When I got home, I flung my bookbag on the nearest chair. My textbook I set down gently on the table, looking down at the thick parchment that hung slightly out of it. I tried not to think about the gift the entire time I was driving home, but it was near impossible.
My heart rammed in my chest, knowing that the man across the way at the bar had noticed me. Victor. That was the name inscribed on the back of the bookmark he had given me. That gorgeous black-haired, dark-eyed, pale man's name was Victor. And he had noticed me. I bit my lip as I recounted all the times he left just before I was about to speak to him.
I shook my head, looking down at the sheet of paper poking out of my textbook. I pulled it gently from its place between the pages.
The calligraphy was beautiful, a past refinery long forgotten by men who wrote love letters to women centuries ago. I had no idea what it said or what language it was written in. I stifled my curiosity, deciding that I didn't want to know. If I found out it was something horrible, I would be crushed. Better to remain ignorant than to be humiliated. My head fell down as I held the object in my hand.
When I was little, my mother had given me a bookmark for every major holiday. When she died, I refused to pick up a bookmark ever again. Every single one she had given me, I buried in a box in our backyard. This gift was a reminder of her.
I set the thin sheet down on the coffee table in the living room and made my way through the empty house.
There was no one here to greet me anymore. No more dad cooking in the kitchen while my mom kissed me in greeting when I got home from school. No. Now it was just empty.
Leaning against the kitchen counter, I sighed. This was my reality now. An empty house devoid of company. Trying to get a girlfriend to fill it was useless. I didn't really want one. I just wanted not to be alone. For a while, Jenna stayed over with me, but then she started dating Clark. It was game over from then on. The house was empty. I was alone.
A sound rattled from the back door, startling me. Walking to see what it was, I found that no one was there. There's never anyone here. I swear my house is viewed as cursed. Ever since my parents died, hardly anyone has come to visit. The first year my teachers pitied me. They tried to let me slide on my work, but I refused. Instead, I worked harder than ever. I even got top honors in my class. Valedictorian. It didn't help me fill the void.
Opening the back door, I looked out into the night. A raccoon ran across the back steps and into the house to ask for cat food. I smiled and went about feeding him. As I carried the tray back outside, I felt eyes on me again. And though I felt like I was being spied on, I could not spot anyone in the bushes.
I poured the cat kibble into the metal bowl and watched the little raccoon start to eat along with all his furry friends. Then, hurriedly I strode back into the house before they all followed me. While they were cute, they were also sometimes pests. I thought I saw a shadow pass my vision as I entered the kitchen, but upon further inspection, nothing was there.
I shook my head and began to prepare dinner, my head in the clouds thinking about the gift that sat atop the wooden coffee table in the front room. Perhaps the man, Victor, was just being cordial. Surely he didn't mean anything by it?
A breeze passed my face as I cooked. I fell deeper into thought. I hadn't expected the man who sat across from me to give me a gift, let alone notice me. The bookmark was too much. I would not have been so dizzy about it if it had been store-bought, but it was handmade. I couldn't get over the excellent penmanship. The way the letters curved, the intricate details of the roses blooming around them. One day, I would have to force myself to figure out what language the text was written in.
I spooned rice into a bowl along with pan-fried tofu and freezer vegetables. I was too poor to afford meat. I sighed, wondering if I would ever be able to get up the courage to talk to him. The gift obviously meant something. Perhaps I could use it as a way to strike up a conversation with him.
In my mind, I attempted to fabricate what talking to him would even be like. The man seemed so sure of himself, always brimming with a sharp-toothed smile, with eyes that twinkled in the dim light of the bar as he worked his hand from a woman's arm to her face. More than once, I had caught myself watching that gesture of his all too closely, wondering what it felt like to have his gloved hand pressed against their skin.
No one ever wore gloves anymore, but this guy, Victor, wore them all the time. I have never seen him without them. It seemed to have a profound effect on women.
I let out a groan as I eased onto the brown sofa, bowl of food in hand, staring at the dark television screen in front of me. I didn't want to watch tv. I didn't want to hear any sound other than my own chewing, the heater in the house going on and off, the refrigerator running, the pipes knocking against the walls pretending to be the ghost of my dead parents. So, I sat, as I do every night, listening to the sounds of the house, the scratching of the raccoons outside as they clawed the walls, asking for more food as I ate mine. I sat in silence, pretending that everything was alright. That my parents were still alive and that they were only just sleeping upstairs.
