Cassandra

Cash requirement

It turned out helping wasn't so complicated and neither was getting a job. Alice's father gladly accepted me as an employ, although Alice herself wasn't too happy about it. I got to work whenever I felt like it – best job ever.

Helping out did rob a lot of my time, but I did get quite a lot of new experiences. Patrick was really good at chemistry, so he taught me some pretty cool stuff. Alice didn't want to teach me anything and kept as much as she could away from me. I guess I couldn't really blame her for not trusting me.

In general Patrick and Alice went against most stereotypes. Alice was the mechanic, the IT girl, basically she worked on everything that had electricity and she was pretty into wearing clothes and her hair so that she was more similar to a boy than a girl, not to mention her attitude. Patrick was the doctor, chemist, science guy. When somebody got hurt, it didn't matter if it was physically or mentally, he fixed it. He was just generally a nice guy, too nice.

My meetings with the parole officer were quite boring. All I did was say, that I was okay, everything was going great and that was it. Well except that he wanted me to teach one of his daughter chemistry, because he couldn't understand a thing and she was failing, so I got another extra job, but I guess I was that good at teaching, that after three meetings, she was already getting straight A-s.

Christmas was awesome and so was New Year's Eve. I had never celebrated them before. Wasn't really planning on celebrating this year either, but the whole science center had a party and sitting all alone in my dorm for the whole Christmas break, didn't seem like a good plan. I spent the rest of the holiday with Aurora at her grandparents' house. They were really nice people. Aurora had lived with them ever since her parents were murdered. She liked her grandparents a lot too, but they got at times way too overprotective and she couldn't really handle it, especially because of the whole superhero thing, so she was really happy to move out, once she got into the university, although she didn't really have to. Her grandparents lived about 20 km from the university.

Even though being there with Aurora and her grandparents was a lot of fun and it really wasn't my fault, I still felt guilty about what my father had done to her parents. Her grandparents of course had no idea, who I was.

*

Everything went well until one quite usual Monday. It was 4 pm. I was just walking home from my last lecture.

"Hey, Cassy, you got a minute," said Seth. He honestly came out of nowhere, I almost had a heart attack.

"What the hell are you doing here? How did you find me?"

"Well it was pretty complicated. I've been coming here for a whole week, hoping to find you." Didn't he know, there was no school during the weekend?

"I said I was done. You're not getting anything from me." I kept walking towards my dorm.

"What makes you think, that I want something?"

"Because it has been over three months and so far you have had zero interest in me. Now you suddenly show up and expect me to think, that you are here just for me?"

"Okay, you are right. I need cash." So he just blurted it out. He wasn't even trying to ease into it.

"I told you, can't help you. Where am I supposed to get cash anyway?"

"You have a scholarship."

"If I give it to you, how am I supposed to live then, huh? Besides why are you asking me anyway? Why not ask your freaky friends or those crime bosses you are supposedly getting along better?"

"Because I owe those crime bosses. I messed up a deal okay, they lost a lot of money and now they want it back."

"Again, how is my very small scholarship supposed to help?"

"Maybe if they see, that I'm working on getting their money back, they will give me more time to get it."

"You know that is not how it works."

"Well they are not getting their money back, if they kill me."

"Just steal the stupid money and leave me alone."

"Come on, Cas, help me out. I need a lot of money to show them, that I'm working on it, so everything helps. You don't want me to die, do you?"

"Prove it."

"Prove what?"

"That you actually need it to save your life, not just to buy drugs or alcohol or something else pointless."

"What do you want me to do? Drag you to the guy I own the money? He will just kill you."

"What's the name of the guy?"

"You don't know him, his new."

"How convenient."

"Look, I'm not kidding, Cassy. I really need help." He looked at me with sad puppy eyes. I had never seen him this desperate, so maybe he was even telling the truth.

"Fine," I said reluctantly.

"Great!"

"No, not great. I have a few terms of my own."

"Like what?"

"First of all, I'm going to give you the money, just so you could show the guy you are working on it, but I want it back later. I'm borrowing, not giving it to you?" I tried to speak slowly and simply, hoping that he would get it through his thick scull.

"Okay, no problem." I was probably never going to see that money again.

"Second of all. Once we are through with this, I really don't want to see you again."

"Come on, Cas, you can say whatever you want, but I know you still care about me."

"I only care enough about you to not see you die, but that is it."

"So about the money?"

"Meet me here, tomorrow 7 pm." We were in front of my dorm.

"Why not now?"

"Because my money is in the bank now and I have to go get it." After I got a job I realized, that I couldn't just keep cash under my bed anymore, because no place really pays their workers in cash. I had to go to a bank. I guess since I was only 19, they didn't really bother to check my background that much and just created me an account. I also got my first bankcard.

"Fine, but you better be here tomorrow and not leave me hanging, because I have to meet them on Thursday."

"Hey, you came to me remember? So my rules or you just leave empty handed."

He turned his back and left. No thank you or anything, he just left. What a jerk. I really should have left him hanging.