Laia & The Transferee - Chapter 83

VIVI’S MANSION was as big as Laia remembered it.

But of course, the girl just had to remember what happened the last time she visited Vivi’s mansion.

Laia kept her eyes away from the spot where Samuel parked his car and where they spent most of the night having the most meaningless of conversations and also the most meaningful.

Sometimes Laia thinks that those memories were just dreams or maybe figments of her imagination and yet they are not and she honestly just wanted them to be so. She’d rather those memories be revealed as mere dreams rather than the concept of how it was real and how it truly did happen to her.

“Laia?” Brie calls out to her friend who unconsciously stopped in her steps. “Are you okay? Did you see something?”

The girl tried to laugh it off. “What is this, a horror movie?”

“It’s just,” Brie seemed to be reluctant to say her next words. “You seem really down after we passed that spot,”

She even points at the exact spot that Laia was looking at just a few moments earlier before she regained composure and pushed back those memories to the back of her head.

“Don’t worry about it,” Laia pushes her friend gently towards the tall gates of Vivi’s house. “Vivi’s waiting for us,”

True to what Laia said, Vivi was indeed waiting for them by the front door. She was still in her pajamas and was even wearing bunny slippers that were almost identical to the slippers that Laia owned but the girl still looked pretty.

That’s really unfair, Laia thinks.

Upon noticing the two girls that arrived, Vivi immediately pocketed her phone and skipped towards the girls with obvious excitement. “Hi!”

“Hi Viv,” Laia waves.

“Hiya! How was your shift?”

It was shitty. “It was okay,”

“Is everyone here already?” Brie asks, obviously changing the topic once she noticed Laia’s uneasiness.

“Nope,” Vivi opens the gate for the two girls and beckoned them towards the front door. “You’re actually the first to arrive,”

Laia glanced at the spot one more time before the door closed behind her.

“Shane and Thalia are on their way,” Vivi says once she settled on one of the couches at their theater room. “I didn’t really invite anyone else except you four so let’s just wait for them for a little bit before we start the party,”

Both girls nodded. Brie spoke up after a while. “Is this room new? I didn’t see this last time,”

Vivi turned the huge television screen on. “Yep, Mom got it for us since my younger brothers are huge fanatics of watching movies in, as they said, a huge screen,”

“I didn’t know you had younger brothers,” Laia says.

“Ah,” Vivi browsed through the huge selection of movies on screen. “They’re twins and are both annoying and irritating,”

“Aww, you don’t mean that,” Brie raised her legs and hugged them. “I think having siblings makes your life a bit less boring than being an only child,”

Laia turns to Brie who suddenly had a sad expression on her face. Brie was never the type to open up about how she felt about being an only child with mostly absent parents which is why it surprised Laia to hear her talking about it openly now.

“You’re an only child?” Vivi asks. She had finally decided on a movie, a 90’s romcom that Laia hasn’t watched yet before.

But then again, Laia was never a fan of romcoms. She was more of a mystery-thriller girl or anything that involved action (and attractive main characters).

“We both are,” Laia answers for Brie who seemed to be absentminded until Laia elbowed her. “Brie here wants a sibling but I’m perfectly fine being an only child,”

It’s not like my mother would have the time to take care of an extra child and the responsibility to take care of that extra child will most likely be passed on to me, Laia thinks.

She might be harsh but she was honest at the same time. Her mother was already busy and had her hands full with her two jobs and taking care of Laia’s grandmother.

“I suppose it is a bit enjoyable to have siblings,” Vivi says after a while. “Although I’d probably rather have younger female siblings than my two male siblings who are more likely to fart in my face as I wake up in the morning than braid my hair or play with their dolls with me,”

“Choke you in your sleep?” Brie asks.

Vivi rolls her eyes. “They have this habit of sleeping on top of me and beside me even if they have their own bedroom,” She mimics the sleeping positions of her younger siblings. “When I wake up in the morning it’s their butts that I see first,”

Brie laughs. “That’s so cute,”

“You’d think it is until you smell their farts and disgusting morning breaths,”

“Vivi!”

“Vivi!”

Two identical boys opened the door to the theater room and jumped towards Vivi who screamed murder. “Why are you here?!”

The shorter among the two grinned. “Mommy says to guard you in case you do something bad!”

“She also told us to smack you in the head if you do bad things!” The taller among the two adds with an identical mischievous smile.

“Ace, get your face away from mine,” Vivi pushes the shorter one, whose name was Ace, away. “Archer, get your twin back to your room and just play with the new video game that Dad bought you,”

“But it was boring!” Archer complains.

“Definitely boring!” Ace agrees.

“You are annoying,” Vivi groans and yet still stood up from the couch much to the happiness of her younger siblings. “I’ll be back, I will just lock these two idiots inside their room,”

“What?!”

“You’re mean, Vivi!”

