A month before I die

1

It was a lovely morning, the rays of the sun were not scorching, and the breeze is cold, yet not freezing. It felt like this February morning favors Kevin, a tall, skinny, and pale young teenager that just woke up. Kevin was fond of the cold weather since he was little; he just loves how his morning hot choco goes along with the cold winds that blew every winter season.
The teen loves how he could walk from his house to his campus at the rising of the sun yet still having no sweat to tear due to the temperature of his surrounding. At this time around, the snow from the previous winter melts as the spring season burst, the winds carries the cold vapor and spread it towards the whole continent - walking was considered a great mode of transportation at this time since the people won't go sweating from the heat of the sun.
Although having to travel a couple of miles towards his campus, Kevin prefers walking alone. He does not walk with friends that well because he is often silent, and collected. He likes walking through alleys and bridges while taking a glimpse of the nature around him - the river and its lotus, the flowering plants of the trees, even the sleeping cats at top of poles. His face lights up at the sight of these things. As a city boy himself, he is quite impressed how the government of the city manage to retain the nature surrounding it at first. Everywhere the people go, handful of colorful and beautiful flowers are present, as different species bloom every season.
As he stroll along the busy and loud streets of the city, he would always be seen with a doubting yet curious look - at buildings, trees, residential infastracture, dogs and cats, the loud cars, the gossiping lady at the café, and even at the traffic lights. Passing by different kinds of people, Kevin finds peace and solidarity from the diversity present at his city.
'Dude Kevin!' a sudden voice from his back shouted.
Kevin, with wandering thoughts, still managed to hear and comprehend those words that were shouted. In confusion, he looked back to see who it is.
John, his classmate-slash-friend appeared out of nowhere, riding his bike while carrying his heavy bag. He seemed to be a tall, fair-skinned, enthusiastic teen with a friendly aura. Maybe he is thought to be that "Get-along-too-well" type of classmate in his class.
John sped up his bicycle and managed to give Kevin a fist bump. Well, fist bumps for Kevin was an odd ritual for "friends", he thought was like a dueling ritual that someone that will be battling should do before brawling - a sort of wrestling-type of gesture he may say.
'Hey there, John?' in an awkward tone he said while putting his hands away after the fist bump.
'Never seen you in this alleyways before, are you from in here?' Kevin said curiously. He never really did knew where John's house since he does not go at anyone's houses, he finds comfort in his own abode.
'Nope, I am just trying out different alleyways to see which the best route to go to school. It was just a coincidence seeing you on my way. How 'bout you?'
'This is my route to school. I pass by different sorts of stuff before our school bell ring, that is why I chose to walk this path.' Kevin said confidently.
'Well, we are both here, so why don't we just both go to school together' an invitation with mix enthusiasm stated by John as he goes down on his bicycle. It was not the first time that he was invited by John to walk with him, he felt oddly comfortable everytime he's walking with John, even though he does not go with friends that well.
On their way to school, John talked a lot of stuff - their homework, his rank game experiences in his LoL accoount, and his crush. Kevin also talked with a lot of stuff but with fewer words.
Out of nowhere, a blossoming flower from a tree fell.
'Seemed like spring is coming, we should get prepared for the allergy season, am I right buddy?' John said jokingly while staring at Kevin as if he wanted Kevin to laugh at his joke.
'You don't get it don't you?' John said calmly while having a disgusted kind of look at his face.
'There are a lot of mysterious things about you Kevin, but nonetheless, spring is coming soon, and I don't want all that pollen to get in me.'
'Well, yes pollens are qui-'
'Hold that thought dude, look, Penny is here' John stopped Kevin at speaking as he points out their class' "muse".
'I might want to get her attention for a sec. Wait for me here will 'ya' then John ran towards where Penny was, and tried talking to her.
Kevin tried to stop John because he foresighted that he is going to fail at so many levels, but John's admiration towards Penny was unbreakable. Kevin waited for a while, checking his phone for new messages, scrolling through his Facebook and Twitter to see if something was new.
The only notification in his Facebook account was a tag that said "Today is Elliot's birthday".
His twitter was the same old boring feed, filled with emotional qoutes from different twitter accounts. He is not amazed by their qoutes but he love how they played with words.