After dinner, I headed upstairs to get a shower. Before I did, I quickly snatched the bookmark the man had given me. I took it with me upstairs, placing it on my bed before making my way to the shower. I shook my head again in disbelief. What did it all mean? If I was brave, I could find out by next Friday. I might even look better by then, with Jenna's help. We are planning to go going shopping tomorrow after all.
I should call off. I really don't want to go.
As I thought this, I turned the water in the shower on, removed my clothes, and let the water run over me. Letting it pelt down on my head.
It seemed hopeless to even think that I could become someone I wasn't. What use was it to change my clothes? What good would it do to dress nicer when no one would even notice? It wouldn't get me a girlfriend, and it certainly wouldn't help my chances of being confident enough to approach the man named Victor.
The more I thought about how he smiled at me, the more embarrassed I became. Perhaps the gift wasn't a gift at all, but a 'I see you watching me. Here's something so you'll just go away'. My stomach churned, the food not settling well in it.
***
I found it hard to sleep at night. Victor's face constantly running through my mind as I tossed back and forth. His eyes looked different in my dream world than I remembered. There was something odd about the way that the light reflected off of them. His smile also threw me off. His teeth were too perfect and white. It seemed that he snickered when he smiled, only half of his mouth open at any given time. The only thing that remained the same about him was how charmingly handsome he was as he winked at me over and over again.
I woke with a start, my phone ringing off the hook. Four missed calls. Jenna.
I checked the time. Ten a.m. I had slept in. Rolling out of bed, I clamored down the stairs to the front door. A brief look at the slew of text messages told me she'd been waiting outside for over an hour.
As I opened the door for her, Jenna barreled inside, first hugging me tightly, then telling me everything she had planned for the day. First breakfast, then shopping, and then we would get boba at her favorite tea shop.
"Is Clark coming?" I asked, raking my hands through my tangled hair. The blonde waves of it stuck in my fingers. I gave up trying to detangle it. There was no way my fingers were going get through it.
Jenna put her hands on her hips, "Um, didn't you listen to me last night? I said he wasn't invited. This is our day together. Just you and me. Without him."
"Alright," I said. I tried to smile, but it came out as a grimace instead. Jenna moved toward me, patting me gently on the shoulder before grabbing my hand and pulling me into the kitchen.
As she wandered around the space for a frying pan, she set down the bag of groceries that she carried in. Now that her hands weren't full, I saw her clearly. She wore a bright aqua crop top and dark, high-waisted skinny jeans. The color of the shirt did wonders for her complexion, bringing most of my attention to her face. My gaze roamed over the soft shape of her eyebrows as they knitted together concernedly as she cracked eggs over the stove. Every now and then, she tossed her long braids over her shoulder, looking annoyed that they kept falling over her front as she cooked.
I walked to stand beside her, filled the coffee pot with grounds and water, pressed brew. I watched her as she cooked and bantered on. "I mean, seriously, you and I have not had an alone day together since I have started dating Clark. I love the guy and all, but you're my best friend, Phillip. I still can't help thinking that I am at fault for not being around when you needed me most. If I had," she looked over at me, pointing the spatula at me, "maybe you wouldn't have ended up like this." She moved the cooking instrument disapprovingly over my nightclothes.
The sweatpants were old and wearing out at the seams, the long-sleeved shirt that I wore as a top was not much better, threadbare more in the chest than anywhere else.
"What's wrong with what I wear," I said, knowing full well that there was a huge problem with it. My clothes were the reason people avoided me.
Jenna glared at me, her big brown eyes squinting disapprovingly at me.
***
Hours later, we arrived at the local mall. I felt squeamish and not at all comfortable as I followed Jenna around various department stores. At first, I thought that she would try and dress me like Clark in dark wash skinny jeans and button-down shirts, with a leather jacket. But it seemed that Jenna had an idea of what I would like to wear if I wasn't constantly dressed in my father's clothes.
She grabbed multiple knitted wool sweaters, nice t-shirts, and dark wash relaxed fit pants. All these she made me try on, which I did reluctantly.
One glance at myself in the mirror was enough to make me tremble. I looked nice. Like someone girls would actually approach if my hair were brushed and I wore contacts instead of glasses. I liked the outfits Jenna picked for me a lot. She had a great sense of style and was always wearing something fashionable. More often than not, boys would look her up and down, then take a look at me next to her and grimace. Sometimes they would ask her what she was doing with a deadbeat geek like me. 'You should date a real man, sweetie!' they would shout at her. To which she would flip a bird at them and tell them, 'I am with a real man, asshole!'. This always resulted in the other party calling her a bitch, then Jenna smiling at me and pulling me close to her.
