BEL AND THE FOUR OF HEARTS

Two

“Be back before….”

I slammed the front door shut on dad's last words as I jumped down the short steps. The sun wasn't as scorching as it shone to seem, but it sure was warm enough to make you go out in shorts like I did, with a black low-cut-armhole tanktop and what looked like a bra underneath it, which was in fact just a swimsuit.

Feeling extra comfortable in my knitted slippers, I aimfully trotted to the backyard and wheeled my bicycle out of the shed and further outside the gate. I placed my long strap leather bag in the bicycle basket, swung my leg over the seat and sat.

With my feet ready to start pedalling away, I felt my fairly old bicycle beginning to lower in height.

“Really?” I scoffed annoyedly at the flat tyre as I got off it and stooped beside it like staring at it would pump it back up. I absentmindedly looked back at the house, at dad's car, immediately looking back at my useless bicycle.

Even the tyre pump was worn out, I remembered.

Dad would've loved to drive me to wherever I was headed, but I wasn't ready to let “daddy” go with me on the mission I had that day. He'd also bombard me with questions I would be guilt-tripped into answering.

“Ugh!” I groaned, burying my face in between my knees as I tried to convince the lazy side of me to trek down two blocks, since my destination wasn't far enough to use a taxi.

“It's okay, you can just use mine.”

I raised my head, resting my eyes on the gorgeous extremely expensive-looking chassis of a yellow car that I did not know the name of. A boy who looked to be around my age or a little older loftily smiled at me from the passenger's seat. He had long brown hair and eyebrows that were thicker than normal, as well as ‘shaved-off’ signs of puberty above his upper lip. I almost rolled my eyes.

“Why?” I retorted quickly.

It was fun watching the wide smile on his face narrow down into confusion. I could tell he was very rich. We were rich enough too, but he was obviously richer.

“I can just use mine too, you know?” I added, tilting my head to the direction of the house so that he could see that we also owned a spendy car.

Just like I wanted, he looked at it but gave an unimpressed smirk that made me almost taste bile on my tongue.

“Greg, doesn't that look like mum's former car?” He asked someone else, whose presence I noticed only then. It was the chaffeur.

The so-called Greg angled forward to look at it, now making his face visible to me from where I crouched. I frowned. Did he just compare dad's latest model car to what his mom used to have?

Greg gave a slow nod.

I rolled my eyes again.

“Can you drive though?” He proceeded to ask, lacing his lips with that annoying smile of his again.

I didn't reply.

‘Do you think I'd be here if I could?’ I scoffed inwardly and stood to my feet and turned the wheels of my bicycle towards the house, walking in.

“I know right? I'd be on the other side too if I could,” he replied.

I stopped, turning back at him, with my brows so close to eachother that they could interlock.

“Did you just read my mind?” I asked surprisedly, walking back to his car.

He held his hand dramatically over his mouth, then smiled.

“Sorry, I didn't mean to…I didn't know you didn't say that loud…”

“Shut up, I'm coming in,” I said, running back to get my bag from the bicycle basket. I rushed back to the car and got in the back seat.

“So, you're a mind reader?” I questioned interestedly.

“I come from a family of mind readers,” he responded proudly.

“I see. So…”

“Where are you headed ma'am? Greg interrupted.

“Two blocks down,” I said quickly and watched the middle-aged man nod his head again.

“So, you…”

“Mark. I'm Mark.”

“Yes, okay. Hmm. So you you can read everyone's mind.”

“No, only minds that want to be read.”

I sat up.

“I certainly didn't want my mind to be read. I don't want it. It's an invasion of privacy,” I said.

Mark laughed.

“Yes, but you didn't expect it was going to be read at that moment, that means you technically weren't trying to protect it from being read also. When you intentionally desire for it not to be read, it won't. The time you forget to do that, it's open again. But in extremely dire situations like criminal investigation and other mind-reading authorized activities, a skilled mind reader can always tell even from your facial expressions.

Anyway, I still have yet to gain control over my ability. Sometimes, I can't read anything even if you don't block it. It comes and goes, you know?”

“I didn't ask for the whole explanation though,” I replied coldly, although being impressed. It was my first time meeting a mind reader, I'd only heard of them before. I immediately reminded myself to not get my mind read.

“Oh, I thought you did.”

I tried to think of another question to ask him. In fact, I knew the question I was burning to ask him—the same question I had gotten into his car for. But I couldn't bring myself to utter it because it'd make me feel bad for myself like it always did.

“Please drop me off here,” I informed the driver as I pulled my bag strap over my head.

“Oh…” Greg muttered, slowing down.

The car soon pulled over by the roadside and I quickly alighted.

“Thanks,” I said.

“Thank you too. You're actually the first neighbour I've actually spoken too since we moved here,” he told me.

“Neighour?” I quizzed.

“Yes, I live in the grey house next to yours—”

“Oh—” I nodded, starting to feel somewhat uncomfortable by the news.

“Yeah. See you again,” he smiled more gleefully, waving.

I merely nodded, watching the car zoom off.

I hated how there was yet another person my age who could boast of a forte.

***

The man oddly inspected the phone and put it back down on his busy table, noisily chewing gum.

“That'd be two hundred. The screen is completely shattered, plus the…”

“I don't care, just fix it as quickly as possible. And no, don't ask me to come back for it. I'm waiting right here till you have everything fixed,” I replied sharply, taking out seat for myself in his shop which reminded me a lot of dad's room.

The man shrugged and stood up from the chair he was seating on, which turned out to be a peculiarly made furniture—one more lavish than needed for a workshop that was in such an unpolished state.

“I got that from a friend—” the man informed me, having noticed how weirdly I had been staring at it. I looked away from it and focused on the phone in my hands which was just as boring as living alone without technology.

“Want some water?" he asked.

“No.”