Chapter 4

'We are here' Alex said and I looked up at the beautiful mansion house in front of us.

Wrong, rather a mansion. An enormous white palace-like place.

Oh yeah right.

It's the house he assumed was my home which I didn't deny.

'Yup. thank you for walking me back, see you tomorrow.' and I waved him goodbye, he said he wants to see me in but I told him I'll see him off first and he reluctantly went back to his own home.

When I don't see him anymore, I looked back again to the beautiful mansion in front of me.

My facade

My lies.

I turned and walked to the small alley beside the mansion and there, at the very back of it is a very small house, a house so old that it's near to its ruin.

This is the orphanage that the owner of that beautiful mansion owns.

On the outside, they are known for being kind-hearted and philanthropists but what the people do not know is that they are just disguised to deceive people.

They had hidden their thick skin very well. Even though I'm aware of my surroundings in the past. I wasn't able to know the lies of my old home until when I was already an adult.

I went inside the old building and I saw children running around. 

Some are playing, crying, and being noisy.

No one paid attention to me as I'm just another unknown child in this orphanage.

No one bothered to look at me. I'm very used to this kind of treatment and I don't mind at all. I just walk to my assigned room. I am very tired.

>........<

I wake up early in the morning just before the sun rises.

Fixing my bed, getting the clothes that I readied last night, I got dressed before getting out of the room. I always make sure to do it carefully and quietly not to wake the people up. I don't have the luxury to have my own room. There are 2 bunk beds in this room so I share the room with the other three children.

Thankfully they sleep like a log. There was no one when I got out but I can hear the people from the kitchen doing their works downstairs. I went out through the back door and the cold air welcomed me. I inhaled the fresh air and started my daily run.

It's been 3 days since the time turned back for me. I must have been the luckiest person in the world to be able to get the chance to get back in time. Of course, I want to do it all differently. I rethink again and again and I realized.

Before I died, I said to myself that I wish I can go back to these happy memories where I'm with the love of my life, Alex.

In the unknown and miraculous way, I got my wish

So I decided to satisfy myself.

When my parents died, I have no one.

I was passed to my father's side of relatives since my mother's side don't want me. They even didn't come to my mother's funeral.

No one cares. If they couldn't care to attend mother's funeral, how so to her child who was left alone in this world.

With their heavy heart, my father's sister had no choice to take me in. 

The first abuse started with her and her family. I am not allowed to open the fridge. I slept in the utility room. I was always the punching bag of their verbal stress in life.

When my father's sister got sick because of my existence, to be able to be free from the responsibility, she brought me to this orphanage that can even barely manage itself.

It was a different place but it was still the same, I was hated, even in the orphanage -

No one wanted me.

I grew up in this orphanage and no one wants to adopt me because of my history. A person with living relatives but not wanted, they all think I was defective. The people in the orphanage thought of me as useless, just another mouth to feed.

I'm jogging now as I remember the time when I got into the St. Catherine Academy. Not everyone can get into this school, only the capable ones. 

I was able to get into this school because of charity. 

The director of the school wants to show gratitude to the owner of the orphanage for a reason I do not know why but he offered a scholarship to three students from the orphanage.

Oddly enough, they selected me.

Fast Forward, I saw Alex at school, he was a popular one. 

Every girl admired him, Every boy respected him. Even though he is from a well-known family, he is very humble and kind. Maybe that's why everyone likes him, he talks to everyone, even me who had no one, he befriended someone like me.

That's when I think I first lied.

I said I'm a scholar but not the type of scholar he thinks. He thinks I'm very clever when I'm just a normal person.

We became best of friends, his friends befriended me because they think I'm someone like them who was given everything but I was not. I was the very opposite of that.

I don't know how I pulled up all my lies but I did.

When Alex wanted to take me home, I didn't say that the white mansion is my house but he thought it was and the amazement in his face is something that I cannot deny so I didn't correct him either.

Knowing Alex is like living in a lie but it was the happiest moment in my life.