Part 2 of 6
"Well, it was…" A deafening silence falls as she watches him freeze into total immobility, all pretense of relaxation forgotten. He does try. Not that it saves him. He takes a shaky breath, "Um, sometime in the far past, I'm sure? You've obviously forgotten all about it…" Colour is racing across his cheeks.
"Oh, no, I haven't. I haven't forgotten about it because I very carefully wrote it all down… in my notes." She gives him SUCH a look, "My PRIVATE personal case notes!"
"No, no, no, I'm sure you insulted me about it… or maybe you told Dwayne or Fidel?" His eyebrows rise hopefully.
"No, I didn't. I've never told ANYONE." His eyebrows snap down and he looks away. "So! You read my notes? When?" No answer. No defence. No hope. "Some of them… or ALL of them?" Still no answer. "I see. So you read my innermost private thoughts… and you said NOTHING? Have you been laughing at me all this time? HAVE you? You HAVE, haven't you? Oh, how could you be so cruel?" She is livid.
He whirls back to face her, his face very white, "Cruel? ME?! I'm not the one writing such… such…" His hands gesture as he stutters.
"Such WHAT?!" Her eyes are wide and outraged. Very French.
"Such bosh," he finally spits out.
"It's NOT bosh!" she yells, then… A pause, "What's bosh?"
"Utter tripe… you know… moon June spoon, that sort of thing."
"Hmm, how about thrill grill kill? That rhymes too!"
He slouches back into his corner, arms crossed, "Well, I mean, really! I knew it had to be an elaborate prank. My old unit once pulled a stunt just like it and I had to take personal leave to recover from it."
Her blood pressure sky-rockets! She stares at the road, strangles the steering wheel, "Oh! How I HATE those people! Will you PLEASE give me their names so I can mail a bomb?"
"What? No! The very idea," he huffs.
Silence descends. They are almost back to town. This conversation can NOT end soon enough for him.
As they swing into the station parking lot, she catches his elbow in an iron grip as he opens his door and hisses, "Just so you know, it wasn't a prank. I'm very sorry you had to read such TRIPE!" Her voice is rising in fury, "I know how SENSITIVE your tender psyche is! Pity you don't care about MINE!" This last is shouted as she slams out of the truck and goes up the stairs without a backward glance.
He stands beside the truck, watches her go, his brain in absolute turmoil. NOT a prank? Is THIS part of the prank? Did I ACTUALLY say 'tripe'? Especially if it ISN'T a prank… then perhaps 'tripe' was too strong a word… but… NOT a prank? She can't really have meant ANY of those things she wrote in those private… Uh, oh. Sudden motion up on the veranda catches his attention.
She is leaning over the railing and waving a notebook he recognizes. It is the notebook that he'd found in her bottom drawer… the bottom drawer that he'd been searching while looking for his extendable silver pointer just last week. He had been sure she'd hidden the pointer to wind him up. What he'd found instead had wound him up good and proper!
"Here!" she yells for the whole world to hear, "Maybe you'd like to correct my spelling too!" and she heaves it as hard as she can. It flutters down onto the lower lawn like a sad wounded bird. She storms back inside. He swears he can see heat distortion outlining her silhouette.
He slowly walks up to the fallen notebook and looks down at it. Just an innocuous bit of paper… but so loaded with potential dangers… horrific uncertainties… and NOW… boundless possibilities. He stoops to pick it up. It doesn't feel heavy at all… not at all fraught with difficulties and dread and... He looks back up at the station and wonders in dismay… could ANY of it be true? Actually be true? He shivers.
He sighs, slips it under his arm, and straightens up to military stance. There's only one way to find out, isn't there? He stiffens his spine and climbs the stairs. When he enters the station, it is as tense as he expects. Dwayne and Fidel are graven images of terrified men in the same room with a tiger. The tiger herself is rigid in her desk chair, burning a hole in the desk top with mad eyes.
