Bernie kicked a pebble. It flung into air and landed in a puddle in front of his gate. Small droplets of dirty water splashed his doorstep as he jumped over the puddle and opened the door.
It creaked, announcing his presence all the while he entered and closed it again. Though, his grand entrance was overshadowed by his father's shouts.
"OH YOU THINK YOU CAN HIT ME NOW?! YOU WILL HIT ME? FUCKING TRY BITCH, I WILL BREAK THAT JAW OF YOURS."
Bernie heaved a sigh and strolled up the metal staircase trying to make as less noise as humanly possible. His mind reeled back to the conversation in the cyber cafe, he remembered Nadia's half-lidded eyes and subtly smiling lips as she reminicised about her father.
A pang of jealousy stabbed his chest though he shut the thought down before it could escalate any further. So what if she had a perfect mother and perfect father? He's gone now, it must be sad for her. He must be grateful for what he has.
Grateful.
Bernie scoffed as he placed his bag on the chair in front of his study table. He beelined towards the bathroom to wash his hands and wiped them in the towel hanging outside the rickety door. He walked back to his study table, flicked on the study lamp and took out the homework worksheets from his bag.
Shouts and banging continued downstairs which urged Bernie to put in earphones and play music on his phone. Though his eyes were staring at chemistry equations and Kate Perry was roaring in his ears, his mind couldn't help but spiral.
Ryker was wealthy, athletic and handsome. Nadia was talented and hardworking with a supportive mother. Marilyn seemed perfect. Nobody had to deal with the shit he dealt with on a daily basis. He exhaled, mumbling to himself, "This is why education is important. Educated people don't fight. I must study to be better."
He spent the night completing his homework and re-watching downloaded movies on his phone. They provide him an outlet to laugh, cry and escape. To be a person different from the one living under a metal shed, in a small room, surrounded only by books, a study table, a chair and a bed.
His stomach did grumble overnight. It's not like they wouldn't give him food. His portion would probably be sitting on the dining table downstairs, getting colder and staler by the minute. It's just that Bernie did not have the courage to go downstairs, to face his parents, to breathe wrong in their presence and trigger yet another fight. He would rather stay up and wait for tomorrow.
Surely, Nadia and Ms. Paisely would be pleased to have him for breakfast. Sleep consumed him as his mind travelled farther away from the present, imagining tomorrow's breakfast. Maybe it would be noodles with a warm chicken broth and stir-fried vegetables on the side. Maybe it would be grilled sandwiches and milk. Maybe it would be porridge and rolls and Nadia would force her share into his bowl when Ms. Paisely was away.
Every morning Nadia would wake up late, it would be Ms. Paisely making porridge for breakfast and buying rolls from the Square. Though she only had two mouths to feed, Ms. Paisely would always buy extra for Ryker and him. She wasn't mandated to, they never said that she should.
She just did.
And the little gesture warmed Bernie's heart.
It began around the middle of fourth grade when Nadia proposed they all walked to school together after Bernie's bicycle broke down. He had shown up at the Paiselys' doorstep, looking bedraggled and hunger-stricken. Ms. Paisely opened the door for him, invited him inside and naturally sat him down on the dining table beside Nadia.
She kept an extra bowl of porridge for him and some leftovers from the night before while Nadia munched on her rolls. Bernie just stared at the food, desperate to eat but also feeling awkward to devour it mannerlessly in front of Ms. Paisely.
Maybe she caught the cue and went inside. Bernie didn't care. He merely grabbed the spoon and started inhaling the porridge. Maybe it was the fact that he was eating so hungrily that Nadia said she doesn't like porridge and gave him her portion as well. She muched on carrots and cucumbers while Bernie licked clean two bowls in record time.
They never called out his desperation but it was obvious enough that they noticed. Ever since, they saved a seat for Bernie, the one beside Nadia, middle of the left row. It was Bernie's place.
The next morning, as usual, Bernie rang the Paiselys' doorbell. Though the door should have open on the first ring and he should have been greeted with Ms. Paisely's familiar shouts, 'Look, even Bernie is here! Can you get out of the shower now?? I will be late!'
But today, the door was pulled opened and a solemn Ms. Paisely greeted him at the door. Sweat stuck her face, her hair were a tangled mess and dark circles caged her eyes. She was wearing her work clothes but her entire being did not look like she was going to work.
"Are you okay, Ms. Paisely?" Bernie asked, wide-eyed.
"Oh Bernie, I am glad that you're here. Nadia is sick. She was burning up around 3 in the morning. I have got the fever down but the cold's still there. The changing weather must have got to her," Ms. Paisely replied as she let Bernie inside.
