Mastermind

Chapter 2

"Oh. Oh. He's so down for you. One hundred percent certain."

Nara's hand moved to cup her ear while the other hand ran silently across her general chemistry notebook. Her friend didn't catch the motion and instead, heightened her voice to make Nara look.

"He just asked you to go to some cafe—TONIGHT?"

Jasmine's scream was enough to make Nara throw her pen in annoyance, and she grabbed her phone from her friend's grasp. She squinted over a new DM that now filled her eyes. She read it over and over until she could finally make a voice, "What the hell is he thinking?"

Jasmine tugged at her shirt, "Come on, now. Remember your real goal." she lifted her brows continuously that it made Nara sigh in surrender.

"I can't believe I'm doing this."

Funny how men easily asked her to go out even after only one stare in her eyes, because this wasn't her first time getting texts from men she barely know. Then again, who she is to blame when she herself noticed how her face looked like? With her beautiful sun-burnt smooth skin, little eyes that become two moons when she smiles earnestly, and lips that radiate bold pink color even when she didn't apply any additional lip products there.

Honestly, men.

Jasmine was now shaking Nara's shoulders happily, "I'm so so happy for you!"

"Jasmine, relax. This isn't a real date." Nara tried to move from Jasmine's grasp but failed when she held them facing each other.

"That might be right, but this could also be when something real happens!" Jasmine was flailing her limbs delightedly and starting to sing some love songs with silly lyrics. Nara closed her eyes tiredly, wondering how she could withstand this girl in front of her.

When she told Jasmine what happened that day when Keza asked to use the electrical plug, Nara swore her eardrums were bleeding since Jasmine yelled once she finished telling the whole story. After that ear-splitting scene, Jasmine has been having her phone as a captive to monitor her i********: DM because she believed (which is a very, very strong word) that Keza would send her a text or two very soon.

And Keza just proved Jasmine's prediction was right, after all.

In the present time, Nara looked up at the clock hanging on their dorm wall and realized she only had 3 hours before the clock's finger hit 7. She took a moment to count her remaining time and decided to end her current study session to make some food. Jasmine followed her exiting the room, closing the door behind her carefully, not to make any fuss in the dim and silent dorm corridor.

Nara and Jasmine have been sharing a room in one of the university's dorms since the second month of the term. Jasmine moved to the dorm first and had been living there alone for a month before she asked Nara to join her, right after they established a good bond with each other as the consequence of a month studying in the same major. Their dorm is as regular and unspecial as a dorm room could be, with a bed, desk, and closet for each of them. The dorm is located so close to their faculty's building and it is one of the dorms that provided the most sophisticated facilities, considering it is the newest dorm building in the university.

Right now, they're ascending the stairs to the kitchen. The kitchen is placed on the third floor, and it is the kind of kitchen that you use together with other dorm members. This is why Nara chose to cook meals at the most kitchen-empty hour. If the kitchen is too crowded for her liking, they usually opted for meals outside instead.

Luckily, the kitchen looked sparse in the present, with clean cooking utensils which hinted that someone was here not so long ago. They entered the kitchen and start looking for something they could make in the refrigerator. Jasmine peered through the freezer and noticed a pack of frozen pempek, cramped between other residents' frozen foods. She waved the plastic package to Nara, who nodded twice before working her hands to prepare the frying pan to heat.

Five minutes later, amid the sizzling of pempek being fried, Nara leaned her back at the cabinets, standing with her hands holding the edges. She eyed Jasmine sideway, "Maybe I should not have started it in the first place."

Jasmine moved from the refrigerator just so she could face Nara. She shrugged indifferently before replying, "The fun hasn't even started yet."

Nara's eyes looked up at the ceiling now, "It's just ... weird, I think."

"You haven't even tried."

"I know. Still feels weird. And foreign. You know I'm not an expert in dealing with boys."

Jasmine leered her eyes, her teasing demeanor was back in a mere second, "Right, your expertise lies in rejecting boys, not dealing with them."

Nara rolled her eyes, too caught up in her own thoughts to even counteract her best friend's mockery. Both of them fell into silence when no one seemed to be about to say something, until Nara started a few moments later, "Hey, I actually was thinking about what I should appear to be when I meet him later?"

Jasmine didn't even need to think when she answered, "You don't need to appear to be someone else. Just be you."

Nara took her attention fully on her friend before replying in disbelief, "That is probably what you need to say if I ever wanted him to really fall for me, while right now, I just need his brain."

Jasmine stared back at her incredulously, shaking her head dramatically that Nara decided to focus on the sizzling pempek instead.

"Just be nice, then." Jasmine resorted to this answer, gaining a faint smile from Nara.

"Does that mean, nicer than the real me?" Nara wiggled her eyebrows to Jasmine. It is Jasmine's turn to roll her eyes, mumbling whatever among the deafening sound of the frying pan.

