Chapter 03

Seems like barging inside my room has started becoming his habit. Again, he barged inside my room so early on Sunday morning. So, he really did come but why so early? Never in my life have I thought that this popular guy would barge inside my room someday.

"What happened to your room?! I just cleaned this yesterday and now, it's so messy again?!" He said in an annoyed voice. I threw my pillow on him and buried myself under the blanket.

"Shut up and get out! How did you open my door, anyway? I made sure to lock it last night!" I said. I felt him tugging my blanket. Seems like he's trying to remove it from me.

"I have my ways. Now, shut up and get up! You still need to learn how to bake cookies for tomorrow. Your grade is my grade, that's why from now on, you should care about your grades," he said.

"It's too early! Five more minutes! I'm still sleepy!" I said, groaning in frustration.

"Do you really think that one thirty in the afternoon is still early? Come on! Get up! It's late! What time did you sleep last night, anyway?" He said, still trying to pull the blanket away from me.

"Shut up! It's none of your business! Just go! I'll just do self studying! Leave me alone!" I said.

"As if you'll really do that. And I doubt you'll learn on your own," he said.

This guy won't give up that's why in the end, I got up and scratched my eyes to make my sight visible. Well, my sight wasn't really clear since I have poor eyesight. I still need to wear my eyeglass to be able to see clearly.

"Fine! I'll get up! Could you hand me over my eyeglass? I couldn't see clearly" I said and even though my vision was blurry, I could tell that he was just staring at me.

"Hey! Haven't you heard me?" I repeated, snapping my finger in front of his eyes.

"O-oh, sorry. Sorry...it's just that...I kind of. Ugh, never mind" he said and finally handed me my eyeglass. After wearing my eyeglasses, he sat next to me and said, "Have you ever thought of wearing contact lenses?" He asked. "I mean, well...you looked nicer without your eyeglasses."

"No. I don't want to wear contact lenses, you know?" I said, combing my curly hair using my fingers.

"I know I already said this before but I'm gonna say it again anyway. Why don't you try straightening your hair? I think it looks good on you," he suggested.

"And I know that I already told you this but I'm gonna say it again anyway. Stop telling me what to do and mind your own business, alright? Jeez," I said, getting on my feet.

I looked at him and said, "Now, get out because I'm gonna change."

He got into his feet and began walking out of my room. "Sheesh, you just woke up and you're already grumpy. And I was just trying to help, you know?"

"I never asked for your help," I said and shut the door as soon as he got out. I leaned my back on the door and took a heaved sigh.

Suddenly, what he just told me popped up inside my mind. I wonder if it's true that I look better if I don't wear my eyeglasses.

I'm pretty in my own way and I don't care about other people's comments about me. Well, since when did I care, anyway?

After checking myself in front of the mirror, I went inside the bathroom and washed myself then after that, I wore random clothes. Whatever clothes I grabbed first inside my wardrobe, that's what I wore. And what I grabbed was a simple plain white duster. You know, a light loose clothing. Not the original coat type duster.

The duster I wore was like a dress. Of course, I had a cycling short inside. I put my curly hair into a pig tail and when I'm all set, I went downstairs to start learning how to bake for tomorrow's activity. If only Johnson wasn't persistent and irritating, I'm not really going to study baking. I have zero interest in baking. Oh well, it's better to get over it.

While I was walking downstairs, I overheard my name being mentioned so I hid behind the wall wherein they couldn't see me and listened to their conversation.

"Why do I feel like you really didn't teach Beauty yesterday on purpose? Are you tutoring her as an excuse so that you could hang out with her?" Lovely asked.

What was she talking about? My sister's crazy imagination is working again. And it's embarrassing!

"What are you talking about? Of course not!" I heard Johnson answer.

"Then why didn't you teach her yesterday? Instead, you took her out on a date? Wasn't teaching her more important than that?" my sister stated.

Eavesdropping wasn't my style because I know that eavesdropping is wrong. It's wrong to listen to other people's conversations. But I was too curious so I did it anyway. Eavesdropping, I mean. Hey! I was just curious, that's all!

I really didn't expect that his answer would be, "Making her happy is more important than teaching her, you know?" When he realized what he just said, he quickly added, "I-I mean...well, I think it's much better to make her happy first before teaching her how to bake because...ugh. I-I couldn't explain..." he stopped talking because my sister laughed. What's funny? I don't think something's funny.

"Even though she doesn't want to be your friend and even though she keeps on pushing you away?" my sister asked.

"I-I just want to see her happy. Well, it would be nice if she accepts me as a friend. Am I really that annoying?" I heard him say.

So...wait, was he trying to make me happy? But why? I don't need someone to make me happy. I don't need his effort. I'm better off alone, alright?

