The Boy in the Basement

Chapter 6

"What was the date like?" Liesel asked as we walked down the street. Her and I were going to the store for food for the week. Eventually, Cora and Rudy had joined us.

"It was fun." I said. "We mostly talked."

"What's Peter like?"

"He's very nice."

"Wasn't he handsome?" Cora asked.

"He was." I said. Rudy started mumbling something about us being so into boys, and Liesel began arguing with him.

"This happens often, doesn't it?" Cora said as she watched them.

"More than you think." I replied. "But who doesn't argue with their best friend?" Cora nodded in agreement. "So Peter said we should go on another date."

"He really seems to like you." Cora teased.

"I know. I like him, too." I replied. "How's life with Nik?"

"Wonderful." She said. "We've been together for almost a month." She talked about him often at work.

It only took a few minutes to get to the store. It was quite busy, and since Cora, Rudy and I had to get things for each of our families, which took a while. Liesel and I had to be careful; now that Max was around, we had to buy more food. The others would notice that, and I wasn't sure how to explain it to them.

"What do we have to get?" Liesel asked.

"The same as usual." I replied. "We have to get a bit more because of Max, so try and keep that on the down-low." She nodded. We got the usual - things for pea soup, bread and we managed to get a bit of chicken. Now that I was getting paid less and mama had lost a customer, we had to be very careful about how we spent out money. The two meals a day thing helped out a bit, though.

"Are we going to run out of money now that Max is here?" Liesel had a worried look on his face.

"No, of course not." I replied. "We may have to save a bit more, but we'll be alright."

"What about Max? What will happen to him?"

"He'll stay with us for now. Maybe soon enough, this will all end soon, and he won't have to hide."

"He could find his family, then!" Liesel said.

"Maybe he could." I replied. But I knew that there probably was no chance of him finding them. They were probably already gone. But Liesel couldn't know that. "But everything is going to work out just fine, I promise." The other two came back, so we began to head back home. When we got back, Liesel and Rudy went to play soccer, and I brought the food inside.

"Got everything?" Mama asked.

"Ya."

"And no one asked why you had to get more food than usual?"

"No, everything is fine." I said. "Anything happen while we were gone?"

"We moved Max downstairs." Papa said.

"Why?"

"So he could move around a bit more. It was awfully boring staying up in that bed, I assume." Papa said. "It's not much, but he seemed to be fine with it."

"Well, that's good." I said. I put all the groceries away. I decided to go down and visit Max; he was probably lonely down there. It took me a moment to find him. He was sitting on a mattress and some blankets under the stairs.

"Hello." He said.

"Hi." I replied. "How do you like it down here?"

"It's nice. I like the change of scenery. And now I have room to move around."