Chapter 2: Tongue Tied
"Man you're just pulling shit out of your ass now!" Adam throws a pillow towards Eli who dodges it and throws it back, Adam catching it and placing it back where he had gotten it from off the couch. "Dude would you play it when you were little in the dark?" Eli questions Adam. "No, but that doesn't make it the scariest one, Elijah" Adam threw back, putting emphasis on his whole name, knowing that his roommate hated the saying of his full name instead of the simple three letter word to describe him. "Ok ok, then, Torres you teabagger, what is the scariest then?" Eli crosses his arms and waits for his friend to say something. "Dude that's not even a smart question! Resident Evil, duh!" Adam shook his head at his best friend and took a sip from his drink on the living room table. Since both weren't working on anything today, they had decided to watch whatever was on Netflix, one being a documentary about how video games came to be what they were now. That immediately got them in the discussion of the scariest video game to play when they were little kids. "No! Ok ok I know zombies and them jumping out of windows and things like that, but dude! Mortal Kombat two on the SNES was WAY more scarier at night because sooner or later, you would have to go to sleep and picture scorpion grabbing you while saying "Get over here!" and you looking into his white eyes so tell me again who is scarier? Oh! And they used real people. Remember that. They literally had to play out the game with real people as the characters and after playing it for maybe what, three to four hours, you know they looked real, for the time."
"I'm going to get more juice. Work on another argument, dude because right now, I'm winning." Adam tells him, Eli screaming that he wasn't, only making Adam validate his point more. Adam goes over and checks on his phone that's plugged in on the kitchen counter wall plug before going over to the fridge and getting more orange juice, remembering that he had it on silent while it was charging. He looks and sees he has missed a call and has a new voicemail. He unlocks his phone and sees if the caller left a text, but nothing. He looks down at the phone number and doesn't recognize it. Adam furrows his eyebrows before clicking and listening to the new message. "You have one new voicemail. To replay your messages press-" Adam presses one to hear the new one. "New voice message. Wednesday, 11:36 am…. Hey Adam. Its uhh Fi.. Fiona. I wanted to see if you wanted to hang out and maybe grab some lunch together. You left last week so suddenly I didn't have a chance to umm catch up with you so just you know..give me a call back. This is my number. I'll be waiting for your call or if not, we'll just see each other at Clare's party. Ok? Ok well bye."
Adam replays it. "Hey Adam, its Fi.. Fiona" yeah I can hear that he thinks, but lets it keep playing until she gets to the part of meeting up for lunch. "…we'll see each other at Clare's party.." She's going he thinks and sighs. "Ok so I came up with the most prefect argument to drop your R.E one down. You ok, dude?" Eli comes into the kitchen. "Yeah just. I- Fiona called" Adam looks over at Eli who rolls his eyes and seats on the table. "And?" Eli states, Adam leans against the fridge now, his arms crossed. "She wants to have lunch, well she called to have lunch and I don't know"
"Go then. See what she wants to talk about" Eli tells him. "I don't think that's a good idea, Eli. I mean what would we talk about? What does she want? It's not like were best friends or anything."
"Maybe she could finally tell you why" Adam looks over at Eli who walks back to the living room. "Just call her back." Eli told him, sitting down and going through their queue to see what they had to watch. Adam looks down at the phone and clicks the last call and waits.
"Hello?"
"Uh Hello. Is Fiona Coyne there?"
"Jut a minute." Adam hears a fumbling of the phone before a Miss Coyne and a thank you are said. "Hello?" he hears her.
"Oh hey Fiona. It's Adam"
"Hey Adam! Did you get my message?"
"Yeah" Adam tells her, nodding at the same time as if she could see him doing that.
"So are you calling to cancel or.."
"No I just wanted to see where you wanted to meet. I'm saying yes to your lunch invitation"
"Oh ok are you busy right now?"
"Uhh not really. So do you want to meet in an hour?"
"Sure, Adam. Ou-the usual place?" Fiona correcting herself before blurring out our.
"Yeah ok. The diner is cool. So I'll see you there."
"Ok. Bye Adam"
"Bye" Adam hangs up.
