Chapter 10: Chapter 0010 – Aftermath

Ravela’s eyes shot open. She tried to sit up but her body made no effort to move. She felt her finger twitch but that was it. The rest of her body remained aching, stiff, and cramped.

 

She gave up on moving. Her head felt like someone took a club and went to town on her skull. She swore off any extensive use of her ability right then and there.

 

Ravela saw the room without distortions or weird coloration, which at the very least was a sign that she may be okay.

_________________________________________________________

 

Laena woke up from a nightmare in her bed. She was safe. The memory of the accident was replaying itself endlessly in front of her inner eye.

 

She got up and began her morning routine. The bruises on her head and body were still fresh.

 

The shadow on the lakeside. The dark figure raised its hands, and the bus slowed down in midair. Laena, not for the first time, wondered if she had just imagined things.

 

At breakfast, her grandmother was much more doting than usual. Fussing over her and being still all around riled up. Laena somehow doubted Ma had slept at all.

 

“Ma, why did you make so much for breakfast? That is way too much for the two of us!”

 

Ma looked at her. “Well, you’re still growing. But for your information. No, I didn’t go senile and cook all this, just for the two of us. We have a guest who never missed breakfast before. Well, until today, that is. He’s in room four.”

 

“We have an actual guest?”

 

Ma looked at Laena and huffed.

 

“Why, yes? His name is Ramiel Roice, and he paid for the entire year in advance. Don’t look at me like that! He did. Maybe he is skipping breakfast for once. Anyway, you will meet him eventually, and there will be other guests coming soon. I will tell you about them later.”

 

Laena's shoulders slumped. Many guests meant she would have to help out, and Safora would flip her lid if she dipped out on too many of their grand holiday plans, as would Laena.

 

“But Ma, I have a bunch of plans for the holidays. I can’t spend the next four months helping you out with everything. You promised me this time I would have more time with my friends, Ma.”

 

Her grandmother nodded. “Yes, sweetie, I know what I promised you. And I am not going back on my word. I only need a little help with the house. I even arranged my doctor's appointment to align with your plans. Don’t you worry! I will take care of the other guests, and Ramiel is zero work. He is only ever around for breakfast and dinner. The rest of the time he is out learning with keeper Namon.”

 

Laena tilted her head. “Why is he learning from Namon? Is he a keeper?”

 

“No, no. The poor soul has lost his memory. When he arrived at my doorstep he didn’t even know how to say ‘hello’. But he did so well. He is a fine young man. Polite, and reserved, he paid for his stay in advance for the entire year, did I mention that? Be nice to him he had a hard time relearning speech and keeper Namon told me that he is a good soul. And the keeper is not in the business of being wrong about people.”

 

Laena frowned. A man lost his memory and had money to stay in her grandmother's hostel for an entire year? It’s strange. Laena ate her scrambled eggs with all the silent skepticism she could muster.

 

She eventually shrugged it off. If the holiday plans wouldn’t get ruined, Safora would be happy, Ma would be happy, and most importantly of all, Laena would have a lot of fun that won’t get interrupted during this school break.

 

When Laena finally left the house, Safora had already reached their front gate.

 

“Come on we are going to be late for our training, you slow poke.” Safora urged.

 

Laena retorted, “As if the coach would do exercises after the accident yesterday, you dunderhead.” and stuck out her tongue and her friend.

 

Safora made some grumbling huff as a response. “Well, whatever the coach plans instead to take our mind off that, we’ll be late for that, prickcess.”

 

Laena opened her mouth to say respond but ended up closing it again.

 

Safora made a silly face at her. “That’s right, Miss fish-out-of-water! I just said that.” she mimicked Laena’s opening and closing move with exaggeration and began running.

 

“Ey, wait up, you! I will show you prickcess, you, you argh forget it. You know I’m not good at this! Just wait for me, Safora.”

 

“Nuh-uh. Move your chops. We can’t be late. There’ll probably be ice cream! GO GO GO!” Safora intoned in cheerleader fashion.

 

Laena laughed and caught up to her friend.

_________________________________________________________

 

Keeper Namon sat in his office talking, not for the first time today, to parents troubled by the events of the day before.

 

The town’s families were still in shock, and the parents especially suffered a sleepless night. The keeper foresaw a very harmonious holiday break.

 

He expected no drama from the parents being too strict in the first two months. For all the trouble this accident brought, it got everybody in Gradjia to band together even closer.

