𝐢 𝐰𝐢𝐬𝐡 𝐢 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐥𝐚𝐲 𝐝𝐨𝐰𝐧 𝐛𝐞𝐬𝐢𝐝𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮
𝐰𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐝𝐚𝐲 𝐢𝐬 𝐝𝐨𝐧𝐞
𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐰𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐮𝐩 𝐭𝐨 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐟𝐚𝐜𝐞 𝐚𝐠𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐬𝐮𝐧

I knew it was too late then. To wish that I hadn’t had dinner at Irene Bae’s place and to regret ever setting foot inside her ridiculously impressive place. There was this old saying somewhere that you couldn’t love someone you didn’t know. And I wasn’t saying that I loved her. God, no. But it would be idiotic of me to say that whatever information I had gathered about her that night wasn’t able to make me put a name on whatever she made me feel.

I thought nothing of it at first. This had happened before and I knew how to deal with it. I would first, keep my distance; second, do whatever I could to not think about her, and third, focus more on her weaknesses. I thought it was simple and like the previous ones, conquerable. But I didn’t count on the factor of the other party. I didn’t think Irene Bae would be coming onto me too.

And like hell she did.

Ever since that night, she had been spending more time with me than with her usual group of ‘friends’. She wasn’t affected the slightest bit by their weird gazes and when I asked her about it, she only said:

“I noticed. I just don’t wanna mind them. We’re not even ‘friends’ or anything. I hung around them because at the time I thought it was needed to survive high school and because they were the only ones who tried to get close to me. But I can’t say that their taste in many things suits me. I’m more of a street foods, road trips kind of girl. I don’t need expensive things to keep me happy. They do. I don’t like it. I’m not gonna hang around those toxic people.”

And suddenly I had the wish to travel around the vast city for street foods, so I did the next best thing. I asked Joy about street foods recommendation the night of the same day and she told me with reluctance. She was probably wondering why someone who had never been interested in street foods suddenly wanted to know about it. I told her I was curious, but I didn’t think she believed me.

The fault in my usual tactics was that the second point was impossible to do if the first point was not executable. Now that Irene Bae was basically everywhere—she latched herself onto me whenever she saw me—I couldn’t in heaven’s name stop thinking about her. When I tried to study, I thought about how she had started to tag along with me in the library and how she looked as she tried to focus to make sense of whatever she was working on. When I wanted to tie my hair, I thought about the many times I was left speechless when she tied her hair up and let her neck become exposed. When I opened my phone, I always hoped for a message from her because she texted sometimes and we would be talking about nothing and everything till the morning. When I listened to some music, I would start to relate the lyrics with her until hours passed. when I ate, I remembered the occasional homemade lunches and snacks she would bring for me. Working out didn’t help because my thoughts ran even wilder and I thought about her harder. I even avoided my mom because she would only ask about her nowadays. And for ’s sake, I couldn’t even stand my own name because it reminded me of the times when it passed , be it when she was scolding me for making fun of her or when she was shouting it out when she saw me in the hall. I guessed beautiful people could pretty much do whatever they wanted without worrying about their reputation.

The third point was even more useless now that the first and second were off the deal. Finding a fault in someone whose image you see in your head every hour of every day and whose smile and laughter induced a surge of dopamine and oxytocin in your brain creating all sorts of chemical reactions that you wished you could stop was not something easy. It was near impossible. The only thing I didn’t like about her was the fact that she rarely ever talked her problems out. Often she kept it in and let it eat her inside. And it didn’t change a thing about what I felt. In fact, it only made me want to be around her even longer and be that person she could talk to.

This feeling I had for Irene Bae was not something I dared put into words. And I certainly hoped I never would have to.

-

It was Sunday and we were out eating lunch on the same place we went to the first time I agreed to go on a lunch with her. Yes, the first time I ever skipped school too. Oh, how that happy and adventurous day seemed so long ago. Now every moment I spent with Irene Bae felt like an adventure on its own, even though for the most part it was just me trying to get a grip of my hormones and not let myself fall into a much deeper than I already was in with her around.

Lunches with Irene was a regular thing now, and this place had turned into one of our favorites. We and the owner was even on a first name basis now. Carlos. Funny how two months ago I would’ve turned the idea of eating street foods down in a blink and now I ate it so often I was familiar with the owner of one.

In front of me, Irene was busy on her phone. Her food laid ignored in front of her, which would be weird if you knew her. It was lunch and she said she hadn’t had anything to eat she could eat a dinosaur whole. Nobody in her position would’ve ignored that mouthwateringly tasty and juicy burritos that was the very definition of food .

“Hey,” I tried to get her attention, but she just lifted her chin slightly and hummed in response, so I tried again.

“What are you so busy doing