Alive If

Dear I Forgot I Had You In The Future,

Blue. It's the color that greets my eyes as I wake up from my three-hour sleep. I feel groggy. I wouldn't have opened my eyes this early if it wasn't my first day of college. I clumsily walk to the kitchen to get my daily dose of Vitamin C. I giggle, knowing that changing what I call my coffee makes my mom worry less about me. I need to get up early because my morning routine takes two hours. I like to treat it as an elegant ceremony.

As the drops of water from the shower hit the back of my head, I stare down at the tiled floor contemplating why I enrolled as a chemistry student. I'm not even good at calculus and now I have 3 classes. Goodness, maybe this is the suicide mission that would finally end me. I laugh at the thought but for now, I want the "introduce yourself" part to be successful. It's funny, I can feel all the butterflies in my stomach escaping from all these weird thoughts.

Since it's 28 degrees Celsius outside, I should wear something that says I don't want to stand out on my first day. A white shirt tucked in my high-waisted jeans partnered with my black high-cut Converse shoes. I always catch myself singing the line "Venus in Converse" from the song Cruel by Snakehips.

As I scramble through the things that I threw in the bag the night before, I see the note that my mom left me on the dining table.

FIE,

I'm sorry. I won't be home tonight. Marites wants me to cover for her in the canteen and she said she will pay me double for the trouble. I will buy you another cake when I get back. Happy Birthday!

LOVE,

MOM

I open the fridge and there is a small round Ube cake in it. MY FAVORITE! She's a very busy single mother and I'm grateful that even though she's not perfect, she really shows that she is trying and I love that about her. Honestly, it's not the first time that I would spend my birthday on my own. In fact, the apartment feels like a dorm since it's mostly just me who does everything.

The convenient thing about living in a city is that any destination is within walking distance. The traffic in my city however is a different story. It is so bad that on a jeepney ride, I can sleep on the way to the university but on foot, I can get there in 15 minutes.

Thankfully the Gods must have seen my struggle for I have arrived just in time for the welcoming remarks of the President of the University. I've got a split-second idea of running through the gate but I suddenly feel someone pull my sleeve. I turn to look at this interfering stranger, to my surprise is a kid who I estimate is less than 12 years old. She looks at me without fear, her eyes look like one step away from making a scene and that makes me freeze in place.

"Ms. Sofie Vila, I'm your daughter from the future." She said with all seriousness. From the tone of her voice, she doesn't seem like she was joking. How did she know my name? I have been warned about weird people lurking outside the university, waiting for a new student to trick. I want to panic because she knows my name and I'm not wearing anything that has my identity plastered on it. I'm not falling for this so I remove her hand by force from my sleeve.

"Get lost, kid." I sneer.

"Wait." The little girl stops me. She carefully places a folded piece of paper in my hand.

"I know that you don't believe me but please open it when the day ends." She pleads.

"What? Why?" I think she's trying to put me under a hypnotic trance but a round of applause snaps me out of it. The speech is over and everyone is going up the buildings, heading to their assigned rooms. I'm starting to freak out.

"Okay fine, happy now?" I said, shoving the damn paper into the right pocket of my jeans. I want to ask a few more questions but when I look at her again, she isn't there anymore. Man, she must be a fast runner. Oh well, this could also be my chance to showcase my running abilities. Lucky for me, I managed to find my classroom on my mini field trip to school a week ago so it buys me a lot of time to pick a better route.

As I enter the classroom, I notice that only 6 people are in it. I know Chemistry is a hard course but IS IT THAT HARD? Maybe the rest of the class is still lost so I have plenty of time to compose myself and prepare for anything that could happen. I scan the room, there are not a lot of chairs to choose from and the existing ones are not in a very good state. The board looks newly painted though but the windows look like they have not seen a window cleaner in years. I always call dibs on the seat close to but not along the aisle, because I love how the seat is close enough to the board that I can see what my professor is writing and its location is somehow not in his direct vision so I would have a very low possibility of being called for a surprise recitation.

One by one, the students start filling in the empty seats. It is shocking that there are a lot of guys taking this course because I have been told that the population tends to be 80% female. I'm starting to feel the urge to overthink so to distract myself, I should befriend the people next to me. I am no queen of small talk so I hope they don't feel my desperation so much.

"Hey, I'm Fie..." A few of them already knew each other, it is evident by the way my seatmate ditches me mid-sentence when her friend enters the room. HOW RUDE! I may have said that a bit loud. The guy in front of me notices my reaction and he immediately transfers to the seat that she left. He bows his head down a bit and chuckles.

"Hi, I'm Kai Angeles. I can't help but notice your painful efforts in the introduction and it's a shame for it to go to waste." He smiles cheekily.

I can't help but blush. This is humiliating. Somebody bury me. He looks at me and continues to chuckle.

"You know, I'm actually just a station away from here. I arrived late because the train suddenly had an emergency stop before it could leave for the next station. What do you think happened?"He pauses and stares at me like he is waiting for me to reply.

"Uhm... Somebody got hurt?" I guess.

"Close. Someone took a nap on the train and almost missed his station. In a panic, he pressed the emergency button discreetly to open the doors and stop the train. And that selfish someone is me." He looks at me with very guilty eyes and a contradicting smile.

"Seriously? You really did that?" I want to know what happens next.

"Yeah. I wasn't as discreet as I thought so the other people on the train ratted me out. They were pissed." He laughs. "The guards in the station also didn't let me off the hook so they scolded me and banned me for life."

"What?" I shriek.

"Nah, I'm just kidding. I told them the sob story on why I took a nap and they gave me a warning. Haha, I'm still free to ride on the train once more." He starts acting like a Shakespearean theater actor. I couldn't control myself from laughing. Where did he get this much confidence?

"Now that's what I like to see in my audience." He points his hand to my very red face.

"I can't help it. You really have a contagious smile." I try catching my breath but his face turning tomato red is making it hard for me.

"Good morning, class." The first professor of the day suddenly enters the room, making us lose our moment.

Hours of introducing yourself in 3 different subjects and a surprise quiz on grammar later, It feels like I have been drained of my energy juices. I am just so tired that I want to go straight home. Surprisingly, Kai also feels the same way. Oh, this is going to be the start of a beautiful friendship.

By the time I got home, it was already dark. I pull my journal from under my desk and I write the events that happened in school today. l have been documenting my life since the first grade so this is mandatory. Doing this helped me a lot growing up because I tend to forget a lot of things.

I don't want to leave a single significant detail out of this forgiving day. After standing up, I notice how my arm's sweat has marked the brown table. I think I need to take a shower again. I unzip my jeans and let them slide down my thighs but a piece of paper that fell on the floor stops me. I forgot I had it in my pocket. Since it's the end of the day, I think I should open it. I don't think this piece of paper contains explosives or anything detrimental. What's the worst that could happen? I slowly unfolded it to relieve my curiosity. The paper feels familiar though like it's infused with nostalgia. I think I had one of these but this one feels a bit worn out and it looks like it's been torn out of a notebook. I read the letter out loud.

"Dear Fie..." Those words are the only thing that I could utter since I already recognize who this note belongs to.