Chapter 30: Thirty

Chapter Thirty

“Oh great, you are awake.” Jennifer squinted her eyes as the sharp reflection of the sun hit her face. When she was well adjusted to the sudden illumination, she looked round to see where she exactly was as the bed she was lying on wasn’t exactly familiar.

As soon as she saw Charlie at the foot of the king sized oval shaped bed she knew exactly where she was.

“Don’t tell me. This is your sister’s room?” She asked teasingly.

“If I had a sister, you would be in my bed right now.” He smiled, got up and came to her side as she sat up against the wall. “How do you feel?”

“Pretty normal. How long was I out?”

“Pretty much a whole day.”

“Oh wow, so we are already in yesterday’s tomorrow?”

“A.K.A today, yes. You drank the whole bottle Jennifer, if you were out for more days, I wouldn’t have been surprised.”

Jennifer smiled sheepishly. “Sorry I drank all of it.”

“It’s fine. I must have forgotten to keep it last time I used it.”

“Keep it where? Keep it from whom? Dude you live alone.”

“Jeez girl, you don’t have to remind a lonely man of his sorry situation.” He faked a pained face as he rubbed his chest through his t-shirt making Jennifer chuckle.

“You must be hungry.”

“I am hungry.” Jennifer confirmed.

“You should have at least a sandwich first, and here it is.” He took it from his back and gave her.

“You were carrying a sandwich with you?”

“I even took them to work, all I needed was a call and I would have had them delivered.”

“Them?”

He bit his lip, looked away shyly before facing her with a cute face. “Well…I might have made ten sandwiches.”

“And…” She asked amusedly.

“I ate them all.”

“And…”

“I made one to present to you. Two actually, I ate one.” He made an extremely sad face this time and it was very cute.

“You know you have to make up for eating my sandwiches.”

“I made pasta.”

She removed the meal from its package and took a bite. “Good. Oh this is good.”

“Glad to be of service.” He stood up from the bed, leaving a dent.

“I’ll excuse you to take care of yourself. I already brought your bag in, toiletries are in the bathroom, just take your time to freshen up. Join me when you are done.” He smiled and walked towards the door.

“Charlie…” Her voice stopped him at the entrance and he turned to face her.

“Thank you.”

“Anytime.” He left the room, closing the door after him.

Jennifer got off the bed and took a minute to look round the room she was in. It was quite big and a little bit on the brown side as most of the things in the room were brown or had a shade of brown, well except for the bedsheets.

Deciding it would be inappropriate to keep Charlie waiting, Jennifer went into the bathroom and that was after she ate all of the sandwich. She was super hungry. And because of that, she wasted little time in the bathroom. Immediately she left the bathroom, body and hair dripping water, she hurriedly yanked out a t shirt and a pair of jeans. Her stomach was starting to churn.

After her hurried dressing, she ran out of the room, walking right into the dining room slash bar.

"Oh wow you are fast. Some ladies like to take their time"Charlie set down the huge bowl on the dining table.

She sat down and grabbed a plate. "Oh trust me when I say I am 'some ladies'. I am just so super hungry right now, a relaxing bathe can wait. Ow." She held the side of her stomach as a pain pierced to make a point.

Charlie immediately dished her food, pouring her a glass of water. And she immediately dug in, her full concentration on the meal in front of her.

“Be careful to not eat the plate with it. I am that good as a cook.”

Feeling a tad embarrassed, she slowed her eating pace and gave him a sly grin. “You can’t exactly blame me , I have not eaten in like 24 hours or so.”

“You know you want to say it.”

“Say what?” She dropped few strands of pasta into her mouth, realizing how great the food tasted.

“That I am an awesome, very good looking cook.”

She drank some water. “Well Charlie, you are an amazing cook. This is so delicious.”

He nodded and helped himself to some pasta.

“So, you mentioned work earlier. Where do you work?”

“I work mostly at home actually. As an entrepreneur and rightful owner of my company, I can do as I please.”

“I hardly got to work from home when I was working at my dad’s company. My father wouldn’t even want to hear that I stayed at home to work.” Jennifer went quiet for a minute and she smiled sadly as she remembered her father.

“Jennifer, are you okay?” He had noticed the change in her expression and dropped his fork.

