Chapter 10 Gossip Folks

Allegra, picking at one of her numerous guitars, was sitting in the lounge beside Elise who was, to nobody's surprise, reading a magazine. As Allegra played "California Dreamin'" on her cherry red electric guitar, Elise suddenly jerked her head quickly towards Allegra, staring at her intensely, her mind wandering. Allegra a bit freaked out stopped strumming and looked at the Canadian boarder who seemed to want to say something. After a while of silently staring each other down, Elise tranquilly turned her head towards her magazine, as if nothing had happened. Allegra looked puzzled as she continued to watch Elise with a wtf face, who soon turned her head back towards the other girl, not knowing how to express herself. Allegra desperately wanting to shatter the silence quietly said
"What, do I have something in my teeth?" She said as she picked between her teeth.
"Somebody's gay"
"WHAT?" Allegra replied instantly with a screwed-up expression.
"Somebody's gay and I don't know who it is, I don't know how I found out, and I don't know why I found out." Elise answered in a monotone voice, a blank expression on her face and a semi-presence that gave the illusion that she was lost in her thoughts.
"Well… uh… do you know when you found out?" Asked Allegra.
"Not even, all I know is that one of the competitors is gay and it's a guy."
"Hmmm… It's probably Brodi, that would explain the tight shirts… or maybe that Viggo guy, he seemed… odd…" She laughed "Or maybe both and they're dating, hahaha!" Allegra let out, laughing.
Elise didn't answer. Her face was emotionless and she didn't seem to react to anything, she just looked forward with a dumb expression.
Allegra continued to play her guitar alongside a motionless Elise, gazing into space.

Nate came in and Allegra's face illuminated.
"There you are, sexy; I've been looking for you all over the place." Nate said
"Really?" She asked smiling like a dumb six-year-old
"Of course! You coming?" He asked as he dangled his car keys
"Sure, where are we goin'?"
"To the mall, I need to pick up a few things"
"Ok, just let me go get my purse" She stated enthusiastically
And with that the two had left Elise, swimming in her thoughts all by herself, who was trying to remember details about her discovery.

Zoë walked in, in a horrible mood, and turned on the Gamecube. She mumbled under her breath sentences that only had a few comprehensible words that resembled:"… can't even……my frikin birthday…..jeeze…."
As she was in her last lap, she gained first place and as she was approaching the finish line something broke her concentration…

"MOBY!" Elise shouted out

Zoë almost shit her pants; she hadn't even noticed the other competitor was in the room with her. As her car flew in the ditch, an unaware Zoë replied:
"JESUS, what the hell?"
Elise, finally snapping out of her trance, looked embarrassed and didn't answer anything
"What about Moby?" Zoë asked.
"He knows" Elise said, nodding as if everything was crystal clear " …He knows who the guy is and he wont tell me …or… it could even be him,... eh?"
"That makes as much sense as a bunny with a pancake on its head" Zoe said blankly,"What does he know? What, what?... what is… goin' on?" Said Zoë completely lost.
Elise took a deep breath to concentrate on her story
"I found out the other day that one of the male competitor was gay because Mac was making fun,… but… that doesn't make sense…unless…well anyhow, Moby knows who it is and I imagine Mac does too…" Elise blurted out.
Zoe took this all in and then said: "Well I'll have to ask Moby some time, I'll tell you if I find anything out. But you know, it's probably Brodi or that new blonde guy that looks as queer as a 3-dollar-bill."
"Yeah but Moby doesn't really talk to them much, does he?" Elise asked
"Well… no, but the things that guy knows are almost scary, he a walking encyclopedia, he knows everything…. " Answered Zoë.
"But something seems wrong, I'm missing something, it doesn't make sense…" Said Elise.
"Well, I gotta check to see if I have any messages, talk to you later." Said Zoë, as she left to reach her room.

Alone once again Elise regained her motionless "pensive" mode. After re-enacting the situation in her head several times, it finally clicked.

"PSYMON!" She yelled with a smile, then screaming and holding her hands to her mouth.

By this time Zoë was out of ear's reach and heard nothing of Elise's discovery. She walked up the stairs thinking about how crappy her birthday was so far. She got to her room, the most secluded one, furthest in the building, and then opened her door. Her Mcom was on the bed with a little "new message" light blinking, there where two of them awaiting her. The first one was from Allegra who wanted to know what song was playing the night before at about 11:57.
"How the hell am I supposed to know?" She said, wondering why the world was over-populated with stupid people. Moby hadn't come to see her yet and it was already past supper time, nobody from her family had called yet and the cherry on the sundae: she was P.M.S.ing.
"Could you imagine a worse birthday." She said as she pressed buttons furiously, answering Allegra's message, saying she would lend her the CDs and she would give her the titles of the ones she liked. Then Zoë opened the second message, Moby's.

...

"Well, at least he remembered it was my B-day" She thought, turning her Mcom off.

It was a little past six o'clock and Zoë was laying on her bed, her arms stretched out wide, staring at the ceiling, trying to clear out her head…

There was a knock at the door.

"Jesus Christ... " She thought in a pissed off tone

end of chapter 10