I'm With...

A short story by @kikiavicenna


Case 1: "I'm With The Twit"

It was a wet autumn day, and I was still in high school at the time this happened.

Well, I was at the second floor, and I remember everyone laughed out loud when V.J. was walking side by side with Elsie that day. Elsie was adamant. As always, she thought that everyone were just plain jealousy that this elite girl could walk side by side with her boyfriend, Victor James, the most popular guy in the cram school I attended. But I knew the true reason why people laughed out loud.

Since I knew V.J. well enough to see his bad habit of playing pranks on other people, I had thought one day he would do this to Elsie.

And you know why?

V.J. was walking to Elsie's right, and on his white T-shirt, there was a big red arrow pointing to the left and a clear caption saying "I'm With The Twit".

I bet Elsie had no idea what 'twit' means. No, not Twitter. Twit equals with... roughly, 'moron'.

As she walked through an even more crowded corridor, the laughter sound echoed, even with bigger volume. And no one ever told Elsie what 'twit' means.



Case 2: "Lovely"

This one is a rather recent story. It happened at my first week in university. Dianne chose to sit to Michelle's right on one certain lecture day. Michelle said yes, but her face showed a different expression.

Perhaps she knew the ultimate reason why Dianne did so. It wasn't only for the fact that they had grown closer since their first encounter in university enrollment. And it wasn't only for finding a good friend to talk to, just in case the lecture got boring all of a sudden.

Yeah, it was for Michelle's collared polo shirt with a very sweet word on it and an arrow to the right:

"Lovely".



Case 3: "I'm With Genius"

Yesterday, on a sunny Thursday afternoon, I walked along a street with Rivan, Angel, and Marky on our way to the bookstore. I confidently kept walking, while Rivan kept asking me to switch positions.

"Come on, Zania, move to my right!" "What's the matter? I'm feeling more comfortable on your left side," I answered with a confident smile. Angel and Marky giggled from behind. I confidently stayed on his left side. Rivan was attempting to move to my left, but of course I didn't let him.

Had you seen me yesterday you'd have understood why I didn't want to switch positions with Rivan...

I wore yet another "I'm With ______" T-shirt, and it said "I'm With Genius" with the arrow pointing to the right.

And later, as his revenge, he sneaked out to a nearby store and looked for such T-shirt like mine with the arrow pointing to the opposite side while I was through choosing science-fiction books at the second floor of the bookstore, and he wore it immediately. Ouch.

So, the trip ended with Rivan and I pointing at each other and arguing along the way home,

"Rivan, you're so down-to-earth. You're prodigious but you just won't admit it!" "Come it off, Zania, you are even more low-profile..." "Hey, Rivan, stop that! The world sees that you're the real genius!" "You are!" "No!"

(Ow, come it off, folks.)