Chapter 13
Now back from break, well rested and prepared for the second half of the year, everyone got together, having missed the school family just as much as they had missed their blood families while studying.
Upon returning, winter had taken over with a vengeance, and they could hear Taew crying, “Augh, why is it snowing so much! And it’s so cold! I hate this! I wish I was back home.”
“Who was being all romantic and playing like a princess in the snow?” Mark mocked. Taew grumpily hugged herself in her chunky sweater, giving the snowflakes outside a resentful stare.
“I have an idea,” Mario said while writing down notes, quite fed up with her annoying groans, “Why don’t you stop complaining, go outside and dance in the snow and maybe your knight in shining armor that you’re always talking about will find you so beautiful he’ll sweep you away to a tropical island and—HEY!”
“I have an idea. Why don’t you go stand outside and I’ll build a snowman around your stupid face!” she had kicked him under the table.
“Come on please! We need singers!” Beau begged Yaya. She was forming a team to compete in the upcoming singing competition set up by the campus involvement organization.
“Nooo, I can’t sing!” Yaya refused, shaking her head stubbornly.
“Oh please girl, like I haven’t heard you singing Bodyslam’s Dead Clock before, like, you think these walls are that thick?” Beau accused almost viciously in her desperation.
Yaya pouted, never realizing anyone would be listening while she sang harmlessly to herself.
“What?! Yaya bodyslammed a dead clock?” Mario asked, turning around in his chair, with one of his facial expressions worn whenever his ears selectively chose parts of a conversation that made least sense.
“NO.” Beau continued to plead. “Please Yaya! We need at least four people on our team. There’s me, Julie and I convinced Nadech, and you would be forever my favorite person if you do this just this once! Oh! And if you’re really nervous, we can have two of us do a duet! Pleeeeease!”
Yaya scrunched her face, torn between wanting to help her friend and being too shy to perform. “Let me think about it.”
“Fine,” Beau glanced at her cell phone. “Ok, how bout now?” making Yaya laugh and give in.
“Okay, I’ll do it.”
“Oh nice! I owe you one girl, thank you muchos!”
Nadech came up behind her and said, “Don’t get stage fright and freeze in front of the audience.”
She gasped, horrified by the thought, then reached up and rapped his head with her knuckles.
He winced, rubbing the spot. “What was that for?”
“I was knocking on wood.”
His brow creased, “What does that do?”
“When you say something unlucky, you take it back by knocking on wood.”
“Ooh,” he nodded in understanding of this new tradition. Half a minute later, he looked up, offended. “Are you saying my head is made out of wood?” his narrowed eyes on her stifling her laugh.
------
Mario dropped his Caribou coffee cup in the trash can as he was about to leave for class. He saw Taew standing by the door, sighing loudly as the snow continued to pile more and more. Rolling his eyes at her unceasing whining, he strolled up to her.
“Are you going to keep blocking the way?”
She shot him an irritated look before stepping out.
“You totally need to play the ukulele while you’re onstage!” Mai said to Nadech.
“Yeah, you’re getting really good!” Beau added, having listened to him play many times since the semester began.
He shrugged bashfully. “I could try and see if it works with the performance but I still haven't decided on the song. What about you all? Any other instruments you want to add?”
“Do any of you play the guitar?” Kim asked. They shook their heads. “Darn. I was hoping to get someone to teach me how to play.” She smiled. “Isn’t a guy who plays the guitar just so cool?”
Mark stopped twirling his pen and rolled his eyes. “Yes, that’s such a turn on.”
“Shut up.”
“You and Nadech could do the duet with ukuleles,” Yaya suggested to Beau before consulting with their teammate Julie. “Which songs do you want to sing?’
Pope and Om joined them and they discussed enthusiastically about the competition.
Kim was telling Great that as a Christmas gift, her parents had put in some money in her savings for a car. Oh, the excitement of having freedom and her own reliable transportation. “So hopefully by summer I can get my own car!” she grinned with excitement.
“Speaking of which, I was wondering if you would like to take a ride with me tomorrow to the movies.” They still hadn’t made up the two previous unsuccessful dates.
“Shoot,” she frowned, “I’m helping them out with the café tomorrow.”
“How about Thursday?”
“I actually have night class.”
“Saturday I have indoor soccer and work. Come on, there’s gotta be a time that works for both of us.”
“Do you have a lot of homework? If not, we could go Sunday?”
“Hey, that’ll work! Ok, Sunday it is.”
