"What?!" Ellie's totally shocked and shaken up to hear what Sydney had to say after appearing late to work today.
"Yes, you heard me. What happened to what you told me about nothing happening if we chose to stay this time and not run away? Well, spoiler alert, Ellie, that happened. My brother is our f**king new neighbor now, and I don't even know how he was able to make Mr. Brown move out overnight. But he did and now I'm so mad that I just want to…"
"Calm down, Syd. Calm down first. Why don't we go outside and have this conversation there? We have customers here and you do not want to disturb them, okay?" Ellie removed the gloves she wore while doing the dishes and quickly grabbed Sydney along with her.
They went out of the coffee shop to stay outside and talk about Shane instead. Sydney can stay out here and then let all her anger out, it was better than for her to chase away the customers that they had inside with her fiery temper. The other workers can attend to a customer if they are needed.
"Okay, so you are saying that your brother Shane is now our new neighbor?
"Yes"
"Was he who you saw that made you change your mind and told me to take Roman to school instead?
"Yeah…"
"And you mean to tell me that he's currently living inside Mr. Brown's house?
"Yes"
"And he's living just opposite us?
"Yes"
"Wait, could that be the reason why I didn't happen to see Mr. Brown drop by the shop to buy coffee today? He usually comes every day. Oh my God, it's true. I think your brother Shane just made us lose our favorite neighbor and customer" Ellie pointed out and appeared to be a little sad over losing one of the coffee shop's favorite customers.
"Seriously, Ellie. That is what you are worrying about right now?" Sydney couldn't help but ask if losing their favorite customer happens to be a problem to Ellie, rather than the actual problem that she's supposed to feel troubled about like her.
"It's not that, Sydney. It's just that I think your brother might be a real problem to us now Mr Brown is gone. I didn't want to say this the first time you told me about crossing paths with him, I didn't want to add to your hate towards him, you guys are still family after you left, but it's just…"
"I don't hate my brother, Ellie. Don't get the wrong idea. He's family and I like him as my brother, but that's not what I'm talking about right now, you don't really understand what's going on. You know I think that we should have just left as I planned this morning, we shouldn't have stayed and now my head hurts" Sydney rubbed the space between her brow to soothe the headache that she was starting to feel.
Since the first day she crossed paths with Shane, she's been feeling this same particular headache appear out of nowhere and disturb her at the slightest thought of him.
"This is all my fault, I'm so sorry, Syd. I guess I should have just listened and done as you wanted. We can still leave, I'll go back home now to pack and get our things ready…" Ellie apologized, making a U-turn immediately to head home to pack up everyone's stuff.
"No, hey, wait, where the hell do you think you are going? Sydney was quite lucky that she had speed and was fast enough to hold Ellie back from leaving. When she made that U-turn, she didn't just plan to run, she definitely planned to fly.
"Home, I can sneak in and get our things out quietly, your brother wouldn't even notice when I sneak into the house. I'll come right back to the shop and drop our stuff here to go get Roman back from school. We can stay in a hotel and then tomorrow we leave to find another place to stay" Ellie explained the little plan that she just created for Sydney, and it was so simple and smooth that she couldn't agree to it.
Yeah, there's no way her brother Shane wouldn't notice Ellie sneaking into the house as if she's invisible.
"You really think that Shane wouldn't notice you sneaking into our house?" Sydney asked, and she couldn't help but be utterly amazed at how confident Ellie happened to stand, saying to her.
"Of course, he won't. I used to raid and break into people's houses till you saw me and picked me up from the streets"
"Okay, let's say that would work out, but you seem to forget that he's not human. He can smell you no matter how far from his house you are. He's living right opposite us and probably only thirty feet away I think…"
"I can still try, it's not like he would kill and eat me up or something if he caught me sneaking into the house, right?" A glint of terror flashed through Ellie's eyes when she asked this. She lives with a person who's not human, although half human but then it's still too risky.
However, she trusts no one else the way she trusts Sydney, so she has to be sure that Sydney's brother is like her and won't eat her if unfortunately, he catches her.
"I don't think he knows who you are, Ellie. So If he catches you sneaking into the house, there's certainly an 80% percent chance of that happening. And since he doesn't know you, he wouldn't know that you were sneaking in, he would assume that you were breaking in instead. Just because he's my brother doesn't mean that he's like me"
"Okay, I think I will pass on that one for now. I'll think of something else. What do we do, Syd? We are not going to be staying, right?" Ellie reached out to Sydney for what to do when she couldn't get any more ideas regarding what to do about Shane. She's scared enough to learn what could happen if she insists on going back home and sneaking into the house.
"Maybe we are going to, Ellie. I don't know. What if my brother is still able to track us down and find us even after we leave? What if we don't run this time and stay instead? To be honest, I'm tired of running away. I think the only way we have to put an end to this is by not doing anything about it" Sydney said, confusing Ellie, who didn't get her point yet.
"Uhm, I don't think I understand…"
"We are not going to be moving out and I'm not going to disturb Shane to move out either. I'll just keep ignoring him since that's what he wants. The only thing I simply have to do is to make him regret why he moved in and want to leave instead. You certainly should have been smarter, Shane"