Chapter 4 The Stuffed Animal

• Chapter four
• Have you ever slept in a big, wide, and soft bed, with linen sheets and a quilt for the cold?
• Well, that's where I am lying, but despite having slept for a long time, I feel like I need something, and that something is a stuffed animal.
• I open my eyes wide, get up, and walk towards the door. I grab the doorknob and hear a loud noise coming from the bathroom. My heart beats rapidly, and the idea of a ghost wandering around the room gives me goosebumps. I carefully open the door and run out through the hallways until I reach the stairs. I descend as if the devil were chasing me and calm down my agitated heart.
• I feel like I'm going to have a heart attack.
• I look up. Now the only thing that will calm me down is some food.
• My feet lead me to the kitchen on their own, and I find its radiant facade of deliciousness. I pull the door and walk straight to the refrigerator. I open it and find all kinds of delicious things and some not so much.
• Does an entire family live here to have a two"door refrigerator full of food?
• Is this heaven?*
• Of course not, crazy."
• Just shut up, you annoy me. *
• I'm you, remember."
• I know, but the ugly and unstable version*.
• Sometimes I wonder why I argue with my mind if it's me, just inside and annoying and crazy and...
• Shut up already and focus on the food, then on finding a stuffed animal."
• Yes, mom*.
• I take out a raisin bread, pineapple jam, and a succulent orange juice. I prepare my sandwich and finish it quickly. I yawn, and my eyes beg to be closed again.
• I furrow my brows, every time I eat, I get sleepy... Maybe I'm diabetic.
• I climb the stairs with all the laziness in the world, and vague memories of Wade come to my mind. I think I was a bit harsh, especially because the poor boy was desperate to find me.
• I shake my head and touch wood again.
• Wow!
• If I can climb one hundred and fifty steps so quickly just by thinking about him, now how will I climb them thinking about his oval"shaped abs.
• They should look so sexy.
• Besides, it's not one hundred and fifty steps, it's just to add drama to my mind.
• I focus on finding a stuffed animal and enter the first room without much success, nothing, just an empty bed. I enter the second room, and again, nothing, just a room full of games and a super screen. I enter the third room and find a giant bathroom. I enter the fourth room and see my mom sleeping with Mate. I enter the fifth room and...
• Wait, are my mom and Mate cuddling like that?
• Am I seeing things?
• I open the door again, and yes, indeed, they look like a couple, and here I am feeling cold. I internally shake my head and close the door slowly. I prefer to go to the rooms on the left side, that spooky side.
• I walk to the first one and find a room full of photos and posters with a blue bed in the center of the room. Definitely, this one doesn't have any stuffed animals.
• I enter the second one and see a big bed with a lady lying on it. I furrow my brows; I think she must be the housekeeper because her uniform is on the side.
• They don't let her rest!
• I close the door and go to the third one, where pink walls make me cry. It's so garish. I observe the whole place, and my eyes meet different stuffed animals.
• Just what I wanted.
• I enter and grab a gigantic dog proportional to my size. I leave the room and walk towards where I took my first nap. When I arrive, I put my ear to the door just to make sure no one is there, and what I hear is the sound of the heating making itself known.
• I sigh resignedly. I open the door and look around for any traces of someone. I find nothing, as it must have been my paranoia. I shrug and walk towards the bed, placing the stuffed animal on the left side and myself on the right. I hug it and try to fall asleep on a completely cold and somewhat messy bed.
• Could it be that I sweated before and didn't realize it?
• I adjust the stuffed animal to the perfect angle to go back to sleep, and as soon as I do this, my eyes close.
• ...
• I stretch my arms and feel something soft and hard at the same time. It feels so good to touch those little hollows and bumps. I smile and run my hand over them several times, grabbing the gigantic arm and holding onto it.
• Wait.
• Arms?
• Why does this have big arms?
• I furrow my brow. Stuffed animals don't have arms, let alone be this hard and with a consistently high temperature, and they definitely don't breathe.
• Do they breathe?
• It breathes!
• I open my eyes wide and in an instant, I'm out of bed. The scream I let out surely has been heard throughout the house, waking everyone up. The person turns twice in bed and falls to the floor. I curl up in the corner of the room and hear the door open. I quickly run towards my mother while I see Mate in boxers looking around.
• "What scared you, Sara?" Elizabeth appears and I take refuge in her arms.
• I sigh in fear. "There... There's someone there," I point to the left side of the bed, and Mate relaxes.
