Chapter 2

FROM where I’m sitting inside the classroom, I can clearly see the wide plaza of our school, the Mabini College, through the window. Out there you could see a group of fourth year college students happily playing baseball by themselves.

Their bags are all placed on a blue bench just right in front of them. The other benches surrounding the plaza are all occupied by girls watching them play with admiration in their eyes, especially for Akira.

I just watched Akira’s every move. From the time he hit the ball until he ran around, my full attention was focused on him. Even before, it has always been a habit of mine to watch what goes around the plaza through the window, but today is different. It’s all because all my eyes could see is Akira. It all started since that juice accident happened.

THE moment I turned my gaze on the man who spilled his mango juice on my Birkin bag, my eyes first landed on his brown eyes. I was stunned for a moment. This is the first time I had the chance to have a close look into a man’s brown eyes. It was a beautiful sight. If I would be given a chance to stare at it every day of my life, I’ll grab it.

“I’m sorry. I really didn’t mean it,” he sincerely said straight to my eyes.

That’s when I averted my gaze from him. My eyes landed on the two men that were only a few steps away from us. I caught them laughing silently while looking at us, but they stopped when he noticed me staring at them with my expressionless, intimidating face.

“It’s okay,” I told Akira, barely above a whisper. After saying those words, I went back to my seat and ate my siomai rice like nothing happened.

Akira Dela Cruz is a popular guy in our school. Girls drool at his almost perfect physical features, and his pair of brown eyes is the most charming thing about him. He is tall, maybe six point five. He is white. His dark slightly wavy hair is long enough that it reaches his elbows. He always ties his hair in a high ponytail.

He has a muscular body. Lastly, he always get excellent grades in all of his subjects. He took a course related with agriculture, and it looks cute seeing a handsome guy planting and caring for plants.

Jeremy Badaguas is the name of the guy with him, the same guy I caught silently laughing at us. He is Akira’s close friend and they can always be seen together including Lance Cristobal. However, it looks like he’s not with them today. Unlike Akira, the two were planning to become policemen.

This is the first time in four years as schoolmates that Akira and I met this close. We never cross paths in the school hallways. We haven’t even greeted each other before, but I always see him in the plaza playing baseball with his friends and some of his classmates. Sometimes, I would see him with his two best friends Jeremy and Lance sitting on a mango tree’s sturdy branch inside the campus.

“Jennifer, if you want… I’ll wash your bag. I’ll bring it back when it’s clean, but if not I’ll pay–”

“Take it. Bring it back whenever you’re done with it,” I cut him off. What happened was not a big deal for me. I can just wash my bag.

“Thank you,” he replied, brimming with glee.

A long silence had passed between us, but he’s still standing right beside me and my bag is still where I put it.

Right after I was done eating, I looked up at him. Our gazes collided, making him step back.

“Do you have anything more to say?” I asked him. I’m trying my best to sound soft and not plain and expressionless just like how I usually sound like.

“Ah nothing. I’ll take the bag,” he replied.

He pulled out a white plastic bag from his black bag and there he carefully placed my wet bag.

After doing those things, he still remained standing in front of me. Instead, he even offered to take me and Lorilyn to our houses with his friend Jeremy. There’s a five minute difference from their house to our house, but their house is nearer than ours.

“Just accept it,” he told us before I could protest. I slowly nodded my head as an answer.

I looked back at Lorilyn. She rested both her elbows on top of the blue plastic table that was separating between us. She rested her head on her hands while looking at us dreamily. She even made what happened between me and Akira as a romantic scene that happened in a romance movie.

We began to walk on our way home. The sky is orange. The wind has already turned cold and the street lights had started to light up. There are also many people around us. The others are on their way home, some of them are taking their dogs out for a walk, while there are also others heading to the market to buy cheap fruits and vegetables where only during rush do they sell those things in the market.

“Is your name Gillette?” Out of nowhere, Akira asked who was walking right beside me.

I heard Jeremy fake a cough. Lorilyn on the other hand, simply poked my side.

“My name is Jenniffer,” I corrected him.

“No, I’m not asking your name.”

I frowned and stared at him. “What do you mean?”

“It’s knock-knock.”

“Uh… okay. Why?”

“Because you are the best a man can get.”

Lorilyn started laughing beside me accompanied by a hurl of light slaps and punches. I also heard Jeremy laughing too who is walking just behind Akira. My mind hang up for a moment. I’m trying to think what’s funny about what Akira said, and then I realized it. Before I know it, I’m laughing loudly with them too. I lightly hit Akira on his arm because of his funny joke.

When I was done laughing, I noticed that I’m the only one left smiling and laughing among the four of us. They were staring at me with a shocked expression on their faces. When I realized what I had done, I was no longer surprised by their reaction. I just laughed for the first time.

“MISS Largo,” Ma’am Anica called me once again. She is our math teacher.

I looked away from Akira who was at the plaza and turned to my teacher who is now glaring at me. The whole class’s attention are now on me.

“When I am in front of you, you are not allowed to look outside. And Miss Largo, the second time around that I catch you looking outside, I will pull you outside this classroom,” Ma’am Anica firmly said.

I wasn’t hurt by what she said. We are used to her strict behavior. She’s very strict when it comes to her class, but outside classes, she’s totally treating us fine.

“I’m sorry ma’am,” I apologized.

LORILYN and Jeremy left to buy skewered food at the farthest end of the boulevard. Akira and I were left at the shore of the beach of Bagasbas. It’s already evening, so it’s dark around us. Only the light from the street lights near the beach served as our only source of light.

“I like you ever since I saw you walking around our neighborhood with Wolf. As far as I remember, I was only in grade six at that time,” Akira suddenly confesses.

My whole body froze. Almost two weeks have passed since we got acquainted. Everytime our classes ended, the four of us would go outside and eat street foods together. We would even return to our houses together. I’m not that numb not to feel that Akira has something for me. Still, it feels different to hear it coming from his lips.

He placed his hands on both my shoulders and turned me to face him. He gently held my chin and slowly lifted my face. When our eyes met, my heart raced within me. I almost lost my breath because of how close our faces are to each other.

“Can I court you, Jennifer?” He asked with a sincere smile on his lips. My cheeks are blushing.

The sound of the waves of the sea, the cold whisker of the wind, the street lights along the boulevard. A perfect place for me to kiss Akira as my response to his question.

I leaned towards him until our faces were only inches away from each other. I closed my eyes and pressed my lips on his. I felt electricity shot in my body at our contact.

A few moments passed and Akira didn’t respond. I was suddenly ashamed of what I had done, but when I’m about to withdraw my lips, he wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me closer to him, finally responding to my kisses – deepening and savoring our precious moment.

And I’ll admit it. I have had a crush on him since the day he said that he had a crush on me. That’s the first time I saw him. Like he said, I was in grade six at that time and I was walking with Wolf around our street. At that time, he was also wandering around, riding his bicycle and then he passed by. Our eyes met for almost a second, but it felt like the world around us stopped for a minute at that moment.

And when I transferred to Mabini where he was studying, I wasn’t expecting this to happen.