Chapter 8: Step by Step

The manager's disdainful look turned into a respectful one. Finally, the manager promised that he would look into the incident tonight and clear Elias' name. I achieved my goal, patted the non-existent dust on my clothes, and turned around to go back to the box. Elias followed. "Why do you believe me?" He asked. Wasn't that a knowing question? I turned around and stared him in the eye as I asked him, "Did you steal the things?" "No." "Then it's okay." I shrugged. "It's okay?" He frowned, "That's it?" I raised an eyebrow, "Or what do you want?" "Actually, I did put some things into my bag, but they were snacks that the guests hadn't even touched." He pressed his lips together and then continued, "There was a birthday party in the next room today. There were a lot of snacks left over and the guests told me I could take them away." He had the rare patience to explain to me. "What do you need these snacks for?" I wondered. "For the kids." "Oh!" I remembered, as an afterthought, that Elias seemed to be volunteering at the orphanage. Volunteering. That was easy. The storm of the evening subsided. I supposed that even if I didn't look for the person in charge of the clubhouse, no one would dare to pick on Elias again after today. A few days later, I appeared at the entrance of the orphanage. Looking at the dilapidated gate, I sighed, "Is this really an orphanage?" Yvette, who was directing the workers to carry things out of the car, heard me and came over to me, "Boss, I have done some research. This orphanage was founded in 1960. It was not an orphanage before, but the woman who owned the house asked the servant she trusted to convert it into an orphanage for homeless children. However, it is going to be demolished recently, so these children will soon be homeless." I nodded. The noise we made aroused the attention of the people inside the orphanage and a gray-haired old lady came out. Judging from her appearance, she was probably the director of the orphanage. She smiled as she said, "Elias, we have visitors." Elias was only momentarily surprised when he saw me. He then frowned as he saw what I had done and I knew what he was thinking about. I bypassed him as if I didn't know him and smiled at the director, "You must be Mrs. Sanders. I'm Jacqueline Thompson, the head of TR Group, and this is my card. I heard that your orphanage is short of some things that the children need, so I took upon myself to send them here. I hope you don't mind." Mrs. Sanders was very touched when she saw the brand-new clothes, children's beds, books, desks, and all kinds of daily necessities. She said, "Thank you so much." She was incoherent with excitement and kept holding my hand tightly. I turned around and winked at Elias. The workers finished moving the stuff and left. I asked Yvette to go back first while I stayed and watched Elias busy in the house. The orphanage didn't have much money to hire staff, so, besides Mrs. Sanders and Elias, there were only two childcare workers. There were more than 30 children in the orphanage, and the two childcare workers were too few and far between. The caregiver who cooked was out today and Mrs. Sanders was old, so Elias served as a temporary cook. I've eaten his cooking, which was both delicious and good-looking, so I was happy to see him cooking. However, by the time he finished cooking and brought out the food, I was disappointed. But I didn't show it explicitly. I looked at the chicken breast with carrots, broccoli, steamed eggs on the table and then looked up at Elias, "I don't eat these." Mrs. Sanders laughed with embarrassment and said as she got up, "I'll make other dishes for you. Elias only thinks of the children, sorry about that." "Mrs. Sanders, she can eat these. Don't bother. Sit down and have lunch, please." Elias handed me a bowl of rice and said, "Let's eat." Although I did not usually eat food with stronger flavors, I was not accustomed to eating these foods for children and elderly people. I put it down after a few bites and watched quietly with my cheeks rested on my hands as Elias helped the children to eat. He was very patient when he was with the children. The children in the orphanage were basically abandoned by their biological parents and some of them suffered from different degrees of disabilities, for example, the child he was feeding was born deaf. He couldn't hear and could only gesticulate. Elias seemed to know a little sign language and always patiently talked to him with gestures. That strange sense of familiarity and warmth suddenly came over me as I watched this scene. I wondered, if he and I had children in the future, would he be the same patient with the children. "Jacqueline, do you like Elias?" Suddenly a childish voice interrupted my thoughts. I looked down and saw a little girl in a little blue dress tilting her head and looking at me with a smile. Hearing this, Elias looked over and said gently, "Susie, be a good girl and eat." "Okay." Susie nodded docilely, then leaned in my ear and whispered with her hand covering her mouth, "Jacqueline, Elias is actually very easy to please." I asked, "Oh, how?" "Elias likes it when we sing to him. Jacqueline, if you sing to him, he will be very happy." A kid was a kid. I pretended to be enlightened, "Oh, I see! Thank you, Susie." I stroked her head and she smiled shyly, then sat down in her place to take her meal. After we finished eating, another caregiver came to clean up the dishes while Mrs. Sanders took the children to their lunch break and Elias took me to the back lawn of the orphanage. With its beautiful mountains and clear lake, it was indeed a nice place. "Today..." He suddenly spoke, "Thank you for bringing so many gifts to the children. They are very happy." "It's a small thing." I replied. He narrowed his eyes, "It may be trivial to you, but to these kids, it's something they've only dreamed of." I looked into his eyes and realized why he was not able to save money from doing so many jobs and living in such a dilapidated house. He had given all his money to these children. Honestly, he was really silly, but he was also lovable and heartbreaking. "I have heard that even if it is a part-time job, the salary of this club is quite good. Besides, you have other jobs. How come you have no savings? You are not married and have no children. I suppose you spend all your money on the children in the orphanage every month." After a long time, he looked at me, the lake and the mountains were reflected in his eyes, which made me enchanted. He said, "I'm saving money for Susie's operation." "Susie?" The little girl in the blue dress--wasn't she alright? Elias explained to me, "Susie has a congenital heart disease. If she doesn't have surgery, I'm afraid she won't live long." I was silent. When we were ready to leave, Susie handed me a drawing. I opened it and saw three people standing hand in hand under the blue sky and white clouds. She pointed to the tallest person and said, "This is Elias, this is Jacqueline, and the one in the middle is me." I touched her head and for the first time I whispered softly to a child, "Susie is great, what a great drawing." Little Susie rubbed her head sheepishly, then looked at me with big clear eyes and said cautiously, "Jacqueline, will you come over next time?" "I will." I squatted down and looked at her, "Next time when I come, I'll send you lots of pretty dresses and cakes, okay?" "Alright." Mrs. Sanders came over and took Susie by the hand, "Jacqueline and Elias are going to go, let's go back to bed too, okay?" "Jacqueline, bye, Elias, bye." Susie was reluctant to go and turned back again and again. "Bye." After they left, I pointed to my car, "I'll drive you home." "Okay." He nodded, and for some reason, I felt that the way he looked at me was much softer than usual. "Do you like kids?" I talked to him while driving, "I found that you are even busier than a president like me. You have to deliver take-out, work part-time at the club, and volunteer at the orphanage on weekends... Other people work from 9 am to 9 pm, what about you?" I thought about it, "You don't have to work so hard. Yancey keeps complaining about his back pain recently and I'm planning to give him some time off. Why don't you work as my driver? I'll give you a salary of $20,000 a month and various welfare and bonuses, how about that? I don't use my car much, and when I'm free, you can go to the orphanage to help." "Your driver?" Elias looked at me and asked me word for word.