Chapter Seven

“ Excuse me”, I said to the lady at the reception.

“ How may I help you?” She asked, putting on a smile.

“ I'm looking for the administration office. I submitted an application a few days ago and I'm here to get the reply”, I said, smiling back at her.

“ Oh, Mr Madrigal, right?”

“ Yes?” I was surprised, how did she know my name.

“ Oh, we've all been expecting you”, her smile grew larger, exposing the little bread crumbs around the stem of her teeth. She must've eaten just bread for breakfast; no tea, no coffee.

“ Expecting me?” I asked, just to be sure that she wasn't mistaken.

“ Yes, of course, we would've even called but the contact info on your CV was incorrect”.

“ It can't be incorrect, I uploaded it myself”, I was sure that she was talking about someone else.

“ It was. Here, take a look”, she turned her laptop to my face, enabling me to take a good at the CV that I had uploaded and sent to them. The passport on the CV didn't do justice to my real appearance. I knew I wasn't that gorgeous or handsome, but at least I manageable, but the passport made it seem as if I was running for an Ugly Pageant Competition. I took a look at my contact info, taking my time to recall all the numbers, and she was definitely right, it wasn't complete, I had omitted a number while trying to hasten up and submit the application.

“ Oh, you're actually right, it's not correct”, I said, turning the laptop back to her.

“ I knew I was. Anyways, the administration office is down the hallway, the last room to your right”.

“ Thank you”, I said and headed down the long hallway.

I knocked on the door and a thick voice answered, telling me to come in.

“ Good day……. Ma”, I wanted to say ‘ sir’ because my brain had programmed me to say so after analyzing the thick, bass voice that I heard from outside, but as I looked at the person at the table, my eyes quickly sent signals to my brain to abort mission. It was a woman, not a man, a woman that sounded more manly than an actual man.

“ Good day. How may I help you?” She asked, her deep voice still resonating, refracting on the walls and sounding so foreign to me, as if she was lip syncing.

“ Um…….. I am Mr Madrigal, I came to check if my application was accepted”, I said, still standing at the door.

She looked at me again, carefully this time, as if to make sure that I was speaking the truth about who I was, before inviting me to take a seat.

“ So Mr Madrigal, your application was reviewed and congratulations, it was accepted”, she said, making efforts to sound as professional as possible, and not like the chatty lady that sat at the reception.

“ Oh, thank you ma’am”, I said, smiling and feeling happy. I knew I was going to be accepted, but it was still good to know that I actually got accepted.

“ You applied to work in the Sex Crime department, right?”

“ Yes ma'am, I did”.

“ Good. You've also been accepted into the department”.

“ Oh, thank you so much”.

“ So, we'll run some auditing on your CV today, so you can actually fully start tomorrow”, she said, looking back into her laptop.

“ Thank you, and have a nice day”, I said as I exited the office. I think I heard her say “ and you too”, but I couldn't care less. Whether or not she replied was totally no e of my business, all I knew was that I was accepted into the state prosecution office.

I arrived early the next day, eager to start off. The chatty lady at the reception, Galinda, showed me to my office and introduced me to the other members of the department. Mr Churchill, Stiles, Elphie, and a bunch of others that I couldn't quite remember their names. Most of them, especially Mr Churchill, seemed to immediately become intimidated as Galinda spread the unwanted news of me being a graduate of Harvard law school.

“ He went to law school at Harvard”, she said, smiling brightly like a Chinese mother bragging to her friends about her son getting into med school.

They had welcomed me with warm words, all seeming friendly and reliable, especially Elphie.

I went back into my office after the introduction was done, finally settling down. The office was mediocre, nothing special about it, just a table and an arm chair, with a refrigerator and an air conditioner.

“ I traded a nice office at the private law firm for this”, I said to myself as I took in everything in the room. I almost started regretting my decision, but I reprimanded myself, reminding myself of the reasons why I had joined the prosecution office.

“ Here's your first case”, Galinda said, dropping a file on my desk. “ It's a case between a female teacher and a male student”.

“ A student raped a teacher?” I questioned, shocked at how unlikely it was.

“ No, it's the other way round”, she said, and I couldn't tell which one was more weird; a student raping a teacher or a woman raping a boy”.

“ You'll be meeting the boy today”, she said as I went through the files, “ he'll be coming around with a detective, around 11 AM, and umm….. Stiles will also be with you on the case”.

“ Okay”, I said. “ Where will we meet? Here in my office?”

“ No, at the meeting room upstairs”.

At exactly 11 AM, I was seated at the meeting room, and after a while, Stiles walked in. I was pretty nervous, and I didn't even why.

The door budged open a man directed a boy into the room. The boy, a teenager, or at least in his early twenties, walked up to us, with his eyes so red and puffy; he must've been crying, and I definitely understood what that felt like.

As I turned to take a good look at the detective that had accompanied him, I was left dead-struck at who was standing before me.

“ Marcelo?” I said, a smile appearing on my face.

“ Angelo?” He said, smiling back, leaving Stiles and the other boy to wonder what was going on.

This must be fate, there are no two ways about it.