Our Second Life

Chapter- 22

Winter's POV

It has been over two weeks since Ryan's death and Ian was yet to come around. It wasn't like he had completely aloofed himself from all of us, but somewhere there were behavioral changes on his part. He still smiled like before but the smile wasn't genuine anymore... most of the times it was more like a cover up.

But he still fulfilled all his duties and responsibilities as a father and a doctor (rest I don't know how to tag our relationship... we were not even like friends).

He woke up every morning, made Aiden ready for school, gave three of us (Aiden, Adam and me) a ride to school, then went to his hospital while I came back home in the afternoon with Aiden and ultimately he returned late at night which was usually around 11 when he came to my place to pick Aiden up.
Life had pretty much fallen to this monotonous routine where I spent a major part of my day with the five year old kid and I knew that I was gradually getting very attached to him.

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I woke up today at six in the morning and though it was a Sunday, I had a lot of stuff to be done on my list.
So, I quickly made my bed and sat down on my mini desk to write down in my journal.
Honestly speaking, journaling early in the morning has really helped me to cope through these days. It was like I could write my heart down in those pages and never worry about anyone else knowing them. Sometimes I also practised guided meditation early in the morning before going to work because it helped me calm my mind.
This past one year has brought a lot of anxiety and instability in my life, but to get through the tough times I relied entirely on these.
Many a times even I have considered going to therapy, infact once Irene almost dragged me to a counsellor's chamber. But me being socially awkward and horribly broke didn't really support my case.

After journaling, I also quickly wrote down my to do list. Technically I had a lot of work to do for the day. Sundays were practically meant for laundry, grocery shopping, dusting and cleaning. This was because the whole week I would be literally too lazy to do any of the above mentioned tasks, hence they all would stack up for the weekends.

After writing for a while, at around seven, I got up from my desk and went to take a warm shower. The temperature outside was already freezing and during the early hours of the day it would literally remain below zero degrees.

I quickly hopped into the shower and somehow managed to scrub my body and shampoo my hair. It always felt useless to me to take showers during the winter season. Number one because it was too much of a struggle to strip out of all the warm clothes one is wearing and number two as it ultimately served no purpose because as soon as one comes out of the shower, they would literally rewrap themselves with warm clothes only this time feeling double cold due to taking the stupid fucking shower.

When I finally came out of the bathroom, I was literally shivering to my bones. I instantly grabbed a freshly washed t-shirt and a pair of joggers from my small wardrobe and put them on while shaking like a popcorn machine. Then I grabbed my favourite panda coat which my mum had gifted me on my 17th birthday. The fact that it still fitted me was because I had completely stopped growing since I was fifteen. The only growth that my body went through during this phase was that my boobs, hips and curves became more detailed and visible.
But still I could wear most of my teenage clothes!!!!!

I was loudly blowdrying my hair with my ten year old hair dryer when the doorbell rang. For the first two times though I could faintly hear the sound of the doorbell through the loud ear deafening sound of my hairdryer, I still decided to ignore it thinking it was just something in my head. But the third time when the sound of the doorbell didn't seize, I turned off my hair dryer and confirmed the fact that someone was really at the door.
To not look like someone who just got a electric shock, I gently patted down my puffy hair which was all over the place with my curls having a all night wild party. I finger brushed through my hair once again before I rushed to open the door hearing the bell for the fourth consecutive time.