LOVING HELL IN PARADISE

Its morning time, another dreadful day for the curter’s. its been a year and 2 months now since they last saw their parents but they left two infants in the hands of a 17 year old girl. Tyla being the eldest was left to care for her younger siblings, kerin and kelvin both age five. Their parents disappearance till remains a mystery to everyone till today. Not a single soul that was interrogated could give any clue as to where they went, if they had a fight or were even involved in an accident.

Despite all, there was nothing and besides it wasn’t like anyone was exactly interested in what happened to two random human beings. The children officer had tried to separate the three children a number of times but failed. Tyla wasn’t willing to part. For all she knew, her parents could likely just pop out of nowhere tomorrow and she wasn't willing to part ways with the only family she had. She was already loosing sight of what it felt like when they were around and couldn’t allow herself to loose what she had with her siblings.

To her, they were all she had and meant the world to her. Compared to the life they had before, their present condition was a living disaster. Even though they still had their parents house, it meant nothing. Tyla herself was bearing the brunt of it all, their useless relatiives were only useful in stopping the children officer and any other third party form probing into their business and for that much she was grateful. Even if it meant her happiness was at stake, she was willing to do whatever it takes to make up for her parents absence.

The alarm rings and Tyla gets up from the bed. She stares at the two adorable figures still fast asleep beside her and smiles. There are other rooms in the house but Tyla sn’t willing to let the twins out her sight. Circumstances had succeeded in turning her into an "overprotective single mum", a guardian angel and a dangerous teenager at that. She wouldn’t tolerate any injustice against the two most imporatant people in her life and would go to any lengths for them. She taps both kids gently, waking them both from sleep,

‘’ good morning my angels, how was your night’’, Tyla said smiling lovingly at them both.

Kelvin is the first to get up from the bed and settles in Tyla's bossom. Kerin follows suit with a peck on Tyla’s cheek, throwing her arms around her big sis. Tyla sighs and embraces them both for a while before releasing herself from their hold as she carries the twins into the bathroom for a morning wash. It had become her usual routine on week days to prepare them for school and she was glad to. The money from her parents trust which was now in the name of both Kerin and Kelvin was almost enough to cater for their educational needs, for now at least. She gets them ready for school and leaves them to eat while she goes to get ready, herself. She still had to drop them off and just in time to resume duty at the eatery where she worked as a waitress. Moments later, she is ready for the day dressed in a red polo shirt with a chicken logo and the words ‘ROOSTER EATERY’ boldly written at the left chest area, on a jean trouser and her hair tied into a ponytail.

Having packed their lunch boxes, they all head out for the day with kerin and kelvin jumping and chatting away happily while holding on to their sis hands. After about ten minutes walk, they arrive at the school . Tyla wasn’t going to take any chances and hence always made sure she walked the twins into their classes and only left when she was sure they were settled in. She waved a final goodbye and walked out of ALICE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL.

Anyone who came cross Tyla could testify that she was a true beauty but it seemed like she was ignorant of her beauty. Even though she was forced to grow up too soon, she was still satisfied. She had chosen to drop out of school to be able to fend for her siblings, though the money from the trust was capable of catering for every single one of their needs for the next four years maximum, Tyla wasn’t going to give fate a chance to make a mess of her life again. She was constanly thinking of different posssiblilities mostly negative,

‘’ what if she got scammed?,

"what if the twins got robbed and the perpetrators ask for a huge ransom?

"What if one of them fell seriously ill and all the money is needed for treatment?’’.

