"Hey, everyone. My name is Vernon Louise. You can just call me Vernon. I don't think I'm old enough to be called sir. Unless I was stopped by a police officer," he joked.
I facepalmed as the class slightly snickered at his lame joke. The talk went on and we proceeded to the Q n A section. Many of the shameless girls asked irrelevant questions like are you single? How old are you? How tall are you? And such.
Finally, the painful hour of my last class had ended. The students packed up and left the room. It was a Friday, and everyone had planned to go home early and start their weekend plans or catch up on assignments.
"Zee? Can you stay back for a bit?" Vernon called out as I made my way to the door.
'Dammit,' I thought.
"Oooh… Miss popular. I'll email you the template when I get home. Enjoy your weekend!" my seatmate abandoned me in the assembly hall alone with the speaker and our coordinator.
I sat on a desk at the opposite end from where they were still talking and pulled out my earphones to listen to music. They were kissing each other's asses and I ignored them for the most part. But my coordinator came over and scolded me for sitting on the desk in the presence of an outside guest. I apologized and pocketed my phone as he left without another word.
"Yikes! Is he your lecturer?" Vernon eyed his back.
"Nope. He's always been like that to everyone. Reminds me of high school," I leapt off the desk.
"So, anyway. I thought you would've texted me by now," we walked out of the empty room.
"What do you mean?" I pretended not to know what he was talking about.
"I left you my business card under your door. I didn't want to wake you up, but I realized we had no way of contacting each other."
"Oh, maybe the housekeeper cleaned it up before I could pick it up."
"Okay, well, anyway, it's Friday."
"Yeah, it is," that was all I could come up with.
"Any plans?" he walked towards the carpark.
"Just dinner with the girls I guess," I stopped walking.
"Oh, I can drive you home if you want. It's getting colder. You looked underdressed."
"Sure, we could grab dinner for them too on the way," why did I say that?
"Yeah, that's cool. Cathy didn't wanna tell me the address. She told me to ask you. I wonder what that was about,' he walked two paces in front of me, 'but that plan didn't go well."
I knew exactly what she was doing, 'I can show you the address, so you can go there alone next time."
"Yeah, that'll be nice. I crave for some good Japanese bento from time to time."
We reached his car and drove to the Japanese food chain to order some dinner for the girls. He was a smooth driver. Especially with the sudden snowing, he was cautious and efficient. Vernon drove up to the house and stopped in front of our garage.
"So, can I get your number? If we didn't end up texting again, it would be my fault this time," he handed me his phone.
"Why don't you come in and have dinner with us? I'm sure Eric's gonna be there if you're scared of being the only guy there," I invited.
"You sure you guys wouldn't mind? I don't wanna disturb anything," he pocketed his phone.
"Yeah, for sure. The more the merrier," said me, never.
He turned the car off and carried the boxes of food. I was about to reach for the plastic bag, but he swatted my hand away.
"I'll do the carrying. Just open the door and get warm. It's snowing harder," he motioned.
I followed his instruction and held the door for him. And I was right, Eric and Lily were huddled up in her infamous pink faux fur blanket on the sofa watching some reality TV show on Netflix.
"Dinner's here!" I unpacked.
"Oh hey! Didn't know you were coming along. Since when were you guys so close?" Taylor greeted him and winked at me.
"Yeah, I was giving a talk at her school and I was just craving katsu," he helped unpack the other plastic bag.
Everyone passed the boxes around and took a seat to watch movie together. Somehow everyone had found their own partners to sit with. I was forced to sit next to Vernon again and we started eating.
"Why are you not eating the salad?" he whispered.
"I hate cucumbers and mayo," I whispered back.
"I'll take the salad if you take the carrots."
"Deal."
The restaurant wouldn't accept customized side dish orders, and coincidentally, my favorite menu had my least favorite sides on it. We had finished our food by the time the movie ended. It was Taylor's duty to clean up today. She collected the trash and busied herself in the kitchen while the rest of us hung out on the sofas.
"Why don't we go to Whistler for the weekend?" Lily suggested.
"What? We can't just go spontaneously. What about Eric and Zack? They don't have clothes prepared," I interrupted.
"Yeah we do. We were planning to stay over anyway," Eric answered.
"What?" I eyed Zack and realized that the couple had finally made it official.
"I just texted Cathy, she said she will be staying over at her friend's dorm to finish her project. It's perfect! Everyone has their own partners," Taylor announced.
"What? Vernon didn't say yes. And how are we supposed to get there?" I blurted.
"I have a few spare clothes in my trunk for the gym and I drove in my car here," he smiled at the brilliant idea.
"How is everyone just ok with this?" I got desperate.
"If you don't come, it would be lonely for our guest. Wouldn't it?" Taylor peered from the kitchen.
"We're not dating, it would still feel like a next level third-wheeling," I folded my arms.
"I brought my car here too, we can just drive there individually," Zack finally said.
"Is no one listening to me?" I faced Vernon.
He shrugged, "I mean it sounds like fun. Unless you have some work to do."
"It's her winter holiday next week. C'mon Zee!!! Just this once. It's been ages since I went on a holiday," Lily begged.