"Oh you must have worked hard. Don't worry, let me take over now, I will help in any way I can," Bernie stated as he entered, took off his shoes and neatly placed them in the shoe rack.
"Oh, thank you sweet child, I will get your leave application approved from Mr. Robert. You can just stay here and keep an eye on Nadia, give her something if she needs, will you do that?" Ms. Paisely asked as she meandered around the living in search of a hairbrush.
"Yes, always, don't worry," Bernie smiled and beelined towards Nadia's room. He knocked on the room before entering and spotted a sweaty Nadia wrapped up in the thickest blankets she owned, coughing in her sleep. Bernie grimaced as the scent of nose-clearing-balms assaulted his nostrils. He opened the window and let in some fresh air and sunlight.
"Tsk tsk tsk," Bernie stood by Nadia's bed and stared at her, "It's literally the third day of school and look at you." He looked around the room. The ground was littered with rolled up tissue paper and used wash towels. A small fiber tub laid beside the dustbin with its own fair share of tissue trash in it.
Her study desk had books scrambled all over and half opened magazines hung off the bookshelf beside it.
"Lock the door Bernie, help yourself with breakfast, yeah? I'm leaving. Be safe!" Ms. Paisely called out as she left. Bernie heard the front door close shut and went outside to lock it. He took out his mobile phone and dropped a quick text to Ryker: 'Come to Nadia's place. Ms P is at work and she is sick.'
Bernie slipped the phone back in his pocket and stared around the silent house. This was the most silent he had seen the house be. He sighed and mumbled, "What does a sick person need?"
His stomach grumbled.
"Ah-ha, food, of course," he said to himself and beelined towards the kitchen. The refrigerator was stocked up with fresh vegetables, sauces, fermented vegetables, eggs, milk and bread.
"There's nothing in here," Bernie stated as he closed the refrigerator. "Should I ask Ryker to buy food on his way? No, sick people cannot eat food made outside..." Bernie tsked. Nadia's violent middle-aged-man coughs alerted him and he ran back in her room.
"Hey, are you okay? Do you need anything?" He asked, voice tender as he saw Nadia stare up at him with one open glassy eye.
She nodded, sniffled then muttered, "Tissue." Her soft voice was laden with phelgum.
"Of-of ofcourse," Bernie stuttered and looked around the place for a tissue box. Her room was too messy and he remembered a tissue box sitting on living room table. He ran and brought it back for Nadia. "Here you go, anything else?" He asked.
Nadia shook her head and agressively blew her nose.
"You poor child," Bernie held her hair out of her face as she blew her nose.
Nadia lazily threw the tissue ball on the ground and fell back into the bed. Bernie grimaced, ran to the bathroom to wash his hands and ran back with a mop and broom in his hand. He broomed her flood, cleared out the trash and mopped the floor before the doorbell started ringing agressively.
"Shut up! You're going to wake Nadia up!!" Bernie whisper-shouted as he unlocked the door. A panicked Ryker entered, throwing his bag on the ground and flinging off his shoes in the foyer. He ran into Nadia's room without a second glance to Bernie-the-maid's scowling face.
"Nadia! Are you okay?! What happened? Do you have a fever? Are you sick really bad? Should I bring the doctors to you?!" Ryker shot questions after questions as he perched himself on the corner of her bed and started feeling uo her face.
Forced awake, Nadia grumbled and wriggled out of Ryker's grip. "Shut up and leave me be, I am disgusting, go wash your hands. It's just a cold," Nadia grimaced, voice thick with phelgum.
Ryker winced and pulled Nadia into a hug, caressing her back, he whispered into her ear, "Don't worry, I won't let anything happen to you, okay? Just sleep well."
"I am not dying you dumbarse," Nadia wriggled out of the hug, "And I will sleep when you let me," she grumbled, took out another tissue and blew her nose in Ryker's face. Through it all, he sat there, staring unmoving.
"Get away dude," Bernie thrashed the back of Ryker's head, "Or you'll get sick as well and I'll be in a mess." He stared at the new rolled ball of tissue laying on the ground and mentally swore. Then, he dragged the dustbin by Nadia's bedside and popped the trash ball in.
"Look at her," Ryker all but cried, "She looks so haggard and sickly..." Ryker sniffled, eyeing Nadia's small face in the midst of all that hair as she slept again.
"Oh my, she just has a cold dude. Go make ginger honey water for her," Bernie ordered and moved onto rearranging the books on the table.
"I don't know how to make ginger water," Ryker replied, "You make ginger water, I will clean."
Bernie turned to look Ryker in the eye and laughed out loud at his kicked-puppy expression. "Do you know how to clean, Mr. Cordelio?" He asked.
