Calculations Made In The Dead Of Night, And The Waters That Watched

               It had taken less than ten minutes for me to break. That was pathetic as fuck. It's like my fingers typed the message all on their own, so maybe it wasn't me.

I'm fairly sure that for the first time in my life, my buttons had really been pushed. (In the way that they were) Because no one...not one person, has ever won this kind of battle against me.

Julian... why was he different? What is it about him that makes me the way I am right now? Or just lately, because I was becoming harder for myself to recognise.

Ju:
good, good. how are you so photogenic.

I was smiling so much lately it was starting to worry Ma. At first, she hated the fact that I was grumpy more times than not. And my sudden change was now her greatest concern. It was always concern mixed with a little relief in her voice trying to get me to tell her what exactly changed. If I was being honest, I didn't know either. And maybe it would be the weirdest thing to say that out of nowhere, Julian happened.

Me:
it's a me thing

Ju:
that is hard to believe, considering there's no substantial proof. well, apart from this picture that is...

Me:
you did not just say that

Ju:
read it again

How I wish he was right next to me, we'd see where the cheekiness came from then. But then what would you do?

That was the question, wasn't it?

Me:
i AM handsome, admit it. in fact, you prolly aint admittin shit because its too much for you to handle...i understand juju

It felt like I could see him smile from the other side.

Ju:
after sighing a lot...i've made up my mind. we'll test it out

Me:
and how exactly are we supposed to do that

Ju:
i'll show you when i see you

Me:
does that mean i get to see you soon?

Seriously, what were we doing? This obviously couldn't be normal. I'd rather eat a flip flop than talk to Mike, Liam, Kit or Connor like this.

Ju:
not as soom as i'd have wanted but yes, soon

I looked at the piece of text with more than a thousand things swimming through my mind. Against my better judgment, I texted back a question.

Me:
and how soon would you have wanted?

I watched the three dots like they held the secrets of the universe.

Ju:
i'm not telling you that...it's embarrassing

Me:
no need to be embarrassed juju...tell me

Ju:
fine...
Ju:
maybe now

If Julian thought that was embarrassing, then he should have seen how intensely my stomach churned the moment I read his text. I might as well have swiped my brow of imaginary sweat before typing my reply.

Me:
i want to see you now too. lets meet

Ju:
now?

I knew the time wasn't ideal and I knew that it was unreasonable for me to ask him to meet me at this hour. It was late or perhaps a little too late for him, and although it would have been a bummer for me, if Julian had declined the idea to meet, then I would not have pushed. Hopefully, he didn't change his mind.

Me:
yes, now...meet me at the bent-gate bridge in like forty minutes

Ju:
i dont know where that is

Me:
alright, remember the mad egg? how about we meet up there, then we'll see what to do. we could meet at the grand hall if you prefer that

Ju:
okay
the mad egg is fine

Julian's affirmation made me so happy I practically bounced off the bed after replying.

Me:
ok see you there

•••

               It was no surprise to see Julian in a navy blue hoodie and shorts. He walked over to me and put his hands in his pockets, a little distance away. "Hey," he said.

             "Juju," I said and smirked at him. He seemed to light up for the shortest time when he heard me. It made me want to say it again.

              "Kayden the cute?" He replied, the neon lights of the Mad Egg casting a yellow kind of sheen on his hair. The lights made his eyes look darker than they were.

              "Don't even...don't make me bring up the cotton candy and lizards, Juju. Seriously, I can talk about it all day," I replied with all the seriousness I could muster, nullified by my never-ending smile.

"No, thank you," Juju replied with a slight roll to his eyes.

"That's what I thought," I said then closed the distance between us. He was taking too long to give me my hug, so I did it by myself.

I swayed Juju from side to side, with my arms all around him and his own, still inside his pockets. He was so tense and so stiff so I didn't let it continue for too long. Reluctantly, or not, I released Juju.

"Did you really want to come?" I asked after releasing him. "I know it's really late."

Juju turned a little to the side, and I couldn't tell whether his cheeks were red or it was just the neon lights. "Of course I wanted to come."

My heart soared. "Okay, okay. So, I know just the place to go. Just follow closely behind me," I told him and he nodded.

Bent-gate bridge was just after the last intersection from my place to the Grand Hall, and because of its multiple flood lights, it looked divine at night. And because it was so big, we could park our cars at the sides and no one would be bothered about it. Kit and I had already done it several times.

"Your favorite place?" Julian asked me as he approached from his car, he mimicked me leaning against mine so that we were shoulder to shoulder looking over at the water, and folded his arms across his chest.

"Not exactly. Wanna see my favorite place?" I asked him instead.

"I do," he answered with a hint of excitement in his voice.

"Nah, I'll show you another time," I said, then teasingly added, "Maybe."

"You better," he said firmly. "That's a promise."

