Three

Chapter 7

           The day of the earthquake felt like a dream. Clover, Jack, and I spent the rest of the day helping sweep up any leftover trash or wreckage with the help of the rest of the foster kids. The younger ones stayed lounging around the Game Room or playing with one another around the building. All the foster kids picked different sections they wanted to clean. The three of us decided to mop all the floors in the building after sweeping the Game Room. While the rest took out trash, organized, and clean the bathrooms.

 I caught myself lounging around here and there while everyone was cleaning up. Chester supervised everything happening on each floor. Not helping one bit but instead criticizing how we cleaned or worked. Chester reminded me of Miss Hannigan from "Annie" but from hell. He's the dark clouds that filled the sky on a rainy cold day that makes you get a fever or a cold.

He disappeared after a while with no sign of him again. No one noticed but I took note. I mentioned it to Jack and Clover. Clover said she last saw Chester walk up the stairs and back down to the main floor when she was cleaning the floors. Jack, on the other hand, could care less where Chester went only that it wasn't around him. 

I took a glance up & down the stairway to try and see Chester from where I was standing but no sign of him.

 Everyone finished cleaning as much as they could. The floors now smelled like Pine-Sol lemon that filled the whole building with its heavenly scent. No sign of any remnants of the earthquake except for the big wide cracks on the walls and some damaged windows that the contractors will fix later other than that it was good for now. 

Jack and Clover helped place all the cleaning supplies away in the janitor's room with the help from everybody else. While I helped carry the lasts few full trash bags down with the help of a couple foster kids. Carrying two trash bags in each hand down the steps to the first floor we were greeted by Chester's hall monitors clocking in for their midnight shift for the day. I was told by previous kids that use to live in the Winchester explain to me they never had hall monitors before and that they were hired during the time I arrived. They dressed in all black from head to toe with an athletic polo, slim slacks, and dress shoes. All of them were in their late thirties early forties but athletically built. Which was an odd sign since the rest of the other employees around the same age gap were all overweight. They didn't say much and kept to themselves. The only person they have a good long conversation is Chester. Their job is to make sure that everyone is in their's room by curfew and asleep. They also check for any drug substances or alcohol in any of the rooms. But one time a few days I caught one of them lurking through my stuff in my room and confronted them. Giving me an idiotic reason for snooping through my stuff.  When confronting him even more aggressively. Getting in his face which he didn't like at all and now cussing at me in a different language other than English now having trouble speaking proper English. Eventually, the aggressive act towards him didn't help as it ended in a brawl. Fists and a few splatters of blood flying everywhere in my room. Lucky enough I had a share of many fights back in school and I was highly trained in martial arts provided by my dad. 

Hearing the commotion in the ocean from outside the door. A handful of hall monitors flooded my room breaking up the intense brawl between myself and the hall monitor. Chester heard about the situation not even a minute later. The hall monitor was fired and was never seen again. No apologies were given to me for what I had to deal with that day. 

 New faces are always seen with the hall monitors. It's never the same people each week. They hang out outside for their cigarettes breaks all the time when on the clock. Didn't know much about them except that they were sketchy hall monitors especially after the incident my room.  

I paid no attention to them as I continued walking out of the building turning the corner and dropping the two large bags inside the trash dump. The dreadful situations of everything that has happened in the past months filled my thoughts. Playing back to back in my head like a film reel. I knew after today I had enough and soon think of running away. The most stress I've felt ever in my life involved the Winchester and the person that owned it. It was something I've always planned for a while but worse suicide. Knowing I had no family left and my only mother and father were gone I had given up hope. Luckily enough I do have Jack and now I guess Clover. The only reason honestly I still have hope. But running away was the plan for me now.