From there, there was a change in things. Elle hated change, she did, but this one she couldn't help but find almost…Welcoming. For one, Carmella started eating lunch with her, rather than just dropping and running. According to her, she re-worked her schedule so she could have time for a thirty-minute lunch break and if that lunch break just so happened to happen after she delivered to the tea shop, then well, who would say anything? Not Elle. She was happy about it, she loved it, even. Usually, she spent her lunch break watching videos on her phone or conversing with Robert about his studies, but this was far better. Carmella was better conversation than boring old Rob, anyway.
The additional change was that Leo was distant. Since his fight at the fete, he didn't seem as happy as he usually was, and he wasn't as interested in Elle either. As she and Carmella lounged on plastic chairs in the alley behind the store eating their lunches, she couldn't help but wonder if it was only to her.
"Can I try a bite of yours?" Carmella asked, sticking her fork into her pasta. She loved Italian food. Elle wonders about trying to cook it but expects to be told that her vegan versions of food are abominations.
"Sure." She said and offered her the lentil curry. Carmella took a thoughtful bite, chewed, and then handed the plastic Tupperware back to her. Her fingers leave spots that tingle where they touched her skin.
"It's good." She smiled, "But a bit spicy."
"I'm a bit spicy." She said, with a smile. "Hey, can I ask you something?"
"Sure," Carm said, curiously.
"Has Leo been acting weird around you too, recently?" Carm mulled it over, twisted her fork in the pasta, then said -
"Well, he's your brother."
"He's your boss."
"No, he's my client, if anything, I'm his boss."
"Whatever," Elle said, frustrated. She stabbed her spoon into the lentils with force.
"Has he been acting weird around you?"
"He didn't want to watch Making Mansions with me last night."
"Maybe he was just busy."
"He didn't cook the meat in a different pan when he cooked dinner."
"Maybe he just forgot." She doesn't know how to express that Leo doesn't 'forget' to spend time with her, he always did it because he liked doing it. Because he liked her. And she liked him. And now, for some unknown reason, he didn't like her anymore.
"Yeah. Maybe." She said, "I just wish I knew what I did wrong."
"Maybe you didn't do anything wrong. Maybe it has nothing to do with you at all."
"Maybe."
"You could pray on it?" Carmella suggested. "That's what I do when I'm feeling down about something."
"Not my style." She admitted she had not been to a church since David's confirmation, and that had been only because Leo had bribed her and Cameron with a trip to their favourite fast-food joint on the way home.
"You two will be fine." Carmella promised, "He loves you. You love him. That's enough, right?" Elle isn't so sure. What with the failing companies and the new friend he won't talk about…Maybe it isn't.
"Anyway. I should get back on the road." Carmella stood, and then placed her hand on Elle's shoulder as she passed. "You expecting any more customers today?" There's a pause while she waits for the new wave of sparks brought on by skin on skin contact with Carmella to disperse into her bloodstream.
"Unlikely. I could do it better, you know."
"What?"
"Run the store. Leo hasn't got a clue about what the youth want, and he's too focused on the bar."
"Why don't you?" Why didn't she? Well. Because she didn't want to. She was only working anyway so Dad and Aunty Julie would get off her back about being at home all the time. She didn't want to be a manager. She didn't want to do anything. Except…Well. She wanted to hang out with Carmella, and now she wanted things with Leo to go back to normal. Whatever that had been.
"Because it's his baby." She shrugged, "Not mine." Carmella rolled her eyes, and as she slammed the door closed to her ute she rolled down the window.
"I bet you could, too."
But, she has other things on her mind now, anyway. If she wants an outfit appraisal, she can always ask Rob. Speaking of Rob, he turned the corner into the living room and frowned when he saw Elle spread out on the floor, going through the CD box. Said box was a large plywood thing painted in shiny lacquer and mostly used by Dad and Julie to put their cups of tea and coffee on in the evenings when they watched the news since they no longer had a coffee table - Julie slept on the lounge every night and there was no room for one.