-

All'sgood. The first meeting is ready to be executed.

The girl that walked to the short stairs of a cafe was wearing a sky blue T-shirt, combined with a deep blue cardigan and loose black pants. Her shoulder-length hair was braided by her roommate an hour earlier. She sported a huge tote bag that contained her books, a wide variety of pens, a water bottle, a wallet, and her phone. She didn't bring her car this time, relenting to her roommate's idea about the possible situation that the boy-she-was-about-to-meet is going to ask to drive her back to the dorm.

She doubted that, tho.

Winding her way into the cafe, Nara looked around the surroundings before she pushed the entrance door inward. She spotted Keza's frame almost immediately, considering how he wore the exact same shirt that she saw today at the campus.

No worries, she was also wearing the same outfit that she wore to the campus today. If men expected me to wear something nicer than my usual go-to-campus outfit, then good for them 'cause they will never get it.

Nara threaded her way to a table facing the window, giving a clear sight of the wet road, now that the rain has just stopped about thirty minutes ago. The table is quite far from the entrance door, and Nara wasn't going to lie that she liked how he chose the right table for the right occasion. Far away from the cracking sound of the door whenever it received a new customer, but close enough to see the happenings outside from the window, the ambiance would be perfect for her study session.

Or, should she say, a private tutoring session.

She wanted to laugh thinking about that alone.

Nara stopped beside Keza's hunched body (he was working on something on his laptop), prompting to make him realize first rather than making any sound of greetings. Luckily, it didn't take a long time for his head to turn to the side and meet Nara's expecting eyes.

"Hi." he started, as a matter of greetings. Nara nodded once and pulled the seat in front of him.

"Hi. Been waiting long?" she replied after she settled into her seat comfortably. Apparently, the cafe provided one of the most comforting chairs as she could already feel herself enveloped in the softness of the material. She wondered why she never encountered this cafe with Jasmine before.

Keza shook his head and closed his opened laptop to focus on her now, "No, not long. So, what to discuss, now?"

Nara bit back a laugh as the question entered her ears, wondering why they now sounded as if in a business meeting. She forced her smile into display before replying, "Kinematics, as you promised, maybe?"

Keza nodded in satisfaction, allowing Nara to take her stationeries out while he inserted his laptop back into his backpack's sleeve.

And just like that, they fell into an entertaining-but-also-frustrating discussion of physics problems. Nara would throw a question, and Keza would happily catch it by explaining everything until Nara nodded in understanding. Nara would point at something she hasn't fully comprehend, and Keza would point at another something to elaborate.

To the people outside, they probably looked like two ordinary college students being ambitious over some numbers, but between the two of them, they made amazingly good study partners. Keza seemed to turn pages over pages of his own notes just to make sure Nara was walking on the right path in solving the problems.

Nara wasn't a fool not to realize how Keza looked at her, compelled by how she moved her lips when working her brain, or how she tucked her loose hair whenever it disturbed her writing activity. When she looked up from her work to engage in his game (because Jasmine said to do so) just to find two deep brown eyes staring back at her, she let her little laugh out to the surroundings, intentionally showing how her eyes dwindled into two small, precious moons. She could catch Keza's slightly rounded eyes and thought, that's that, then, you're under a trap.

Nara's heart swelled in her victorious attempt on attracting this boy. She got everything she needed tonight, from the understanding of the previously-difficult physics problems to the adoring gleam in the boy's eyes. Killed two birds with one stone, I must say.

Two hours into the study session, Nara stretched her arms before saying, "It's late, I have to go," she packed her stuff back into her bag, "Thank you so much for tonight. I really really appreciate it." she let her eyes stayed on Keza's for a while, and then she slung her bag to her shoulder.

"Yeah. Yeah, it was a nice discussion," Keza's smile might be full of meaning, but Nara was already too tired to even engage with whatever this led to. He stood from his seat and grabbed the car keys from his pocket. "I can drive you."

Nara blinked, thrown off guard by the suggestion. She was about to shook her head before Keza abruptly added, "If you don't mind, of course."

"Hold on, I—" Nara almost tried to rummage her bag for her car keys when she realized she didn't drive one. Her mind circled over one hundred possible situations, but she wasn't going to lie that going back home this late by an online transportation service doesn't really assure her safety.

Accepting Keza's question would be safer, wouldn't it? Wouldn't it?

Keza might sense the uncomfortable silence that stretched between them, so he once again added, "You can take the back seat," he tapped his fingers to his thigh, certainly didn't want to look like he understood the worry that appeared in Nara's face, "It's late at night, I'm just ... worried. For your safety."

And by that, Nara decided, "No, you're right. I can take the front seat, that's fine with me." I have some training in taekwondo, she almost add.

Keza replied with a nod so faint and they took their feet to the cafe's door.