“There’s no need to check on him. You should just let him stay on his own since that’s what he likes best.” Although Jean spoke in a harsh and resentful tone, she didn’t physically hold Toby back as he headed upstairs. Tyler was her biological son, after all; no mother would have the heart to act so cruelly toward their child! Toby headed for the stairs after finishing his sentence as he knew that Jean didn’t truly mean what she said.
“Open the door, Tyler.” Toby stopped outside Tyler’s door before rapping his knuckles against it. Toby was greeted with Tyler’s swollen eyes once Tyler opened the door. “Toby,” Tyler muttered.
“Did you cry earlier?” Toby raised an eyebrow.
Tyler hastily raised his arms to rub his eyes furiously. “No, I didn’t,” he replied in an indignant tone. His words put a slight smirk on Toby’s face, but Toby decided not to expose his lie. “Can I come in for a talk?” Toby asked instead.
“Sure.” Tyler nodded and stepped aside for Toby to enter the room, and he followed behind Toby after Toby went in. “Didn’t you promise me that you’d help me convince Mom to let me focus on my basketball? Mom’s nagging me to quit the team, and she doesn’t even allow me to join the training now. The U17 Youth Expedition Competition happens the day after tomorrow, and I have been missing my training. My coach is mad at me.” In fact, Tyler’s coach had called him earlier and told him that he would be removed from the team if he were to miss more training. Tyler had put in a lot of effort to get into the basketball team, and he didn’t want to get kicked out so soon.
Meanwhile, Toby twisted his features into an exasperated look. “Mom did promise me that she would allow you to play basketball—I don’t know what drove her sudden change of mind. Don’t worry; I’ll talk to her later.”
“What’s the point of talking? What if she agrees now but changes her mind later?” Tyler plopped on the edge of the bed as he spoke in an annoyed tone.
“Don’t worry. I’ll get Grandma to pay a visit when that happens,” Toby said as he strode over to lean against the desk.
Tyler’s eyes lit up immediately. “That’s right. We should get Grandma to come. Mom’s terrified of Grandma.”
Toby grunted in agreement and was about to say something when he noticed something from the corner of his eye. There was a letter on the table that looked like it had been around for a while. Its paper was yellow and worn. However, that didn’t matter much to Toby. What mattered was that the envelope looked really familiar to him.
In the past, when Toby and Tina were still pen pals, they would use the exact same envelopes. “Why do you have one of my letters to Tina with you?” Toby held the envelope up and shot Tyler a look of displeasure.
Tyler jumped in surprise before he snatched the envelope away from Toby. “That’s not one of your letters to Tina.” Tyler had gotten the envelope from Sonia, so it couldn’t have belonged to Tina.
“Isn’t that one of the letters I wrote to Tina?” Toby frowned. He didn’t bother to conceal the disbelief in his eyes.
Tyler simply kept the letter away. “It isn’t.”
“Why don’t you tell me whose letter it is, then?” Toby narrowed his eyes as he glared at his brother. His gaze made Tyler feel rather self-conscious, and Tyler quickly looked away as he spoke. “All you need to know is that it doesn’t belong to you. I’m not going to tell you who the letter is from—that’s a secret,” he uttered.
Initially, after Tyler got hold of the letter, his plan was to tell Toby that Sonia had been writing love letters to others ever since she was in high school. However, Tyler changed his mind and decided to help Sonia keep her secret after she helped him to get his contract with the basketball team. That was why Tyler refused to tell Toby that the letter belonged to Sonia.
Toby looked like he was about to say something else as he glared at Tyler’s rather reserved and cautious expression. Tyler hastily stuffed the letter into his trouser pocket before he pushed Toby out toward the door. “Alright, Toby. You can go out now. Please help convince Mom about this.”
Toby pressed his lips together as he headed downstairs.
“Phew…” Tyler pulled the letter out once he shut his bedroom door. “That was close. I nearly got caught. I should just return this letter to her.” With that said, Tyler pulled his phone out to call Sonia.