She shook her head, not sure whether to answer yes or no. “I…I just miss him you know. I miss my dad a lot. Funny thing, his birthday is next month and we are meant to be in Bahama right now, making plans concerning his birthday party sort of retirement party. But he left me here too soon .”

Charlie placed his hand on hers soothingly. “It is very normal to feel this way , all you have to do is focus on the good memories. Let those be the ones to make you happy, because our loved ones, if they truly care about us, won’t want to see you sad.”

“So you are like also a motivational speaker?” She asked teasing him, his words sinking into her brain.

“Oh no. I don’t even like them, I don’t buy their talks at all.”

“I hear you.” She smiled and ate some more.

“Anyway as I was saying earlier about my work, I own a electrical and electronics company where we repair and sell appliances. Not to toot my own horn, but we are the best in the city.” He smiled victoriously. ‘Well, he must have gone through a lot to get the company to where it is, cause this smile is bright.’ Jennifer thought.

“These days I work from home because I need to get more sleep hence the sedatives. But someone drank a whole bottle of it and slept throughout the day and I had to be around to give her food.”

“I will be hearing this a lot won’t I?” He grinned.

“Hey, you are done with your food. Do you want some more?”

Jennifer took a look at her stomach and then the almost empty plate. “Let me take some minutes break from eating.”

“Alright.” He pushed his plate aside, covering it.

“So let’s talk. About your situation. Is the police aware of your issue?”

Jennifer took a gulp of the water in front of her before answering. “Yes they are. Ever since I was found, they have been aware. But unfortunately they couldn’t do much because your city has some unsettled feud with mine, so full investigation was not possible. But the guy I stayed with, Mark, his friend Mike and the sergeant in charge of my case decided to hire a private investigator to look into things.”

“Do you think the investigator would be back by now?”

“I don’t know. I really don’t know. I should be at Mark’s now, waiting for the PI’s arrival but I just had to leave that boredom house.”

“Was it that bad?”

“It was terrible.” Jennifer said intensely. “I could feel my brain decaying at a point.”

“Oh wow. Didn’t you tell him to take you out or something? Hamesia is quite fun you know.”

“Charlie the night I snuck out after him, I had asked him earlier that day to take me along and he said and I repeat, ‘I would rather a chicken follow me.’”

“Why does he sound angry at the world?”

Jennifer threw her hands in the air dramatically. “He is so unexplainable. He is like some crazy, grumpy, old woman.”

Charlie smiled softly, his eyes narrowed at her with a very gentle stare. Noticing the way he was looking at her, she dropped her drama, sat well and cleared her throat.

“What?”

He sat up immediately as though he immediately realized he was staring, bit into his lower lip and ran his hand through his hair. “You are quite dramatic. And I like drama.”

“Oh.” She said, almost inaudibly.

“Yeah . So I wanted to ask this question after you told me your story yesterday. Let’s accept that you don’t remember how you came to be around the ocean at all…”

“I don’t even like swimming.”

He nodded as though noting her statement. “And I am guessing the only people that know that are people close to you?” She nodded in affirmative.

“Alright. So, I did a little research yesterday, at the other side of our ocean is a relaxation center. So I am taking a wild guess and saying you probably went on an holiday or something.”

“A relaxation center. Well Francis and I were talking one time about where we would be having our honeymoon and I don’t remember us talking about any relaxation center.”

“Well, you probably went on an holiday to the center because it is directly connected to the ocean making it easy for whoever it is that drowned you. So I am sorry to say, it is probably Francis or any other person close enough to you that you would go on an holiday with.”

Hearing Charlie’s proposition, her heart felt heavy again. The thought that it could be Francis made her close her eyes for a second, thinking why he would do it if he was the one that indeed did it.

“Listen Jennifer, it is probably not true, it is just how I feel about the whole thing.”

Jennifer nodded, her mind suddenly wondering why there was no missing picture of her on the internet.

‘Maybe…”She could not even complete the thought.

“Jennifer, don’t stress yourself with that right now. Look, I got music concert tickets for both of us. You clearly need a distraction before you lose your mind from all these drama and I am here to create more than one distraction. I am here to give you an amazing time while you are still here. So what do you say?” He got up and stretched his hand to her.

“Was that supposed to be your convincing speech?” She grabbed his stretched hand, smiling wide.

“Call it whatever. What do you say?” He asked again.

“I would love to be distracted.”

“You are going to have the best week, I promise you.” He said, pulling her into a hug.