Good-day-ish

Anne

“Holidays are here, yay!”

Who am I kidding, my department wouldn’t allow us go for the holidays due to the annoying projects and term papers. Anyone who decided to leave would have a lot of work piled up, so most of us decided to stay back and finish up. The holidays weren’t for us.

We all knew that most of the work was for lecturers who were too lazy to do it themselves. But when it came to receiving the monetary rewards, we won’t be acknowledged.

School was basically boring.

My roommates had all left for their homes shortly after the exams. It was a teary holiday sendoff. If you had seen us then, you would have thought we were parting forever. I cried the most because then I would be alone. I was seriously missing my family.

Pam had begun her assigned project earlier this semester and had finished before the holidays. She was free. I had never been envious.

Today was the worst. School was rapidly getting empty. Everywhere I looked, boxes, traveling bags, and whatnot were pushed and pulled towards the same direction, the exit. The usually bubbling streets began looking deserted and haunted.

After a stressful day at school, I came back by three o’clock to an almost empty hostel. I sighed sadly and entered the room I shared with my roommates. I stared at the empty beds and began feeling my eyes water.

I felt so left out.

I managed to drag my tired body to my bed and slumped on it, looking up to the ceiling for solace. I didn’t know what to do next. The strength to fix lunch wasn’t forthcoming. I didn’t even have the appetite.

I was revved out of my depressing thoughts by the vibration of my phone.

It was a text from Andrew.

“Hey celebrity,” it read.

I stared at my screen for a while, a smile gradually creeping onto my face.

Since that dreadful party that gave me an enormous hangover from the pit of hell, I had vowed never to attend again. The worst part was I didn’t remember much after taken that forsaken drink.

Andrew wouldn’t tell me. Whenever I tried prodding him for info, he would snicker and runoff, yelling ‘celebrities’. Sometimes he would begin singing hips don’t lie, and would whine his waist to the beats he made with his mouth. He took pride in frustrating me.

Now in his message, he called me a celebrity.

Any other time, I would have given him the middle finger, but his message was actually comforting. It was the break I needed from all the depressing thoughts.

I knew he was stalling. He must think I would feel bad if he told me all the humiliating things I did. But what he didn’t know was that keeping it from me and using it to make fun of me was making me feel worse.

‘Did I strip or something?’ I found myself thinking.

“What do you want, stranger?” I texted back.

“How’s my celebrity doing?” he typed, adding a grinning emoji.

I smiled at the emoji but sent an angry face.

“I’m kinda good,” I added, sending a sad face emoji.

“ Oh no…red alert!.. I’m coming to pick you up…get ready!” He replied immediately.

“I’m okay Drew.” I texted.

No reply.

“Drew?”

Again, no reply. He hadn’t even read them.

Oopsy!

I jumped out of bed and ran into the bathroom to freshen up.

Once I was done, I slid into a pair of black jeans, a white top, and a pair of ropy sandals. I was making finishing touches on my face when my phone began ringing, signaling Andrew’s arrival.

I was excited to leave this depressing hostel.

He arrived at exactly three-thirty, fifteen minutes since his last text.

“You ready?” He asked strolling into the door I opened for him. He was wearing blue baggy jeans, a black shirt that had a huge skull drawn in the center, with slits here and there, and a shiny leather jacket over the shirt.

“Expressing yourself much?” I asked, rolling my eyes at him.

“Yep. Now answer my question,” he said coming to stand right in my face, “are you ready?” he spoke, dragging each word as if I was daft.

“Hey! Get out of my personal space. I’m not dumb, I heard you the first time,” I said irritated, pushing him backward while he fell back, laughing at my annoyance.

 “Where are we going?” I asked moving to carry my handbag from the bed.

“My house.” He stated.

I went rigid, gripping tightly to my bag.

‘Uh...what!’

“I’ve got a great movie you’d enjoy, and of course, we’ll have scrumptious pizza,” he enticed.

“Uhhh,” as much as my mouth was watering at the mention of pizza, I was a bit uneasy to spend the day alone with him.

“Anny,” he began, sensing my anxiousness, “It’s okay if you don’t want to go…we can go somewhere else, alright?”