"That sounded so lovely." Eli inserts from the couch. "So are you going to see her and have her run into your arms as the rain pours around you?" Eli jokes, emphasizing it all with arm gestures. "Stop watching chick flicks with Clare, Eli. I'm starting to think that Clare isn't the only one with a vagina" Adam tells him and goes to his room. "Don't forget to tell her you don't give a damn" "You went from a crappy chick flick to Gone with the Wind?" Adam says as he starts to get a shirt and pants out of the closet. "What? Gone with the Wind doesn't count as a chick flick?" Eli yells back. "Fuck no. It has war, a whore house, hot ass Vivien Leigh fighting for some dude that doesn't want her and having Clark Gable buy her all this shit, kill his kid, and then dump her ass. That is not a chick flick. Hell it's more like the best little whore house in Texas, except without the sheriff taking the whore and making her his wife." Adam keeps talking after putting on a plain red T-shirt with lettering on the front and jeans with some Vans and heads out of his room. "Alright I guess" Eli tells him. "Gone with the Wind is not a chick flick. Casablanca, The Graduate, those are not chick flicks. It's like seeing Goodfellas and the Godfather or seeing A Clockwork Orange or What Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest. They are great films that don't have to be put into this love little box that has to be exploited so at the end of the day a guy can take a girl to the movies and get laid. Pop in Life is Beautiful and then Shawshank Redemption. If she doesn't like either of those films and only wants to see some dude kiss a girl while they use a hose to rain over their heads, then she is the easiest girl to get in bed, my friend. Let her be a "bird" and have her fly into your bed" Adam stopped the rambling and heard Eli laughing at the bird comment, almost falling over on the floor. "I have to get going. See you, pussy" Adam tells him and grabs his keys, wallet and is out of the door. "Hey Grinch"
Adam smiles as he is closing up the door. "Hey" he says back to his next door neighbor. Nora lived with her sister and was a funny girl that moved in a few months after Eli and him got settled in. She was only 5'6, 24, light brown hair, and light brown eyes with a touch of hazel at the end of the iris, almost looking like yellow honey when Adam would talk to her and the sun blazed down on them. She had told him she was from a Lebanese decent from her mom and American from her dad, Adam already taking notice of that by the touch of light caramel on her skin and her pear shaped body. He hadn't tried to ask her out since he was just not looking and so they had become good friends, Nora already coming up with a nickname whenever she saw him, knowing that he wasn't a morning person. "So where are you heading off to?" she asks him, Adam walking over to her as she was getting groceries out of her car. "Just to lunch with an old friend" Adam tells her, going for a few bags before she shook her head. "You need to get going. Wouldn't want to keep her waiting, would you?" She told him, smiling widely at him. "Why do you think it's a girl?" Adam asks her. "Your hair. If it was another guy for some beers, you wouldn't have put some much emphasis on the hair product, Grinch" she tells him before they share a laugh and he walks to his car, a '94 gray Mazda b3000.
Adam walks into the diner and seats at the usual seat he would seat when he would come in for lunch, already knowing the waitress would bring him his usual coffee. Just like clockwork, he sees a small white porcelain cup placed in front of him and his usual waitress, Patricia, there to take his order. "Nothing for right now, Pat. Maybe later" he tells her and waits for Fiona to show up, taking a few sips from his coffee cup until she comes in. Adam stands up and greats her, putting out his arm as she tried to go in for a hug. "Hello Adam" she says formal, as if she was talking to someone else. ""Hello" he tells her and the seat down. "See Eli has been influencing you with how he takes his coffee" she tells him as she seats and he laughs. "Yep" Pat comes over and Fiona only orders a green tea and puts her purse on the corner of the small table. "So.." she says and claps her hands together, placing them on the table. "I'm happy you decided to come and meet with me" Fiona tells him as she smiles at him, Adam smiling back, but again they go into silence.
Adam didn't know why it had to be this way with her. Like if nothing had ever happened, or if what happened had ruined what they had. It still burn why she left that way. "How's working coming along?" she asks. "It's good." he gives her a generic answer. "How's Drew? And your Mom? It's been a while since I've seen them" Fiona thanks Pat for her tea and sips from it, careful not to burn herself as Adam just sits there, having thoughts pop in his head to ask her. "Last week, you forgot to say goodbye at the uhh" "Wedding party" Adam finishes for her, Fiona only nodding. "You seem really good, Adam" she tells him, which Adam only nods to this. She keeps with the small talk, even as she is about to talk about it looking like rain outside, Adam cuts her off. "This is why you wanted to see me? To talk about the weather?" Adam looks at her and sees her look away. He knows she knows what is on his mind and what he wants to know.