He makes the tiniest motion with his head to the men and they are gone in a rapid clatter of 'Yes, Chief!" and "You betcha!" Clever boys. No sense in everyone being decapitated. He takes a deep breath and lays the notebook on her desk where it does NOT immediately catch fire, much to his surprise.
"I'm sorry," he says quietly. "I know that isn't nearly enough but it's all I've got. I'm so sorry." He waits. Nothing. He begins to fret and hastens on without thinking, "I'm even sorry that I'm sorry… which is the sorriest thing of all. I didn't mean to read it but I was bored and I couldn't find my pointer and…"
She scoffs, "Oh, you mean THIS?" She pulls the pointer out of the radio on the corner of her desk where it has been masquerading as the antenna all this time and throws it at him. It hits his chest and falls to the floor like the meaningless little gizmo it is. He ignores it. She ignores him.
"Camille…" She turns her head, not even looking at him now. He tries again, "Camille… please… I don't know what else to say. This is very embarrassing for me…" At her sudden glare he hastily adds, "… and for you too, I'm sure! Can't we just pretend it was a clever prank and I fell for it and now we've had a good laugh and we can go back to…" but he can see by her stiffening body that this isn't going to work.
He slumps and makes his way to his own desk and collapses into his chair. They sit in silence for long minutes. Finally, he just has to say, "Now what? What do we do? I've never been any good in situations like this… not that I've ever been in this situation… you know… where the woman isn't trying to ruin my life and I'm the butt of the joke…"
She erupts, bolts to her feet, surprising him mightily, "Why do you think I'm trying to ruin your LIFE? Hmm?" She stares into his wide clueless eyes and it makes her madder still, "Maybe I'm trying to SAVE it! Did you ever think about that?" She slams her hands onto her hips and scoffs, "Yeah… save you… and maybe same me too! Is that possible in your world? Or is this all a joke to you?" She is steaming!
He doesn't know what to say. His brain kicks out one phrase and he clutches at it, "Save you?"
"Yes! Am I not allowed to be lonely? Scared? Seek comfort? Be attracted to a man? Am I!?"
He flinches. He's seen madly barking dogs that looked friendlier! "Well, of course, but… ME? Not me! You can't possibly mean me. How can that even happen?"
She looks away, suddenly quiet, "You read it… you know how it happened... slowly… over time… then POW!... with no warning. Then denial, repression, long nights of no sleep, long days of hiding it. You know EXACTLY how it happened." She sounds so betrayed.
He shrugs helplessly, hands up in supplication, "Yes, but… me?"
She rounds on him, "Why NOT you? Who else is there to compare to you? Huh? Look around! It's a small island and you stand out like a lighthouse… burning so bright… but there's no door! No way in! How am I supposed to overcome that?" She crosses her arms and waits. Maybe he'll give her a clue?
But no. He is looking back at her as if she is something that has just dropped down out of the sky. He has no clue. He is racking his brains in desperation but nothing comes to his rescue. Where are my words, he despairs? She's given him the perfect opening to start the conversation he's been dreaming about for months… and his words have deserted him. He closes his parted lips and just looks at her in sorrow.
She sees this and draws her own conclusions, "I see." The silence spins out. She studies him. He's rejecting her… something she has dreaded and feared and now it has come to pass. She takes a deep defeated breath and monotones, "If you are the gentleman you pretend to be…" here she sees she has wounded him deeply, "…sorry… as a gentleman, you'd throw me a bone. You'd at least TRY to let me down easy." Her shoulders sag and she can only drop her eyes in sorrow.
There is a VERY long pause before he stutters, "Let you DOWN? You mean… spurn you? Refuse you? Are you INSANE? Why would I do that? You don't know how your words have tortured me ever since I found them." At her startled look back up, he stands and walks past her desk, heading for the door, "I have to go outside. I need to think. This has blown up into something I can't process right now. Please excuse me."
He almost makes it out the door but she once more catches his elbow. She swings him around mightily and lashes him across the lips with a bruising kiss. "There! Take that with you! Maybe it will help you think!" she growls then turns her back.
END – part 2