The Bond

Ch 41

"Bold."/"Bold italic" : animatronic is talking/animatronic is talking in mind

"Normal."/"Normal italic." : human is talking/human is talking in mind

=o^o=

The supermarket in question was meant to be completely emptied of its contents and actually replaced with new merchandise. Michael was surprised to realize how empty all the shelves in the supermarket were, he began to think that the chances of him helping the employees to organize the merchandise would take about one to two weeks.

Although this situation actually reminded him of the Alice incident a while back, and he had some doubts but this was the only thing he could do to earn money.

He couldn't possibly steal, but Ennard would and he didn't want that.

"Hey, Mike!"

Michael turned to the person who called out to him as he was lifting a box from the truck to put it in the supermarket warehouse. "Oh hey, Dawson," Michael greeted the girl back.

Lucy's grin made Michael a little awkward. "Come on, why are you calling out the last name? Just call me Lucy, Lu-cy." Lucy even spelled her own name as if Michael didn't know how to pronounce it, only to get a nervous chuckle from Michael.

"All right, Lucy," Michael said resignedly, then placed the cardboard he'd picked up at his feet. Michael looked at Lucy who was looking at the data board to check the list of items, Michael's brows knit together for a moment. "Can I ask you something?"

"You've asked."

"I mean—well, you know what I mean." Michael rubbed the back of his neck lightly, Lucy laughed and nodded, a sign that he could ask. "Do ... do you have any family or friends, whose name is ... Alice?"

Hearing his question, Lucy immediately looked away, and her serious gaze made Michael tense. "No," Lucy replied casually after that, her shoulders hunched up. "Just because my middle name is Alicia doesn't mean there's an Alice in my family, you know. None of my friends are named Alice either."

"Right," Michael said quickly, then mumbled incoherently. "Sorry." At least it made him feel relieved, and he hoped the same thing wouldn't happen again.

"Why?" This time it was Lucy who asked. "Your ex's name is Alice and you're afraid she might turn out to be one of my friends or family, hm?" Lucy teased him, causing Michael to glare at her in disbelief.

"No!" Michael replied quickly. "Just—just a bad communication with an Alice, that's all."

Lucy gave a small snort. "Yeah, sure."

Michael puffed his cheeks in annoyance at the disbelief in Lucy's tone, then he gasped in surprise when Lucy suddenly patted the top of his head while laughing, and Michael immediately took a few steps back from her.

"You're so funny," Lucy chuckled causing Michael to frown deeply, but his cheeks were starting to turn red out of embarrassment. "By the way, Mike," Lucy said after that. "My boss said you could go home."

"Now?"

"No, tomorrow."

Lucy rolled her eyes while Michael blinked. "Yes, now, Michael."

"Oh ...."

"Your payment is every two days, so tomorrow I'll give you the money. See you tomorrow, Mike!"

Michael nodded. "See you."

Without waiting too long, Michael immediately said goodbye to other employees who were nearby and left immediately. It wasn't too far from the supermarket to where they lived, so he didn't mind walking at all. Even so right now he was running home.

He quickly opened the gate and quickly locked it, then darted into the house.

The living room was still cluttered with tools as usual, Michael stepped past the endoskeleton without even bothering to look at it and walked into the room he'd been frequenting lately; though there was no change at all as well, Ennard was still there in a deactivated state.

Michael glanced briefly before going to the table close to where Ennard was and pulling out a drawer, he took out the paper and stationery, then decided to focus on the sketch of the illusion disk.