NOVEL NEXT Chapter 227: Bittersweet.
Kyle wept at the life that he never knew, he cried because he knew that his childhood was stolen from him.
He quickly wiped his tears and began to move around in the house, the creaking floor showed how much it had aged.
It felt like it was going to cave in at any moment, but this was its usual state.
Kyle didn't know how it was still standing but it was a lot sturdier than it gave it credit for and he found himself standing in the room that once belonged to his mother.
"Mama…" Kyle found himself saying before clamping his mouth shut, not understanding why he muttered that word.
It had been years since he left this house yet it looked the same despite signs of it looking like someone had lived.
"My home… It feels strange being here again," Kyle muttered to himself, running his fingers along the walls.
Kyle noticed that there was something on the floor but unlike everything covered in dust, this was something a lot different because it didn't share the same fate as the rest of the objects within the house.
"That is weird," Kyle said before crouching to inspect the object, it was a piece of metal but that was it, an underwhelming find but could it be that someone broke into the house with this item and disposed of it the moment they discovered this place was a dump.
But there was a poignant smell coming from this house, it invaded his nostrils the moment he opened the kitchen door.
The stench, it was like something died in here and Kyle could see a decaying rodent in the corner of the room.
It came to find food in this building but ended up starving to death but this didn't solicit any sort of empathy from Kyle not because he was some heartless monster but due to this simply being a rodent.
Kyle expected him to remember something, to have some kind of epiphany but nothing came to mind, unfortunately.
But Kyle soon heard sudden movement at the back of the house and without thinking twice he rushed outside to see who it was.
Kyle barged out the door and saw there was no sign of life, it was just the wind.
He felt like he was losing his mind at this point but Kyle knew he had to remain calm.
This was turning out to be a waste of time but at the corner of his eyes, he saw something or someone standing there.
Kyle jerked his head towards that direction only to see the woman he had just spoken to staring right at him.
"What the hell are you doing here!?" Kyle was startled but the woman had a creepy smile on her face.
Kyle knew that she was bad news and wanted nothing to do with her because she belonged in the asylum.
"My friends want to know why you are going into that house?" The lady asked, prompting Kyle to look around to see her so-called friends but his eyes met nothing.
"Are you with someone?" Kyle asked but the lady raised a brow.
"They are standing right beside me," The lady responded with such seriousness.
"How did I get myself in this fucking mess?" Kyle thought to himself, his return has been far from uneventful.
He nearly beat a man to death and now he was interacting with someone that was schizophrenic because she had imaginary friends.
This was the effect this place had on people, it turned the sanest of people into lunatics, a product of their environment.
But before the conversation could evolve, his phone rang, it was Priscilla and without giving it a second thought. Kyle was on his way.
The lady was left standing there but her eyes looked at the house before shuddering.
"A lot of bad things happened in that house," The lady said under her breath but with Kyle nowhere in sight, her words fell on deaf ears.
-
Oliver and his partner arrived at the given location, all eyes were on them as people looked at them in confusion but there was no doubt that they felt threatened by their presence.
"What the hell is this place?" Oliver questioned, he couldn't believe that it was this bad.
However, Priscilla didn't have the same reaction, she looked indifferent because they had seen over a dozen kids that needed help.
"So… which of the children was he talking about?" Priscilla asked Oliver and Oliver realized that they might have been too hasty.
They didn't have all the information but he also didn't know it would be this bad either.
"How about you call him?" Oliver suggested and that was exactly what she did.
Priscilla engaged Kyle in a conversation but Oliver was taken aback by the state of this place.
However, he soon felt a hand on his gun and Oliver reflexively defended himself by swinging his arm back but it collided with something that had far less body mass than he assumed.
This meant the force he exerted was for an adult, not a child but Oliver knew right away the moment his hand collided.
It hit the child right in the face, sending him tumbling before Oliver placed his hand on his holster to make sure his gun was still there.
Priscilla looked at it unfold and once again, didn't react showing she had more experience in navigating these situations than Oliver.
"I-I'm so sorry!" Oliver apologized, attempting to help the boy up but the boy ran away without looking back.
The fear in everyone's eyes tripled and Priscilla sighed knowing that this was going to be a long day.
The police were pigs or at least that was how some people viewed them and this meant that not everyone had the idea that the police were their friend.
Who could blame them considering they had been abandoned by them for so long or this place wouldn't look the way it did?