I Did Something Bad

Chapter Three

Hi! Really short chapter, just to remind you that I'm alive. After getting my bachelor degree I've started studying in a new Uni and in a new city, so I'm still trying to get used to all the changes. Nevertheless, I hope to be more constant with the updates! Next chapter THE ANGST is coming ;) Hope you enjoy! 

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The air felt hot against the skin of her exposed neck and collarbones, the summer's breeze blowing the red sand of the nearby desert in her face. A few locks of hair that had escaped the bun beneath her hat stuck to the skin of her neck, as a warm drop of sweat made its way beneath the collar of her blue tailored jacket.

She had never felt more out of place.

You did actually, but that was a lifetime ago.

The busy town looked much smaller than what she had remembered. When she was a kid, she recalled spending whole days up and down the main road of Grace Town never stopping or getting bored. Now that place seemed almost too small for her. She could see the town limits with her own eyes, both on her left where the train rail ended and on her right, where squinting her eyes, she could see the buildings thin out and till the farmland start.

Karlie tightened her hold on the handle of the leather bag she was holding, standing still in between all the hustling passengers of the train. Everyone seemed to look at her as they paced around and scrambled out of the wagons, looking for their baggage or some relatives waiting for them.

The woman was so deep in thought that she didn't even notice the little boy looming around her.

"Miss, miss."

Karlie looked down at the kid, at his messy black hair and the freckles hidden by filth and reddish dust.

"Shoe cleaner, one dollar." he exclaimed, hinting at the elegant leather shoes she was wearing, a greasy rack already in his small callous hands.

For a moment she was back in time, nearby the saloon not so far from there, a greasy sponge in her hand as she shouted prices at the strangers walking by. She hadn't much free time working at the manor, but there she had been paid in nothing by food and accommodation and she had needed money.

"What you need the money for, kid?" an old traveller from the North had asked her, a foreign accent flavouring his words.

"A present, for my best friend." She had replied already at work on the man shoes.

"Miss?" the kid asked again, a hand on his hip as he sent her an annoyed look. If she wasn't interested other potential clients were walking around the small station.

"Fifteen dollars if you bring my bags to the hostel." the woman replied, immediately winning back the boy's attention.

"Yes, of course, Miss, thank you Miss!" he immediately started bubbling.

"You can find them in the last wagon. Here's the ticket." Karlie handed out to the boy a small piece of paper, the one she had been given back at the station where she had taken the train and that would have allowed the boy to retire her luggage.

"Also, when you get there book a room for Karlie Kloss. I have some business going on in town, so I don't know how long it will stay."

"Sure thing Miss Kloss, thank you."

Karlie gave him a five bill, a crooked smile making its way on her lips as she watched the boy's eyes shine with happiness.

"The rest when you get the work done." She added.

The boy nodded, the shoe cleaning rag forgot in his trousers as he ran towards the end of the train, the money and the ticket held tight in his closed little fist.

By the time the boy had disappeared from the woman's view the station had grown quieter, the last passengers flowing into the small town in silence. Some were carrying bags, others had nothing but their used train ticket with them. It was clear who was there for business and who was there as a last resource.

She could still feel some eyes on her.

A woman in men's clothes, a woman's in tailored men's clothes. Was that gold shining on her cufflinks?

Karlie cleared her throat, taking a first step towards the station exit, a large rusty gate. Small tufts of drained yellow grass grew in between the tiled floor nearby the train track, sweeping the red dust away from her shoes when she walked among them. On her right, she could see what looked like an office, the only building within the station, but it looked abandoned and as the gate in front of her. Dying bushes grew here and there, giving her an idea of how many trains reached that forgotten land.

The woman put the strap of her leather bag on her shoulder, slowly walking out of the station as she left the solid concrete floor behind her. The main road of Grace State was nothing but pressed earth with a thin layer of red sand brought by the wind, it didn't take long for her shoes to be covered in it.

As soon as she was out from the rusty gate, she started recognising the buildings around her. It was as the whole town had been frozen in time.

It's like not even a week has passed since I was gone.

But the nearly 20 inches she had grown and the gold cufflinks shining on the wrist told another story.

Right in front of her, there was the old town hall with a ruined red and blue flag dangling from its balcony. The wood of the porch looked scraped and weakened by the time and the weather, but the doorsteps leading to it had been fixed multiple times and the black closed door on the front looked like it had just been repainted. The windows on the first floor were also opened and long blue curtains hung before the small balcony.

Karlie wondered if Mr Benson was still in charge. She remembered him vividly, his neat black hair, so similar to the ones of his older daughter Elinor, as he played with his younger daughter, a small blonde toddler, on that same porch.

Karlie squinted her eyes looking up at the opened windows, but all she could see were the long blue curtains moved by the warm wind coming from the south.

The woman turned then to her right, facing the busiest part of the town. Swarms of people were walking around her, some busy carrying boxes or wheelbarrows, others just looking for the first pint of the day. Even so, she couldn't but see the town as empty. Maximum twenty people were walking down the street, and maybe another ten were inside the pub on her right, that was less than half on the people you could see at glance in a small side street in Philadelphia. Some of them looked already drunk, others as they had never been sober in days. No one seemed interested in meeting her gaze, but she could feel their eyes on her.

They all knew each other in small towns like that, and she could bet she was the first stranger they had seen in months. Funny is that she wasn't really one, she could too have probably recognised some of those faces if she had looked closer. There was the kid with who she used to have mud wars with, he now was seated in front of the pub's porch spitting on the red sand as a dark messy beard covered all over the features Karlie had once known. Even the little girl who had lived in the farm next to Mrs Swift grape hill was there, leaning onto the pub's door as her dark brown eyes ran over Karlie's elegant suit.

The woman raised her gaze meeting Karlie's green eyes, who for a second alt her steps, a veil of acknowledgement running through her features. But the gaze was not reciprocated.

"Seeing something you like?" retorted instead the woman nearby the pub entrance, a hand passing through her dark curly locks.

"I could make a good price for an angel face like yours." She continued running her long fingers over the porch's balcony.

The woman's corset was far more loosen than what Karlie had originally thought, and as the girl bent over the railing separating them there wasn't much left to Karlie's imagination.

Karlie felt her face redden as she shook her head. As she walked away whispers and chuckles erupted behind her.

They had no idea of who she was, just one of the rare strangers passing by.

And if she had to be sincere, she was starting to feel like one.