Still at Mr. Radit's residence, morning came... Just as they were about to leave for the office, Mely's room on the second floor was lined with her neatly arranged award trophies from elementary school onward, not a speck of dust clinging to them.
Mr. Radit was pacing back and forth like a restless tiger, thinking hard. In front of him, Mely, who had just come out of the bathroom, watched her dad with one eyebrow raised.
"Dad, that's enough. Stop walking around. Watching you go back and forth is making my head spin. Are you trying to count the tiles?" Mely quipped as she sprawled across the imported velvet sofa in her room.
Mr. Radit stopped abruptly and wiped the sweat from his forehead, which was slick with expensive pomade. "Mely..." Mr. Radit's voice trembled dramatically.
"Mm..." Mely hummed, then reached for several skincare products on the vanity. Silence...! Mely glanced toward her dad, who stood frozen with his eyes fixed on the ceiling. "What's wrong, Dad? Don't tell me you're having a stroke. You're not that old yet, and besides... you don't have high blood pressure, do you?"
"This kid... As if I want to have a stroke. I'm healthy, Mel...! It's just that..."
"Wow, Dad, you look like you're about to pull something. When you start talking in broken sentences like this, there's only one possibility....! You want to confess to me that the installments on my new Mercedes are overdue, right?"
"It's not the car payments, Mel!" Mr. Radit blurted out in a panic, then leaned closer to whisper to his daughter. "I'm sure those damn mafiosi will hunt you down until they find you—even here at home!"
The room suddenly fell silent. Mely stared at her dad for a full five seconds before letting out a small laugh at his haggard expression. "Dad, please. This is an elite neighborhood, Dad...! Even the security guards wear uniforms that look like four-star generals, every guest has to leave their ID card, and even the vegetable vendor drives an electric golf cart. How would a mafia gang end up here? The most likely thing we'd get is a Shopee delivery guy."
"Don't underestimate them, Mel! Those mafiosi are filthy rich. One of them could easily own a house here." Mr. Radit gripped both his daughter's shoulders solemnly.
"They're ruthless! Once, I was two weeks late on a payment. Dad's assistant said they threw a rotten shark's head at our official car with a message written in blood: 'Pay up or your boss becomes food for sea lions.' And in our neighborhood, we don't even have sea lions—our koi pond is full of the neighborhood chief's pet tilapia!"
Mely blinked, a little horrified by the story about the shark's head. "Ugh... because of that debt you had when you almost went bankrupt, I'm really being offered up as a sacrifice now?"
"Forgive me one more time, sweetheart. I should've just gone completely bankrupt and become a handsome beggar at an intersection instead of borrowing from 'The Black Srak,'" Mr. Radit lamented, flailing around on his own.
Mely snorted and folded her arms across her chest. "So what's your plan now? Hide me in the office safe? Or should we fake our deaths, change citizenship, and become seaweed farmers in New Zealand?" Mely asked sarcastically.
"Don't worry. I'll prepare a high-level tactical security plan!" Mr. Radit declared proudly as he reached into his shirt pocket. He pulled out a smart remote, then pressed the large red button on it. Suddenly, the automatic curtains in Mely's room closed tightly, the lights shifted into a dim red spy-movie mode, and a robotic alarm sounded... "Emergency Defense System Activated."
Instead of getting tense, Mely just gaped.
"Dad... did our luxurious house just turn into a nuclear bunker? And why did the AC shut off?" Mely complained, starting to feel hot.
"So the enemy will have trouble breathing if they get inside, Mel. How's that?" Hearing her dad's answer, which sounded like his clueless mode had been activated, Mely immediately went stiff as the Pancoran statue, thinking in confusion. *Dad's lost the ability to think logically again. Could it be because his brain is starting to deteriorate? Is it an age thing? Impossible. Dad isn't elderly yet.*
"Bro Regi... can I have some money to buy a book? My history notebook is full," Ami asked softly.
"How much?" Regi pulled his wallet from the pocket of his worn, long jeans, which were ripped at one knee. "Is this enough?" Regi asked again after taking out a twenty-thousand-rupiah bill, while Ami curiously peeked into her brother's wallet. He held it out to her. Ami immediately snatched the money with a sweet smile.
"I'll make it work... Thanks, bro. Are you selling this week in the afternoons?"
"Mm... Where's Mom?"
"She went to the laundry, bro. When you were praying at dawn, Mom told me to make sure you had breakfast before you went to work as a parking attendant." Ami giggled, feeling sorry for her brother, who had recently been working as a parking attendant in the mornings and selling street food by the city park in the afternoons—a routine he'd kept up for the past three years. Ami understood perfectly that Regi wasn't the kind of big brother who showered people with sweet words. His features always looked stiff, his gaze was cold, and his voice almost never rose an octave above its flat tone. Yet behind that icy attitude, his shoulders were the ones carrying Ami and their mother's lives after their beloved father's passing.
As an obedient little sister, Ami knew exactly how to treat her brother. She never demanded more, never complained about the bare-bones facilities at school, and was always quick to help with the housework without having to be asked twice.
"I'm done. I've already eaten. Come on, I'll give you a ride while I'm heading out," Regi ordered, already dressed in his black windbreaker.