The Price You Pay

The Price You Pay: Chapter 02

Sara is by far the most beautiful woman to ever walk the face of this planet. She is shockingly blonde, with perfectly shaped eyebrows and blue eyes that can either be hot with fire or cold as ice. Or at least, I think so, as I've only seen the cold look so far. Her cheekbones match perfection, as does her perfect mouth.

Right now she's looking some daggers at me, but it doesn't upset me much. Hate is an emotion I know.

I can handle hate.

And I'm just guessing she's not too keen on me marching into her life, which I can totally understand. I just can't tell her that. She'd really have a reason to glare at me when she knows about my past. I decide that I'll just stay out of her way as much as possible. She won't mind that, I think.

I did meet Kabir a few hours after my arrival in the house. Sara has retreated to her room shortly after introductions, which I don't mind. Ishani insisted she wanted to sit next to me on the couch and so she is, about a foot away from me. I don't like her so close to me, but I can handle it, maybe. She's trying not to look at me as much, but I know she's staring at me like she's never seen another human girl before. Her looks make me nervous.

I feel as though she is looking right through me.

It has taken her exactly ten minutes to find out I can, and sometimes will, answer to yes-or-no questions. But mainly she's babbling about all the fun things that we can do once I'm settled in. I try to listen, I do. But I'm starting to get hungry and my painkillers are wearing out. And I'm dead tired of my trip here and all the new things. And it's only 4pm. The atmosphere is tense.

Vedant and Maya are just opposite of me. They talk a little with Ishani and try to engage me in the conversation. They treat me like the person they have just met, but at the same time the knowledge that I will stay here for a while hangs heavily in the room.

Maya occasionally asks me if I am all right. I nod every time.

That's lie, of course.

I'm not comfortable, but I don't dare do anything that might upset them. I don't dare to ask for anything. Asking things is showing weakness. And weaknesses provide mighty weapons in the wrong hands.

So far, I've not seen much that could alarm me though. Sara has even snapped at Maya and Maya didn't tell her off. Vedant is calm too, collected maybe? There's nothing of the tension here that was thick when I was with Rajeev or Stefan. But then again, they too had their own 'frequency,' maybe I still have to find the tune here.

God, what a metaphor for something so sad.

I guess I'm just waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Then I hear a car outside, and moments later, the front door opens and closes with a thud.

"I'm home," a low male voice calls out. "Can I come into the living room?"

"Are you ready to meet Kabir?" Vedant asks.

I nod. If I'm going to live in this house with others, I might as well get to know them as soon as possible.

"Come in, honey!" Maya calls in her soft voice. I'm beginning to think that her entire demeanour is this soft, not only her voice.

I don't know yet if I should look up or not, but when the door behind me opens, I turn around so quickly it dizzies me.

Kabir stands in the doorway. He's tall, well-built. His hairs are dripping from the rain and he rakes a hand through them in order to keep his hair from falling into his eyes. He spots me and stalks forward, his hand outstretched. "Hi!"

Alarm bells go off in my head and I fly up from the couch, walking backwards, away from this man that is approaching me at rapid speed. I back away until my back hits the wall, hard. My hands are splayed out on the wall near my hips, to keep myself steady and to gain some comfort out of the solid bricks behind my back. My heart is hammering in my chest from the shock. Whether this is the shock from Kabir approaching, or my own reaction to that, I don't know. I don't have room in my head to figure that out right now. The back of my mind screams at me that I'm acting ridiculous, but somehow I cannot seem to snap out of it.