"What are you doing?" He wondered. She didn't see Harlow anywhere, so she was probably down for a nap. She did take those occasionally, and leave Rob to do as he would. He did not join her on the floor, instead folded his arms over his chest. His muscles seem more well developed than they did last time she noticed them, perhaps he's been working out? Perhaps it's to impress his new girlfriend. She hasn't bothered him with that, either. Just doesn't seem like a good use of her time, if he wanted to do something in secret…Well. For now she'd just let him. Unless he expected her to watch Harlow so he could go on a date and lie about it. In that case she would be telling Dad and letting him dump more chores on Rob as punishment. He would deserve it.
"I'm looking for a C.D"
"Clearly."
"The Power, by Vanessa Amorossi."
"You can just listen to it on the internet. You don't need a CD."
"I don't want to listen to it, I want to give it to Carmella."
"Why?" Rob asked, and then sat on the fold-out couch with his long legs crossed. He lay his palms flat on his knees, "Those are Dad and Chrissy's CDs."
"Her favourite song is on that album - And our stuff too. " She held up a copy of JumpStart Fourth Grade Adventures. "You remember when Cam begged Dad to get this for us? So we could play it on the -" Rob snatched the CD out of her hands and then scowled at it as if it had offended him.
"Why do we still have this junk, anyway?"
"Because it's our stuff. We paid like thirty dollars for some of this." She ran her fingers lovingly over the spines of Taylor Swift's earlier albums. "Chrissy brought me two copies of Speak Now, the red one and the purple one, that wasn't cheap." Rob doesn't seem to be listening, he's reading the back of the CD in his hands. "I think Harlow's probably a bit young for that." Rob picked up the CD inside, and then snapped it between his hands before she even realized what he was doing. The CD was now in two pieces. He stared blankly at them as if he hadn't realized they would break. Elle leapt to her feet when she came back to herself and snatched the CD pieces and the jewel case out of his hands.
"What the Hell is wrong with you!" She exclaimed loudly, "That was Cam's!"
"Will you shut up about Cam?" Rob demanded, "Cam this, Cam that, it's all you ever talk about!"
"But that doesn't mean you get to break his stuff!" She said, voice rising in pitch. "You...You bitch!"
"Wow, nice one." Rob says, "We need to start getting rid of all this old junk, what's Cam going to do with it now?"
"Robert!"
"He's dead, time to move on!"
"What on Earth are you two yelling about?" Demanded Dad from the doorway, he looks tired, and he was wearing a work suit with a black tie that had a blue detailing on the front - but only on one side.
"Rob broke the CD!" She said, pushing past her brother to give it to Dad. Dad took the pieces from her and examined them.
"Well, I'm sure it was an accident."
"He did it on purpose, just…Just broke it! Just like that!" He looked at her, confused, and then to Robert who was picking up CDs by the handful and examining them.
"Is this true, Rob?"
"Who cares? It's just a game. You can get another one online."
"That's not the point, this was one of Cam's games from when you were kids. Why would you break that?"
"Cam again!" Rob exclaimed, angrily, "All everyone ever talks about is Cam!" Elle does not think that's true. They seldom talk about Cam at all unless she brings it up first. "First, you let Elle keep all his old crap up there untouched, and now you're upset about some game?"
"It's not just some game!" She exclaimed, "It was Cam's game, it's special!"
"And now it's nobody's game." He grabbed the keys to the red JAG off the table.
"If you think I'm going to let you break someone else's property and then keep your car privileges then you are sorely mistaken young man. Put those car keys down, or I will be reporting that car as stolen." Rob looks at Dad, cusses under his breath, put the keys down.
"You only ever care about what Elle says about Cameron. He was my twin brother, don't I get a say in what we do with his things?"
"Not if the answer is break them." Dad said, sharply. Robert looked between them, and then stomped out the front door, slamming it after him for effect.
"Sweetheart -" Dad began,
"No, It's okay. It's just a silly game."