 

But his community needed a lot of support in the next few days. Especially the parents and grandparents. The young were ready to shake off that hick-up, and the old suffered visions of mortality that were not for themselves. Namon knew that these nightmares would haunt them for some time, and he fully expected to have his hands full for the foreseeable future.

 

He sighed and looked out of the window of his office. It was a good day to sit down at the lakeside.

_________________________________________________________

 

Ravela lay on the floor still, but she noticed a change. Her muscles were unclenched. She dared not move at first.

 

She ever so slowly rolled over to the side. She was groaning at her stiff and aching body. Every movement hurt, and Ravela swore she would never do something like that again.

 

She dragged and stumbled her way to the bathroom. What stared back at her from the mirror was an awful sight. 

 

Dry blood around her nose. Dry blood on her cheeks and in the corners of her eyes. She turned her head and tremble in disgust.

 

“Ew, ew, ewwwww.” Dry blood in her ears. That was what muffled her hearing. She took off her ring and saw a very much yucked-out Ravela in the mirror.

She filled the bathtub with urgency. While rinsing her face off. The dry blood on her eyelids felt the worst. Ravela scrubbed her face till it was all reddened and clean. Then she got in the bathtub and tried to flush out all the gross blood in her nose, and ears, and with disgust, she realized why she could taste pennies.

 

She didn’t even know why she was so grossed out, after all, she was quite the grub in her former life but it did.

 

“Ew, ew, ew, yuck, yuck, double blergh.” She kept repeating while the bathwater became decisively tinted. She let out the water after some time to get clean. She was thoroughly appalled by her mirror image.

 

When she got out of the bathtub she felt as clean as a princess could feel after such an ordeal. Oh the horror, oh the travesty. Her only solace was that nobody saw her like that.

 

She look at the towel she had used while standing at the sink and decided that she would explain that away with a heavy nosebleed.

 

She would of course have to compensate Ma Stone for absolutely annihilating this towel. Ravela put her ring back on, and gave the tub and sink one last look, to make sure there was no more red tint to the pearly white.

 

She walked to the bedroom window and took a peek outside, and guessed it was just a bit past noon. Breakfast was long gone. That darkened her mood. 

 

Ravela put on some clothes her headache had suddenly ended the moment she saw herself in the mirror, or so she thought. She began to feel the pulsing of her brain again.

 

She needed suddenly craved a steak and a milkshake. Ravela was about to go on a prowl through town. She armed herself with some cash and left to confess her towel murder to Ma Stone. 

 

And after that, she would hunt herself a steak and a huge milkshake. Ravela was determined to get exactly that combination, her stomach desired it, her soul screamed for it and her mouth drooled for it.

 

She met Ma Stone at the foot of the stairs.

 

“Oh, Ramiel. Oh dear, oh dear, excuse me for saying this but you look like death. What happened? Are you alright?”, Ma Stone greeted her.

 

“Blessed day, Ma Stone. Well, about that. I had a massive nosebleed yesterday and just about spent the day laying on the carpet in my room. I have ruined one of the towels you provided me with. I am so sorry about that and will of course pay for the replacement.”

 

Ma Stone looked at Ravela stunned. “You missed everything that happened yesterday?”

 

Ravela tried to keep a poker face.

“Oh. Oh, the homecoming! I wanted to see that. Keeper Namon said it was such a big festive occasion. How was it?” Ravela tried the miffed route. Getting the last few steps down the stairs.

 

Ma Stone huffed. “I wish it had kept with tradition. I tell you what you missed was much more important. You missed a miracle. My little Laena could have died yesterday. Oh, I can’t talk about this. No, no just the thought of it is too much already. Namon should catch you up. That boy is still young, he has the stomach for it. I am much too old for such hair raisers.” With that, she fled the scene by just walking off into the kitchen and waving, decidedly ending the conversation before Ravela could inquire more.

 

Ravela shrugged and went outside. She didn’t need to protest but she wanted to know if the people on the bus were okay. Had she saved even one person through her actions? Keeper Namon would be busier than anticipated after yesterday.

She walked through town, and there wasn’t much gloom. The mood was surprisingly upbeat. She looked around town for a place where she could fulfill her unnatural cravings.

 

‘Where does one get steak ’n shake? What does a pointy-eared dimensional invader have to do to see her desires fulfilled? Feed me, humans. I crave flesh and demand sugar!’

 

Ravela spotted a diner that was tucked neatly behind the train track bridge. The building had neon signs and big windows with rows of filled tables. There were many young teenagers inside. She spotted bruises on them from the other side of the street.

