Matched Up With My Tomboy Childhood Friend

Bleeding

“That's why I like you, Kev,” says Eli out of nowhere, smiling at me.

(Let's marry then.) “What?” I exclaim, looking away.

“You're my best friend at whom I can be who I am.” (Oh that's what it is. Okay, no marrying then). “I don't need to think about my actions and the things I say. After letting out jokes like that, I knew that you'll not take it seriously and will always treat me like a friend unlike the a*sholes I've met. You make me feel free.”

“It's not a big deal,” I say, looking away from her. “Other guys would do the same.”

I hear her sigh before saying, “So, we should go back and spend these tokens before the mall closes. We still need to buy you a new phone.”

“Okay.”

We leave the bench then head back to the arcade to spend all of the tokens we have. I decided not to play Metal Slug or Tekken so that we could get done right away. I spent most of it in machines that require luck to get a lot of tickets. The machine I'm invested in is this token catapult. Somehow, I find it mesmerizing that the coin gets tossed then goes through the hole to be randomly sorted to any slot that determines the reward. I got about 600 tickets because of this machine. Eli is spending her tokens at the ball machine with labeled holes that determine the reward.

Holding my tickets like a rope hanging on my arms beside her, I ask, “How's it going?” She just dropped a ball.

Her face is so enthusiastic, looking through the glass that houses the machine. “Just a little bit more,” she answers, hoping for the ball to fall into the bonus hole. Instead, it falls into the 20 ticket hole. “Oh, man...,” she complains and the stretch of tickets extends from the machine. They are neatly arranged on the floor.

It took a while until she finally spent most of her tokens but then looks at me with widened eyes like she has thought of something. Here we go again...

She looks at her phone then says, “We still have time. How about we try karaoke?” she points behind me. I look there and find four doors on the wall for each karaoke room. “Let's go!”

She pulls my arm but I pull to stop her. “Wait, we have to exchange these tickets.”

“Oh, right,” she nods.

“Collect yours and we'll get them counted together.”

“Okay, give me a minute.” She sits down, pulling the tape of tickets out of the machine. When she holds it, I can see that I have more of what she won, so I smug. “What are you looking at?” she asks.

“I won more tickets than you.”

“Nobody cares,” she rolls her eyes, walking to the counter. I follow behind her.

First, I let her tickets get counted first. She got 480 tickets. Combined with mine, we got 1,120 tickets. So, that makes the tickets I won are 640—nearly the amount I have guessed. I let her choose the prize and she chooses that big stuffed dog.

“Sora will like this,” she says.

“I won,” I mutter behind her.

“Nobody cares!” she growls and elbows my chest.

“Ow! That hurts!” I push her shoulder just before she could receive the stuffed animal.

“Let's go.”

So, we enter one of the vacant rooms. Upon entering it, I'm glad to see a sofa. I sit on it and sigh deeply. My feet are tired of standing in front of the machine for an hour. Meanwhile, she inserts tokens into the machine. That's when the screen turns on as well as the speakers. I grab the song list but she takes it from my hand. I just frown because she didn't even say a thing before taking it.

“I'll sing first,” she insists as she sits on the sofa and hugging the stuffed dog.

“Suit yourself. I'll grind some primo- Oh, wait... I forgot I don't have a phone anymore. All I got is my sim card that I saved from that mess. Great...”

She begins to encode the numbers of the songs into the list without asking me about what I want to sing. It's not like I want to sing, so I don't care if she doesn't give me the time to sing. The songs she picked are almost K-pop and J-pop. She can speak Korean so well. Makes sense, because she has been studying in Korea for years before moving back to Japan. You might expect that she is singing the typical K-pop songs of Black Pink or Twice but she actually sings rap songs that I never heard before. It might be popular locally in South Korea just as we have our own local rap songs here in the Philippines that never boomed among the global audience. They don't target a large audience but are good in their own ways.

Minutes later, she got tired and asks me, “Do you want to sing?”

“Nah, I think I'll pass.”

“Oh, come on.” She presses the microphone onto my chest. I got no choice but to hold it or it will fall and the speaker will burst our eardrums. “What do you want to sing?”

“Any My Chemical Romance song.”

“What's that?”

“It's a band in the early 2000s.”

“Oh...,” she mutters, trying to find it in the list. “Found it! How about this song named, ‘Teenagers’?”

