Chapter 20: A Lovely Banter
"Are you challenging me?" Derek huffed.
"Whatever." Amelia looked away from him and stomped on his foot. Derek took the opportunity and banged on the wall with his hand, making Amelia shook in surprise.
"Alright, challenge accepted, my feisty kitty." Derek smirked and tugged Amelia's hair behind her ear, making Amelia glare at him and rush away from his side.
'How did I end up getting even more involved with him.' Amelia thought as she rubbed her forehead in frustration.
~An hour ago~
As soon as Amelia came to university she bumped 'again' into Derek, there he stood with his old stupid sly smirk, making Amelia grit her teeth in anger. She spotted her friends at a distance, but when they saw her, they just chuckled and waved before going away to their respective classes. Amelia gasped as she realized she was dumped by her friends.
"Don't worry about them, I've explained them about us." Derek said and smiled.
"What do you mean by 'us'? There's no us, okay? What shit did you filled the heads of my friends with?" Amelia gritted her teeth in rage while speaking.
"Oh come on, calm down, will ya? Let's go there and have a nice conversation in private." That's when Amelia noticed that they were not in private and people were staring at them. Derek pulled her hand and took her in one empty class.
As soon as they entered the empty class, Derek locked the door and stood in front of Amelia, staring in her eyes. Amelia folded her arms on her chest and made a cold, frowning expression,
"Why are you doing this?" Amelia started.
"What? What did I do?" Derek acted as if he was confused.
"Don't act like you don't know…tell me honestly, why are you always involving in my matters? Can't you just go and poke those girls who're genuinely interested in you?" Amelia tried to keep the interrogation calmly, so she decided to go for the polite way.
"Yes, I agree that there are girls who are interested in me not that I care, but I'm more interested in you than them so can't argue about this with you." Derek shrugged and gave her his signature smirk.
"You-!" Amelia was about to say something when Derek started moving towards her, making her back slam on the wall.
"Why are you being this angry about me being interested in you? Other girls might just faint on the spot if they had been in your position. Can't you just agree to this fact?" Derek said in his cool voice, acting all smug. Amelia scoffed as if mocking him.
"You won't be able to get what you're trying to get, I'm telling you, Derek." Amelia huffed in anger.
"Are you challenging me?" Derek huffed.
"Whatever." Amelia looked away from him and stomped on his foot. Derek took the opportunity and banged on the wall with his hand, making Amelia shook in surprise.
"Alright, challenge accepted, my feisty kitty." Derek smirked and tugged Amelia's hair behind her ear, making Amelia glare at him and rushed away from his side, escaping from the class.
'How did I end up getting even more involved with him.' Amelia thought as she rubbed her forehead in frustration. She sighed and proceeded towards her class, she passed by her friends who stood with a mischievous and teasing grin, but she just scoffed and ignored them.
"I definitely won't melt this time, I've always forgiven them for any silly antics, but this time I'll be a rock instead of ice because rocks don't melt easily." Amelia whispered to herself as if convincing her heart to challenge everyone who comes in her way.
Here Amelia was dealing with her university life, on the other hand Gianna was busy worrying about managing her expenses.
Gianna came up with an idea, which could solve her problem, but she was hesitating if she should go ahead with her idea or not.
She decided to give it a try, and took Charlie with her and hailed a cab to head towards the real estate office.
"Good morning, Madam, Please have a seat." The real estate agent welcomed her politely, he noticed she was carrying a cane, had a dog's leash and a dog with her, so he decided to guide her towards the couch to sit.
"How may I help you, Miss?" He asked. She clenched the hem of her dress and hesitatingly opened her mouth to explain.
"I… I want to put my shop for rent, is that possible?" Gianna said and bit her lip, she felt as if she was committing a crime. It was her mother's wish to open a café or a small bakery, which Gianna did open, but she was now in a tough situation and couldn't help but regret renting her shop.
"Yes Miss, it's possible to put up your shop or property or house at rent and our team will assure you to get the best customers. You'll just need to provide us with your ID, details about your shop like it's size, area, neighborhood, and other small details. We'll take some fee charge for service like looking out for good customers, putting up notice of rent in newspaper and our website, and making posters for your shop rent. You will be able to get a customer in 2-3 weeks or by 4 weeks. You can let us know if you want more help, or you are in urgent need of a customer." The real estate agent explained in detail while handing her a pamphlet. (A/N; He literally read out a whole pamphlet in short to explain her, so kind of him, no?)
"Oh I understand…" She paused for a moment thinking, "Will it be possible if I want to rent out my shop urgently?"
