A Little Something Different

October (Mirabel - Lea's roommate)

Maribel- Lea’s roommate

Lea practically attacks me as I walk through the door Sunday night after spending the weekend at home.

“I missed you too,” I say, my hands full of Lea and clean laundry.

“The worst thing happened,” she wails.

“What, oh my god? What happened?” I steel myself for awful news. I try to run through my head what could possibly be this bad.

“Gabe lives here!”

“Isn’t that a good thing?”

“Well, yes, but I didn’t know he lived here. All this time! How did I not notice? We always get off the same bus stop. But I never even thought he lived in this building. I just figured he lived in the general area.”

“You realize this isn’t awful? Close proximity to a crush is not a bad thing.”

“That isn’t the awful thing.”

I sigh, dumping my laundry on the bed. She throws herself on her bed while I start putting things away.

“Tell me your troubles,” I say.

“So, I ordered Chinese,” she starts.

“Did you save me any?”

“There are some leftover dumplings in the mini-fridge.”

“Yummy.”

She rolls her eyes. “When the delivery guy gets here he buzzes me down and lo and behold when I get to lobby, who steps out of the other elevator but Gabe in the flesh.”

“Amazing.”

“I thought so too,” she agrees. “Of course he doesn’t say anything the whole time the delivery guy is babbling about how we ordered the same exact food and how that never happens. And then the guy asks if we’re together, which is just a little bit embarrassing.”

I make a so-so gesture with my hand.

“But then it got way worse.”

“How?”

“We were waiting for the elevator together and kind of looking at each other, or at least glancing over at each other at regular intervals. And I was trying to think of some topic of conversation…”

“You should have told him how much you liked the essay you critiqued of his in class last week.”

“Yes, that is something a normal person would have said.”

“Oh, no. What did the non-normal person say?”

“Well, this idiot looks him in the eye and says ‘As a Chinese person, I can tell you that you have great taste in Chinese food.’”

“That could be worse,” I say.

“Would you ever in a million years tell someone that you felt as a Mexican person that they have great taste in Mexican food?”

“Well… when you put it that way…”

She pulls the hood of her sweatshirt up and tightens the strings so only her nose pokes out.

“Lea, I’m teasing. It’s really not that bad,” I say, sitting next to her on the bed. “What did he say back?”

 She loosens her hood so she can speak. “He just kind of stood there, opening and closing his mouth at me.”

“I mean, it would have been better if you had complimented his essay, but I don’t think all is lost just because you said something mildly weird to him.”

“The first time I finally get up the nerve to talk to him and that’s what I say? I don’t talk like that. That’s not something I would say.”

“You should have complimented his essay and then invited him to eat with you.”

“Why aren’t you always around to coach me in these moments? Why do you leave me floundering alone in the world?”

“I don’t have answers for these questions.”

She squints into the distance. “To be fair, had I asked him up to eat with me, I’m pretty sure it would have been a disaster. There’s no way I could have been cool around him. I would have ended up talking about my family tree or how the plural of cul-de-sac is culs-de-sac.”

“Maybe he would have appreciated that,” I say, rubbing her back.

“I just have to keep reminding myself that I’m not actually blowing my chances. I don’t have to be super cool around him.”

“Keep telling yourself that.”

She tightens her hood back up and shakes her head.