Chapter 23 For Fear She's Stuck in There
Chapter 23 For Fear She's Stuck in There
Chapter 23 For Fear She's Stuck in There
"Since when?"
Ursula pulled her to the sofa and started grilling her about her relationship.
"Recently."
"You lied to me last time you said you helped a coworker out with the night shift, didn't you?"
"Mom, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to lie."
"It doesn't matter. You've been out there the entire night and didn't answer any of my calls. Do you have any idea how worried I was? If I didn't see you this morning, I'd go turn to the police."
Ursula said in a firmer tone, which triggered Gwenyth's tears.
"It's normal having a boyfriend at your age. Why do you have to hide it from me?"
"I'm sorry. I should have told you earlier."
Ursula exhaled a long and heavy sigh.
It was a blessing for her to return home safely.
"Are you dating one of your coworkers?"
"No."
"Then who is he?"
Gwenyth didn't know what to reply to this, but when it had to come to this, she didn't want to lie anymore. At least, she didn't want to hide from her mom the reunion with Eddison after four years.
She'd rather reveal it than hide it until her mom bumped into her and Eddison together.
After all, Eddison had come here once and would do so in the recent days. Sooner or later, Ursula would find out all of it.
"He's someone you know. Perhaps you still remember him."
Ursula was kind of fretted and urged, "Who the hell is he? Tell me already!"
"Eddison Yates."
"You mean..."
Ursula gaped, and after a pause, she restored the calm slowly.
"Is he the young master of the Yates family?"
"He is."
She lapsed into silence for a long while and then held Gwenyth's hands tightly.
"Gwen, I don't want to sabotage you, but the Yates live in a different world from us. You might need time to consider this."
Gwenyth surely knew what her mom meant.
"Mom, I'll date him for three months to see if it works."
"Even if it works, the relationship won't end well because the two families don't match."
Ursula drooped her eyeballs and looked upset as something sad occurred to her.
"Don't take it seriously, or you'll be the only victim of the relationship. Look at me and where my miserable life and I are stuck. Having me as your bad example, how could you get close to those rich playboys?"
Gwenyth didn't want to get close to Eddison Yates, but she had no choice, for she needed money. Her family needed money.
Once she walked that step, there was no turning back.
"Mom, trust me. Give me three months. I know it well and I can handle that."
"I'm afraid you're gonna be stuck in there."
"I won't."
Tears suddenly brimmed and glimmered in Ursula's eyes because she was in worry that her daughter was going to take her path.
Back in her time, she'd fallen in love with a young master of a rich family, but it hadn't ended up pretty as she'd been abandoned even if she had two children with that man.
To this day, she still had the scene playing in her head.
When Susie, who hadn't been a month old back then, was crying in her arms, she had to hold the baby with one hand and drag the trunk with the other and carry a big bag of belongings on her back. She wished she could have the third hand to hold Gwenyth's little hand.
She asked Gwenyth to grab the pocket on one side of her trousers. The little girl did it, complaining about nothing and following her staggered steps.
Gwenyth had been two years old and just learned how to run. Published by Nôv'elD/rama.Org.
Thinking about that memory and looking at Gwenyth, she was too overwhelmed to express her feelings.
"Gwen, I'm sorry you had to follow me in the quagmires all these years."
Susie was an autistic girl, so Ursula had to put most of her efforts into Susie. Therefore, Gwenyth didn't receive as much love from her mom, but even if that, she was very independent and made her mom worry less about her.
Sometimes, Ursula felt sorry for Gwenyth, for she couldn't have been that independent.
"Mom, the future will be better. I promise."
Gwenyth clenched her teeth and reached a hand to wipe tears off Ursula's face for her.
She knew the past was coming to her mother, the things that marked pain in her soul forever.
"Stopping weeping. Weeping swells your eyes, ages you, and makes you ugly."
She was comforting Ursula, but this time, great sobs racked Ursula's body and her tears kept streaming as she was going through an emotional breakdown.
"Your father should be killed a million times. He's been so ruthless and it never concerned him to ask about our situation all these years!"
She mentioning Gwenyth's father made her upset.
"Don't bring him up. He's dead to me."
"He's dead to me for a long time, dead to ashes and blown away by a gust."
"Then never talk about him again."
A man having no relations to their life was not worth mentioning again.
Ursula had cried for a while before she finally calmed down. She wiped tears off her face and got up to the kitchen while sobbing her nose.
"I'm gonna boil some eggs. You must be hungry."
"Kind of."
"Have a good rest later."
Gwenyth nodded and lay down on the sofa.
After the night with Eddison, she was worn out, and her head was still aching, probably the side effect of the pills.
She wanted to stay up and eat two eggs before sleeping, but somehow she fell into her dreams.
When she woke up again, it was 2 pm.
Neither Ursula nor Susie was at home at this point. She found a bowl containing two boiled eggs on the table, and a glass of milk alongside.
She sit up, grabbed an egg, and started husking.
At the same time, her phone rang.
She fumbled the phone out of her pocket, and the call was from an unknown number.
Hesitating for a moment, she answered it.
"Hello."
A familiar voice came through the phone, "Miss Lovelace, I'd like to ask you if something happened between you and Eddie last night."
Recognizing it was Nancy, she didn't answer but asked, "Miss Shandy, did you fix your front tooth?"
"You..."
"It was you who drugged the booze, wasn't it?"
"What drug?"
"Don't play dumb. You took the booze to us at the party on your own. I bet you prepared it for Eddison but didn't expect that he'd let me drink it."
"Since you know about all of it, then tell me, whether you have slept with him."
"What do you think?"
"Lovelace, you filthy slu..."
Before Nancy could swear more, Gwenyth hung up on her right away.
Nancy called again, but she didn't answer and muted her phone.
Taking Eddison's insults was enough, she didn't need to take from Nancy.
She ignored the screen that kept showing incoming calls, ate the two eggs, drank the glass of milk, and went back to her room to change. After that, she went out to the fast food restaurant for her shift.
She was sensing someone stalking her all the road, but looking back several times, she could only find the hustle of traffic and pedestrians, not anyone weird.
Maybe she was overreacting.
She quickly walked to the restaurant and changed into a uniform. After two hours of leisure, customers came to eat one by one at the dining hour. She began getting busy but didn't even notice a man and a woman sitting in the corner and watching her. Since they came in and got their order, they'd never moved their eyes away from her.