"I just have to stack the books, it's not that hard," Ryker rolled his eyes and piled up all of Nadia's books in a shaky tower. "See, all done!" He exclaimed.
"Hush!!" Bernie smacked Ryker's head again and pulled him out of the room. He got rid of the gloves in his hand and washed them. "You search honey, I'll search ginger," Bernie ordered and got to work.
This was the first time in their lives wherein an ocassion had arrived for Ryker and Bernie to be of genuine service to Nadia. But the poor lass had raised spoilt brats who could not peel a ginger without sacrificing 3/4th of its parts in the bin. Turning on the gas stove freaked Bernie out and he put the pan on a high flame and added water a minute later, eliciting seething from both, the pan and Ryker.
Vapour rose and fogged their vision. They boys coughed and threw the pan into the wet washbasin, raising even more seething noises.
"Let's microwave instead," Bernie stated.
"Yes please," Ryker nodded. His eyes glanced over the living room wall clock and widened with scandal. "We have been at it for forty minutes?!"
"Well making ginger water is no feat for the cowardly," Bernie stated.
"Microwaving it surely is," Ryker said as Bernie added water into a cup along with ginger and honey and put it in the microwave for fifteen minutes.
Around the ten minute mark, when Ryker and Bernie had opened the stocked up fridge for the seventh time and claimed, "How is there nothing to eat? I am so hungry," was when the doorbell rang.
Ryker walked up to the door and peeked through the eyehole. He spotted a blonde head and rolled his eyes as he opened the door.
"Marilyn," he greeted.
"Out of my way," Marilyn snapped as she entered the house and haphazardly took off her shoes in the foyer, "Where is my Nadie? Is she super sick?" She asked, looking at Bernie. Her hands were stacked with paper bags and they scrunched as Bernie pointed his hand towards Nadia's room and Marilyn sucked in a deep breath.
She entered the room without knocking, tip-toed around Nadia's sleeping figure and unloaded the paper bags on her bedside table. Bernie swore under his breath as the previously spotless table was now littered with medicine boxes, chocolates and flower petals.
"Did she get something to eat?" Marilyn asked, staring at Ryker and Bernie leaning on each side of the doorframe.
"The ginger water is in microwave," Ryker pointed towards the kitchen.
Marilyn scrunched her nose, leaving the paper bags on the floor, as she walked back into the living room. It smelt like burning ginger and honey, she realised. "How long has it been in there?" She asked Ryker while Bernie was picking up the paper bags and rearranging the medicines, chocolates and flower petals in three different piles.
"Not long enough," Ryker replied.
"I reckon it is too long enough," Marilyn forced a smile at him and turned the microwave's dial back to zero. As she stood in front of the machine, the fumes were clearly in sight. She opened the door and lo! The cup was empty and what remained within it was charred ginger and honey at the bottom.
"I guess you were right," Ryker shrugged his shoulders and coughed upon inhaling the ginger fumes.
Marilyn turned on the exhaust and shoved Ryker out of the kitchen. "Leave it to me, you go and do something you're capable of," she snapped at Ryker.
The ravenette scoffed. A woman quarter his size was ordering him around. He scoffed again. That woman wasn't even Nadia. He scoffed thrice.
"I am very capable of cooking!" He snapped and re-entered rhe kitchen. "I've cooked with Nadia on countless ocassions!" He said a little too loud, urging a scoff from Bernie who was still in Nadia's room. "I know where everything is kept!" Ryker added, just in case his flex case was weak before.
"You would be more useful if you had called your butler to speak that in your stead," Marilyn scoffed, "I bet you haven't turned on a gas stove in your life."
"Oh I so have!" Ryker snapped back, without adding: just today!
"Mhm," Marilyn rolled her eyes and took the pan out of the sink. She washed it and placed it on the stove before opening the refrigerator to look for ginger.
"I do not like your attitude," Ryker scoffed.
"I do not like your incompetence," Marilyn mumbled, "Nadia deserves better."
"Ginger is there!" Ryker all but shouted, pointing at the box in the lower half of the refrigerator.
"I was looking at it," Marilyn mumbled.
"You so were not," Ryker scoffed again.
"Watch and learn, loser," Marilyn snapped and took out the ginger. She washed it and started peeling it with a knife like she had been peeling gingers all her life.
"Woah, you're good," Bernie said as he stood behind her with a smile on his face.
Marilyn flushed but said nothing in reply.
"I'm so hungry, should we order some food for ourselves?" Bernie asked Ryker as he pulled him out of the kitchen.
