Tangerine

matcha bread

I woke up groggily as the Saturday morning light filtered in through my thin white curtains, draped prettily over my window. Over the past few days, I learned a lot about Elijah, and his secret snark and humor and I felt pretty ready to tackle the project on Monday. However, what disturbed me the most was how much I replayed the time I spent with Elijah over and over in my head, almost obsessively and his charming smile that came out once in a while didn't help me at ALL. Which led me to ponder, Is he single? Which obviously could not be possible because he was funny, absurdly handsome, and was just as caring as Jay. Wait, what!?! When did that come out? Of course Jay is more caring AND he's the one I like...not the other way around. I thought to  myself rather forcefully. Wait, actually it might not be such a bad idea for me to give up on Jay anyway. Especially now that ...Si-Sia is here. Sighing, I cuddled and buried my head deep into my warm and rather cool comforters, relishing the one morning in the week where I didn't have to wake up early. Sunday, I always went over to the local bookstore or senior center to read books to children or elders at the break of dawn. Then, suddenly as I began drifting off to the enticing realm of sleep, a sharp and screechy noise jolted me awake. Confused and drowsy, I rolled my sleep ridden body over to the nightstand and picked up my phone with a sigh. Incoming call. With another sigh, I gently scooted my body into a sitting position and cleared my throat before accepting the call with a cheery hi, like I had three cups of coffee already and has been already awake for four hours instead of just rolling out of bed. 

"Is this Alina?" There was no mistaking who was at the other end. Sia's lilting and soft voice floated out into the empty room as I stared at the phone in shock. Quickly I gathered myself and myself to be as cheery as possible when I responded.

"Oh!! yes, it's me, is this Sia?"

"Yea! I was wondering if- Hey Jay stop!" I hear Sia giggle, as my ears strain to hear another voice that was slightly muffled, as Sia laughed softly at whatever he said.

"For the photography assignment, do you want to do a little double date?" Sia finally gets out, between fits of laughter.

"Uh- you mean between me and Elijah?" I try to keep the green monster of envy inside of me as I hear Jay mutter something else that makes both him and her laugh. I couldn't help but feel like the only reason they called me was to show me how happy they were together. 

"Oh no silly! I mean as friends of course, I mean that's what you and Elijah are, right? Although for me and Jay...." Sia says in her deceptively sweet voice. And what in the world does she mean?!!

"Well, actually, me and Elijah are like-realLy close friends, if you get what I'm talking about," I say smugly, letting the news sink into Jay and Sia's ears while also slapping myself in the face att the voice crack. But my satisfaction only lasted a few seconds before panic settled in at the news I just shared.

"Omesygosh , really?! thats so great~~" 

"Yea good for you Alina," Suddenly, I hear Jay's deep voice on the other end of the phone. I couldn't tell from his voice whether he felt genuinely happy or jealous for me. My heart constricted as I heard his voice congratulating me genuinely. Suddenly, I felt like the walls in my heart built up as warm tears began to form behind my eyes. My mind didn't understand why I was crying, but somewhere in my heart, it understood. A singular tear trickled down my face, as more threatened to spill out. I didn't realize it went silent on both sides until Jay spoke again. 

"Alina?- I mean we don't have to do it, if you don't want to-" His concerned and warm as honey voice spoke through the phone.

"HUH, oh NOO NO NO, it's no problem, I'll text you any details- details or something and yea-" Just as my voice began to crack and sniffles ensued, I frantically hung up.