Original Love

Episode Eight

Mondays are the days I dreaded the most. It’s the particular day of the week when all you think about is how weekends end so terribly fast without you noticing it and how long you will wait again for them to come back. Oh, Mondays… Just the mere sound of them felt like torture to my ears.

Unfortunately, I still haven’t apologized to Aus. I even didn’t get enough sleep last night because I forgot that I still have to do my paper in Psychology. After thinking too much about how I would make things up with Austin, I almost forgot that I still had a deadline to chase.

Thankfully though, Cassidy texted me yesterday afternoon to remind me about the paper. How lucky I was to have a friend like her now. I really ought to treat her a meal this week, at least for saving my ass this day.

The coffee shop is jammed and packed this morning as I wait impatiently on the line for my turn to order. Students are mostly stressed out when it’s Monday, that is why a lot of us crave some hot coffee before the first class.

After getting my cup of morning medicine, I check the time and find out that I still got thirty minutes more before the start of the first class. I sigh in relief and search for a vacant seat across the place. As I skim my eyes throughout the whole area, a certain familiar presence startled me as it waves at me with a big grin on its face.

What is he doing here?

I tried to ignore him and continued to search for somewhere else to take a seat. Yet unfortunately, all the tables seemed to be occupied now and I was already blocking the path of other customers that are walking around me. Without any other choice, I surrendered and acknowledged the persistent figure from a distance who was still waving gleefully at me like an i***t.

I begrudgingly sat on the vacant seat across from him and scowled at his annoying smiling face that seems to light up the whole place with its almost genuine expression.

“Have some.” He tells me as he pushes the plate of sweet bread on the table towards my direction. It seems like he’s been already expecting I would be sharing breakfast with him today.

“No, thanks.” I smoothly decline, sipping in my cup of coffee instead. I still don’t trust him enough to take anything he offers out of courtesy.

“Have you talked to him already?”

“What?” I frown at him.

“You two had a fight, right? No wonder, you look like death today.” He says to me with that smug smile as if he’s so sure of what he’d pretty guessed.

“It’s none of your business,” I told him with an irritated look as I try to look away and ignore his annoying smile.

“Fine,” he swiftly lets me go, leaning his elbows on the table, “But I think you still had the right to know that you really look old frowning like that. At least try to smile for one bit. Believe me, it’ll release some of the tension,” he tells me using a gesture with his hands on his face, putting his index fingers on both sides of his smiling lips while he waits for me to do what he told me so.

I gave him a sarcastic grin instead just to spite him. “Now, happy?”

“It still doesn’t make you pretty.” He comments and I scowl again.

“You—“

He quickly shuts me off by putting a big chunk of sweet bread into my opened mouth. And I was too stunned to even snap at what he did.

“There, eat,” he says, sounding too proud of his work as he stares at me, “You need some energy to survive the first semester, you know.”

I pause for a moment and settle down with a stubborn groan in response as I chew the bread in my mouth in mocking silence.

“How’s the first month, by the way?” he asks me with a curious face all of a sudden, “Has giving up already crossed your mind?”

I smirk at him in return. Does he seriously think I’m that weak?

“I’m not that shallow. I’m very determined to do this, you know. I don’t easily surrender. Being a doctor has been always my dream and there’s nothing that could stop me from achieving that.”

“Good.” Bradley smiles at this as he gives me that soft look on his face—an entirely different one that I just get to see the first time today.

“Now, enjoy the day for a while. You deserve it.”

“Yeah, sure…” I said in a slightly startling way as I watch him warily while taking another sip of my coffee. Bradley remained silent for a long while as he occasionally eat the sweet bread in his hand and drink on his own cup.

Sometimes, this strange side of him still confuses me.

“He likes you.”

What? I sat in silence, a bit confused about what he’s referring to.

“He probably doesn’t know that now but he surely has feelings for you,” his eyes met mine this time as he gives me that look that I knew was sincere and genuine, “Like you have for him. It’s mutual.”

Was he talking about Austin?

“What are you saying?” I chuckle at him, thinking he must be playing me around again. But this time he’s using Austin against me, “What even makes you so sure of that?”

“Because he flipped out when I said I like you?”

“He’s just used to being too overprotective of me,” I explain the most reasonable thing I had in mind, “That reaction doesn’t really mean anything romantic.”

“It does.” He still insists and that slightly irks me as I stare straight into his face.

“Can you please just drop it off?” I tell him with an angry frown, “You’re putting thoughts into my head again.”

Somehow, those words made the bastard look more amused and interested.

“Does that mean I affect you in more ways than one?”

Conceited bastard.