Almost

3.

Before listening to what he was saying, I was observing the surroundings. I haven't been here since long. This park had so many memories of me, us.

Oh I forgot to mention his name, didn't I? His name is Charles Smith. Pretty good, right? Stop it, Luana stop it!

Regardless, this place was really a good one to hang around. Coming back to the moment, I saw that he already had started off with telling us about his trip to Texas the previous week. I thought that was cool, I loved Texas. But the sadness and fear in his eyes grew bigger and bigger. Was he afraid to express the matter or something else?

Then I heard everything with all my ears. He paused after telling us that he had visited his best friend, Dean who, I knew, lives in Texas. He took a deep breath to say the latter part and I don't know why but I held his right hand with my hand and rubbed it with the other. This seemed to soothe him.

He resumed, "So I visited Dean and he now had a villa, a beautiful one. He had informed me that he was moving into a new house when I was here. But it really was well-furnished and had many rooms. Dean had the permission to throw a party for me from his parents. I met them, no, um...sorry I met only his mother."

"Oh boy, I see what it could've been-" Clare interrupted him.

"Shush Clare, let him finish." I brushed her statement off by that.

"Hmm, then how was her behavior Charles?" I questioned him.

"Um...she hardly seemed annoyed and she always showed care for me and love towards her son. She had been

treating me like Dean's brother when I was there."

"Was she always like that when you had visited them last summer?" I asked as dubiosity crawled in my mind.

"Not much like that but still, she used to care for me like that, this time too. But she was extremely interested in what her son was doing, which she didn't do ever since I met her."

"I get it. Go on. You were partying with Dean, then?"

"Yeah, we don't do drinks at this time of the year so it was not exactly a party that makes people go crazy. We were sober and we had pizzas, Cokes and music. We enjoyed a lot and took tons of selfies which we both don't do eminently. Then after eating we made his cousins come over and then we all danced, laughed, joked, whatever. Soon after we all sat down to watch a movie."

He continued, "After a while, his mom appeared in the doorway. She was extremely curious about what we were doing at 2am and also eyed a gesture at Dean by which he quickly got up and followed her to the kitchen. Neither of us decided to go after 'em and we were enjoying ourselves with pop corns while watching the movie. He arrived after a noticeable time and quickly brushed off his previous expression with a smile plastered on his face. His cousins were with us until the movie finished and left a few minutes later. It was 5 am until then, I think."

He took a pause," Now only me and him were in the room when suddenly his mom peeked in. She was really being too interruptive and wasn't pleased with Dean's idea that I should stay there. But then she showed me a guest room where I can sleep."

"Then?" quizzed Clare.

He nodded,"Dean was pacing around me when I was unpacking my things. He frowned and with a broken voice alerted me that I should be free to tell him if anything unusual is spotted and also that he wanted to tell me something important."

He stopped, closing his eyes to remember everything he had listened.

As if being a mind reader, Clare asked, "Sorry to interrupt but for how many days did you stay there?"

"Two." He said with firmness in his voice but with the stress increasing in his eyes.

"Continue, please. We have a few minutes, mom needs me in an hour." I said, finally disclosing the reason.

"Uh, sorry. Then the night went pretty well and the next day was spent with him not in the house, but around the
city. While returning, Dean told me something and I was terrified with what he had told me."

"What did he say?" Clare quizzed.

"He, with pouring all out which was in his heart had told me that his mom was acting like that because there was a horrendous reason behind it. She was now the owner of all their property. But, for that she had done something which Dean himself hadn't even expected in his dream. She had killed her husband by poisoning him after dinner, which happened just a month after I had visited him last year. I didn't believe my own ears at first, then I remembered that I hadn't seen his father and nor his mother had said a thing about her beloved husband."

"So we have to arrest her for murdering her own husband?" I asked, hoping I would get an answer.

"No. We need to do more than that, there's much of the story left. I'll tell you that later but really soon, now you need to go." By that, he got up and stuffed his hands in his pockets. I glanced at my watch, I had only 15 mins to reach home.

I grabbed Clare's wrist and took her home with me. Mom, as usual told me some housework and was teaching Clare some dishes. She had been taking free cooking classes from mom and that's not something I can see go well.

But then I thought, was this all important than Charles's story? Certainly it wasn't. So by keeping that in mind, I quickly finished with what I had been assigned to do.

Soon, Clare came up to me and informed me that she was done for today and was going home. I quickly hugged her goodbye and then she exited. I was left alone in my room. I decided to go through that day's things. After summarizing, I felt the need to call Charles.

I searched through my diary in which I had kept the phone numbers of my friends and family. When I found his
number, I dialled it immediately and phoned him. It took many rings and retries for him to pick up.

"Hello? Who's it?" he spoke softly.

Oh now he doesn't even remember or has saved my number. Who am I kidding? I forgot his too.

I spoke as soft as he did, "It's Luana."

He now sounded a bit relaxed after knowing who was it because he said, "Oh..." on the phone. Then, "I'm sorry
Lu but can I call you later? Just busy with stuff."

I impulsively said, "Yeah no problem, bye" and hung up.

And from when has he started calling me Lu? I mean only Clare has claimed the nickname. I shook my head and the thought dissipated, I stuffed the phone in my drawer and left out of the room for dinner. It was my last dinner of summer vacation after all.

***