"Mhm, let's do that," Ryker grumbled as he sat himself on the sofa and called Antonio. "What do you need?" He asked Bernie who took a seat on the other end of the sofa.
"Noodles with chicken broth and stir-fried vegetables on the side," Bernie grinned.
"That was awfully quick," Ryker mumbled, "Two Noodle Special Meals from Sinha's please, thank you," He said into the phone and hung up.
The boys looked back, saw Marilyn efficiently working around the kitchen and turned again.
"Do you think we should learn how to cook?" Ryker asked, staring dead into the glass of the table in front.
"Maybe, yes, we cannot let Nadia feed us forever," Bernie replied.
Ryker leaned back into the sofa, amused by the idea. He did not mind eating Nadia's food for the rest of his life. Somehow, the thought made his heart skip a beat. How odd.
Nadia's door clicked open and she walked out. Her eyes were swollen, hair a mess, and nigh-suit smelling of sweat. "H-Hi," she croaked as she looked around the house, "I did not know there were so many of you."
"Nadia! I'm making porridge for you! Here you go, drink some ginger honey water, here, come, sit down!" Marilyn grabbed Nadia's hand, seated her on the sofa, between Ryker and Bernie, and handed her the glass. "Are you feeling any better?" She asked as eyed the bad hair. "Bring a hairtie," she ordered Bernie, "You bring me a tub of water and a towel," she ordered Ryker.
Bernie stood up instantly but Ryker stood up hesitantly, eyes narrowed at Marilyn's blonde head. She helped Nadia sit with her back resting against the sofa and held onto the glass while she took small sips of the water. Bernie came back with a hairtie and comb. Marilyn looked up at him, surprised by his thoughtfulness.
She smile and thanked him before beginning to comb Nadia's hair. The girl moaned and winced while Marilyn womanhandled her hair into a neat bun. "Good enough," she mumbled as she looked at Ryker who stood beside her with a tub filled with water and a towel hanging over his shoulder.
Marilyn dipped two fingers in the water, expecting it to be chilly and get a reason to demean Ryker but the water was lukewarm. So, she merely rolled her eyes, wetted the towel and ran it over Nadia's sweaty body.
"T-thank you so much," Nadia croaked again, tearing up.
"Yes, yoy better start packing lunches for Marilyn now," Ryker snorted. He stood behind the sofa and cupped Nadia's small face, "Look at what you did to yourself, overnight, might I add. Tsk tsk tsk. You had too much fun in the cold yesterday, did you not? Now look at yourself!"
Nadia coughed on him.
Ryker grimaced and looked away, earning a cackle from Bernie.
"Don't get sick, Nadia or we'll all starve to death," Bernie pinched her cheeks.
"Mhm, I'll try," Nadia mumbled through the Bernie's cheek-assult.
"No, you must!" Ryker snorted, "Or Marilyn here will be working overtime, unpaid."
"It's called taking care of a person, try it sometime," Marilyn rolled her eyes as she ran the towl around Nadia's neck and nape. "Do you feel any better?" She asked.
"Mhm, loads," Nadia nodded.
The doorbell rang and Ryker ran to get it. Their food order had arrived. Ryker winced at the timing, hoping Nadia wouldn't get a whiff but her demonic eyes were staring at him the moment he entered the living hallway.
"I smell noodles with chicken broth and stir-fry," Nadia stated.
"You shouldn't eat it though," Marilyn insisted.
"Only a few bites," Nadia pouted, "And I can smell the porridge about to burn."
Marilyn shot up and ran into the kitchen. Nadia gestured Ryker to come up and open the food. Bernie grimaced as Nadia did not seem like she was about to give up the noodles in a "few" bites.
"There are chocolates in your room, Marilyn brought them, did you know?" Bernie tried to redirect her attention.
"No, no, no, I don't want chocolate. I want a spicy burning soup to burn my cold away," Nadia stated as Ryker opened the lids of the broth bowls. "Ugh, it smells so good, I am already feeling better!" She exclaimed, bobbing up and down as Ryker opened the noodles. Nadia poured the noodles in the broth and stirred them well while Ryker opened the sauce. She added the sauce into the noodles and rested her back against the sofa. "Come Rykie, let's eat," she urged him to sit beside her and share.
"Yes sirrr," Ryker mocked a salute and took the extra pair of spoon and chopsticks to sit beside Nadia and slurp on the noodles.
Bernie settled on the ground with his big bowl of broth, noddles, sauce and vegetables. Maybe Nadia knew that he was hungry is why she decided to share with Ryker instead, he thought to himself before beginning to eat.
From the kitchen, Marilyn stared at them as she stood holding a bowl of hot porridge in her hands.