Open Heart: Second Year {On Halt}

Chapter 33- Fractured

In the hush of eventide, I closed my door as softly as possible, barely emanating a thud and steadily climbed five floors below to an empty avenue of Roxbury where Rafael was waiting for me. Everything in the world shifted to a discrepant side during night. The same place you walked thousand times over hinted of dark gallows waiting to snatch you in their esoteric walls. Farley never allowed the staircase or hallway lights to remain turned on which meant clambering down upon mercy of my phone's torch.

Rafael's revelation not only took me by surprise but it rendered me unable to process next words to speak. Like, what the hell was I supposed to say even? Try to stop him or something? Tell him to hold on here while I looked for jobs for him to kill time? Invite Sora to do community work if she hasn't been getting any employment?

Those possibilities swan in my head without even knowing cause for this sudden announcement. Overthinking was trying to overcome my rational side but I angrily leashed it back. My mind, a conspirator of its own kind always birthed chimeras of absurdity before anything.

Entering into the dingy space of my apartment's parking, I gripped my cardigan over my frame tightly and crossed the lot hurriedly. The locality was relatively safer than my earlier pathetic-residence at Jamaica Plain but at this hour of night, anything has the possibility to lurk in dark corners of Roxbury.

Outside of premises, mistral-windy weather beckoned me first, fanning in restless unbridled manner with a low goose-prickling whistle. Blackened stretch of night sky was not envisioned by our natural satellite today because even with its glory, thick-orangey clouds blanketed its illume resembling patches of willowy cotton wool. The cool scent of air was well-known. I knew this wind and weather. It was progenitor of a forthcoming storm.

Away in crossroads, Rafael sat on his bike and flicked on his phone—a being so silent as dead of night. He looked ghastly in dark, under bare gleam of sullied streetlight scintillating to a minimal expanse. He looked like a knight of the night, as my creative mind conceptualized.

"Rafael?" I called in for his attention, footsteps clapping against pavement.

He snapped up from his screen and replied in a jarring voice, "Hey. Thank for so much for coming."

Reaching near his space, I catechised, "Why are we here?" my eyes darted both to sides; "Let's go back to apartment and talk. Streets can be dangerous this time."

A lazy smile overcame on his shadowy face, "You've got a frat party going on just a block from here. This is one of the safest neighbourhoods one may find himself."

The air dropped its gyre.

"Still." I insisted, "Let's go inside."

"No. I'll make this quick." He jammed the phone inside his black leather jacket which hugged him robustly and averred in shaded manner, "I just came to say goodbye and I needed it to be done in person. Not phone."

"Why are you leaving? Tell me if something is wrong or you need anything. I'll try my—"

"Charlotte." He cut me off, peering down, "Things aren't severely wrong but they are not perfectly right either. They have finally declared my duration for suspension."

"Oh..."

"It's till June." He informed.

Five months?! Five freaking months!?

"That's too much!" I blurted out, "What the hell is wrong with the department? I must go at once and launch a complaint! It's unfair and injustice and—"

"And already been sanctioned by Chief." He duly informed, shrugging, "The other guy got till August."

I scoffed, "Jesus! Is that why you're leaving?"