head to our group before Miss Thea starts yelling our names." Liv says from beside me, moving in front of me before I grab one last item.

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"It smells like someone threw up in here."

We're at the orphanage right now. We only arrived a few minutes ago and Liv is already complaining.

"That's just baby powder." I furrow my eyebrows at the lack of smell.

"Yeah well, it smells like shit." She keeps close to me, afraid one of the children will bite her or something.

Everything here is pretty loud, there's christmas music filling the air, and a bunch of voices from here and there. There's also christmas lights hanging from every corner, a tree at the end of the room decorated very gorgeously, and kids sprawled in every large surface area.

It's a mess, but somehow the smiles on every child's face makes up for it.

Many others are handing them presents, their faces lighting up immediately making me smile at it. It's just sweet and nice to think that we probably made their entire year.