Behind Blue Eyes

Chapter 3 Amina

Once I make it to my desk, I pull my phone out and call my brother back. I wouldn't normally do this on company's time, but five missed calls is unusual for him.

"Hallo?" I ask as I can hear him panting on the other side of the phone. "Felix, what is going on?"

"Nothing, why?" He replies casually.

"Seriously? How are five calls nothing?" I ask with a scoff. I'm irritated. He actually made me think something was wrong. That's what little brothers will do, though. Little is a bit of an exaggeration. He is twenty-three. But since I'm two years older, he will always be little to me.

"Yeah, no big deal," he laughs through the phone. "I just wanted to let you know you have one more box coming."

A box? Oh... A box. "It's been five years, what is even in this box?"

"Let me look, I don't remember. Give me a second," I hear loud sound of cardboard breaking through the speaker. "Looks like photo albums."

My mouth drops open. When I asked Felix to send all of my stuff to me, I assumed that the tragedy of a human being destroyed them. He knew how much they meant to me, that's why I assumed he would have done something like that.

My thoughts are interrupted as I hear my brother ask a question. "I'm sorry, what?" I ask.

"Why do you have so many damn pictures?"

"That's a stupid question, even for you." I mouth him off.

"Calm down, dude."

"Right." I say as I roll my eyes to him, thankfully he can't see it.

With the anniversary of my dad's death creeps around the corner, I haven't even thought how Felix has been doing. I ask him even though he avoids the topic like his life depends on it.

"I'm cool. Just keeping it one hundred, you know?"

My face scrunches together with embarrassment. Great. "Don't let the new lingo catch up with you, you're not that cool." I say with a smile slowly forming.

"Says you. You hardly did anything when you lived here."

He isn't wrong. When I lived in Seattle for college, I was the definition of a hermit. I stayed in my apartment all the time. I only ever left for groceries or class. "Whatever. How is my apartment, by the way?"

When I left my old life behind, the timing could not have been more perfect. My brother was starting college where I went. I ended up signing my lease over to him.

"It's good. Nothing to update really, and it's not your apartment."

Amber walks over to me with a smile from ear to ear. "Felix, I have to go now. Tschuss."

"Tschuss."

The line ends and I find Amber sitting on my desk.

"That's not a seat you know?" I say while pinching my eyebrows together.

"Let's go get lunch."

I scoot my chair closer to my desk. I have so much work to do with this new project Jason gave me. I don't have time for little lunches anymore.

"Can't. Did you see what Jason left me with?" I sigh.

"Yes, but it can wait ten minutes," she groans while pulling on my arm. "The Muffin Man has great lattes."

She would use that against me. "Fine," I act disappointed. Coffee is exactly what I need right now, despite sleeping in two hours. "You'd think they have good muffins."