Novice in Love | on hold

Ten

ELLIE

Bryan: [What happened?] 

Out of all the people, how did I end up selecting his contact to send the text to? That's just my luck, I suppose. Whether it was good or bad luck is the bigger question... 

I contemplate on what I should say, how I should respond, fighting the urge to call Jenna for a SOS. She might have messed with me last time, but she would probably help me since I had a feeling she didn't want me interacting with him outside of tutoring sessions. For that reason alone, I hold myself back from actually calling her. It's not like I can't see where she and Michael are both coming from with their worries, but I feel like I should be giving Bryan a chance. Despite his initial weirdness, I saw potential in him being a good person... and friend.

[Nothing] I send. 
[That text wasn't meant for you, sorry]

[Is everything okay over there though? Are you okay though?]

[Yeah, living my best life]

[Is that sarcasm?]

[Is it?]

[...I would say so]

I send a shrugging emoji, not wanting to confess anything. [🤷🏻‍♀️] I may be wanting to give the guy the benefit of Jenna and Michael's doubt, but I also wasn't ready to divulge my feelings to a practical stranger. 

Bryan replies with a emoji too and I fight back a smile because I could imagine him making that expression for some reason. [🙄]

That's when the emoji game begins. 

Me: [😶]

Bryan: [🤨]

Me: [🙃]

Bryan: [🤥]

Me: [💩]

Bryan: [🥴]

We send emojis back and forth to each other with no words being exchanged at all, yet I find myself slowly forgetting about the bad dinner and all the stress that had been silently suffocating me. I actually start enjoying it, and I think he senses this over the texts because he ends our little game with a text that actually contains words. 

[Are you feeling better now?]

[Surprisingly... yes] I admit. 

[Why is it a surprise?]

[You're just not what I expected.] It was a lot easier to be honest hidden behind a screen. 

[I'll take that as a compliment]

[What if it wasn't🤪 ] It was also much easier to be myself, not having to worry about eye contact and all that good stuff. 

[Isn't it better be unpredictable than to be like everyone else?]

[🤔] Never heard of someone twisting it into that perspective before. I am reminded of his weirdness again but wait for his reply.

[You don't agree?]

[Don't know if I do]

[Haven't you heard it's better to be different than to fit in?]

[Yes but being unpredictable is a whole other story, isn't it?] 

[Close enough lol you know what idea I'm getting at]

[Sure] I purposely make my response ambiguous so he won't know if I really do, even though I do. He already caught me in a moment of vulnerability and I didn't want him to know more of what I was thinking.