"It's not just a silly game, and you know that. But Rob has a point. Have you thought about which of Cam's things you might like to keep when we clear out the room?" She hadn't given it a seconds thought, because clearly the answer is all of it. Every item. All of it. Nothing is changing in their room. Why would it? She looked back at the CD box, before saying -
"Oh, there it is!" Hidden under the Taylor Swift CDs, was the album she'd been looking for. She grabbed it, and her Taylor CDs and said, "I'm going to go listen to this!"
"Elle -"
"It's cool, Dad. I'll pick some things." She lied, having no intention of doing so. Dad's all talk anyway. She slipped into the bedroom and opened her laptop on her lap, sliding Speak Now into the appropriate slot. She's only up to The Story of Us when her phone dings with a message from Carmella. She almost didn't check it, because it might be Rob coming in for a second round, but she decided to anyway and was glad she did.
Hey, you doing anything tonight? Do you think you could come over? If you're looking after Harlow, she can come too.
I can come over
Just your bad self :0)
Please come soon. We can do those face masks you like and stuff.
Tucking the CD into her Wizard of Oz Bag, along with a change of clothes and her toothbrush, Elle practically skipped into the living room. Julie was watching television, sipping coffee from a cup patterned with lorikeets. Leo was sprawled long legged on Dad's chair, messing around on his phone.
"Where are you going?" Julie questioned, as Elle tucked the keys to the red Jag into her bra.
"Out, Carmella invited me over to do some face masks and stuff."
"Right, and your dad knows?"
"...Where is Dad?"
"Terese called him." Leo said, "There's an emergency at work." Code for they were sleeping together. Elle has never been more glad she was conceived through IVF.
"No, but I'm sure he won't mind, and I am an adult in case you forgot." Julie worries her bottom lip but then nods.
"Have a good night, then."
"I will, I'll try not to wake you up if I come home."
"I appreciate that."
"Bye Leo." He didn't reply.
…
Carmella lived in a beat-up flat just outside of the suburb. Outside her building is a car up on cinder blocks, and there are several letterboxes in one large square hutch. It's not a bad neighbourhood necessarily, but it doesn't have great lighting, and the price means that there's a large variety of people making up the populus. Probably why Leo didn't want her hanging around here, she thought as she stood under the light of Carmella's porch waiting for her to open the door and reveal another piece of her life. Despite their friendship, Elle had never been to her home before, they usually just spent lunchtime together and then texted in the evenings, like naughty school girls. Neither had ever felt the need to visit each other's home, they both knew where they lived on account of having dropped each other home on the few times they met outside of work.
When Carmella opens the door, her face is streaked with tears, and her long hair is dishevelled. She sniffles, and then smiles at her, stepping aside so she could enter. The home was older, but tidy. Along the walls of the entryway are photographs of Carmella and her family, along with a certificate given to a Rosetta Camenetti for passing the bar. The thing that catches Elle's eye is a statue of the virgin Mary sitting by the door on a side table with a bowl for putting keys in. The topic of religion was not a frequent one, but Elle has never really known anyone especially religious. It's just not the kinds of people that her father associated with, and as a child she'd done the basic religious education offered at Erinsborough Primary but dropped it in highschool to have more time to spend working on other assignments.
"Are you okay?" She asked, quietly.
"I'm okay now you're here." Carmella assured her, as they entered the attached living space. A brown, overstuffed leather sofa and a television on a wooden stand are separated by a long coffee table. "I just had a fight with Rosie. That's all." Ahh. The mysterious Rosie, and her husband Fraser. Carmella's family, she also had a father she has never mentioned and a mother she doesn't spend much time with. Unlike Elle, she doesn't seem close with any of them.
"Oh, I brought you something. Might cheer you up." She produced The Power from the inside of her coat pocket and passed it to her. "I found it in my family's CD box." Carmella looked at it and then began to cry earnestly, alarming Elle.
"What? What's wrong?" She asked.
