A Prolonged Denial.

“Do you like him?”

Her eyes bulged. That was not a question she was expecting at 2 in the morning, not when she was sprawling on the floor of their room pulling half her hair out, trying to memorise the Acts from the Penal Code and getting the Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs right from bottom to the top.

“Who?” she asked, although she had a faint idea of the person in question. Bee, her best friend slash best roommate ever slowly shook her head and put her book down. It seemed as if Bee had finished another chapter of the Social Psychology while she was still stuck with the last page she opened since last night.

“You know who.”

“I seriously don’t.”

“Yeah right,” Bee finally said after a long pause, rolling her eyes as she crawled out of her bed to reach for her water tumbler on her study desk. She tried to ignore Bee’s eyes that were shooting like laser on her back, and flipped to another page of the Penal Code which she had dog-eared according to the list of what might get into the test that she got from Sergeant during class last Friday.

“Sergeant’s a hot stuff, you know.” Bee warned her after a couple of minutes, and she finally looked up from her books.

“I know that already?” she acknowledged, but it ended as a question instead of a statement, because she was curious as to why Bee would give her the warning. “Should I not befriend with him because of that?” she asked, this time rather worried about Bee’s warning.

“Well, there’s nothing wrong with being friends.”

“True that.”

“But... he’s just too nice with everyone, you know?” Bee shrugged, as if doing so could help her making up the point she was trying to convey.

“He shouldn’t be nice to everyone?” she asked again, playfully. Okay fine, she got what Bee meant. Don’t fall in love with Sergeant because he is the type of person who’s going to make everyone falls in love with him and then chooses nobody.

“No, you idiot!”

“Okay, okay I get it, stop screaming!” she covered her ears, and Bee pouted. She closed her books and took a deep breath, leaning into the edge of Bee’s bed that was so tidy all the time in comparison with hers, and sighed.

“He’s fun, alright? He’s friendly and brilliant, and we always have endless of things to talk about whenever we see each other. That’s it for me. I don’t know about him being too nice or too friendly towards everyone else—that’s his thing and I don’t see any importance of knowing it now. We’re just friends, okay? So can we drop it, please?” she pleaded, and Bee nodded her head. Great, no thanks to Bee, her mood to study was ruined.

“He was looking for you today during mass lecture,” Bee suddenly said and she rolled her eyes.

“I said drop it, Bee.”

“Not Sergeant. I mean the man you cold-heartedly dumped. I told him that you’re having flu, so he told you to take care of yourself.” Bee explained, and she was, honestly, surprised.

“Did he bring nunchucks along or something; you know—to break my skull?”

“No, not really. He seemed genuinely worried that you weren’t there. It’s amazing, you know. He’s like not even mad at you. I think it’s not going to be a problem if you suddenly decide to get back together,” Bee suggested, and she gave her best friend a hard look.

“That’s ludicrous. He’s not a saint, and stop making me look like a jerk. If we’re not meant to be then we’re not.” She said, putting an end to this conversation that started to divert from the original focus.

She got it; it would be very inconsiderate of her to show her friendliness with other guys when they had just broke up. She tried to be subtle—not accepting Sergeant’s invitation for dinners with just him, pretending to be asleep when she saw him at the library so that he wouldn’t pull a chair and sit next to her. She even toned down the Frisbee practices so that they wouldn’t have to meet so very often during weekends.

It made her feel stuffy, but she wasn’t ready to put another blow to her ex-boyfriend’s heart yet. She’s just too nice to be a bitch by then.

And she was definitely not in love with Sergeant. Like him, yes. But to be romantically involved with that man who came with a long list of admirers was suicide, and she was not ready to burden herself with all kinds of nonsensical affairs.

Not until a few more months, at least. Not yet.