Hacking The Relationship Code

Chapter 3: Keep it

I kept the rose that Nick had given me in my small purse which I slung over my shoulder. I plugged in my air pods to play my favorite playlist way back home. Charlie Puth blasted my ears with his magical voice and I drifted into the world of 'See you Again.'

Rosemount was one of the finest suburbs in St. Paul. It facilitated medium sized apartments for its residents. It was also home to abundant parks and cute cafes. Ours was a scenic suburb. The weather was pleasant all around the year and the winters were right out of some wonderland.

Everyone around the block had standard kind of apartments. I surveyed all the lawns to rank them in order of their beauty. It was just my trick to kill time while walking home. I was surveying a particular lawn when my thoughts drifted towards Adrian. That was because the lawn belonged to his apartment. It was unkempt and derelict, not much to my dismay. I knew it belonged to him because it was where our bus dropped him before shipping me off to my apartment.

Just out of curiosity, I surveyed his apartment. I stood far from the porch to get a quick 360° view of his apartment. Adrian's parents had to be well off to be able to afford this apartment. Just then I heard a thud from inside the apartment and I felt someone was approaching the door. I stepped away from my position in an attempt to not be caught trespassing and started walking along the sidewalk again.

Taking some calculated steps on the sidewalk, I turned around. I wasn't prepared for what I saw next. I saw a man tackling Adrian outside the door. Adrian limped his way to sit on the steps. His ankle was bleeding profusely and he had bruised his elbow. He was definitely in pain but he I couldn't see a flicker of it on his face. It was as if he wasn't feeling anything. He was numb while taking all of it.

I wanted to unsee the sight before me. I felt the bile rise in my throat. What was going on with him? Who threw him out of his own home beaten up to the pulp? Does he have an abusive father? Is he adopted? Thousand our similar thoughts raided my mind as I saw him closing his eyes and leaning against a boulder. I decided to approach him despite my better judgement.

When our eyes met, he rebounded as if he had seen a ghost. I could literally perceive from his face that he had a hard time reacting. I sat down right beside him. He flinched and strayed away from me. His eyes were radiating flames in which I was soon going to burn.

"What are you doing here? Go away.", he said clenching his upper and lower teeth against each other.

His demeanor daunted me. If looks could kill, I would have been a martyr by now. I was lacking words to speak due to how petrified I was. I stood still for a while as he glared at me utterly confused, to check whether I had even heard him or not.

Finally, I was able to form a coherent sentence.

"How bad is it?", I asked him.

"None of your business, get out of my property."

"I am not going away until we take care of this situation."

"This is my situation, not ours."

"Let me help you."

"Help me by going away and never mentioning this ever happened to anyone."

"If you want me to never mention it again, you are going to let me help you." I used my serious stance to show him that I wasn't going to budge.

He diverted his gaze away from mine, accepting defeat.

"Wait over here. I'll fetch a first aid for you."

"You don't need to go and buy one, you will find one inside the shoe rack by the side."

Who keeps the first aid inside a shoe rack? Were his assaults so frequent that he kept his first aid handy?

I fetched the first aid from the shoe rack and started cleaning his wound. As I applied the disinfectant on his wound, I some how could decipher from his face that he was about to cry and it wasn't because his wound was burning. My eyes roamed about his body. I could see that he had some similar wounds from before which were getting better at different places. He wasn't wearing his usual jeans which could cover all that up. He was in his shorts which made some of them visible. He was being abused, I could tell for sure and he had been hiding it for long.

His eyes told his story. They were begging me to not ask for any explanation. So, I decided no to. I simply cleaned up his wounds and placed the first aid back in its place.

"Will you be okay by yourself?", I asked concerned.

"Yes. I will be."

"You need something?"

"No."

"Will you be able to come to school tomorrow?"

"Yes."

"Okay. Take care of yourself. I'll see you tomorrow in class."

As I stood up to sling my purse over my shoulder, the rose that Nick had given me slipped out. Adrian picked it up to return it to me. He extended his hand to hand it over.

Adrian Carter was offering me a rose!!! At least it looked like that from our position.

Who could have thought? Though it wasn't from him, it was plain awkward. He felt the uneasiness between us as soon as he saw my hesitation and lowered his gaze.

"Keep it." I heard myself spell it out without thinking.

Now why did I have to do that? Maybe he could have it after all for feeling better. Not wanting to witness his reaction, I just turned around and left the spot hurriedly.

What happened there? I was still processing it. I knew it wasn't any of my business but I felt bad for Adrian. No one should be treated in such a manner. He was a child after all. Just like me.

While I was pondering over it, I couldn't help but think of how my life was so different than Adrian's and many others like him. We don't realize how valuable, what we have is until we have to live without it one day. I was living a better life than most other children of my age. I had a loving family, a great place to call home, good schooling and my best friends to be there for me. I was happy and satisfied. I shouldn't take all of this for granted.

Bringing my thoughts back to Adrian, whatever it is, Adrian is going through, I had to be there for him regardless of our nonexistent friendship. He wouldn't tell anyone of his troubles. The least I could do was be his friend. I owed that much at least to all the goodness bestowed upon me.

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