SEBIAN

I dropped all my friends one by one and reached home. I grabbed the papers given by Alin and got out of the car. This girl is deliberately trying to stay away from me. I went inside the house and was greeted by my grandma. “You know Sebian, I was thinking of making your favourite pie for dessert today. How would you like that?” I smiled at her question. “I would like that very much grandma.” “But you see I am missing a few ingredients for the recipe.” I sighed, “So?” “So, I want you to be a good boy ad drive to the mart and bring me those ingredients so that you can enjoy a great dessert.” “Tell me where the mart is and give me the list of ingredients.” She smiled and went inside to fetch pen and paper.

After driving for about 20 minutes I reached in front of a store where a sign board reading ‘Poppy’s Mart’ blinked in blue lights. I parked my car and went inside the store. A lady was sitting at the front counter. She gave me a genuine smile and asked, “Is this your first time here?” I nodded my head in a ‘yes’. “No worries, one of my girls can help you with the items you want,” she told in a jovial tone. I liked her. She didn’t seem very old and her short figure with neck length black hair and a beautiful smile on her face made her look so friendly and approachable.

“Alin honey, can you come here and help the customer find what he is looking for, it’s his first time here.” Alin! Did I hear it right? The girl in question comes out with a bright smile on her face and was about to say something but her expression slowly changed when she saw me. Yep, that’s definitely the Alin I know but somehow she looks like a whole different person. For once she was out of that shell of hers and with that gone off of her she looked kind of cute. She had an average height and her body which I could never configure before was actually slender. For the first time I was able to see her face clearly. She had a small, fair, blemish free round face. Her hair was actually brown soft curls which were left free and fell at the mid of her back. Her dark green eyes looked dense and her lips were parted in shock of seeing me, I guess.

“Take him and help him Alin,” the happy lady told. I smiled at Alin as she hesitated a bit before going inside. I followed her as she went on aisle to aisle telling me about the products available. She can’t run away from here so instead she made sure to maintain her distance from me and to never directly look at me. This time I was not irritated by her behaviour but was rather fascinated. I took two long strands and went and stood right beside her. This made her stumble a bit but I caught her hand and steadied her.

“So, this was the work you were referring to when you handed me the papers at the college.” She nodded slowly. “You come here daily?” she shook her head to a ‘no’. “Four days a week for four hours.” “Oh... and do you work somewhere else the other days?” she again shook her head. “So, have you decided what you want to buy sir?” she spoke in a professional tone. I took out the list and gathered up all the ingredients I needed. “So, why did you give me those papers? Don’t you want to work with me? Look, I am not a good student like you and will need help in completing the project, so I think it would be nice if we sit together and work.”

She was about to say something when her phone rang and I was accompanied by another girl who also seemed to be an employee here. With my basket in my hand I started looking at other things around, waiting for Alin to be free but suddenly I heard a loud ‘WHAT’ coming from her mouth. I, along with the other girl went to her. The expression on her face was somewhat of panic. “I am coming, I am coming right now” she kept on saying on the phone and with a shaky gesture ran towards the entry of the store.

“Miss Poppy I need to go. My father has been into an accident at the diner, I need to go, now!” she was almost about to cry. She looked at the girl standing near me. “I will not be able to leave here but you can take my car, can you drive?” Tears started falling down from her eyes as she shook her head. “Tell me where you have to go, I can take you there” I told her. “Yeah honey, go with him,” the old lady spoke. Alin nodded and after I made the payment we both sat in my car. Alin showed me the way and we drove towards the diner.