Whisper For Me

Chapter 10

"What's wrong?"

"I'd rather not talk about it."

"Derek, I need to know what's going on."

"I don't want to tell you, Whisper."

"Why not?"

            He turned towards me and looked me in the eyes. "Please, Whisper don't ask any more questions. I'm not telling you anything to protect you. I understand that you're curious but some things are just better left unsaid."

            I frowned but nodded. I hope he didn't think he would be getting off this easy. I would get answers. It might not be answers from him, but somebody knew something and I was determined to find out. I wasn't the type to just sit around and wait on something to happen. If something was going on, I wanted to be part of the action.

I studied him. He still had that frown on his face and he looked to be in deep thought. Even though I haven't been around him that much I knew that he was worried about something. I glanced at his hands. They were fidgeting. Whatever this was about, it had to be something big.

My mom took this moment to knock outside my door. She was looking straight at me until she noticed that Derek was in here. I mean how could you not see him. He had a very noticeable presence. "Oh, well hello Derek. I didn't know that you were in here with Whisper."

Derek gave her a small smile, "Hello Mrs. Rayne. Whisper didn't know that I was here either. I thought that I would come up and surprise her. It's amazing how I beat her here. And when she first came in she didn't even notice that someone else was in the room with her."

            My mom chuckled. "She has always been the type to not notice anything whenever she has something on her mind."

Derek laughed loudly. This time he gave a real smile. "I can only imagine how she was like whenever she was younger. I can just imagine her bumping into things."

I scowled, "It was only once or twice. Gosh, I was little. Cut me some slack people. You're talking about me like I'm not even here."

My mom continued talking. "You should see the pictures I have." I groaned aloud and sent a glare towards Derek. Every time you mentioned me being younger or anything remotely close to my youth, she would always start telling these little stories. These stories always embarrassed me and if we were at home then she would always pull out the photo albums. I swear she had about a million of them.

"I would love to see some pictures of my little mate prancing around." He sent a cheeky grin my way.

"Don't you dare." I mumbled.

            He waggled his eyebrows at me. I groaned. 

My mom chuckled. "Well kids, I have dinner ready downstairs. So you two wash your hands and come on down to eat."

            We washed our hands and then we went downstairs to eat. My dad and grandma were already at the table. Derek greeted them. We said grace and began to eat. Derek complimented my mom every single time he tried something new. I mentally rolled my eyes. He was such a suck up. After we were done eating my mom scooted back her chair and looked at me with a grin. I knew that grin. It meant that she was up to something. She excused herself from the table and went in to the living room. She came back about three minutes later and I saw one of the photo albums in her hand. I looked at her in horror.

"Mom! I don't want him to see me when I was little! I didn't have any teeth for crying out loud. If you love me, then you won't do this!" I pleaded.

            She waved her hand dismissively. "Honey, he's your mate. He has the privilege to look at these kind of things."

"Yeah, I sure do." Derek grinned right along with her.

I crossed my arms and grinned maliciously at him. "Fine then." Little did he know that I'd be asking his mom to show me some pictures of him when I came to visit her.

            Mom handed him the book and he was flipping through it. He came to one picture and just started laughing his head off. Everyone was curious as to what he was laughing at and all he could do was point. I grabbed the photo album and looked at the picture. I smiled. It was a picture of me at my eighth birthday party. I had cake icing on my nose and I was frowning.

The candle on my cake had been blown out. Another little boy was beside me and you could tell that he was the one who had blown the candle out because the picture had caught him with his lips puckered up. Derek took the photo book and looked at the picture for a little while longer. He raised an eyebrow.

"Who is this little boy that's staring at you?" He pointed at a little boy who was downright staring at me.

            I looked at the boy and just studied his face. I had no clue who he was. I passed the book over towards my mom. "Mom, who is this little boy?"

            Mom scrunched her eyebrows together. She grimaced and looked at me. "His name was Jacob. I figured that you probably wouldn't remember him. It's been a long time."

"Was?"

Derek looked just about as curious as I felt. I wanted to know who this little boy was. I'm pretty sure I would have remembered him.

"What happened to Jacob?" He asked.

Mom looked at both of us sadly and just shook her head. "He died."