August 20, 2018 (Monday) 10:57 PM Ly Café
The French bread lie hot and fresh against the cold plate served by Lyka. Clasping his cup, Ivan sips on his cocoa drink, its smoke unsteadily seethed, ascending upwards.
"I haven't seen the other one for a while," Scarlet remarked. "Where is she?"
"The other one? Faura? I've no idea."
"And how about Bryner?"
"Why does he concern you now? What did you see in that man, anyway?"
"Bryner? He's a rich man. I was accidentally invited in a camp and that's where I saw him. I stayed in that area to live with him while my prostitution was yet unknown to him. When we decided to return to my place, he finally knew about me and it hit him hard in ways I never expected would strike to him harmfully. So he went away."
"And you still continued being a prostitute that time?" Ivan asked, his intense eyes boring underneath her flesh.
"Of course. Women's world don't stop after a heartbreak by a man. However… it costs us our sanity at some point. I continued being a prostitute despite his scornful reaction. And during the times I was comforting different bodies of men drooling with insatiable lust, I met Raven. And no, it wasn't during sex. Raven is a decent man."
"How?"
A smile crawled across her face as memories flash rapidly, striking her soft spot recurrently. Raven felt like the morning sun.
Innocence and restart showered her eyes blindingly as if someone who just resurfaced from a dark tunnel for years. He was a breath of fresh air.
A lullaby throughout midnight, a rocking silence in twilight, and a piece of green leaf amongst dried, flaxen ones.
"Raven… He accepted what Bryner couldn't. He was the man who accepted something in me, which others couldn't. He was pure and decent and kind, which was why we named our child according to an angel. I met him in the bar also and paid me for the private room. I thought he also wants sex, but then he told me that he just want someone to talk to. He was broken when I found him. And I was broken too."
Ivan sipped the last drops of his cocoa drink.
His throat satisfied with burning sweetness spoke gently. "But you were still married with Bryner, weren't you? When you met Raven."
"Yep. That's why I..."
The door swung open and a familiar face greeted from the entrance. It was the female receptionist of Cardeal Hotel, Mair. As she saw the two guests, she went near them.
"Good evening," Scarlet greeted her. "You look stunning as ever."
Mair subtly blush upon the unexpected compliment. "Uh… Do you, by chance, know the man outside? I think he's been looking out to you for a while already."
Scarlet leaned sideward to see a clearer view beyond the glass windows to check on Mair's statement. She momentarily saw a man's eerie silhouette glinting at their place in a shady manner.
Scarlet smiled at Mair's impeccant expression. "Why don't you take a seat and chat with us for a little?"
Mair cleared her throat and timidly sat down on the vacant seat. "Thank you. But the man…"
"Oh, forget about it, young woman," Scarlet assured her with a mature and womanly smirk. "Tell me your name, I'll also introduce you to this young man beside me."
Ivan gave no reaction or comment as Mair tells her name. After a small talk, she politely excused herself and went to her friend, Lyka.
"Well? What do you want to do now?' Scarlet asks Ivan.
"I have something to buy in the market," He coldly said and stood up. "Come with me."
"That doesn't sound like a request at all."
August 20, 2018 (Monday) 11:31 PM Cagan Commercial Center; night market
The hustling night market was filled with customers, satiating the merchants and vendors in rows and columns.
Throngs of flurried crowd flock about, entrepreneurs fired up with competitiveness, people overwhelmed by their passions and goals surround the busy street.
The noisiness and dissonance ironically set tranquility over Ivan.
He felt the furtive steps taken by the unknown man as pointed out by Mair earlier. It was then he confirmed that they've got a stalked on their trail.
Passing along the narrow and crowded street of night market was what they did until they finally lost his track.
As they are walking, a woman suddenly called out for him. "Ivan!"
He swerved his head around and saw a familiar face of a woman. Her delicate feature along with her aquiline nose trademark made him remember her. "Sopheirin…?"
Delighted with her name pronounced from his mouth, the blonde woman neared to them, ignoring the busy mob. "I'm really thankful I met you here. It looks like you remembered my name, Ivan."
He nodded indifferently.
Scarlet nudged Ivan on his back and meltingly whispered, "You know the girl? A past girlfriend? I prefer the female receptionist, but whatever."
"Shut up. This girl's Sopheirin, she's my elementary classmate."
"Oh, a childhood sweetheart."
"A former classmate," Ivan emphasized the correction. "I'm not romantically associated with her in any way."
Sopheirin cleared her throat against the arbitrary noise of the crowd around them and got back Ivan and Scarlet's attention. "My mother runs a small museum nearby. Would you like to visit?"
"Uh, actually we're on our way back to a hotel," Ivan felt inertly uninterested as he rejects her offer. "It's almost midnight, so--"
"Oh actually, we've still got a little time!" Scarlet declared delightfully, her eyes shining with exhilaration. "I love museums and paintings! Can we still visit right now even if it's so late?"
Sopheirin quickly nodded enthusiastically. "Of course, ma'am! We're still open at this hour and it'll be a great honor to have Ivan see my paintings!"
She led Ivan and Scarlet to the small museum, completely burying the memory of an eerie stalker earlier.
The footsteps of the vile man lurks within the bustling street of the night market, hidden, vigilant, and patiently waiting to be a wild predator.
The menace lingers amongst the impeccant throng, beholden by the silent ash gray moonlight.
After Sopheirin had taken the pleasure of touring Scarlet and Ivan around her museum, the two guests finally returned to the Cardeal Hotel.
August 21, 2018 (Tuesday) 12:46 PM Cagan Commercial Center; Sopheirin Museum
Sopheirin sat at a wooden hickory chair clasping tightly her worn down diary.
A certain entry fiddled with her heart in retrospect to a painstakingly vivid memory. One which plucked the strings of her heart with a bittersweet love.
Her childhood sweetheart.
December 15, 2010 Wednesday 12:00 noon at Selvind Elementary School
"I'm in a roller coaster of feelings! I really love nude paintings. My father taught me that it represents vulnerability and honesty. He told me that he likes naked women, so I learned to love those too. But now, I'm starting to hate it. My classmates tease for having such a guilty pleasure. But then I returned liking it because a boy from my class saved me from being bullied."
The text translated to a clearer meaning after a coded child written sentences spell out of the jaded papers, turning brown and soft.
Sopheirin quaffed a lump on her throat as grief starts crawling up her senses. She gripped unto her chest as her heart thumped restlessly, attempting to burst out and break her ribcage.
Tears started trickling down across her flawless cheeks. It feels like her heart melted to a fluid coming out of her eyes.
She loved everything her father teaches her.
Except for all the painful abuses that her system could hardly accept. Physically, emotionally, and... sexually.
She looked around her own citadel.
Her own world in dark, void of rapture and comfort.
It was a room full of horribly haunting paintings of sexual abuse. And the most shocking image at the center was Ivan's portrait.