The Orphanage Rose

Chapter 4

I pull Cecile with me in the our attic room. I quickly check if there is anyone in the room who could overhear us talking.

Luckily there isn’t.

Cecile sits down on her bed as I give her my handkerchief. She dries her tears and I sit next to her.

‘’Now,’’ she sniffed, ‘’ tell me what happened.’’

‘’Last night, I heard someone screaming.’’ I begin, feeling the tears burning behind my eyes. I went looking for it, and found it. I saw  a girl, leaning over Sara’s bed. Sara was the one who was screaming and…’’ I swallow my tears escaping.

‘’Please go on,’’ Cecile speaks with a voice thick of emotion.

‘’And I couldn’t do anything, I couldn’t to help her.’’ I cry.

‘’It’s okay,’’ Cecile says, then she hugs me. I feel slightly comforted by her hug.

I look at the old clock which hangs on the wall opposite of me, and see it is already 2:15 PM.

‘’We should go downstairs,’’ I whisper, unable to speak with a normal voice.

I hear someone move in the shadows. My eyes flick in the direction of the sound. The person shyly comes forward, tears in her eyes.

‘’I didn’t want to,’’ she says, ‘’I didn’t want to hurt her, I just had no choice.’’

My eyes widen as I see that the person who just admitted to hurt Sara, was Becky.

While I’m cleaning the bathroom floor, I keep thinking about Becky and Sara. The bathroom floor doesn’t seem to get less dirty but I don’t care. I’m glad to have some time to think.

It’s been a week since Sara got attacked by Becky. We help her with taking care of her wound, we don’t want it to get infected. Unfortunately we don’t have much equipment but we do the best we can.

It slowly gets better but it takes all of our spare time.

I barely hear someone entering the room. I jump when someone softly touches my shoulder.

‘’Edeline… It hurts’’  Sara says, with tears in her eye. I wash my hands in the sink and kneel in front of Sara. I cut her hair so it hangs in front of her non-eye, which of course has bandages on it. I brush her hair away from her face and examine the bandages.

‘’I can’t help you now, I need to finish my work.’’ I say, shivering form the thought of the punishment you get when you don’t finish your work. I only say it has something to do with a whip.

She nods. A tear escapes her eye. She walks away, barely making a sound.

Finally, the bathroom floor is cleaned. I sigh and walk out of the bathroom, looking for Sara. I see Cecile walking down the hallway hurriedly. A worried look in her eyes reveals she is stressed about something.

‘’Cecile, what’s going on?’’ I ask while I walk towards her.

She searches for something.

‘’Cecile answer me,’’ I say, a worried tone filling my voice.

‘’Sara, her eye, It’s getting worse,’’ Cecile replies while finally looking up at me.

I see her blue eyes filled with tears and emotion.

‘’How long do we need to keep up with this?’’