The Red Rose - The Prequel

Chapter 19

2 months later, 11 April 2014

11:05 am

Author's POV:

It had been two months since Lily came to this weird place and in these two months, she had learned a lot about it. From what she saw, she came to a conclusion that it was like an orphanage where girls who have no home live.

There weren't many girls in there, hardly thirty and Duena was their caretaker. She was a little scary at times; rarely does she go soft on them. She had a bad temper and when she was in a not so good mood, there was nothing worse than the hell she'd bring. She had learned that the hard way. Currently, Lily was the youngest girl in there. Everyone else was four or five years older than her at the very least, except for Ayna who was only a year older than her. That was why they both were roommates and lived in that small room. Everyone else stayed in a dormitory on the floor above them. Ayna and Lily were strictly not allowed there or anywhere other than their room and kitchen when the curfew starts in the evening.

Lily and Ayna had come upstairs to give Ayaat her breakfast. For the last few weeks her relationship with Ayaat had become better. She smiles at Lily when she jokes around and she had also become a tad bit more responsive than she was the first time they met. That was definitely an improvement. Lily was at first confused why Ayaat never spoke but later Ayna told her that Ayaat had not spoken to anyone for almost three to four years because something that had happened to her and she was hospitalised for nearly two months. That was all even Ayna knew about the incident. She did catch Ayaat communicating with Ayna using her hands which Ayna had explained was sign language and that she was willing to teach Lily if she was interested to learn. Lily had learned pretty much everything about sign language in the last one month. All she now needed was practice to become fluent in it.

Once Ayaat was done with her breakfast and Ayna was collecting the dirty dishes, Lily excused herself from the room and walked towards the back door of the building.

On her first day here, she had discovered that there was a back door there that could always be opened from the inside and no one had ever caught her sneaking out.

She didn't do much outside; just walking around the back yard that was filled with overgrown plants, digging holes to bury small dead animals like squirrels and snakes, lying around almost creating an animal cemetery. She always found at least one every few days. Sometimes she just sat on the little bench right next to the door doing nothing, just lost in her thoughts.

It is not that she didn't try getting out of the place and going back home. She had tried it once, one month ago and failed miserably when one of the guards saw her and took her to Duena. That was one horrible day. She gets Goosebumps just remembering it. Besides even if she got out of there, she had no idea how to get home. She barely knew her address and she was pretty sure it's not at a walking distance. But roaming inside the gates for an hour or so seems to be fine.

Lily walked out the door and took a deep breath.

It smelled funny, unlike the usual smell of wet grass and rotting wood. It smelled weird but it wasn't an unpleasant smell. She looked around trying to find the source of the smell and since she didn't find anything unusual, she decided to walk around to the other side of the building. When she reached a corner of it, she silently peeped to see if there was something there since the smell had become stronger and to her surprise, she found a man standing near the wall with a cigarette in his hands.

The smell was too strong and it was tickling Lily's nose. Her loud sneeze alerted the man of her presence and he turned his head towards the direction from where the noise had come. He just blinked at the little girl in front of him who gave him a sheepish smile before stretching out the cigarette in his hands towards her.