"So how did your winter break go?" I asked my university friends while we’re walking to the cafeteria.

"Don't ask me about that one, Kai," Tao dismisses my question and walked faster.

"Why, Tao? Where did you end up?" Knowing Tao, he probably ended up somewhere boring or somewhere he lost his remaining pride at.

"He ended up in Manila and stayed there for like, a week." Kris tells me.

"How is that not okay?"

Tao stops walking and once we're side by side, he says, "There's this girl that I liked in class. She told me she's going to China and I told her...," Tao's face lights up and softly says, "Oh, I came from China! Actually, I'd be spending the winter break in China. My family lives there. So yeah, I'm going to spend my time with my family." His face went back to looking aloof and continued walking.

“So why can’t you go to China? You can just teleport from Manila to China!”

“Kai, we’re not like you,” Kris says.

“If I could only teleport as I please then, I would have teleported immediately as I set foot in Manila to China.” Tao rolled his eyes and pushed the door to the cafeteria.

“I told you. Practice makes perfect, guys. You should’ve joined me before going from places to places.” I spent all my school breaks teleporting to different countries. Sometimes my mom would ask me where I went that she won’t even see for a week. I always told her I went camping with my friends even though it’s winter. Or there was a time I tried teleporting before tests to unwind and ended up somewhere in Japan for three days and when I came back, I told my mom I reviewed with my friends. When I turned 20, my teleporting became more frequent. Since I have been teleporting since the age of 7, I am now more in control of my ability. And now that I’m 22, I am having more fun than ever.

“My mom already put a CCTV in our rooms. How are we going to explain to her why I didn’t come home for more than a day?” Kris asks.

“Well, teleport twice in a day? Just spend a day in one place then go back here at night. You can just teleport from anywhere but your house, Kris.”

“We told you, we can’t teleport that much and we don’t always end up where we want to be,” Tao reminds me and puts a lot of food on his tray.

“How we wish we can just teleport as we wish.” Kris followed Tao and gets food on his own tray.

The three of us have teleportation ability. We all wished on our 7^th birthday to have such powers in order to change the world as we would want it to but here we go now, doing everything we just wanted to satisfy our own pleasures. Our mothers came to know about this when we all first went missing overnight and we told them how we saw Mickey Mouse and the gang in Disneyland.

***

“Where have you all been?” Kris’ mom asked us. My mom and Tao are seated on the couch. Tao’s mom still sniffing from all the cries she has done and my mom massages the temple of her head.

“We went to see Mickey Mouse, mom,” Kris answered and looked at me and Tao. We all giggled as we remember the Disneyland experience.

“That’s ridiculous, boys. How come you went all the way to Disneyland without passports and money?” My mom takes over and she looked really scary.

“Mom, I don’t really have a habit of lying,” I told her and started to cry.

***

I didn’t really lie that much when I was younger. The thought of lying makes me sick. But when she finally saw it with her own two eyes – how I disappeared and went back in front of her, carrying my dad’s bag which is in that moment, at his office – she banned me from going places to places through my teleportation ability. Since then that my mom banned me, my lying became more frequent as much as all those times I teleport without my mom’s knowledge.

To this day, she still doesn’t know me teleport a lot. Usually, I’d teleport in late afternoon and come back the next day in the morning. When she asks me what time I came home, I always told her I came home at 1am or later. After that, she doesn’t ask anymore. Maybe she believes on my lie or she already knows that I went somewhere…

“By the way, Kai, when are you going back to school?” Kris asks me as soon as we found an empty table.

“Maybe next week? I’m not that sure. But surely, I’d be here before preliminary exams.” I shrug and feasted on Kris’ and Tao’s lunch. “So, how did it go from there, Tao?”

“She called me from China and I told her, ‘Hey, I’m already in China too. I’m at Shenyang City right now. How about you?’”

“Where are you in Shenyang?” Kris took the role of the girl Tao liked.

“Coffee bay in Shenyang. Why?”

“Oh! What a coincidence! I’m here in Coffee bay too. Where are you? I can’t see you?” Kris’ voice changed into his real voice and says, “Then that’s how the girl spotted a liar.”

“Is she in one of our classes?”

“Unfortunately, yes.” Tao’s face went gloomy.

“Some love stories start from there, Tao!” I tried cheering him up but to no avail. “C’mon, it’s not yet the end of the world!”

“It’s not because you didn’t lose anything yet, Kai. Wait until you lose something you have always sought after and you’d know.”

“How ‘bout we go on an adventure before prelims?” Kris suggests. “Call?”

“Where to?” Tao asks and Kris and I look at him astounded. “Why?”

“We thought you’re not going with us anymore due to prior…mishap?”

“The world doesn’t end there, Kai.” Tao winks.

“Brazil was nice…” I told them. “Let’s go?”

“Let’s go!” Tao and Kris shouted in excitement.