"Excuse me?" Kamji wasn't sure she had heard him right. Did he just ask her to take off her clothes?
"I said you should take them off." he repeated to her horror. "I can't take a look at your wound with the bandages on your fingers."
"Oh." A sense of relief washed over her as she realized what he had meant. "I thought you were talking about something else," her voice was timid and her cheeks flustered at the naughty thoughts she had imagined earlier.
Joshua grabbed the T-shirt slung around his shoulder and quickly put it on. "What did you think I was talking about?"
"I would rather not say." she tugged on the bandages wrapped on her fingers. There was no way she was going to tell him what she thought about. "Do you have a scissors I can use to cut these?"
"But I am curious to what you thought about." he said grabbing a first aid kit and some ice from the freezer, setting them down on a table in front of her.
"Believe me. it's best you didn't know." she insisted and was glad he didn't probe further.
She watched as he fished out a scissors from the kit and assisted her in cutting the bandages. When they finally came loose, he closely inspected her fingers that looked slightly out of shape.
"It's a boxer fracture," Joshua could tell just by looking at it. Having gotten into multiple fights when he was younger, he had experienced a fair share of injuries and boxer's fracture was the most common.
"That's what the doctor at the clinic said." confirmed Kamji. She had stopped being surprised at how he seemed to know everything after realizing how he had always been locked up in a room and forced to study.
"If you want to punch someone, atleast do it right," he snorted.
"I didn't punch anyone," she quickly denied the accusation. She might understand the fact that he was able to diagnose exactly what was wrong with her fingers but him being able to pinpoint exactly what she did was simply unnatural. Was he one of those rare humans rumored to have psychic powers?
"You do know that you're a terrible liar," Joshua pointed out. His was gently massaging her fingers with some ointment and Kamji tried hard not to wince.
"Does it hurt that much?" he asked looking at her brows that had scrunched slightly.
Kamji nodded but Joshua didn't let go of her fingers but handed her an apple instead.
"You might want to bite onto this?"
"But I am not hungry." she said pushing the fruit away.
"It's not for eating. It's more like a gag in this situation," he explained.
"I don't understand Joshua. Why do I need to be gagged?" there was a hint of fear in her voice.
"No time for questions honey. This is going to hurt." he said, shoving the apple in her mouth.
Wait. Did he just use an endearment term to address her or had she misheard? But she didn't have much time to contemplate on that as she felt her the crack of her bone as it was being shifted back in place.
The next sequence of events happened to quickly and all she remembered was the unimaginable pain that had shot through her body during the next few minutes. She bit hard into the apple, burying the most of the scream that was threatening to leave her lips but the tears clouding her vision was enough to show she was in pain.
Joshua removed what was left of the apple from her lips which had a been successfully mangled. "The apple tech company have to adapt this as their new logo," He smirked at the deep teeth mark imprint that permanently engraved on the fruit.
"Ha ha, very funny." she rolled her eyes at his mocking joke. "The least you could have done was to give me a heads up before breaking my fingers"
Joshua had tossed the apple in a trash can before proceeding to place some ice on her fingers. "You wouldn't have let me if I told you."
"You're damn right about that," she agreed. "The last time I checked, you aren't even a certified doctor to be doing these kind of stuff."
"Is that the gratitude I get for fixing your arm?" he retorted.
"Well we can't say you fixed it yet, It still feels numb and I can't use it." she gazed at the tickle of water running down her fingers from the melting ice he had placed on top. The comfort the cooling sensation brought to her throbbing fingers was definitely a welcomed one.
"It should be healed in a week. Try not to move it around too much." Joshua said as he began wrapping her fingers back in bandages.
"Whatever you say dad." She joked but as soon as the words left her lips, Kamji wished she hadn't said it. Not only because of how lame the joke sounded but because of the fact that the it had a dark humor vibe to it with respect to the fact that Joshua never had a father figure in his life.
"Stop it." He stood up and replaced the first aid kit back in the cupboard.
"Stop what?"
"Stop looking at me that way. I don't need your pity."
The comment made her feel even more guilt "I am sorry. I didn't mean it like that." How could she not pity him after knowing he had a rough childhood. Nobody deserved to go through what Joshua did, not even Satan.
"You should get going. My mother would be back any minute and I don't want her to meet you here."
"Good idea." She agreed. She wasn't sure she would be able to face Shelby again after their deep conversation at the Cafe.
There was a tug at the door knob followed by a voice, "Joshie, are you in there? I am back."
"Speak of the devil," Joshua cursed.
"Joshie?" Kamji stifled a laughter, "That's a very cute name. Do you mind if I call you that?" she batted her eyelashes at him.
"Don't even think about it." he warned, making his way towards the door and unlocking it. "How was your therapy?" he asked his mom as he let her in.
"I have had better days." Shelby replied walking into the room. "It's funny how a random stranger thinks I am going to tell them every single thought that goes on in my head. No doubt I will wound up in jail if I did."
"Mum, if you're thoughts are toxic enough to land you in jail, that's exactly why you need the therapist." he remarked as he followed behind her to the living room.
Shelby gave a dry laugh at her son's comment before she finally took note of Kamji's presence in the room. "My, what a lovely surprise Kamji. What brings you here?"