Sonia had just reviewed an entire stack of files, and she was already sprawled across her desk in exhaustion. Charles let out a hearty laugh as he watched her. “Are you tired after such a minor task? Wouldn’t you be lying on the bed all the time if Paradigm Co. further develops their business? What if the company becomes as renowned as they once were in the past?”
“That might just happen.” Sonia let out a little laugh, but her voice sounded relatively flat. All of a sudden, her cell phone that she had placed beside her head began to ring. Before Sonia got a chance to see the caller, Charles craned his neck to glance at her phone. “It’s your ex-husband’s brother.”
“Tyler?” Sonia lifted her head instantly.
Charles let out a light scoff. “Why would he call you?”
“How am I supposed to know?” Sonia held the phone up and ended the call.
“Aren’t you going to answer it?” Charles looked Sonia in the eye.
“There’s no reason for me to do that,” Sonia replied calmly as she gradually lowered her phone. Right then, a new message popped up on her screen. ‘Your letter is with me.’
My letter? Sonia knitted her brows before she returned the call that she had ignored earlier. “What letter?”
Pride was written all over Tyler’s face when Sonia called him. “Didn’t you reject my call earlier?”
Sonia sniggered when she heard the hint of cockiness in Tyler’s voice. “I’m going to end it again if you don’t tell me what you’re calling for.”
“Wait, wait, wait!” Tyler hastily stopped her. “I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you what it is. The last time I was at your house, I saw that you have a lot of letters that John wrote to you. I stole one of them.”
“You searched my room?!” Sonia’s face darkened as she felt anger bubbling in her chest. “Is this what the Fuller Family taught you to do? Do they teach you to trespass and poke around in other people’s rooms?”
Tyler knew that he had made a mistake, so he lowered his head and replied in a meek voice, “I know that I was wrong. That’s why I’m calling you—to admit my faults and to apologize to you.”
“Hah.” Sonia scoffed once more.
Tyler scratched the tip of his nose. “I’ll return you the letter in the future,” he mumbled.
“It’s fine. Just throw it out. I don’t need it anyway.” Sonia ended the call after finishing her words.
Charles came forward with a curious look on his face once Sonia got off the phone. “Why is he looking for you?”
“That guy stole one of the letters that John used to write to me.” Sonia pinched the bridge of her nose as she spoke.
Charles seemed rather intrigued by this answer. “Based on what I recall, you and John haven’t been in contact in a while, huh?”
Sonia nodded as a hint of nostalgia surfaced in her gaze. “It’s been nearly seven years.” Sonia would’ve forgotten about her pen pal if Tyler hadn’t brought it up with her.
“What’s the reason you guys stopped talking? I thought you and John were pretty close in the past. You guys would send two or three letters each week.” Charles’s tone seemed a little salty as he spoke. Charles and Sonia grew up together, so they were extremely close. However, he felt like he had been neglected ever since she became pen pals with John.
“Who knows,” Sonia shrugged. She didn’t even know why John stopped writing to her. Six years ago, John sent her a final letter to explain that he would stop communicating with her. Since then, she never heard from him anymore. She even wondered if she had written something to offend him and if that was why he ignored her after that.
Charles assumed that Sonia didn’t want to give any further details, so he stopped grilling her for answers after that. “It’s time to get off work. I’ll send you back,” he offered after taking a look at the time.
“Okay,” she replied with a nod.
Charles drove off after he dropped Sonia at the Bayside Residence. Sonia used a walking stick to help her into the bedroom, where she began to dig out the letters that John had sent her in the past. A wistful look surfaced in her gaze as she gently ran her fingers across the letters. However, she was quick to suppress her emotions before picking the letters up to throw them into the trash. She had been keeping the letters for years, anyway—it was about time for her to give up and let go. Yet, for some reason, Sonia felt unable to let go of the letters in her hand even as she held them up above the trash can. She couldn’t bear to do such a thing.
After a while, Sonia let out a huge sigh before returning the letters to their initial spot. Forget it. I’ll just leave it around since I know I’ll miss them if they’re gone. I’ll just stop reading those letters. Sonia massaged the space between her brows as she stepped out of the bedroom and headed into the shower.
