APRICITY... Jan Rozmanowski

Sunflower

Authors note: from now on Polish is written in italic

"Me and my siblings always come here to chill," said Jan as he was stirring his coffee.

We are at a small pastry in the middle of nowhere.

"Wait, how many siblings do you have?" I asked, furrowing my brows.
"Seven," he answered my question. I widened my eyes and almost spit my drink out from the overwhelming information,
"And when will I get to meet them?"
"Tomorrow maybe? Maciej is out of town for some work stuff but other than that they're all here in Warsaw somewhere," he sipped on his latte and took out his phone, scrolling for a bit,
"This is all of us," I looked at the picture, my mouth wide open.
Four girls, four boys and the parents.
Now I understand the need for a huge house.
His family is huge, and I thought my little brother was annoying enough.

Huge respect for the parents.
"You all kind of look alike," I pointed out the obvious.
"Well duh," he chuckled finishing his drink.

We made our way to the checkout.
I took out my card to pay but Jan dodged my hand, getting ahead of me and paying for both of our orders.
Even the cashier laughed.
"I invited you, so I'm going to take care of you," he quietly said as he swiped his card through the machine.
I smirked and quickly pecked his lips when he turned around.

We exited the shop and entered a vintage store after a ten minute walk.

A Lana vinyl was playing as we greeted the woman at the checkout.
She waved at us, mostly looking at Jan.
I glared at her and pulled him between the tall racks full of old clothes.

We explored the whole store one section by one.
Jan had already found a jean jacket and some leather pants with a cool design on them.
In my cart were band T-shirts and two pairs of vintage Levi jeans.

"Sunflower, look at these," I had found a pair of dark red high heels that were exactly my size.
He chuckled at the nickname as he watched me twirl around the tiled floor,
"They're almost as beautiful as you."
I smiled and switched to my normal shoes, adding them to the cart.

After about thirty minutes we were finally done.
The cart was full of our finds.
Needless to say that the shopping was successful.

We pushed the cart to the checkout.
The cashier started getting a little too touchy with Jan.
He was obviously uncomfortable.
She tried handing him her number.
He refused, pulling me close to him and kissing the top of my head.
She stared at me angrily as I nodded, smirking.

He paid and took both of our bags to his left hand while his right found mine.
I could still feel her gaze on the back of head as we stepped out of the building, the bell ringing.

"Omg, are you Jann?!" Exclaimed a girl, running towards us.
"Yes?" Jan responded, clearly confused.
I just stood next to him.
"And you are Julia?! This day couldn't get any better," as expected, I didn't understand a thing she was saying so Jan translated it.
A big smile grew on my face as he finished.
"Can I take a picture with both of you guys?" She asked, taking out her phone and going into the camera app.
"Sure," Jan agreed, putting a hand over on of her shoulders. I took the phone in my left hand and shot a few pictures of us doing the peace sign and pointing at the girl.
"Thank you so much, I'm Aleksandra by the way," I smiled and shook her hand, nodding.
Jan did the same, whispering something.
She laughed and replied sarcastically.

"So, what's the status?" She spoke in an accent, looking mostly at me.
I furrowed my brows and tilted my head to the side, not understanding the question.
Jan chuckled at my reaction and mumbled to himself.
"Dating, no?" She tried clearing up the confusion.
"Ooh," I elongated the O, feeling slightly embarrassed.

She snapped me out of my thoughts, repeating the question.
To answer, Jan took my head in both of his hands and quickly kissed me.
I was left speechless as I angrily stared at him.
The girl was jumping up and down from excitement just like Sophie.
Taking about Sophie, she still doesn't know.
I know, I'm such a bad friend but I just haven't found the right time.
Jan and Aleksandra talked for a few more minutes before we went our ways.

"That was new," I chuckled, still shocked as we walked down the narrow sidewalk back to his house.
"It's weird that people recognise us," he mirrored my expression and hugged me from the side.
We stayed like that, his hand around my waist, for the rest of the walk.

When we arrived it was already 11 pm.
I ate some grapes and then did my night routine.
Jan was already in bed when I entered his childhood room.
I climbed next to him and shut the dim light.

Good night.