Later that day, Santana had just woken up..

 

‘Hm? Yesterday was a lot of fun. I wonder if Helix is awake now.’

I got out of bed and went for my morning run as per usual. Since it was Saturday, I was told to rest, but I didn’t run much yesterday and thought I could catch up.

I ran for about a mile before going back to my apartment.

I opened the door and went to the shower because I was sweaty.

When I got out and continued with my day, I looked around for my phone and started making breakfast for everyone.

Wait.. I’m making breakfast? Doesn’t Helix usually make breakfast for us?

‘I seem to be forgetting something..’ I paced around the kitchen.

‘Helix. Where is he?’ I looked over where he slept and there was not a trace of him.

‘My phone!’

I ran back to my room, and grabbed my phone. I should call him…. But he doesn’t have a phone. How has he lived until now???

I put my phone back down and woke Sarah up.

“Sis. Do you know where Helix went?”

He’d usually go out for the weekends, so I wasn’t really worried about him, but he stopped going out a few months back.

“Mmmh?” Sarah was groggy and annoyed from being woken up from her precious sleep by none other than her brother.

“What do you want, Santana?”

“Do you know where Helix is?”

“No. Now go away. Too early for this.”

“But there wasn’t breakfast this morning for us.”

“So? He’s not Mom, or our chef. He doesn’t need to make food--- WHAT??” Sarah finally processed the situation.

“WHY IS THERE NO BREAKFAST!!??”

“I don’t know. We should find him, or a note if he left one.”

“Santana, go call him!”

“Sis, he doesn’t have a phone, remember? The key is with him still, so he can come anytime.”

“Maybe something happened and he left.”

“Not possible.”

“Why? It’s not like we were related.”

“True, but if it’s not that, then--”

A sudden memory flashed in my head from the day we first met.

 

“About your question, I do have some room for you, but you’ll have to sleep on the floor.” 

“That's fine. Anywhere is better than outside.” 

“How long do you need to stay?” 

“How long am I allowed to stay?” 

“Until you can support yourself.” 

“Alright.”

 

Oh. I remember now.

But since when could Helix support himself? I never saw he had a job..

Unless he lied to me and took advantage of my goodwill!

‘That bastard. I’ll definitely hunt you down and pay you back tenfold.’

I need to vent my frustrations.

“Sarah. Follow me.”

I went to the living room and Sarah followed me.

“Brother? What’s this about? Why am I following you to the living room? You could have just told me to come here.”

“You might be right.”

Sarah’s jaw dropped and her eyes opened wide.

“D-did you just say that I was right…? You of all people??”

“Tch. I say you might be right. Don’t get too full of yourself, sis.”

“Okay. So he left? Is that it?”

“Yes, but let me explain to you why. When we first met, he asked me if he could crash here. It was 5 months ago.”

“Okay, and? I don’t want to listen to your life story. Tell me the important information as to why Helix left.”

I gave her a dumbfounded look. How could someone be such a bitch?

“Anyway, when we first met, he asked me how long he could stay and my answer was until he could support himself.”

“Wow. Brother you’re so mean.”

“I really wasn’t. Even though we don’t necessarily pay rent, there’s still only enough for two. If the bill gets higher, dad will cut the expenses.”

Sarah looked down.

“Okay, you’re right. But if you said until he could support himself, then Helix shouldn’t have been able to leave.”

“Exactly. You’ve got the gist of it. He never got a job that I know of, so either he broke a law to get money to support himself, or took advantage of us.”

“I’m going to kill him. I'm going to tell dad to find him and make sure he won’t have a peaceful life. How can someone be so shameless as to take advantage of others’ kindness?!”

“I agree.” Sure enough, as we cursed Helix, my phone rang with a ding.

“Hm?” I looked at my phone.

 

Transfer received and completed:

Amount: $5,000

Sender: Anonymous

You cannot reply to this message, or send back anything because the sender chose to stay anonymous.

Press the X to delete the message.

 

My mouth dropped and my hands trembled.

“Brother, is everything okay? Why are you shaking? What happened?”

“We--”

“We what? Spit it out.”

I turned over my phone and showed Sarah the notification I got on my phone. She was dumbstruck.

“Did he do this?”

“Probably. He asked for my account number last weekend. So this was why…”

“He’s a really good person. He paid for 5 months of rent.”

“Yeah.” I fought back tears. 

‘So he really left.. I’m going to miss you, Helix. May fate cross our paths again.’

