Chapter 2: The Weight of Responsibility

"Mom, I prepared your bath for you," Savvy smiled. I nodded. "Don't worry, the others have all taken their baths but haven't brushed their teeth because as you can see," she looked at her younger siblings stuffing their faces with ice cream and pizza.

Wait, where's Zachary?

"Zachary is trying to figure out an algorithm to… what he said. Should I bring him some ice cream, Mom?"

"Sure," I turned and started walking to my room.

"How was work today?" She asked, following me into the hallway.

"It was good, very…" I stopped at their bedroom door, opened the door partly, and smiled as I saw Zachary focused on what he was doing. "Good evening, sir," Zach jolted from his seat.

Zachary was the second eldest. He was the only one among his siblings who took no single feature from me. Even his intelligence was like that of his father's, if not higher that is. He was more of the cold-hearted type to outsiders and too obsessed with drawing a line between him and everyone he finds underneath his standard. His personality wasn't like his father, I could vouch for that. I just didn't get where his personality came from. If he was raised by his father, he would have definitely been the heir.

"Mom!" He dropped his pen and ran over to me. I'm not allowed to carry him so I just let him hug my body. "Welcome home, how was work?"

"Work is as it always is, stressful. How did online classes go today?"

"As you can see, homework," I could never be more grateful to God for giving them to me. Instead of giving up when they stopped school, they made use of their old laptops and surfed the internet for daily educational videos. Zachary, Zayne, and Savia did the learning and then Savvy would teach the remaining two. It was the only way they could learn for now.

"Do you want pizza, Zach? Mom bought pizza and ice cream," Savia said with a smirk.

"And you didn't tell me sooner! Zayne would eat it all!" And with that, he ran out of the room to the small living room to fight for his share.

"Boys," we said simultaneously and shook our heads. Savvy did everything like me, and even took over my cleaning obsession… Ur, I mean, the ability to know when something needs to be cleaned because dirtiness is bad. Yes, that's it.

After bathing, I ate what was left of the pizza before taking Zayne and Serenity to my bedroom to sleep. Savvy helped me brush their teeth and change them into their pajamas. I sang them to sleep, kissed their foreheads, and went to the kitchen to feed their highly intelligent pet parrot. Personally trained by Zach.

Zach was in the kitchen, sitting on the small low kitchen island with his laptop, Perry watching what he was doing in awe while Savvy stood on a huge stool, washing the dishes. If those two weren't so helpful, I would never have been able to survive. They started taking care of their siblings before they turned four. Sometimes I wished they acted their age but it was because they didn't act their age that I was able to survive.

"Perry, I forgot to give you your own share of the snacks. Cream cracker?" He raised his head quickly and spread his white and yellow feathers.

"Ooh, ooh, can you dip it in hot cocoa? Can you? Can you?" He pleaded.

I rolled my eyes. "Eat it like this. Tomorrow, I promise to make you hot cocoa with marshmallows," I promised. He nodded in agreement. I tore the wrapper open and dropped it on the island for him to find his way. I walked to the old refrigerator to get him a glass of cold milk.

"Mom, are we still going to The Houston apartment tomorrow for game night?" Savvy asked. The Houstons were a family of four we spent every Friday with for game night. Their children were nine and eleven by age, but they were the only family we associated with. I limited the people I talked to because the fewer people knew about me, the less opportunity for them to figure out who I was.

Because of that, I dyed my hair glazed strawberry blonde and wore black eye lenses, and even dyed the kids' hair black to make it more difficult for people to spot the resemblance between my kids and the all-famous Rominic B. Verlice. They all also wore glasses they didn't need, just to make it harder.

"Definitely." I chirped, shutting the refrigerator door. Savvy sighed, the kind of sigh she normally did when she wanted to tell me something she knew wouldn't please me. "Savia, what's wrong?"

"Four things, Mom, four things," I quietly walked to the kitchen island to drop the glass and the milk while she climbed down. Zach shut his laptop to exaggerate how serious it was. This can't be good.

"Okay…?"

"Mommy, the landlord came today, and not the friendly one that has been letting us live for free," my heart skipped. I heard our old landlord sold our house. He used to let me live for free but after he sold it, he told me I would have to pay the new landlord or be kicked out. I didn't want to tell them because I thought I'd have enough time to prepare before he came.

"And he talked about the rent fee?"