Kamji could see the see the woman didn't bother to hide her surprise and the uneasiness she felt about Kamji's presence. She was probably worried about the fact that Kamji might have gone back on her word and told Joshua the truth she had kept hidden.
"I was about taking my leave Miss Bakare." She made sure to stress the name slowly to pass on the message that she hadn't revealed anything to Joshua and at the same time make it look like their relationship wasn't as awkward as it turned out to be.
The invisible tension between them seemed to have disappeared after Kamji's statement and she saw a sense of relief wash over the woman. "No need to be so formal dear, I remember telling you to call me Shelby."
"I will be taking Kamji home now." Joshua said to his mom. From the look of it, he seemed oblivious of the underlying tension between the two of them or maybe he did and was doing a good job at hiding it. Knowing Joshua, Kamji suspected it was pretty much the later scenario.
Grabbing her bag from the sofa, she was ready to head out with Joshua. "It was nice seeing you again Shelby and you too Snow." She bent down to pet the puppy which had followed them to the front door.
"Feel free to drop by any time dear," Shelby replied as the duo headed out. Kamji gave a brief nod in response although she had a feeling that Shelby would have definitely preferred that she never showed up in their lives in the first place.
They had reached the front of the building and Kamji proceeded to call for an Uber on her phone but Joshua had stopped her.
"If you don't mind taking the bus, I can walk you." he offered.
For a moment Kamji thought she must be dreaming. Joshua offered to walk her to the station? Was he finally getting comfortable with her company? She tried hard to bury the excitement that was bubbling within her and look composed even though she was screaming in her head. "That would be nice."
They started down the path leading to the bus station and for minutes no words were exchanged between them. Kamji racked her brain thinking of topics that was good enough to start up a conversation and end the awkward silence between them. Ofcourse she had a lot of questions to ask Joshua but ninety percent were personal questions about his life and as much as she wanted to satisfy her curiosity, she knew when to keep boundaries.
Like hell, Joshua had slowly started to accept her into his life and the last thing she wanted was to make him distance himself again.
"Thanks for helping with my fingers. They feel a lot better now." She said, breaking the long silence that had ensued between them. "Though I hate to admit your methods of fixing it was kind of peculiar."
"It is a very popular method especially when you're one used to street fights and brawls." he replied.
"So that means you fight a lot?" she asked looking at him. It was stupid of her to ask when she clearly saw the skills he had displayed when he had rescued her few weeks ago when those men tried to rape her.
"It's more like a survival skill I was forced to adapt along the way." his eyes looked distant as he said it as if he was relieving some sad memory. Kamji decided not to divulge deeper. Somehow she could tell the weight those words carried and she wasn't going to force him into telling her anything.
"It's a pretty good skill if you ask me. I have a lot of people I would love to punch in the face without breaking my fingers." she joked trying to lighten the mood.
Joshua gave light chuckle. "I can give you a few pointers if you want."
"Really? I am going to take you up on that offer." she warned, hoping he was serious about it. "If I can learn a few offensive and defensive moves, I wouldn't need you to rescue me all the time like a knight in charming amour."
"I don't remember complaining about being your knight in charming amour," his voice had an edge to it, "You make a pretty good damsel in distress afterall."
She blushed at his statement even though it wasn't exactly a compliment. "That's not what I meant. You already got suspended for helping me at the Valentine's dance not to mention how you risked your life the other day facing those armed thugs for my sake. And if you hadn't been smart enough to realize that text today from Buchi was a set up, you could have gotten expelled."
"So?" he shrugged, "I would have done the same thing for anyone. Try not to feel too special." he added even though he knew that it was an obvious lie. It was a good thing Kamji didn't know he had showed up earlier today in school just to make sure she was okay even though he knew it was a trap.
"Thanks anyways for whatever reason you did it. You really are my Knight in shinning armour." she teased.
"Stop with the cringey talk. I told you I would have done it for anyone." he said burying his hands in his pockets while avoiding eye contact with her.
"Why?" she smirked, "Afraid that your cold hearted bad boy persona would be ruined?"
"I have absolutely no idea of what you're talking about."
They had spent the rest of their walk making mild conversations about school stuff until they finally reached the bus station.
"I guess I will see you some other time." Kamji said to him before she started to head for the bus that had come to a halt in front of them.
"Wait." He reached for his pocket and pulled out a cell phone. "Put your number in there. I couldn't find the paper you wrote your contact info the last time you came."
She readily accepted the phone from him, realizing that Shelby must have been that had taken the paper with her contact info and impersonated Joshua just to be able to see her.
As she saved her number on his phone, she realized that the only other saved contacts his cell was one that was saved as Mum and the other that read Landlady. It must have been the nice little elderly lady in the kiosk she had spoken to the other day, she noted.
Still Kamji found it strange that he just had just two contacts saved on his phone. Was he that lonely? She could understand the part about him being socially distant from people but having just two contacts was a bit extreme.
"Chat me up so that I can save yours as soon as I get home." she said, handing him back his phone.
"Yeah, Sure."
She quickly entered the vehicle when she noticed the impatient stares she got from the driver. After settling down on a window seat, she waved down at Joshua who had stood there waiting for the bus to move. The familiar feeling of Deja Vu lingered in her memory. Ofcourse It was at that time she had secretly stalked Joshua in order to find out where he lived and nearly got raped. He had escorted her to the bus station at that time but the only difference between now and then was that this time around, he waved back at her.