Luka.

"Oh! Kelley! You're here!"

Laura greeted her with a tight hug making them swing sideways in happiness. Riona just arrived from the little tour she attended to where she called home. Temporarily.

"You could've called so I could pick you up instead of using the subway." Laura gently scolded her as she walked back to the living room.

"I didn't want to bother you." Laura sat by the dead fireplace on a chic, burgundy chair.

"Oh hush. Anyway, Luka will be coming today from Florida." Her face beamed of motherly pride just by the thought of her only son.

"That's awesome! When will he be arriving?"

"In the evening. He didn't tell me when exactly." She sighed and said, " I'll be working at the hospital by then. Shift starts at 7p.m. "

"Bummer."

"I know right?"

"He still has dreads?"

"Ugh!" Laura rolled her eyes. " If only he could listen to me and cut off those things from his head, he'd be such a perfect boy."

Riona chuckled at Laura's comment on her grownup son. She bet that Luka would never shed off his precious dreads not unless it was a matter of life and death. It had been half a decade since she last saw him back at her home country.

I wonder what he looks like in person.

" I'll leave you to rest, or freshen up. I'm sure that getting yourself familiar to this big city is exhausting." She rose from the chair, glanced at the wrist watch on her elegant wrist and said, " I've gotta run to the university and fill out some exam results. There's food in the fridge or, you can whip up something for yourself. Luka is a grown man but lazy so I'm sure hell warm up whatever he finds. See you later pumpkin."

" Thank you Laura."

Laura grabbed her handbag and left the house.

Lying on her bed, Riona exhaled as exhaustion took over her body. She had not eaten anything after breakfast and her tummy growled in protest to that.

Shower first then food.

~~~

She closed her eyes and turned her face into the shower's spray and allowed the warm water to rinse away the vanilla scented soap. The water pressure was strong compared to the ones at her family's home. With her taut muscles relaxed, her mind drifted off to her home in Europe.

For almost twenty two years, Claudia, Riona's mother sacrificed her career just to please Rodgers by being a housewife. She gave birth to her younger siblings with the last one having been birthed through caesarean section. After they had grown up enough and started attending school, Claudia introduced the idea of her starting to work. She'd noticed how Rodgers was struggling with paying for each child's school fees and wanted to lend him a hand. Rodgers, being old school, forbid her from ever getting a job since in his view, men work and provide for their families, and women stay at home and raise the kids.

She turned off the water, pushed the curtain back and reached for her fresh towel. Despite being verbally abusive towards her, Riona still loved her father. She adored her younger brothers and her mother. They might have not been the support system she needed when she did everything she could to get herself financially independent but that didn't matter much. They were still there for her.

Riona remembered the time she applied for a job as a house help back in London. She'd gone through various agencies till, finally, she found one where she was to work as a cleaner at the Emirates airport in Dakar. The pay was good; right about four hundred euros a month when converted from Arabian currency. This was before she joined nursing school at Bournemouth University four years ago. Five months into the job, she'd made enough money to get an international passport and visa plus the green card of which everything got ready by the time she graduated from Nursing school.

Riona heard the door being closed shut and hurried up to lotion her body.

"Must be Luka."

Putting on her black yoga pants and her mother's extra-large black t-shirt, Riona walked out of her temporary bedroom and into the halls heading straight to the kitchen. Her feet quietly pattered on the carpeted floor and got to the gray, double door fridge in the kitchen.

Turkey-avocado sandwich... macaroni... Frozen pizza... Salad...

Her eyes roamed over the readily available food, trying to find something to eat without having to cook.

"Chicken!"

The fried chicken breasts sat in a clean and colourless container. She took it out, placed the chicken breasts on a paper plate and popped it in the microwave to warm it up. Closing its door and setting it, a frightened, but many voice startled her.

" Who the fuck are you!" Riona turned on her heels to find Luka looking at her intensely with the vein on his for head throbbing.

"Ree...?" He asked. Unsure of who was really in his mother's kitchen.

"Luka." she slightly tilted her head. " Been a while since we last saw each other." Riona stated with a chuckle. She glanced at the wooden baseball bat he clutched in his hand making him attempt to hide it behind his broad back. Heat shot through Luka's core making a deep shade of pink show on his neck and the tips of his ears.

"Thought you were a burglar or something." he rubbed the back of his neck and scoffed his embarrassment away.

"So... It's nice seeing you in person after almost a decade." He spread his arms inviting her for a hug after setting the baseball bat against the wall. She welcomed the warm, innocent embrace and relished in the sandalwood scent with a dash of...

"Weed?"

"What? Oh yeah... that. I was in my zone in my room till I heard you moving around. Sorry." Luka confessed.

"I don't mind the smell. Just surprised." She pulled out of the hug and looked at her old friend slash big brother she never had. Luka was in his late twenties, about six feet tall, and looked like he belonged in an army recruiting poster. Army, because his body was muscled like a man who had seen combat and not in a bodybuilder kind of way.

"How's my man Caleb?"

Caleb, Riona's brother, and Luka were really close friends despite the age difference. They used to go hiking together, play Riona's piano together—horribly— and pulled pranks on countless number of people, young and old.

"He's alright. In his senior year right now and probably stressed."

"He shouldn't be. Those tests were way too easy compared to the shit in universities."

Riona shook her head and chuckled. "That's not how we felt when we were in senior year."

He shrugged and walked to the fridge. "How have you been?" Riona asked him.

"Been great. Modelling agencies have been contacting me to strike a deal and I couldn't ask for more." He replied.

Riona's chin dropped. "You're a model?"

"Yeah. Not the Victoria secrets kind. I'm in the freelancing category. Pays decently plus, my classes don't get disrupted." He opened the carton of milk and drank directly drank from it as the microwave pinged.

"That is so amazing!"

"Right?" Shifting on the stool by the kitchen counter, he asked, "What about you Ree? What have you been up to."

"Well, nothing much. Just waiting to start working at the hospital." She took out her chicken and served on a plate.

"You still do some art work?" He asked while eyeing the delicious chicken.

"Occasionally."

"I still have the farewell card you made me years ago."

Before Luka's family left Europe for America, Riona had made a Spongebob themed card for Luka as a farewell gift. They were both in highschool, Luka being two classes ahead of her. It was a sad moment for both of them even though Luka acted nonchalant.

"Really?"

"Yeah. I'll show it to you tomorrow. It's somewhere in my closet." he gulped the remaining milk and threw the carton into the trash can.

Both of them caught up with each other's lives till ten at night when they called it a night. Luka went upstairs to his bedroom after making sure all doors were locked and that the security system was on and Riona too got to her little, quaint bedroom, turned off the lights and slept peacefully with a smile on her face.