Sydney slept pleasantly throughout the night. Waking up this brand new morning, she can absolutely say that it's all thanks to Ellie, who helped to make her feel better after the ill-willed encounter with Shane yesterday at noon.
The visit she paid her in her room wasn't needed at first, however, she's just realizing how helpful that was this beautiful early morning.
Walking down the stairs. Ellie's nose twitched immensely with happiness when the sweet scent of food directly coming from the kitchen, which she was far from struck it.
She didn't waste time leaving the living room and walked straight into the kitchen, where she found Sydney making breakfast. Roman was present at the table already.
"Morning, how was your night?" Sydney questioned with a bright smile, covering her face.
"It was quite good, I slept like a babe" Ellie sat next to Roman in the kitchen, already munching away his meal. "Ooh, we are having bacon and eggs today? One of my faves" She smiled, ready to have breakfast.
"Here you go" Sydney passed over a plate of bacon and eggs to Ellie and she rubbed her palms together in satisfaction, ready to devour the meal when a knock was surprisingly heard on the door.
Who is interrupting breakfast today? Shane? He's the only person that Sydney can think of right away. Her heart throbbed violently with pain at the thought of that.
"I'll go get it" Ellie offered to be the one to open the door, after seeing the hesitation in Sydney's eyes when there was suddenly a knock on the door. They are not known to have any visitors, especially in the morning. Everyone in the neighborhood knows how busy they are getting ready to leave for the coffee shop.
"No, stay, Ellie. I'll get it myself" Sydney stopped Ellie, who dropped her food halfway to go answer the door.
"Okay…" Ellie moved back into the kitchen to stay with Roman and eat breakfast together, while his Mom went to answer the door so he doesn't feel alone.
When Sydney reached the entrance door, she peeped through the peephole first, checking out to see who came knocking on her doorstep. She let out a huge sigh of relief, finding out it wasn't Shane. But it could have been him.
If he tried to make them talk to each other yesterday, which she didn't agree to. What makes her think that he wouldn't come knocking on her doorstep one day? And now that they were neighbors? And living just opposite each other.
"Chloe?" Sydney called and forced out a smile when she opened the door and came out of the house to tend to her good friend, Chloe. She's one of the sweetest and friendliest to be friends with in this neighborhood.
"Hi Syd, good morning" Chloe gave Sydney a peck on the cheek and she gratefully returned it.
"Fine morning to you too. Uhm, am I safe this morning?" Sydney jokingly asked with a forced chuckle, however, she was also serious. Chloe rarely comes with good news anytime she comes knocking on her door.
"Of course you are, no need to worry. I'm just concerned that's all, that's why I came to tell you about something that happened here yesterday. There was this…" Chloe was cut short of words.
"You know I was just done making breakfast and preparing to leave for the shop right away. You kind of came at the wrong time, Chloe. Maybe we can talk about this later? I don't like to leave my customers waiting. They tend to get…" Sydney in fear of getting bad news from Chloe tried avoiding hearing anything from her, as she tried to leave after making up excuses.
She was right. Any day that Chloe comes looking for her and she starts with 'I just came to tell you about something that happened'. Even without being told, Sydney can tell that it certainly isn't going to be good news.
"I know, Syd. I know how busy you can be but I think that you should really listen to this. It's important, you might be in danger I fear. Yesterday in the afternoon, when you were away, a guy was hovering around here." Chloe kept her voice down, whispering the last sentence.
She's being careful since the creep might be around somewhere watching. She knows about creeps and how they act, and she doesn't want him coming after her next. This wasn't some kind of horror movie.
Sydney, who had already grabbed the doorknob to go back inside the house, paused immediately the moment she heard Chloe mention a male. She didn't think twice or needed to be told that it had to be Shane. If not him, who else would hover around her house like a creep?
He lives just opposite her. He must have come over to talk when she wasn't around.
"A man was hovering around my house yesterday?" Sydney shut the door back, squeezing the handle hard out of anger.
"Yes. I don't know who he was but I didn't like him. He was a fine-looking young man but there was something off about him that I didn't like. I saw him while passing by and I couldn't keep quiet about this, oh my God, that's him, Syd!" Chloe panicked, looking to her left side, and saw just the creep that she was talking about.
"Wait a minute, does he live here?! Jesus Christ, you are in trouble, Syd. Come, let's go inside first before he sees us" Chloe grabbed Sydney by the arm and tried to force her into the house with her. But Sydney stood immobilized, watching the creep with such bravery to be bothered about her safety and going into the house to hide from him first.
"You go back home, Chloe. I'll take care of this, myself. Thanks for letting me know" Sydney opened the door, which Chloe was struggling to open for over a minute now, and went back into the house.
"No, you need to hide from him, Chloe. He's a creep" Chloe cautioned with the door being shut right in her face by Sydney, who went back into her house, looking quite bothered about what she just warned her about.
"Guess I have to leave, Syd. Just don't do anything stupid, be careful" Chloe murmured and slowly, but carefully shifted her attention over to where she saw the creep. Thankfully, he was nowhere to be found again. He must have gone back inside the house. But when the hell did he move into this neighborhood?
That's Mr Brown's house or did he give it up for sale?
That man's a creep, Chloe saw him hovering around Sydney's house yesterday and this morning, she just found out that he could be living in this neighborhood. And his house is just opposite Sydney's.
What a creep! Sadly, Sydney got herself a creep for a neighbor. She better stay vigilant. Chloe let out a distressed breath and left.
****
Back inside the house, Sydney went upstairs straight to dress up and leave for Shane's house. She would be the one paying a visit this time.
"Who was it?" Ellie asked out of curiosity. She was done eating breakfast with Roman.
"Chloe"
"Chloe Adams?"
"Yes!"
"Okay, I think that's interesting. What did she want?" Ellie left her phone for Roman in the kitchen, where they stayed after eating and watching cartoons on it, while waiting for Sydney to be back so they could all leave together for the coffee shop.
She decided to follow Sydney upstairs to find out what happened between her and Chloe since she didn't come back straight to the kitchen, to let her know why their friend dropped by.
Sydney stopped right in front of her room before she could go inside and said to Ellie, grabbing her by the shoulder.
"Listen carefully, right now I need you to get Roman dressed up for me and take him to the shop with you. The others will be there to help out, but I'll still meet up with you guys shortly. Right now, I need to take care of something and it needs to be done right away. If Roman asks, I still have some stuff to do here, now go"
"Yes ma'am"