“It’s okay Drew. I’d better get used to your sorry as*,” I said and we both burst out laughing.

“Although I’m down if you want to indulge in…you know…other activities,” he said stressing the last part while wriggling his brows.

I smacked his arm.

“Anny,” he started, placing both hands on my shoulders, a bit more serious now, “I know you still feel uneasy staying alone with me. I’ll forever hate myself for that. But believe me when I tell you that I’ll never make that mistake again.”

“Hey, don’t get all emotional on me now,” I said to lighten the mood.

He laughed and took my hand.

“Let’s go!”

We went downstairs and outside.

Lo and behold, he came with his massive power bike. I had forgotten Andrew carried this devil of a vehicle around. It had already attracted a few admirers.

“Nooo...Nuh-uh…I ain’t going on that.” I voiced.

“Come on, you’ll love it. It’s exhilarating!” He said tapping on the giant seat.

“No.”

“Yes!”

“Noo!”

“Yesss!”

We kept at it until he got tired and dragged me onto the bike.

“Your such a big whiny baby,” he teased.

“Humph!”  I expressed.

The ride on the bike was scary as it was exhilarating. I loved the rush of fresh air and the feeling of freedom, but at the same time, I kept imagining falling off the bike or under its massive tires. That definitely wouldn’t end well.

We hadn’t even stopped but I was already gaping at the beautiful house in front of us. It wasn’t too big but you could tell it was expensive.

“Welcome to our humble abode,” He said gesturing to the house.

“It’s beautiful,” I said dreamily, staring in awe at the finely cut edges and painting.

“Yea, yea,” he said shrugging.

I smacked him again, gaining myself a chuckle and an ouch from him.

“This ain’t humble,” I stated matter of fact.

“Well, according to my parents, it is,” he said, leading me up the few flights of stairs.

He unlocked the door and we stepped into another world. At least that’s how I saw it.

The inside was breathtakingly beautiful. The walls were all white with contrasting black furniture. The large windows were covered with thick dark curtains that kept sunlight away, leaving only the antic light bulbs. This gave the house a dark essence. The walls were covered with beautiful paintings from artists I would have known if I was an art enthusiast.

“Make yourself at home, look around, I’ll be right back.” He said before going up the flight of stairs and disappearing around a corner.

“I will.”

I was actually itching to look around.

I walked slowly around the house, taking in the paintings and furniture, flower vases, and sculptures.

He said make yourself at home, that meant I could touch stuff right? I decided to do it anyway.

I walked down the short hallway, stopping at intervals to stare at the expressive paintings.

Till now, I still don’t get why some scribblings on a canvas would be considered artistic. Someone would just wake up, take up a paintbrush and begin splashing colors here and there, then voila, something worth thousands would be created. I’m sorry art lovers, I don’t get it.

I was almost at the end of the hallway when I began hearing low grunts coming from the last room. The sounds were not muffled so my best guess was that the door was left open.

Yea, the first thing that came to mind was an 18-rated scene.

My legs moved and before I could stop myself, I was already standing in front of the open door, staring down at an insanely toned body covered in shiny sweat, moving up and down with both arms.

I stood frozen, my eyes fixated on the scene before me.

As he moved, the muscles of his back and arms rippled alluringly. He was shirtless with just sweatpants that dangled loosely on his waist exposing a small portion of the swells of his tight butt cheeks.

I gulped, squinting my eyes at the wild thoughts that seeped into my head.

Each sit-up forced out a grunt similar to the ones I heard from the hallway. The sounds he made were quite arousing.

Anne, get a hold of yourself.

I snapped out of it and shuffled back into the living room, breathing heavily. I almost bumped into Andrew.

“Hey, what’s wrong?” He asked, furrowing his brows.

“Nothing!” I squeaked.

 ‘Was that my voice?!’

“You sure? Your face looks flushed.” He asked worriedly, extending his fingers to poke on my cheeks.

“I’m okay.” I breathed out, moving quickly to sit on the couch.

“Ooookay.” He said. I knew he had doubts but he didn’t push the conversation further.

“I’ve ordered pizza, let’s get down to business, hahaha!” He exclaimed, rubbing his palms together dramatically.

