Finally…a breather!! After the typical everyday, seemingly never-ending hassle of the beginning of a new academic year at college, here it is! May’s week! Oh, right. Some of you probably don’t know about May’s week. Let me explain briefly: here, in Argentina, the seasons are the exact reverse as those in the northern hemisphere, so, obviously, the academic year is quite different from those in the UK, China, Japan, South Korea, etc. Anyway, we start classes on March, get two weeks for the winter holidays in July, then we start attending school/university until the end of November or first days of December, when summer holidays begin! –“Why, they sure have it easy there! More than three months for vacation?! Now that’s life!”- you might think, but you couldn’t be more wrong…at least for university students, that is. I mean, yeah, sure, we do have a lot of “official recess” time, but we never get rid of those friggin’ bastards! Yes, you know which I’m talking about! Those tree-devouring monsters –no, wait, that’s us- called books, which tear our brains apart and burn them to ashes! Indeed, if you really wanted to picture how  an Argentinian undergraduate feels or lives, try to imagine a  young person always juggling with a rainbow-like array of books and notes, making his or her best attempt at not falling or, most especially, letting the monsters fall, until that marvelous day in which you (most incredibly) pass the last final exam. Yeah, I hear you. “That’s just like everywhere else.” But the thing here is that, when we get any holidays, we’re either loaded with homework and prácticos to present/prepare (best case scenario) oooorr, well, we’re studying and sitting for term-tests and the oh-so-lovely finals. To put it simply, most students only get one proper month of holidays a year. Anyway, long story short, May’s week is one of those short “breaks” when we get more free time, since we don’t have classes and we avoid the daily commute and so on.

So here I am, on a Thursday afternoon, spending my time (♪ insert tune here ♪) doing some (more) reading. Touche, ain’t it? Yet this time around I’m just lazily reading one of my favourite novels for pleasure. It’s been months since I’ve properly got my hands on one of my refreshing texts (nope, I didn’t write it myself, but bought it myself...God knows I wish I had the guts, time and money to write a book of my own! I’d be rich! $_$). Anyhow, I came to one of the best bookshops in the city, “Penny’s”, where readers can buy whatever book they need and sit at a table to have some nice cup of coffee while enjoying their brand new read. A light but persistent autumn rain is falling outside...waves of red, blue, black, white, orange, purple, green, and transparent half-bubbled people come and go on the hectic streets, in spite of the little watery arrows shooting across them. I can see those beautiful coloured blurs through the shop’s window, where the clouds’ tiny seedlings get caught one after the other in this seemingly crystal spider web we’d call “glass pane”, whose transparency looks fake now. Sigh. Somehow the mood has made me get poetic for a minute. I get interrupted from my dazzlement by the waitress, who brings me a strong cappuccino, some chip cookies, and a mafalda.  I thank her and put the book aside for a while...my, this sure looks tasty. Just as I start to drink my coffee, I noticed someone staring at me. It’s a dude. Wth man? Can’t I drink my coffee in peace?! He’s not even trying to hide it! Hmph! Who cares? Wanna play who lasts longer staring? I’m up for the challenge! See who’ll win! After what seemed like an eternity, he suddenly frowns and I look away. Wait. Wait just a sec...has he just played me?! He’s grinning! Damn him! I’m so pissed now! Nooo, no way in 🤬 it’ll end like this: I still have my second shot. Yes! That’s it. I  direct my eyes in his direction and stare at him again. He isn’t looking my way, but he’s reading from a newspaper instead. He completely ignores me for a while, apparently too immersed  in the news to notice me or anyone else. Then, for a mere second, he looks back at me, this time with a questioning face. Again. What. The. 🤬. Man. He’s definitely playing with me, now I’m totally certain. Hold on...he rings the bell somehow. Do I know him? From where? I don’t recall ever having seen him on campus. One of my neighbours, maybe? Nah, cross that out. I admit I don’t tend to socialize much with them, but I can recognise them and I remember their faces from the elevator or crossing paths in the hallway. He ain’t from my building. So who is he? An alien? Nope, that’d be me. :P No, please don’t get so imaginative here. I was born in this planet, yet I’m the kind of person who basically commutes and that’s it: no pubs, no bars, no nothing, except parks, but I cannot connect this guy’s  oh-so-annoying face with any of the parks I’ve been to; hence, another big NO. Then WHERE FROM? Geez, this is driving me mad! Damn idiot! Wait! Woah, hold it there...has this guy been following me? Is he...a stalker?! I make a disgusted face at the thought and start shooting daggers at him; my daggers bounce back and return as boomerangs, though. He’s tittering! Seriously, what on earth is wrong with this man?! Can he read my mind or something? Pff! Of course not. No one can. But what’s that in his hand? A notepad? Has he been writing things about me all this time? I hadn’t noticed until now ‘cause he had it between the newspaper and his sweater.