I leveled her with a stare. “I must admit that I can never be too careful. I am only human, after all.”
“Oh, now you’re trying to seem more human to placate yourself.”
“And you are becoming less human by bullying me with your laughter. On what is supposed to be my birthday.”
She rolled her eyes. “Swear that if it was me who had that bathroom accident, you wouldn’t be laughing at my expense.”
“I wouldn’t. Because, unlike you, I would hate to see you hurt.”
She raised a brow. “You wouldn’t try to picture it, not even one fucking bit? Lie and tell me that you wouldn’t.”
“I wouldn’t.”
“See? That’s a lie.”
I shook my head. “Why do I even try to indulge you?”
“Because I’m the most sensible person you know?” She batted her eyelashes.
“You would really hate to hear my thoughts right now,” I told her, evoking a small laugh.
“You know… this is, like, our first real date, like, we came out for the actual purpose of going on a date.”
“I thought it was for my birthday?” I asked.
“Yeah, it is, but this place is a little fancy, and I reserved it two days ago. So it’s a birthday first date. I’ve never had one of those.”
I smiled. “I think that statement should be rephrased. You’ve never had one of me.”
“Look who’s getting cocky now.” She chuckled.
I shrugged.
“So what do you do on your birthdays? I know you don’t celebrate, but what do you do?” she asked.
“Get hurt, unintentionally. Almost every birthday of mine. It’s like one of those curses in paranormal books.”
“Paranormal books? What’s paranormal?” she asked with curiosity in her eyes. She truly did not know what paranormal meant.
“Someone or something supernatural.”
Her brows shot up. “Oh… like, horror things, scary things?”
“Along those lines, yes.”
“Well, I think you’re just jinxing yourself. Sometimes our minds unknowingly manifest these thoughts, and our lives take hold of them, and we jinx ourselves without knowing.”
I nodded, seeing sense in what she was saying, although the feeling did not touch the surface of what I actually felt. I did not comment on that because the last thing I wanted was to trouble her with how I truly felt.
Our conversation veered into another direction. I tried to keep my mind on track with her—often getting lost in my body and coming right back whenever she laughed or covered the side of her mouth from others’ views when she wanted to eat messily because she couldn’t help herself.
Soon after, she excused herself to the restroom when our starter was cleared and the main courses came out. I checked my phone, seeing ahappy birthdaytext from Angelo and a picture of a package his mother had organized for me. There was a birthday wish from Gemma, with tons of red hearts and a promise to shower me with presents when we saw each other again; there was also a small video clip from Gran Louisa.
It was a shorthappy birthdaymessage and a reminder to bring Zahra over.
Still getting lost in the messages, I stopped when I felt Zahra’s presence. I turned my phone screen off, looking up to see she was just two feet away from me when a woman trying to leave a table bumped into her.
“I’m so sorry. I didn’t see you there.” Zahra apologized politely, but the woman, who looked like she had been angry before bumping into her, shot her a glare, muttering something in a language I didn’t understand. From the way Zahra’s politeness quickly shifted to a frown, I knew it was something foul.