"How's it going in there!" Jenna called out to me from outside the fitting room.
"Alright," I replied.
"Get your cute butt out here and let me see!" Jenna yelled. I winced, knowing that people had to be looking her way. Jenna was anything but quiet. I quietly obeyed and came out of the fitting room. My eyes passed over her face as she took in my appearance.
"You did a good job," I told her.
"You think?" Jenna said in a way that told me, 'I told you so' and then hugged me around my waist. "Aright Phillip, it's settled. You're going home with a new wardrobe. We just need to get you new shoes, socks, and underwear. Lord knows those are probably terrible too." I began to protest, wondering how I would afford it all. My job at the college library shelving and checking out books paid barely enough to get by. "Don't worry about it," she soothed me, patting me on the back. "My parents gave me their credit card. They told me to get you anything you need."
Jenna patted my head gently, running her hands over the tangles of it. She sighed, "My parents miss you, Phillip. You should come over for dinner sometime. Just you, me, and my mom and dad."
"Okay," I agreed. It had been a long time since I'd been over to Jenna's house. Our sleepovers stopped when she started dating Clark. So had the brief reprieve of leaving my empty house.
"C'mon," Jenna grabbed me by my hand and led me back to the changing room. "Get changed. We'll get the rest of the stuff you need and then boba!"
For the first time all day, I grinned at her. Jenna's love for boba was unrivaled. I don't even think a man would be able to take the place of it. To her, boba also required eating ramen. It meant a specific tea shop in the middle of China Town where you had to park a block away just to get a parking spot and walk the rest of the way there.
"Sounds good," I said. She hugged me again and let me go.
***
The rest of the day went by without any more shopping. I was both grateful and horrified that her parents were covering the cost of my new clothing. Several hundreds of dollars later, we headed to the boba tea shop with clothes that I didn't know if I could get up the gumption to wear. After we ate, we headed back to my house, where Jenna helped me find room for the new clothes in my closet and dresser. When we were done, we spent the rest of the day on the couch, quietly relaxing.
She laid on my lap until well into the night, the tv turned off, the two of us reminiscing about high school and our first years in college. She talked to me about Clark, her first kiss, her first time having sex. She talked until she was worn out and tired. Then, cuddling into me, she fell asleep, her hands hugging me around my waist, her head pressed into my stomach, her hair falling down gracefully over her shoulders.
Once upon a time, I had thought I liked Jenna that way, but then Clark happened. I figured I would like another girl at some point, but never did. After a while, I figured out that I only loved Jenna as a friend.
As Jenna slept, I thought about the man who had given me the bookmark. The first time I spotted him, he was sitting at the bar by himself. Long dark hair, dark eyes, a face as pale and stone-cold perfect as I'd ever seen. I'd watched his hands move to tuck back a strand of hair that had come loose from his tied-back hair. The man was simply reading a menu, oblivious to everyone around him, a gentle smile on his face as he finally looked up and ordered a drink from the bartender. I'd looked down before he could catch me staring at him. When I looked up again, I saw that he had beckoned a woman over to his side.
I watched him as he wooed her and eventually walked out of the bar with her. I was amazed at how easy it was for him, at how she melted at his touch. My stomach fluttered at the memory.
Every Friday night for the next two months, I'd gone back, wanting to talk to him about how he bagged so many girls. I wanted so badly to get to know him. And now? Now he had given me a gift, and I didn't know what to do.
To say I didn't understand this gesture was an understatement. I felt an odd emotion cropping up inside me that I constantly shoved down, not wanting to even think about what it meant.
Jenna stirred in my lap, breaking me from my thoughts. "Damn, I fell asleep hard. What time is it, Phillip?"
I looked over at the clock on the far wall, "It's ten," I said.
Jenna sat up groggily, "I'm gonna go, okay?"
"Alright," I said. Then, after half an hour, when Jenna was fully awake, she left, hugging me, and kissing me on my cheek.
"I had so much fun today," she said. "I didn't realize how much I missed you."
I smiled at her. She yawned as she pulled away from me.
"I miss you too," I told her.
I walked Jenna to her car and watched her drive away. I stood for a while in my driveway, thinking about the day. About how much she cared about me and how much I miss her. That I wasn't truly alone. That my best friend was only a call away. I sat down on the curb, and buried my head between my hands and knees.