The bell
rang and I half ran towards our next class. I was trying to get as far as
possible from this sweet little couple — Amanda and Jeremy. It’s been quite a
while since Amanda and Jeremy had been together, and it’s not that easy to deal
with them every day. I can’t even look at them in the eye; I can’t show them
how jealous I am. There are times I just try to avoid them, I just go with
Vince (my cousin and a business management student) and his friends. I prefer
to be alone if they’re not free rather than to spend the whole
day with Jeremy
and Amanda. But I can’t avoid them every day.
I sat on
the chair behind the classroom. I chose it because it’s the only vacant seat in
the middle of that side of the room. I don’t want to sit on the other side of
the room where there are three vacant seats where Amanda and Jeremy can seat
next to me.
“It’s curious,” said Beverly, my classmate
who’s sitting next to me.
“What’s
curious?” I asked.
“You used
to sit there beside Amanda and Jeremy,” Beverly said. “And we all think that
you’re Jeremy’s little chaperon.”
“What?”
“Well,
everyone thinks about it of course, except AJ who’s not fond of gossips and
talking,” Beverly said.
“Why are
you all thinking of that?” I asked.
“Because
you’re always with them—”
“I’ve
always been with them since first year,” I interrupted.
“Yeah,
yeah,” she said. “We’re all aware of it, but things are different now. They’re
together now, and you don’t belong anymore.”
“I-I’m
sorry,” I said. “But I didn’t know that friendship has an expiration date.”
“I’m not
saying that you don’t have to be friends with them anymore.”
I just shut
up and tried to forget what she just said. I’m trying to avoid them for a month
now, and it’s not easy when the girl you love asked you on the phone “Are you
avoiding me?” I didn’t know what to answer, every time she calls me I’m trying
and dying not to talk with her and pretending to be busy. I can’t focus on what
I’m doing sometimes because of thinking about her and Jer. I absentmindedly
interchanged my requirements for my two clinical instructors last week and I
have to run after the other to take what I gave them and give the right one. And
I burned what I’m frying for lunch yesterday because I’m lost in my thoughts.
“Benedict,
are you out of your mind?” Charm shouted when she smelled the burning fish.
Just now, I
just realized that I sighed more than ten times. The class has already started.
I jot down notes while I listen to my instructor. I took a glance to Amanda and
Jeremy, she was taking down notes while he just talks and talks like always. I
just look away. I can’t change the fact that they’re together now, and I
can’t
do anything about it.
*
* *
“Ben?”
Amanda said over the phone. “Can we talk, please?”
“What is
it?” I asked.
“Nothing,”
she said. “It’s just that you’re like so far away from us now, are you trying
to avoid us?”
“No, no,” I
lied. “Let’s say I’m just giving the two of you time to be together.”
“I know
you’re lying,” she said. “What is it?”
“What?”
“What is it
that makes you want to avoid us? We’re your friends, Ben. Do you have a
problem? You’re not yourself lately.”
I closed my
eyes tightly and tried to think of what to say. “Come with us tomorrow,” she
said. “We are planning to have another bonfire at the shortcut, more like of a
camping actually.”
“I don’t
know if I can come,” I said.
“I’m not
asking you to come,” Amanda said. “I’m ordering you.”
*
* *
It was
indeed a camping, and most of our classmates came. A huge fire was burning at
the center of the clearing surrounded by tents and people dancing and singing.
Instead of joining the lovebirds Amanda and Jeremy, I sat on a tree trunk
beside Beverly and another classmate of ours, Alyanna. AJ was helping the
others to distribute glass of drinks and she gave me one just as when Amanda
came and took my arm and pulled it.
“Hey, what
the hell—” I tried to protest.
“Sit,” she
said, pointing to the chair beside her. I sat and she sat beside me. “I wanted
to talk to you for quite a while now.”
“About
what?”
“Nothing in
particular,” she said. “I guess I just miss you.”
I stared at
her and smiled. I can stop grinning about what she just said. Did you hear what
she just said? I wanted to shout and go crazy about it, but I can’t so I just
grinned wider and wider. “Why are you grinning.”
“Nothing,”
I said. “Come, let’s dance!”
I pulled
her from her chair and we joined our friends and we all danced crazily. We
forgot that we’re on a forest and not on a disco. Karl, being the one nearest
to the music player, turned the music louder and people it became more like a
party here than a bonfire. I don’t know who did it, but someone sprayed beer
all over the dancing area. Amanda pulled me fast and we’re the only one who
does not smell like beer. We were all laughing and just enjoying ourselves.
“Where’s
Jeremy?” I asked.
“He went to
the town to buy some drinks,” she shouted. The music is too loud that we need
to shout to hear each other. “He’s with Jayson and Jan!”
