La Mémoire de Lune

CHAPTER 20: It Was Enough

"Hope?" Elyse knocked on Hope's apartment door, Sunday afternoon, "Hey, you haven't been picking up any of our calls, you okay?"

Elyse began to feel her panic build up inside her when nobody opened the door despite her incessant knocks. She fished for the spare key Hope gave her from her bag and barged into the apartment in her panic.

The sight of a bare home had Elyse stricken with panic, she checked Hope's room but there was nothing there. No clothes, nothing. The place was empty.

"Oh my God, guys," she contacted the rest of their barkada in a group call, "she's missing. Hope's missing. There's nothing here, I think she got kidnapped."

"Woah, slow down, El. Breathe," Carina tried to calm her down.

Ava asked when they noticed Elyse calm down a little, "What were you saying again?"

"Hope's missing!"

"What?!" The four yelled out in unison.

"That's what I was saying a while ago!" Elyse panicked again, "Maybe she got kidnapped, oh my Go-"

"Okay, okay," Ava began as she tried to calm down Elyse and hush Liza's panic-stricken exclamations.

"Let's all calm down for a moment," Ava continued.

"Okay, somebody contact Tita Del, she most probably knows where Hope is," Carina suggested and everyone chimed in agreement.

Rose called Dellany and the rest were tuning in to the conversation.

"Hello po tita Del!" Rose greeted before asking, "Uh, tita, do you know where Hope is?"

Dellany was taken aback, "Didn't she inform you guys? She went out of the country."

"Ano po, tita?! When was her flight?" Rose couldn't help but exclaim, the rest of the girls let out a chorus of "Ha?!" and "Ano?!" when they heard Dellany's words.

"It was this morning. Nako, yung batang 'yun, why didn't she inform you guys?"

"Oo nga po, tita. Until when will she be there po?"

"Nako, even I don't know eh. I think she'll be there for a long time."

"Oh, okay po, Thank you po, bye tita!"

Rose ended the call and the five were in silence for a moment.

"That little devil, she left without a goodbye!" Ava exclaimed in frustration a moment later.

"She'll definitely pay for this," Elyse uttered, at least her heart settled down from the initial panic that shook her to the core.

"How could she do that?" Liza sighed out, the thought of their friend leaving without a goodbye made her sad.

"Well," Rose began so as to appease her friends, "I think this is good for her, give her the time to heal."

"Yeah," Carina sighed in agreement, "It's for the best, she knows what she's doing."

On a Wednesday morning, Kai thought it would be best to give Evan the letter for it had been 'a couple days' already.

Kai went to work early to talk to Evan for a moment or two, while not many people were present yet.

Evan stepped out of his office to get a cup of coffee when Kai stopped him in his tracks, "Hunter."

"Gonzales," Evan gave him a curt nod in greeting, "You're here early."

"Hope wanted me to give you this," Kai handed the letter over to him.

Evan's jaw clenched at the thought of Kai and Hope together but got the letter from him nonetheless.