"But why? Why would you make an effort to make a girl who keeps on pushing you away happy?" my sister asked. Okay so now, I'll finally know the answer to my question. Finally!

"I don't know. It just feels like . . . I need to make her happy. You know, it feels like . . . I don't know. I just want to make her happy, that's all. Her eyes . . . it's full of sadness. I could see it." I heard him saying in almost a whisper.

"Aw, the school's heartthrob here likes my sister." my crazy sister sang, making my face palmed. That's not a basis of knowing if someone likes someone, right? My sister doesn't know what she's saying.

"What? No! I don't like her that way, you know? I already like someone else. Jeez" he said.

"And now, you disappointed me." my sister said, acting disappointed. Before she said something more embarrassing, I decided to show myself and acted like I just really came down.

"Hey," I called and as soon as I caught their attention, they looked at me and Johnson got into his feet.

"Finally, you're here. What took you so long?" Johnson said as he walked towards me.

"I didn't take so long. It was just your imagination" I said. "Come on, let's start baking." I continued and then grabbed his wrist, pulling him with me towards the kitchen.

When we got there, I asked him if he brought the ingredients with him. I remembered him telling me last night that he's going to bring ingredients. That's why I was expecting that there are ingredients. And there really are ingredients prepared. It was on the dining table. That's good then! At least, we could start baking.

He then began giving me instructions and showed me how to bake cookies. At first, our baking tutorial went well. It was going on smoothly until I accidentally dropped three eggs because of my clumsiness.

"Oops! I-I'm sorry. I didn't mean it" I said and grabbed a towel to wipe the egg away from the floor.

"Let me help you," he said and grabbed another towel. We crouched to reach the floor's level and began wiping.

"Jeez, this is such a waste. Why am I so clumsy?" I muttered angrily at myself while wiping the floor. Why am I so clumsy? I heaved out a sigh at that thought. Suddenly, I heard him calling my name and as soon as I looked at him, he placed the yolk of the egg from the floor on my eyeglass! And what's annoying was he just laughed!

Of course, I took revenge. Standing up, I grabbed the bowl filled with chocolate syrup and spilled on his head which made him cursed. So, it's now my turn to laugh at him.

Of course, he took revenge too. He stood up and spilled the flour on my hair which made me gasp! So we ended up throwing flour, egg and chocolate syrup to one another. At first, we were pissed but then, I just found myself laughing along with him.

Suddenly, I feel like considering becoming his friend. But I'm still kind of scared of becoming friends with a popular person. I wonder what would happen if we became friends? Or maybe, we could become friends without letting other people know. Yes, that's it. I'm going to befriend him but I'm not going to tell or show other people that we're friends.

I don't know what's gotten into me but I suddenly pulled him into a hug which got him in surprise and whispered, "Thank you. Thank you very much, NJ"

"What did you just call me?" he asked. I pulled away and looked at him shyly.

"Don't you want me to call you that? W-Well, I don't know. It's just that . . . um, I wanted to call you NJ because no one's calling you that. I want to be . . . you know, unique. NJ is short for your name and surname" I said shyly. "B-But if you don't like it, I'll just call you Johnson or . . . um, Nicholas."

He shook his head and smiled. "No. I don't mind. Call me NJ if that's what you want. Then, i'll call you BS"

I groaned and said, "I prefer Dork than BS. I hate it, okay? Anything but that" he laughed but agreed not to call me BS. So now, he ended up calling me 'dork', instead. No one's calling me that.

"S-So, does that mean that you're accepting me as your friend?" he asked, trying to stop his smile but failed. Jeez, his happiness comes very easily.

"Don't be too happy. I agreed to be your friend. However, I-I don't want other people to know that we're friends so as much as possible, try to avoid me when we're in school." I told him frankly. His smile disappeared and he looked disappointed.

"Why not? Why don't you want to let everyone know that we're friends?" he asked.

"You and I both know what kind of thinking the people in school have, right? For them, nobody being friends with a popular one is not right." I said, sighing. "Talk about discrimination."

"So what you want was for us to act like we're not friends or like, we're strangers to each other?" he asked and I nodded.

"No way! I don't want to hide our friendship, you know? I'll . . . I'll protect you so you don't have to be scared." he insisted.

I shook my head and said, "No. You don't understand."

"Yeah, I really don't understand. I don't understand why you're so scared. I don't understand why you don't want other people to see that you could be friends with someone and I don't understand why you always say that you don't care. It's like, you don't care about anything at all." he said seriously.

"Why do you want to show other people that we're friends? What's the point?" I asked, ignoring her statement.

"You know what? Never mind." he said. "It's better if we stop discussing this. I don't want us to fight, alright? If that's what you want, fine" he then continued but now, he was smiling at me. "What's important is that you finally accepted me as your friend."