Pope nudged Great. “You see that guy over there?” They sneaked looks at the TV room where, through the glass wall, an Asian guy sat alone, a book open in front of him. Pope continued with an air of trying to impress with mystery, “I heard he’s a super smart guy. Got a full scholarship and transferred from Boston.”
“BOSton?” Mark repeated like that was some fantasy city from Mars. “So is he a first year too?”
“I think so.”
“He looks a bit older,” Yaya noted the facial hair on the mystery guy.
“Maybe.”
“Is he Chinese?”
“Maybe.”
“I’m beginning to suspect how reliable you are as a news source,” Kim said to Pope.
“I’ll handle this,” Mark said. He jumped over a footstool and went into the TV room. They watched as he tried striking up a conversation with the guy. After a minute where they could tell he was having a hard time, they saw him say good bye and come back out. He gave them a fake wipe of sweat.
“So?” Kim asked.
“He makes for a tough crowd. Anyway, his name’s Boy. He is from the east.”
“He said that?”
“Well, when I asked, he didn’t confirm or deny it.” Mark went back to his book, unaware that he had not helped confirm any of his friend’s questions.
------
“Have you seen Mark?” Kim asked Nadech and Mai as they passed by.
“He said he was working on a paper.”
“Ugh, he’s supposed to be helping them move tables in Minerva Hall.” She turned back to Margie. “Ok, so I’ll come get you at two and we’ll go over to prepare for the café,” Kim said. She and Margie parted.
Margie headed towards the science building. Though she was an art major, the university had a liberal arts program that all students had to complete and so she had picked a biology class. She actually found it really interesting, although the first few weeks had focused on population genetics with simple labs.
Reaching the lab room, she found their seats had been rearranged to work with their next team project.
“Margie!” Lily waved her over. “We’re working on our bean lab together!”
As they were waiting for class to start, Lily leaned over and said quietly, “Look, it’s the new guy.” Margie glanced over to see the guy that Yaya had pointed out to her earlier that week—the transfer student. “He’s kind of cute,” Lily said. “Like the brooding and mysterious type.”
Margie spared her a smile and another quick look at Boy before tuning in on the instructor.
------
“Hey, they’re expecting a snow storm and classes might be canceled on Monday,” Mario said.
“What are you wearing, O?” Kim inquired, taking in his orange and green scarf, red jeans and grey cardigan.
“Uh, clothes?” he said dully. “Anyway, as I was saying, since we might possibly highly likely have a snow day, I was planning on having a cook-out in the lounge Sunday night…well more like a cook-IN,” he corrected, “you know? So what do you guys think?”
“Depends,” Mai said, “who’s doing the cooking?”
“Me,” Mario announced proudly. He caught Taew’s look of contempt and made a face at her. “I CAN cook. And Margie will help me. And you guys too.”
“Sounds like fun!” Mai said. “Has anyone seen Mark? He has my calculator.”
“Here, use mine,” Om handed his over. She reached over and he grabbed onto her hand. They playfully fought, interlinked their fingers, and pulled for a moment. He scooted closer so they lied side by side on their stomachs.
“…and deviled eggs, and cheesecake and brownies,” Mario was reciting his menu to Kim.
“Are you sure you can handle all that?” she asked, "we don’t want our kitchen to be set on fire."
He ignored her. “And even if there isn’t a snow day,” Mario continued, “I’m still cooking so you all better be there to eat everything.”
“
I can’t. Great and I are going out.”
“But it’s going to snow
really hard,” Mario said as if his word was the word of Mother Nature.
“We’ll see,” she replied optimistically.
He made her a face. “Well it’s not like you’ll be out ALL night, so afterwards, you can still join us.”
------
Saturday. Mario held up two hats. One was black and green, a University hat, and the other was orange with a blue pom pom ball on its tip that hung down by his ear when he put it on.
“Mark, which do you think—“ He was surprised to find that Mark’s bed was empty. Surprising, seeing as Mark usually slept in till noon on weekends. Opting for the latter, he grabbed his keys and headed out to work.
Out in the parking lot, he shuffled through the snow towards his car and he had almost reached it when he realized another person was present. Taew caught sight of him at the same moment but as usual, didn’t greet him. She got in her car and set her coffee in her cup holder before driving off.
Five hours later, Mario stepped out of Chapter Zero, fixing his hat securely over his head. He got in his car and drove down the block, where another car was pulling away from its parking spot. It was Taew, but his mind was on the food he was going to cook tomorrow night, so he had no time to notice and feel impatient or anything much.
