GIFTED EYES (book two)

Chapter 01: Geneviève Lambert

Geneviève

Geneviève taps her foot against the wet concrete. A song with no words hums from her mouth. Her chattering teeth, akin to a malfunctioning bass, disrupts the beat as the cold takes hold.

"I told you!" Screams a girl. Her hands on her hips as she proudly points Geneviève out. "Once you give these street rats a single loaf they never leave!"

Geneviève hugs her legs tighter as though doing so would make her smaller. She tries her best not to give the rotten girl an ounce of her heart. Her round and hollow eyes remain empty with nothing but desperation left festering. If a couple of cruel remarks was all Geneviève had to endure for some food, she will humbly oblige.

This however, only riles the girl even more.

"Get on! Go!" She gives Geneviève a half-assed kick to the shin. "You'll stink up the place!"

It is not her fault she has not showered. Geneviève wished she had the strength to tell her she tried to bath in the rivers that border between the In-Between and the Vagabonds, but only waste lives there. And the cold, oh how it burned her skin.

I am a clean girl. Is what she would say, but she already knew that. Simply from the scar across her face, Geneviève knew this girl was just like her once. Sitting in the streets of the Vagabonds with her life in the hands of a strangers kindness. No amount of pretty clothes and perfect hair could ever hide that and the girl hated her for that.

Her numb and wet shin begin to throb. She was breaking skin now and Geneviève could not fight the tears that overflowed within the corners of her eyes. Not a single plea leaves her as begging is useless in the eyes of cruelty. She falls over, her face hitting the cold concrete. Her clothes more soaked than before from the puddle before her. A gasps escapes her lips as the burning cold water touches her skin.

"You are...no better than me." Geneviève barely gets out, propping her body back up only to hit the floor again. Her words only light a fire within her and Geneviève watches as it burns within the girl's stare.

"Fucking devil worshiper! Fucking vagrant!" Before another strike from the toe of her boot could ever be made, a man grips her shoulders, pulling her back.

Finally. Geneviève thinks to herself.

He is as beautiful as the first time Geneviève saw him. Black and wavy hair with a subtle streak of grey frames his face. A robust, short beard and skin with a warm hue that reminds her of the dirty coffee her mother would make in the mornings. Wrinkles cradle his eyes, etched by a lifetime of smiles Geneviève yearned to have the pleasure of ever witnessing. To him, she is a dog, a street rat lingering outside his shop under the roofs shade, but to her, he is the second coming of Christ.

"Inside. Now." He commands the rotten girl.

"She'll scare away the customers!"

"Althea!" Even with his voice raised, it is still earnest in affection. Althea squints her eyes, burning unspoken words of disdain through them before leaving inside the shop.

Once the door is slammed, a deep sigh leaves him. He squats down to Geneviève's level, pity in his stare. Normally, this would aggravate her, but his eyes spoke a different language. It was not condescending, it was something else entirely.

His fingers reach for Geneviève's leg and she jumps, backing away into the wall behind her like a scurrying animal.

"I'm just trying to see your leg, thats all." The man says before moving his fingers slowly towards her again. "I'm not goin' to hurt ya'."