Brie laughed as she watched the three siblings make their way upstairs with Vivi pulling the two by their ears. “It must be nice to have adorable siblings,”

“Are you sure? I’m reminding you about how they fart in Vivi’s face,”

“Uhm,” Brie grins sheepishly. “I’ll probably train them not to do that,”

“You’re making it sound like they could be trained,” Laia thinks back to some of her younger cousins who would not listen to any of the grownups unless they get sweets in return. “They’re not like your chihuahuas, Brie,”

“Hey,” Brie jokingly points a french fry at Laia’s direction. “Don’t be mean to my chihuahuas!”

Laia was about to respond when they heard knocks on the front door.

“Ah, it’s probably Shane and Thalia,”

Brie stood up from the couch and ran towards the main hall of the house and to the front door which she opened wide, revealing Thalia and Shane.

“Hi!” Brie hugs both girls who hugged her in return.

“Hi!” Thalia wipes the sweat on her forehead. “We got lost,”

“Didn’t Vivi give you the directions to her house?” Laia asks.

It was Shane who answered. “Yeah, but I’m awful at directions,”

“We rang the wrong house’s doorbell,” Thalia laments. “It was a good thing that the owners were nice people who kindly gave us the directions to Viv’s house which was actually closer than we thought it was,”

“Hehe,” Shane scratches her chin. “Where’s Vivi?”

“She’s with her younger brothers,” Brie replies, pointing at the room at where Vivi and her siblings entered. “I think she’s disciplining them,”

“Ah, they can be indeed childish sometimes,” Shane says. “But they’re still ten so I guess that’s just how kids are?”

Thalia nods in agreement. “My younger brother’s like that too,”

The four stood there for a while, waiting for Vivi to come down and the girl did come out of the room that Brie pointed at earlier with messy hair.

“Ugh,” Vivi groans. “They decided to mess my hair when I was setting up their video game,”

She noticed Thalia and Shane after she tied her hair in a ponytail. “Ah, I didn’t notice you there!”

“You seriously need to get your eyes checked,” Shane says but nevertheless opened her arms to accept Vivi’s hug who hugged a laughing Thalia next. “When was the last time you got them checked?”

“Last year? I did get new contacts a month ago, though,”

“I didn’t know you wore contacts,” Laia says. “Is that why you’re always putting eyedrops?”

“Uh-huh,” Vivi directs them towards the kitchen on where a few maids have already set the table and placed plates of spaghetti and carbonara. “Let’s eat?”

The five girls sat on their respective seats and  started eating in silence until Brie speaks up. “Are you really leaving tomorrow?”

Shane momentarily stopped eating and turned to Vivi with a sad expression on her face. Thalia also stopped and Laia stopped as well after noticing that nobody else was eating and was instead focused on what Vivi’s response would be.

Vivi wipes her mouth with a napkin. “Yeah,”

“Won’t you stay?” Brie was already teary-eyed.

“You know I can’t do that,” Vivi pouts. “I’m already enrolled in IFA,”

“I don’t want you to go,” Shane says after a while, her eyes teary starting to be teary as well. “Can’t you go to New York instead? At least we’ll be together,”

“Aw Shaney,” Vivi reaches out for Shane’s hand and gently massages it. “We’ll still keep in contact through texting and calling, don’t worry,”

Laia looked away. Just like deja vu, she remembered the asshole’s promises about their continued conversations even if he goes to Germany.

I’ll text you everyday and even sent you letters until you get tired of receiving them, he said. Laia grinned bitterly.

Apparently, they were all fucking lies.

“At least we’ll be together in New York,” Thalia tries to smile at Shane but failed and started tearing up. “Ah, I hate being away from you guys!”

Brie started sobbing as well and reached out for Vivi’s free hand which she squeezed. “I know we didn’t start off as good friends,” Brie smiles sheepishly, probably remembering the cringy reason why. “But I’m very grateful to have been close friends with you as the school year passed,”

Vivi squeezed Brie’s hand back and grins cheekily. “At least something came out good from the fight that we had over Jake, right?

“Ugh, don’t remind me!”

They all laughed at Brie’s red face.

“How about you Laia? What are your plans for college?”

Laia turned to Shane who asked her. “Ah, I’ll be staying here for college,”

“We’ll stay here together!” Brie says, raising her hand and Laia’s.

Thalia looked perplexed. “I thought that you’re going to Paris?”

“Eh, I managed to change the mind of my parents,” Brie shrugs. “I gaslighted them as hell,”

“Good for you,” Shane laughs. “At least two of us here can finally decide for themselves,”

Laia smiled. It’s not like she could tell them that she wanted to go abroad for college but couldn’t because of their lack of money.

“Anyway, enough of this sad talk!” Vivi stood up from her seat and clapped her hands loudly. “Let’s get this party started!”

The five girls watched a movie after. Once the movie ended, they hung out by the pool and then on the hot tub.

“Laia,”

Laia turned to Vivi. “Hmm?”

“I saw the news,” Ugh, here we go again. “Or more like we saw the news,”

Thalia placed her hand on Laia’s thigh. “Did you talk to Samuel about it?”

Laia sighs heavily.. Looks like she can’t talk her way out of this.