Chapter 36

May God bless each and every one of you for me and may he grant your heart's desires. And mine too ❤️

Kara’s POV

*

“So... You guys end up doing the fickle frackle?”

“Gosh, no we didn’t. Shut up!”

I slapped Adrian’s shoulder with a mortified expression on my face as we walked out of the department with bags in hand.

The four-eyed glasses guy sauntering out of the class beside me gave me an expression that said, ‘what-the-hell’ because he probably heard what Adrian asked but I responded with a shuddering stare. He scurried past us, probably thinking we were some freak but who could blame us? I hated this class we’d just finished and Adrian shared a like feeling for it.

I watched the guy walk off and sniggered. Minding one’s business was obviously becoming a chore for so many nowadays.

“Whatever...” Adrian drawled.

“Let’s not discuss that, okay?”

“Right,” she heaved a sad sigh, “I just wished my life could be a bit as interesting as yours. You dig? “We walked towards my car and unlocked it, sinking into the seat as she shut the door on her side. Her voice faltered as she asked me that question, something I easily caught onto.

“Don’t tell me all you had on your mind throughout today’s class was details about my sex life...or lack of thereof.” I gave her an eye roll and decided to change the topic. “That test we had this morning wasn’t as hard as I had imagined. Night reading paid off anyway.”

“So... You guys didn’t cuddle...you were just reading all through the two days you spent there, I’m sure you were only acting all stiff and boring; merely reading like a nerd.”

“I’m not stiff but we both know how I’m a nerd,” I giggled a little and finally started the car, “also, stop talking about this. Thanks, hun.”

“I want to.”

“Stop it, Adrian. Nothing happened apart from the little kiss. I told you nothing happened.” I struggled not to snap. She could be a handful sometimes and now I regretted telling her this early. I should’ve stalled some more, surely she wouldn’t be down my neck this way had I done that.

“No heated make out?”

“No. What do you want for this evening? I’m a bit tired, so if you’ll bring up something we’ll get tonight before we get on the road. We should get it.”

“At least you should’ve shown him something, given him a hint. He likes you.” Adrian pressed. Ugh, I kind of dislike her sometimes.

“Cooking or takeout?”

“Y’all story is just too cute to be true...” She sighed with a dreamy look on her face.

“Macaroni and chicken is cool right?” I hissed and gave her a death glare.

She heaved an exaggerated sigh. “I just envy you, Kara.”

“Please don’t. I don’t even have anything, just Stephano who recently confessed to liking me and that’s still a bit weird simply because I still don’t know how to feel about that yet... ” I trailed off. When she opened her mouth to say something, I cut her off, “really. Relax.”

“You don’t know how this works.”

“How would I? This is my second relationship ever. And it’s a pretend relationship, Adrian, even though I kind of like Stephano a bit more now that I know him!” I whisper yelled into her face, taking a turn and driving towards the campus hostels.

“But still...” She looked like she had something to say as she entered beside me and she still hadn’t stopped biting her lips. I gave her my full profile and pulled the pink lower lip from the tight grasp of her teeth.

“Still what?”

“You have a man who openly shows his affection. That’s rare in relationships!” She slowly explained with wide eyes staring at me in incredulity while her chestnut hair tumbling over as she shook her hair.

“Girl, please. You’re always all over Lucas, eating each other’s faces all the time. Don’t tell me that’s not enough affection to you? You guys like each other so much and I think that’s something.” I chuckled but stopped to stare deeply at her for a few seconds when her expression remained gloomy.

“I just... I’ve been thinking,” she heaved a sigh, “it’s all just the sex. Nothing else is interesting. We meet and have sex, we eat and have sex, and we go sightseeing just to have sex... I’m tired of it.”

“Tired of what?”

“How we are.”

“Tell me. I don’t know how you guys are.” I breathed and stared hard at her, surprised things weren’t all that good or as good as she had expected between herself and Lucas. We rarely talked about our relationship lives in the past because for one, I wasn’t in a relationship and Adrian on the other hand always looked so content whenever she spoke about Lucas.

“I want to start doing interesting things like having a decent convo without him looking at me as if I’m a burger he wants to devour. You get?” I paused for a few seconds, and then tapped my fingers on the steering wheel. I had never even thought of things like this because Adrian and her boyfriend had always been good, that I knew of.