 

The lower part of the building had a minty blue hue to it. At least, for the lower part of it. There was a thick red ring surrounding the flat roof.

 

“Betty’s” Ravela juggled the name in her mouth. Trying to get a taste of the place by rolling it over her tongue. The place sounded like it would do right by her.

 

“Alright, Betty’s. Impress me.” Ravela crossed the street and walked inside. The noise was impressive. How someone had hidden all the music and voices from her ears with this many windows was the true riddle. Her headache urged retreat, but her stomach commanded her brain to toughen up.

 

A waitress greeted her not long after she entered.

 

“Hello there. Just one?”

 

Ravela affirmed, “Yeah, sorry just me, but I brought money, I heard restaurants love that.”

 

The waitress looked her over. “You friends with keeper Namon? Maybe you should be friends with Namon. You two would get along, I tell ya.”

 

“I would consider myself his friend at this point. He helped me a lot. Ramiel Roice is my name, it would be delightful if you could spare me a table.”

 

“Ramiel, is it? Yeah, I heard about you. I can tell you spent too much time with the keeper. He’s having a bad influence. Well, come on in, then. Let me show you your table. Lucky for you there is still a spot left. The sports teams have been in here all morning. Nothing to nurse the bruises and sprained ankles like ice cream and friends, I tell ya.”

 

Ravela grinned, she liked her waitress. She was fun, but she had better have steak for the milkshake Ravela was about to order.

 

The waitress took three steps away from the door and showed Ravela to a table. At her table, Ravela looked at the menu.

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Milkshake, check.

 

Steak, no cigar.

 

She kept looking, turning over the menu. There was chicken and pork on the menu but no steak.

 

Ravela pulled a face. “That won’t do. That won’t do at all.”

 

The waitress had skipped off to the next table over to give her some time to order, but she was still within earshot.

 

“Is something wrong?” She asked while scooting back to her table.

 

Ravela tapped the menu with her finger.

 

“Okay, I will be direct here. The strawberry shake sounds divine, however, I happen to nurse a headache that demands a good steak to go with that.” Ravela pulled out two full one hundred dollar bills and pushed them toward his waitress. “You wouldn’t be able to persuade the cook to get me a steak with that, could you?”

 

The eyes of the waitress became big. “Can do and will do, sugar. Don’t you worry. I’ll go right to the kitchen. The butcher isn’t far away you will get a steak, no doubt about that. And a strawberry shake. You got it, boss.” And off she went with the two bills vanishing from the table.

 

Ravela leaned back on her bench and tried to listen in on the teenagers.

 

“Can’t believe the coach sponsored this entire day here.”

 

“Yeah, it’s awesome.”

 

“Dumbass, of course, it was just him. The man would be broke if he did that alone. The mayor opened the town's coffers for all the kids. The couch just spent his share wisely for us.”

 

“Well, that’s just because we were all fine.  Troy Han broke his arm. I guess I won’t hear him practice his music for a while.”

 

“Uuuh, Katty has the hots for Troy.”

 

“Shuddup, jerkface.” 

 

“I’m just glad this shit happened to us and not the other bus with the younger children.”

 

“We’re so lucky nobody died there.”

 

“My parents say it was divine intervention. A miracle.”

 

“Of course, they said that, Melle.”

 

“I went back there this morning. I have no idea how we didn’t flip over on our way down.”

 

“That’s why you were outside my house so early, Safora!”

 

“No, that was because you wake up with the enthusiasm of a sloth, Laena. If I hadn’t motivated you, we would have been late for sure. Ey, don’t throw fries at me! Ew!”

 

“Stop that you two. Aw, man. It got in my hair.”

 

“Sorry, Markus.”

 

“Sorry, doesn’t get the ketchup out of my hair, sister!”

 

“Then go wash it out don’t be a baby about it. You’ll live.”

 

A group of boys piped up in unison: “yEaH MaRkUs,  yOu’Ll LiVe!”

“Oh, shut up, you dunderheads!” Markus bit back at his team driving a dagger into his back.

 

“The bus driver got two of his ribs broken and his leg too. Poor guy probably saved us too. I think we should write him a card or something.”

 

Ravela listened in on them from her window seat by the door. She concluded that A) nobody died yesterday and B) The injuries weren’t all that bad.

 

Ravela was glad that her suffering had made a difference. She kept listening to the teenagers bickering for just over half an hour before her steak and milkshake arrived.

 

She learned a lot about them in that short time. They were friends, loved playfully mocking each other, and there was only one person exempt from their mean quips. Melle was spared the mocking comments. Ravela theorized that was because Melle was particularly religious and much meeker.

