Favor For My Valentine

"Hey!"

“A-AH JEEZ!"

"Ehehe, whoops sorry."

"I think after you scare Kai long enough, you might make his whole life a haunted house."

The hot tropical weather blazed down onto the urban landscapes of Central Estuary City, as nothing liquid but sweat rained onto the walking pedestrians below. The weather was so deathly hot, you could see even the heat surrounding the roof of sitting cars jammed in long queues of traffic.

“Did I miss anything?”

“Oh, Kai was just finishing his talk about the meta for a game he was playing.”

“Aw… I would love to listen to that.”

More inwards though, somewhere within the lesser vehicle-buzzing streets of rare quietness, a corner-placed coffee shop or 'kopitiam' as it's called, sat quietly with only spare numbers of patrons walking in and about.

"Anyway, with Valentines coming soon, any potential people for ya’ll?”

"H-Huh?"

"Nope, none here~"

Of course, from the outside you could even get jumped by the booming voice from a shortly statured Nova, barely able to place their head onto their vertically-postured left arm while a smirk stretched across their brown-eyed, tanned face. On the other side of the foldable square table of plastic and metal supporting beams, where Nova's eyes were specifically aiming at, was a cherry-red-faced Kaino, rubbing his warming peachy-colored arms against each other uncontrollably under the table as his nearly-full-raven-colored pair of eyes stared towards the squeaking fan above the table.

“Kai, are you... okay? You look a little red…” Nova mentioned, his head tilting slightly on one hand while his eyes narrowed concerningly.

“N-No, I’m completely fine! Uh… the weather’s soooo hot, am I right?”

“Ahem, anyway,” an older mature voice interrupted, sounds of rustling paper accompanying it, “I have a favor to ask on the table, if ya’ll don’t mind, of course.”

And almost immediately, all eyes were aiming towards the wall-like newspaper raised to cover the person behind it. Though, the wall was quickly drawn down to below the table, as it revealed behind a darkly skinned lady named Faye with curly wood-colored hair that dragged down to her hips, and black-framed rectangular reading glasses. On one hand, she held the side of the grey paper on her cross-legged lap, while the left one was putting down a black-inked pen on the table.

“As ya’ll know, Valentine’s coming up soon, and I—”

“So you do have a crush on someone.”

“Let me finish!” Nova practically crashed down onto their seat giggling like a child (as if they didn’t look like one already) while Faye went down and up an emotional hill, “anyways, I need ya’ll to help me find gifts for some friends of mine.”

“Ooo… who are these special friends of yours that aren’t us?”

“That’s a business secret,” she crossed her legs to another side, giving an innocent smile towards a bruh-faced Nova, “all I can say is that they’re almost like both you and Kai.”

“That’s oddly coincidental,” Nova’s thick eyebrows folded inwards, “are you sure you’re not making us buy the gifts you want to give us?”

“For goodness sake, Nova, I thought you’d have more confidence in my gift-selection skills.”

“I mean, I appreciate the cup you gave me for my birthday, but that was sixth one you have given me and I have too much alre—"

“Shush, it wasn’t that bad, was it? You still used it!”

“Well of course, but still…!”

And for the next ten minutes, the voice of the two tossed front and back, filling the empty atmosphere of the corner coffee shop. Though, almost hiding like a non-existent phantom, was a phone-scrolling, head-burying Kai, evading himself from the verbal altercation happening on the table...

…What would I give Kai if it was for him… if it was him…

~~~

“Do you think this looks nice?”

“O-Oh! Uh... yeah it looks nice on you.”

“No silly, do you like this necklace?”

“Ah! Uh… yeah, I like it…”

“Nice, I’ll put this on the list!”

“Mm…”

“Ehe, sorry, was the bump too hard?”

A long tiring weekday had passed since the three’s favor-delivering meeting. Though, due to coincidental timing, The two favor-tasked people on the table had literally bumped into each other head-first. Of course, based on what’s going on now, it’s obvious who suffered the most damage.

“Here, let me.”

A head-rubbing Kai had his eyes flashed straight towards Nova’s brown pair, as a sudden pressure on his palm forced his whole right arm to move away from his upper body. And, almost instantly after that, a wet sensation moistened the tremoring bump on Kai’s forehead, as Nova raised their own arm slightly higher to push away their taller friend’s brown hair bangs and rubbing the red skin hill. Although beginning with sharp winces of pain, it slowly subsided to a sore-ish feeling that was like a jelly block filling the bump.

“Does it feel better now?”

“Y-Yeah…”

“Good! Uh… wait,” Nova looked slightly downwards from Kai’s reddened forehead down to his now turning-to-red cheeks, all while a look of concern was intensifying obviously on their face, “do you have a fever or summin’? You’re not looking very well.”

“O-Oh, I’m fine, just the weather, you know?”

“Right… well, in any case,” the shorter companion of the day now placed one arm on their hip, while another swung over the other companion's shoulder (well, tried to), putting up a wide smile, “shall we get your side of the gift?”

“Oh uh, sure…”

“Okay, lead the way Ka—”

*RING RING*

All of a sudden, cutting off the energized voice of Nova was an interrupting, yet familiar ringtone of a certain famous east-asian song's chorus. Almost as if it was muscle memory, they scrambled their hands into the sling bag they had on, before popping out a phone flashing a bright blue and indecipherable words and letters if you looked from Kai's side of the situation. Reading it, Nova’s eyes flashed up towards their friend's as quick as they looked at their phone.

“Uh sorry, Kai, I’ll join you later. I need to meet with someone for a while, yeah?”

“Oh, uh o-okay.”

“Text me where you are, yeah?”

Giving a simple thumbs up, the distinct greenish-blue plaid jacket they had quickly disappeared behind a wall that turned into one of the isolated back hallways behind some stores of the mega mall. Of course, it wasn’t an issue to shop for the gift alone temporarily, but oddly enough it suddenly felt a distinct gap was left behind…