"I just don't know what to say or do without bringing up what happened" Fiona tells him. "How you left without a second notice?" Adam tells her. "How you thought that hey I've had my fun with him and decided to make me piss off?" "I never did that" she tries to explain herself. "That's not what it looked like" he replies back. "I'm sorry for that" Fiona looks down at her cup, playing with the rim. " I still see myself leaving and it feels like a dream, ok?" Adam doesn't flinch, doesn't move, he just sits there and listens. "I wanted to tell you so many things back then. Every holiday, your birthday, your dad passing. I wanted to call you, Adam, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it." Fiona reaches for his hand, but Adam retreats and runs his hands through his hair. "Well it's not a dream, Fiona. It happened. You abandon me when you said you wouldn't. You never kept your word to me."
"We were always just fighting, Adam. Every other day it was a fight that escalated into a bigger fight and then one of us would get hurt, always. I just" Fiona exhales and looks at Adam. " I just thought this could be good for me and for you. For us to have our own lives without each other. I feel horrible for it, but I needed it. I could handle it anymore." Fiona sees Adam swallow down hard, but still not talking, making it so she was the one talking. "I know I can't take it back, but if I could, I would spare you any hurt or any pain you had when I left, Adam. I would make it right" Adam calls over for Pat to come to the table. "The check, please" he tells her.
"What no food this time? You are like a war machine all the other days. Oh I see! Taking the pretty lady out to another fancy place?" Pat tells him. "Just the check, Pat. I'm just not in the mood for anything anymore." Adam looks over at Fiona, who turns her head to face the window. Pat only nods and leaves. " You can't change what's already happened. You showed me what you were made of. What I meant. That the words and things you did were nothing anymore but just a cheap excuse." Fiona is about to intervene. "I let you talk, let me finish. You always hated that people put you in a category, but you put yourself in this one for me- A heartless user who only lead me on and made me her toy. That's all you are to me. I wish it wasn't like that, but with you turning your back towards me and being a coward, that's what you showed me. Yeah I'll admit I miss you, but then I think about all the false things that you said and I don't know. It just amazes me that I let myself fall for you." Adam sees Pat come over and puts down a 20 for the tea and coffee. "Keep the change, Pat" he tells her and looks over at Fiona. "I don't have any harsh feelings towards you, no resentment that Eli would want me to have for you or my brother would too. I just really want to know why? Why the leading? Why the toying? I wish you would answer why, but you won't so…"
Adam gets up. "I'll see you at Clare's party. Goodbye" He walks out to the exit and goes over to his car, not looking back and just turns it on and leaves.
"No! God you are just like him!" He hears Eli say from the couch and hears laughter. "Hey Grinch!" Nora tells him, sitting on the love seat as her sister seats on the couch next to Eli who is just clicking through documentaries. "Hey Nor." He says putting the keys on the counter and walking towards the living room. "Valencia" he says to her sister, a bit younger than Nora and more tan skin, Adam wondering if she looked more like their mother. "What are you guys doing?" Adams says, making Nora scoot over on the love seat as the both sat their. "Trying to get Nor to agree that Mortal Kombat is scarier right, Val?" Eli said, Valencia nodding. "No resident evil!" Nora screams back. "A girl after my own heart" Adam says to her, giving her a high five. "Hey so Clare called. It starts in a bout a few hours. So what movie?" he asked. "Food Inc" Adam replies, ignoring the Clare party comment. "No! No ok I know you like it and stuff, but dude its disgusting! God the pigs and the meat and then the clone meat in California and the butchering in Kentucky, no. We are not seeing it again"
They decide on the simple, Como Agua para Chocolate (Like Chocolate for water) "Man that is so messed up how they die though. After all their suffering" Valencia says, Eli nodding along. "I don't see it that way though." Adam says. "Yeah they were dealt a horrible card of faith in the whole movie, but they fought through it all in the bitter end though. They were finally together at the end and they went out that way. They didn't start out like that, but they ended like that. Its a happy ending" "Adam they both died" Nora tells him. "Yeah but not once did he stop loving her or did she stop loving him. They died, but still cared for one another. I don't know, but hey its better than half the crap out there now" This went on for a few more hours till the girls left and Eli and Adam got ready for the party, Eli opting for a cab than to take his car. "You sure you don't want to drive?"
"Nope" Adam told him. "I know by the end of the night I will be too drunk to try and drive." Eli looks over at him and raises an eyebrow. "What did you and Fiona talk about any ways?" Eli asks. "Nothing important. Let's just go and get drunk, ok?" They hear the horn form the outside and head out, Adam wanting to drink his sorrows away.
End of Chapter 2