"Yes Miss, it is possible, but we cannot give you a guarantee for finding 'good customers', your charge will be reduced as we won't be posting any notice on newspaper, we will just post your shop rent details on our website and contact the ones who called us for renting shop in the past. We will do our best to find you a customer in just 4-5 days or by one week." He explained.
"Oh…okay, I would like it if you find me a customer urgently, I would be grateful." Gianna had never been in such a situation, it was even harder for her to talk or even make up words to speak.
"Can I have your shop's address and your contact number so that our staff can come and take pictures, measurements, details, ID and discuss the payment with you tomorrow?" Gianna nodded and gave him details about address and shop's telephone number. She didn't want Amelia to worry about these stuff, so she avoided giving her mobile number to him.
Gianna didn't know what she was going to face by hiding things with Amelia.
~After a week~
Gianna started moving out stuff from her shop with the help of some moving staff provided from real estate office, she was grateful to them receiving help even if she knew that they were just showing sympathy towards her situation and condition. She never accepted sympathy services from anyone, so she paid extra for moving help.
Everything was settled very fast, Amelia didn't even notice a tiny bit of change, but the disappearance of the shop sign board was noticed by Amelia the very next week after all the stuff was moved out, and new cardboard boxes were lying on the corner of the shop ready to be opened and placed in the shop. She stomped her way inside the shop and found out that there was nothing, not even a speck of dust in the shop except those boxes.
"What the hell happened here? Where's our cute, clean and soothing café me and my sister opened together? Was our shop sold off without my knowledge!!?" She whispered-yelled to herself. She turned around when she heard the shop door open, a lady in her mid 40s stood there glaring at Amelia.
"Who are you? What are you doing here?" She asked Amelia. Amelia scoffed in anger and shrugged.
"Lady, I would like to ask you the same question." Amelia frowned and gritted her teeth in anger.
The lady got angry too, she strolled towards her and yanked her arm, digging her sharp nails in her arm. Amelia was strong enough to make her a bouncing ball, but she didn't want to create a ruckus in the neighborhood where she lived.
"You want to know who I am? Come, let me tell you!" The lady exclaimed.
She dragged her out of the shop and threw Amelia's arm, making her fall on her butt in surprise. The lady pointed her finger on her face and said,
"Be Never around here. I am Gretta Brown, the new and current owner of the shop. If I see you in or around my shop, I won't hesitate before calling the cops, do you understand!?" She shouted at her. Making Amelia flinch, she can't argue with the older ones so openly on the street, so she just nodded and slowly stood up from the ground.
"Good." Gretta exclaimed and huffed before going inside the shop and started arranging boxes and opening them.
Amelia stood there for a moment, she looked up at her store, remembering how she and her sister used to decorate the shop in Christmas and New Year Eve. Everything is gone now, there's nothing left to cherish anymore except their home.
Amelia trudged slowly towards her home the next door. As soon as she opened the door, she saw Gianna sitting comfortably on the couch with Charlie as she rubbed his hairy fur. Amelia stood there for a moment silently staring at Gianna.
"Why don't you sit?" Gianna knew Amelia was home. She already sensed her natural fragrance.
"Am I a stranger for you?" Amelia's voice was hoarse and she clenched her jaw while asking.
Gianna gulped in surprise and she stood up to go near Amelia.
"I know Ami--"
"SHUT UP! I don't want to hear even a single word from you!!" Gianna was interrupted by Amelia's loud scream which made Gianna flinch in fear and surprise, never had Amelia raised her voice like this at her. Amelia was stomping towards the bedroom when she paused for a second.
"Don't call me that ever again." Amelia said and rushed to bedroom slamming the door behind.
Gianna's lips trembled, she stumbled a little in shock and took support of the wall, she slid down against the wall blocking her mouth to stop herself from whimpering, tears of pain and sadness emerged from her eyes, she knew what she did was not right, but she didn't wish for Amelia to get distracted from her studies and disturb her with these problems.
Charlie came to her and started licking her tears away and engulfed her in his cuddly hug to calm her down, which he did succeed in doing.
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A/N:-
Important note to be noted: The shop was "RENTED OUT" to Gretta not "SOLD OFF", it's just...her character is a bit rude and egoistic that's why she mentioned that she's the owner.
It was not a mistake from my side, it is actually in the plot to make Amelia misunderstand, she thought that the shop was sold off to Gretta LOL.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
StellaCrystal23
StellaCrystal23 It's long, emotional, and dramatic I know but that's what novels are for right? The content in this chapter also relates to the real-life struggles of people who find themselves in such a harsh situation.
Thanks for reading ;)
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