Kiss of A Titan

At first, we all thought it was aunt that had returned back from town but Tom was quick to remind me that there was no sound of a car being driven into the yard from the main road and to confirm his observations, we looked through the window and saw that there was no car parked at the front of the house. With these observations in mind and the findings we discovered, I ordered the kids to stay put and went down alone to check who was at the door. I was only halfway down the stairs when the doorbell rang for the third time and I found the stairs too slippery to walk fast.

Therefore, I carefully retarded the speed of my footsteps on the staircase till I eventually climbed down to the living room. I walked to the door carefully enough not to slip and reached the door after skillfully ensuring that my slippers didn't slip on the floorboard.

The doorbell rang again for the last time but I was there to answer the call of the second visitor we would have in a day when aunt was not around to see who they were.

"Hold on. I'll open the door", I said and pulled the doorknob only to discover a pizza boy with his delivery at the doorstep. He was the second visitor from this side of town but much younger than the old dustman and was about my age with bulging biceps that was woven along with his rigid sinews up to his broad chest which was more prominent in his tight-fitted pizza T-shirt that had logo brand of pizzas printed on it representing the pizza shack he worked for. He was well dressed and had a cap covering his black haircut while his black jeans fitted him perfectly enough to enhance his manly features in such a manner that I was taken aback at first sight. I was a bit drawn to him by the time I saw his face staring at mine.

A kind of attraction that usually occurs when a girl sees a handsome boy under some odd circumstances and our unexpected meeting at my doorstep was no different from such a case.

His looks weren't bad at all at first glance and more enchanting in his bright smile which seems to glisten his visage like the sun that was shining on the front porch when I met him holding the package of pizza that I knew we didn't ordered any and it was expected that I should turned him away but his gorgeous appearance stung my curiosity to keep him standing there without uttering a single word out of his mouth. He knew we were supposed to acknowledge each other's presence with words but he too might have been attracted to me as well which prevented him from introducing himself and he must have liked what he saw when I opened the door to answer his incessant call.

We had wasted some minutes staring at each other as though we had met somewhere before and I was still lost in his enchanting smile. He was the first to snap out of the spell before I could even say a word of my mouth because I was so dumbstruck and so captivated by his appeal that I forgot what I was going to say.

"Should we keep standing or.....?", He was the first to speak and smirked when he noticed that his charisma was affecting me in some sort of way which both of us knew that we were a bit drawn to know who the other person was. A thing almost every boy often does whenever they encounter some new girl which my old friends at my former school usually utilized to ensnare any kind of boy they want for themselves.

"I...Sorry...for that, we...didn't make any orders for pizza", I stuttered and managed to get the message that I was battling to get out my head, across.

"Is that so?"

"Yep, you got the wrong house", "But the street address clearly says the house by the left", he answered by checking his pocket for a postcard and he took it out before rereading the address to see if he must have derailed on the right path. "Maybe you must have misread it", "And landed myself at the wrong house, I'm so sorry", he said apologetically as soon as it occurred to him that he had lost his way. He turned around to see if there were any houses in the neighborhood close by and saw the actual house at the opposite side of the road facing us directly. I noticed that it had dawned on him that he was supposed to have knocked on the door of our opposite neighbors instead of coming all the way to our house to deliver the pizza and there were three to four packets of them. At that moment of his discovery, he paused for a while thinking of what to do to save him from an embarrassing situation that had landed him in a huge mess. "Damn. I must have lost my way", "Told you so, I think it will be best if you figure out where you ought to deliver those before they get cold", "Thanks but I already had it figured out", "You have? That's so quick", I said with a bit of surprise. "Yes, I guess it must be that house over there", he said taking a second look at the postcard which was given to him to find the customer who made the order. I looked past him and saw the same house that I saw the other day but there was nobody outside in the front yard waiting to see if he had arrived to complete the delivery.

"Are you sure anyone's home?", "I absolutely have no idea", "What was the time for the delivery?", "About an hour ago", he said, still peering at the postcard. My guess was that he wasn't yet sure of the address that was scribbled on the postcard and he didn't want to find out that his speculation turned out to be wrong again which would worsen the situation that he had landed himself in.

"Then you better check if that's the right house because they might be thinking that their order wouldn't arrive today", "I think you're right. Do you mind accompanying me there?", "Me?"

"Yeah...", he replied and beamed a cute coaxing smile.

