He continues to sit there for a minute, his breathing coming in ragged pants. After another couple of minutes, he slowly stands up, still keeping an eye on the door and waiting, trembling all over. Another minute passes and he’s finally able to hold his breath no longer and gasps for air. He feels weak from holding it for so long and falls backwards onto the mattress, panting heavily, still clutching onto the edge of the blanket. He shuts his eyes tight as he tries to regain control of his breathing and senses. ‘I have to calm down…if I start freaking out again they’ll know, they’ll kill me… I can’t risk it…,’ he repeats silently, repeatedly repeating this thought as he tries to force himself to relax, to remain as calm as possible. It helps a bit, but he still doesn’t have enough control over his breathing nor his heartbeats to keep track of time, so it takes him several more minutes before he manages to calm himself down.
When his breathing slows down again, Hugo looks at the door, waiting to see if the door opens yet. It does, and soon after a familiar face shows up. He recognizes her immediately. ‘Astrid…she’s here!’ he sighs in relief.
Chapter 8
He’s completely relaxed, lying comfortably on his bed. He’s wearing a large white shirt under a pair of dark blue sweatpants that hang loosely on his hips. He looks comfortable despite having no clue where he is right now, considering all of the events that happened earlier today. He thinks that everything has settled into place – he’s safe, he is loved, his parents are gone, and he is going to get the chance to live out his dream. There are no bad memories associated with this house that he will remember.
As he stares at the ceiling, he wonders if he should talk with the woman. Should he open up to her? Should he even bother? He doubts that she’s going to react favorably, but he’s curious to find out. He figures that she might be the one person other than his parents, his brothers, and his mother (who was his birth mom) who might actually care enough about his situation to try to change his mind.
He decides to call her. As his hand reaches towards his cell phone, he realizes that he doesn’t really know what to say. She might be furious with him, and she may not want him around after he revealed her secret. He contemplates hanging up, but decides against doing so, and quickly types a message.
--
He’s still lying down when his phone buzzes beside him, indicating that he received a message. He hesitates momentarily, before reaching over carefully and picking it up off the ground, pulling the blankets further up his body. Hesitantly, he presses the power button on his phone, unlocking the screen in order to view it better. He squints slightly as he reads the text from Astrid, taking a few moments before responding to it with an equally unsure reply.
--
Hey. You alright? Are you ok?
He doesn’t answer right away, glancing over at the door once before replying with a simple, ‘Yeah.’
After a few moments, there’s another response.
Are you sure? That’s not like you.
For a brief second, he considers lying and pretending nothing happened, but decides against it, knowing that she’s smart enough to figure out that he did something wrong if he did that. He pauses for another moment to decide how much he should share about the incident. It wasn’t like he was planning on mentioning it. He was planning on keeping quiet until the very last possible moment, hoping that he could manage to convince her that what she said was wrong. But then he remembered the man standing behind the door. How scared he sounded as he pleaded with the door not to open. And he couldn’t help but feel a small spark of hope in his heart as he imagines him saying that Astrid must have been mistaken about something.
She must be confused, he tries to reason. It doesn’t mean anything, maybe she misunderstood him. She wouldn’t know. Maybe she just thought that she saw someone else.
The image of the man with the brown hair flashes before his eyes as he thinks about the encounter. He tries hard to ignore it. He can’t let himself think about it – he needs to focus on getting back out of here safely. He puts the picture out of his mind.
He clears his throat, typing out a quick message:
Sorry for the late reply. I had to take a short nap. I’m fine now.
The next instant, her response appears on his screen.
That’s good, but I think we need to talk. You know that I love you more than anyone else. And that includes your parents too. I always do. Even though it pains me that I cannot love you as much as I wish. Because I know my place…and I do not fit into your life. Not that I want to. I love you, but…