Caesar

CHAPTER TWO • DEJA VU

Caesar's eyes find hers in the crowd, it's like petals falling off a peach tree; a moment so beautiful yet brief. As his eyes locates her standing audacious in the kneeing crowd, he couldn't help but feel deja vu.

            1897 CRASTLE LAND OF 
                           TOWERS

The sun beams brightly in the clear blue sky with its radiant lines stretching far into the sky. A crowd forms around seeming like tiny dots compared to the grey towering scrapers.   A black Buick car drives through a hailing crowd moving past a sign written on a huge brick wall "CRASTLE LAND OF TOWERS."

The hails are so loud resounding and lording over with thunderous voices yelling out praises. People in the crowd hold placards and newspapers cheering loudly;

" Stefan Davoy for Zaki!" "A man after the peoples' heart."

Chatters cloud his ears as he sits closest to the window by his mother's side. His parents wave out to the hailing crowd. Mrs Devoy, his mother smiles and utters through tightened  closed teeth;

"Darling, why must we have to drive through this crowd of peasants?" She turns to face his father who sits close to the other window by the left. She separates them by sitting in the middle. Her bulky hair slightly shakes so does her long ass golden earrings as the car drives through the crowd.

His father turns to look at his beautiful wife reassuring her.
"Just wait...when i become the Zaki, i would separate Crastle like the city of Neno...Elites on one side, peasants on the other...any peasant who dares to cross the boundary would be killed!" His mother laughs out giggling like she always did.

Caesar's childish big eyes stare up, emotions and empathy flowing in them. His naive voice echoes: "But that would increase hierarchy amongst the Naives ... no one deserves to be killed for simply wishing to explore or...!"

The stares he gets is both demeaning and intimidating making him shut his mouth once more. The silence after that persists then is followed by a mocking laughter.   

His father mocks not only him but his childish voice. "No one deserves to be killed?..." his voice once again cracks up in laughter.

While his mother stares back at him with pity in her eyes but soon she is immersed in a maddening snicker; maybe it was a pretence just to please her husband. 

"And the time he actually opens his mouth, he sounds like six when he is ten...down's syndrome fool! How would this sicko become my heir?...listen child, next time, if you are going to speak like that then don't speak at all!"

Little Caesar looks out the window with his tiny lips pursed together. His teary eyes face the happily cheering crowd and finds her in it.

Her eyes like fire burns into his skin as he turns to face her. A little girl around his age stares at him and she had been staring for several minutes, following the moving Buick. Her huge eyes drill a hole in him, her radiant dark skin makes her stand out in the cheering crowd. A white man stands behind her putting his hands on her tiny shoulders and towering over her. Her petite stature even for a child of her age makes him appear bigger than he actually is.

Once she is aware that he is staring back at her, she smiles blowing kisses in the air towards him. He quickly looks away refusing to stare back at her. The car stops and the chauffer opens the door, his parents step out walking on the red carpet that is spread on the part they are to walk on. His parents walk through the crowd with plastered smiles on their faces. Caesar lurks behind them clothed in his white suit and neat hair jelled backwards to give him a corporate look. As he walks behind his parents with his head down, he still feels her eyes on him. Looking to find them, he traces them to the owner, a beautiful black girl with long curly and a humorous smile. Her baby tooth is broken as it enhances her goofy smile. She mouths out silently illustrating with her hands.

"Me" she points to herself and her smile more beatific.
"You" she points to him refusing to release his eyes.
"💖" she forms a heart by wrapping her hands and joining her fingers on her head. Her eyes glow with an emotion he had never experienced before, something so alien to him...happiness.

Instead of giving a response, he stares back at her coldly. What was he supposed to do? This was the first time he had been around a girl his age. First of all, he was antisocial. He was homeschooled to prevent 'external contamination'  as his father called it. He never left his house unless it was to accompany his parents to exquisite balls where he met obnoxious little boys of his age. He couldn't socialise with them for he would have been Caned so badly by his father until he falls to the ground so he always found himself withdrawing from their loud company. No one brought their daughters to the business balls because obviously it was 1897 where girls were household utensils or rather a means to expand family, wealth or alliance.

His mother calls for him interrupting his staring contest. She had noticed that he was lurking behind while his father was already on the podium giving his speech.
"Caesar!"  she calls out in a sophisticated accent and with regret, he looks away - a decision he will forever regret as that smiling girl had disappeared into the illusions of time. With evasive steps, he advances towards his mother, leaving the smiling stranger in the crowd...

The memory replays in Caesar's head
as his carriage passes through the lake of deception and his eyes once again finds her staring eyes in the crowd of peasants. She looks at him with those same eyes but this time, her eyes lacked that alien emotion...happiness.

Tears fall down her cheeks from the over flood in her eyes. She seems confused by her own tears and the reason for them as she cleans them still staring at him. Her height reduces as someone drags her down to kneel before him.

He stretches his head to find her in the crowd but on her knees, her petite stature seems to make that impossible like searching for a pin in an ocean.

His eyes sadder with remembrance.
"Her body remembers me but her mind doesn't!" He reaches into his pocket and brings out a green elixir with foreign designer writings. His fingers slightly touches the writings.

"I can't give in to my desires or i will lose you once again." With that he immerses the elixir back into his pocket.