"Nothing's wrong. I'm just…You found this for me?"
"You did say your favourite song was -"
"I don't deserve this. I don't deserve you."
"Don't be ridiculous." Elle chastised. If anything, she doesn't deserve Carmella. "It's just a CD."
"It's not just a CD. You listened to me. Listened." She pulled Elle into a hug, being slightly taller she can put her forehead on the top of Elle's head, in her hair.
"Carmella, what's going on? Can we sit down?" She releases Elle and then nods her head, taking a tissue from her pocket and dabbing at her red, damp eyes. They both sat on the overstuffed couch, Carmella drawing up one leg to wrap her arms around her knee, staring at Elle with her big brown eyes. She's wearing a tattered, old sweatshirt, and shorts that stop at the mid-thigh. The shirt is pink, the sweatpants are black. She looks lovingly at the CD, before putting it down on the coffee table, which has a set of coasters and no stains on the wood.
"I'm glad you came," Carmella says, finally. "Thank you."
"It's all good, but if you needed me badly you could have just said." Elle replied, "We all have bad days, you know?" And for Elle, a bad day is nearly every day without Cameron but it doesn't seem helpful to say that. "Did Rosie say something to upset you?"
"Yes, but...It's more than that." She sighed, "Do you want a cup of tea? I'm going to make us some tea." Elle doesn't even like tea, but she stood and trailed after her into the kitchen where she filled a white plastic electric kettle with water and then took a pair of cups from the cupboard. Her fridge, she notes, is covered in stickers of differing origins. The toaster matches the kettle, it looks like the Target home brand. The cups are patterned with smiling cats, one red, and one blue.
"I take mine with sugar. No milk. Unless it's almond.." She said, finally. To break the tension. Carmella nodded,
"If you look in there you might be able to find some biscuits." Doing as she was told, Elle found an open package of Scotch Fingers, and set them on the counter. They stood, both silently watching the kettle as it came to a boil. It took a few minutes. Outside, a tree branch brushes against the window. At least Carmella is no longer crying. Elle is not very good at comforting, that had always been Cam's ball game. She and Rob were, admittedly, emotionally dense. She knew her own jealously and self centred-ness made her a bad candidate for comfort but what choice did she have? Leave her new best friend to suffer? She tries to summon her inner Chrissy. Nothing comes to the surface. She had, at least according to Dad, always been more like Julie. As a child, she thought that was an insult, now, knowing how much Dad loves Julie she wonders if that's not actually true. When Gran died, she made Dad promise he would always look after his sister. Dad had. Julie had outlasted most of his post Chrissy girlfriends, because she, like Elle, did not enjoy sharing Dad with anyone else. It was one of the things that united them. Julie loves Dad too, in her own sharp edged way. She wouldn't pick on him so much if she didn't. Elle was the same, according to Dad. She thought she knew best, and didn't like when things were done any way other than her way. She was emotionally dense, and self-centred. All true sentiments.
"Can you take the biscuits and I'll take the drinks?" Carmella asked, taking a cup in each hand. "And put down the coasters? Rosie's pitch a fit if I get marks on the table." Elle did as requested, placing two coasters down and then the biscuits between them. They resumed their spots, now with Carmella holding her cup between both of her palms. They sat in the quiet for a while the only sound was Carmella sipping her tea, and the light clink of her teeth against the rim of the cup. Apparently, she leaves the tea bags in. Who would have known?
"Have you ever done anything really bad? So bad you can't be forgiven?" Carmella asks, out of the blue. Elle gave her a quizical look.
"Why?"
"I just want to know, I guess. It doesn't matter - You'll find out anyway. Or Rosie will tell you. So I might as well be the one who does it."
"Jesus Carm, you don't have cancer do you?"
"NO, no. Nothing like that. I just…Okay. I have an addiction. To pain pills."
"Okay."
