Chapter 11

***Kenya.***

"Hi." Levi greeted as he walked to my side.

"Hi," I replied, looking at him. I found my initial confusion dissipate as we locked gazes. Levi wore a smile and held my hand.

"You don't need to worry about anything just yet. Before we get you outta here, we will have you good and running again." Levi assured me.

I stared at him, smiling.

I wasn't sure, but those words from him sounded comforting. My phone rang nearby, jolting me. Levi stroked my hands to soothe me before he went over to grab my phone. It was Mum. I saw a soft smile play on his lips after he handed me the phone. I wondered about it.

"Would you be alright, while I go make some arrangements for my dinner and maybe ask the doctor if it's alright for you to have solid food?" Levi asked, as he began strolling towards the door.

I nodded my head. The sound of dinner made my mouth water. I wondered what they served in the canteen.

Then, just before he opened the door, Levi turned back to me and spoke.

"That reminds me. When your mum called, I didn't want her to be worried about you. I told her that you were at work."

I gazed at him, amazed at his thoughtfulness. "Thank you," I confessed. My voice was still dry from days of without use.

"Oh, don't thank me just yet. I seem to have told her that you forgot your phone at my place." He added. My eyes widened in shock, embarrassment and confusion. A mischievous smile tugged his lips as he watched me.

Flashing a glance at my beeping phone, which had begun ringing again, I shifted a look of alarm to him.

"Why would you tell her that?"

Levi chuckled and proceeded to walk out of the open door. I swallowed as my mum's call came in again.

"Oh and just to add to all I told her." Levi's head popped back in through the door, startling me. "I think we are dating." Then he was out the corridor, before I could recover from my shock.

"Hi mum." My voice came.

"Baby. Thank God you finally picked. I haven't heard from you in days and now I hear you are with that handsome man, Mr Ruthford." My mum's excitement was palpable, even through the phone. I suddenly worried how I could tell her otherwise.

"Mum." I attempted. "Mr Ruthford is just a friend."

"Oh honey. That isn't what he told me. He said you two are more than friends. And I believe him." My mum concluded. I had a headache, and I could feel a searing ache in the back of my head. Perhaps the spot the doctor insinuated I had hit when I had fallen? I needed answers. Holding my head, I felt a bandage wrap. *God! How bad did I look*? My mum's voice still rattled in the background, her insistence that I was in a relationship with Levi unrelenting. I wasn't ready to argue with her.

A knock came on the door and a nurse entered. Seeing that I didn't want my mum to know about me in hospital, I gave her a flimsy excuse that I had some work. She bought it and I promised to call her later.

"Mothers right?" The nurse teased, her smile warm.

"Yeah. Tell me about it." I smiled.

"These you are to take now for the ache in your head." She handed me a couple of pills and a glass of water. "And I will come to give you some more later." She smiled, as I took the pills. After she finished attending to me, she left the room.

I sat there in the silence, suddenly trying to figure out how burglars had invaded the school, without setting off any alarm. Plus, why did it seem I was struggling to recall the entire event? The medication began to ease into me, and I found myself yielding to its pull. Sleep taking over.

It was already six weeks since that awful day I woke up in the hospital. The doctors said I had to go easy with everything.

I stared in disbelief at my boss, the director and owner of the dance company I worked, Mr Byron. I couldn't help but wonder if he had also suffered a head wound like I had weeks ago.

"Mr Byron"

"Please, Kenya, call me, Dave." Dave Byron cut in, amicably. I wondered again, nodding my head. It's not like I wasn't familiar with the man. He had come up to watch the routines, usually while the director of the shows, Billy, invited him for last-minute adjustments. Short of that, he dealt with the likes of Odette Withers and Patrick Lloyd, the lead dancers in our crew.

"You do know I didn't audition for the show, I haven't practiced for weeks with the others and Odette was already chosen and II have a limp" I argued, helplessly. My voice squeaky.

"You have done this many times and I hear you were very good at teaching those kids at that school that had a fire accident weeks back." Dave Byron cut in. I looked at him, astonished.

"But Sir"

"Dave"

"Davethe show is this Saturday. That is, I barely have enough time to catch up with anything and Odette has already been selected" I protested.

"It's my dance company. I have a right to select whoever I want, even though it's an hour before the show." Dave Byron remarked, haughtily. I looked at the man, who was as fit as ever, he looked like an athlete. Always in top form.

Word was on the street that his great-grandmother had been a star Ballerina in her days.

"As for the timingI suggest you begin all the necessary preparations before Saturday." Dave Byron said, quietly, his voice raising my alarmed gaze to his.

"But what if I fail?" I muttered, my eyes widening.

"You wouldn't."