These thoughts and so many negativities were all that kept running through her head. It wasn’t like she had anything reasonable to look forward to, she had already made the welfare of her siblings her priority and main purpose in life and there was definitely no chance of another goal emerging. Tyla checks in for work and heads straight to the kitchen area to begin receiving orders for the day, she is already well known by the customers and she enjoys her job. No one knew of the fact that she was still a minor, apart from her employer as she already had the build of a young adult but now she was a young adult. All the customers loved her which was a good thing as the extra tip was also a plus for her. She wasn’t getting her full pay since she closed earlier at 3pm to be able to pick her siblings from school. This has been the usual pattern of operation for Tyla- from work to the twins and vice versa, but it was okay for her. ROOSTER was a very large eatery with two different entrance doors leading to different areas. The restaurant is made of two sections, there was the regular section which was for every regular customer, always quite crowdy but organized and then there was the VIP section, which was where the other much more secured beautiful and heavily guarded entrance door led to. This particular section as the name implied was meant for the rich and well positioned in the society as always. In the same manner the customer section was divided, likewise the staff section and work area. The staffs were divided into the bronze and silver staffs. The bronze staff worked in a separate area of the kitchen and took separate orders from that of the silver staff who served the VIP section. Both sections hence had different kitchen areas and staffs to suit the taste of their customer. There wasn’t really any specific qualification for working in the VIP section. The pay was high but it was not worth it. Tyla was employed as a bronze level staff. It wasn’t like she cared, she had never met any silver staff in person, since their areas were different and the silver staffs as she heard were proud and felt superior to them. For her, that was their bloody business. They had to do all the shitty work and then the silvers as they were called just had to smile, keep a good appearance and serve food to rich brats and to think they enjoyed more benefits than the others just didn’t make sense. The silvers got a higher pay and still they got free transport services, upkeep allowances to keep up the appearance, a special, cute uniform and lots of tips from their customers meanwhile the bronzes who did more work, got a lower pay and had nothing more as rewards except from the kitchen left overs. Well, that was just how cruel the system was, but what was even more annoying was how desperate a few Bronzes were to become Silvers. They tried to impress the Silvers by getting gifts but the fastest way was through the manager, mr. magnus.

Mr. Magnus was a fat, ugly man with an oval head, always in black suit and spectacles that brought out his true nature of a greedy, disgusting, abusing and manipulating scum bag. Everyone bought gifts for him frequently to remain in his good books to either get into the silvers or to even keep their job. Some even went as far as following him home to help with his chores and even worse some girls willingly slept with him to get in. That by far, was the height of disgust to Tyla. She would rather die than have anything to do with him. Hence, her work place was another drama house.

Tyla walked out into the customer area with a pen and paper taking customer orders. she wasn’t the only one doing this, several others were doing different things; some taking orders like Tyla, others serving food, liquids, clearing out tables and so on, but as for Tyla she always went a little extra and tried to engage the customers making sure they felt welcomed. While taking orders, she made it a habit of complimenting the customers, asking about their day and when she didn’t have orders to take, she helped first time customers pick out the best dishes from the menu, answered any question, cleaned spillages and lots more. she does all this in such a professional manner that she was often mistaken for the manager by unknowing customers.

She especially had a good reputation among the kids and everyone loved her personality except for a few of her colleagues who were constantly looking for means to humiliate her but she wasn’t going to let them bring her down, never! She had just finished taking the orders and handing the list to the kitchen staff and in no time a few staffs walked out of a door by the corner holding trays of the respecive tables for each order. Having collected all the orders no new customers were coming in and so Tyla was pretty unoccupied for the meantime. She walked over to an empty table by the corner and decides to take a seat to relax her legs. No sooner had she sat down did Evelyn, a colleague of hers walk up to her ranting . Evelyn was one of the annoying little brats that felt on top of the world since she was among mr. Magnus favorites. She particularly hated Tyla basically because she was one of the very few whom she felt had too much pride and was not willing to compromise like she and the others did. Nevertheless, everyone tried to avoid crossing her path as she was just bad news.

‘’ and what do you think you are doing sitting here . everyone is walking their ass off and you are busy lazing about", evelyn scolded.

" 'am sorry, I didn’t have anything else to do and no new customers had come in for a while now so I decided to just sit her and wait’’, Tyla anwered.‘

" I didn’t know that Rooster now had too much staff and lesser work load to give you time to sit! Get up this instant, go and stand by the door, call in customers and welcome them nicely’’, Evelyn retorted and walked away hissing.

Tyla sat there for a few seconds staring at her from behind. How could one person be so annoying and stupid at the same time! Well that was all in the past, right now she needed to do as she had been told else the witch would come back to hunt her again. She straightened her shirt and walked briskly to the entrance door. The door man was still there, it was his job to welcome in customers but now she had to do it with him. He was an old man of roughly seventy, but his age didn’t affect his activities around as he was even more active than some young men she knew. He was quite nice and easy going.

