**Brie**
I was so frustrated with myself. Why the hell did I do that? I am not sorry that I punch the guy, but what I regret the most is the unexpected confession toward Archie. Now what will I do then? I am 100% sure that she will not want to have anything to do with me anymore. I mean, who would want to be friend with a freak like me?
It's not that I want to feel like that, but my heart just keep feeling it. I know I love her but I never thought of loving her this much until today. But, how could loving someone can be so wrong?
Well, what's done is done, I can't take it back and pretend as if nothing happen right? I just have to learn to deal with it. Maybe it is probably the best interest if we didn't continue our friendship anymore, that way I will easily get rid of my feeling to her.
But will I manage to handle it? That's the million-dollar question that I might not be able to answer straight away.
I was still standing in the same position as where Archie left me about an hour ago. Somehow I can't bring myself to take a step. I know I need to start walking if I want to go back to my room before midnight, but I just can't make my leg move. It's as if I've grown a root there, making me stand still.
I need to forget about this feeling, it is not right at all! I scolded myself.
But love is all about right? Not the gender... The voice within me countered.
"Yeah right. As if all people can accept that fact. You and I know that women are suppose to be devoted to the men, not the same gender," I told myself loudly.
My cellphone ringing shrilly, making me almost jump out of shock. "Good Lord!" I exclaimed while putting my hand on my chest. I answer it without even looking at the caller ID. "Hello?"
"Hey Brie, are you still in the same position?" Said the voice that makes my heart melt.
Stop it! She is your best friend and is a girl, for God's sake!
"Yes I am," I said bluntly, trying to act as if I never confess to her anything at all.
Archie exhaled. "Listen, your roomate Bella will fetch you using my car, her car is still out of service. So just stay there until she get you safely okay?"
I blinked my eyes, thinking how she still care of me after what I've done. "Yeah. Sure, I'll wait for her."
"Good. Ehm... I gotta go, nite," she said and hang up before I can even formulate my appropriate reply.
Good night best friend.
*******************************************************
**Archelle**
I know life is not always perfect. It can be said as a roller coaster, sometimes life turns out great, sometimes it's worse. But never did I expect myself to have my life completely change ever since that night.
The next morning, I wake up at my usual time, 6 o'clock. Thank God Kendra is sane again, so she didn't pull a prank to me today. I go to class on time and sit at my usual place, regardless of the knowledge of Marcus might be seated next to me again today. I wanna make a peace with him and clear some misunderstand about me. I wanna know where he got the idea of me being a slut.
Slut...slut.. I cringed at the thought of the word. I always use that word when I was refering to Jane Louis. It's the real fact, that Jane is the real slut who can't get enough of fucking one guy. I never expected Marcus to think of me like that. Hell, I never even went on a date with one guy before in my life.
Marcus come around just 5 minutes before class started. He has a big bruise on his nose. Every eyes stared at his shiner, but he took no notice about that. As I expected - and hoping - he sit next to me, but didn't make eye contact with me. I was just going to start a conversation when Mr.Rufus come into our class.
Damn, now I have to wait 4 hours before I can really talk to him. But nevertheless, I write him a note and pass it to him silently. This is what I write:
Marcus, we need to talk, about yesterday. I want to clear some thing about me, I hope u can spare some time with me. Give me a chance to explain the truth please?
He read my notes expressionless, but regardless of that, he stole a glance at me and gave a slight nod, giving me the answer that I needed. I smiled a bit, relief that he agree to meet me after this hell-hours of class.
******
The time is ticking, people come and go, but still, no words are said ever since we sit on the same place we sat yesterday at cafeteria. Neither one of us is eager to start the conversation. I was staring at the ants on the table, while he close his eyes as if he is meditating. Time pass slowly and the tension that surround me makes me feel uncomfortable.
"Okay, that's it, if you don't want to talk, I'll talk," finally I initiated the talk.
"Mmm," he just nodded.
"First question I wanna ask you, what gives you an idea that I am a slut?" I drawled the last word with sarcasm.
He didn't reply me, but instead he snatch out his cell phone from his pocket, punching on it and then give it to me. "Read this to yourself."
I grabbed his cell phone and the first thing I saw is my name on message inbox. Weird, I don't remember ever send him a message yesterday. I open up my message and gasped out loud.
"Fuck! I didn't write this!" I exclaimed, in shock.
Marcus look as shock as I am. "You don't?"
"Hell yeah! Let me check what time this message is delivered," I checked the message detail, "6.15pm, hey I was sleeping at this time, and wake up at 8pm."
