Kai's History

19 Years Old (Part 2)

The very next day was surreal. Normally when I sleep outside, everything would hurt since I would be sleeping on the cold, hard floor. But now, I was sleeping on a sofa and I woke up completely fresh, clean and without any neck and back pains. The make-shift bed was so comfortable that if it wasn't for Nova waking me up, I would still be in it. 

Nova had gotten up before me and was next to the front door putting her shoes and jacket on. Was she preparing to leave? Since I only just woke up, I asked her not to leave as if I was (you guessed it) a dog whining for their owner not to leave. I wasn't thinking straight because it really did feel surreal. If I didn't know any better, I would have said it was a dream.

She smiled as she walked over to me and crouched down. Adjusting her shoe to her foot, she instructed me to relax, that she would come back in a few minutes and that there was toast for me on the kitchen table.

Keeping in mind I'm writing this in the future, I now know she went to Star Lucks to meet up with the same guy (James). 'Past me' was perplexed though and didn't have any idea to why she had to leave.

Once she left, I wandered all zombie-like towards the kitchen and ate the food she made me. Unfortunately, after one was eaten, I just wanted more. Not only was it delicious and tasty but it was also food... In the morning!

I hardly ate anything during the day and now I was eating breakfast when I normally only had 'dinner'. My stomach hurt for a bit due to eating too much in such a short amount of time. 

The house was also something to discover. Again, it's hard to describe how excited and overwhelmed I was back then. Living outside and then coming inside a nice-looking, clean house is like collecting a plant from a desert and putting it in a rainforest. I was essentially mind-blown. I went to each room of the house, except for her room since that would be an invasion of privacy.

When I went to look around Cody's bedroom, it was different because I was sleeping in his bedroom and we were practically like brothers anyway. With Nova's bedroom, it's completely different since I didn't know her very well and I wasn't sleeping in her bedroom. In fact, she kept the bedroom door locked anyway.

As I explored the rest of the house, I found a book on a small table in the apartment. Once I picked it up and opened it, I felt like I had forgotten how to read. I legitimately blanked out when looking at the words in the book. It just looked like a bunch of lines and scribbles.

The last time I probably read anything was in college and I hadn't really tried to keep my academic side of things going; I had other issues and worries to deal with. While I struggled to read for a bit, I discovered a bunch more books as well as a strangely familiar family photo working as a bookmark. 

I took a break from trying to read the unreadable and looked at the photo instead. Then, I was absolutely certain that it was Nova. I recognised her parents (at least her mum) and the little girl standing in between them.

I still didn't want to say anything to her about my true name yet. I'm sure I had many reasons for it at the time but right now, I have no idea why I did that. Perhaps to really check it was her before I creeped her out saying that "Hey, it's me, Kai! Your best friend from when you were a child! Sorry I lied to you all this time. Please let me stay.". 

Nova was still not back by then, so I got the book I found before, laid down on the sofa and persevered through the journey of 'reading'.

Eventually, I remembered how to read and I finally understood what the hell was written on the page. It was about a girl called Livy who was in a library with her boyfriend called Brad. It had something to do with a book falling on her head and the rest I didn't get to read because Nova came back. I put the book down and looked at her. She seemed angry and, to put it simply, pissed off at something. Although, when she saw me, she seemed startled at the fact I was in the house. Perhaps she had forgotten I was there?