"A deep feeling of affection and sexual attachment."
That's all Mina has - words stolen from a dictionary. How will she earn an apprenticeship at Luckman Inc. if she can't write an essay on what true love is? It has been a week, and she has yet to c...
Luck's magazine was challenging Cosmopolitan in the race to become most popular with the 20-year-old crowd. Mina set goals, it was her kind of crowd, and she needed to compete too. Thinking ahead she made a list of what things made people fall in love throughout time and countries. She searches blogs through the web, she makes a Facebook poll for the week being for public use.
She spent a whole weekend as a hermit, shut off to everyone in her world. Take-out food and leftovers for three days straight, and glued to a computer screen for intense concentration. In fact she even canceled shifts at work, which was a surprise to everyone who knew her at the bakery. It was good timing too.
After that kiss Mina and Jean-Noel had some radio silence for a day or two, really just to assess what happened. Jean-Noel invited her out and kissed her, but it wasn't a date. They're friends and liked being with each other but that was it. By this point, they had really started following each other's content on social media. It was like getting a feel for their past and present in a way. Now she saw his career as an artist and she was in awe of his talent. Granted it was all worded in French but the art was multilingual, it spoke many languages to people.
This time it was her that could not stop cyberstalking his social media and Heidi was the one that was battling her to return to the real world. Even if it was something she did only in the safety of her home after work.
"He is very talented. I see that too, but this isn't healthy." Heidi started the conversation one late night after work.
"What? I just did some light stalking into his life in France." Mina had learned a lot since she first looked through his Instagram page.
Heidi gently pushed closed the laptop on the bedroom desk, giving her a doubting look, "Light?"
Mina shrugged her off, "But it's in France, I'm curious. "
To change the conversation and take the spotlight off of her she brought up Xavier. Heidi hooked up with Xavier one weekend and set a relationship as friends with benefits. She seemed happy, but Mina was skeptical of it. They initially started talking when she came back from the work trip. And she knew of the relationship before she saw him last week in the apartment building.
Xavier ran into Mina Sunday morning in the hallway that connected her apartment to Heidi's.
"Had a nice sleepover Xavier?" She snickers at his facial expression for being caught off guard by her.
Xavier salutes her and cracks a smile, "Talk about an unholy Sunday."
Unlike Xavier, there had been no contact with her so-called boyfriend for weeks, when suddenly on Instagram Barbara was posting photos of them going out and at what looks like her parents' condo out in the city. Many hashtags to go along with them. Mina had one hashtag in mind that would get her reported on the site. There she was worrying about their relationship and the doubt was real now. Where do they go from here? How should she handle this situation? What if it's over? Does she want it to be over?
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Mina's parents were talking about the future of the family's business, the bakery. Even though that was a couple of decades away, she asked herself again if she would stick to baking as her primary source of income; and stay at the bakery forever.
A week later Geo is getting followed, stalked more likely, he felt it. Although he'd never admit it to his family. "Hey, how've you been?" he asked out of the blue, on Wednesday morning at work.
Mina was happy to have him taking shifts again because she missed having him around."Stressed actually, but that's not new. I need to figure some stuff out. Career-wise, feelings, and-"
"I need a big favor..." Geo blurted out in one breath. He didn't mean to but he needed to tell her before he lost the nerve.
She sighed knowing it was too good to be true that he came back without reason to, not hiding her disappointment she asked what he needed.
"...500 dollars," He asked Mina for a loan; and because he was such a prideful young man it was how she knew he really was desperate. This was probably the most serious conversation they had in years.
"500 American dollars?! Geo!" Her eyes widened drastically, cartoonish really. This was beyond what she thought he'd ask of her at that moment.
"Yeah, I'll pay you back as soon as I can though," He rushed to cut her off and try to calm the situation.
She pinched the bridge of her nose with her eyes shut and inhaled deeply, "Why?" Her eyes opened and narrowed before he could say anything, "And don't say you can't tell me why. I need to know."
Geo looked anywhere but at her. He couldn't stand how much her gaze resembled their mother's when she was this type of upset. "I owe some frat guys money and I don't have enough," he mumbled back.
She raised an eyebrow not verbally asking but still wanting more than that short explanation.
He dared look at her face and dragged out more of the situation, not all of it but just what he felt like she needed to know about it. "It's been a while and they're giving me a hard time about the money, okay?"
Mina cursed under her breath, this had put a damper on her mood not to mention she had no idea that her brother would do something so stupid. It sounded like he was close to gambling but she had no way of confirming what was what. In the end, she did give him the money but it did come out of her biweekly paycheck. However, this loan was the one thing she would hold over his head for a while, not telling her parents anything about this conversation came at a cost. This was a serious problem.
