Chapter 2

“Annie, you can’t do this to me, who is this man and what are you doing with him? You told me you were traveling, told me you are going to see your parents, how are you here in another man's house wearing a robe an…”

Nathan said and paused as the reality of the whole situation started to dawn on him, she lied to him that she was traveling meanwhile, she was here, with another man, having a sex marathon, openly cheating on him and pretending they had nothing going on, this had to be a horrible dream, Annie would never do this to him, they love each other too much.

“Honey, is he the boy you talked about? The one that thinks you are going to settle with him?”

The man asked, still laughing.

“The very same delusional idiot, I don’t know what gave him the idea that I was in his class, at least he got the wake-up call now, Naty baby, you and I were never a thing, and we will never be,”

Annie said. Nathan concluded he was dreaming, this wasn’t real, he is going to wake up in bed with Annie any moment from now and she would mock him for his stupid dream, he slapped himself to help him wake up fast but instead of waking up, the laughter of Annie and the man filled the room, he felt paralyzed by the pain that shot through him when he finally let himself believe that he wasn’t dreaming, this was real, Annie really cheated him, he raised his head and looked at her, she looked like a complete stranger, the Annie he knew and loved wasn’t the one standing in front of him, it was someone else, and she was mocking him.

“Laughing so much suddenly makes me so horny babe, what do we do?”

the man asked and Nathan watched in dismal as Annie walked up to him and threw her hands around his shoulder and his around her waist.

“Oh baby, you can have me anytime you want, I am all yours,”

Annie said as she removed her robe, she was naked under the robe, Nathan watched in horror as the both of them started making out in front of him, he couldn’t take it anymore, he walked up to them and pushed the man away from Annie.

“What’s your problem fucker? Get out of my house,” the man yelled at him but Nathan ignored him and turned his attention to the woman he loved and who he had thought loved him too.

“Annie, you told me you love me, I don’t know what’s happening but I can let this go, I can pretend this never happened and I won’t talk about it ever again, just don’t leave me for him, I love you so much, I can’t live without you Annie, my life is meaningless without you,”

Nathan pleaded desperately, he couldn’t imagine his life without her in it, he hated how dependent he was on her but he just couldn’t help it, but his pleads fell on deaf ears, the more he talked the more they mocked him, Annie called him a loser and a beggar with no future.

“What made you think I will settle for a beggar like you? I mean look at me, do you think you can handle this?”

She asked, spinning around. Nathan was much too dumbfounded by her change of attitude to say a word.. He could only stare in horror at the woman he had thought he would spend the rest of his life with.

“The only reason I stayed so long with you was because you knew how to do me right, now I found someone who can spend on me and also do me well, you think I will leave him for you? No matter how good you are in bed, if you are poor, you can’t get a woman, unless she wants to do some charity, which is what I did for you,”

Annie revealed and Nathan felt his heartbreak into a thousand pieces, he couldn’t take it anymore.

“Is that it, Annie? Why didn’t you just tell me? You should have told me you wanted out, I know I would have been hurt but it would have been better than me finding out this way, we were together yesterday, you should have told me,” he let out in anger

“Yeah, where is the fun in that? I like it this way, of course, I didn’t plan it to happen like this but I like how it turned out, I always wanted to see you lose it when you find out, I wanted to see your face when you find out just how much of a delusional loser you are and boy, I wasn’t disappointed, I had fun, but you can’t handle me, poor boy,”

She said in a mocking tune and they both burst out laughing, right before they went back to kissing in front of him like he wasn’t there.

Nathan walked out then, walked as fast as his shaking legs could take him, he ignored the security man at the gate and got out of the house on his own, got on his motorcycle, and rode back towards his workplace with a broken heart, he felt ashamed, to think he had dreamt of building a life with Annie, she had pretended to love him and all this while she had been using him, he should have known, he should have seen through her, the fact that he had given her his whole savings because she had complained of not having money to pay her bills, she lied to him, he wiped his eyes to keep the tears.

His eyes got blurry from crying and he had to pull over to get himself together, he saw people watching him but didn’t even mind, he was much too heartbroken and sad to give a fuck about what they thought of him crying n the streets, he thought his life couldn’t get any worse, jokes on him because it did, Annie had played him and mocked him behind his back all the while he was in love with her and cared for her, she had played him for a fool, he was indeed a fool for not reading in-between the line, they were clues but he had ignored it, he wiped his tears and tried to put himself together, but just the thought of what they had shared, what he thought they had and how he found out it was all made up lies broke him so badly.

Nathan sat on top of his motorcycle for more than one hour, barely aware of what was going on around him, he was much too absolved by his pain and sadness, and when he finally got himself back a little, he started his motorcycle and rode back to work still grieving.

“Why are you just coming back? What took you so long?”

His boss yelled at him when he finally arrived at work, he let out a sigh, he knew this would happen.

“I am sorry, I had a lot on my mind and had to pull over to avoid getting into an accident,”

He explained, his boss glared at him before tossing the next delivery at him.

“You better not be late this time or you are not getting any pay,”

The man said and went back inside, Nathan stared at the delivery box in his hand, turned around and walked back to his motorcycle, and made it to his next delivery place, he did about eight more rounds for the day, he had to force smiles and be nice to all his customers to avoid getting a bad review from them, he finally did his last order and got by to the restaurant at seven pm, he parked his motorcycle and went into the restaurant to get his pay for the day’s work.

“Good that you are back, can I have my keys?”

His boss said as soon as he entered stretching his hand out to collect it from him but Nathan held on to the keys, he already had a bad feeling about this and knew he might not get his pay if he just gave back the key.

“Why sir?”

He asked in a weary voice, he already knew he was getting fired.

“Do I need a reason to get my keys back from you? In case you want to know, your services are no longer needed, I can’t stand to lose a very generous and regular customer because of your nasty attitude, give me my keys<”

His boss yelled at him, charging towards him, Nathan took a few steps back.

“I can’t hand the keys over if I don’t know what I did for you to fire me, plus you have to pay me first,”

Nathan let out, today has been too hectic for him to face another injustice at the hand of this wicked man that was already underpaying him.

“You, rude ass mudafucker, you spoke rudely to my regular customer, he pays too generously for you to have been disrespectful, here is your day payment, I want you out of here this minute, and don’t ever come back,”

He yelled at him and threw the money at him, the dollar bills scattered all over the ground and Nathan bent down to pick them up before wordlessly handing over the key to him, he took it and hissed before turning away from him to yell at the other delivery guys who had gathered to watch him get fired, Nathan turned and walked out of the place, he had a long way to walk before he gets home, he couldn’t afford to take a bus, that would mean no lunch for his sisters tomorrow and he didn’t want that to happen and the walk back home will give him time to think and come in terms with all that happened today, and get his thoughts together because he wasn’t about to take what happened home, he didn’t want his sisters to know.

As he walked home, tired and heartbroken, he brought out his phone which has been in his jacket pocket, and realized he had lots of missed calls from Nora and also Nelly’s homeroom teacher, he felt his heart beat increase in fear, the call was since two pm, and now it was almost eight pm, he couldn’t call the homeroom teacher because it was already so late, he dialed Nora’s number praying that nothing bad has happened.

“Nathan, why weren’t you taking your calls?”

Nora cried over the phone and Nathan felt his heart sink in pain, something bad did happen…