Loserboy

 “I’m a bit late today so there’s not much food left. I bought you a packet of nasi lemak and a boxed juice. I hope that’s okay.” I placed the food gingerly on the table as it was already filled to the brim with study notes and stationery. Noticing there was absence of her usual smart reply, I looked up to see just the exact moment a teardrop ever so slowly made its way down the nooks and creases of Nadia’s face. She was gripping the book so hard I could see the blue green veins of her hands. 

“Are you seriously crying now? From reading the novel?” She turned to me, biting her lips. Perhaps she’s also pissed that I disturbed her reading.

“You’re a boy, you won’t understand.” She sighed as she carefully placed a bookmark between the pages and put it on the table that we shared. She wiped her eyes dry and opened the small pack of nasi lemak in front of her. 

“If it isn’t because you buy me lunch every day, I would be so mad at you right now.” she meekly said as she started spooning the fragrant rice mixed with sambal into her mouth. I poked the straw of the boxed juice and pushed it at her direction. She nodded approvingly.

“I wouldn’t have to do this if I lost the game. Should’ve known that I still got a long way to even be on par with you,” I smiled bitterly, admitting the fact that she was a much better badminton player than I was. She was a national player after all. I didn’t know what kind of spirit possessed me last week; I challenged her for a game and she beat me easily, as if I was nothing. My stupid past self even promised that I would buy her food during recess for a whole month if I lost the game. Which I lost by a bunch of points. To add salt to injury, she even let me have 1 point of pity at the end of the game. I was just grateful that there was only her best friend watching the game and she didn’t even record the moments of my embarrassing defeat. I was forever thankful for Lena for that.  

“Don’t you think it is quite idiosyncratic, an athlete like you, is also an avid reader? I mean, the other sports people I know, they don’t even glance at books. Sports and novels just don’t gel, I think?” She chuckled at my words, her eyes twinkling with pride.

“Well luckily for me, my mother taught me to love sports, and my father taught me to love books. Doesn’t it fascinate you that with just words on paper, you can immediately get transferred into another world? A world where anything can happen?” 

“That’s basically the same thing as , like, when I play games.” I frowned. And it’s much, much harder getting bored while playing games compared to reading thick, musty books. That’s like casting onto myself a sleeping spell.

“Reading is just… boring.” I sighed with a wistful smile. Nadia wiped her mouth with her dainty white handkerchief as she stared at me with an unreadable look.

“You’re just reading the wrong book. Why would you torture yourself with reading things that bore you when there’s literally million other books exist? And it doesn’t even have to be literal books, you know. Now we have apps, websites where you can read stories people submitted online. I like sad romance so I read books under that theme. What do you like? Ask yourself and find something related to it. Short story, light novel, whatever the piece is, as long as it can bring you to the other realms.” Hm… I never felt the need to explore the various ways to read for fun. Maybe it’s time I do. We’re gonna have a long holiday after this week so I have ample time to do some exploring.

“I’ll think about it.”

“Good. BTW your girl is giving me stink eye right now. I told you before, don’t sit with me, just leave the food.” Nadia grumbled as she pouted at the direction of her left. Not a fan of conflict, she was. Her confident outward appearance was just a facade of the shy introverted person inside. That much I gleaned from our brief meetings these two weeks. I turned to see Aryssa standing on the pavement, arms around herself while staring at us with fury in her eyes. I smiled at her and promptly got up, waving a little at Nadia before I left the table. Yes, I had an earful from her that day. And no, I told her there's nothing to worry about because I met Nadia because I lost a stupid bet. She said she'll pass her the food the following days.

Girls and their jealousy.