The World We Do Not Know 148 Red Eyed Faust - 5

Faust spends the next 5 days just by sitting and looking down while reminiscing Gus' words. He has been crying without food or sleep, he didn't even flinch to the barking of Bella or to her bites.

Word spread around the village that they haven't been seeing Faust the past 5 days. His school teachers, and everyone who sees Faust training or walking did not see him and so everybody pa.s.sed a word to Yang.

Yang decided to check up on his friend's grandson and came to his house. As he opened the door, a foul smell struck him, it's the smell of stale food Faust prepared for Gus on the day of his arrival.

As he took a step inside the dark room, Yang saw Faust and Bella in a corner, Bella is laying on the ground whereas Faust is sitting down with his back against the wall and looking down, seemingly lost in another world.

His body has become thinner and weak. He has not eaten or drank something from the past 5 days, his eyes and lips have turned dry, his body dehydrated and he looks like a skeleton with skin, looking like he is going to die soon.

Yang collects all the stale food into a cover and throws it outside in a trash can. He stands and watches Faust after his little errand, he leaves loud helpless sigh and says "He is not going to come if you keep crying."

Faust does not reply, he does not even seem to respond, he doesn't even seem to notice than a man broke into his house.

"If you were strong, you would have gotten on the ship and Gus might have been alive, or at least you would have gotten to see him in his last moments." Saying that Yang opened the front door widely, left it open and went back the same way he came. 

"The kid is alive, If he pa.s.ses out, just take out his body and throw it in the ocean." Yang says with a commanding tone.

*"If he has no talent, this village doesn't need him. Gus was useful all these years, this kid doesn't even qualify to help. He's better being dead."* Yang convinces himself.

At night, cold winds combined with snow stars to enter inside Faust's house. The bone chilling cold is freezing and already froze Bella and Faust.

Faust doesn't seem affected but Bella is howling in a very low voice, it breathes quickly trying to keep itself warm. Faust still seems to be lost in his own world, the blood freezing cold increasing after a couple of hours.

The nose of Bella has turned cold and frozen into ice, the corners of Faust's eyes has become frozen.

"Faust! How can you leave Bella like this? She did not eat anything, since you have not eaten anything." A voice is heard.

"Grgrandpa?" Faust saw Gus who seem to be in a hurry, he took off his shoes quickly and rushed inside the house, closed the door. Faust is watching with a shocking expression.

"Faust, heat some water and bring them to me, we need to warm Bella " Gus went on to bring a warm blanket, he wrapped the blanket around Bella and started rubbing the blanket on its fur.

"Fausty! You do remember the treatment right? Also put some wood into the fireplace. Faust! Move! Don't just sit there!" Gus yells while he is carrying Bella in his arms and carrying her towards the fireplace.

"Bu-but, yo-you" Faust doesn't have enough strength to even talk, he is still taken by surprise with the sudden entrance of Gus.

"Faust!" Gus turns back to face Faust - "You have already abandoned Bella once, are you going to leave her to death again?" Faust snaps out to reality, he observes the room, there is no sign of Gus. And the front door is still open, Bella is still laying beside him.

"H hallucinations?" Faust utters in a very tiring voice and falls victim to cough, thrust and hunger within seconds.

He quickly realises that Bella is in trouble, he strongly slap his face with both of his hands, gets up on his feet with lots of effort, immediately rushes to close the door, brings rugs and blankets and wraps them around Bella.

He arranges some wood in the fireplace and fire them using matches, he goes on to heat water after placing Bella near the fireplace, he brings a huge tub, places Bella inside n slowly pours the hot water onto her while rubbing her fur with his fingertips.

He later wrapped her again in the blankets and slept with her in front of the fireplace.

He woke up the next day to drink a whole barrel of water, he cooked up some food for himself and Bella.

Even though he is walking, eating and cooking. He does not seem to be himself, he does not go to train nor go to school. He sits on top of the hill for hours watching the ocean.

He visits the port everyday, waiting for Gus to come back. He did not lose his hope. This went on for days and months.

Two months pa.s.ses by without Gus, no training or school. Faust looks soulless and a robot walking and doing the things to survive and live.

"So, I just wanted to check why you were not coming to school." A beautiful woman sits in front of Faust questioning his absence in school.

Faust doesn't reply back anything, in fact it has been 2 months since someone saw Faust talking, he has not spoken a word since the death of Gus.

"I know, you have been having tough times since three months." The woman perceives how thin Faust has become, she takes a deep breath before continuing.

