Simon rolled over and opened his eyes to the low ceiling in his small room.
He frowned a bit as he tried to remember something, and then his eyes opened wider as he jerked upward.
"What the...?"
He didn't need to think much to know that his wounds were gone.
He couldn't feel any pain at all, and he was dressed.
"What is going on?" Simon thought in surprise as he stood up and looked around the room.
Nothing seemed out of place and he supposed he was not going crazy.
"Unless you are crazy already and do not know it," whispered his inner voice.
"Shut the hell up," he snapped out of frustration and part fear that that might be true.
He quickly hurried out of the room, but the house seemed empty, apart from his pa, of course.
He could perceive the faint smell of cooking in the air and from the living room he saw the covered food on the kitchen table.
Probably potato chips and gravy. It was their constant breakfast.
"Morning, Pa," Simon knew Celia would have fed his pa before she stepped out.
"Where could she have gone?" he wondered aloud as he stood looking absentmindedly at his father's knowing eyes.
His pa's eyes moved slowly towards the side and Simon followed the movement to see a sheet of paper close to the medicine cabinet.
He quickly picked it up.
"Morning, son. I have fed and given your dad his medicine, so you don't need to bother. I can see that you were very tired from work yesterday, so I didn't want to disturb you. Mandy is not back yet. I think she is really angry this time. I have gone to the farm to do something useful rather than just worrying about her. I will ask some of her friends if they have seen her. You can rest at home and stay with your Pa today. I will be back soon."
"What?!" Simon shouted, then he looked apologetically at his Pa.
Though he had almost believed that everything that seemed to have happened yesterday was a dream, he still couldn't shake off the feeling that it might not be.
What if their farm was really destroyed and his mom had gone there to see it?
What if Theo and Hans really hurt her?
The sound of a vehicle sounded outside as Simon quickly put on his slippers.
"Pa, please, I will be back very soon. I really need to check," he said as he rushed out of the house.
He almost hit Mandy as he burst out of the house.
"Hey, watch where you are going, dummy!" She yelled at him.
"Sorry, Mandy. I just need to...wait."
Simon stopped running as he turned to look back at Mandy.
First, the clothes on her were not the ones she left the house with the night before.
Also, a man leaned against a sports car just a few steps from the house.
Simon knew him!
Hans had told him about how the man had come from the city during their carnival and was trying to lure girls to sleep with him.
Simon had even seen him flirting with some girl the other day.
"What are you doing with him, Mandy?" Simon said as he automatically stepped in front of Mandy and glared at the smirking man.
Dressed in expensive jeans, a polo and a blazer, the man pushed down his glittering glasses as he winked at Simon and said, "Oh? Babe, do you want to tell him everything we have done? Which one should I tell him or...?"
Mandy pushed Simon roughly out of her way as she said, "Get lost! Who do you think you are to ask me any question here?! You must be thinking too much of yourself, you idiot!"
Simon has had it with his rudeness. She was younger than him after all.
"Mandy, what is wrong with you?! Do you know who he is? This man is..."
"He is ten times better than you, you fool! He has lived in the city all his life. He has a mansion in the city. He doesn't even need to work because he has others working for him. Have you seen his car and his clothes? Have you seen yourself?! How dare you even talk badly about my man?!"
Simon was shocked.
"Your man?! You just got back yesterday. How can this...?!"
Mandy slapped him hard across the face.
"Stop talking to him like that!"
"Ouch!" the man yelled in mockery as he held his face like he was the one she slapped. "That must have hurt hard, bro. Babe, I like your temper, you know. Makes things more interesting when we are..." he wiggled his brows at her in a disgusting way and Simon was shocked to see Mandy preening like a peacock as she said in a sickeningly sweet tone, "Stop, you are making me shy, honey."
"Honey?" Simon and another voice echoed.
When he saw Mandy's changed look, he turned back to see who she was looking at.
Looking like the survivor of a hurricane who had given up all hope, Celia Andrews looked at Simon with tears in her eyes, "Why didn't you tell me?"
"Oh shit! That wasn't a dream," Simon thought as he rushed forward to meet her. "Ma, listen to me."
"Listen? What should I listen to? That you offended Theo and his men, and they decided to take it out on the farm? Why did I have to hear that from Hans before my son told me?" she said in a desolate tone that broke Simon's heart the more.
That bastard!
Simon rushed to Celia, holding her shoulder as he checked her over. "You saw him? What did he do to you?!"