"Weird..." he mumbled. "I should have know it, you will never write this kind of language. I know you ever since we become classmate 3 years ago." He cringed, then scratched his head. "I am such an idiot.. Archelle, I'm sorry for calling you that name. I would never done it if I knew it wasn't you." He looked so apologetic, it makes me smile.
"'s okay, I understand. I might react the same way as you do if I were you..." then a sudden thought hit me. "Don't tell me that bitch is the one who screw this up," I mumbled to myself, clenched my teeth so hard.
"Archelle? Are you okay?" He said with a worried look.
"Yeah, I'm glad we are cool again, but I am not alright at all, thinking that someone is apparently too nosy to mess things up," I said. Then, I remember that Kendra will not have evening class today, and neither am I, so this is the perfect timing to confront her. "Marcus, I gotta go. I have something to be settled with my dear roomate."
He nodded in understanding. "Okay. Will you go to dinner with me tonight? I wanna make it up with you, and plus, I really wanna get to know you more," he whispered the last sentence with a wink. I blushed, suddenly become speechless, but I recovered quickly.
"Okay. See ya later," I said, waving at him before I rushed back to my room.
Kendra Louis, you are SO DEAD now!
********
By the time I reached my room, my anger limit has reach its maximum limit, and if I didn't know better, I would have capability to just kill Kendra right away. What she did to me is unforgiveable, and despite that I regain Marcus's trust, I lost my best friend. Well, not entirely lost, just that if this didn't happen in the first place, Brie will never confess that to me, and everything is back to normal again.
Sadly, "normal" didn't apply in my life anymore.
I wonder how is Brie doing right now? I exhaled a loud sigh as I reach my door knob and twist it. I didn't contact nor seeing her ever since that fateful night. And neither is she making effort to contact me. I began to feel mellow just the thought of my best friend. I am sorry for making her feel like that, but we are human and we can't stop from falling for other human, regardless of what gender they have.
I don't have any problem with the same gender relationship. The only problem I have is that I don't love Brie the way she did to me. And this gonna hurt her more if I chose to stick with her and pretend as if she never utter those words to me. That'll be like a hypocrite ass, and the last thing I want is to let Brie dwell with her feeling.
I want her to give more time to forget her feeling to me, 'coz there's no hell way a chance for us to have that kind of relationship, and Brie did know that our family is a tight religious...
My thought has gone the moment I lay my eyes on the bitch. She is online with her laptop now, swinging her legs in a relaxing way.
"Hey, Kendra, can you look for me, the definition of 'slut'?" I said out loud as I throw my bagpack on my desk hard. She fidgeted a little, then settle her eyes on me.
"What do you mean by that?" She asked in her usual soft way.
Oh no you don't, Kendra, your softie act will not work with me ever again, I can't believe I fall for your stupid act all these years.
"I was asleep yesterday evening, but the weird thing happen to me you know?" I sat on my chair, whistle a bit, trying to look nonchalant. "Marcus showed me my messages to him, and apparently he believe it, but don't worry, we are settle now." She wear a look of expressionless right now and it makes me want to just strangle her.
"So?" She asked, rolled her eyes.
That's it! I go to her desk and slammed my hands on it so hard that she almost jump in shock. "Don't you try to play a fool with me okay? I know YOU sent that messages to him! You bitch, arrogant asshole!" I spat right into her face. She cringed, her face now flushed in anger.
"Watch your language, girl! I don't tolerate people talk dirty to me!" She poked me on my chest, I grip her hand so hard that she did cry in pain, I loosened my grip but still did not have intention to let it go.
"Look at yourself in the mirror, bitch! You are nothing but a trash, and very nosy too! Are you have any mental disorder? Do I need to call a shrink for you???" I shouted right on her face, I don't care if my voice can be heard all around this campus or not, I still wanna let go all of my anger toward this bitch. "Listen to me carefully, Kendra," I lowered my voice in a hiss but still sound menacing, "I'll let you go this time. If you do this again, next time I won't play softie with you again, GET IT?" I pushed her and burst out from this hell.
"FUCK YOU, ARCHELLE!" I heard Kendra scream to me, but I just keep on walking. I looked at my watch and decided to go drive out of town for a while before my punishment duty is due. I just wanna go away from this hell created by Kendra. I really like to kill her if I wanted to, but I love my future more than I love to kill her, so I just let her go. But I am a girl who keep her word, so when I said I will not play softie with her the next time, I will do exactly like that.