"Hm," I replied. "I'll think about it."

Was it just me, or was the space between our shoulders a little smaller?

Turns out, it wasn't just me, because after a little while of talking, the space was closing in, so much that a single movement in his direction would close that space completely. I turned away and tried my best not to move, I kept on talking normally, or trying to, wondering if Julian even realised anything. He seemed oblivious.

I stopped listening to Julian mid sentence when I felt our shoulders touch. It was at this time that he also stopped talking and our eyes met for the shortest while before we both looked away, saying nothing about the body contact, and pretending like none of it was happening. But not moving away either.

Against my will, I chuckled nervously. "Yeah...uh, about that handsome test..."

"Aw, you're really not being cute right now Kay," Julian said with a tiny groan and a small smile. If he knew just how cute he was...

Kayden stop! Because what the hell is this? It felt like my brain and I needed to sit down and have a talk, because there was too much I didn't understand.

Julian then pushed himself off the car and pulled his phone out. "So it works like this," he explained. "I'm going to rate the individual parts of your face out of ten, and the closer the total score is to fifty, the more handsome you are. I'm declaring that you're going to rank really low on the scale so do not expect too much."

"Hmm," I said and closed the inches between our faces until I was sure he could feel my breath on his face. He blinked several times. "And what are these individual parts?"

               Julian took two steps away from me and moved to the side. "Uh...I...the...," he said hesitantly, it was so...ugh. Stop Kayden, please stop. ...not now, brain...

"Well?" I asked cheekily.

"Your... facial structure, then eyes, nose, lips are all out of ten each," he said.

"And the other ten?" I asked him.

"That is the general ranking. My final verdict on how well the entire structure fits together," he said and made a round motion with his fingers towards my face. "I'll start now."

               Julian started typing into his phone as I held my hands behind my back, way too happy, waiting to be assessed by him.

"Julian's Special Handsome Test," he said while his fingers tapped his screen. "Name, Kayden..."

               "Wilson..."

               "The Cute," he corrected. "Kayden the Cute."

               "You're asking for it Juju,"

"Am I?" He asked, but did not let me answer. Lucky, because my hands itched to do something. "Here we go, so I'm going to have to give you a four for that facial structure."

               The nerve! "What do you mean four? Let me see that!" I made to grab the phone but Julian stepped away from me.

               "Your eyes would definitely be a two," he said and I smiled wider. "No, wait, lets give it a one actually. Nose, two will do just fine. Lips..."

Julian stopped talking and I noticed his eyes nervously fleet away from my lips then glue themselves to his phone to input the data. "Uh lips would be te- three..."

               "Yeah, that's definitely three," I smirked.

               Julian ignored me. "And finally, the final verdict," he said and pretended to look at me seriously as if ananlysing each part of me. "Okay, this is definitely and without a doubt a one. Yeah," he nodded like he'd checked again and made sure. "And with that we have a total score of eleven." Julian then shook his head. "Kayden, your score is eleven out of fifty. Now that you know you are not at all handsome, how do you wish to proceed?"

               I took a step towards him. "I would like to look at your phone," I said and as I tried to grab the phone, he snatched his hand back and hid it behind his back.

               "Not happening," said Julian.

               "Oh, something you don't want me to see? Something like the truth?" When I moved behind him, Julian moved the phone in front of him and completely dodged me. I wrapped my hands around him in an effort to grab the phone from him, which made it look like I was hugging him from the back.

               Julian immediately turned and made one of the most "harmless" moments of my life become one of the hottest and most confusing I've ever been in.

His arms automatically rested on my shoulders at the same time mine wrapped around his waist—a little too tightly at that.

We both stopped smiling and looked at each other. It felt like I was looking at him for the first time, every single thing about his face felt different. Every single thing I'd never noticed before. At least not to that level.

I felt Julian's hands withdraw from my shoulders and move to my chest, trying to push me away. I used the moment to steal the phone from his hands.

"Hey!" He yelled.

I laughed at the face he made and tried not to focus on the flushed cheeks. I then groaned and gave him back his phone when I realised it was locked and I didn't have his password. "Lucky you," I said while dropping the phone in his hands reluctantly.

"What are you doing?" His look of victory quickly morphed to confusion. Julian exclaimed after a while when he was lifted and put on the hood of my car.

"It's your turn to be tested," I told him.

"I'm not–"

I traced the outline of his face with a finger. "Ten," I said and the colour on his cheeks deepened.

I knew I was being bold but I was too focused on his every feature to even worry about that. "Ten," I said after poking his nose once. "Ten," I said while tracing his lips. This couldn't be normal. This couldn't be just two casual friends hanging out. Julian tried to turn his face to the side but I turned it back to me and looked into his eyes. "Definitely ten."

"Stop, Kay," he said softly.