"What did he do to me?! He told me what you have been hiding from me, of course. When the plants died over and over, you were experimenting with some chemicals? We went hungry for two seasons because you were trying to prove a point?"
"What the...no! I did..." Simon's eyes widened as the realisation sunk in.
All those times, the crops had not done well, and they could barely scrape enough money to send to Mandy or to buy drugs for Pa. It had not been a coincidence. Hans must have had something to do with it.
It must have been one of his tactics to get them to sell the land to Theo.
He had even said then that he dreamed that the land was cursed.
"Oh, that bastard! I am going to... Ma, listen to me. I didn't do anything. I will make sure I get the crops planted back and..."
With a bored yawn, Mandy said, "Well, your drama has nothing to do with me. I have better things to do."
With that, she entered the house.
"What is she talking about?" Celia asked Simon, still in that awful tone.
"I don't..."
"You know, man. Now that I think of it, I think you look familiar." said the man as he tilted his head sideways, corked his two fingers together and looked at Simon through it. "Yeah, real familiar. You look like that hotshot heir of..."
"Hotshot heir?" Mandy scoffed as she strolled out of the house with her bag. "More like a parasite. If he looked like anyone, maybe a homeless man from the dumpster. Honey, are you sure?"
The man shrugged and said, "Yeah, you are right, babe. There's no way he can be related to a family like that."
"Where are you going?" Celia asked with fear as she saw her daughter's bag.
"Where else? I am going with my man, of course. You already made it clear that you don't want me here. If I stay, you will only keep talking to me about nonsense things. What more? You have lost everything on your useless farm. Who knows, maybe you will soon lose the farm too. You expect me to stay here and suffer with you? Think again. Honey, let's go."
"Mandy, don't be silly. You can't go with a man like him. He would only toy with you and dump you!" Simon said in a desperate bid to get some sense into the girl.
Mandy folded her arms and gave him a disgusted look, "If I do not go with him, who should I go with? A man like you? What a joke! Stay out of my business. Honey, let's..."
They were all surprised when Celia dropped heavily to her knees, "Daughter, please don't go. I have lost a lot today and I don't want to lose you either."
"Ma!" Simon said as he tried to lift Celia.
But she shrugged him off and continued facing Mandy, who stood surprised, "Please, don't go. Your father won't be able to handle it. You are supposed to take care of him now just as he took care of you. Have you forgotten that his sickness started when he fell off the palm tree and got bitten because he was looking for your school fees? Think again, Mandy. This boy doesn't look like a good person. Don't shame your family like this."
"Ma!" Mandy shouted with anger. "Don't you dare talk about him like that again? Me? Take care of that cripple? With my delicate hands? I can see that you are hellbent on ruining me finally. You think because I come from this family, I will let you drag me down for the rest of my life?! Dream on! Let's go, honey!"
The man took a picture of Celia kneeling on the ground and said, "Sick! This is the first time I have seen a mother kneel for her daughter. Babe, you are so exciting!"
With that, he dragged her closer and kissed her fully in front of her kneeling mom.
"Ma, get up," Simon said, and he didn't let her go this time until she was on her feet.
By the time he turned back to the two, they had entered the car.
"Stop there!" he said and ran towards the car.
Mandy said something to the man, and he grinned as he gunned the engine.
As Simon stepped in their path to stop them, the car hit him and the two occupants laughed out loud as they drove away.
"Okay, that was a stupid thing to do." Simon thought to himself as he tried to clear his head where he fell.
He turned his head around to see his mother entering the house with that zombie-like slow walk she was doing when he first saw her.
"Oh, shit!" he thought to himself as he remembered what he still had to deal with.
He groaned out loud as he stood up and held his head to keep it from rolling off his shoulder as he followed her in.
He entered the house to hear the sounds of crying and saw Celia with her head on her husband's lap as she cried in broken sobs.
"We lost the entire crop, Gabe. Everything. How can I pay back the last loan? I didn't tell Simon because I thought we could finally sort it out now. What will I do now? And I lost our daughter too. I am an incompetent mother. I... lost everything."
What loan? Simon thought in surprise.
Then, before he could say anything, he started hearing a very strange rumbling sound.
It was coming from his Pa.
Celia raised her head just as Simon saw his father's body jerking.
"Pa! What happened?!"
"Gabe?! Gabe?!"
Simon grabbed his father before he could slip off the chair.
A great fear crashed into him as he felt the difference in the body.