Chapter Three

Neela felt that time was acting very strangely for the rest of that day. Some hours would seem to be on a time loop, where things just seemed to stay the same until she thought she would die of boredom. Then time would speed up incredibly fast, and a whole hour would seem like 5 seconds…just when she wanted time to slow down. Nothing seemed to be going her way either! And soon it was time for her to take the long walk back home…and she was sure that would take no time at all.

Little did she know, that Ray was feeling the exact same way that she was.

Sighing when she eventually walked in through the door, she hung up her coat, looking around expectantly. "Ray?" she called out, knowing his shift had ended earlier then her own. "Ray, you here?"

She walked nervously up the stairs following the sound of his latest music phase, and hesitantly opened the door to his room. "RAY!" she yelled.

Finally he turned the music off and looked up at her coldly.

"We need to talk Ray," she told him, trying to build up her confidence as she went along.

"Oh, it's you. I thought it was the alley cats outside," was his only response as he picked up one of his guitars.

"You know that's not gonna work," she tried not to act like his words had phased her. "You don't have the right to treat me this way you know!"

That made him pay attention, as she had known it would.

"Excuse me?"

"You heard me."

"Yeah I did. I thought maybe I heard wrong. See, Neela, I've been trying to talk to you all damn day, you've given me nothing but the cold shoulder."

"So what, you talked to me once during our break. One lousy attempt doesn't seem like all day to me Ray."

She was trying her best to keep her voice and feelings neutral, but it wasn't working all that well.

"How could I possibly try any more when the minute I walk in a room…you mysteriously walk out."

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. "Look, it's just after the way you treated me this morning, I didn't feel like facing you ok? You treated me like I was nothing more to you then a ….."

"Time for you to stop there Neela," he said quietly. She couldn't exactly read his tone of voice, and it scared her. was he angry, or hurt? He didn't seem to be much of anything, just coldly calm.

"I may have said that i wanted to forget things this morning, but that's because it's clearly what you want. You weren't exactly behaving any other way, so what was I supposed to expect? Now I can actually say to you, you don't have the right to treat ME this way."

"What way?" she asked, almost afraid of the answer.

"Listen, we both know what last night was Neela. You even agreed with me you thought It was a bad idea, you knew it was wrong, we both did."

"You remember huh?" she looked down at the floor.

"Let's just say I won't be forgetting it anytime soon."

She met his gaze and her eyes widened slightly. "It was that bad?"

He looked shocked at her question. "I meant in a good way. A very, very good way."

"Oh, thank god," she said greatly relieved and he smiled slightly.

"But that's not the point. Point is, we could analyse forever why we did it. We were both lonely, you'd had a bad night, or whatever. Point is it was one fantastic night that we'll remember forever, but that's it. You know? Everything goes back to normal. Or as normal as it can be, because usually, we wouldn't know each other, and probably wouldn't ever see each other again"

"I guess that is how these things usually work," she agreed with him. "And normal," she added thoughtfully. "Were we ever that?"

He shook his head. "Your guess is as good as mine."

"Ok, but we can't just ignore it either right? Since we do know each other. And I know I said it's what I wanted as well but…"

"No, we can't ignore it. But we can at least try to get back what we once had."

She sat next to him on the bed, picking up one of his albums, quickly scanning the song titles. "You mean the constant debates and three hour arguments? Shouldn't be too hard I'll bet."

"No. Not to hard."

"So….we'll try to be something more then just roommates and colleagues that argue. How about we stop being kids and be friends."

"It'd shock them at work. I'd do it just for the look on their faces!"

She slapped him playfully and then stood up. "Right. I have to get as much sleep as humanly possible. Night shifts start soon, remember?"

"Great. Why don't you just kill me now and get it over with."

She smiled. "It won't be that bad I promise. So we're friends right?"

He nodded, and to her strange disappointment and surprise, he agreed. "Friends."

It didn't exactly work out that way……

Thank you so much for reading this, and for the lovely reviews. Happy New Year everyone!