“You didn’t tell me your brother was around,” I blurted out, regretting it immediately. Now he’d figure out why I was acting weird.

He walked over to me and stared at me perplexed, “I didn’t know. His car isn’t in the driveway. You saw him?” He asked, moving past me to swat in front of the large TV screen, whilst glancing at me. 

As if on cue, Vincent walked in shirtless with just sweat pants and a towel around his neck.

My eyes landed on his abs, slowly going down to where his waistband ended. I could see veins running down and going beyond the waistband. I couldn’t help but wonder where they led to.

I gulped again, subtly removing my eyes from his body down to my palms placed on my laps.

‘Just kill me, Vincent!’

“Andrew, I didn’t know you were bringing a friend over,” he said to Andrew whilst wiping at his face with the towel. “Hello Anne,” he said to me, with a small smile on his face.

I raised my face directly to his. I dared not look below, else he’ll figure it out.

“Hi,” I choked out with a wave of my hand.

“Hey bro, I didn’t know you were home. Your car’s not in the driveway.” Andrew said, stills shuffling through an array of movies.

“I’m not on call till tomorrow and my car’s at the mechanic,” Vincent stated, removing the towel from his neck, and dangling it casually.

“Okay,” Andrew said absentmindedly, “Uh.. we’re going to watch a movie,” he added, inserting the disc in the disc player, then as  he strolled over to sit beside me, he said to Vincent, “You can join us.”

‘Bad idea, Andrew.’

“I’ll pass. I’m going to take a shower then head up to the study. So, have fun.”

“Bookworm!” Andrew jibbed over his shoulders from where he sat.

“Dummy,” Vincent jibbed back. I was already staring at him when he turned to face me. His intense eyes looking straight into my eyes. He had opened his mouth to say something but refrained from it.

“Nice to see you, Anne,” he finally said.

“Same here,” I replied with a tiny voice that I could’ve sworn didn’t belong to me.

Two hours into a very funny movie that had Andrew and I reeling in laughter, Vincent walked down into the living room, now putting on a white polo and black track pants.

“I’m starving Drew. Rita didn’t come in today. Did you order anything?” he asked rubbing his stomach while moving straight to the kitchen. I could hear pots being opened from where I sat with Andrew.

Andrew looked up from the sofa, “Yea, like two hours ago, yet nothing. I’m gonna call another place.”

“I can prepare something,” I found myself blurting out.

‘Great Anne! Just great!’

Andrew stared at me with a wide grin on his face. Vincent walked out of the kitchen, coming over to look at me as well.

“What?” I asked, darting my eyes from Andrew to Vincent.

“You don’t have to Anne,” Vincent said.

“I’m hungry too you know? And this dude forgot all about food the minute we started watching this movie,” I gestured to Andrew who was sniffling away. “If you have groceries, I can prepare something,” I said with a shrug.

“Yay!” Andrew cheered, bouncing up and down and clapping his hands vigorously. “We have groceries, Anny.” He chanted continuously.

“Yea we do. Rita, our help restocked before taking the day off.” Vincent assured.

“Okay,” I said standing up from the couch.

“I’ll assist you,” Vincent said leading me to the kitchen.

“And I’ll stay here and finish the movie. You don’t need me there, it’s a complete disaster, trust me.” Andrew said spreading his arm and legs and resuming the movie he paused.

“Why is that?” I asked looking behind my shoulders at Andrew.

“The last time he attempted cooking for us, he almost burned down the whole house,” Vincent answered on his behalf.

“Oh,” I said laughing.

When we reached the kitchen, Vincent opened the refrigerator, and the grocery compartment which were both filled to the brim with foodstuff. He opened several other compartments.

“Okay, what do you need?” He said, gesturing with his hand at all the open cabinets.

“What do you have here?” I asked moving to check each opened cabinet. “There are noodles, pasta, rice, beans, carrots, some vegetables, eggs,” I counted,  “You choose,” I said turning to stare at him, my lips twisted to the side expectantly.

He looked from me to the open cabinets, then stretched out his hand and grabbed a pasta pack, bringing it in front of me.

“Pasta it is then…here we go!”