Chapter 4

On the other side of town.

Leon slipped in through the back door of the house he shared with his mother and daughter. It was his grandfather's home and the last thing he had managed to scavenge after his foster father had gambled away all their properties. Yes, You heard right. Leon Petrov was from a middle-class foster family. He went to good schools, had good grades, was appointed captain of the football club, and had girls and boys falling at his feet. He had the looks and everyone wished to be him. Then his other family was revealed and everything went downhill. His foster father had another family he had kept a secret for years. He had stopped sending child support for his daughters and their mother wasn't taking it lightly. She appeared on their doorstep on Christmas eve when he was just seventeen and nothing was the same anymore. The fights were endless and his foster mother was diagnosed with arrhythmia. His father stopped coming home and for two years he took care of his mother and school.

One day, he received a phone call during lunchtime that his father was found dead in a ditch and owed a solid eight hundred thousand dollars. His parents' accounts were scraped clean and his home was taken. They moved in with grandpa but soon after he was gone too. The people he called his friends turned their back on him and he was treated like an outcast. After graduation, his mother was hospitalized for four months and the hospital bills were weighing heavily on him. He had to dismiss the thought of college, even if he had a good scholarship, and take on a waitress job at a good restaurant and a grocery store. He met Adrianne at the park one evening and they had instantly clicked. She was like the light at the end of his black tunnel. She took care of his mother and did the chores around the house. Due to their carelessness, she had somehow gotten pregnant. They were determined to keep the baby. Everything was looking good. His salary was good for the three of them and he was sure he could add a fourth mouth too. They were so in love and he thought maybe God hadn't forsaken him after all. His mother's health was steady. The doctors said she may need a transplant but for now, she was perfect. He took online classes to become a business administrator and get a better job at a good company. Adrianne was so good at baking, he planned to open a small bakery for her.

Then, life decided to remind him that the world was evil; life reminded him that shitty things happen to shitty people; life reminded him that he was a mistake; he saw the world, and the world saw him. He came back from work one evening and his week-old daughter was screaming and crying on his bed. Her face was so red he could tell she had been crying for hours. His mother had gone to visit grandpa's grave but she should have been back by now. This got him very worried but not as worried as Adrianne's disappearance. Then he saw it, the white paper that was lying on his bedside table, containing the most painful words that mankind had ever seen. His lover had left him. She was dissatisfied with the life he offered her and craved greener pastures. Unlike him, Adrianne's life had never been pretty. She grew up in an abusive home and passed through four different foster homes. She never went to school and had to work at the tender age of twelve.

Soon he received a phone call, his mother hadn't made it back home because she had been found passed out cold on the sidewalk. Another debt of his father's had been uncovered and his grandpa's house was to be taken. He had to divide his bank account into two and soon he had nothing left to his name. He had turned to drugs for comfort but this had cost him his two jobs. No one wanted a drug addict as an employee. Luckily he had scooped up a job at a small shoe factory that paid half of what his last job did. Hardly able to provide food for his three months old daughter, he took up underground fighting and he was good at it. There was a thrill that came from hitting other people. Inside the ring, he was able to relieve his soul of the pain and heartache that life had given him. He wasn't proud of who he had become, but if he had to provide for his daughter, he would do it again and again.

Present

Leon closed the door as quietly as he could. It was 2:00 am and he knew his mother would be asleep. His daughter, well she must have a superpower because very often than not he will return home to his five months old daughter sitting quietly in her cot which was in the room and waiting for her daddy. So yes, he was closing the door quietly, not because of his sick mother, but rather for his supernatural daughter. He tiptoed to his room sending a quiet prayer to God that his daughter was fast asleep and won't see him this way. Isn't this just funny? He was a twenty-seven-year-old man who held his shoe in one hand and a dirty duffel bag in the other and was tiptoeing to his bedroom because he was scared of a five-month-old baby girl catching him red-handed. Almost like a teenager would do after a wild party to avoid scolding from his parents.

Unfortunately for his grown-ass, his daughter's baby blue eyes which she had inherited from him were the first thing he saw when he peeked his head in. She was supporting herself on the railing of the cot and made a joyful sound when she saw his unruly midnight curls peek in.

Defeated, Leon sighed and dropped his shoes and bag and picked her up.

"Why do I even bother when I have never been successful?" He scolded himself and as if to make a mockery of him, his daughter squealed in agreement.

He laughed and rocked her on his undamaged shoulder. The other one was dislocated, but luckily that was better than his other injuries and he made three thousand dollars tonight so he didn't mind a dislocated shoulder.

He put his daughter to bed, ate the dinner his mother had probably prepared before going to sleep, took an hour class of business administration and retired to bed. He counted the brown cracks on the ceiling. The house wasn't very bad but it needed some renovation and he was going to do just that when he had time. He thought of Adrianne who had gotten married last week to a somewhat rich man. She was happy if any of the photos online had anything to say about it and she never contacted him about Leona, their daughter. She had moved on, he could tell, but her betrayal was a fresh wound on his hardened heart. Without saying his night prayers, because why should he when he had nothing to be thankful for, he drifted off to his four hours sleep.