"Mom, the man just kept screaming at us, not even caring if we were just kids," Zach winced, "he called you all sorts of names, really bad ones that I do not wish to repeat," What more than how I've been sleeping with the old landlord to avoid payment of rent?

"And he gave us until the end of this month to pay or he would be forced to evict us out of his property," Savvy murmured. I inhaled and nodded. Guess I don't have time then.

"How much did he scream about?"

"He claimed that he would only take a year's payment or more and the building needs renovation so—"

"The total is $26,499," my heart sank into my stomach. I didn't have that kind of money. And how can I pay that much for this rundown building? "And number two, the companies you borrowed money for Zayne's surgery, they sent people over today—" I clapped my hand over my mouth to stop myself from screaming out loud. "And Mom," Zach sniffed back his tears, "Zayne showed signs today, symptoms of relapsing. His sickness might be coming back, seriously. Mom, you have to finish his treatment before it's too late. If his sickness comes back, he could die."

"I know, but the drugs are too expensive…"

"And lastly, Mom, I think Serenity is also…"

"God, no! Don't tell me! What am I supposed to do?!" I cried. "She stopped breathing again?" I sobbed. They nodded. "How many seconds this time?"

"Enough to kill her soon enough," I slowly lowered myself to the floor to sit. Zayne and Serenity were not healthy children, especially Zayne. They had been sick since they were born and that added to my stack of debts. If they were under their father's care, things would have been better.

A few years back, Serenity was diagnosed with some kind of abnormal disease that temporarily tightened her lungs and sent pangs of pain to her chest. At first, the doctor thought it was pulmonary edema or cystic fibrosis, but it wasn't—thank God.

According to the doctor, it was an abnormal case but not severe—then. It was a sickness she would outgrow if she kept taking her medication but the problem was that I didn't have the money to keep it up. I only bought some drugs to suppress it and keep it at bay at first, but the drugs were too expensive so I stopped. The doctor kept warning me against delay, but what was I to do?

At that time, I spent everything, sold everything, and borrowed money for Zayne's surgery. He got a spinal cord disease that paralyzed him. It was an emergency surgery to prevent permanent paralysis. I spent it all but I didn't finish the treatment. He needed some drugs to completely cure him but just like Serenity's, I couldn't afford them. The doctor told me it was dangerous not to finish it, but money was a problem.

"What am I going to do now?" I cried. I can't lose them, I can't lose my two precious angels. I'd already come this far. The doctors told me when they were born that Serenity and Zayne would have very weak immune systems, that sickness would threaten their lives and might kill them but if they could successfully cross over to ten years, their system would become stronger.

One more year, just one more year to go.

Serenity's time to outgrow her breathing issue was twelve or thirteen. Still, the probability of her getting better after ten was high. "There's a way," Zach said as he dropped to the floor to sit beside me. He placed his laptop on my lap and turned the screen up so I could see. I almost had a stroke when I saw the headline.

U.S. SWEETHEART AND SINGLE BILLIONAIRE, ROMINIC B. VERLICE, COMING TO LAS VEGAS TO FINALIZE THE A.J. COLLABORATION. IS LAS VEGAS READY FOR THE HANDSOME BACHELOR?

The first thing I picked out was the single part. I never checked and never bothered to look at the magazines or watch the news about him, so I thought he was married. What happened to Peyton?

"Wait, he is coming here?!" Yes, they knew. Like I said, they were really smart and Zach was clever. He was able to see the resemblance between him and his father at five years old. Then he intentionally showed me magazines and talked about him to see my reaction. I failed. He found out and then made Savvy force the truth out of my mouth. You can never lie to Savia, she is like a truth-hunting machine.

I told them everything but made them promise to keep the truth away from their younger ones. It wasn't capable of scarring them (hopefully), because they were them, but it could break the others.

"Yes, Mom, next week. I know you don't want him to know about us, I know you would rather remain dead to him and the world, but, Mom, your children's lives depend on him. He is the only way…"

"No!"

"Mom, listen to us, you need him because no one else would help you…"

"He can reject you all or try to take you away from me through the law! I don't have any money for a lawsuit! I can't…"

"Mom, what choice do you have?!" Savvy screamed. "Serenity and Zayne could die, I don't want them to die." She burst into silent tears, same as Zach. They were kids after all.

"I will find a way to get the money but your father doesn't need to know about me or either of you. Don't try to force me, I won't listen—"

"But, Mom—"

"Enough!!!" To him I was dead, and I will remain dead. I rather watch my children die than have him find out about them and claim them. And that's final.