And then she was gone

Chapter 4

"Good afternoon everybody! I bought pizza for this special occasion. Is cheese okay Serenity?" 

"Yes sir." I responded lightning fast. 

"No need to call me sir sweetheart, you can still call me Chance."

I knew for a fact that that was not an option, that was an order. 

"Okay, Chance." 

"That's better. You will fit in perfectly!" He said, beaming with pride.

I hope so. I need to gain as much of his trust as possible if I'm going to make it out of here. I need to watch what I say and be careful of how I act. He will probably be cautious of me already and try and keep me away from most sharp objects because of by martial arts training. Damn it! If only I hadn't told him that! It could have been my ace up my sleeve.

 Chance set the pizza in the centre of the table, and they all sat in their seats, Chance at the head of the table, Hope and Faith on one side, and Honor on the other, leaving one spot for me. Right next to chance. 

We ate in silence, and after we had finished  we  introduced ourselves again, and then we played "Darling if you love me." Hope was first to go around the circle and ask people. First, she went to Faith.

"Darling, if you love me, would you please please smile?"

Faith responded masterfully with a "darling, you know I love you, but I just can't smile." 

Next, she went to Honor, and repeated the question, this time making silly faces. She got the same response from him, he didn't even blink. Something was wrong here. They were too good at this. Almost too good. When Hope finally made it to me, she had fear in her eyes. This was not right. 

  "Darling, if you love me, would you please please smile?"  She said it in a squeaky voice while making overexaggerated spins and landing on one knee. 

  "Darling, you know I love you, but I just can't smile,"  I said biting my cheek to prevent a grin. Her eyes widened, and she turned around and looked at Chance, who was smiling. 

"Looks like you lost Hope. You know what that means." 

She looked to the ground and went to sit on the couch. 

"The rest of you, go to the bedroom." We stood still.

"NOW!" We hurried into the bedroom and shot Hope a glance of pity.

"What is going to happen to her?" I asked Honor seriously. 

"She will get a punishment. Probably a minor one considering it was just a game, and he seems to be in a good mood. You don't want to lose any games when he is in a bad mood."

"But that seemed unfair! She was the one who was picked to go! We only did one round!"

"True," Faith said in a whisper, "but she was trying her hardest to get you out. I'm surprised. Usually the new ones crack the first time playing."

"Almost worked too," I responded. 

***

30 minutes later Hope came back and sat down on her bed. Nobody wanted to ask her what had happened, but she did have a black eye.

She tapped up a piece of paper on the wall. 

"This is our new chores schedule. Faith cooks and does the dishes, Honor will dust and vacuum, Serenity does the laundry, and I clean the washroom and make sure the beds are made in the morning. Now it is free time."

Hope and faith picked up books while Honor  picked up a crochet needle and yarn. I picked up a dull crochet needle and 3 shades of green yarn and got to work. By dinner, I had made a yarn-stuffed turtle. Honor nodded his head in approval, and Hope looked at it in awe. "You're really good at this. Could you make me one?" She asked. 

I chuckled and said "Sure! You can have this one, it matches your eyes." I handed her the turtle and she squeezed in and smiled like a kid on Christmas. "Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

"No problem. It's kinda chilly down here, I should make  blanket tomorrow."

"Dinner!" Chance called from the other room. We all quickly put our things in our drawers and books back on the shelves and mad our way to our seats as we waited for Faith to heat up some leftover pizza from lunch. We ate and then went straight to sleep. This is my life now. I need to gain his trust and find a way out. And with that hopeful thought in my head, I drifted off to sleep.