************************************************
**Brie**
Two months has passed. Hmm, who ever thought that time can move so fast with just a blink of an eye? My cosmetic course is doing well, I passed the theory as well as the practical test. I have a very big dream in future. I wanna be a professional make-up artist, and hopefully I can make it to the Hollywood. Once I fullfill those dreams, I will open my own make-up boutique and will make as much money as possible.
These past two months, so many things are changing. Apparently until now, Archelle never make any effort to contact me, which is both fine and also painful for me. I keep blaming myself for not be able to keep my mouth shut at that time, but I know regretting about it doesn't do any good to me. Things happen, and so bear with the consequences, no matter how much it hurt me. I never have lunch at cafeteria again, instead, I will drive to the restaurant or sometimes fast food restaurant to grab my lunch or dinner. For breakfast, I just eat bread with jam or margerine or whatever that suit me at that time.
Besides eating, all I did was study and study and study. My roomates once said to me that I study like a maniac and should be medical student instead of make-up artist. The mere mention of 'medical student' remind me of Kendra. There's no news about Kendra at this moment, so I guess she is back to her original miss-goody-two-shoes self. I don't care about her anymore. The person that I care most is her roomate.
The problem is, Archelle is already cut loose our friendship without saying it directly to me, and that makes me so frustrated. I prefer her to just say that straight, not let it be and pretend as if we never met. There are times when I really want to go to see her and have a discussion with her about our friendship, but everytime I started to make that step, I ended up losing my gut and in the end, I will shrink cowardly like a turtle.
I always trying my best to avoid her, even during taking shower. I will make sure that she already take a shower before I did, and so far we never met accidentaly in the toilet. Outside dorm, sometimes I see her with Marcus from a distance. They look like a couple to me, but according to several sources, they never declare themselves as a couple. But they can't fool me, I know Archelle for 5 years, and the look of her face said it all.
She is in love with Marcus Lawrence.
The fact is enough to make my heart ache. How stupid I am to even consider of falling in love with her, and find myself not only losing her as a potential partner, but most importantly, lose her friendship. And now, besides my 2 roomates who constantly care for me, I do not have anybody to trust anymore. Yeah, there's been some time when guys approach me and ask me out for a date, but I decline them all. I don't want anybody to be near me. I just want....her...
All these problems that keeps lingering in my mind has slowly gnawing my good senses. By the end of September, I have been falling apart, and is having a great depression. No one will help me get through this, because I just keep all to myself, even my roomate never have any idea of me dealing with depression. I seek for a shrink once in a week now, with prescribe medicine to calm me down. Even though talking with a shrink can help me relief some of my burden temporarily, I don't know how long I can hold on.
I am starting to drift apart.... no one knows what am I going through.... But I'll just keep quiet 'coz seems like my mouth can brings to disaster in my life now. I don't trust with my mouth ever again, because of the stupid slipped out from my mouth, I lost everything.
*************************************************
**Kendra**
I keep looking at my watch, somehow feeling anxious about the event that will occur here in this club. Oh yeah, you hear it right. Me, Kendra Louis, a medical student, is going to have fun in the club tonight and there'll be nothing that can stop me from it. To add to the excitement, I will soon meet my love of my life. Just the thought of him enough to make my skin tingle.
I have a great plan tonight, and I hope he will accept it with an open arms. And open legs too, I added with a smirk. With the way I dress tonight - a miniskirt with a very tight tank top - no one will even expected it to be me, at all. People always see me as a girl-next-door kind of girl. But looks can be deceiving, right?
I saw the guy that I love so much enter the club. God, he look so handsome right now with his jacket, white t-shirt and a jeans with a cowboy belt. People will think that this guy is in his middle-age, single guy instead of 43 years old guy and have 2 children in which I despise the most, especially my roomate.
Oh yeah, speaking of my roomate, apparently she and Brie are no longer friend, even though I still couldn't find the main reason of their broken friendship. And Archelle is in love with the same guy that I tried to screw up with. Hmm, typical. But Archelle is too boring for me anyway so I started to behave myself again so as to not having another unwanted issues with her, especially thinking about the fact that I love her father.
Of all guy in the world, I still couldn't understand why I love Archelle's father? I don't mind having married guy as my lover, but I do mind if their family is related to me in my life literally.
"Hey pretty lady," Joe drawled, brushing his hand over my waist.
"Hey babe," I replied with a husky voice. He hissed and kiss me on my mouth. I kiss him back, and without even care of people watching, we deepened our kiss with our hands around our waist respectively.
