Les Laches

Oops

A black parachute jacket wrapped in Tian's body is now walking down one of the main streets in the city of Cienfuegos along with Meda. Despite being two-size, Meda's jacket was warmer than her now-wet coat and hung on the young man's right arm. Meda, who was worried about Tian's condition if the girl was allowed to walk outside in a wet shirt, decided to take the girl to a two-story, cream-painted building. The building that reads Teatro Tomas Terry on the top wall of the second floor is a theater building that is quite famous in Cienfuegos.

The two arrived at a large hall that was quiet because there was no show. Because of the size of the building, both can choose a seat that is far from other visitors.

"You want a photo?" tian asked while taking out his cell phone.

In fact, Meda doesn't like taking selfies unless absolutely necessary. He will even quickly run away when he heard someone start calling the word "picture together" or "selfie". However, for some reason, refusing Tian's request suddenly felt to be the last thing he wanted to do at this moment.

In the end, Meda adjusted her body position so that it was within range of the front camera of Tian's phone. The girl threw a small smile at him before staring at her camera and pressing the snap button. Meda who stole saw the shots that are now displayed on Tian's phone screen frowned.

"Is this your broken front camera or your tremor hand?"

Tian gave the young man a "take it or leave it" look. Meda took a long breath. His memory returned the night Afgar tried to show off everything he knew about Tian. At that time, Afgar did mention that Tian really sucked about taking pictures.

"I borrowed your HP, huh?" Meda did not wait until Tian answered. Within seconds, the metallic purple phone had already moved into his hands.

"Make what?" Tian asked curiously. However, he did not try to recapture his phone.

"Make it show you how to take the correct motto."

Meda positioned the phone in her hand with a distance of several centimeters in front of her body. Without waiting for Meda to give a cue, Tian placed his chin on the young man's shoulder. It was his reflex when taking pictures with people who were higher than him. Meda who had intended to slightly insult Tian by taking a portrait when the girl was not ready to pose finally made herself look unfocused in the picture.

Meda's head rotated almost 90 degrees to ensure that the girl did not deliberately take such a close distance to her. However, seeing Tian who seemed more interested in their photos compared to the closeness previously created between the two, made Meda try not to think about it any further. After that, Tian's phone seemed to belong to Meda. Tian entrusts the task of documentation to the young man, seeing Meda's ability to take on picture quality that is arguably far more "worthy" than he is.

At exactly 2 p.m., Tian began to starve. Meda who heard a loud voice coming from the belly of the girl immediately let out her laughter. Tian could only grimace wrongly. The two decide to stop by at a restaurant called Camillia which has a direct view towards the sea. There are actually many restaurants with similar views on the streets that they pass, but both agree that the restaurant is the most interesting to visit.

The two were engrossed in talking about the portraits they took along the way. Meda is used to being an object for Tian's camera phone and no longer thinks twice about posing when Tian shouts the word selfie while in places he thinks are instagramable.

While busy chatting, Meda accidentally dropped the piece of chicken that she stabbed carelessly with a fork. The tomato sauce that smeared the piece of meat fell on the surface of the white shirt it was wearing and left a reddish orange stain. Meda had tried to wash the stain on the toilet, but could only remove the remaining sauce stuck to the surface of her t-shirt.

"Pake your jacket again!" Tian's orders that saw the stain traces even appear to be widened in the part of Meda's shirt that was not initially exposed to the splash of sauce. "The good-looking times are a mess."

Unknowingly, Meda smiled faintly at the girl's comment. To him, hearing someone else praise the good looks on his face was not something surprising. However, knowing that the girl gave him a similar assessment brought a new sensation to him.

Meda refused to take back her jacket. Tian's clothes had indeed dried up, but the thick coat he had kept in his backpack for several hours, would not dry as quickly. He would not let the girl roam the windswept streets of Cienfuegos without a coat to protect her tiny body.

Tian did not force any further. He was not sure he could beat the stubbornness of the young man without going through a long, emotionally draining debate. No. gabe. Their journey is long. Tian did not want to be exhausted long before the trip was over.

As the two paid for their order at the cashier, Tian saw small sets of white chalk chalk on the side of the calculating machine.

"Medic. Tanya to the cashier, may we not buy chalk one seed," whispered Tian while slightly on his tiptoes to make sure his voice reached the young man's ears.

"Make what?" meda asked after conveying Tian's request to the cashier.

Tian pointed to the front of the Meda shirt adorned with a sauce stain. Meda's forehead grew increasingly wrinkled, but she did not ask any further. Meda felt that she would not catch Tian unless she saw for herself what he was going to do with it. As soon as Meda placed the object in Tian's palm, the girl pulled it towards the sink lined up in front of the toilet at the back of the building.

"Excuse me, yes," Tian said as he pulled the tip of the young man's shirt and placed his hand behind the spot where the sauce was smudged.

Meda could only stare at all of that with widened eyes. The beating of his heart that rang out to those ears made him anxious in case Tian also heard it. In fact, Tian himself who seemed to be busy scraping chalk on the cloth that spread on the surface of his hand, was, he is also desperately trying to concentrate on removing the stains on Meda's shirt as quickly as possible while easing the pounding on his own chest.

Tian tried not to raise his face which was warming up. However, as Meda twitched uneasily, the back of Tian's hand touched the skin behind the cloth. Spontaneous Meda held down Tian's wrist which held the chalk and made the girl lift her face. Although at a glance, Meda had caught a reddish tinge on Tian's cheek that she had hidden earlier.

Meda laughed inwardly knowing that this closeness not only affected her, but Tian as well. And he could no longer hold back when he realized everything. His hand touched Tian's cheeks which were getting flushed.