 

At the same time, Melody was in her room.

‘I don’t feel too good. My neck hurts. I can’t remember much of what happened yesterday.’

I went downstairs and went to eat breakfast.

Mom and Dad were in the kitchen making eggs and bacon.

“Morning.”

“Morning, Melody. How’d you sleep?” Dad asked.

“Sleep? It was okay. What happened last night?”

“Hm?” Mom questioned.

“Never mind. How was your night?”

“It was alright. Nothing much to talk about though.” Mom answered again.

“But He-” Before Mark could finish his sentence, mom elbowed dad in the gut. She gave him a sharp look and he changed the subject immediately.

“You’ve got two weeks of school left. Are you going to miss your friends?”

“Yeah, but we can still hang out during summer.”

Mom handed me my breakfast after I answered and I dug in.

As I was eating, I felt nostalgic. I looked up from my food and viewed the kitchen from the bar I was sitting at.

“Helix.” I said.

“Who?” Dad asked. Mom and dad looked at each other with nervous expressions.

“Helix. Where is he? What happened last night?”

It had to be right after I finished that sentence that the memories flooded in. I started to cry. Tears streamed out of my eyes.

Mom and dad looked uncomfortable, so they looked down.

It took a few seconds of me hawking my eyes out for them to come comfort me.

“It’s okay baby. It’s best to not remember him.”

“B-but how can I not?!” It was hard to talk. I was choking up from the emotions pouring out of me.

“Shh, it’s okay. We’ll be here for you always.”

I cried for a good 15 minutes. My heart felt heavy and I felt like there was nowhere to go. Is this heartbreak?

After finally calming down, I went to my room and holed myself up in there for the weekend.

‘Helix, I don’t know why you left, but I’ll miss you and never forget you. I love you.’

As I couldn’t speak any more about him because I’d cry again, I sent my silent wishes to him in my thoughts.

 

Meanwhile, Helix was traveling.

Traveling around the world, but without a set destination. Where should I go?

I had flown as an eagle, and carried the stuff I intended to burn, to a campsite.

Coincidentally, there was a campfire that was still going from the night before and people around it with bottles of liquor in their hands. They were all wasted.

What an ugly sight.

I hovered over the fire while flapping my wings and dropped the stuff on top of it.

The longs moved and sparks flew. The fire grew because it had material to burn. No one woke up from around the campsite.

I stayed there for a short while to confirm everything was burned.

After I confirmed nothing to be left, I carried the remaining bag for my clothes and flew away.

I didn’t really need a passport to travel anywhere since I could fly, but it’s useful when dealing with visas and such. I had one for each country, using the same name, but on different passports.

Of course, they didn’t know I had memberships for each country, because the world was not unified.

So far, I could speak English, Spanish, Chinese, and French. I learned this when I went to school. I started in America, so I was fluent in English.

Spanish and French were taught in school. I have abnormal comprehension. On a superhuman level, at that.

I also have an amazing memory, but don’t use it because there’s nothing much worth remembering. So basically, if I deem it necessary or important to me or my life, I’ll remember it.

I became fluent in Spanish and French in 2 years and fluent in Chinese in 3. The only reason why Chinese was harder is not because of the vocab, but because of the tone you have to speak in to mean certain words.

The reading and writing parts were simple though.

Without any clue as to where to go, I flew for a good 5 hours up north in Florida and landed in an alley.

In the alley, I transformed into a human and put my clothes that were in the bag on. I could only carry one pair and the cat collar. The rest had to be burned. Sorry, Santana.

‘Though, I wonder how they’re doing.’

Not my problem anymore.

When I finished dressing, I walked around the place. The alley I went into was behind a hotel and a restaurant.

Why is it always food? Is the universe trying to tell me something?

As I walked around I heard a group of people talking about anime.

It was interesting, so I decided to stick around and listen.

“Dude, the girls in anime are so hot. This is my waifu.”

“What? Her? No way! She’s okay, but I think her sister is better.”

“You two must have decorations for eyes. Obviously it’s--”

“...” I had no words. What’s a waifu?

Fighting over 2-D characters? What was the point in that?

A short while later, one of the three in the group spoke.

“I wonder if the uniforms are the same in Japan. I want to go. I’ve also heard it’s a really nice place.”

“Same. After all, if it’s as pretty as they draw it in anime, I’d live there happily until the end of my days.”

Anime? I’d heard of it, but never watched it. So it originated there?

Guess I’ve found my destination.