They were always talking, chatting on the phone through video calls or audio whenever he was away in Philippines, his country or on some business. They never fought for more than a few hours and they really couldn’t do without talking to each other.

“Yeah... But, have you discussed this with him?”

I swerved into the Walk for Life Avenue, remembering we had to get some groceries and also I needed to check an orphanage in a few streets from here. It was a newly established orphanage. I had a thing with orphanages, maybe because Stephano’s mom used to take me to some with them while we were growing up back at the Alfonsi mansion.

Adrian nodded. “I tried telling him thrice. Those three times, it led to an evening of more body exploring...” She heaved a sigh to cut her trailed off explanation.

“Wow.” I was short of words. A thought struck my mind and I momentarily wondered if Stephano had ever looked at me and felt any sexual urge.

“I really don’t know what to make of this. You two are always so happy and gooey-eyed when staring at each other.”

“Girl, you don’t even know the half of it, l want something more. Something spontaneous...I want to look forward to a bright future with him after we graduate next year.”

I parked in front of the orphanage and alighted, going to the booth to take out the packages I already prepared since yesterday.

“Tell him. And no-” I cut her off when she threw me another look of bewilderment, obviously about to start protesting and explaining how she’d tried that several times and failed miserably. “Talk to him in the language he understands. Deny him sex. Okay?”

“Wow.” She breathed and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, picking the two remaining bags.

“Yeah...”

“How on earth do I do that? He knows all the right buttons to push and then I’ll be writhing under him within sec-”

“Ugh! Please, I don’t want to know about your sex life. When you want something Adrian, you go for it, regardless of the consequences.”

She heaved a sigh and shut her eyes tight for a long couple of seconds. When she opened them, there was confusion written boldly in it. “I just don’t want to lose him, Kara.”

“When are you ever afraid of losing someone?”

She chuckled, “Till I met him, we both know I’ve never really cared about all the other guys. He’s a good guy Kara.”

I mused. “I know. I hope you sort this out real soon because damn, where is my bitch?! She doesn’t go all mushy on me.” That earned me a chuckle from her and before I knew what was happening, her slim arms had wrapped around me.

“I’ll be fine. Come on babe. Let’s go feed some kids.” We alighted and headed for the first door facing us. It was time to get to work!

~°~

“Ring A-ring O’ Roses, a pocket full of posies, atishoo,  atish-”

Mimi snickered. “What are you? Five?”

“We could as well make proper use of this video...” I trailed off with a pointed look, showing her the video I was watching on YouTube.

“This video belongs to kids my son’s age. He’s a baby...it’s for babies... do you get now?” she told me smugly.

I slapped her butt as I huffed past her. “Just because you have a child doesn't mean you know better than us. I am a child as well, I still have a mom so I can watch this video and sing along while Armando is babbling it later on.” I snickered at my bland excuse.

“I do too, I also have a mom. But you don’t see me watching cartoons and reading rhymes all day do you?”

“Whatever. How’s his dad anyway? Has-”

“He’s fine. Great.” She responded quickly but I hadn’t even completed my question.

“You don’t want to talk about it, I get.” I started slowly.

“Glad you finally got the memo. When will you be through with exams? You come home every other day and it’s not even like you’re in your finals.”

I did an eye roll. “I have four papers next week and then I’m through. I don’t read in the day and that’s why you see me playing all the time-” I was cut off by the ringing of my phone and I raised my hand to excuse myself from the conversation with Mimi. “Hello?”

“Kara....” I look down at my phone screen with a rapid heartbeat, realizing who the caller was. Stephano.

“Yes?” a small smile crawled its way to my lips.

“Baby,” He breathed, making me bite my lower lip at the sensuality in his hoarse tone, then he cleared his throat, “How are you?”

“I’m fine. Thanks for asking.” I rasped, feeling my heart turn to mush at the mere sound of his voice. What are you doing to me Stephano? I made sure I responded in the same tone. We hadn’t seen much since that day at his office when he confessed his undying love for me, which had been a week now but he never failed to call me every single day.

“Andre is coming to pick a file now. It’s in a large green envelope on my bed.”

“Oh, alright. I’ll hand it over.”

“Have you had anything to eat?”

“Yeah, you? What did you eat?” I asked sultrily, biting my lower lip and randomly dusting an invisible wrinkle on my cloth.

