1. Psychosexual
Akio's POV
On the last weekend of that year's Summer I had only the light of my phone's screen illuminating my bedroom. The room was in complete silence as if mocking my loneliness, and I felt turning on the TV to feel less alone would have the opposite effect. I had let go of enough shame and had enough desperation to finally make an account on a dating app. Since my teenage years I've been unsure of where I fall on the attractiveness spectrum. My adult conclusion is that I guess I have to be someone's specific type for them to be into me, but I still chose the pictures I thought were my best, which were a few ones where I wore no glasses. As I imagined, I had few matches. But I was immediately excited when the girl that intrigued me the most also liked me. She was a goth-looking white girl, whose profile stated she was 22 and that her name was Sofรญa. Her hair was dyed red and she also had nails painted red and wore red lipstick in most of her pictures. I risked coming off as unfunny by asking her something as a joke instead of saying a simple hello.
"So what's your favorite color?"
"Can't you tell it's green?" she said.
"You look great in red." I said, not knowing how to start off being serious suddenly "So I guess we go to the same college."
"Thank you. Yeah it seems we do." she said, then, before I was able to think of another thing to add to the conversation she asked "Are you Japanese?"
"Yes. I've lived in California most of my life, though."
"I've only been in the US since I started college."
"You aren't American?"
"I'm Mexican."
When I wasn't sure how to continue with the conversation I decided to ask her directly about what I wanted.
"Want to come to my place?"
"Yes" that was all she responded with, after a few minutes in which I was wondering whether I had ruined my chances with her.
After sending her my location, it took more than I had expected of my willpower to get dressed just to answer the door, but I did just in time. I did something that I must now laugh at. My father, believing that Americans all owned guns by default, had been telling me to get one for months and eventually gave me one. I kept it on my bedroom, but I went back to retrieve it when it landed on me that maybe it all seemed too good to be true. From the main door there was no way of looking outside without opening it, so when I heard the knock I opened it with my left hand while having the gun on the right, prepared to show it if I saw someone not remotely a young woman. On the other side there was the girl from the pictures though, with the same stoic expression as if she had been trying to get me to recognize her in a passport photo.
"Hey" she said, in a meek voice.
"Hey" I responded the same way, while putting the gun somewhere hidden while the door still kept my right side away from her view.
"Come in" I then said, and walked backwards to not turn my back to her. She did walk in but then just kept standing.
The apartment was so small that even just a few steps in, my bedroom door was almost in front of her, and she was in fact staring into it. I hadn't turned the lights on, but she could see it was dark because I didn't care to close the door.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing" she replied as soon as I had said it, and turned to look at me.
Until that moment I had neglected the idea that maybe she still had the lingering feeling I had before I opened the door. To me just seeing her face told me I was safe, but to her I could still be anyone. Her hands were holding each other.
"Do you want something to drink?" I went for the most unassuming and obvious phrase for having a guest.
"Um, yes," she said "Thanks."
She sat down beside the wall-mounted table that made my dining room.
"Do you like tea? I have black, white, green-"
"I like black." she said. "Um, with milk would be best."
"You seem a bit nervous," I said as the water was getting to a boil.
"Yes" she said. Maybe noticing she'd been saying that a lot, she went on, "Well, I'm... I do feel I did this all impulsively. I don't want you to think I regret it though, that's not what I mean."
"I understand." I said, trying to choose my next words carefully "As a child it was pretty difficult to be surrounded by people who didn't think you could belong with them."
Before saying anything, she looked into my eyes. Most of her face made an attempt at another stoic expression, but her eyes couldn't hide her surprise. I knew she wasn't talking about that at all, but she still knew what I meant as soon as I said it.
"It does feel lonely sometimes. Even when I know I have friends, they simply... They have other friends they like more. And well, I can't blame them. They grew up together, they can relate to them more, their parents are from the same neighborhood or at least from the same country." she looked through the kitchen window and kept that soft voice as if she was afraid someone would hear "And yes, there's a lot of Mexicans everywhere in California, but all the ones I've met already know how to be American, and it's as if... They didn't want to teach me, or something."
I started talking while I got the tea leaves into the strainer and into the mug with almost boiling water.
"I didn't have many friends in my teenage years either." I said "I hung out with other Asians sometimes, but there could be tension because some of them were Chinese and their parents didn't like the Japanese."
"Oh, I see," she said, and took the carton of milk to tilt it over the mug "You're really into tea, aren't you? Most people just have tea bags."
"Yes." I said, feeling myself smiling "I hope you like it."
"I do," she said after taking a sip "It's pretty strong."
"Yeah, I like it that way."
The room was silent but it was a comfortable silence. I only spoke later to ask something out of curiosity.
"So what are you studying?"
"Philosophy." she said "And you?"
"History. I guess we might have seen each other before."
"Well, my classes are from evening to night."
"Oh. Don't you feel unsafe leaving campus after class?"