“He’s Winston’s basketball team captain, right?”

“You didn’t tell us you know Xander Chua!”

“Wait? Is he your boyfriend now?”

It was the beginning of sophomore year and my classmates were still eager as ever. I arrived in the classroom only to be welcomed by the sight of them getting excited around Yana.

This is what social media can do, I said to myself, pertaining to that photo from her birthday. Thanks to my classmates, I had finally figured out why he somehow looked familiar to me.

The guy they were calling Xander was the injured player in the Sports Fest. I knew my memory wasn’t that good when it comes to people so I wasn’t surprised, especially if I deem them not interesting enough.

“We were just schoolmates before, and no, he’s not my boyfriend,” I heard Yana answer, a few chairs from where I was sitting. It wasn’t that I was eavesdropping though; I just had exceptionally good ears.

I put down my English textbook—opened and yet not read—and looked at Yana. I didn’t mean to stare but she caught me looking, to my surprise, and smiled.

I wasn’t sure if it was because I hadn’t seen her in a while, or if it was because we were just fresh from vacation that she seemed to be radiating some kind of ‘aura’. I mean she really was beautiful to begin with, but it was more this time. I heard my classmates say, she’s ‘blooming’, so I guess that was the proper word for it.

Speaking of classmates, there were a couple of new ones who got promoted to our class. I knew them by face from the neighboring class last year.

There was the foreign-looking girl who could easily pass for Yana’s kin, but shorter and looked more of a talking cupid to me; and the tall, pony-tailed girl who looked like she was ready to play volleyball anytime of the day. 

Sitting behind them, I could tell how excited they were for getting to the top class. I was sure they worked hard for it like what I did back then. It made me wonder why they wanted to be here. Competitiveness, perhaps? Or the feeling of wanting to achieve something?

In my case, it was probably both. I didn’t want to lose to my brilliant sister. And I didn’t want to be compared to her anymore.

“I’m glad we did it together,” the tall girl said to the other.

“Yeah, I wouldn’t be as happy if you weren’t here with me,” the short one with curly ashy hair replied.

Their friendly exchange made me think of Yana. The fact that I would get to spend the entire year with her again had finally sunk in to me.

It made me excited, hoping we’d be sitting next to each other again.

And as I wished, after Sebastian, there came Sevilla.

I tried to contain my smile as I looked at Yana, relieved that there was no one to come between us this time.

In front of us were the newbies: Ava Theresa Sanford (in the introduction she said we could call her Tessa); and Akira Sato (Kira for short) whose name instantly reminded me of an anime character at that time.

I took a deep breath as the first class started, wondering what the new school year would bring us.