My parents' restaurant were still heavily noise polluted when I returned. In fact, I think the exact same customers were sitting at the exact same seats at the exact same tables. I couldn't understand Cantonese, but I truly believe they were still on the same topic.
"Welcome home!" It wasn't my mother, it was just Darryl the waiter, walking past with a tray of dim sum on his palm.
"Thanks." I nodded lightly.
I walked past the cash register again; Mother still wouldn't spare me a glance.
I stopped; I didn't pass by without a word this time. My fingers played with themselves. I wasn't nervous. Don't think that I was.
"媽? (Mom?)"
"幹嘛? (What?)" She hissed with a deep frown and not an eye.
"Can I go to the park?"
"Which one?" Her attention was still down at her palms, which were shuffling bills while her mind counted.
"The one behind my primary school?"
"Go-lah." A Malaysian slang slipped into her words; I'm too whitewashed by the Internet to relate though.
She was done with counting. She placed the stack of bills into the cash register with a ding.
I still stood awkwardly in front.
"Do you want to come with me?" I eventually suggested.
"I'm busy."
She responded so fast. Then again, what did I expect? "Okay..." I nodded softly; not that she would notice.
Before I went back upstairs to my room, Darryl the waiter halted me, "Hey!"
"Hm?" I glanced back over my shoulder.
"I'm on shift today. But if you need company: any weekends."
"Thanks." I smiled faintly before leaving.
...
I ended up not going.
I stayed in my room sketching until night, where the only light illuminating my spacious bedroom was the table lamp.
My room had quite a fair bit of empty space. I didn't need that much space. I only needed my single bed, my work desk and my wardrobe closet.
I think I drew too much anime girls; I should switch to sketching guys.
Flipping open the next empty page on my sketchbook, I doodled without a vision in mind.
Quick, light strokes of the pencil, rapidly formed lines on blank, eventually becoming a shape that we're familiar with. That's art in my opinion: expressing what's already familiar in a unique, reimagined style.
Wait, this sketch kinda looks like...
I held up my sketch book for a better look. I tilted it to the left, then to the right. Who is this that I just drew?
I opened my laptop and clacked in his name quickly, then compared my sketch with Google Images.
Yeah, why did I just draw Ivan Lerring?
Whatever. His face card's proportions was probably just that great that he looked fictional.
I shut the table lamp, and hit the sack.
...
March 31st.
As always, I could only be woken by the sun itself, seeping through the curtains. The alarm I set on my phone beside my bed had been snoozed at least twenty times.
Groggily, I sat up on the bed, unravelling from the thick blankets and pillows, as my messy, long raven hair disturbed my face.
BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP
The twenty first snooze was over.
THUD! BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP
What? I slapped my palm to the usual spot but the alarm didn't went off.
I had missed by a few inches, what I actually slapped was an unfamiliar box.
BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP THUD!
There, finally, I shut my phone up, stupid ass phone.
The unfamiliar box was of only two colours, blood red and black black, but the patterns were intricate. It fit comfortably in my palm, with a smooth, soft, almost fuzzy feel to its surface.
There was a small slit that I could slot my nail in and pull, opening the box.
Sat inside the box, delicately placed atop red cushions: an earring. Yes, singular.
It was an elegant magnetic clip-on earring. It was mainly silver, but the centre of its diamond-shaped dangle was a shiny red: like ruby, but I couldn't be sure if it is.
There was something so tiny inside of the jewel that I couldn't make out its shape until I picked the earring up and held it centimeters from my squinted eyes.
It was the shape of a loong, or a Chinese-style dragon, frozen in the red jewel.
There was two things bizarre about this: one, where did this box and earring come from? I know my parents enough to know they wouldn't prepare such a surprise. Or... maybe they did? Maybe Mother felt bad for turning me down yesterday?
Two, why was there only a singular earring, where's the other one?
Nonetheless, it was pretty, and it piqued my interest.
After washing myself up in the bathroom. I went back to try out the earring before heading down for breakfast.
Today's Tuesday, which means there will actually be class very soon: at nine.
It's eight now though, there's no rush. I picked up the earring and stood in front of the vanity mirror hung on my wardrobe closet.
Clip!
Yeah, this looks super cute, and especially sophisticated. If only this came in a pair...
"Hey."
"Woah!" I jolted away from the sudden voice. My head shook frantically until finally finding him — him lying on my bed... alluringly.
He was a tall adonis with well-defined muscles... and he was shirtless. Round deltoids at the edges of wide clavicles, and poking abs by a slim waist: a perfect inverted triangle. A sharp jawline, a messy head of dark hair, and deep, sharp, red hunter eyes. My dream man...
BUT WHAT THE FUCK IS HE DOING ON MY BED??!!!?
I scampered over to my work desk and grabbed a pair of scissors with my now clammy palms. My face tensed up, and my jaws trembled badly, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?! DARRYYYYYYLLL!!"
"Woah, woah, woah." He got off my bed hurriedly and rushed forward before I could react.
His palm approached, and it landed on my...
"DARRYY—mm... mm.!!" He shut my mouth forcefully with a palm the size of my face, all while I had to almost tilt my head all the way up just to not stare into his pecs; he towered over me.
