My Crazy Housemate

"My...." Her brows furrowed as she began to talk.     

"My mother sold me off." She said and looked at him.     

Leo looked at her with a straight face before saying..  "That's not funny."      

He knew she was joking and it made him slightly angry that she was joking when he was being serious.     

He waited for her to get serious but the look on her face showed she was very much serious and he frowned deeply.     

"You are being serious?" He asked in a mixture of shock and surprise. He still couldn't get it. The whole thing didn't make sense. Her mother sold her off? Which mother would ever do such?     

"You think I'm joking right? Sounds funny doesn't it?" She asked with a straight face before laughing dryly.     

He continued to look at her with confusion written all over his face.      

"Your... your mother sold... you?" He asked with his brows furrowed in confusion.     

"What happened? How did it happen? It doesn't make sense." He said as he shook his head.     

*FOUR YEARS AGO.*     

Mia wasn't a very deep sleeper especially when she hadn't done any hard work before going to bed so while she slept that night, she was roused from sleep when she heard someone walking around the room.     

There was a very faint light in the room which came from the old bedside lamp so she was able to adjust her eyes to see Mary walking about and it looked like she was in a hurry to go somewhere.     

She was fully dressed which was unusual since she had learned to sleep in her underwear from Mary so it was surprising to see her wearing a trousers, polo and face cap.     

She looked at the alarm clock by the side of the bed, it was just 4am and it was obvious it was still dark outside so where was she going to?     

Mary turned around, probabaly because she wanted to make sure Mia was still asleep but she gasped in shock when she saw Mia looking at her.     

'Something is definitely wrong for her to have reacted this way' Mia thought as she finally sat up.     

"Where are you going to?" Mia asked curiously but Mary quickly rushed to where she was and used her hand to cover Mia's mouth before looking at the door in panic.     

"Shush!" Mary whispered. From her reaction, it was obvious she didn't want their mother to know what was up with her.     

Mia frowned before pushing Mary's hand away. "What's with you? Where are you going to?" Mia asked when her eyes landed on Mary's luggage bag close to the door. "Are you going somewhere?" She asked.     

After a few stutters, Mary finally found her voice and said.. "Yes.. I'm going to Thelma's house."     

Thelma. She was Mary's BFF. Even their mother knew her so why was she behaving like a thief and going there by that time of the night?     

"I need to beat the traffic. We are both working on a project that needs to be submitted this morning so I need to leave early. Didn't want to wake you or mum but mother knows about it already so just go back to bed and help me tell mum I'm out. Okay?"     

Strange. Very strange. Mary didn't always sound that nice to her.     

"Alright then." Mia said before lying back down and closing her eyes. She wasn't close with her sister so she didn't see any reason why she should keep asking her questions. The next day was going to be really hectic for her since she had to go to the university to go process her scholarship. After two years of being stuck at home trying to help the family and also complete Mary's tuition fees, she was finally able to secure a good scholarship.      

She returned to bed with a smile on her face at the thought of finally going to school like her mates and elder sister.      

The next morning, when Linda came to call both girls to come down for breakfast, Mia told her Mary was out and mentioned Mary said she knew about it.      

She noticed the ugly frown on her mother's face as she began to frantically search for her phone.      

She dialled Mary's phone repeatedly but it didn't go through. She didn't have Thelma's phone number and neither did Mia but Mia knew her house so she went there with her mother to check whether Mary was there but Thelma mentioned she had a quarrel with Mary and hadn't been keeping in touch with her for over a month.     

Mia hadn't thought earlier that it was a big deal searching for Mary when she already mentioned she was going to see Thelma but in that moment, she realised something was wrong.      

Her mother cried and cried and blamed her for not waking her up when she saw Mary leaving the house that morning.     

A few days before the day Mary disappeared,  she had had a really hot quarrel with their mother inside her room so Mia stood by the door and listened to all the harsh words Mary spewed at her.     

"I can't continue living this way! Maybe you all can but I cannot. It's better to die than to live in a slum like this!" She yelled angrily at her mother and threw something on the floor which broke.      

Their father had been really rich so they always lived comfortably with maids and butlers. But the moment her father disappeared, everything turned into a nightmare. They had to relocate into a smaller house with two rooms and sell all of their properties. Sharing a room and a bed with Mary was the most uncomfortable thing in her life.      

The room was so congested and Mary wasn't the very neat type so her things were always everywhere around the room. She ate and threw things about on the floor and never did any chores to assist around the house. She was spoilt beyond control and it was too difficult for her to adjust into the kind of life they were to live.     

She noticed that Mary suddenly began to buy a lot of things and go shopping one time but when she asked her how she got the money, Mary had told her it was none of her business.      

Now that she thought about it, it was probably the money she borrowed. She borrowed money to live extravagantly and now she was working her ass off to pay for it.      

'We reported the case to the police. My mother begged them and said she was probably abducted so they took up the case once a call didn't come from her after a long time. But when they started their investigation, somehow, they realised that Mary had left a note for my mother before she disappeared and the police became annoyed at her for wasting their time when my mother knew she had deliberately ran away from home."      

"I can't remember the contents of the letter but she said something about wanting to live how she was supposed to live and for us not to find her. Then she said to let me take care of her."     

"A month later, Mr Timothy came and told us about the debt. My mother looked really surprised when he mentioned the interest rate. I knew we were never going to be able to pay up such an amount but since Mary was nowhere to be found, we didn't have any other choice."     

"Well.... I realised last night that my name was also in the contract. If we couldn't pay up, then I would have to be taken by him and get married to his son. His son has some kind of down syndrome. I think he should be approaching his thirties... so I heard."      

By the time she finished narrating, tears were already dropping from her eyes.     

"Life hasn't been easy for me. Everything made me angry. I was even angrier because I was most times verbally abused during my part time jobs but the money I slave away for isn't even mine! Whenever I think about it, I just get so angry and I end up unconsciously transfering the aggression to someone else."     

"Everything messed up my head and my mind to the point where I hated myself. It felt like I was simply living to be a slave. It was.... it's so painful Leo." She turned to look at him with teary eyes.      

"I was always a good kid. Even though I wasn't loved at home, I had friends in school. That was how I met James and Mira since we all attended the same elite school. I was such a good kid back then that I even let people bully me."      

"It hurts me so much that even when I try to take my own life, the first question that pops into my head is... who is going to take care of my mother? How is she going to pay up the debt on her own? But how... how could she do this to me after everything? Why does she hate me so much?" She was beginning to sob loudly now as she spoke between tears.      

Leo had never been so shocked in his entire life. At that point, he couldn't even seem to think.      

He scooted closer to her and pulled her to himself in a comforting hug as she began to cry even louder while remembering all the events of last night.      

"It's okay Mia." Was the only thing he could say even though he knew nothing was actually okay.      

Whoever that woman she called a mother was, she was a devil!