"I'd loved to but I got kids I need to look after", "Kids? Like yours?", "Absolutely not! They aren't mine. Let's just say I'm babysitting", "That explains it. Well, have fun babysitting. I guess I'll be leaving now", he replied but his feet didn't seem to move for he was still wondering if the address given to him was a wrong one. His face had turned pale with worry eroding his earlier bright countenance as he read it over and over again till he decided to depart from the porch. "Thanks for the suggestion", he said and didn't wait to say goodbye nor did he waved back when he had stepped out of the porch going back the way he had come. As he was leaving, I was still standing by the door, watching him as he headed towards where he had parked his little scooter motorcycle at the end of the walkway by the side of the main road.

Then I shut the door and went inside thinking that I must have forgotten about the stranger but I found myself by the window, looking at his tiny figure in a distance avoiding his motorcycle and saw him cross the road to the other house still carrying the whole bunch of pizza around with him till he was at the doorstep of the next door neighbor, ringing the doorbell for whoever was still in the house.

From the way I saw it, I believed that his long anticipated delivery was received by someone dwelling inside, probably the owner of the house after waiting for some few seconds for a response which came quicker than expected and then, he signed some papers with the client and strolled towards the road under the sunlight with his little shoulder bag, I barely noticed he carried across his torso. He crossed back again and went straight to his little scooter. He took his helmet and wore it before driving off out of the neighborhood.

Soon after he had driven back to town in his scooter, I lost interest in watching him and went back to join the kids upstairs but I chose to check on the dustman instead. I found out that he had already done a whole part of the hallway and was working in two of the rooms after mine. To me, he really did a good job scrubbing and mopping the floorboard in the corridor which gave the once dross passageway a new look and I was pleased when I saw the wet floor sparkling with an aura of cleanliness written at every corner of the place where the old paintings were hung around despite the fact that I am didn't step onto to the corridor so as not dirty what the dustman had cleaned. Even the paintings as well as the statue of the cupid near my room have now gotten a new glossy look as if the house was new in the first place. Afterwards, I went to meet Nora and Tom in the other corridor and I found them still getting along with the final rounds of the board game we were playing before the pizza guy arrived at our doorstep.

It was already midday when everyone started feeling hungry, especially the dustman and Aunt hadn't come back yet from where she went. My cell phone was still down and there was no way of contacting her through the house's landline which was apparently dead with the absence of electricity in the house though I could have gotten help from our neighbors across the road but I have never been good at requesting help from outsiders not to mention that this was a new town we just arrived in yesterday and the people living here might be hostile to outsiders. The dustman was still upstairs when the two kids and I went to the kitchen to get whatever we could find to eat for lunch and the bacon was still intact where my aunt kept them in the morning for us to easily find it. We were pleased to find the kitchen in a neat state just like the living room and everything seemed to be going to according to aunt's plan to properly renovate the house in two weeks before any further arrangements for the kids and I schooling in the town and it would be at that time we would get acquainted with the town settlers.

I found that the bacon was a bit cold but still warm enough to be eaten by all four of us in the house with the dustman included. I quickly gave the kids their own share to eat and ordered them to eat in the living room instead of their room upstairs where there were still particles of dust in the room. I joined them with a fair enough portion of delicious bacon on my plate but I left behind a tangible amount of the available food in the kitchen for our working guest named Matt who was still performing his tasks in the other room upstairs.

I sat down with the kids at the table but I had barely touched the food with the spoon when the doorbell rang again. I felt irritated with this since it was the third time we had anyone visiting us when aunt wasn't here to tell them to scram. Nora and Tom gave each other a perplexing look wondering who it was at the door.

"Stay here. I'll go see who's at the door this time", "Maybe it's Mom", "I doubt it is her", I replied and got up from the sofa. I took my time to go to the door and I swung it open before the intruder could think of ringing the bell a second time. Part of me was hoping that it would be the pizza guy again but I quickly brushed aside that thought the moment I saw an average heighted blonde haired lady of about twenty years old at my doorstep.

There was nothing too special about the way she looked at me smiling wistfully except for her yellow sleeveless blouse which fitted tightly to her fat body and ended a bit above her knees. Her pink lipstick was rather too colorful while her makeup was too light to cover some of the pimples on her visage. Meanwhile, the dustman was just heading downstairs carrying out some dirt with one of his parkers and he carefully moved past where the kids were eating and headed straight for the door.

I paved the way for him to pass through and he went outside avoiding the third visitor of the day till he went to the backyard possibly searching for where to dispose of the dirt since there was no dumpster within the area. We both stared at him as he obviously continued his way to the corner of the house till he was out of sight.

"Hi there, I'm Chloe", "Hello. What do you want?", I replied and looked at her suspiciously. Then my eyes fell on what she was holding.

