Chapter Three

I was grateful that she was kind enough not to put my sad proposal out for everyone to laugh at. But rather gave me a sit in her cozy friend zone, which is even worse than an open rejection.

With these simple words

"No, but I would love to be friends" I was locked in.

The worst thing about the friend zone is that it becomes a constant reminder of what you could have had. But apparently (according to the girl) were not man enough to get it.

It is like having your phone call answered and then instantly put on hold for eternity.

I would get phone calls in the middle of the night like.

"Hey you" and then I would answer back "hey!"

Slightly surprised upon noticing the time.

"What are you doing? Are you free?" She would ask

"Nothing really, I am just in bed. What are you up to?"

then she would lay down the trap.

"Nothing much I just had a bad day and I need some company. Can you come over to my room?"

And just like that the cheese was laid down carefully and the trap was set. I was trapped in her web, unable to say no to her juicy offer.

"Sure, I will be there in 10 minutes"

Then immediately I would drop whatever I was doing, grab my favourite black hoodie, open my food locker and pull out two large packets of Dorito chips and my laptop in the other hand then head out to my execution.

Not so long after, I would be there, she slept in room number fourteen. With Doritos in hand I would knock once on the door then let myself in.

"That was fast" she would say and I would just smile and wave to her the bags of chips in my hands, that always seemed to get her attention.

Then she would jump up and down jump at me hug me and kiss me on the cheek. In the excitement she would say to me

"You are the best, you know, that right?" and again all I could manage was a smile and find myself a spot on the bed.

We would watch some movies, eat the chips while she talked to me all about her day. Most times it would be trouble with her boyfriend and sometimes just general girl drama. Being the good listener that I was, it was such a curse I might add because I was genuinely concerned with her problems.

I always tried to offer solutions or share my opinion. What a gentleman I was, all thanks to my mother for raising such a pure soul.

Eventually she would fall asleep on my shoulder in the middle of something we were watching. For some time, I would just let her sleep watch her peacefully snoozing. Creepy right? No one can tell but that is how it was then.

Later on, after she was well engulfed in her dreamland, I would lay her down carefully, tuck her in and retreat back to my cocoon.

That is how it went and generally I was okay with the whole arrangement until I met her again the next day with her so-called boyfriend walking hand in hand.

That was the worst feeling, like a lightning aimed straight at my heart. And there was nothing I could do about it except look on as they went by and pull out a fake smile as she waved at me on the opposite side of the corridor.

Her boyfriend Mac went to another school. My friends and i used to call him "big Mac" because of his giant like stature.

I had a certain level of envy and respect for the guy. I believe it was mostly because he was living the life I dreamed of. From the girl of my dreams and the BMW M2. Which was more than I could say about myself.

I suspected that he knew about my weird friendship with his girlfriend, but he never actually came to me with it or showed any hint of the knowledge. He must have figured out that I was not much of a threat to him.

Every time I saw Anna and him together, it was my reality check moment, bringing me back from the fantasy world of the night before.

Deep down I would savour the little episodes we would have together and wait for the next time I would become relevant again.

It would be a lie if I say some nights as she rested on my shoulder, I did not harbor dark thoughts of trying my luck one more time. Just one kiss would change it all, maybe that one kiss was how I would finally break the curse that the evil witch put on her. On all these countless occasions I held myself back and managed to keep my emotions in check and settled for that cozy seat in the friend lounge.

All this, because I took the advice from my friends. Not that my friends are to blame because I mainly blame myself for listening and dreaming too much, always trying to get things I can never have. This was my curse.

Just as the saying goes "once beaten twice shy" I had learnt my lesson and was not about to make the same mistake again.

That morning, I had just found my chance for redemption. I had met an Angel and I was going make sure not to fall out of her grace.

"I have to come up with a new strategy" I said to myself.

What exactly I was going to do, was entirely a mystery to be at the time. But something in my gut told me my luck was about to change. This was about to become a story I would live to tell one day in the future.

In all my day dreaming I totally zone out of my body and drifted off into the distance. At the sound of chatter and laughter from the class my soul was pulled back into its shell.

I was back to reality and scanning my surrounding.

Someone must had done or said something funny to get the class off its feet like this. I thought to myself as I looked searched around.

Moments later I managed to piece together that one of the students had apparently given commercial sex workers as an example of his ideal business. And just like that the whole class was up in chants and laughter.

Moments later when the chaos had died down and we were back to business with me now listening attentively. The Professor casually looked at his wrist watch and decided to end the class.

Before walking out of the room, he managed to remind us of our twenty-five pages assignment on business models that was due later that week. At the time I had just done the first five pages with all the errors included. I could not help but feel a little bit of pressure thinking about the pile of assignments I had stacked.