He leaned in even closer, until he breathed into my ear, "Please quiet down."
"MM! HRGH!" I stabbed him.
He barely reacted other than stumbling back two steps and removing his grasp on my face.
"This is unnecessary." He casually pulled the pair of scissors out. No blood was on it or on him.
"S-s-s-s—" I stumbled backwards. My tailbone thudded heavy against my desk and rattled all the stationaries atop, but I kept moving back despite the pain, "—STAY AWAY!"
I had raised an open palm in front of myself defensively, but my fingertips were... melting?
It didn't feel any different from regular fingertips, but as if they were ice, they slowly liquified into clear, pristine water, cascading down my fingers, then to my palm before dripping onto the floor from my wrist.
"H-huh?"
The melting didn't stop at the fingertips, it escalated over time. In merely a few seconds, I've lost half of all my fingers on my right hand; they had all, unpromptedly, magically, turned into water.
It was now I noticed that the shirtless adonis behind my melted hand had vermilion dragon horns on his head.
What the fuck is happening? Help me, Amelda...
He smirked wryly, with his hands firmly planted on his waist, "You're getting really wet over there."
"Ahh..." I gasped, then I wheezed, "Arghhhhh..."
"Look at you go—"
"ARRRRRRGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!" Then I screamed.
...
"Wei. (Hey,)" a table downstairs ceased their chatter, one of them asked my mother working the cash register: "Meh Seng Oh?(What noise was that?)"
Mother pretended to strain her ears a bit before replying, "Mou ah. (I didn't hear anything.)"
...
"ARRRRRRRGHHHHHHHH!!!"
"Wait wait wait, please," He waved both open palms, "I can explain everything—"
"ARRRRRRRRRGHHHHHHHH!!!" The melting had now reached my forearm, and it was approaching my elbow.
I dropped down to the floor helplessly, squeezing myself into a corner while crying, "ARGHHHHH!!!"
"LISTEN! LISTEN! LISTEN!" He grasped my shoulders and gently shook, "INSTEAD OF SHRINKING, TRY EXPANDING!"
"WHAT?!"
"FEEL THE CHI WITHIN YOUR ARMS AND EXPAND INSTEAD OF SHRINK!"
"WHAT?!"
"WHY ARE YOU YELLING WE'RE AT A VERY QUIET PLA— oh wait I'm yelling too." He shook himself back to his default face, which was still too enticing for me to look at directly. "Try to expand." He held his arms out with a wide grin, "Like when you're scared, you'd shrink." His arms returned to his chest, then went out again, "But when you're happy, you'd expand."
"I'M SCARED OF YOU!"
"Oh shit, my bad." He backed off a couple steps, "Is it the scissors? Sorry." He hurled that onto my desk.
I was still gasping on the floor. I had lost my elbows to water too now. Tears streaks my cheeks. "Oh my god..."
"Expand, Angela, expand!" He held his arms out again. "Close your eyes... Feel the chi..."
I complied. Whatever the fuck's happening was beyond my comprehension anyways. I might as well listen.
"... Expand..."
I closed my eyes, and tried to vibrate every muscle I had. From my shoulders that were still intact, down to the triceps... the elbow... the forearm... wiggle my fingers.
I opened my eyes again and there they were, my hands, fully restored, and the floor fully dried of water.
"Look at you go! You're a natural!" He clapped; I dashed for the scissors to stab.
I thrusted not just the scissors, but all of me, aiming dead for the heart. But right before impact, his skin turned translucent. The scissors went through without resistance, like he wasn't even there. I went through him too, with too much momentum to the point where—
THUD!
I slammed my face into the wall behind.
"Argh..." I held my fuzzy head with a groan as I tried to readjust.
"Please just allow me to explain."
CREAK!
"What's the noise, Angela?" Mother burst into my room; I forgot to lock the door.
"HIM!" I pointed at the adonis with tremulous fingers, while my feet worked to push me way into the wall and away from him. "H-H-H-HE BROKE IN! AND HE WANTS TO RAPE ME!!!"
"What?"
"What? What him?"
"HIM! THIS..." I gestured frantically, "THIS FUCKING PERVERT!"
"Oh no... Is this another imaginary friend?" Mother squeezed her temples with a sigh.
"Huh?"
"She can't see me."
"Did you not just hear an overly masculine voice say "She can't see me."?"
"She can't hear me."
"No. Angela. Please just quiet down, there's customers downstairs." She left the door ajar as she went back downstairs.
I was discombobulated. I froze up and all I could do was maintain my defensive stance with the scissors against the shirtless man.
"Alright. Usually, it always progress until here." He walked towards the door, "May I close the door?"
"No."
"Okay, let me explain... I..." He pointed at himself with two index fingers, "... came from that earring you're wearing. That earring you're wearing is a zodiac emblem, and I'm its spirit, a zodiac spirit."
None of that was even close to coherent, "HUH?!"
But he did mention something about the earring.
"Basically, you have been chosen to be one of the— WAIT WAIT WAIT DON'T TAKE OFF THE EARRING—"
I took it off, and he disappeared.
I dragged my sweaty back down against the wall until I was sat, still panting.
Amelda, what should I do?