“It's fine. Play it, please.”

“Okay.”

She already encoded the number of the song. It plays and I start to sing. I memorize this song because I love it as well as the other songs of the band. Their songs have something in them that takes all of my frustrations, sadness, and regrets away. Because if you want to sing them, you have to reach deep down from your chest and vent out what you feel.

As I sing, she looks at me while smiling. I can tell that she's beginning to like this song because her nodding is going along with the beat. In the second chorus, she starts to sing with me.

“D*mn, I like this song!” she yells for me to hear.

That was not the end of it because she asks me to sing other songs that I think are the best of this band. For me, it's hard to choose because it depends on my mood. Since my mood is pretty great this time, I think “Mama” would be a great fit. This song's lyrics are wild and quite disturbing for others because in the song there's a part with, “Mama, we all go to hell,” repeated many times. Turns out, she likes it and listens to me. I'm quite shy singing this because I'm not a good singer. She asks me to sing more but I can't. My throat is dry.

“Sing more!” she insists like a child.

“I told you, my-” I cracked my voice. “can't.”

“Well, okay. I guess we'll call it a day and let's get you a new phone before going home.”

We pack up and leave the karaoke room, exhausted. “I'm thirsty,” I tell her.

“Yeah, me too. Maybe we could find some drink on the way to the store.” Coincidentally, we passed by a stall serving fruit juice. She buys for me again and I'm beginning to worry about it.

Then at the cell phone store, we stand in front of the glass at the cashier. Rows of brand new phones are being displayed. Most of them have good processors that can run any game I would like to play. My recent phone (now dead) can barely run Genshin Impact at the lowest possible resolution. One of these phones could run it at full.

With both of us standing side by side, she says, “Pick one. I'll pay for it.”

“I was thinking, maybe I should just save money to buy-”

“Ugh, just pick!” she insists, irritated.

“No, really, I'll work for it. You have spent so much for me in the past few days.”

“Pick. No more arguments because I'm tired.” Her eyes are telling me that she is. Her energy has been drained.

“Okay,” I give up then look at one of the phones.

She said any phone so I will choose the cheapest because I still have a conscience. No matter how she tries to be this generous, she must curb it down or I'll look like I'm using her. The phone I chose is the cheapest among them of course but costs a lot more than my old phone.

She scoffs, saying, “Seriously?” To the cashier, she says, “Please get me this one, miss.”

She chose the most expensive! “That's not the one I chose,” I whisper.

“I know.”

“Then why?”

“Just shut up. My head is dizzy.”

“Are you okay?”

“I'm not—obviously!” she growls out of annoyance.

After receiving the brand new phone in a bag, we leave the store and head for the exit of the mall. She's just looking at the ground while walking.

“Hey, how are you feeling?” I ask.

“Not good, man...”

“If you're dizzy, you can... uh... hold my arm.”

Slowly, she wraps my right arm with her arms. She leans her weight against me while we walk. Her cheek is resting on my shoulder. I feel nervous as my arm is touching her chest. I try not to think about it but her warmth is something.

The way her hair smells like... is like that meadow full of wildflowers where I used to fly my homemade kites alone under the good weather. The sun was high up but I didn't feel it burning my skin. It's a wonderful feeling that gets rid of my worries. I can't believe how I miss feeling the breeze of that place on my face.

It's like we're a couple—the way she's holding my arm. But it's not real. It's just in this instance that she's dizzy and needs someone to take her home.

I guide her to the taxi and tell the driver where to go. She takes a nap on my shoulder and I make myself as steady as possible as to not disturb her. I can hear her gentle breath and her slow heaving. Like how I wish I have a girlfriend that would lean on me like this... I would kiss her on the head. Right now, I feel like I would but this is only my friend.

A few moments later, we have arrived at her place. I take her even up to the floor of her room and her door. She gives me the keys, I open the door, and take her to her bedroom. Sora follows beside us while wagging his tail, looking curious at the stuffed dog she hugs on the bed.

“This is why I hate about being a female,” she groans while I cover her with the blanket up to her neck. “This stupid womb and bleeding vagana...”

Oh, she's on her period—that's why. I almost forgot that she has a menstrual cycle like all girls. Her personality kinda makes me forget.

“Are you gonna sleep right away?” I ask.

“Yeah... and don't even think about r*ping me.”