Ravela annihilated her steak and ordered another strawberry shake while doing so. She felt her whole body sighing in satisfaction at having its cravings satisfied.

 

Then she heard something she didn’t want to hear.

 

“So did any of you see the person standing on the lakeside when our bus crashed down the slope?”

 

“The what?”

 

Ravela stopped sipping on her milkshake. ‘Oh, no!’

 

“It’s…it’s nothing. I just thought II saw someone standing there when we had just crashed through the guard rails. Forget it.”

 

Of all people, Melle spoke up.

 

“Well, now that you say it I saw the shadow of a person in the fog when the bus turned sideways.”

 

‘No, no, no, Shuddup, Melle.’ Ravela felt her ears twitching. This was bad.

 

“You think someone was down there? Who would have been down there in that wheater?”

 

‘Safora, smart girl good question. Nobody, conclude NOBODY.’

 

Laena responded, “How would I know? I just asked if anybody saw.”

 

Markus chose this moment to get back at the fry thrower.

“Maybe it was the ghosts of all your failed math tests, sister. Booooo.”

 

Roaring laughter around the table. Situation defused. Markus and Safora for the rescue. Big relief. Nicely done.

 

Ravela leaned back with a grin on her face. It was time to pay her bill and get out of the diner. She made eye contact with the waitress who to her credit winked at him while walking by and came back after delivering her current orders.

 

“So was everything to your liking, Ramiel?” she asked.

 

“Yes, indeed. Thanks for entertaining my somewhat unusual request. So how much do I owe you.”

 

“How much do you owe? My friend, you have to become better with money, honestly. That would have been 20 dollars tops, 30 with Franky our dishwasher running to the butcher to get your steak. You tipped 170 and we’re even. If Namon learned I billed you on top of you throwing that much money at me, I would get an earful.”

 

Ravela raised a brow. “Well, if you say so I won’t argue. I will get better with money eventually. But thank you, for looking out for me.”

 

“Well, hope you come again before you learn too much about handling your money, sugar.” The waitress was off to take care of her other guests.

 

Ravela got up. She took one look back at the teenagers having fun and locked eyes with the girl named Safora. There was recognition in her eyes.

 

Ravela turned away. ‘No, why would you recognize me? What was that reaction?’ Ravela hurried out of the diner. Things just got complicated.

 

Ravela walked through town, and on her mind was the brunette Safora and the shocked expression she had the moment she saw Ravela.

 

That was not good, the opposite of good to be precise. 

 

‘Did she see me? No, she was one of the people who dismissed someone being near the lake. Then why would she look at me like that?’

 

Ravela looked over her shoulder on her way back to Ma Stone’s house.

 

She met keeper Namon on her way back sitting in the park looking peculiarly at peace for a man who probably had to deal with a lot of distraught people after the accident.

 

“Blessed day, Namon,” Ravela greeted the man slowing down a bit from her dash back to Ma Stone’s house. “I didn’t expect to find you relaxing in the park today. I heard the town was in turmoil over something that happened yesterday.”

 

Keeper Namon was seemingly pulled out of his musing and made eye contact with Ravela. “Oh, blessed day, Ramiel. I was lost in thought for a while. So you’ve heard about the accident. Sorry I couldn’t make it to the library yesterday. Looking after the children was a more pressing issue.”

 

Ravela waved her hand in a throw-away gesture. “Don’t worry about it. I wasn’t in the library yesterday. I had a terrible nosebleed and headache and stayed in my room all day.”

 

Ravela saw the genuine worry and care in Namon’s eyes as he said, “Oh, I am sorry to hear that. You’re okay now, I hope.”

 

She smiled heartily. “I feel all better now. The fresh air and the food at Betty’s diner worked wonders for me. The waitress there warned me, however. Apparently, your humor is having a bad influence on me.”

 

The man laughed a low rumbling laugh. “Oh, I see. I think I know who you’re talking about. I am sure we shared similar humor from the start.”

 

Ravela smiled. “I agree. If anyone is having a bad influence here it should be I.”

 

The keeper got up from his bench. “Aren’t those kind words. I have extended my break for far too long. Ramiel, apologies I have to get back to the souls in my care.” Namon gave Ravela’s shoulder an encouraging pat. “I am sure you have important matters to take care of as well.”

 

Ravela watched the man slowly walk away, and her mind immediately went back to the teenager and her odd reaction to spotting him.

 

One headache nursed, and another appeared.

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