Make Your Move Katherine

Forget Everything You Think You Know

“Please be seated.”

Kat looked at Oscar as he sat behind the laptop that Eric had previously taken away in the navy-blue colored duffle bag and wordlessly sat down and drummed her fingers nervously on her lap, beneath the tabletop where she sat opposite him. As usual, Oscar had signaled to her to take the seat on the other end of the table- the other head- of the long table which Kat normally would find irritating but she always found a distance away from him better. Back at the castle, there was always a length of twenty chairs distance between them, in the Great Hall, but here at his place, it is only two chairs. Two on each side and two single chairs at the ends, where Oscar and she now sat- just like back at her place.

She knew the importance of the heads seating at the table’s etiquette but at her father’s wedding he had sat at the center with Miriam, with her on his other side, and they always sat at the center whenever family came over at their home too. Her father was so different from her real mother, who had been a strict parent who seemed to care more about etiquette than her own family.

Eric had just left them to ‘do some walking’ as he had put it, since Oscar stated they were not heading back to Castle When immediately. He said being cramped in her tiny apartment made him get a phobia of enclosed spaces now. As if- Oscar’s place was the same size as hers but she knew what Eric meant as she felt the same way. She needed to get some fresh air and a walk too- she didn’t care if it was in the park, the woods, or even the exhaust-filled streets from fuel, as long as it was outside.

“Are you okay now?” Oscar asked her quietly without looking up from the screen and Kat saw the light from the screen flashing across his face.

“Yes,” she squeaked, pressing her knees together, her ankles too, and fought the urge to bite her nails. One; she didn’t want to for her nails were so stiff and her teeth would hurt at first and when she started, she didn’t stop and sometimes even peeled the soft flesh near her cuticles too. Then she would have to wear fake nails until they grew back for Kat was keen on appearance and a firm believer that neat, beautifully colored nails were an asset to a female. 

And two; she figured that the man in front of her typing away would disapprove.

Yes, Kat feared the monster she knew he kept hidden inside.

“Did Eric harm you?” he went on, still tapping on the keys.

She straightened her legs, still keeping her knees together and pressed onto them with the balls of her hands when she felt the tremors in them. She was beyond scared right now to be alone with the man. So, why was she blushing earlier and allowing him to touch her naked body?

“No.”

“Good, I assure you that he just does his job without any room for a mishap. I assure you that he meant no harm,” Kat nodded, believing what he said about Eric for she had sensed that too- except the entire part where she thought he had entered the shower. She was watching Oscar while he spoke, not realizing that he couldn’t see her nod, “Bear in mind that he and my guards- all- will do what I request always- so don’t ever try to play with their minds.”

Kat furrowed her forehead, never had she ever tried what he literally just accused her of doing and he looked up then. “I apologize if you thought that he would have-” he turned his head away breaking off his words. “That he would- you know the bathroom- he would never.”

She felt a bit embarrassed by the way she also had assumed that it was Eric’s hand on her back in the shower too but she just didn’t feel safe even though she knew she was. Something was beyond sinister even though she was ‘safe’, she could feel it in her bones.

“Where’s Anthony?”

“Really? You would have preferred him, wouldn’t you?” and Katherine nodded. “Well, he’s busy with other things,” Oscar stated as he closed the laptop down, clasping his fingers over it. “Would you want it to have been him with you in the shower?”

What? No what was he even suggesting? Wait- she probably would have if she was being honest with herself.

“Hmm, your face is red,” he called out her lie and she felt the heat spread more across her face.

“How can you walk in daylight?” she blurted out. The only indication that her words had surprised him was the arched eyebrow, for his expression didn’t change.

“I shall tell you my secrets now?”

“No- no, I mean yes. No, I am just curious for vampires are supposed to be… night stalkers or something like that,” she finished lamely.

“Tch, I’m surprised the attendants haven’t told you yet,” he murmured and stood up and even pushed her chair back towards the table. “I can walk in daylight, just not in the blazing sunlight.”

“You- you can?” she stuttered even though she had seen him in sunlight, feeling stupid when he shook his head.

‘Just what was he playing at? Why was he being nice suddenly?’

“Look everything you think you know about what I am is wrong. Just forget everything you think you know and relearn everything.” He raised his hand to silence her as she opened her mouth to shoot another question at him. She was about to ask him about the blood she had seen on Nuwa’s neck. “Let’s not talk about back home. You saw your family, is everything okay with them?”

‘Is everything okay? I just lost my father and he dares to ask me that?’

As if sensing her dark mood, he said, “Look, let’s forget about the castle and let’s get you home to-”

“I don’t want to go back there,” she interrupted him and Oscar didn’t even bother to threaten her about it. She did not want to see what she would miss. She did not want to grow a bond with her stepsister- she did not want to get attached to anything or anyone when she know she was about to die.

“I just meant if you wanted me to accompany you- as your husband I mean.”

“No, I don’t want them to meet you,” she admitted. What a waste on her family to meet him. A tragedy really, to meet the man that was to kill your stepdaughter. Kat pitied her stepmother if she were to officially meet this animal. She just didn’t know if Oscar would reach his hand over in some sick twisted way to go after her mother and sister next. She would protect them by accepting her fate to die.

Really it was for the greater good- her death. And she did owe Oscar her life for that was what she signed on for in the contract when money was her goal to save her father’s life from debt. Money. She should have said no and they would have found a way to keep the debtors at bay until she received her money.

She was positive now they would have given them some time to pay it off- what was a little embarrassment. So, what if they had threatened to put up a nasty headline about her father’s restaurant going under because of multiple health violations? So what? Kat now felt that her greed to get them out of this situation had been the cause of her father’s death.

It wasn’t, she knew but still the feeling lingered on.

They had discussed the relapse before the cancer recurrence happened because, in spite of the best efforts to rid of cancer, some cancer cells could remain. The doctor had spoken to them about it, saying cells could be in the same place where the cancer first originated, or they could be in another part of her father’s body, for they may have been dormant. Cancer cells would eventually multiply, resulting in the reappearance of the cancer.

They could have beaten it the second time the doctor had assured them that the survival rate had gone up to more than fifty percent. She didn’t even know if her father was in a hospice or not and Miriam did not have to tell her that her father was worried about her.

She did know her father was beyond fatigued and stressed because of her. She had made a deal with the devil and her father paid the price. Funny how the reason why you made the deal is always the one taken away from you.