"I live at the house over there", "Okay, you are the neighbor", "Yes, I am", "So what are you here for?

"Uh...I just wanted to thank you for earlier", "For what?", I replied and brought myself out into the open. Then I shut the door behind me and moved closer to get a better look at her.

"The pizza guy", "Oh, that was nothing. There's no need to thank me for that", "Still, you helped save the day by directing him to us. I wondered what would have happened if he didn't show up when we needed him", "He figured it out on his own and I did nothing but told him he missed his way", "Well, I still feel grateful for your help and for that, I came to share it with you", "We ain't hungry, you shouldn't have bothered yourself by bringing one", "Please accept my token of appreciation. I'm just relieved that things turned out great in the end", I was reluctant to accept her gift but her friendly smile was somewhat inviting and I felt inclined to receive the pizza she brought for us though I wasn't sure how aunt would react if the kids told her that we received a gift from one of the neighbors living around.

"I'm grateful for that but accepting it would be too much", "Please....for my sake. It's still fresh just the way it was delivered few hours ago", "I'm not sure if that would be the best thing to do", I hesitated even when it was tempting to eat some pizza with the bacon we were going to have for lunch.

"Come on, we all love pizzas and I'm sure you do as well", "Alright, I'll take it", "Great! I'm sure you would love it", she replied and grinned broadly as handed the pizza to me. I opened the packet after I received it and saw all the slices of it completely as though it was a pie chart proportionately divided in halves for more than one person. I peered inside and saw the delicious pizza but I wasn't too delighted like she was when I got it from her. She seems to me to be a freak and more of an excited character than the pizza guy who came earlier. Well, I'll say it was just the first impression I have gotten from the two visitors so far apart from the dustman who had been really nice to us and didn't want to be rude to them all.

The dustman returned from the backyard and came to the porch shaking off dirt from his gloves as he climbed the little stairs till he got to where we were at the doorstep chattering amongst ourselves. He almost bumped into Chloe who didn't quite notice that he was heading towards her.

"Excuse me, miss, I need to pass through", "Oh! Sorry, Mister. I didn't quite see you there", she apologized and took a step back away from his path.

"It's alright", "Huh... Mister, you can grab some food in the kitchen that's if...you wanna take some time to rest", "Sure. Did you order Pizza?", "Uhh...No, I did not. She brought it for all of us", "That's so kind of you. What's your name, child?", "Chloe", She responded with all smiles on her face.

"You live around here?", "Yes, she does", I answered instead of the nosy neighbor.

"I'm their neighbor", she added even though he did not ask and beamed another smile across her lips which brightened her chubby looks.

"Neighbor, huh? That's means we'll be seeing you a lot around here especially you who just moved in", "You got that right, Mister", "Anyway, let me help you take that to the kids", "But your gloves are all dirty", Chloe was the one who pointed out the observation and he saw that in fact, the gloves were indeed dirty.

"Ain't that disappointing?", "Don't worry about it, Mister. I'll bring it in myself. You can go in and take your food from the kitchen when you are done getting cleaned up", "If you say so, I won't refuse", He replied and I opened the door for him to enter so that he doesn't stain the door with the gloves. As soon as the door closed behind him, Chloe drew closer to me mainly to start a conversation which I wasn't prepared for in the noon. My supervisory role to watch over the children as they eat was biting me inside but her importune nature kept me from going inside the house even though I wanted to chase her away from the porch.

"I saw you guys yesterday when you moved in", "You did? I didn't notice", "Of course, you didn't. I did see your mom driving all of three of you to this house", "I thought there was nobody in that house when we came", "Well.... It's kinda hard to explain. My parents don't like us coming outside like this all the time, especially my mom. She has this hatred for neighbors and hate mingling with other people particularly people who just moved in next door", "No wonder the area is this quiet", "Yeah. What about your mom? I'd love to meet her", "She isn't at home right now", "That's too bad", "Sorry. She's quite busy with the house moving thing and you might not get to see her all day until evening", "That'll be the worst time to come out of the house", She mumbled to herself in deep thought though I heard her.

"As you can see, Matt is helping us clean the whole house and I don't have much time to talk right now", "And you got to go take care of the little ones, right?", I nodded in affirmation.

"Okay, fine. I'll take my leave then. See you around", she said and left me waving at her as she strolled back to the main road. I watched as she went hoping that aunt won't see her and then, I went inside the house and found the dustman already cleaned up as he was having a nice chat with them while eating. Tom had his mouth full with the bacon he was eating and was half done eating the rest on the plate into his stomach whilst Nora was still finding it hard to finish her meal.