“Oh, he’s the one who lent you a jacket?” Mary teased. With a mischievous smile on her lips, she elbowed Serene. Meanwhile, Serene hoped to evaporate on the spot. Her cheeks burned from the implication she and Mary had been talking about him. Mary’s playful giggles added to Serene’s discomfort.

She rolled her eyes at her friend and gave snuck a fine pinch on her arm quiet her. But Mary seemed tickled by the whole situation. The harder she pinched her arm, the more she giggled. Serene loved Mary like a sister, but at this moment, she wanted to strangle her.

She felt so exposed, and all she wanted was to find a hole to hide in. Her eyes made a clandestine peek at Bryan. She wanted to see how’s he’s taking all this. Serene expected to see ridicule in them, or smugness, but she saw nothing of the sort. The moment their eyes met, Serene felt fireworks explode in her stomach. She could not help but bite her lower lip in embarrassment. The smile he had on his lips conveyed an apology. It looked like he also felt uncomfortable with Mary’s teasing, but could do nothing about it. He shrugged his shoulders and scratched the back of his head.

Joining Mary in making fun of her obvious discomfort was an expected behavior. But he did not behave according to her expectation. He was a complete gentleman and ignored Mary’s cue to tease her. Clearing his throat, he said, “Well, are you two pretty ladies going to join me?”

“Well, come on now, ‘pretty lady’, let’s order food, this guy’s paying,” Mary said as she scooted over to the end of the seat. Serene followed her friend, keeping her eyes down. She sat in front of him.

Mary ordered her heart out. In no time, her orders filled their table. An assortment of fried and greasy food laid in front of them. Serene swallowed at the variety of food on the table. Unlike Mary whose eyes sparkled at the spread she ordered, Serene looked troubled. Deep creases formed on her forehead and her teeth sank on her bottom lip. “How will I eat any of these without looking like a slob?” she contemplated.

“Hey, dig in! They’re all your favorites,” Mary said as she took a big bite of her a juicy cheeseburger. She rolled her eyes at her friend. Of course, these are all her favorites. Her mouth watered at the sight of them. But then they are also not the neatest to eat. The last thing she wanted Bryan to see was her big mouth covered in grease. Serene picked up her cheeseburger and took the daintiest bite she could. She almost tasted nothing of the juicy beef patty.

“What’s wrong, Shen?” Mary asked, looking, her eyes full of concern. “Got toothache or something, babe?”

“No. Why?” Serene asked while she chewed on the minuscule cheeseburger in her mouth. Mary shrugged her shoulder and continued to eat with gusto.

Bryan watched them with amusement. “Relax, Shen. Enjoy your food. No one’s judging,” he said, before picking up a greasy chicken wing and biting it. Sauce smeared on his lips, which he licked with his tongue. He did not bother about looking composed at all. He chomped on his food like Mary, giving no airs about how he looked.

His actions made her feel at ease. She threw away her inhibitions out of the window and ate her food the way she wanted — grease and all.

She did not expect that lunch with him would go without a hitch.

Serene thought that she would embarrass herself by being ditzy, yet the three of them had an enjoyable lunch. They shared food and stories.

Bryan made people feel at ease. He listened to them with genuine interest and gave them his full attention. He laughed whenever she or Mary said something he found amusing. The more Serene sat and listened to him, the more she felt her kicking heart.

There was no untouchable topic to the three of them. They talked about his life abroad, Serene’s pageant stint, sometimes even politics. There was not a subject untouched. Serene sensed his deep understanding of various things from the way he spoke about them. Although he knew a lot of things, he was not an insufferable know-it-all.

Although he would share things about himself, most of the time he would ask questions about her and Mary. It is as if their thoughts are of utmost importance.

After their lunch, he sent them back to the university. He also exchanged contact details with Serene. As expected, Mary teased her to death as soon as he left.

Like their first meeting, he occupied her mind. As she was lying on her bed while she surfed the internet on her phone, a message notification popped on her screen. Seeing Bryan’s name on her screen, her hand lost its grip on the device and it fell flat on her face. Ouch!

“Are you still awake?”

“Yeah.”

“Studying?”

“No, just surfing. You?”

“Thinking of you.”

Serene was so surprised her phone slid off her hand and landed flat on her face once again. Scratching her nose, she kept looking back at the message to make sure that she read it right.

Thinking of you… Thinking of you… He was thinking of me?!? Why?

She felt happy and anxious at the same time. It seemed like today was a day of surprises. Her heart drummed in her chest as her eyes looked at the lighted up screen in front of her.

She has not yet recovered from the elation she felt reading his last message when a phone call came in. She looked dumbly at the caller ID. It’s Bryan.

“Hello?” she tentatively answered, trying so hard to keep her voice as neutral as possible.

“Were you angry?”

“Huh? Why would I be angry?”

“You did not answer my message for quite some time. I thought you were angry”

“I’m not. I just couldn’t believe that you would say that.”

“Why?”

“Well, because I was doing the same thing,” Serene’s voice was almost inaudible when she responded. She chewed on her lips as her self-consciousness engulfed her. Not only were her cheeks red, her entire face burned, even her ears were red.

“Doing what? Say it,” although it was a command, his voice sounded as if he was teasing her, which made her blush even more. Although it was not a video call, she cannot help but turn red up to her ears. She imagined he had his lips stretched to a mischievous smile.

“Thinking of you.”