Wilt and Ruin

Chapter Seven - Turnaround (Tao)

I couldn't remember ever seeing King smile.

He had always been a sad child. I remember the first time I met him. I was fifteen and King wasn't being called that yet. He was twelve, sitting under a mango tree, reading. His mother was off somewhere like she usually was, all the servants were busy, and I was bringing my mother some things she asked for from the market for dinner. My mother worked as the personal chef for King's family. At fifteen, I began coming after school and on weekends to help my mom.

I remember always watching him to see if he would bring friends home, if his mother would ensure he had birthday parties and invite friends. But as the years passed, and a quiet child grew into a spoiled king, I couldn't ever remember seeing him with friends.

He and I were close. I ensured he was protected and safe. But things changed, life threw curveballs the poor swings right through then suffer. I didn't have a choice and made the decision to begin working for his father. King placed an ocean between us. Losing my friend broke my heart.

Each time I tried speaking to him, King merely walked away. He just didn't want to hear it. My life had taken a strange and harrowing turn and I had no one to lean on. King didn't understand my accepting a job with his father was out of sheer desperation. My mother had taken ill and couldn't work to take care of herself anymore. I had no education and jobs weren't easy to come by in our town.

My responsibilities weren't solely to take care of King anymore. My mother's health and welfare came first. I wouldn't change my actions if the situation could present itself again.

Then one day, when he turned sixteen, we were told King wouldn't be coming home again. I thought they had sent him off to boarding school abroad. I couldn't have been more wrong.

Apparently, he'd taken the better part of two years to develop an app plus a small company and had sold it for big bucks.

But as I watched him with his friend in the water, I saw a side of King I'd been searching for. He was laughing, splashing water around. His friend jumped on his back and King simply laughed and dove under the water.

The old King wouldn't have gone in the water at all. Getting splashed would have angered him.

At some point along the way, and I wasn't sure when, something had changed in him.

I left him alone with his friend after that and headed into the city. It wasn't my plan to follow them all the way here. But I was wrapped up in my thoughts and before I knew what was happening, I was slowing down at the outskirts of the property.

My mother thought I was being obsessive over him. But she didn't understand. She'd spent all her time with that family in the kitchen. I knew what that man was capable of. King hadn't been behaving like he wanted, and I knew it was only a matter of time before the darkness descended.

It was late when I arrived at the hospital my mother had been staying at for the past eight months. The cancer descended and it wasn't kind. I was still a child when she became ill and hid it for as long as she could. When I turned nineteen, she told me, and I was devastated. I had needed my friend then, but King only saw me job with his father as a betrayal.

She couldn't manage on her own for the cancer hadn't been kind.

With no other options, I walked away from King and began focusing on making sure my mother had everything. I had worked hard to earn enough money to keep her at home for a few years. I had doctors come to her rather than stressing her out to travel to the hospital.

The other shoe dropped when she explained that they'd caught it too late. Nothing they did helped. Even with drastic treatment, it spread, and they really had no idea when she would go.