My Universe

36: “Our age difference doesn’t matter.”

The smell of chicken wings in different flavors surrounded the whole restaurant. Just by smelling the spicy aroma in the restaurant, the raven could already feel the pain circling around the insides of her body from her abdomen down to her anus. If not for Iris, Winter would not hesitate to decline their invitation for lunch and flee from that restaurant even though she knew that Aster was there to help her in whatever problem she might have.

There was still hope to run away by using the excuse of going to the restroom, but it was too late because Ryan suddenly stood up to go outside and answer a phone call from her girlfriend. It was supposed to be fine since it was just him, but Aster just had to excuse herself a few seconds after he left. As if the brunette had read the mind of the raven, she went to use the restroom to leave the two of them who were ex-girlfriends in the other universe alone together. At that point, there was definitely no more choice left for Winter but to stay throughout the whole lunch with them.

“Have you been here before?” Iris casually started a conversation as she held the gaze of the woman across her while taking a sip on her water.

“I haven’t. Have you?” Winter answered, feeling proud that her voice sounded normal.

“No, actually. Ryan just told me that this restaurant has the best buffalo wings and I like buffalo wings, so why not try this for lunch?” the blue-haired woman replied. “Good luck to our stomachs and intestines later.”

The raven let out a chuckle at the response as she unconsciously leaned her face on her hand while her elbow was resting on the table. It almost seemed like Winter had no plans taking her eyes off the attractive face of Iris as she did not realize that she was doing the exact same habit that she had whenever she was eating with Claire. There were a lot of things that made the raven fall in love with the architecture students, and one of them was her face that always looked beautiful no matter what expression she had on her face; even when she was just having a straight face. Everything about her always made Winter fall in love with her all over again. Winter could forget that the woman across her was Iris Skyler, and just think that it was still Claire Lylah who just had plenty new sides to show.

“Your course is Hotel and Restaurant Management, right?” Not wanting to lose, Iris rested both of her elbows on the table and leaned her chin on her clasped hands.

“Yeah, it’s my second year.”

“Really? I didn’t know I was older.” A chuckle escaped the lips of the dancer.

That was the sexiest thing that Winter had ever seen and heard. She wished that she had that as a voice recording for her to listen while taking care of her hygiene, eating meals, cramming, walking to her classes, and sleeping.

“It’s fine. Our age difference doesn’t matter,” Winter said with a broad smile on her face as she recalled herself saying the exact same words to Claire before they started dating.

The blue-haired woman raised her eyebrows as the smile on her face grew wide in amusement. She felt like it was a flirt attack as she was about to reply with a counterattack when the waiter came to get rid of the coquettish atmosphere between them with their food. Seeing the glossy red chicken wings that was fresh from the kitchen with the smoke elevating to the air, the smile on the face of Winter dropped as she was returned back to reality with the reason sinking in about why she was seated at the same table as Iris in the first place.

Exactly at that time, the two that almost had their presences forgotten arrived with excitement painted on their faces because of the delicious aroma and appearance of the dishes that they would be eating. Each of them had a plate of buffalo wings as they all agreed to have an eating contest in which the first person who finishes their plate gets to buy ice cream for everyone after. A portion of French fries and regular chicken wings were also what they ordered for everyone.

“Paula was bragging to me about how they’re eating spicy rice cakes because her bestie’s Korean uncle cooked for her,” Ryan said with a groan as he slumped down his seat.

“Is that your favorite food?” Aster asked as she took a glance at the raven beside her, who had just been staring at the food in front of them.

“Yeah. I’d die for it,” he replied as he wore the plastic gloves that the restaurant staff provided for them to not be messy while eating the buffalo wings. “Anyway, the buffalo wings are the best so I’ll be fine.”

Winter gulped in nervousness when all of them were almost done putting on their gloves. It was an eating contest, and she knew that she would definitely be the one who would be buying ice cream for everyone eventually. The four of them glanced at each other as the blond wore an excited smirk on his face.

All of them immediately began eating after the brunette was done counting from three to one. Even though she knew that she would lose, it was not like the raven would not eat it as she let out a deep sigh before taking one piece of chicken and taking a small bite on it to check the spiciness level with her eyes shut tightly. But her eyes shot open when she could barely taste any spiciness while chewing it.

Curious why the chicken wing was not spicy, Winter took a big bite as she slowly chewed and anticipated the burning feeling to run through her tongue; but nothing happened. All she could taste was the sweetness of the chicken wings, which made her think that the chicken wings that she was eating could be honey glazed chicken wings instead of buffalo wings. Eventually, it did not matter as the raven grinned with the thought of not being the loser.