Though he and Tyla hadn’t met on frequent ocassions, since Tyla being a core staff was mandated to use the back entry which was specifically meant for the staff alone. Tyla walked out of the door and was now standing on the front porch. She turned to her side and noticed Pa Jones the doorman standing almost mute by the side. She greeted him and he responded with a very warm smile. Tyla informed him that she was asked to replace him for the meantime and he could take a break until she would be called in for duty again. Pa jones was very glad that he could take a break as it was not very often he got the chance to take breaks. It was always an issue if he was found missing from his post for more than ten minutes. He explained a few things to Tyla and left Tyla to commence her duty. It was at that moment that she realised how hard Pa Jones work was, she had always thought that he’s job was the most simple job at Rooster’s. He didn’t have to move up and down or scrub dirty surfaces, all he had to do was just stand there and smile, a surprisingly boring activity. The old man had literally been going through hell every single day at work and she thought he was just taking things easy. She had only been standing for only thirty minutes but she felt like she had spent an entire day in that spot.

The most annoying thing was that she was being monitored through the cctv camera just above her head and so she couldn’t even do enough to make things better. Three hours had passed and she was still standing there, tensed up and upset but could not even show it because it was mandatory to smile. She looked over to the side observing the VIP section separated from where she was by a small rail fence.

Every single person she had seen pass through that door was definitely in every right above her; to their dress, hair, skin and even the callibre of vehicle, a normal person would know his place.

This would be third time she had seen the doorman change. Why wasn’t her section operating in the same manner? If only equality was a term that actually existed. Her mind raced back to Pa Jones, after today she woud make sure to advice him to get another job as she was sure that his legs would stop functioning if he continued with this for another year. It was now mid afternoon and the scorching sun wasn’t even sparing her. She had tried to take a rest for a while but the moment she decided to take a step, Evelyn’s voice had blasted through the speaker in the ceiling. Now she was sure that she was being watched and her oppresoor wouldn’t rest until her spirit was broken. She had utilised every single standing posture she knew to ease the strain on her legs but she had been standing far too long that nothing was working at this point. If Evelyn thought that she was at her mercy, then she was obviously mistaken. The worst she could do was get her fired and that it self had a rare chance of manifesting.

Frustrated, she sat down on the floor. She was hungry but that was the least of her problem right now. It was almost time for her to go pick up kla nd kelvin from school but Evelyn had still not called her in. Pa Jones who was now just sitting by the corner noticed her restlessness and approached her.

"what is the matter child’’, Pa Jones asked. "please sir, can you cover for me for a few minutes? I need to go in and talk to Evelyn". Its’ really urgent’’, she pleaded.

"of course child, you have helped me enough today",Pa Jones said warmly‘’

"thank you very much sir’’, Tyla replied and dashed into the eatery.

Everyone was busy doing one thing or the other and it was packed full wiith customers. She eye-searched the whole service area but couldn’t find Evelyn anywhere. She went into the kitchen area but Evelyn was nowhere to be seen. Time was running quite fast and she couldn’t wait for Evelyn to pop up from wherever she was. Tyla walked up to Franca who was known to be one of Evelyn’s minions.

‘’ hi Franca, sorry for bothering you but I can’t find Evelyn and I need to go now. I have to pick up my siblings from school. Could you please inform her when you see her’’, Tyla said.

‘’ if you can’t find evelyn then wait until you do find her, I would not be found running errands for you’’, franca hissed away.

What warranted the sudden outburst was unknown to Tyla. She wanted to give the bitch a befitting reply but she decided to save the drama for another day. On normal grounds, none of them was better than her at anything, she had never offended them before and so she couldn’t grasp the reason why they decided to become a pain in her ass. She went to the locker room,took her bag, punched out and left rooster. She had a feeling that there was going to be an issue tomorrow but who cares, her cute little siblings were busy waiting for her. She could not afford to adopt her usual habit of trekking to preseve money had she had wasted a lot of time, hence, she boarded a cab straight to Kerin and Kelvin's school.

On getting to the school gate, she could see that there was almost nobody around and Kerin and Kelvin where sitted in the corner wearing very sad faces. She called out to them and they raised up their heads to see Tyla running towards them. The sight of heir sober faces brought a very sick feeling to Tyla, tears already dripping from their eyes.

‘’oh my babies, am so sorry….. something happened at work and I couldn’t make it in time’’, she knelt down to give them a consoling hug.

"we were getting scared Tyla, everyone had already left and you still hadn’t shown up, you have never done that before’’, Kerin said between short sniffs.