“I had pancakes and juice. Then I recently ate some grapes.” He reported, making a small smile tug at my lips.

“That’s good honey, be safe at work and don’t stress too much. Okay?’” I blushed at my own motherly acts, blushing even more furiously when I heard him laugh softly.

“I will, baby, and I won’t stress too much. Also, I’ll be thinking of you a lot, so do the same, okay?” He questioned. He didn’t even need to ask, because he was on my mind a lot lately.

“Okay.” I replied bashfully.

“Take care, love.” Hr ended softly.

I giggled lightly, a bit nervous that I was now so free to this extent with Stephano, considering how we were in the past but there was no need for it though because we were doing great. “You too.” I ended the call and dropped my phone. He’d recently gotten me an iPhone and I loved all the several features on it. It wasn’t that I couldn’t get myself the phone earlier before, because the truth was that I had tons of cash in my account and Stephano still transferred more every month even though his PA was the one dealing with house workers salaries.

It just never been bothersome to me that I would need a new one since my china model was doing well and it had all the features I needed. Also, I was contemplating on trying something that wasn't china. Yes it was loud but it performed all the activities I needed it to be useful for and it also sent and received information.

What else was there to worry about? But Stephano felt it didn’t match my standards and that it was ‘annoyingly loud’. His words, not mine. That was the same thing Adrian always referred my phone as. Annoyingly loud.

I smiled as I thought about my blue eyed boyfriend. The thing was, I could never really get used to hearing him call me love. I caressed the edges of my phone and rested my upper body on the counter, smiling from ear to ear. One would think this was the first time I was hearing his voice on the phone.

“Was that the boss?” Mimi questioned as she came back into the kitchen. I hadn’t even realized I was alone until she spoke.

“Yes.”

Her face scrunched up into a cute frown. “How do you cope?”

“With?” I inquired.

“With him of course.” She stated in a duh tone.

“I just do.” I shrugged.

“Isn’t he all dominating and cold?” She further asked.

“He’s not as bad as we think he is. He just, he has a unique way of expressing himself. And he doesn’t even like expressing himself so much in the first place but once you get to know him, you’ll discover he’s very easy to talk to. He’s a good man though.” I shrugged, realizing the smile was still evident on my face as I spoke.

“Hmm. I saw how he looked at you that night at the party. He really likes you.”

I mused, remembering all the times he’d looked at me like I was meat and he wanted to devour me whole. “Really? How so?”

“He looked like something would grab you and you would be gone forever if he took his eyes off you.” She walked towards the counter and opened the carton of crayfish. Pouring some in a plate, she started munching on them.

I gave her a look that that said I was appalled but she giggled. “What?”

I shrugged. “You’re eating that much crayfish.”

“You guys rarely eat it anyway. You should be grateful I am eating this so it won’t get spoilt at home.”

Someone cleared their throat behind us and we both stilled, eyes going wide. The men from the ranch were not allowed to come into the mansion and so were the driver and gardeners.

At the same time, we turned around. It was Andre, Stephano’s office assistant. He had his eyes glued on Mimi, boring into every hole on her skin. It was full of so much expression, his one single facial expression spoke a lot and that was the first time I’d see him looking at her that way.

“Hey.” I called, diverting his attention from Mimi.

He finally faced me. “Hey, Kara. Boss asked me to get an envelope fr-”

“I should go get it. Where is it?” Mimi stated too fast. She looked like she would dash out of there any minute, her cheeks suddenly flushed as she munched on the rest of the crayfishes in her mouth.

“Okay?” Andre snapped out of his dream induced state when she spoke. “Alright. Do that.”

“Hmm.” She mumbled.

I smiled at Mimi. She looked a bit uncomfortable and I didn’t blame her. Andre was shamelessly ogling her. A dreamy look was cast about his features.

I tapped Mimi. “Don’t worry. That was why he called. I know just where it is.”

“Oh. Okay.” she stuffed two crayfishes into her mouth at the same time. Her hands shook a little as she did that.

I excused myself quickly to get the file so Andre would leave already. They should have met once or twice since Andre sometimes came here to get files or run some other errands, so I didn’t get why Mimi was being all nervous and stuff.

I entered Stephano’s room and just as he said, the envelope was right on the bed.

Turning to leave, my eyes caught the picture of a younger version of Stephano from several years ago; from when he was eighteen or nineteen years old. He was in the snow, with a red shawl around his neck and large glasses protecting his eyes.

