Chapter 5

It was already four days after they retuned from the trip and they were yet to speak to each other. Apparently, Kristine was the one facilitating the silence owing to the fact that Camille already left plenty of voicemails for her friend, who got them but never responded. And whenever she stopped by the house to check on Kristine, she acted like she wasn’t home.

On one occasion Camille had coincidentally arrived at Kristine’s just as the later got home. And when she tried talking to her, Kristine went in and slammed the door in Camille’s face.

But lately, Kristine felt the urge to call her friend. She had sort of a heavy heart and needed someone to rant to, but when she picked up the phone, a whole new thought creeped in. She thought of what led to where they were now, how childish she had acted towards someone who had been in her life a long time and even when they had fights like this, Camille always still showed she cared about her somehow.

Kristine dialed into the phone and it rang at the other end and she got a voicemail feedback ‘Miss Camille’s phone…at the tone, leave a message…’

“Hi Camille…please we need to talk…”

At the other end, Camille sat and watched her phone, but as soon as she got the message, she picked up her keys and zoomed out of the house. A blue wagon was parked just outside. Camille got in and drove off. Couple seconds later, a black sedan followed after but not to her notice.

The doorbell rang and Kristine was quite surprised as she wasn’t expecting anyone. She got up lazily an made for the door.

Kristine opened the door and surprisingly, Camille was standing right in front of her house.

“I got your message. You good?” Camille asked.

Kristine rushed to her friend and gave her a big hug. Camille was a little bit taken aback by her action.

“You’re obviously not good.” she continued.

Kristine tugged her into the house and shut the door. The black sedan pulled up at a distance and one of the occupants cautiously took photos of the area, including Kristine’s house.

“Don’t tell me you’ve been in here all this time.” Camille said with disgust when she saw the state of Kristine's place. “it’s a complete mess in here.”

“Yeah yeah…I haven’t had enough time to do anything.” Kristine was defensive.

“What have you been spending your time on?”

“Thinking. I suppose.”

“Who spends four days thinking?” an irritated Camille asked “What were you thinking about? Saving the world?”

“A lot of things actually.”

“Things like?” Camille asked.

“Us, how sorry I am, my attitude; I think I overreacted…you know…stuff like that.”

“Nice…really nice.” Camille replied, still trying to come to terms with the condition of the place. She knew her friend to be very neat and whatever was going on was odd.

“Is that all you’re going to say?” Kristine asked

“I have a lot to say and first on the list is that your place looks like dumpsite that needs immediate attention.”

Kristine scanned the living room and settled her gaze on Camille, who already knew her next move.

“No! I'm not” Camille cried out.

Kristine smiled and walked towards her position.

“No means no.” Camille asserted and turned away so that she had her back to Kristine.

Kristine adjusted accordingly so that she faced Camille, just smiling and looking her in the eyes without saying a word.

“Your manipulation isn't working this time. I mean how on earth did the place get this bad with you in it?”

“Okay. Never mind. I’ll just-“ Kristine sluggishly retreated from Camille whose defensive wall was already weakening, picked up a trash bag and began to take some things off the floor. She spent couple of seconds picking up just one stuff and spent more time putting it in the trash bag.

“Its definitely working.” Camille said to herself and proceeded to take another trash bag and joined her friend. She knew Kristine was being intentional, and there was no way she was winning. Kristine smiled and picked up pace once Camille had joined her.

“Alexander, why do you disapprove of him?” Kristine asked.

“Did I?” Camille asked

“Don’t… don’t do that short memory thing please.” Kristine pleaded.

"Really I can't recall." Camille insisted.

"But you could recall the road to my house. That's a wonderful brain you have within your skull."

“Okay here's my two cents. He’s not attractive, he kind of looks ugly to me. He’s too bold, too full of himself, too commanding…he feels everyone must do what he says and act how he wants, and judging by the kind of people he keeps around, he's definitely not a good person.”

Kristine stood transfixed to a spot while listening to Camille listing her negatives about Alexander.

"That's five."

"Five what?" Camille asked.

"Your take...five cents."

"Oh."

“Yeah. But doesn’t it seem odd that you’ve met him just twice and you already noticed all these qualities?” Kristine asked.

Camille shrugged, “well, its my super power. This isn't the first time I’m doing this.”

“Yeah I remember, you did it with Darius too.”

“You didn’t need to say his name...you know?” Camille replied.

“Don’t worry about that.” Kristine waved it off, “There’s no effect anymore.”

“You sure?” Camille asked.

“Yeah.” Kristine repied.

They were done with the living room and moved over to the kitchen. It was a much bigger mess. There were undone dishes, which judging from the quantity and mold on them, had been unattended to for days. There were leftovers from snacks littered around too. Camille turned to Kristine in disbelief with the later acting like she wasn’t aware of her friend's presence.

Kristine settled for the dishes while Camille attended to the leftovers littered around.

“What do you find attractive about him?” Camille asked Kristine who pretended not to hear the question at first.

“I know you heard me.” She continued.

“I really don’t know. I just… maybe I... I was just carried away. Nothing more.”

“Carried away by what in particular?“ Camille asked.

Kristine let out a huge sigh. She was struggling to find a suitable answer but couldn’t. Her mind was completely blank. She had continuously asked herself this question since that day at the site and yet she couldn’t still compose an answer.

“Looks like he’s got that effect though.” Camille said almost inaudibly.

“You said something?” Kristine asked.

“Uh no. I mean, take your time and come up with something reasonable.”

While the two were at it, Kristine’s phone beeped. It was a message from an unsaved number and it read ‘Lunch?’

Kristine looked confused, prompting Camille to come over.

“What’s the problem?”

“I don’t know, just a text from… I don’t know who.”

Camille took the phone and once she saw the number, her expression switched. She was like someone about to confess to a crime. Kristine noticed.

“Spill it!” Kristine ordered and tossed the phone on a table in the kitchen.

“Well, after that morning, I had a rethink and thought I didn’t do right. So I thought why don’t I fix what I might have destroyed before it was built. While we were all getting set to return, I slipped your number into his stuff.” She bared her teeth like a child trying to coverup a mischief.

“God…Camille.”

"C'mon it was the best way I thought to make up for my actions. Afterall, it's what you want."

"You don't know that."

"You know your pretense game doesn't work with me. Right?" Camille asked.

"Sometimes I wonder what I'm doing with you." Kristine teased.

"Better put, what you'll do without me."

"How did you know it was his number by the way?" Kristine asked.

"Well," Camille shrugged. "I-we... You know he's a partner at our firm right, and I have access to documents, so I memorized it. You should be thanking me." Camille replied rather clumsily.

"You sound funny right now." Kristine said, observing her friend suspiciously.

“Don’t be pathetic. Are you going to reply or should I do it myself? “ Camille asked.

Kristine picked up the phone and as she texted back, she thought about all the negative qualities her friend listed about him, the way he handled her outburst at the site, the kind of people she’d seen around him. Then she considered Camille's initial reaction, the sudden change, the fact her friend wouldn't attempt putting her through something bad because according to her in previous outbursts, they both share the damage which ofcourse was true as Camille had helped her go through a number of side effects from bad decisions. Was it worth it?

Well, there's really no harm in trying.

She smiled as she replied; Yes.