‘’ we thought something had happened to you, no one was going to take us to you’’, Kelvin lamented placing one hand over his eyes trying to block the tears fom raining down.

Tyla couldn’t deny that she felt sorry for making them feel that way but then looking at them crying their lungs out just because they thought something bad happened to her suddenly made her smile. She was only two hours late and they had thought that far. She was still smiling but then she heard something form Kerin’s mouth that mad her freeze in shock.

‘’ you won’t leave us like mum and dad did right?’’, kerin blurted out having freed herself form Tyla’s embrace and was now looking directly into her eyes.

‘’ yes Tyla , you won’t abandon us right’’, Kelvin stated.

The two kids were now staring directly into Tyla's eyes. Tyla wasn’t in a state to respond to what they said. She was lost in between a myriad of emotions. She didn’t hate her parents atleast not until she found out why they disappeared. For what she knew, they were the best parents she could have ever had, so she was never really open to the idea that they left willingly. Kerin and Kelvin were still little when it all happened and so whatever memory they still had of their parents would be as faint as as a splatter of dust on a wall. She had tried to keep them away from the troubles of thinking about the whole incident but there had always been little to what she can do. They had minds of their own.

Drawn back to reality she stared at thm for a while and moved to place her hands so lovingly on their faces.

" what made you say that uhn?’’, Tyla said with trembling voice. She didn’t even realize that tears were already pouring down from her own eyes. Now it was Kerin and Kelvin’s turn to console her.

‘’don’t cry Tyla, you’ll make us cry’’, kelvin said wiping the tears off Tyla’s face.

‘’ why won’t I cry, how would you ever think that I would abandon you or forget you. You two have really spoilt my day. I had a bad day at work and now you two are summimg up my grief’’, Tyla retorted.

" we’re sorry Tyla, we won’t say that again. We love you’’, Kerin said hugging her sister.

"I love you two more’’, Tyla stated giving the two of them a hug. ‘’ I would never abandon you, you’re all I have and mum and dad didn't abandon us’’, she said.

After a long hug, the three siblings finally let go of each other. Tyla uung their bags around her shoulders and they walked out of the school gate. They had been walking for quite a while but none of them had said anything, the atmosphere was quite tense and Tyla was still thinking about what had happened today.

She was quite down but she knew that this would only make her siblings feel even more guilty and sad. Hence to break the ice, she offered to get ice cream and this immediately lightened the mood as the twins jumped up and down excitedly. This brought a warm smile to Tyla’s face as they walked straight up to an ice cream truck parked by the road. Tyla got ice cream for all of them and they licked away happily. The three siblings laughed away and they didn’t even realise how much they had walked until they found themselves on the street of their home. The twins ran all the way to the front door with Tyla just a few steps behind them. The door was unlocked by Tyla and they headed in. Tyla helped with their assignments,, prepared dinner and tucked them in . She sat beside their beds and sang them to sleep patting them ever so gently on the back. She spent the next hour simply staring at their innocent faces asleep. Tears rolled down her eys but she quickly wiped them off.

’it ain’t fair’’, she murmured and stumbled out of the room.

Three whole days had passed since Tyla had been asked to replace Pa jones by evelyn. Her entire life had turn upside down since that day thanks to Evelyn. On resuming work the next day after leaving without seeing Evelyn previously, she was met with an enire workload of drama.

Though mr. Magnus slept with virtually every single girl he saw, Evelyn maintained the position of his major side chick and everyone knew that. Evelyn wasn’t ignorant of Magnus’s nature, she just didn’t mind as long she wasn’t placed below another girl. Afterall, they were both using each other; she was using him to keep a high profile above others at work and she; well she was just a pleasure tool to him.

She had gotten to Rooster the next day, only for Franca to tell her that she had been asked to report to Mr. agnus’s office whenever she arived. She knew something was up and it had to do with Evelyn and so she was quite prepared for what was going to come. She walked into the office to find Mr Magnus and Evelyn in a very compromising position. There she was sitted on his lap with his arms around doing God knows what. They were so engrossed in what they were doing that they didn’t even notice Tyla entering, she had to cough loudly to draw their attention.

And yet despite seeing Tyla standing there, they didn’t even show signs of being ashamed or embarassed as Evelyn still remained sitted on Mr. Magnus lap but they had stopped whatever it was that they were doing previously and Evelyn was now staring daggers at Tyla. This meant trouble .