HOPE...HURTS

HOPE...HURTS《2》

Sometimes it's okay to forget the past and move on.

After a quick warm shower, I headed downstairs. I had settled for a baggy blue t-shirt and white pair of skinny jeans. My long dark brown hair was still wet so I left it open to dry naturally.

From the bottom of the staircase, I could see Angel across the living room. She was sitted on a sofa, fully engrossed in what looked like 'Tom and Jerry' on the television. Clutched in her right hand was her fluffy cream-colored teddy bear which was mercilessly squeezed by an open-mouthed Angel everytime Jerry was on the run with Tom right behind his heels! (Wait, Jerry is a guy mouse right?)
On a more serious note though,  the cute little bear was sort of lucky it wasn't humanly capable of feeling the torture it had unintentionally been subdued to.

Leaving her to her cartoon, I made my way to the kitchen which was directly opposite the living room. The kitchen was a fairly large spacious area with a window near the roof to allow in as much natural light as possible. There was a stainless steel sink on one side, refinished light colored oak cabinets and marble granite counters.

Sophie was sitted on one of the high stools, her elbows rested on the counter, sipping a cup of green tea. (She was the kind of person who considered herself fat despite the countless times she had been compared to a walking stick!)

She was a lady in her late twenties with short straight jet black hair and dark brown eyes. Initially, she had been our next door neighbour when we moved in three years ago but that changed dramatically fast. Just a day after we had moved, her husband mysteriously disappeared before he was reported to have been murdered in cold blood.

Normally, such a mishap would have frightened and chased away any new neighbours but we felt like it wasn't a good enough reason to run again, especially after all we ourselves had been through. It was time for us to settle down and live like other normal families. So we stayed.

With her husband's killer still on the loose, Sophie could not stand living alone in her house. She was in constant fear of attack and did not feel safe.Also, the painful memories of her husband that were all around their house made living for her torture. Seeing her distress, we offered to take her in with us and she volunteered to work as Angel's nanny.

"Good morning dear. How was your night?" She asked as soon as she noticed my presence , her charming smile lighting up her whole face.

"Morning," I answered, returning her heart warming smile. "It was just perfect. I haven't slept like that in days. Were it not for Angel waking me up , I'd probably still be paying visits to different parts of dreamland."
Chuckling , she slightly shook her head, "How very typical of you!" My smile immediately turned sheepish knowing well that I was guilty of the same thing almost every single morning.
"I'm glad anyways," she finished, before turning back to her tea, still smiling.

In the three years that we had lived together, Sophie had become more than a big sister to me. She was always there for me whenever I needed her advice and we shared our happiness and sorrow. I loved her more than words could explain and to be honest, the circumstances that led her to come live with us felt like God's excuse to bless me with the perfect guardian angel. If it weren't for our physical differences, hardly would anyone be able to tell that we weren't blood related sisters.

I went ahead to take out the required ingredients from the kitchen cabinets for our morning specialty- pancakes- and placed them on the counter near the cooker.

Angel came in when I was almost done with the whole pancake flipping. Her cartoon had ended and now she was restless.

"Mama, where is daddy?"
"Still snoring like an elephant in bed. You know what, I think he deserves a good lesson for being noisy. Wanna go wake him up, princess?"

The grin that immediately spread across her little face was just priceless! Of course she understood what that meant. The two of us were awesome partners when it came to things like that.

I took out our new secret weapon which was basically a bottle of *secret*  from the fridge.
"Be creative!" I winked as I handed her the bottle.
She grabbed it with both hands, still grinning widely and sprinted up the stairs.

Wait and watch!
Sophie sighed , knowing she was stuck with two adorable devils in disguise, "Poor Love!"

After a few minutes...
"Aaaaaaaahhh!"

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