Hawke fell silent again after hearing the dead tone on the other end of the line.
The next moment,
his mind raced.
Hawke wasn't worried about Gwen coming to his apartment, but rather he was quickly trying to think if there was anything in his apartment that was inappropriate for children, or something Gwen shouldn't see.
Inappropriate for children?
No.
Forget videos, he didn't even have a poster, let alone magazines.
He was simply poor.
He couldn't afford a phone card, let alone those expensive and exhausting magazines.
In the past, when he was full of energy, he usually chose to go to the rooftop and punch the air, waiting until he was tired before going back to sleep.
As for anything that shouldn't be seen by Gwen?
It seemed like there wasn't anything either.
He had wrapped the five Chitauri alien weapons tightly in his sheets and stuffed them under his bed.
Gwen shouldn't find them.
So forget it, let her be.
Business matters.
After thinking about it.
Hawke regained his composure and put away his phone.
The gentleness he'd just experienced while talking to Gwen vanished, replaced by a profoundly cold gaze.
Blackie, his mouth covered, looked terrified.
Hawke admired the fear in Blackie's eyes, his lips curling into a beautiful curve.
"Now..."
"It's my turn to rob you."
"..."
After hanging up, Gwen immediately shoved her phone back into her pocket and headed straight for the emergency staircase built into the exterior wall of Hawke's new apartment, making her way smoothly to the top floor.
Gwen moved aside a pair of shorts, seemingly made from slacks, that hung in front of the half-open window.
Then, through the window, she jumped into Hawke's apartment.
The living room wasn't large; a secondhand sofa and a secondhand folding table with a laptop on it took up two-thirds of the space.
But it was clean.
It wasn't spotless, but it was certainly well-organized.
Gwen's first impression of the living room was comfort.
She had never been to Hawke's previous apartment, and this one was her first time seeing it.
But just as Gwen pulled the envelope Dr. Connors had told her to give Hawke from her pocket and placed it on the folding table, her eyes were drawn to the closed laptop on the folding table.
It wasn't that she was surprised Hawke had a computer.
It was the stickers on the laptop's cover.
"This is…"
"Too cute."
Gwen couldn't help but laugh at the girly stickers on the laptop's cover, curious about the girl who sold Hawke the laptop.
She hadn't considered Hawke putting the stickers on it, or even who had given it to her.
Impossible.
Absolutely impossible.
Because no one knew Hawke better than she did.
She had no doubt that if she had spoken to Hawke after giving him the phone, he would have returned it to her.
So, just to be on the safe side, Gwen simply didn't see Hawke for the next ten days.
Gwen thought to herself, then glanced back at the envelope on the folding table before turning to leave.
As she turned, the gust of wind from her open sun-protective jacket blew the envelope off the folding table.
It took flight and drifted toward the bedroom adjacent to the living room.
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Gwen instinctively walked over, bent down, and picked up the envelope that had nearly blown under the bed.
As she stood up, a faint green light shone from under the bed, caught in her peripheral vision.
Her movements to pick up the envelope paused.
Gwen's gaze darted under the bed, and a tightly wrapped sheet caught her eye.
But it was definitely not a good sheet.
At least it wasn't protected from light.
The faint green light flickered through the sheet, like the rhythm of breathing.
But it was dim.
Even in daylight, Gwen wouldn't have seen it if she hadn't just happened to catch it in her peripheral vision.
What is this?
Crouching down and leaning under the bed, Gwen raised an eyebrow at the sight.
As she was about to stand up, clutching the envelope she had just picked up, Gwen's gaze shifted upwards, catching sight of a slightly broken picture frame on the nightstand.
Inside the broken frame was a photograph.
The photo was set against Times Square, and the protagonists were a young man and woman, looking about fourteen, their clothes a bit worn and white.
Gwen knew the man.
Hawke.
Hawke in the photo was smiling broadly.
Gwen had never seen Hawke smile so brightly before.
But the girl in the photo?
Gwen frowned again, set the envelope aside, and picked up a photo from the bedside table to examine it.
The photo must have been taken when Hawke was fourteen, not long after starting school.
Gwen examined it, mentally confirming the date.
She recognized the pants Hawke was wearing.
They were the ones she had complained about earlier, the ones Hawke had worn for three years, clearly too small for them, but couldn't bear to throw away and instead turned into shorts.
Yes.
Those shorts still hanging by the window.
But who was this girl?
Gwen frowned, looking at the girl in the photo.
Her skin looked a little pale, but she was also smiling broadly, her arms tightly entwined with Hawke's.
A sister?
I'd never heard Hawke mention her.
Gwen caught the resemblance between Hawke's features in the photo and the girl next to him, and a thought struck her.
But she pondered it carefully, realizing Hawke had never mentioned it.
Died?
Gwen considered the most likely possibility, one Hawke hadn't mentioned.
After a moment's reflection, she set down the photo frame and placed it back on the nightstand.
She stood up and headed outside.
Just as she reached the living room again, she suddenly realized what was happening.
She slapped her head and turned around.
She had forgotten to retrieve the envelope.
"Huh?"
"Where's the envelope?"
Gwen, reentering the bedroom, paused briefly at the envelope on her floor, now missing again.
Then, as if realizing something, she squatted down again.
Sure enough,the envelope had slipped under the bed, perhaps carried in by the breeze created by her rising.
Gwen looked at the envelope, stretched out her arm, and reached inside.
Quickly,her fingertips found the envelope.
At the same time her fingertips also touched the tightly wrapped bed sheet.
The moment her fingertips touched the bed sheet, a feeling of touching metal was transmitted from Gwen's fingertips to her mind.
...
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