The night seemed to stretch longer and I found myself wishing I could fast forward it all to get it all over with. I was exhausted from the day’s events what with Sonia almost finding out and having my parents call me 10 minutes ago, saying that they’ll be back home soon. Don’t get me wrong, I’m ecstatic that they would be around. We would have movie marathons, eat some sushi, grab a few ice creams and pig out together but it would undoubtedly get harder for me to sneak out into the night for these fights and God knows how much I couldn’t afford missing out on these fights.One missed encounter and you’re out.It was a huge tournament and although I wasn’t aiming to win the whole thing for pride and fame, I did aim to collect enough money to fund Carla’s medications and ‘enough money’ wasn’t just two grand. Two grand can probably get her two treatments at the most but to actually giv

I looked left and right among the small groups of people, trying to find a certain blonde but after a minute of searching and coming up short, I rounded the school to the parking lot and searched for the pink car.“Case!” Penelope called, jogging towards me with a huge grin on her face. I thought that she was going to stop jogging once she was nearer but instead, she increased her jog into a sprint. I didn’t have enough time to brace myself and almost went sprawling onto the rough pavement if it wasn’t for Penelope holding onto me. She smiled weakly when she lets go of me from the hug, seeming sheepish of how she reacted at the sight of me and I gave her a small smile. She was definitely something.“I’m sorry. I was just so happy and excited that you finally gave me a chance to prove myself to you. God, I won’t let you down! I promise,” she gushed and she sounded so determined that for a minute there,

I shut the door of my car and walked in the cafe, ordering some overdue hot chocolate and took a seat on one of the booths.A minute passed, then it was two, three and soon, half an hour.I tapped my nails impatiently on the wooden table. Where the hell was this guy?Probably banging some chic; typical.Jealous? Hah. Not a chance. Don’t sweat it y’all, I’ve got my eyes on some hot piece of ass and it was definitely not the man- whore you were thinking about.The bell above the door chimed, signaling someone’s arrival. By then, I was already on my phone playing piano tiles 2 with an ear bud stuffing my left ear. A hand landed on the table and jolted me back to reality and made me lose focus. My finger slipped and tapped the wrong tile, causing the song to end.Goddamit.That could’ve been a new best! This guy needed to learn some things about manners. I couldn’t wipe my annoyed expression even if I wanted to.

Today was the day of the burial. My parents decided to join me and show their condolences by attending the funeral. We were already on our way and the whole car ride was silent. The funeral was held in a town a couple of hours away, where Adam moved from. Her family wanted to bury her with the rest of her ancestors so we had to sit in the car for a two hours straight.I kept my eyes trained on the trees that whizzed by as we drove and I was trying really hard to keep my mind off the fact that we were going to bury Carla’s body today. Everyone knew that a funeral came with heartfelt eulogies.Jerry requested me to make a special eulogy for Carla. Although I tried preparing myself and wrote what I wanted to say in a piece of paper, nothing sounded enough to express how much of a wonderful woman Carla was so I ended up crumpling the papers and then, I had a room to sweep.In the end, I had to drop everything and rest, leaving my mind to wing it

“So you were the one who slid those envelopes into my mom’s hospital room to help pay her bills?” I winced when I saw the look in his eyes but nodded slowly.“Case; what were you thinking?! You could have died! We could have found another way to pay her bills,” I couldn’t help myself at that. I tried to bite my tongue so bad that I tasted a slight metallic taste but that was the last straw.“And then what? Watch her die slowly on that white hospital bed and see you grieve even worse because you felt guilty for not being able to prolong it for a little while until we found enough money to fund for her operation? I saw an opportunity to at least try to help buy Carla some time and I took it. That winning prize could’ve funded her whole operation if we just had more time.” My last words were accompanied with a sob.Time; that was our true enemy; It wouldn’t stop to let us catch up with it. E