Minutes passed and John walked to Kevin, with a long face.
'Bummer, she's gonna have lunch with Elliot today, lucky birthday boy.' John said with disappointment.
'Shall we go? Mr. unlucky-because-its-not-his-birthday?' Kevin said jokingly.
'Hey, stop teasing me; I wish it was my birthday everyday. Damn Elliot's gonna have his greatest lunch ever. Penny is like the goddess of our classroom and Elliot is having a free lunch party with her. I really do wish it was my birthday everyday.' John said while saddened by the thought that some classmate of his will be having lunch with his highschool crush.
'Maybe one day dude.'
'I'll make sure that next time, I will be having lunch with her.'
Their conversation went ecstatic and inspired in just a moment. Kevin thought that John really do have a chance of him being with Penny for a while, but he knows that now was not the right time since the whole class knows that Penny have a boyfriend. Elliot is just lucky that Penny's boyfriend is his friend.
Both of them headed inside their campus, secured John's bicycle parking, and head on to their class. John goes on talking with their friends while Kevin chose to sit quietly at his chair and plug his earphones on to listen to his classic playlist. He loves the 'blues' genre and would listen to dramatic and sad songs all day, the beat of the bass seemed soothing for the teenager and fits well with his voice to sing along to. Despite of his musical genre preference, he is quite optimistic, he just loves how poetic their lyrics are and how much emotion does this songs possess. It was like he is in the 'heartbroken' type of situation.
At the stroke of the clock's arm at 8:00 am, their professor came. Bringing his bag on to his assigned chair, Kevin sighs as his eyes grew sleepy, he's tired of all those walking he did. He sat at his desk and placed his bag beside him, pulling out his notebook and a pen. As soon as he opened the pages of his notebook, he noticed a loose sticky note at one of the leaves of his notebook, the content said:
"Have a nice day ahead Kevin, I always look up to you.
-xoxo"
At his confusion, he scanned the whole room. His head went left to right and vice versa. Suspecting his classmates because one of them may be the one who poorly sticked a sticky note at his notebook. His suspicion goes on; he never received any kind and nice notes from someone at his class.
'Who could've done this?' he whispered to himself.
'Elliot? John? I am not quite sure, there a "xoxo" at the end, maybe a girl. Penny? She does not talk to me that often, it is impossible that she would do this.' his whispers turned into murmurs for those near him.
'Sophia? Rhea? Sarah? Their the silent girls in our class, they would--'
'Kevin! What are all these buzzing? Aren't you listening?' his professor, Mr. Smith, said out of nowhere.
'I am sorry sir.'
'Good, now eyes on the board. Let's continue.'
Filled with shame, Kevin just remained silent, and puts the sticky note in his hands in his pockets. It was like he is a Sherlock of his own mystery case. Finding out who did such sweet thing to him.
Still he searched around for suspects for this undeniably charming note - its message was clear yet the penmanship of whoever wrote this is like giving him eyegasm. Yes, right, the penmanship of whoever wrote this.
He thought of a plan to somehow distinguish the writer from her penmanship, knowing that the writer might be a girl. He's not the class secretary though; he does not know where to look for files and papers that were handwritten. He thought he should probably borrow a notebook from his suspects.
He was really curious at the thought of someone had wrote this to him secretly, with just "xoxo" as an author's note or a pen name. It is unusual or someone to have that kind of pen name. Still, having to receive a note like that does not creeps him out, nor makes him tingle - he was not like those anime girls that blush red full face, he was more like the Conan of the situation - trying to look as if he was listening at their class.
'Dude.' John whispered.
'You've been staring in the blank again, you sleepy?'
'What is it John? Have some questions?' their professor said, in a close to being mad type of voice.
'None sir, I'm sorry'
'Good, eyes on the board, we are going to have a short quiz about this topic later. Get your calculators ready.'
Kevin shrugged his shoulders and gave John a quick "Why did you speak at the middle of Mathematics class?" type of stare at John, at least all of their classmates did.
He got his mind of the note for the moment; he does not want to fail this short quiz just because he is curious to whoever wrote the note for him.
'Geez, Thanks.' he mouthed towards John, sarcastically.