My Instagram Love

Episode 17

“Don’t worry.” Denise interrupted me and smiled, having recognized who I was talking about. “I know who you’re talking about. He’s at the topmost floor right now, waiting for…” She paused all of a sudden, shifting glances between I and Jessica again, probably unsure of who to place as the major subject since I was barely standing upright with crutches in my hands and my friend was more qualified to be seen with a gorgeous man like Tunde.

“…you.” The salesclerk finally settled her gaze on Jessica when she completed her sentence, probably thinking my best friend was Tunde’s guest and I was her nosy sister who just decided to accompany her sibling over here, or her one-legged bodyguard or something. I felt so insulted, but I said nothing negative to her. I simply shrugged it off and masked my disappointment with a sweet smile.
“How do we get to the topmost floor?” Jessica asked.

“It’s easy as ABC. Use the elevator over there.” Denise answered, pointing at somewhere behind us. Jessica and I looked back and traced her gesture with our eyes, and we saw the machine for ourselves.
“Thank you…” I said, still wearing a mask in form of a cool smile, “…for everything.”
“We really appreciate your help.” Jessie added.

“You’re both welcome.” The salesclerk said softly, entwining her hands on impulse, and that was when I noticed her fine fingernails covered in multicolored paints.
With that, we left Denise’s presence and proceeded toward the elevator. When we got there—precisely in front of it, we tried to click on the buttons on the wall so that it would open, but it didn’t. We tried seven more times but it still didn’t work. A security personnel who happened to be passing by at that very moment somehow noticed the trouble we were having with the elevator’s switch and offered to help us, but we still ended up having no luck at all. The odds were not in our favor. We were left with no other option than to use the long staircase which would not be convenient for someone like me, but I had no other alternative so I had to do it even though I didn’t like the idea at all.

Thinking about walking through a flight of stairs with nothing but one functional leg and mere old-fashioned crutches almost made me sick. It could seem crazy, risky and impossible to some people, but I was determined to scale through it at all costs.

9:17 PM.
I was more than late and I knew it. If the word ‘disappointment’ were to be an actual living person, it would most certainly be me. I’d always had this habit of keeping late appointments right from my ‘wonder years’ which I wasn’t too proud about. If care wasn’t taken, I even had the tendency to sleep off on judgement day while other people would be getting raptured and judged by the Almighty God.

15 steps and counting. Jessie was right beside me, holding my left hand gently to support me while we talked about the vastness of the mall as we continued to ascend the stairs.

16 steps, 17 steps, 18 steps, 19 steps, 20 steps, 21 steps and as I placed my only functional leg on the twenty-second step and extended the crutches in my arms towards the same step, someone ran into me so hard. The impact of our collision practically made me stumble and I almost fell on the staircase, but Jessica’s firm grip steadied my body and I was able to regain my balance in no time. The stranger who had been paying much attention to his smartphone rather than the stairway he was descending had now bent down to pick up his phone which had fallen down when we collided heavily.

“Can’t you see?” He said without looking up at me, still picking up the scattered parts of his phone from the steps. “Are you blind?”

As soon as we heard his voice, Jessica’s eyes and mine almost popped out of their sockets and our mouths fell agape.
“You can’t even say sorry.” He complained, fixing his smartphone’s back cover right where it belonged. “You’ve damaged my phone’s screen! How bad of you! Can’t you look where you’re going? Argh!”

The funniest part about the entire drama was the fact that I was finally standing in front of the one and only Prince Charming himself, and he wasn’t even aware of it. He hadn’t even bothered to look up at the person he ran into before he started to complain so much. He sounded so angry; I could tell by the tone of his voice. I was quite sure that his anger wasn’t based on what had just occurred between us, but on something else entirely.