Maid for My Nemesis novel · Chapter 7 of 24

Chapter 7: Groceries

On Sunday morning, someone knocked on our door with two fingers, politely.

I was in my pajamas, with a bowl of cereal in my hand.

My brother got there first.

"It's him again," he announced. "The rich guy. He's holding a bag."

"Do not call him the rich guy to his face," I hissed.

"Why? Is it a secret?"

I opened the door.

Julian stood on the landing in a gray coat, holding my canvas work bag in one hand and a paper grocery sack in the other.

"You left this at the house," he said, lifting the canvas bag.

"You could have given it to me at school."

"I didn't want to give it to you at school."

He looked at the paper sack.

"And this is for your family. My, um, my mother taught me never to arrive with empty hands."

I took the sack and looked inside.

Eggs, flour, a bag of apples, a block of cheese, and a loaf of bread from the good bakery on Main Street.

It was too much for a person who ate instant noodles.

I knew exactly what it had cost him, and I felt my throat get tight.

"Come in," I said, before I could think.

He stepped over the threshold with the careful steps of someone entering a church.

Our apartment is two rooms and a kitchen.

The couch is also my brother's bed, and the table is also my desk, and the radiator knocks.

Julian looked at all of it with an expression I could not read.

"This is nice," he said.

"It's tiny."

"It's warm." He said it quietly, almost to himself. "It's really warm."

My mother came out of the bedroom in her robe with her hair wrapped in a towel.

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