A Slice Of Life

Chapter 16

Chapter 16

 

Wesley Tran

Marriage interviews are the shit. Normally, I find them highly enjoyable. Obviously, the girl must be pretty enough for my mother to pick her. S-he usually has a decent personality that prevents boredom, but never has a personality that would make me actually fall in love with her. My mother also gives me money to take these girls out on dates. It’s a great excuse to buy an expensive meal that, theoretically, should be delicious. By the end of the night, I usually even get a full on make-out session. I’m a guy and I have needs. Then, hopefully, I’ll never see her again.

Unfortunately, my mind is elsewhere tonight. This is rather sad, since the girl is quite pretty. What was her name? Vivian? No, it must have been Valerie. Either way, she is a looker. Yet, I can’t enjoy it because I have too many problems that have popped up in the course of the past day.

 The first problem is my friends. I’ve gotten used to Hale’s episodes of angst. I was completely prepared for Oliver’s period of depression. What I was not ready for is Ren’s unexpected fight with Elle. I don’t know if I can handle living with them for the next week or so. It’ll be a whole new level of depression and angst in the apartment. This leads into my next problem.

Lottie. She can no longer act as my escape since I was the idiot that screwed everything up. Knowing her, she’ll avoid me at all cost. Lottie’s basically told me that she hates confrontation. Best case scenario is that she’ll pretend the incident never happened and we’ll never speak of it again. It is absolutely not my fault that she had that expression on her face. It’s the expression where her eyes are just a bit bigger than usual and she’s looking at me and she bites her lip out of nervousness. It is not my fault. If anything, she should have not looked at me at all. From that moment my hair got wet, till now, our relationship has completely changed. We have gone from siblings that are comfortable with any amount of space between us or not between us to two people that can hardly sit next to each other. Obviously, she doesn’t want to sit too close to me because she’s awkward like that, but I can’t allow myself to sit too close to her in case of what I might do.

I cannot pinpoint the exact moment this started, but I know it was the little things. Was it the way she held her chopsticks kind of weirdly? It must have been the way strands of hair always ended up in front of her face. Did it start the first time I wanted to brush that stray stand out of her eyes? Maybe it was the way I could always listen to her talk on and on about things she loved, or complain about all the things she hated.

I must not have noticed until the conversation in the kitchen. All those small things must have built up to this bigger, more momentous event. During that conversation that only took place a couple hours ago, I realized that I didn’t want to just know the trivial things about her. I wanted to know what she actually thought. And then I wanted to kiss the life out of her, but that’s beside the point. What I’m getting at is, I think I, Wesley Tran, have a crush on Charlotte Le.  That in itself is the third and last problem. It is the worst of them all. Maybe I should just take Bryn’s advice and introduce Lottie to my mother. And then we’ll get married. And make little Wesleys and Lotties. And then I’d actually get to kiss her. And not be interrupted.

What has she done to me? I’m going crazy. Why am I even thinking these things? A couple hours ago, I did not think about this. I obviously need to be admitted to a mental institution. “Wes, are you even listening to me?”