Bitch; Me.

It was a quiet day in my favorite cafe, and I was sitting serenely by the window. The sky was a friendly gray with delicate puffs of whites here and there in its vastness. The air was cool. And everything else was perfect. Well, almost. There was a cup of jasmine tea on my table, a pink notebook next to it, and an open book on my lap. Across from me were the last two people I wished to see on earth. One of them was angry. The other was trying not to cry. This could be one of those days.

'You'll apologize to Syahda for that,' said Khalif. He was suppressing his anger plus I-don't-know-what as he looked at me. He was now standing, mad and all protective. Like she needed him to be. How sweet - Not! Honestly, I couldn't even put my finger on it; the thing that made him seem such an awesome person just two years ago. I must have been dumb back then. No, really. I must have been.

His fiancée; Syahda, his drop dead gorgeous, soft-spoken fiancée was now on the verge of tears because I had just called her stupid for telling me what a gentleman Khalif was. Man, I really needed to control myself. One of these days I was going to get myself sniped or something. For being too honest. And with that, a pain in practically everyone's ass. I mean, yeah he was the cursed moronic d*ckhead from I-don't-wanna-know-where, but I didn't have to tell the whole world that he was, right? Wrong. The world deserves to know what kind of people are walking it. So that these air and space-consuming, good-for-nothing, intolerably annoying - you know what, I'm not even going to finish that. And I guess I really needed some self-control. So here's how it went.

'No, I won't,' I replied, and returned his angry (yeah, right) stare with a successfully made up confused expression. 'I don't see why I should.' And that definitely did it. You should have seen how he hilariously fumed and how she dramatically sobbed. It would have made a perfect scene in a Nur Kasih episode. There was the supposed-to-be-angelic girl sobbing behind the supposed-to-be-heroic-guy as he demanded an apology from the incredibly smart, villainous bossy bitch from hell. Told you. It would have been perfect. Because the bossy bitch from hell was me. Bitch; Bibliophile In Total Control of Herself: Me.

He tried a forced calm look. No success. Seriously, why did he have to fake everything? It wasn't like I didn't know who he was. And she was still sobbing. Now pitifully wiping her tears as she was. Good one, girl. That would definitely boost his ego. God knows how guys like him are desperate to be the ones to heal wounds, to make a girl stop crying, to be the savior of hearts. God knows too, how much they intentionally hurt people and pretended to not realize that they did, and how low they'd bring themselves down for their ego. Sad? Wait until you really meet one. They're everywhere, I can promise you that.

He sat back down slowly. 'I'm not here to fight,' he began, after a few seconds of fake self-calming session. No, I wasn't being judgmental. That's just how he was. Fake.

'Then leave,' I said as I returned my focus to the book in my lap. That should send his temperature way over the boiling point already. The Girl Who Could Fly, by Victoria Forester, if you're wondering. This is one awesome book. One of the best on my shelf. And my shelf is not small.

'Khalif, it's OK,' she whispered. Loud enough to make me laugh. But I didn't. Self-control, Nina. Self-control.

He wouldn't budge. Not even with her soft, dainty fingers on his arm and the gentle pull on his sleeve. 'No, Syahda. She has no right -

'It's OK. I'm alright,' she insisted, and wiped another tear, and sobbed some more. Man, she really was good. Then she took that one glance not many would dare to take, at me, and said, 'It's from Khalif's parents. They'd love to see you there, on that day. Auntie Sally said you're a striking resemblance of your late mother. She misses her, a lot.' She placed a heavily-scented beige envelope on the desk, next to my notebook. Then the long-awaited intended remark came through. Smoothly. 'Khalif never talked about you, Nina. Now I know why.' She wiped another tear. Jeez.

I looked up from my book and replied, 'No, you don't. Don't get smart with me, Chada, or whatever your name is. He never talked about me because - why, he just had nothing to say.' I blinked twice and smiled.

She returned my smile with a sweeter one because she could. She was so pretty and I was so plain. I'm still plain. 'Maybe he had nothing good to say about you, Nina.' Ah, I didn't realize that we were going that way. Fine. Two or more could play your game, Chada.

'Could be. There's nothing good about me, I hope you'd noticed that by now. Just everything awesome,' I said, shrugging. 'And he has zero ability to digest awesomeness,' I added, slightly playfully. With another smile. This time it was an honest one. Of course he had no such ability. Why would he end up with a good girl and not an awesome one if he had it?

Khalif was looking at both of us in disbelief. Speechless? You bet. His fiancée wasn't such a goody-two-shoes now it seemed. You know, if there was a thing Khalif really hated about me, it's how people seem to just walk out of their social shell on their initial encounters with me. Syahda was doing exactly that. And you guys should really have seen the look on his face. Good as dead, heh.

She shook her head and frowned. Genuine. 'You're childish. And so full of yourself! And you had the guts to call other people names? This behavior of yours, this thinking so highly of yourself isn't taking you anywhere I hope you realize that by now. You even lost a friend because of it,' she said, emotions threatening to spill from her eyes in forms of more tears - God, what the heck was this anyway? I was just trying to read here!

'I didn't lose anyone, Chada. I walked away-lah. I left because he's stupid, and you don't know how much I hate stupid.' Face, expressionless - checked. Voice, innocent - checked. Score? Leading.

'I'll give you a piece of my mind -

'You don't even function correctly with all of the pieces together, Chada. You wanna give a piece to me?' I beamed brightly at her and quietly offered, 'That's suicide.'

'Nina!' Khalif almost shouted and sent his ego to the floor to be stepped on. By me. But he didn't. A few heads were turning towards us. Great. Don't I just love to be ogled at like that?

Now Syahda was fuming. She was so angry she couldn't even shriek a curse. I could see the drying tears on her cheeks evaporating - OK, I lied. But hey, she really was fuming and swallowing God-knows-what cusswords. Not a goody-two-shoes at all anymore, now wasn't she, Khalif?

'You know what, I'm not even going to respond to that,' she said, finally. Suddenly. 'I'm not going to go down to your level.'

'Oh, alright then.' You're boring. And I'd just leveled up, Chada.

'A good woman know her limits, Nina,' she added, with a very hard tone of finality. Ooh, I'm so offended!

'Well an awesome one knows that she has none,' I replied with a brighter smile. The look on her face made me laugh a bit. 'Sorry.' But at least it wasn't a made up one. I really laughed. Very politely, too.

Then they both left. Not very quietly I assure you. Not quietly at all. But they left and I was now alone again, with my book. I looked out the window and saw the sky glowing a more vibrant shade. It was blue now. With more puffs of fluffy whiteness. I smiled at the paramount emotional shift of atmosphere and at my lucky self. And hey, this might really be one of those days.