I first met this guy in college. A typical grunt, a common face among the unattractive lot. His dark complexion gave little away from his overall countenance. He dressed horribly, and one look at him hints that he also smelled as terribly. His voice, in plain speech volume was a raucous, vulgar and disquieting. He best loitered around spreading mischief. Along with his peers, he loafed spewing out ribaldry with outbursts of laughter, resounding hormonal issues burning from deep within his loins. He was an infamous scapegrace all around campus, and always got into trouble. He was reputably incapable of moral uplifting, and obviously was unable to outgrow the juvenile delinquencies that were ought to be left behind in High School. He very much resembled those underage louts I detested from way back. They were those who spurted disarray into the confusion of adolescence. His and their comparison compounded into a common stereotypical image—a bully.
He seemed friendly, but I was very hesitant even to go so near him so as not to give him any slightest idea about my orientation. Whenever I stumbled across him, I've always tried to put on a somewhat genial expression, and I always appeared to be in a hurry to avoid his attempts of striking any conversations. We had never drawn upon each other more frequently than ever, but it was always an essential endeavor that I advanced onto him in a civilized approach in hopes of having a similar respond as well. I remember having to endure a moment with him during enrollment. He was extremely talkative, though he only spoke of nonsensical things that weren't very engaging to stimulate even so much of an interest for a chat. His humor is inevitably the same. His lowbrow jests are disapprovingly lacking of amusement, and he ridiculously laughs at them so loudly as if he were convincing me that it was actually funny. Oftentimes he even does this with the recurring compulsive behavior of either picking or poking me to get my intentionally fleeting attention. That annoys me very much, though to some tolerable extent, I manage to ground my temper, realizing that I wouldn't want to be in a mess with such a gorilla. Clearly he had brute strength under his athletic build, and I don't want to suffer the wrath of his loathing.
I soon regretted putting up with him. Wherever I went, I always had this rain cloud following me. What could be worst than having him sit beside me in every class we were in? I had three consecutive subjects in the same room where I had different sitting arrangements. In all of which, he was seated right next to me. His growing fondness had soon become alarming, and I had to break away. In my efforts to erect a wall between us, I was dumbfounded to know that the more I did, the more he roused curiosity in my personal life. I can't seem to shake him off my tail. He was like a lost puppy who kept following me. Even when I try to go the rest room, he tagged along and chattered during when I take a leak. Since then, I never took one from urinals, instead I went straight into cubicles.
One faithful day, I was attracted to a pink magazine with sexy coverboys in skimpy underwear and bought one immediately for spoils later. Class hours were yet to finish so I stashed it in my bag for safe-keeping. Then, he went on doing what he did best, annoying me with the best of his interest. Unexpectedly, it was the same awful day in which he felt like rummaging through my bag. Behind my unsuspecting back, he saw it and took it out. This event had never been accounted for! Seeing it on his hand, that nauseating sight of him tearing through its seal was starting to blur, as though I was fading through the thickening vagueness of the surreal. Then I felt as though a sudden staleness in the air chokes me of my breath. As his fingers ran through the pages, I was compelled to sprint toward him and grab it, but I was so unnerved to do so, seeing the thronging crowd around him. I stood there, with cold feet, hemming and hawing at the amassing fuss it had made. When the fear of discovery struck me too soon, I was seconds apart from being stalemate to the queries of the intriguing mob. I was gone.
I found myself running. I ran away from the room, from the class, from him, and from the memories I've been so bitterly ashamed of. From thereon, the road seemed endless, but not far enough to lead me back home. Dismayed over unsettling matters, the next few hours were uneasy tosses and turns, the steady ceiling, and noisy thinking amid the silence of isolation. Torn between being foolishly careless and being inconsiderately encroached, I swayed back and forth from a tug-of-war of whose side it was to blame. As I got tired of rocking back and forth, one thing became very clear; There was actually no one culpable to the ironic situation. My mind rested on a debate between, "He wouldn't have done it if I had just protected it" and "He shouldn't do it, because in the first place it was disrespectful". After hours of battling over these two notions, there I had lain defeated, frozen and suspended in disbelief, yet the vivid scenario plays over and over again, burning itself into my memory. Further into the depths of my brooding capacity, my perturbed consciousness diluted those memories with my imaginations of the unspeakable. I've thought so much that dinner came as the last thing on my mind.
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