"You shouldn't stop your studies no matter what happens in your life, it is a basic necessity for anyone. You won't be able to live in the world without any knowledge about it." The woman utters while being concerned.

The woman is a teacher named Clara (29) from Faust's school. She wore a long sky blue dress with a long brown handbag which is resting on her legs.

Her long black hair is fluttering due to the air blowing from the window behind her, the ends of her hair is also dyed in blue color with a sea sh.e.l.l shaped hair pin.

Her face is showing how much she is worrying about Faust but at the same time, hesitating to really cheer him up. She has never communicated with Faust. Nor does she teach him.

She heard that a student from her school lost his grandfather and haven't come to school from two months. She just wanted to tell him 'no matter what happens in life, we need to keep going, keep fighting, to eventually have good days at some point.' 

But she feels hesitant since Faust doesn't talk back or say anything, she grips her hands tight cracking her fingers. "Faust! Come back to school, like will be good once you give it a chance."

"Please, come to school, be around lot of people, school teachers you lots of things." Clara says with a helpless pleading face.

The eyelids of Faust slowly folds as  his eyes roll up to look at the woman in front of him. *"School teaches everything?"* He gets down off the chair that he sat on till now, he goes towards a basket which was placed in the corner of the room.

Clara looks with a puzzled face as to what Faust is doing. He picks up the basket and wears it on his back like a backpack and turns towards Clara and stares at her, he then walks towards her with a dead face.

*"Di-did he agree to what I say?" The atmosphere around Clara eases up with a smile curving on her lips, as she thinks that Faust agrees with her.

*"I wonder… if school teaches about life? Is there a meaning to life?"* Faust casually walks towards her, pa.s.ses her and walks out of the door which was just beside her.

Realizing that Faust is leaving with a basket, Bella joins him on his journey into the forest to collect fruits, bamboo and some meat for their meal.

Clara lowers her head in disappointment, she doesn't understand what Faust really is thinking and leaves on her way.

From the next day, Faust starts off by getting ready to school. Bella sleeps near the front door as a guard as usual.

Faust walks out of the door, stops in the middle and turns back as he is about to reach outside. He turns around and looks back inside the house with sad and murky face reminiscing how Gus dropped him at school everyday.

*Woof woof!*

To his surprise Bella comes out running, wagging her tail, she joins Faust.

On the way to his school, Faust received many glares from the villagers who looked at him like a trash.

To his surprise Bella comes out running, wagging her tail and joins him.

On the way to his school, Faust received many glares from the villagers who looked at him like a trash that deserves to be thrown away.

Bella heads back it's way, once Faust enters inside school. Even though Clara is happy to see him back, his cla.s.smates and his bullies did not show him any mercy.

They made mean comments about how Gus left him because he is a failure.

Faust does not say anything back nor does he respond in anyway, he stays as a dead person just taking everything that comes his way, this angered the bullies more.

"You won't say anything back huh, let's see."

The bullies  places spikes on his seat, on which Faust sat, the whole day without caring, they also glued a note on his back, which says 'hit me'.

As Faust took walks in the corridor, every kid came from behind him to mark their hand prints on the back of Faust. Some kids even compete to see whose slap made big sound.

They tore and colored his shirt with curries and sauces in lunch, Faust walked with his torn shirt and spikes at the back of his pants.

Clara notices what was happening and comes to remove the note from his back and she punishes the kids who were mean to him, Faust still walked around with the spikes and a half torn shirt.

"What is this? You punished our kids for some no namer?"

"You are not even a head teacher, who have you the right?"

"Why don't you open a service to save orphan kids, if you like to blame the innocent kids and punish them."

After school ended, a group of parents seem to be shouting at Clara at the front gate for the punishment she has given to their kids who bullied Faust.

Clara, even while panicking, tries to explain to the parents that their kids are at fault for bullying, but the parents are not ready to buy it. Clara is in a tough situation explaining things to the parents and dealing with her higher-ups.

"There, the idiot is coming!" One of the parents says in a despised tone upon seeing Faust coming out of school.

One of the mother walks up to Faust, she pulls Faust towards her by hastily grabbing his arm

She lowers her upper body to look Faust in his eyes.

"How dare you frame our kids for something they did not do?" The mother glared at Faust, her teeth are gritting against each other in a rage and her eyebrows are raised.

All the schoolmates and kids of his age are staring at Faust, even some parents and old people who were once nice and kind to Faust are among them. But n.o.body jumped in to help Faust.

*Groan*