Snow was already rushing in flurries down, obscuring his vision now and then. He reached Autumn Avenue and was held up by a red light. When he could finally move forward, his attention was stolen by a car that seemed stranded ahead, lights flashing. About to pass it, Mario did a double take, seeing Taew outside of the car on her phone. He parked in front of her.
“…yes, please be here as soon as possible. Thank you.” Taew sighed huffily, closing her eyes in frustration for a second. “Cannot believe this…”
“What happened?”
She looked up to see Mario huddling by himself near her. “I don’t know. Something happened to my car…”
He grimaced in sympathy. “Will the tow truck be here soon?”
“Yeah.”
“I’ll wait with you.”
Very much taken aback as they had only exercised a restrained politeness with one another before this, she said, “Uh, you don’t have to.”
“Nah, it’s ok. I’m not in a rush. Oh, you wanna go wait in my car? It’s freezing out here.”
“No, I’m fine out here.”
He raised a brow at her. It was cold enough to freeze their breaths in midair, but she was still going to be stubborn? “Suit yourself.”
She expected to him to drive back to campus, but instead, his car didn’t move.
After what felt like an eternity with frozen ears, Taew was about to give in, but just then, Mario got back out again.
“Look, will you just get in so I don’t have to feel guilty about leaving you out there to get frostbite? Sheesh,” he rolled his eyes.
She tried to snobbishly stay still, but her teeth were chattering, so she was forced to stomp over and climb in Mario’s car. She was surprised to see how clean the interior was, with hardly a tissue or candy wrapper in sight. And she was definitely appreciating the heater he had running.
“How long do you reckon they’ll take?”
“I don’t know.” Just as she said this, the tow truck arrived.
After everything got cleared up and her car was taken to get fixed, she turned and saw Mario on his phone. He got off.
“Everything good?”
“I hope so. Ugh, my dad’s going to be so mad.”
“Well, let’s get going.”
She hesitated, as if riding with him would be agony, but really had no choice.
“Wait, where are we going?” she noticed they weren’t heading towards campus.
“To the grocery store.”
“What? Why?”
“I have to get all the ingredients for tomorrow night.”
She shook her head. “Why couldn’t you have told me earlier?”
“Why, so you could walk back to campus?” he snorted.
She scoffed. “I have a lot of stuff to do.”
“Well so do I and it’ll take too long dropping you off and driving back.”
“This better not take too long.”
“Hmm…” Mario held up two lemons in each hand, their perfect sun-bright skins gleaming. “Hm…”
“Will you hurry up?”
He shot Taew a sharp look. “I’m trying to pick the best quality. Just be quiet.”
“Ugh,” she muttered under her breath, patience wearing thin, as she followed him and the cart he was pushing through WalMart. They moved on and got two dozen eggs and some baking ingredients. Moving through the aisles, Taew grew more and more impatient.
“Organic? Or natural?” Mario wondered out loud, cocking his head in question at the varieties of cheese displayed before him.
“They’re the same.”
“Yeah, and you would know because you’ve worked at Sargento Foods before.”
“Why are you so picky? We’re wasting time.”
“Here, you can help me.” He handed over a list.
“Wha—“ she took the list and muttered, “Fine.” He was taking far longer than necessary and she couldn’t decide if he was doing it on purpose to tick her off or not and she was also trying to decide if she should be telling him off more even though he’d helped her.
Mario finally chose his cheese, got some juice and turned back to his cart that was suddenly much fuller than before.
“There. Done.”
He hesitantly picked up one of the items. “You could have gotten Hershey’s. Why’d you get Giradhelli?”
“It’s on the list,” she said.
“No,
chocolate is on the list, which does not mean I want the most expensive one! Oh god,” he looked at everything else she had brought. “Don’t tell me you went around and just picked the most expensive stuff.”
“Well, aren’t those better quality?”
He gaped at her briefly before palming his face. “…rich kids…” he shook his head before wheeling his cart away.
“What are you doing?!” she was outraged that he was returning everything when she had taken her time getting it all.
“Not everyone’s bank accounts are limitless, ok?” He peered around. “Eh, forget it,” he shoved a bag of sugar into the pepper shelf when unable to locate the exact pile.
“Damn it O, will you just hurry up?”
“Yeah, you’re really speeding things up. You need lessons in poor college student grocery shopping.”
Taew was admittedly quite privileged and did not have to worry much about a limited budget. However, it was a blow to her pride that she could appear excessive or spoiled to others, so she paid closer attention as Mario went around to finish his shopping.
------A/N
@Tubbytinker: Glad you enjoyed!
The transfer guy
(images credited to owners)