~~~

‘Hey, I’m at G floor, east atrium, Eleine’s Jewelry, see u soon :)’…. Sent!

“Hello! You finding a gift for that one person you want to confess to?”

“G-Gah, no, no way!”

“Oh? But most people that come here at this time usually have that in mind?”

“N-no miss, I’m here to just buy something for a favor.”

“Ah, I see…”

It was a souvenir store, one located in a quite isolated area of the mall. Judging from the lack of much normal in-mall voices and sounds of shoes stepping onto the tiled flooring, the store probably wasn’t expecting much foot traffic.

“Well, maybe I can help you find the gift you need? Maybe you can describe what they like?”

“Hm… I know they like uh… I… hm….”

Looking around without much attention to the basket of flowers or shelves filled with jewelry hooked on steel bars, Kai dug around his mind with unfruitful results to what he was asking to himself.

“I don’t really know…”

“Ah, that’s fine. You know, it’s okay if you don’t know what the other person likes sometimes, because we aren’t robots and all, right.”

“Mmhm…”

The one dashing around, flipping front and back plastic-packaged chains, bracelets and necklaces, was what Kai hazarded a guess to be the store clerk, probably the only one in the tiny rectangular store for the day. Unlike the larger retails in the mall, it was almost unfitting for the store to be here at all. But that’s what happens to local brands when they get surrounded by popular international brands, does it not?

“How about this? This would be a good gift for anyone.”

The store clerk, with a name tag attached on her buttoned shirt’s upper left pocket branding the name ‘Akilah’, stretched out her long-blue-white-striped-sleeved hand to show a thinly steel chained necklace with two doves hooked below. Seemingly, the gleaming metal doves had their beaks onto each other’s, while standing on a single gem-covered heart with wings wide opened towards their back.

“As you know, doves symbolize peace right,” Akilah tapped on the doves kissing onto each other, her small near-black eyes widening with contagious enthusiasm, “but do you know, they also mean eternal love? Isn’t it interesting?”

“Yeah… that is quite interesting.”

“So, do you think this would suit your friend’s friend well?”

“Uh…”

“That looks perfect!”

Sending an unsuspecting friend to a literal jump scare, was Nova entering the scene with the presence of a crashing dumpster truck. Noticing this too, bystander-ing Akilah couldn’t help but laugh.

“If you didn’t tell me, I would’ve thought you were giving it to this friend of yours here,” she continues laughing a bit while leaning onto a metal shelf nearby.

“Well, while it isn't for me, I think it looks nice, to be honest,” Nova winked, before stretching his arms upwards as he left the scene as quick as he entered, walking into another row of shelves mostly filled with bunches of colorful flowers small and large, “don’t mind me, I’m gonna look around here.”

“So, young man, are you going to get the necklace?”

“I’m not sure… will they like it?”

“Okay… well, is this friend’s friend almost like someone you know?”

“Well, my friend did say the friend was like Nova, t-the person you saw just now.”

“Alright… do you think Nova would like this?”

“Probably not… knowing them, while they look like uh… a lot, but they are very simple.”

“I see… give me a moment, I have just the one.”

For a while, Akilah and her friendly aura disappeared into a path of shelves somewhere, followed by a small silence of nothingness other than some occasional shoe-stepping and voices outside. Although, this quickly dissipates as soon as she returned with a wide accomplished smile and a clenched hand on some kind of plastic package.

“Here, I believe this would make a very nice gift for that friend’s friend of yours.”

“O-Oh… hm… do you think this would work?”

“Well, I can’t say for sure since I don’t know anything about this friend’s friend, but if you think it works, than go for it.”

“Mm…”

“Look, young man, sometimes you need to take a leap of faith. It’s fine if you think you don’t know much about the person, but if your gut feeling says it’s the one, than go for it, because you probably do know about the person more than you expect!”