Now I
remember its Jeremy’s 18th Birthday tonight. I remembered because of
what Amanda said. No one will sell them liquors if they’re still minor. “He’s
enjoying the life of being 18 years old and of legal age.”
After few
minutes of dancing, Jeremy and the others came with three cases of beer. They
put it on the center of the clearing as everyone sat on chairs and tree trunks.
Someone turned the music off and they started to distribute bottles of beer.
“You came!”
Jeremy said to me cheerfully as he gave me and Amanda each a bottle of bear.
“Yeah,” I
said. “Happy birthday, buddy!”
“Thanks!”
he said and went back to distribute more beer.
We sat
again on our bench and we both put our beers on the ground. “You won’t drink it?”
Amanda asked.
“I’m
drinking wine and other liquors, but I don’t like beer,” I said.
“I don’t
drink at all,” Amanda said and she laughed.
People
we’re singing Happy Birthday for Jeremy now, Amanda was just looking at him
smiling. After they sing and Jeremy gave a little speech, people resumed
dancing. He pulled Amanda to dance with him and they both vanished in the
dancing crowd.
I need to
deal with the fact that Amanda is my best friend’s girlfriend. Avoiding them
won’t do anything good. All I need is to accept what is happening and don’t
give a damn thing, like how I stare at them now while they dance and they kiss—
Hey
WHAT??!!!
I’m looking
at them from my chair, four meters away from me, Jeremy kissed Amanda on the
lips and they hugged after. I tried to smile but I know it didn’t reach my eyes
and I just scratched my neck. Man, I’m just trying to deal with it now they
just kissed in front of me.
It’s okay,
I need to deal with facts.
After few
minutes, there are some who are drunk now and is sleeping on their tents. My
house is just two blocks away from the entry point of the woods and I plan to
go home after this jungle party. Everyone is listening as Ernesto played the
guitar and Christine and Gayle led the singing thing. Every after a song,
someone needs to tell an urban legend or a horror story or they will be dared
to say something true or do a consequence when the bottle points to them.
“Okay! Who
will be the next story teller?” Christine said as she spins the bottle. The
bottle stopped and points at Jayson. Everyone looked at him and he said,
“Anyone who heard about the story of the white lady on our back yard?”
“No one’s
interested with that, bro,” Karl said.
“How about
the werewolf that resides on the farm of the Seeley’s?” he suggested.
“No werewolf
or vampires on this country,” I reminded him.
“Okay, how
about this,” he said. “My mother told me once about her experience in college,”
everyone is now listening. “She was walking on the corridor at 8 in the evening
on the administration building where she does some office work because she is a
working student. So she was walking—”
“What
school is it again?” Jan interrupted. And we all shouted at him for
interrupting when we are almost into the story. “Sorry, guys.”
“So, as I
was saying,” Jayson continued. “She was walking on the corridor when she heard
something in front of her, something bouncing. She thought a varsity player on
basketball or volleyball was still in the building with her but then she
realized what a varsity player would do on the administration office.
“She tried
to focus on the end of the corridor, trying to make out a figure out of the
dark. The she saw it (Amanda pushed her body on my arm, she’s now afraid.), a
something round was bouncing—ricocheted— on the walls. She stopped from walking
and waited for it to stop, she’s afraid that it might hit her. And then the
thing stopped from bouncing when it was few feet away from her, and it rolled
to her feat and she saw,” he leaned towards us, his face serious and scary, “a
human head.”
Something
big jumped behind us and put its big hands on Amanda’s shoulders. Amanda
shouted and she launched herself to me, hugging me tight. Everyone laughed so
hard; I looked behind us and saw that it was just Jeremy (now laughing) who
jumped at us. I tapped Amanda’s back and I said, it’s okay now, it’s just
Jeremy.
She let go
of me and tried to compose herself. “Sorry,” she said. The bottle is now
spinning again, and everyone is waiting for it to stop. All of us are staring
at the bottle as its spin slowed down little by little and it stopped, pointing
at me.
“Sorry, I
don’t have any ghost stories,” I said.
“Well then,
truth or dare?” Gayle asked.
“Truth,” I
answered.
“Tell us
something about your love life,” she said. Everyone looked at me, I don’t know
I they all look so interested.
“Why are
you all looking at me like that?” I asked.
“No one has
an idea about your love life,” Gayle said.
“Nobody
knows if you have or had a girlfriend,” Alyanna added.
I sighed
and smiled. “Can’t I just change my answer and just say ‘dare?’”
“No!” They
all shouted.
“Okay,” I
said. “My love life? My love life isn’t for the pain of the heart. I’ve never
had a girlfriend in my entire life. I fell in love with a girl for the first
time when I entered college and I’m still in love with her but I don’t think
I’ll tell her.”
“Why?” they
asked.
“Ask that
again if the bottle points at me again,”
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