Chapter 19
"Please, can I just have his home address?... I can't tell you why. All I can tell you is that I need it for something very important... Like I said before and for the upteenth time, I can tell you why I need it.... What do you mean you don't know where he lives? Aren't you his friend?... So you want to tell me that you've never gone to visit him before?... You know that it's obvious you're lying, right?... I need to see him urgently, please... Look, Rex, do you have it or not?!!.... Fine. I'm sorry.... Thanks then. I'll be expecting it as soon as possible.. I promise. Thank you", Angela said and with a frustrated sigh, she cut the call and threw her phone across the bed.
Angela had been getting more and more uncomfortable by the fact that Leo had been nowhere to be found for the past week. She thought that it was he was just absent for a day or two, but coming to find out that he was AWOL since when she was in the hospital, she was shocked and quite frankly, worried.
She had to find him and know why he was absent, so he had Debbie give up the numbers of one of his friend, Rex. She had just placed a call to Rex, asking him about the whereabouts of his friend, Leo, but he said he had no idea. It was hard to Angela to buy his claim though, especially knowing that the both of them were quite close in school. She proceeded to ask him for his address, but he proved stubborn until he finally agreed to send it through text.
She stayed on her bed, staring at the ceiling for another five minutes and was getting impatient, so she decided to call him again.
She as she was about to ring him, a message notification popped up, and she saw the message...
"No. 15, Dawest street, Twilight. I don't know why you insist on having his address, but you better don't do anything stupid when you get there", the message.
She couldn't help but roll her eyes at the last sentence. She knew how to compose and take care of herself. She wasn't a baby.
She stood up from her bed and put on her shoes.
Before long, she was off to see Leo.
***
Angela was starting to think that Rex played her, cause this address seemed to futile. She'd been walking and trying to get to the address without really asking anyone for directions, and it felt like she'd not made much progress...
She finally stopped in front of a house and compared the number to the one Rec had sent her. They were the same. She seemed to be in the right place. She hoped so too.
The fence wasn't that high, so it was relatively early for her to climb over it without making a lot of noise. She quietly tiptoed to the side of the house and hid beside an abandoned, rusted tank that looked like it hadn't been used for over a decade.
She obviously couldn't just bathe in through the first door and ask for Leo, even though the thought crossed her mind, and it seemed tempting...
"Leo, you cannot keep doing this!! We'd talk about this time and time again! You can't just let everyone out if your life and go missing for days or weeks without telling anyone where you're going to, only to come resurface, and act like nothing happened, and also expect us to play along with your foolish act!! Why the hell haven't you been home for the past few days?!! Huh?!", A husky voiced roared from inside the house, and it was obvious he was really angry.
She could only wonder why he was so vexed...
"Dad, you're screaming!", a voice Angela recognized as Leo's yelled back in frustration.
"I'm screaming?!", the husky voice that Leo had called dad repeated. His voice carried anger and a hint of shock.
"Isn't it obvious?! You're disturbing the whole neighborhood! Very soon, with the way you in keep screaming for no necessary reason, they'd have to call the cops on you! ", Leo retorted
"Leo!! How dare you talk to your father that way?!! Have you gone frigging nut?!! What gave you the guts to think you can talk to him like he's one of your buddies?!! Plus, I'm very sure those your stupid, juvenile rebels you call friends are the ones influencing you like to this. Because reasonable, down-to-earth humans cant you as your friend, and you on the other hand has decided to associate yourself with reasonable person as friends of yoyr ", a female voice that Angela guessed was Leo's mom cautioned rather angrily.
Although Angela could not see the faces of the people involved in this verbal brawl, she imagined that Leo's father was too taken aback to speak...
"Leo... Answer my question before I do something we both would regret I did. Why did you leave home for days without telling anybody where you were going to, or even caring to tell anybody where you were?", His father asked rather calmly.
"Dad, first of all, let's get this straight. I don't owe you or momma here an explanation...", Angela could his mom let out a little gasp when he called her 'momma'.
"... It's none of your business where I go or when I want to go, or what I went to do, or why I did what I did. The fact that I temporary live under your roof doesn't mean to can randomly throw questions at me like I'm in a makeshift courtroom, and expect you to answer me like a criminal, cause I'm not.
Secondly, I'm a big boy, dad. I know how to take care of myself. If you're scared that I'd get lost or die, then you're worrying yourself too much. Try to get some sleeping pills and have a rest. Thridly...", Before he say anymore, a hard, loud resounding slap landed on Leo's face. It was so loud that it startled Angela a little, and for a moment, she rubbed her chin, thinking it was her that was slapped. She almost felt pity for Leo, infact.