“Okay… I’ll buy it then...”

~~~

“Hello people, how has the search gone for the both of you?’

“Got the package!”

“Yup, I uh got it here.”

After a week or so had passed, the day of love was approaching within a few days away. And with that serving as a reminder, the trio had finally grouped back up again, this time in Faye’s apartment room somewhere in Eastern Estuary City. In the living room they were, you could see the highways under an almost romantic evening sky zooming with vehicles going left and right, up and down…

“Amazing job you both. Now, gimme gimme.”

Giving paper bags of respective product brands to the only couch-sitting Faye, one of the floor-sitting friends gave it with clear smiling glee, while the other delivered with an odd, slightly shaky hesitancy. But just as she had the bags on hand, her face had changed from neutral to an odd excitement.

“Okay so, Kai,” she glanced straight towards his shrunken body with glasses-magnified brown eyes, “I… may have lied a bit about the favor to you.”

“H-Huh? Wait, Wha-!”

Without giving anyone time to react, a jumpy Faye tossed the two bags to opposite sides of where they were given. Calming down from the unexpected surprise, a what-is-going-on-faced Kai had his brain gears trying to turn slowly…

“Well…remember how I said that the gifts were to help a friend and stuff?” she rocked left and right while looking towards the ceiling with a weirdly-shaped smile, “well, that friend I am mentioning is next to you.”

“…”

“Ta-da… yup, it’s me, Kai. I was the one that called for the favor.”

For a few long seconds, a silence came by as Kai’s face and brain blanked out altogether. After that, the brain cells were finally sparking and connecting as the emotionless face turned from paper-blank, to confusion, all the way to wide-eyed shock, and finally a flaming-red face.

“Nova, I think you broke him.”

“Uh… okay, so… how do I say this,” the once limitlessly and shamelessly energetic Nova suddenly was in an uncharacteristically flustered mood, “I’ve… been having feelings for you since the day I met you."

“Ah… uh…” the already quiet Kai downsized his volume to the sound of a mice at this point, while his fingers tapped nervously on each other.

“It’s fine if you don’t feel the same, but…” their eyes closed excitedly, as tinges of pink started spreading across their face as they swung back and forth like an unbalanced building, “I just... wanted to say what I’ve been keeping inside of me for a while.”

“Well… h-honestly, I also have feelings for you,” Kai finally broke the silence he held, his hands now proceeding to scratch the back of his darkly-haired head, “but… am I really someone you like?”

“Kai, trust me, after seeing a few people in my life, you are… honestly the one that is the most genuine … I…” Nova held back, before continuing with a genuine, emotion-bucketed tone, “I like it when you talk about the games you play, the books you read… I like everything about you!”

“…”

Kai couldn’t search up any words that describe the slurry of emotions evolving in his head. Was it an intense embarrassment? A tornado of shock? Something? Honestly, it was a mystery. But... somehow, he managed to summon the calmness to speak.

“But… I don’t know anything about you at all… you only hear me, but I don’t really hear anything from you. I don’t really know what you like, the type of music you enjoy, what your everyday hobbies are…”

“Kai.”

All of a sudden, two hands gripped onto his shoulder, as their faces neared each other with a straightforward line of emotional eye contact. It was as if, both of their eyes were staring into each other’s head, attempting to win in this battle of doubts... It was from this, that their brown eyes were beginning to tear up every so slightly...

“Listen to me, when I say, you don’t need to know everything I like, because I like whatever you’re doing already. Every time before this, I was an... emotional wreck because of my own personal life. But... when I see you now, you have became the joy that I wish to see every day, every moment. That is why...” the two broke their teary-eyed contact for just a slight moment as Nova dug into the paper bag, before opening what they wanted to show, summoning as much energy they could to deliver what they wanted to say without sounding like an emotional mess, “This is why... I want you to be my Valentine this year, and hopefully for years to come.”

It was a ring, one of those famous friendship rings that you would see in the market. But this one, it was encasing a jet-black liquid of silk-like textures and glimmering glitters. On the top of it, a bright dove with wings wide was welded beautifully. It was... fantastic.

“I…” Kai took an empty gulp.

Breath in…

Breath out…

Leap of faith…

Lub dub...

Lub dub...

Take a jump...

“I... would love for you to be my Valentine too, Nova. I love you so much.”

~ THE END ~

Extra:

“Soooo… what did our dear friend Kai get you?”

“It’s… a pineapple necklace!”

“Kai…”

“I tried!”

“No no, I love it! It looks funny, like me!”

“Pfft, you? Funny? I think watching a horror show would be funnier.”

“H-Hey!”

"Thank you, Faye..."

"Ah, it's all worth the pain. But... shouldn't the one thanking me be Nova?"

"Ugh.... thank you, Faye..."

"Louder~"

"Nope, that's all you get!"

"Uh... by the way, Nova, when did you get that ring?"

"Oh, remember when I left you to take a call? Faye helped me with that, and I went to get it during then. How did you get the pineapple necklace?"

"Oh it was when you left me to the flower section and uh, the store person gave me the necklace."

"Huh, so it seems you both had the same situation. Probably it's fate."