Under the Umbrella ✓

-11-

She glared daggers at the papers in her hand as she headed to Coffee Break. She wasn't paying attention to the routes, but by now, she knew the way by heart. She'd only be looking up, being extra meticulous, when she was crossing the roads, but right now, her eyes were on the sheets.

Aria read her assignment from the beginning to the end at least about three times, and she believed that she didn't deserve the grade she received. She had stayed up all night trying to finish it to perfection. Even if it wasn't worthy of an A, she thought a B would have been justified.

If it were for the rational side of her brain, she knew her grades were slipping because she didn't have enough time to go through the materials. She still hadn't decided on whether she was to take on another job, but she wasn't sure if she'd be able to handle it when she was falling behind on her studies.

She was nearing the café, and soon her mind had coasted away from her grades to the stranger. She could feel the weight of the umbrella that she learned to shorten inside her backpack, and she was left with more questions than she had the last time, although she was positive she wouldn't go to the ends of trying to find answers. For some bizarre reason, she felt inferior to him, and she didn't want to humiliate herself.

But Aria was extremely curious. The stranger gave up his shield from the rain for her yet again. He had left the same way as he did the first time. He had wordlessly walked away after he had seen to it that she knew of the weather, and quite dazed, she watched him scuttle under the rain to the other side of the street through the window. She couldn't help wondering now if there was an ulterior motive other than him just being selfless. But even considering such a thing seemed a little too exaggerated.

Not to forget, he carried the umbrella around as if he knew it would be raining that day as if he had placed the order for the sky.

She looked straight to the window seat when she entered the café and wasn't the least stunned to find the stranger there, right on time. He wasn't leafing through any papers today but was scrolling on his phone, mindless to his surroundings. She strode to him as she wrestled to get the umbrella out of her handbag, and when she did, she placed it on his table, catching his attention.

His immediate eye contact with her caught her by surprise, and she ridiculously forgot what she wanted to tell him upon seeing the atypical color of his eyes.

She averted her gaze to the umbrella, and though it wasn't exactly what she wanted to tell him, she ended up stating the obvious, "You keep giving me your umbrella."

"Didn't you want it?" he asked, in that quiet, low-toned voice of his.

"I did..." she trailed off incompetently. She couldn't work up the courage to vocalize any of her queries, especially when he was being so damn straightforward and short. "Well, thank you for lending it to me again."

She was about to leave back to her customary afternoon seat when the stranger said, "You can sit here if you want." Aria was startled at the offer. She could barely mask the question on her face. As if to answer her unvoiced but undisguised query, he continued, "It looked like you wanted to sit here the last time since you kept looking over here."