NIRELLE - Chapter 13: Chapter 13

"You can let me go now," I say, my voice barely coming out. He blinks and slowly raises me so I am now standing just a bit from him. "Thank you," I murmur as I create distance between us. "Why are you here?" I ask immediately.
"Well, I heard you were cooking," he said as if I had committed the gravest of sins ever to exist. He seems to be moving on quickly, unaware of the effect he had just had on me. I don't know what it is, but it is unfamiliar to me, and I am not sure I like it.
"Yes, I woke up early and did not know what else to do, so I just decided to prepare a meal for everyone to show my appreciation."
"You don't have to do that." I don't know if he is telling me to warn me or if it's a concern in his voice.
"The staff made it very clear, but if I do not cook, then what should I do? Clean? Handwash your clothes? Do the gardening?" I could not believe I was asking for work. When I had begun working my bones at the Thamore mansion, I had always hoped for the day of my escape, but now that it seemed here, I did not want to let go of it at all. More because it seemed like a trap; as if I did nothing, I'd be falling for a long time.
"None of that; you can do anything you want aside from the household chores. We have enough staff for that," he explained like he was talking to a two-year-old failing to understand his explanations.
"So you are saying that I should sit all day in the house and do nothing?"
"You don't have to be indoors." My eyebrow goes up in a questioning manner. "Didn't Theo tell you that you could go out? As long as you are with your team, then you have nothing to worry about."
"So I am supposed to go out alone, right?"
"You'd not be alone," he replies, and the swift upward and downward of his lips tells me that he knows what I mean but is trying to be funny. "An entire team will be with you, and if you need more, all you have to do is ask, and I will have Theo assign you more."
"Great," I say, making sure he can hear the sarcasm in my voice. He isn't too impressed by it either.
"Well, even if I get out of the house, what am I going to do? Am I going to roam around looking like this?" I point to my face. The idea of being outside has been enticing to me, but I know that if I manage to step out of this house, I'd only come back in tears. I have not a single clue how the world works. It's been six years since I was able to enjoy the freedom of nature, and now I know I would not be able to fit in.
"Give me some house chores; I promise I will do it better than the staff does, and you might fire them all and just keep me."
"I can't do that." His voice was sad, as if I were a sad tale he had just heard. I want to ask him why not, but he does not wait for me before he answers. "You have to consider that if I give you that job, they would all be jobless. Are you really that cruel? Wanting to take the job of others?"
"Oh well, if you put it that way..." I trail off. I had only been thinking of myself, but that was a first for me. I had not really put myself first in a long time. I had always been trying to please Yvette, hoping she would notice me, and the hell I was in would break.
"I do," he said with a head nod. He was manipulative, but it was the truth, so I couldn't call him out on it.
"So why are you here?" I ask. I know that I would spend the entire day coiled up in bed if I could bear the unfamiliar feeling it gives me.
"I told you that I came because you were staring at me, and I thought you wanted to say something to me," he says, and if not that, I know he had never been spotted outside; I would have mistaken him for those playboys who took women as their toys. Or maybe he was one, and nobody knew because he never showed his face to the public.
"That is a misunderstanding, so you can leave now," I say, turning over and hiding the handle of the door, ready to kick him out.
"I also thought we could talk about what happened yesterday.
"What happened yesterday?" I ask, swallowing the lump in my throat, as I hope he will not ask me why I refuse to accept medical help.
"When you refuse medical help?"
"Do I need to get medical help? I already told you that I was not going to have sex or babies, so why should I be worried about my fertility?" I ask, turning my nose up as if I want to challenge him.
"It's about that; I just think you should take care of your health no matter what it is," he says, and I feel like calling him a big fat liar.
"Are you that concerned about my fertility?" I ask, and my hand clutches the doorknob even more, making my knuckles hurt in the process.
"I don't really..."
"If you don't care, then I am not going to have this conversation again," I say. Fear gripped my entire being as I opened the door and motioned for him to leave. The memory of being in the hospital the last time still haunts me; I can't go back there, and especially not alone.