The Child of Scraps

Chapter 6

Leandro entered the makeshift house, and he found Avery, with her back turned against him and a sleek cellphone out, and Noah staring at her own phone. "Uh, hey?"

Avery's head turned around to Leandro, and Noah looked up as she noticed her friend's movement. Avery narrowed her eyes. "What do you want? I thought you couldn't stand the sight of me."

"Well," Leandro said as he scratched his head. "I changed my mind. I need to find out more about Aguirre, and the only way I can do that is if I stay with you."

Okay, staying with her wasn't the only way, but if he did stay with her, he could learn more about her father, who was tied into this somehow. Plus, the girls needed help, admittedly.

Avery turned around and faced Noah. "Oh, really now. Aren't you going to complain about how I can't do this or that, or how impossible certain things are? Or, you know, tell me to burn in Hell again. That was super great."

Leandro gripped his hands tightly. He needed to control his anger. He walked right in front of Avery, such  that he was in between the two girls. "Look, if I apologize for saying that, will you let me in the team?"

"As if you would actually mean it."

Leandro grabbed the phone from Avery, who finally looked at him. "What the heck?"

"I need to see your plan." And he read the conversation quickly , which went like this:

Noah: 'What are we going to do?'

Avery: 'Hm, we can do this. *insert stupid plan that needs improvement*'

"This plan is stupid." Leandro said as he fended off Avery's attempts to get her cellphone back.

"Would you shut up about how stupid everything I do is? Give me a better plan then."

"I won't unless you let me join the team."

Avery gave this exasperated look. "I don't need you, oh my gosh. There's no need for me to let you join."

"And what, you're okay with letting this plan fail? Come on, have you ever really thought out through things? I mean, it was rather impulsive of you to chase the car. What if they had noticed you? Please, your plan is terrible. You're going to be put in jail for eternity, at this rate. I mean, look at you, do you really think-"

"Shut up!" Avery slapped Leandro on the cheek and she grabbed her cellphone very quickly. Leandro looked at her in surprise. He knew that she had a temper, but he didn't expect that at all.

"Look," she said in a very tired voice, "If I let you on the team, would you promise to stop calling me stupid, at the very least?"

"Sure, and uh, I kinda need a place to stay."

"Why?"

"Because we're probably going out late at night, since that's the best time to go sleuthing. I can't go home because that would kind of scare my family. I made sure that a, uh, friend of mine told them that I was sleeping over at their house, for a week or two."

"And your friend followed you, because?"

"I was able to convince them," Leandro said as he thought of how hard it was to bargain with Talisay earlier. He ended up promising some human contraptions as payment, which he'd give in two weeks.

"How about school?"

"I, uh, don't go to school."

"Really? Weird. Noah isn't in school because she's deaf, I'm not in school because I recently moved here from America, and Dad will teach me for the remaining six -three months of you strange Filipinos- of the school year. What's your excuse?"

"Er, I just don't go to school, period."

Avery stared at him. "Alright, I totally believe you. Anyway, since we're all probably staying together -Noah's alone, I'm alone, you're kinda alone- we can sleep in my condo. Since it was only Dad and I, he gave me the spare key. We can all go there later, or even right now." Avery looked outside the window, and pointed out the crescent moon. 

"Alright, but not right now. For now, let's go back to the factory. Do you remember where it is?"

Avery shook her head, and said, "No, but I'll ask Noah if she does." As Avery started typing, she asked Leandro, "Hey, do you have a cellphone? It's easier to talk to Noah that way."

"Er, no."

"Really? A kid who wanders in Quezon City, and doesn't have a cellphone? You're getting stranger by the minute. I'll have to badger you about these questions later." Avery looked at her phone as it gave a little 'ding!'. "Noah says that she remembers. Do we go now, or..."

"No, all of us stand out too much, except for Noah, with her weary clothes. That factory was located in the slums, remember? There were shanties and squatters all around. The only non-shanty building was the empty one that we hid in earlier. We need to look like poor kids, so that we blend in."

"This is Noah's house, so I think she has clothes." Avery texted Noah the message, and Noah got up, and motioned for the two kids to follow. They went to the entrance of a very old bathroom, with two cardboard boxes in front of the door. Both of them were labelled using markers, one of them saying Dominiko and the other saying Noah.

"Who's Dominiko?" Avery asked out loud, looking at Noah in a curious manner.  Noah just stared at the box. Regardless of whether she seemed to have gotten the question, it seemed like Noah wasn't answering it.

"Who cares," Leandro replied to Avery, who gave him a little angry glare. "Let's just get changed."

They quickly changed in the bathroom, Avery going in first and Leandro coming in after Avery. They placed their old clothes on top of the box saying Dominiko.

"Let's go," Leandro said as he started marching out of the house. He pushed a surprised Noah in front of him, as Noah knew the way, did she not?

He could've sworn that he heard Avery mutter under her breath, "Who made you leader?"