"Dad, did you just slap me?!", Leonard asked in utter shock.
Angela could imagined his hand on his face, nursing the numbing pain he got from the slap.
"I was slapped you. And I will slap you again and again if you ever talk to me like that again, I'll give you another slap! You must be nuts to think that you can talk to me like that!", His dad yelled.
"Do you know you can go to jail for what you just did?", Leo asked either calmly or still in in shock, from Angela's perspective...
She didn't know whether to marvel or be scared of Leo for threatening his dad with an arrest.
"Go to jail? For what? A father putting his own son in order? For silencing a blabbermouth who think he can talk to his parents the way he likes, which presumably us the worst way possible?! I'm certain the court will understand", his mum retorted.
"I hate all of you!! I hate you all!! You guys Dan go to hell for all I care!! I bet you guys aren't even my biological parents in the first place!! Real parents never treat their children this way!! You both should fuck off!!", He yelled and Angela could hear angry stomps.
"Leo!! Come back here now!!!"
"Leo, don't you walk out on your father and I while we're still talking to you!! Come back here now and apologize to us!!", Leo's mum yelled, but Angela still heard the persistent stomps away from them.
She sighed and shook her head. She didn't know that Leo was on few bad boys that they rebels at school and also at home.
She shook her head again...
She brought herself back to focus, and just noticed that the angry stomps she was hearing seemed to be approaching her. The main door was forward, and from the build of the house, all or most rooms were upstairs. Why did seem like Leo was coming towards her???
She looked around and she saw that there was a side door not too far away from where she was hiding! It was apparent that that was the door Leo was about to come out from!!
She began to panic, frantically searching around, asking herself what next to do, or where else to go. The last thing she wanted was for Leo to come out and see her hiding in his house.
By the time she reach any sort of decision, Leo was already out of the house. She decided to stay put, even though he hands were shaking profusely.
She watched as Leo came out of the house, heaving in anger. He kicked an empty can laying outside as he as he could.
Gratefully for Angela, He just farther and farther to the front until he just stopped and searched for something in his pocket. He brought out a cigarette and a lighter. He placed the cigarettes on his lips and hung it there as he lit one of it with his lighter.
He took a long drag , before puffing everything out, allowing a lot of smoke to exit from both his mouth and his nose. He look in the distant like he was thinking, before he took another drag and puffed out everything l, letting the evening air take it away.
Angela could not keep it together anymore. She wanted to get out of here as fast as she could, but she couldn't afford to let Leo catch a glimpse of her. How he managed to not see her up till now was quite surprising, but she needed a lot more luck to get out of here.
She wanted to stay put so Leo wouldn't noticed her, but it was like Angela couldn't control her body anymore...
She stood up from beside the tank and tried to escape by climbing the fence, but unfortunately for her, the fences at the sides were higher that the one in front.
In her attempt to climb up and away, she lost balance and fell hard on the floor, hitting her leg with the empty tank.
Leo became alert immediately and sharply turned to where the noise he heard came from, only for him to see Angela struggling to get up from the floor.
"Angela?!", He called as he began to walk towards her. He took one last big puff and put off the cigarette in his hand.
"Angela?! What are you doing here?!", He asked, as he was just in front of Angela, a deadly frown on his face.
"Answer my fucking question! Why are you here?!", He growled angrily, making her scared to death.
"Umm... I, urmm... Just wanted to.. it was what-"
"Wait... How long she you been standing her?", He asked.
"Well, urr..."
"Were you listening in on the conversation I was having with my parents?!!", He asked loudly.
"Look, it's not what you think, Leo-"
Before Angela could say anything else, Leo grabbed her by the neck and slammed her hard against the fence.
"So you had the guts to be eavesdropping without permission... Huh?!!", He yelled and he picked her up from the ground and slammed her again, this time not leaving her throats, but holding it tight, leaving Angela no room to breath at all.
"Leo...l... Leo... I can't breath!!", She tried to make out but it was impossible.
Suddenly, she raised her legs as high as she could abd wedged it against Leo's groin.
"Ahh!!", He yelled as he let her go and held his groin in pain, leaving her to run away like that.
****
Angela held her neck in pain as she switched off her phone and kept it ok the drawer beside her bed.
She couldn't believe that Leo could do this to her...
If only she knew, she wouldn't have decided to look for him.
She slowly laid down on her stomach and closed her eyes in a bid to sleep.
She knew she was going to have a sleepless night, so she let her mind travel l to anything good memories she heard.
Her mind for some reason, drifted to Dimitri from the party. She didn't which was weird: thinking about him after such incident of that she didn't stop the thoughts from coming as well.
Either way, she lay down and let her mind rto fantasy land.