Page 53 of Clichés & Curses

Now that Colton was gone, I could slowly feel the panic withering away. I pushed myself off the door and made my way to the living room.

‘The date was fine,’ I started. ‘I—’

‘What are you wearing?’ Nina gasped.

Her question got me slightly confused, since she had helped me pick out my outfit for the night.

But the confusion quickly turned to horror, when I noticed my cardigan sleeves were in a different colour.

And instead of a cardigan, it was a jacket.

Colton’s baseball jacket.

My eyes widened in panic.

My brain must have thought I was still wearing my cardigan, since my arms were covered. If I was wearing Colton’s jacket, it meant I had left my cardigan in his car.

But that wasn’t why my heart was racing at the moment.

No, the reason for that was the look on Nina’s face as she was figuring out whose jacket it was.

‘That looks like a baseball jacket.’ And I could see the exact moment it finally dawned on her whose it was. ‘No way. There’s no way. Right?’

I didn’t know what else to say. I was pretty sure she had already figured it out. So, instead of saying anything, I just gave her a nod.

It seemed I stunned her into silence. Her mouth gaped at me as she tried to think of what to say.

After what felt like an hour—but was probably only a minute—she said, ‘You don’t have to tell me anything. I’m rewatchingGilmore Girlsand I still have some popcorn. Wanna join me?’

I loved Nina for respecting my space. As much as I wanted to keep the night I had with Colton to myself, it was also the first time that I couldn’t wait to tell her about it—even if it wasn’t an actual date. Though I did tell her about all those prior to the one that night, it had been more of an active, formal recalling of how the date went, instead of being all giddy about each detail.

But the thing that had been holding me back from telling Nina right then was that I had to make her understand that whatever happened with Colton that night was a one-time thing. It would also mean telling her about the curse, and explaining why Colton and I couldn’t be anything more than friends.

I knew that Nina would understand where I came from, but I couldn’t help that tiny fear that she would look at me differently after this, once she found out that I was a twenty-year-old who still believed in things as stupid as curses.

‘Clara?’ Nina said, when she noticed I was still standing there.

Before I could stop myself, the words were already out of my mouth.

‘Nina,’ I said, so quietly that I wasn’t sure she heard me. ‘I’m so screwed.’

Chapter Twelve

The Monday after that fateful night, I got a text from Colton.

I was in the middle of my last class for the day, with my phone on airplane mode to avoid any distractions. When the class was dismissed, I took it out of my bag, and turned my phone back online. When I noticed Colton had texted me, my heart couldn’t help but flutter a little and yet feel a hint of nervousness when I saw the notification.

We had each other’s phone numbers since the first night he had driven me home, but we had never really used it before. Since ASL was a visual language, our assignments and tests weren’t paper-based; we only had one test coming in the next few weeks, along with a final at the end of the semester. The rest of the assessments were during class where Mr Albert would randomly pick someone out to quiz them on what we had learnt the previous week. There was, of course, the partnered assignment—the culprit that had brought us together in the first place—but we were yet to be given the guideline for it, so there wasn’t much to discuss.

After our first ASL practice at the bubble tea shop, it had pretty much become a weekly routine for us to practice afterclass. This way, we didn’t have to text each other to plan for our next practice.

I was about to open the text, when I noticed more students were coming into the lecture hall for the next class. I figured it wasn’t too urgent, so I packed up the rest of my things, and exited the hall, finding a nearby spot to sit. Luckily, there was a sitting area underneath a tree, and those who were sitting there were leaving.

I took a seat at the empty table and put my bag next to myself. Once I inhaled a deep breath, I finally opened the text.

Colton:

Hey. We have an away game this Thursday, and we’ll be leaving on Wednesday. So, I won’t be attending ASL class. I guess we’ll have to reschedule our ASL practice this week.

---