"You sick? How come your face is red?."

Meda increasingly aggressively teased Tian who clenched his lips tightly while rubbing the surface of the cloth in his hand. Meda, who initially only touched Tian's cheek with her fingertips, now used both of her hands to cupped the girl's face and pulled her head up to look up.

Tian, who had been feeling anxious from realizing the intent of Meda's actions, punched her in the stomach with enough force to make the young man in pain for a while. While grumbling, Tian washed the surface of the Meda T-shirt that had returned white as if it had never been stained with sauce at all.

Tian's phone in Meda's pocket rang. Meda took it out and showed Afgar's name appearing on her phone screen. Tian gestured for Meda to pick her up because her hands were wet and she did not want to waste the tissue she had accidentally "stolen" from the restaurant table to dry her clothes. Restaurants in Cuba are indeed different from places to eat in Indonesia which generously provide a box of tissue at each table.

"Hello?" Meda answered the phone from Afgar while again pinching Tian's cheek.

"Meda?" Across the phone, Afgar frowned. Sapphira who saw the change in Afgar's expression from behind the totebag display tried to guess what else would make the mood of her lover was turned upside down.

"Tian where is it? Why is he's HP on you?" ask Afgar again. There was absolutely no hiding the displeasure in his voice.

"Next to. If there's anything to talk about, just say it. I'll tell you later" replied Meda.

"If there's anything I want to say to Tian, I'll talk to him myself, not to you."

"OKAY. If you can be picky like that means the thing you want to talk to Tian is not that quick. We're spending time together. So, I'll hang up on him first." Meda said it as she walked away from Tian and stepped outside the restaurant.

Tian walked out from behind the restaurant door. Meda's jacket re-wrapped her body and only showed the bottom of her minipants. Meda's hand again moved to Tian's cheek which was still flushed red, but this time the girl rejected his hand.

"I just wanted to say thank you." Meda reasoned while pointing at the part of her shirt that had returned spot-free, although it was still a little wet. Seeing that, Tian recalled the tissues he had stored earlier. He took the thing out of his jacket pocket and handed it to Meda.

"What did Afgar say?" Tian opened the conversation as the two continued their walking agenda.

"She seems to want to know where you are, but when you got out the phone was turned off." Meda shrugged her shoulders. "Would you like to call me back?"

Meda intended to hand the phone back towards Tian, but the girl shook her head slowly. He put his hand in the pocket of the jacket he was wearing. Slightly shivering as the sea breeze blew past him. Meda paused her intention to take Tian's phone out of her pocket, then pulled the girl's right hand out of the pocket of the jacket she was wearing. However, before Tian voiced his protest, Meda's hand clasped tightly onto his hand and started walking again. Tian could only open his mouth in response to the behavior of the young man who was still putting on that poker-face expression.

No time has been shown at 5 pm local time. Today, both are on the roof of the Palacio de Valle, a castle built in the Cienfuegos region around the 1800s. A restaurant located on the roof terrace of the building was the place where both unwind and see the sunset at the end of Cienfuegos Bay. The port located next to the bay was also seen crowded with visitors.

"Four hours to go back to Havana, Ti," Meda sipped her coffee while looking at Tian's face looking far out into the ocean.

"Yes. You said you had breakfast." Tian changed his sitting position to look back at Meda.

Meda saw the remnants of the sunlight that struck Tian's face forming a silhouette on one side of the girl's face. The young man held his breath as the wind that was blowing at the height of the building played the strands of Tian's hair that had previously been tucked neatly behind the ears. His gaze cannot shift. Even as the girl raised her face and stared back into Meda's eyeballs.

***

"Have a safe journey, Pal."

Pito gave a warm pat on Meda's shoulder as the young man welcomed the farewell embrace he offered. Tian on the other hand received a kiss from Yeni on both of his cheeks. After being satisfied with each other's hands with the hostel owner's partner, the two then walked along the road to the station.

As soon as the two entered the carriage and sat in the corner of their respective seats, silence surrounded the two. For the past few hours, both of them have been lost in their minds. The moment when the two could not take their eyes off each other on the roof of the Palacio de Valle was probably one of the triggers. Or maybe it was the whole time they spent on the streets of Cienfuegos that made both of them feel the need to uncover the meaning behind the togetherness.

The first conversation since they left the city of Cienfuegos occurred when Tian realized the time indicated by the watch in his left hand. Bedtime Meda.

After knowing Meda's disease, the two did occasionally talk about the topic during the trip. From there, Tian learns that in addition to taking the drug regularly, Meda must also adhere to the same hours of sleep and wake up every day to control so that narcolepsy does not recur. Right at 11pm this is the moment that Meda should start resting her body.

"Medic. You just sleep. Later at 4 I wake up," Tian said as he glanced at Meda's face which did look exhausted.

"Can I borrow his shoulder?"

The question slid quickly from Meda's lips without her having a chance to prevent it. However, the young man had absolutely no intention of retracting his words. He looked at Tian's eyes instead. The girl herself was considering what attitude she should take. In the end, his head that could think of nothing but the word "yes", could only nod slowly.

Meda shifted her position to get closer to Tian who was sitting by the window. He breathed a sigh of relief as his temple touched the girl's shoulder. Before falling asleep, Meda thought about the moments she spent with Tian. Starting from the moment he saw the figure of the girl down the stairs of his house, quarrels in the car to the cabin of the plane, to all their adventures in Cuba.

Indeed, his heart was not difficult to translate everything he felt in one word. However, there was something in his head that held him back from touching more than he should have touched, or saying more than he should have heard. Not before he himself was able to discover what made him hesitate to express his feelings honestly.