Mira’s White Moonlight

"I wrote these when I was confused with how I feel, but these are only a few reasons as to why I like her," Mira's eyes glistened as she recited her dark past.

Well, she did not regret writing them, and she did like that girl until now.

She didn't have to be so ashamed of such a fact.

Raja came closer to see Mira's phone screen.

Upon seeing such a long document with a lot of pages, she's dumbfounded.

"You wrote a lot?"

"Not much. Most of them are only conversations and events with her that connected to some of the reasons why I like her. In short, this is my love story that ended in a not so sad tragedy," Mira explained.

Raja can only shake her head before asking Mira to recite them.

"[I'm a transferee. It's hard, especially since I'm not used to my new school. I received a culture shock about how they do things in that school. Third day of school, I cried. I was not a mature girl back then, I don't know anything, and I certainly didn't think that I would be able to study in this prestigious school without breaking down. I only chose this school because the strand I liked was offered her]."

"[It was the First Quarter Exams of Grade 11 when I unfortunately got sick. I was in bed for three days before I managed to get up and take the special exams in the teacher's office. The feeling of having teachers' gazes boring holes in the back of my head is scary, that I did not even move a little from the desk while taking the exam. When I returned to class, the seating arrangement changed. And it was my first encounter with her]," Mira read aloud without shame.

She's even smiling a little, as if remembering the first encounter she had with her crush.

Of course, Raja is listening attentively to the romantic encounter of her roommate.

"[A friend of mine pointed to a desk with my bag on it, only for me to realize that it's my seat. I sat, trying to find the most comfortable position before I turned to my seatmate to introduce myself. However, before I can even utter a single syllable, I saw her raised eyebrows and it gave me the impression that she's the mean type of girl. I lost all my courage and I can only smile at her awkwardly. Her intimidating presence snuffed out the fearlessness that I've gathered for fifteen years]."

"So, she's your seatmate?" Raja giggled.

Mira only nodded before concentrating on reading again.

"[A few days later, our grades were released and because I told my parents not to expect anything, it came by fine. I don't want to be pressured to study with a new school. My grades are fine, but my new seatmate isn't! She's so intimidating! And in every by-pair activity, I'm always stuck with her! What to do?!]."

"[One time during our free period, our class had a jamming session. Emil, the guitarist in our class brought his guitar, so he started strumming the chords for the song Titibo-tibo by Moira. We sang and danced, but when it came to the chorus, I don't know what happened to May, my petite classmate]."

"[She touched my face as light as a feather, and I was a fool for just staring at her actions wide-eyed. When I realized what was happening, I immediately ran into the embrace of my friend Izza and sobbed. I'm so embarrassed! That was the first time I experienced something like that!]."

"Hahaha! Such an ambiguous action! Was that the reason as to why you told me that you were straight as a steel before you bent?" Raja asked with tears in the corners of her eyes. Mira's story is just hilarious.

"Hey! You would be as surprised as I was if that happened to you! I was still so innocent back then! I transferred to a school in the city, without knowing the darkness of society!"

"Heh, as if you knew the darkness of society," Raja snickered.

"Anyway, [The next few days became torture when May and our other classmate continued to tease me about my absurd reactions. Of course, I can only mingle with my co-transferees. And that's when I saw her smile. It was such a tantalizing smile that I unknowingly stared at her in a daze. Dimples. She had dimples! So cute! Even if she continues to tease me, it's fine by me! My seatmate actually had such a cute side to her!]."

"[I know that I'm easily attracted to dimples, and when I saw that she had two, I mentally drooled. I tried to run away from their claws and escape this dimple-heaven and hell when I heard her giggle again. And images of her smile and her dimples imprinted themselves deeply in my psyche. That's when I knew I started falling]," Mira ended as she summarized the first chapter as soon as possible.

Raja tilted her head in interest.

"She's your white moonlight," she commented.

Mira had a confused expression on her face, obviously not understanding the meaning of the phrase.

"She's the one person you can't obtain, just like the moon. Which means she's your white moonlight," Raja tried to explain it shortly.

Mira became a little downhearted when she heard the meaning.

True enough, she can't reach that love that left her for years.

"To be honest, in the past three years of the pandemic, I've never looked at her social media account, except during her birthdays that I greet her," Mira said.

"I think you should just unfriend her account or block her," Raja advised, which earned a violent response from Mira.

"No! I can't! I won't! Never!" Mira swore that she will never do that.

"Then you won't be able to move on. Look, I know that the one you had a crush on might be a great girl but loving helplessly without a stop is bad. You also need to learn to love yourself," Raja said as she approached Mira.

The girl lying on the bed did not even realize that there's only one bed in the room.

So where did Raja rest when night fell?

Simple. She never slept.

Mira was so busy anyway that she won't even realize Raja's strangeness.