Lessons on Love

Wake Up

The florist smiles too, meeting her gaze, "Thank you." and again she felt that ringing in her brain whenever Althea would look at her.

"Oh-kay." The waitress mutters, "I guess the clubhouse is yours?"

Jade tears her eyes away from Althea to acknowledge the waitress, seeing the nameplate on her chest, "Yes." she nods as the plate is placed in front of her.

With her failed attempt at flirting with Althea, the waitress simply huffed and crossed her arms in front of her, "Is there anything else?"

"No thank you, Patty." Jade answers politely.

"Alright, if you need anything..." Patty purrs then turns ever so slightly towards Althea, holding out a small sheet of tissue, "... just let me know."

The indecent proposal doesn't go unnoticed and it's then that the woman finally looks at the waitress, a small smile on her lips. Jade unconsciously clenches her jaw in preparation of what she might hear.

Althea closes her hand around Patty's, "Thank you but..." she pauses to push the tissue and the hand away, her eyes darting to Jade. "I'm not interested."

A warm blush threatens to creep up from her neck and in a desperate attempt to hide it, Jade cleared her throat and took a rather long sip of her water.
"Fine." Patty huffed before walking back to the bar. Jade categorized this as another thing she could only react to when she gets back home. She couldn't think right now. There was no solid thought whenever Althea was around, no logic, no reasoning.

Around Althea there was only emotion and she really couldn't let that dictate her actions; not again.

Even sick and weak, Althea could still crack a joke or say something silly that would make Jade smile. Since family was a topic that Jade didn't want to talk about, she settled for telling Althea about her travels; the places she's gone and the people that she had met.

With anyone else, telling stories of her travels always seemed like a task to Jade; mostly because the people that ask her would only do so out of formality or boredom and not honest interest. She could neither communicate nor duplicate the excitement she felt when telling stories to her Dada or even Sally, but with Althea... When it comes to her, it was like Jade was reliving the emotions as she tells her stories.

"Did you go to any of those weird festivals? Like that uh... that one with the tomatoes? I saw it on TV once."

"La Tomatina? No I didn't go to that but I did witness this kissing festival in Bali."
Althea's eyebrow arches high on her forehead and Jade could feel the giggle bubbling up her throat, "Kissing festival?"

"Yeah. It's called The omed-omedan, or the Kissing Ritual." Jade explains as she takes a small sip from the bottle of water she had just bought.

"What? They just make out?"

"Well... Yeah."

"Seriously?"

Jade nods, "It's a rite of passage that the young and unmarried residents go through on the first day of the Balinese New Year. It was so fun, I got to throw water at anyone getting too... frisky." She laughs and motions as if she was throwing an imaginary bucket of water at Althea. "Pffffff." Jade laughs boisterously at her attempt at replicating the sound of water. "it was amazing."
Althea laughs too but Jade saw some deep thought in the back of her eyes and she falls silent.

"What's one place that you really to go to but you haven't had the chance to yet?" Jade asks curiously as she took a sip from her drink.

"Nepal." was Althea's simple answer.

"Why?"

"The Tihar Festival."