I've Got You | On My Block (fanfic)

Chapter 19: The things you notice

After weeks of dealing with the 5 am wave on my own, it was odd having Cesar there, but comforting too. He rubbed my back, found the toothbrush and toothpaste I requested, had the glass of water and Abuelita's tea on hand ready. Although the tea was luke warm due to the power still being out. Cesar had suggested with a glint in his eye that we make the most of the suites giant bathtub but after our morning impromptu romp and my morning wave, I just want a shower and a change of clothes. So we agree to head back to our rooms and freshen up before regrouping with the rest of the crew. If I'm honest I'm hoping to get showered and changed before Olivia is up, and starts quizzing me about my time with Cesar. Knowing full well that I will give her all the details, as we tell each other everything.

I sit on the couch, as Cesar packs everything up. I had offered to help him, but he wouldn't let me because the room is well lit, so told me to sit down and relax, so that's what I do until he's ready to go. The hallway is still pitch black, but the green fire exit sign glows at the other end of the hall. Cesar uses the torch on his phone to help navigate us down the hallway until we get to the door of the stairwell. The stairwell is dark but the stairs have fluorescent yellow strips outlining the steps, "be careful okay! Hold on to my hand and the rail, we've only got 6 flights to go down, but we're going to take them very slowly" Cesar tells me, and I roll my eyes at him. He's acting like I've never walked up or down stairs before, but rather than argue with him because I know he's thinking of the safety of me and the baby, I take his hand and hold on to the rail as we slowly make our way down. We get to the 7th floor and walk down the dark hallway to my room, and enter to see a sleeping Olivia curled up with Ruby on her bed and Jamal asleep on his front in a starfish position on my bed. I smile at my sleeping friends, and though it's tempting to wake them up, it's not even 6 am yet, and they probably went to bed late, "hey, would it be okay if I got showered and changed in your room? I don't want to disturb them," I whisper to Cesar, "Of course, whatever you need." So we tiptoe into my room and I pick up my backpack which Cesar takes and holds open as I put in some clothes and underwear and grabbed my toiletry bag and hairbrush from the bathroom. We quietly make our way out of the room and close the door, Cesar tries to take my backpack, but I quickly put it on my back, because I'm stubborn and fine to carry my own bag. We walk down the dark hallway holding hands and he uses his torch to guide the way. When we get into his room, its dark, so Cesar guides me to one of the beds and I sit on it, as he lights the candles he packed from the suite. As the room gets lighter from the light of the candles I look around at their room, which seems a bit smaller than ours, maybe its because they have 3 beds instead of two, but the even the beds seem smaller. I must say though for boys they are oddly tidy.

"Here are some fresh towels and I've put lots of candles in the bathroom, so it's pretty well lit in there," Cesar tells me as he hands me the towels. Then a thought comes into my head, "will there be any hot water if we're in a middle of a power failure?" I ask Cesar, "No it should be fine, most if not all hotels have natural gas water heaters which operate with a pilot light, heating water even when the electricity is out," he says and I look at him astonished that he knows that, "I've learnt a fair amount at H&P", he says as if he can read my mind. Last summer, Ms Blanchard our Maths teacher helped get Cesar an internship at Humphreys & Partners Architects because her sister-in-law is one of the managing directors for their west coast offices. Cesar really impressed them with his hard work and readiness to learn, they kept him on after the summer as a paid intern, letting him work with them on Thursdays as he finishes school early and half days on Saturdays. They're pretty flexible with his hours as they know he has school and football, but he really likes working there and it helped confirm his desire to be an architect, and once they saw how serious he was they helped him get the scholarship to the Academy of Art University and promised him a junior position once he graduates. His internship at Humphreys & Partners was one of the factors that convinced Oscar to agreed to let him leave the Santos.