Chapter 4 4

I tossed the last bit of my dress into the box that's spread wide open on my bed and bit my lips. For the umpteenth time today.

I wasn't going to remain in this place. And I wasn't going to UK either. I was flying back to Madagascar. After everything that happened at the Alpha Line company yesterday, I'd had enough time while I couldn't sleep last night to reflect on everything that's happened in the past few days and to think about what I wanted to do. And that was going to stay with my grandmother and only living family in Madagascar for the time being. I needed to clear my head. Nothing a couple of months couldn't fix.

By 9 a.m, I was waiting for my flight and heading out as soon as I boarded the plane. I bade goodbye to everything I ever knew there even though I was most likely gonna come back to get my things if I ever wanna move to UK as I'd initially intended, but for now it felt good watching the city from up there and biding my goodbye mentally.

I arrived Madagascar early, in the late afternoon and hailed a taxi home. When the taxi pulled up in front of my grandmother's house, I felt a strange peace inside me. Even though it's been four years since I last came here, everywhere still looked the way I left it. The house was small and fancy, flower pots decorating every nook and corner of the house, it's porch giving the perfect view of the rest of the few houses around. This side of the city wasn't really populated much, it was all cottages and woods. Deep woods.

I pulled my box up the porch and ringed the bell. I anticipated to see my grandma open that door and pull me into her arms.

I grew up to her face ever since I was a baby. She'd raised me and over the years, during highschool, people easily thought she was my mother and not my grandmother. She was a bit young to be called a grandma as funny as that sounds. My mother had gotten pregnant with me when she was still very young, then she died in a car accident a couple of months after. My father has never been in the picture according to my grandma and I never bothered to find him. I was okay with my grandma. She gave me everything any father could ever give.

"Skipper?" I heard my grandma's thin voice call from the side of the porch and I quickly turned around to see her poking her head towards me from the side of the house, a woven hat on her head, one hand going over to hold it against her head as she arched her face upward to watch me, red gloves on her hands "I thought it was you."

My smile broadened and I quickly ran down the porch to embrace her. "Hey grandma."

She'd been gardening, judging from the newly dug up dirt at this side of the house and the flowers in pots littering everywhere, and how she didn't hold me so she doesn't stain my dress.

"My dear, what are you doing here?"

I tightened my grip around her "I missed you so much."

"I missed you too dear," she said hesitantly, then added "is everything alright dear?"

Slowly pulling away, I watched her and decided I wasn't going to let anything weigh me down. That's why I'm here right? "Everything's great! What are you doing?!" I quickly went down to help with the flowers.

"God you're gonna get yourself dirty child." She said as she tilted her hat "and the sun is just too much for your skin."

At the end of the day, we ended up gardening together and for that moment I felt I had completely left every anger, every pain behind me.

After gardening, we cooked together and had dinner before I retired to my room.

The following morning, I came down stairs to meet her already seated on the small dinning table in our tiny kitchen.

"You made breakfast without me." I said as I grabbed the cereal on the table.

She chuckled and replied "I wanted you to rest, my darling." I bent over and kissed her cheek. "How was your night dear."

"It was great." I threw her my biggest smile as I sat down across from her.

My grandmother loved reading the news. After her husband passed away ten years ago, she'd picked up reading newspapers. She said it was her way of feeling closer to him. He loved reading the newspapers a lot. She folds the newspaper in her hands and tilted down the glasses that sat on her nose to watch me.

"Talk to me child, what is it?" She said. "I remember how much you hated it here in Madagascar. Obviously something drove you down here and it's still all over your face."

There was no escaping when she wanted to get something out of you.

Setting down the bread in my hands, I shifted on my seat and thought of what to say.

"I'm just.... I got really tired, grandma. Of everything. I've been looking for.... work everywhere, Grandma, but they all don't want me..."

"Stop, stop," she cuts me off "ain't nobody who doesn't want you, dear. How I wish they knew what they were missing!" I smiled gently and she did too "don't worry, everything's gonna be fine."

"Just that... I really wanted to work at this company and.... I walked in there, waited for hours and all I got was the CEO couldn't see me anymore. When I saw him walk out I challenged him and just ended up humiliating myself." I felt the embarrassment wash over me again.

"You did what you knew was right, there ain't no embarrassment there. Now tell me, which company is that?"

"The Alpha Line."

"I've heard a lot about that company. News has it that that company's buying some land deep inside the woods to move their company over. A branch, Maybe. Maybe you could get a job here when it's all set up."

I shook my head in disagreement. "No, I don't wanna work for the company anymore. Damon Matteo is a total douche."

"Damon Matteo?" She asked like she knew him. I nodded "do you still remember the Alexander cabin at the other side of town that's been vacant since the past years?"

"How could I forget? I begged you my whole life to buy it so we can move in there but you and grandpa refused."

She nodded before replying "Damon Matteo bought it."