***

After closing the car door, the brunette let out a heavy sigh while stretching her arms up as she stared at the environment that they were at. It was like they just had a 1-hour vacation outside hell only to go back eventually.

“My girlfriend wants me to pick her up. I’ll go ahead.” Ryan waved his hand from the driver’s seat at the three women.

“We all know that you just wanna leave because you’re embarrassed for being the loser,” Iris teased.

“Screw off!”

The three women let out laughter as their male friend rolled the window of his car back up and started the car already with the desire to leave as soon as possible since what the female dancer just said was in fact true. During the ride, the women constantly made fun of Ryan for bragging about how he would definitely not be the last to finish the chicken wings only to end up being the person who treated ice cream for each of them. Nothing was more satisfying than annoying a man, and that was the one common thing that the three of them agreed on.

Iris’s phone started to ring as she fished it out from her pocket and turned to the two women. “I’ll go ahead now as well. Let’s have lunch again together next time!”

“Sure. We’d love to.” Aster smiled as she waved at the dancer, who gave them a wink before walking away while answering the phone call.

The two of them were together once again as it felt like it had been a long time since they saw each other’s presence even though they were literally together for the whole time. The raven let out a deep breath in relief as they were left alone together before turning to look at the taller woman.

“Thank goodness lunch wasn’t a disaster,” Winter said.

“True. You didn’t really need my help, after all,” Aster replied with a smile on her face as if she was proud of her for surviving, and the latter noticed that which made her feel touched.

“Oh, yeah.” Winter snapped her fingers as she remembered what she was supposed to tell her. “I got honey glazed chicken wings earlier. I was worried that I was gonna spend hours in the toilet again, but it turns out I don’t have to.”

“Wow. Really? You have a lot of good luck with you then. The cook probably accidentally gave you that since they look so much alike,” the brunette said with a shrug.

“I know, right? I wish my good luck stays with me until I date Iris.” The raven laughed.

The brunette wore a smile on her face in satisfaction as she watched how the latter looked delighted. Not only did Winter’s smiling face made Aster pleased, but also the fact that Winter was in a happy mood because of her secret movie earlier that eventually benefited her.

It was all in the plan of Aster. She did not have the urge to use the restroom after Ryan left to answer a phone call. The brunette did not only leave them to have a private moment together because she left them together to go tell the waiter to switch Winter’s dish with honey glazed chicken wings, knowing well that she might even embarrass herself in front of Iris with her low tolerance in spicy foods.

But it was all meant to stay as a secret as the brunette just pretended to be surprised by it.

Suddenly, she felt her phone vibrate as she rummaged through her pocket to take the device. It was her roommate that was calling.

“Hey, Gabby.” The brunette winked at the raven when she caught her staring.

Winter took her phone out to check her class schedule. They only had one two-hour lecture in the afternoon which was in three hours, so it was a relief for her. She disliked lectures and hated them even more now that the course she was in was about cooking, which was something that she was bad at. It was like a punishment for all of the bad things that she had done in the past, or a lesson that she has to learn how to cook if she wants to be an independent woman.

After the conversation that Aster had with Gabby through the phone call, she slid her phone back in her pocket as she turned to the raven.

“What’s up? Why’d your roommate call?” Winter asked.

“He knows that I don’t have a class until the next three hours, so he’s asking me to get him some snacks while he’s doing a project,” Aster simply answered.

“And you said no.”

The raven raised an eyebrow when the brunette shook her head.

“Yeah, I said I will.”

“Why? Weird how you’re doing commands from your roommate,” the raven replied in disbelief.

“Well, he said that he’ll give me ten dollars for service fee. I can’t miss out on the opportunity to get free money, you know.” Aster grinned.

Winter scoffed. It was no wonder that it felt suspicious for Aster to do commands that were given to her easily even though she did not know her for that long. It would always be understandable if money was involved, though.

“You’ll be fine on your own, right?” the brunette asked as she buried her hands in her pockets.

“Yeah, of course.”

A smile appeared on the face of Aster as she placed her hand on the shorter woman’s head to slightly ruffle it for a second before running away as fast as she could before she could even receive a punch. The brunette disappeared after as the raven was left there with a messy hair.

“That b***h,” Winter mumbled in annoyance while fixing her hair using her fingers.

Since there was not much to do, the raven decided to explore the university during her vacant hours.