He looked bitter about something, his expression said it all. His usually flat lips were slightly curled up in an unpleasant way to show his displeasure. My hand reached forward before I even knew what I was doing and I found myself picking the picture out of the frame and caressing it.

I heaved a sigh as I felt the pang of desire swirl within me. No, it wasn’t sexual desire. It was the desire to comfort him somehow, to tell him his smile could brighten someone’s day. His smile could brighten my day. I wished I could take his worries away but I didn’t even know how to sort out some recurring issues in my own life, talk less dealing with other peoples own.

I dropped the small frame with a small smile and slowly retreated. Hopefully, I would get to know him soon and also get to fully understand the kind of person he was. Stephano was a mystery and one would only see the side he decided to show them. He was just special, in a mysterious way.

I left his room with a sad smile on my face and walked down the stairs, lost in my own thoughts. When I heard the voices coming from nearby, I halted in my steps and started listening to the conversation.

“I could make it up to you.”

That voice came from the kitchen.

“Save it!” Mimi’s replied, a mild harshness clearly evident in her tone.

Moving closer to the kitchen entrance, my steps faltered. I took a deep breath and just stood still there, taking a peek and easily spotting them due to how wide the kitchen was. They couldn’t see me, which was an advantage because that would be so awkward.

Mimi was in Andre’s arms, his hands firmly around her waist and one finger was shamelessly caressing her backside as Andre nuzzled his nose in her neck. Mimi was facing the entrance and she looked like a lost puppy but sadness was a rare expression I saw on her. Also, her resolve was nowhere in sight.

“I said I am sorry for everything that happened then, believe me Miranda.” Andre spoke unevenly, concern thick in his tone. Mimi didn’t seem fazed.

“And I said I have moved past that.” Mimi muttered but I could still hear her due to how silent the mansion was.

“Come live with me again. I promise not to-”

She struggled out of his grasp but Andre held her tight in his hold till she relaxed again.

“Please, baby. I’ve missed you.” He mumbled into her neck and Mimi made a pleasure filled sound when he slowly kissed her there.

My right hand moved to cover my mouth so I wouldn’t make a sound. Who would have thought?!

Were they involved? Had they slept together before? Was it a one night stand?

“I can’t.” She groaned. It sounded like a moan though.

“Why?”

Mimi looked up at him like he was a special person she’d always had this fondness for. That look slowly turned into a glare, as if Andre’s question had been very offensive and she huffed.

Andre’s brows knitted together. “Oh. Him.”

“Yes.” She pouted. Oh goodness gracious, she actually pouted.

“But is my son alright?”

“Very much.” She nodded.

My eyes nearly bulged out of their sockets. His son?! Mimi’s chubby cheeks is Andre’s son?! So many information for just one day!

“I’ll find a way. He can’t keep you away from me.” The protectiveness seeped from his words. It was like Andre was staking his claim on Mimi and she couldn’t even fight it. Maybe she wanted it.

Mimi moved out of his grasp and he let her but he looked like it took him a lot of battle to watch her leave the comfort of his grasp. “If you say so.”

“I lo-” he started. I decided it was time I got out and revealed myself, so I did, stomping my foot a little so they would be aware I was approaching and move apart. But it felt like I’d ruined a good moment between them. What was he about to tell her before I showed up?

“Hey. Here’s the file.” I told him, avoiding Mimi’s eyes. Then I smiled up at him and looked from one person to another. The air was tense.

Andre looked a little conflicted as Mimi quickly went to the fridge him but he didn’t say a word. Instead, his frown morphed into a tight smile as he looked down at the file in my hand. He took the envelope and left without a single word.

Mimi turned and smiled at me. But I didn’t miss the sadness in those eyes; the longing for the man who had just walked straight out of the kitchen. Then I realized one thing.

I never really knew anything about anyone.

I rarely knew a thing about Stephano and his life when he was younger or why he’d turned out the way he was, as a brooding man.  Also knew absolutely nothing about Andre and Mimi’s relationship; even Adrian and her relationship with her boyfriend was still somewhat a mystery to me.

I wished I could offer some sort of advice to them all or soothe whatever wounds they were feeling its ache.

Wished I could help them all, but I knew I couldn’t. And this was the real world. I still didn’t know how to cope with my own life, talk less butting into that of others.