"Well, I have the addiction because of my face. You know. The scar." Elle doesn't speak. "You've never asked how I got it." Shrugging her shoulders, Elle blew across the top of her drink, it was still too hot to enjoy. Then she said -
"I never thought it was any of my business."
"Well, it's not. Not really. But, it will be. If we keep being friends after this."
"I'm not going to dump you because you have an addiction. Or, had. Lots of people do. Doesn't make you a bad person." Not that Elle would know, she'd never been close to someone with an addiction before. Unless Izzy counted. Elle doesn't count Izzy for much, not after she left. She resolves not to mention the incident where she spiked her food with anti-depressants.
"It's not the addiction. It's how I got the scar that got me addicted. I was burned, in a fire." Well, sure. Elle could have predicted that one. She doesn't interject just yet, it seems like Carmella is building up to something but just can't quite find the words for it. "I…I should start at the start."
"I'd appreciate it."
"So. I used to be a nun, no wait, I should go back further -"
"A Nun?" Elle does interrupt. "I thought you were only twenty five!"
"You can be a nun whenever." Carmella defended, then said, "Yes, a nun. As you can see, it didn't really work out for me. Look, okay. I - I used to date this guy named Connor. You might have seen him around?" Yeah, Elle knew him. She knew Rob hated him too, but never found out why, or much about him other than that he was Irish. She tries to ignore the crushing feeling at the idea of Carmella seeing someone else, let alone a man.
"I saw him around."
"He has a daughter, named Maddie who was unwell. She needed surgery, and he couldn't pay for it."
"He couldn't put it on Medicare?" When Rob was sick, everything went through Medicare or Medibank. As far as she knew, they didn't have to pay much for his treatment.
"No, I don't know why just that he needed the money. Three thousand dollars, to be exact. So…I did something bad. Really bad. I had this cousin, who was pregnant. She didn't want the baby." Elle tries to figure out where this is going and how it leads to an addiction to pain killers.
"You didn't start doing back alleyway abor-"
"No! No, not that either. I'm Catholic." She affirms. "I facilitated an illegal adoption."
"Oh." Clearly, Elle suggesting something that offended her morals had pushed her into thinking what she did wasn't as bad as what she could have done.
"The baby went to a loving, adoring set of wealthy parents, my cousin and I got a huge payday and Connor's daughter got her surgery." Funnily enough, no one in Elle's family had ever suggested Harlow be adopted. A baby is a lot for anyone, let alone a chronically ill fifteen year old boy but from the second anyone set eyes on Harlow they adored her. There was a period of about two days where she, Cam and Rob tried to hide her from Dad because they didn't want to be in trouble for partying (and drinking) while underage but David, the little sneak, ratted them out. Though, to be fair them trying to hide the baby was mostly her or Cam taking her and hiding in another part of the hospital while Dad was with Rob.
"Uh, huh."
"The baby, she passed away. A cot death."
"I'm sorry to hear that."
"So was I, especially because my cousin wanted her back. But, she was deceased. To…To cope with how I felt I decided to pursue coming to a nun. I thought that was the only way I could ever get God, or anyone, to forgive me for what I did."
"A nun."
"I know. I know how it sounds, but I was okay at being a Nun. Not…Great. I had a lot of slip-ups. A LOT of slip-ups. But I did okay. Do you know Sky Mangel?"
"She's a friend of mine." Generous. She was someone Elle used to know. "She sat on my Mum's lap when she was pregnant with me." Carmella blinks at the mention of Mum. Probably because she wasn't around, and she assumed Elle came forth from Dad's cracked skull like Athena. She doesn't press it though.
"You know she had a baby."
"Little Kerry."
"Well, I was in the hospital, visiting her, while my cousin was there. She was obsessed with Sky, and with Kerry. She wanted her baby."
"Oh."
"Yeah. Oh. I tried to stop her, and when I did so…She set me on fire, in the face. And the hospital."
"I remember the hospital fire." Elle agreed, it had been kind of a big deal. "I always thought it was an accident. I didn't know it was arson."