I shook my head. "My final verdict bends the rules a little, but there's nothing that can be done about it. It's probably fifteen."

"But that's more than fifty..."

"Is it?"

Julian nodded and that's when the sound of his ringtone interrupted us both. He looked at me guiltily and I just shrugged at him, telling him to go ahead.

Juju didn't say a single word during the entire phone call, not until the end when he said a very frustrated sounding 'yes' and hung up.

               "I have to go," he said to me, a hint of annoyance in his voice. I didn't ask about it, just nodded.

               "Sorry I made you meet me so late in the night, maybe I shouldn't have–"

               "Thank you for this...time...it's..." he said. "Please don't apologise." Juju sounded so sincere that all I could do was nod at him.

               This time the hug lasted the longest. There was no reason for it to take so much time but somehow, it was too comfortable to let go. "Bye," Julian finally said when we pulled apart.

               "Bye," I replied. "Text me when you get back home."

"Really?" He asked a little disbelievingly.

"Oh yeah. I take those really seriously," I replied. "Especially since all this is my fault."

"Not exactly, but okay I will."

"And a screenshot of the unaltered handsome test results on your phone would be very much appreciated," I added.

Julian smiled. "Never."

•••

               When I woke up the next morning, the first thing I thought about was Julian. Julian Julian Julian. I turned several times to waste enough time on the bed before getting up. But with every position came fresh thoughts of green eyes and brown hair. Light freckles and flushed ears. Pink lips and long fingers.

I felt a little worried about him because this was the second time he got a phone call when he was with me and had to leave immediately. I worried about if everything was fine or if that was normal for him. Something told me it was the former because of how his mood always changed.

I checked my phone and looked at the last message he sent me.

Ju:
hi, i'm back. i'm alright

Me:
good

It was my one worded reply. I pushed down the urge to text any more because I didn't trust myself to stop.

"Kay! There's someone–" Ree started.

"Kaaaayyy!" Rylan interrupted. "There's someone at the door! And mom's still asleep!"

I must have been really lost in my thoughts not to notice. "Teeth," I said and I was flashed with two sets of little pearly white teeth, the action making my siblings look way too cute for this world.

"Good," I approved while giving them high fives. Then I got off the bed.

The reason I still asked them to show me their teeth was because Rylan once got the story wrong and convinced Rylee that every time they brushed their teeth, a tooth fairy died somewhere.

It took a lot of convincing but with the help of gummy worms, I finally managed to change their minds. "Now for my morning kisses!" I said cheerfully. "One here, and one here," I pointed at both my cheeks.

"No! Kay! I'm a big boy now," Rylan complained. "No kisses!"

I looked at him nonchalantly. "Okay," I said then turned to Rylee. "Ree?"

She was already rushing towards me with open arms. She jumped into my arms and gave me two extra kisses as Rylan tried to look every where but at me.  

As I pulled the front door open, I didn't expect to see the biggest bouquet of flowers I'd ever seen. There were all sorts of flowers inside it, but despite that, instead of looking like someone could have easily thrown together different flowers, it still looked like someone really put a lot of effort into it.

"Violet Wilson?" The delivery man asked.

"That's mom!" Ree declared as I signed and carried the huge bouquet inside.

I had mixed feelings and waves of protectiveness about the reality of someone sending my mother flowers, but I couldn't deny the happiness I felt either. All this made me cautious and I read the note attached to it.

'Have a lovely day,
As I spend mine in torture, unable to stop thinking about the day I encountered you'

Who the fuck was this? Kayden thought, honestly, it was borderline creepy according to him. No name, no nothing. Probably someone from work?

"Ma," I said, pushing her door open. She woke up immediately. "These came for you."

"For me?" She asked, her voice still addled with sleep.

"Yes, for you," I replied. "Good morning." I cleared my throat. "Are you seeing someone?"

"No," she said while cradling the bouquet in her arms, looking a little confused. "I would have obviously told you."

I watched her frown as she read the note. "I have no idea whom these could be from. But they are lovely." She smelled them. 

We spent the entire morning in confusion, that was quickly forgotten as we enjoyed our morning together. It was rare for Ma to get entire weekends off like this so this was special.

It wasn't until later on that I was in my room and almost got the scare of my life when I noticed Rylan's head poking through my door and watching me intently. How long had he been there?!

"Jesus! Ry, come here...what is it?"

He got in cautiously and climbed onto my bed, then fidgeted with his hands. "I need to tell you something Kay."

"What's wrong?" I asked. "What's bothering you?" It was rare that Rylan ever wanted to talk because apparently something was bothering him.

Rylan pointed to one corner of the ceiling and when I looked up, he quickly kissed both my cheeks and scrambled off the bed.

"I'm still a big boy though! Byeeee!" He said without looking back as he made his escape by running away and out the door.