Wish Yesenia Happy Birthday

The conditions couldn’t be better. The sun is shining, the warm breeze feels nostalgic - like the perfect days that he recalls playing outside as a kid. 

Trebor takes a deep breath as if trying he is going to dive deep underwater, exhales, and walks up to Yesenia with probably too much confidence. “Happy birthday to you!” His confidence wavers the moment he starts singing. He can hear his notes going flat and her reaction shows that she can as well. 

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Yesenia is surrounded by a couple of older boys, both of whom have thin mustaches and their eyes firmly fixed on Trebor. Yesenia is taken back and lets out a nervous chuckle.

“Hi Yesenia,” says Trebor with one eye on the boys. “I know it’s your birthday so I… you know.” He shrugs his shoulders, “so I thought I’d sing to you.”

“Yo,” says one of the boys as he stands up, towering over Trebor. “How did you know it was her birthday?”

“Yeah,” says the other. “You’ve been stalking Yesenia?”

Trebor sharts out nervous laugh. “Only in my mind before I fall asleep at night.” His attempt at cute humor falls flat as nobody joins in his awkward chuckle. 

“No,” says Trebor - quickly trying to course-correct the situation. But how am I going to explain this? Will the truth be helpful? I can’t see it hurting. “Actually, I didn’t know it was her birthday. It was just a coincidence that I saw her balloons as I was walking home.”

“Oh,” says the second boy. “It was just a coincidence that you were walking in the same park where the girl you’ve been dreaming of  was celebrating her birthday?”

“I know it looks bad,” says Trebor. 

The first boy cracks his knuckles. “Since it isn’t right to hit a girl, I say we give all her birthday punches to you. And if my math adds up, that’s 30 punches.”

“32,” says Trebor. “She’s turning 16.” He looks at Yesenia and she nods to confirm the math. But everything that he says seems to irritate the boys.

Trebor panics and points over their shoulders. “But what about that guy with a cake?” 

He hardly believes that they both turn around to look and Trebors sprints home with ease. He dashes into his house and up the stairs. 

His mother walks out of her bedroom and says, “Why are you all sweaty?”

Trebor stutters and lies. “I missed the bus and tried to catch it a few stops in a row. Eventually, I realized that I was almost home already and just decided to jog the rest of the way.”

“You jog now?” says his mother, seemingly unconvinced. “Likely story.”

Trebor walks toward his room and his mother calls out to him again.

“Oh, Trebor, after you change, can you jog,” she uses her finger to make air quotes for the word ‘jog,’ “to the store and pick up a cake for dessert?”



The End. 


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