"Oooh, wow," I whispered as soon as we ended our kiss. "You are such a great kisser."
"Yes I am, darling, and it is all just for you," he said with a wink.
We order some beer while began to chat about our regular day. Let me get this straight. Joe doesn't know my real name, I address myself as "Keane Dawson" and he's been calling me that name ever since we first met. I know he is Archelle's father long before I met him. He is the greatest artist in the state, and has his own art gallery. That's where we met for the first time. I remember seeing him in very thoughtful position, and I can't help it but to approach the artist himself. We get to know each other, even exchange mobile number, and the next day we went to have dinner together in a restaurant near the beach. That's when he talked about his family, and is telling me about Archelle who will enter the college for art and literature course.
Without hesitation, I enroll the same college that she attend and even have to bribe Mrs. Willow just to be Archelle's roomate. I do want to be a doctor someday, so that is why I take medical course. But somehow, day by day, year by year, my interest toward this course has become mellow. I am not so sure if I wanna continue my study again. The reason why I chose another name to adress myself is that he doesn't know about me being Archelle's roomate. I am so in love with him, and if he know about this, I am 100% sure that he's gonna end our secret relationship.
And I don't want that. I am so close to get him, knowing that his relationship with his wife has hit the bottom rock.
But, tonight, I have another brilliant idea that will guarantee him to stick with me for the rest of our lives. I will make sure that my plan will be succeed, finger cross!
**********************************************
**Brie**
"1 more beer, please?"
The bartender of the day, Jason, clicked his tongue, slightly disapprove with my umpteenth order of beer. I chunked that beer in just one gulp. When I tried to order another one, he held up his hand.
"No more, girl. You are so fucking drunk now, you need to hail a taxi, it's too dangerous for you to drive," he warned me. I laughed out loud, didn't even know why I find it funny but just wanna let it all out.
"D-d-drunk? I am not d-d-drunk, man," I slurred, making no sense at all. "I am p-p-pathetic, isn't it, dude?" I tapped his shoulder. He just shrugged. "Of course you have no idea. Y-y-you have n-n-no idea at all," I continued to slur. Who cares of the way I acted right now? I feel much better after drinking 5 glasses of beer. Or was it 6? 7? I dunno, I've lost count already.
"C'mon, I help you find a taxi," he urged me, but I didn't move.
"I lost my best friend... I love her, really do," I keep on talking, totally clueless to what was I talking about. "I am so f-f-fucking stupid for ruining our friendship.... b'coz of this f-f-f-fucking feeling I had on her. Now she is h-h-h-happy with a g-g-g-guy... Marcus. Yeah... his name is Marcus. She totally worship him.... who am I to compare myself over him?" I know it's not right to just pour out my depress feeling toward Jason, poor little Jason has to deal with my drunken state. But really, I need to talk to someone so bad, and Jason is the lucky one to be the listener.
"Wait a minute. Are you gay?" He asked with curiosity.
I shrugged. "I don't think so. I just love her not because of her gender, but because.... she is herself.... I always like guy, mind you... but she is different... you get what I mean?" He nodded in understanding. "I listen to this song....whenever I was thinking of her...." I pulled out my mp3 player and give him the right earphone while I stuck the left one in my ear, and choose this particular song that I really like.
"I wanna go back to the way it was,
When I knew that you were mine,
I wanna know how it feels to love,
The pure and easy kind,
I wanna go back to the way it was,
Baby tell me where you're at,
'Cause I wanna go back,
I wanna go back..."
The thought of Archelle everytime I listened to this song makes me wanna cry but I still manage to maintain my composure. Jason seems to enjoy the song. When the song is finished, I put my mp3 player back into my jeans pocket. "This song is called 'I wanna go back' by Jordan Pruitt. She is my best friend's favourite singer... Ever since we lost contact, I listen to this singer's songs everyday... " Oh gosh, I can't hold my tears anymore.
Jason put his hand on mine, then said in soothing voice, "Let it go, girl. If you wanna cry, just cry. I guarantee after this you will feel much better."
And I did cry. I cried for the lost that I experience. I cried for my broken friendship. I cried for my own stupidity. I cried for my heartache and heartbroken. I cried for my loneliness. I cried and cried until there is no tears left to be shed from my eyes.
Eventually, Jason manage to persuade me into taking a taxi and brings me back to my dorm. Once I arrive at my room, I directly landed on my bed and fall asleep in a few millisecond.
TBC