• "It's just the Alp... Wade," I let go of my mother and open my eyes as wide as I can.
• Did I hear correctly?
• Wade, here.
• "HERE?!" I scream so loudly that everyone covers their ears. I hear voices behind us and see the lady I saw sleeping next to a younger girl.
• No, look, a young old lady.
• Shut up, focus on what's happening.
• Alright.
• My mom glares at Mate, I turn to see the others looking straight ahead and lowering their composure a bit.
• Why are these people so weird?
• I turn my head and see a Ricky Ricon looking straight ahead without a shirt, only in pajama pants.
• OMG!
• SHIRTLESS, SHIRTLESS.
• He looks like one of those sexy and attractive models with a lot of muscles, and I dare say that anyone can notice that I'm drooling over him. Returning my gaze from infinity and beyond, I see him smile and arrogantly shake his head. I definitely don't like him anymore.
• No, you like him skinny.
• "Mate, why did you put Sara to sleep in Wade's room?" My mother takes on a protective and secure tone towards me. "You have no morals, what's wrong with you?"
• "Yes, but since you told me that she doesn't like pink, I couldn't put her in Emilie's room. Besides, the other one was the nanny Spirit's room, and I wouldn't put her to sleep there either," he says, massaging his temple.
• "Yes, but what about the ones on the second floor? Are they occupied too?" She sighs. Sometimes I think that when she does that, she sounds like a horse.
• "I don't understand you. If I leave her downstairs, it's wrong; here, it's wrong; somewhere else, it's wrong. So, what do you want me to do, Elizabeth? I can't do magic, you know," he looks her in the eyes and leaves the room.
• I look at my mother trying to be strong, I take her arm. "Mom, let's grab our things and leave. I have no idea what time it is, but we'll make it home," she nods and leaves the room with everyone else following, and only he and I are left.
• The atmosphere feels tense. I observe him and sigh without saying a word. I look for my dress in the bathroom and take off everything I was wearing, putting it in the laundry basket and leaving with his gaze on me. I close the door and start walking until I reach the stairs, where I find Elizabeth wearing the dress and holding her heels in her hands.
• We descend in silence until we reach the door that she opens. We leave that beautiful and precious place, and I don't know why Wade comes to mind, with his oval"shaped abs and muscular arms.
• You like him.
• That? Never.
• Suddenly, my mother takes my hand and clings to my arm. "Don't be like that anymore, okay? Let's go home and sleep on the couch, if we both fit there," she nods.
• As if a lightning bolt, her words from when she was arguing with Mate come to my mind""Mom, how did you know that was Wade's room?" I ask, squinting my eyes to try and see its dark interior.
• She sighs. "It's not the first time I've been to that house, maybe it's the last, but for now, I don't plan on setting foot in there again."
• I furrow my eyebrows. Since when did my mother travel when my father was away?
• That's strange.
• I shake off any negative thoughts and realize that we're only a few blocks away from our house.
• Are we really so close that I didn't even notice we walked?
• "We live eight blocks away from them, and we need to sleep because tomorrow I'll enroll you in school so you can be happy again. Luckily, you're in your last year and the second trimester," she sighs. We take the last turn around the corner, and there, in the center of all the houses, is ours.
• "Mom, what time is it?" I ask, and she searches for her cellphone in her handbag.
• "It's three"thirty in the morning, practically time for you to go to school today."
• We reach the entrance and climb the three steps to the door. While she opens it, I start thinking about what became of Mr. Alcibiades, who supposedly is my dad and swore to protect my mom, but ended up hurting her.
• What a coward, what could he be doing now?
• "Sara, come in, you need to sleep, or you'll fall asleep in the morning," she turns around and enters. I quickly climb the stairs two by two and run to my room, where I take off everything and shower, trying to wash away that smell. I step out and search among the boxes for pajamas.
• "You should buy better pajamas, not these," I mutter.
• I cautiously observe the old, wrinkled floral pajamas.
• "It's my body, my comfort, so just shut up."
• "Fine," I reply.
• I put them on and rush downstairs, where I see Elizabeth sleeping on the couch. I go back up to my room and search for a blanket. Among the boxes of electronics, I find my cellphone and head back downstairs. I reach the couch and walk towards the light switch, turning it off. I return to my mom, lie down, and stretch the sheet for both of us. I throw my leg over hers, and she gladly accepts it.
• Maybe I'm a bit strange with her, but that's how we treat each other, love each other, and understand each other. She hugs me, and I close my eyes until I lose all sense of reason.