I forgot to add in the previous part that he puts his gun and the little card away. That bugged me, so I wrote that in just so you know. And the song is a joke as Eli's theme.
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Pretending to stay at ease.
Will they notice your despair?
Capture, twisting your sacred peace.
Does she know?
Does she?
Do you?
Something kept shaking me, beginning to awake me from my deep sleep. I could hear muffled murmurs, maybe a voice coming into clear. I slowly flickered my eyes open to a small figure jumping on my bed. It was Grace. She was bouncing up and down, her hair flowing with her movements. I groaned at her commotion, snapping my hand around her ankle. She yelped, but soon began to laugh.
"Eli!" she called excited, making one last hop down, landing on her knees in front of me. "Wake up big brother." She smiled brightly, leaning forward, nudging at my shoulder. I squeezed my eyes shut to animate my muscles to full consciousness and then blinked rapidly, getting the groggy feel from them.
"How did you sleep?" I asked, reaching up to cup her cheek, it feeling soft and warm under my touch. A light of realization hit her face under my palm.
"I had a wonderful dream, Eli! Mom and Dad and you and me were all there! They kept telling me they loved me and we made a huge dinner and it was so good and it was just amazing," she finished out of breath, showing the overwhelming excitement.
I smiled up to her cordially, adjusting my hand back to my side. "It does sound very lovely."
She paused for a moment then, her expression becoming more grieving. "I'm hungry, Eli." She pouted her lips, poking my cheek with her stubby finger. I attempted to bite it playfully, snatching her wrist and pulling it toward my mouth. I wrapped my other hand around her waist and gathered her close, sitting upward and crossing my legs Indian style so that she was in my lap.
A dark image shifted in the corner of my eyes. I used my first instinct. To protect. I quickly elongated my arms around Grace as a shield, guarding her from whatever lied a few feet away. Grace had stopped talking and I could feel her confused and horrified eyes reading my serious and deadly ones. I bend my closest leg up to the open room so that my knee faced the ceiling as a barrier for Grace, and then slightly turned my body so that it faced away from the end of the bed, toward the plain wall, but kept my gaze keen onto where I saw the movement's direction.
"See, why do you never act like that with me? All those years, and you barely even say 'hi' to me anymore." A female voice I knew too well complained out to me. Ms. Rebecca's shadow danced along the wall until she made an entrance from the lit bathroom. She came into the room with my jacket and gloves in hand, a dubious expression across her features.
"Hello, Ms. Rebecca," I said reassured but plainly. I assume she had gotten a key from the watch room to have gotten in here. What a bother. There's no privacy. Why can't Grace and I be left alone.
She put her hand on her hip, leaning on it, showing irritation. "Is that really the response I get?"
"Miss Hinton!" Grace squirmed out of my now relaxed clutches, lifting herself up on two feet and springing herself at Ms. Rebecca. She caught her, dropping my belongings on the end of the bed and holding Grace against her hip. I threw the thin sheets to my side then, stretching out my legs so both my feet hit the cold floor. I propped my elbows on my thighs, rubbing my eyes with my fists and then spreading my fingertips through my hair, getting the last groggy drop out of me.
