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The New Girl

About a month has passed. It was the same routine everyday, go to class, go to work, walk to my next class with Andre, go home.

I'm working right now, attending to customers, the usual, when Andre approached me.

"Yo, James, I won't be walking with you, today. My class was cancelled, so I'm gonna head home after my shift"

"Yeah sure", I reply.

I just continue on, doing what I know, taking people's orders and preparing drinks. I've started to memorize some of the customers names, since the same ones usually come each time. I had just taken a customer's order and I call 'next' while looking down at the cash register.

"Hi, what would you like to order today?" I ask the next customer, still looking down.

"Hi, I've never been here, um, what would you recommend?" I hear a quiet voice ask.

I look up to see a girl, one that I've never seen around before. She looked different, in a good way. Big eyes, black hair, cute smile. She may be a Filipina. She had a book in her and but I wasn't able to see the title.

"Um, sir?" She chuckles.

I realized I was still staring.
"Oh um, sorry what was that?" I say while I shake my head.

"What do you recommend here?" She smiles, "I've never been here, and was wondering what was good"

"Well, that depends on if you want a cold drink or hot drink. If cold, I usually get a caramel iced coffee with just a bit of extra caramel. If hot, a mocha latte with coconut milk" I respond.

"Hm, that coconut milk sounds interesting... Yeah I'll get a mocha latte with coconut milk, please"

I take her order. "Name?", I ask.

"Nadine" she responds with a soft smile.
I've never met anyone named Nadine. Special name for a special girl, I guess.

"Thank you, Nadine" I say, writing her name on the cup. "That'll be $3.85, please"

She pays, leaving a tip then goes to sits down. I proceed to make her drink.

"Nadine, your mocha latte with coconut milk"
I hand her the drink. Our hands touch and I feel her cold, but soft skin. She smiles and goes to sit down again, opening up her book to read. Throughout the hour, between customers, I would occasionally look up at her, she would sometimes glance back at me and I would just smile.

My shift was over before I even realized it, so I got my stuff and started heading out. The girl was just heading out too, coincidentally going the same way as me.

"Hey!" She called, "Hey, wait up!"

I turned around to see her trying to catch up to me. I didn't notice how fast I was walking.
"Yeah?" I asked.

"Hey, I just wanted to thank you. I dunno. This might sound lame, but you were one of the first people to be nice to me since I first got here" she said in a quiet voice.

"Really?" I asked in surprised tone.

"Yeah...by the way, what's your name?"

"James"

"James, huh? Well, nice to meet you James. I'm Nadine. Where are you headed?" She asks.

"We just met and you're already stalking me?" I say as a joke.

"No! It's not like that! I was just-"

"I'm kidding" I laughed.
Her mouth formed a cute, tight smile as she squinted her eyes at me.
"I'm headed to the campus for my next class" I respond.

"Really? You go to SF state, too?"

"You go there? I've never seen you around"

"Just transferred. I'm not from the US"

"Oh, where you from?"

"Philippines. I just moved here about a month ago"

"Really? I'm from the Philippines, too"

"Talaga? Marunong ka mag Tagalog?"

"Oo pero I've gotten so used to English"

"Oh ganun ba? Okay then, I'll stick mostly to English na lang" she said as she gestured for us to keep walking, "Tara?"

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Again, don't know where I'm going with this. And if there's any inaccuracies involving college and life in the Philippines/language, please tell me! Filipina ako pero wasn't born there, sooo... And btw don't mean to bash on education sa Philippines, just wanted yung story ko to take place sa states.