"She was unstable." Carmella said, as if Elle thought sane, normal people went around setting fires. "But..She got sent away. To a mental health facility. I don't know for sure but I guess she's still there. They gave me pain pills, for my face. They made me feel better. Not just about the pain, but everything. How my life was falling apart, how Connor hated me now, how I killed my cousins's baby. I just felt better. I fought with Rosie tonight. About you. I thought about how easily I could probably find and take pills if I wanted them. But I knew, if you were here…Then I wouldn't be able to. I'd be too ashamed to do something like that in front of you. Not when you have it together all the time."
"What did you and Rosie fight about?" Elle asks, finally, to get the last piece of the puzzle. She doesn't know how she feels about anything else she'd said, and was just buying time.
"You. I was talking about you. About being…Being your friend. She thinks you're too young."
"I'm an adult."
"You're not. Not really. But, I think you're old enough to figure out for yourself who you want to spend time with." Elle sat with that thought for a while, before she said -
"Yes."
"Yes what?" Her tea can be drunk now, so she took a long sip. Carmella picked up a scotch finger and broke it in half, before swirling it around in her drink.
"You asked me if I've ever done something unforgivable. I have."
"What?" Elle set her cup down, and then threaded her fingers together, placing them on her lap.
"My Mum. She died giving birth to the three of us. Me, Rob and Cam. She was never meant to have kids but then she and Dad forked out for IVF and they got three. Two embryos that became Rob and Cam, and the other. Which became me. It was a high risk pregnancy, most multiples are, but Mum especially. Dad said that she always told him if he had to pick between her, and us to pick us. Not that it mattered. She left him just before we were born and moved to Tasmania to raise us alone."
"Why?"
"Because she was mad with him. Pregnancy hormones mixed with him being his usual emotionally distant self. She went away, he couldn't find her, and then he got this call from our grandfather Ian about where she was. Informing Dad that she'd died, and he was now a single father of three babies."
"Wow." They sat in silence for a while, Carmella raised a hand to her face and massaged the scar on her cheek for a while. Elle picked at a hangnail, before Carmella reached out and took Elle's hands in hers. "But…What does that have to do with you?"
"Rob and Cam came out first. One after the other, apparently according to our birth certificates there was only three minutes between them. Mum got to hold them, and feed them and tell them she loved them…But not me. Because when I was born, she had a stroke and died before she even got to see me."
"That isn't your fault."
"Rob says it is. That's why he hates me, now."
"Thank you for telling me, but it isn't your fault."
"Thank you for telling me." Elle said, changing the subject, "I still want to be friends, if you're interested. I thought since you didn't kick me out you might be."
"Yeah. I still want to be friends." Carmella agreed. "You're…Kinda my only friend since I got back from the hospital. Most people don't know how to talk about my face, and the ones who try tend to say some er, weird things. Thanks, for not making it weird."
"It's cool. I don't have a lot of friends either, just my family really. I'm not good at it. Are you feeling alright now?"
"I feel better now that you're here." Carmella admitted, "It's just…It's the first time in a while that's happened to me and I was scared. I don't want to keep being a screw up, I mean who fails at being a nun?"
"Someone not cut out for being a Nun. I'm glad you aren't, or we might not have ever met. But call me, if you feel like that again. I like hanging out with you and coming over so it's not a big deal. And Harlow loves you, by the way, wants to know next time we're going to see a movie with Darmella."
"You take good care of her."
"I guess, but she's Rob's baby. Not mine. Do you want to listen to some music?"
"I don't actually have a CD player Carmella admitted sheepishly.
"Well, we can just listen online. It can't be that much worse."
"Yeah, we can. Together. Stay the night, we can spend all night listening and then we can maybe find some rom-com." It's been a long time since Elle just hung out with someone. Suddenly, she misses it. She misses all of her friendship. And she's glad to have Carmella on her side.
"Hey," She said suddenly, "We should dye our hair. I've always wanted pink tips!"
