Their Days of Nights

18 : Friends

Benjamin

"We just need someone to cook these," Kristina says.

And everyone stops moving. Diego even holds his breath.

"Seriously," she says, looking at each present member of our team.

She's sitting in the middle of the row near the side of the kitchen. I'm standing across from them, with my back to the sliding doors.

She gives us a disheartened look and sighs. "I thought the reason why we agreed to bring raw food is that some of you will take care of it," she adds.

Dominic, who's standing to my right, stares at me with a pleading glare.

"What?" I ask.

"I was kind of hoping you would," he says.

I push my head back a little. "Huh?"

Why would he think that?

Kristina's cousin asks, why can't we just have the rice and a bunch of breakfast food they grouped together on the table? Kristina shakes her head and answers to everyone that those are for tomorrow before we leave. And we say nothing more, for we know better than to mess with her planned schedule and organized things.

Belinda stands and grabs the pack of spaghetti noodles. "I can cook these." And she starts reading the instructions.

"I'll do it," Kim, who's sitting in front of Kristina, says with her hand raised as if she's in a classroom. "I'll cook."

Diego breathes out loudly, and Kristina thanks her. Then the two girls who volunteer to do our chores disappear into the kitchen.

"I told you we should've just ordered take-outs," Lee says to Kristina.

"You also complained that five hundred pesos is a bit too much," she quickly snaps back at him.

Nick comes out from somewhere and takes a bag of potato chips. He walks past the table, out of the glass doors, and to the backyard.

Kristina arranges the paper of receipts in front of her, saying aloud each amount, and computes for the total using the calculator on her phone.

"Everyone owes me—"

"Two hundred, ninety-eight pesos, and fifty centavos."

She looks up at me with an eyebrow raised, then down on her phone, and confirms what I just said.

Joshua shifts his position to the side of his chair. "I didn't know you're a math wizard," he says to me, looking wide-eyed with awe.

I shrug at him. Then I lift the bag of powdered iced tea from the table and go to the kitchen.

"...I learned from my brother," Kim is telling Belinda.

I ask them if they need any help, and Kim says they're doing just fine.

"Wait," Belinda turns to me. "How do you two know each other?" she asks with her index finger pointing from Kim to me and back again.

"High school," I reply.

"So, you're classmates?"

"We're..." Kim answers, "yes, and, um, we're friends." She searches my face as if looking for confirmation, so I nod.

"Oh. Okay," Belinda shrugs, but she doesn't sound convinced. Then she checks back the pot of noodles.

Kim's friend Aya emerges from the other side of the door. She heads straight for the refrigerator and stuffs in there some of the packs of food Kristina insisted are for tomorrow. Aya stands next to Kim and asks if she needs any help as I search the cupboards overhead for pitchers.