The Boyfriend

They drove about twenty minutes to get to Nathan’s villa. There were a lot of motorbikes in Bhorma traffic. Nathan said that people usually go by foot for a shorter distance. He lived alone in his three bedroom villa. The lower ground was for the garage and household tools. The living space was on the upper ground. A wide living room with cushions around the floor sofa facing the TV.

The pantry was on the other side of the room, along with a six seater dining table which looked like it’s rarely used. In between the two parts of the upper floor was a corridor with two doors on each side, three bedrooms and a bathroom was the last door on the left. Nathan occupies the master bedroom with an internal bath of his own.

The guest room was across the external bathroom, and the bedroom across from Nathan was reserved for his parents whenever they came to visit. A local lady was hired to keep the place clean and organized. A huge balcony can be accessed through the glass door beside the living room, a familiar setting that seemed to influence Nathan’s restaurant.

It felt more like home than a bachelor pad. A large bookcase besides the TV was filled with all kinds of books that he and his family read. Pictures of him with his family decorated the cabinet. That was when she saw Nathan’s younger sister that he sometimes mentioned. The two seemed to have a really close bond judging from the pictures.

“Make yourself at home, just let me know if you need anything, Mrs. Elsie comes in everyday at 5. 30 in the morning and leaves at around 10, so … don’t be alarmed if there’s a lady here when you wake up in the morning,” Nathan interrupted her observation of his cabinet.

“Okay … thanks …”

“I’m just gonna take a shower and probably sleep, we’ll leave at around nine tomorrow morning,” he added.

“Sleep? That’s not what we’re going to do,” Kelsey hugged him from behind and pressed her face against his back. He almost blushed.

Julie smiled, “That’s okay, I can manage … you guys go ahead and … sleep, I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Good night Jules!” Kelsey said while pushing Nathan slowly into his room.

She laid on her bed after showering, thanking the stars that the walls were thick enough to contain any sound coming from Nathan’s bedroom. She went over her phone, dropped Preston a message, “I think I’m ready for my new life here.” It was delivered, but left unread. He must be out clubbing with his friends. So she went over Preston’s music she recorded and uploaded it to SoundCloud. It was a song he wrote about his “Girlfriend”. As she listened to it a few times on repeat, she fell asleep.

**********

Kelsey came out of Nathan’s room in her new bikini, a wide beach hat and a sheer beach kimono. Her hairless skin was smooth and glossy, she smelled like coconut oil. She asked to be dropped off at the beach on the way to Ardor, even skipping breakfast altogether to enjoy the morning sun by the beach.

Ardor opens at 7. 00 AM, it serves a delicious variety of breakfast menu up until 11. 30. The food was fresh and well seasoned, Nathan had trained his kitchen crew really well. Andy, the Barista did a good job with the coffee too. She spent most of her first day going through the basics with Nathan in the office, spent some time in the kitchen to see how they operated and observed the floor on busy hours.

“It’s nice to finally have you here,” Andy said from the other side of the bar. “Nathan had been telling everyone about you since day one,” he added.

“I’m glad to finally be here, I hope I can help … well, this is actually helping me graduate next year,” she said.

Andy was a fresh graduate from a local University. He had been working part time as a Barista in a well known coffee house for the past two years. To start working full time at Ardor was an opportunity for a career in the restaurant industry. He wanted to master the art of making coffee and dreamed of having his own coffee house one day.

As the day grew darker, they’ve gotten acquainted through a long conversation about work. She wanted to get insights from people who’ve already worked there since the beginning. She felt like she needed to catch up and make new friends while at it. She listed down everything she learned from that day. Developing ideas in her bedroom at night while Kelsey and Nathan went out on a date, then her phone rang.

Preston was on the other end of that call. He was calling from his dorm room. It was dark, but she can see a silhouette of a girl lying under his bed sheets. “Thank you for uploading my song, it got 600 downloads when I checked this morning … that’s a lot for one night,” he said as he stood up from his bed and walked out of the room.

“You’re welcome … 600? Wow, that’s the most you ever got over night.”

“I know right? How are things at your end? I’m sorry I couldn’t call earlier, I was busy.”

“That’s okay, I can see how busy you are,” she joked.

“What? Oh … that?” he pointed to his door. “No, I was busy getting some materials for the exam week coming up … see, this is why I need you around so badly, I think I’m gonna flunk in all 6 subjects this semester.”

Julie smiled, “You’ll manage … maybe she can get you the materials you need … you should ask her that when she wakes up.”

Preston rubbed his face and sighed, “You know, I didn’t think of that before, we didn’t really talk before … maybe I should ask her.”

She could only imagine how everything went down, Preston doesn’t really ‘talk’ to the girls he brought back to his room. “Were you sleeping? Are you naked?” she saw his bare chest and wondered if he had gone out of the room without putting anything on.

“Uh-huh …” he laughed.

“Jeez, Preston, make sure you’re not locked out of your room.”

He shrugged it off and sat on the corridor floor. “I miss you … I wish I could have breakfast with you in the morning,” he said. It went unanswered.

“Kelsey’s going back tomorrow, you can have breakfast with her from then on,” she offered a solace.

“Me, her and Zach?” they laughed. “It won’t be the same,” he said.

“Isn’t your date going to stay ’til breakfast at least?”

Preston pursed his lips, “I don’t know … can we not talk about my date?”

“It’s hard not to talk about it when you call me after sex, don’t you think?”

“You’re right, I’m sorry, I was thinking about you.”

Julie rolled her eyes. He stared at her through the phone, wanting to say something, but decided to end the call instead.

“I just wanted to say thanks for the upload, I’ll call you again soon.”

He stood up bare bottom naked in the corridor. He went inside his dorm room, put on some clothes and left without so much glancing at his date. She said she was ready for her new life in Bhorma, while he was tumbling around in his old life, or new life, without her.