Speak of the devil's cousin.
Maybe it was the the frequency illusion, the law that causes repetition after an encounter with something for the first time making you notice that same thing over and over again because Wren was sure she had never seen the boy in front of her in this class before or even in the whole campus in general. It had to be Baader-Meinhof's frequency bias.
He raised a hand signalling his presence when he noticed she was just staring as though she was not aware he was standing in right front of her. When Wren noticed, she gave a simple nod as her response and a small smile appeared on the boy's face while he dropped his hand.
"I didn't know you were in this class, how have I not seen you before?" he asked and Wren wanted to say 'same, why are you now everywhere?' but she stayed quiet and replied with a shrug.
"You don't talk a lot." he continued remembering how thier conversation went the last time. He stared at her for a minute expecting no reply then looked around the hall at students who were packing their things to leave.
"Can I walk you out?" he asked, leaning on her table with both hands.
"I'm supposed to meet with someone." she finally spoke. Wren was being honest and not because she didn't want to have another unfruitful talk with this boy, she had to meet Emily whose class ended the same time as hers on Wednesdays.
The boy nodded trying to understand but deep down he took it as though she wasn't comfortable around him so he just asked another question.
"What's your name? just noticed I don't know it."
-Because we don't know each other, Wren almost spoke out but gave the most basic reply, her actual name.
"Wren."
"Mexico." he said immediately and Wren looked up at him. "My name's Mexico." he repeated.
She didn't want to ask questions but she became undoubtedly curious that the questions could be read on her face, 'how is your name a country?' and he could read it too.
"Méhico!" a voice shouted from across the hall making the two of them turn their heads.
The voice belonged to a guy who had a figure similar to Mexico's, he had shorter hair and darker skin with two other guys following him and they were all walking towards Wren. Wren squeezed her face in uneasiness because they were all good looking, including the one standing in front of her.
"Let's go, I brought my speaker." another one spoke. He was leaner but still looked good, his hair looked fuller and had a shade of black and brown, like the original colour of his hair was black and the brown dye was starting to fade out.
Mexico coughed loudly when he noticed her staring. The boys took it as their signal to acknowledge the person with him so they all did in ways that Wren found very amusing then she nodded and smiled in response.
"I'll see you later in class then." he told her waiting for at least a nod from her before walking away with his friends.
Wren stared at them as they walked away and she felt different, she didn't know how to explain it but she felt... good.
_ _
_ _
Emily was standing outside her lecture hall when Wren spotted her. She was scrolling through her phone a frown on her face looking like she was ready to take her frustration out on anyone. And she did.
"I don't even understand him, why did he have to post a picture of both of them in a pool, in a pool Wren IN. A. POOL." she complained as soon as she saw her cousin. "He never posted a picture of the both of us when we were together, I hate him."
Wren was Emily's fundamental support, most times she said nothing and just let her rant. Last time it was about how her highschool classmates had changed now in college, one time she even cried when was turning twenty saying she was getting old and had done nothing with her life and now she was complaining about her ex and his post with his present girlfriend.
"Wren believe me I don't care, I just... aarghh!" Wren smiled to this while Emily continued and both of them started walking.
The campus was big like every other university campus with student flooding outside around evening hours. Some walked alone, most people walked in pairs but today Wren and Emily noticed over fifteen people clustered together with more joining curious to see what the crowd was about, Emily being Emily dragged Wren to see for herself.
As they got closer, the sound of music became clearer and by this time Wren had gotten interested too. They pushed gently through the crowd to get at least a glimpse of what was happening until they could see what caused all the chanting and screaming.
Mexico was in the middle of the swarm of students with his three other friends, dancing.
"it's definitely Baader-Meinhof."
She recognized the speaker from earlier, she didn't know they danced, she thought that they looked like they could, but she didn't know they actually did. Seeing them in the middle of a crowd inside campus dancing to this volume of music made them look ten times better than she thought they were.
Unlike his friends who were mostly chanting and hyping him up, Mexico was in the middle of his three friends dancing, with a girl.
Wren was trying not to stare at the girl so much but she had to admit they looked good together and their steps matched each other's rhythm.
The song was coming to an end and Wren wanted to go before any of them noticed her amongst the crowd but there was something about him dancing that made her stay, something alluring that didn't want her to move.
It was exciting, until their eyes met.