She Screams in Silence

The next morning, Felicity stealthily crept out the door. At this point, who honestly cared if Rachel and Richard knew she had snuck out? She had nearly destroyed that fragile image they had of her––certainly one more crack couldn’t make much of a difference.

That, and there was Billie. Just exactly what was she supposed to say to him now? They couldn’t ‘just be friends’ anymore, could they? But then, what did that mean they were? Perhaps it had just been nothing––a spontaneous random action never to occur again.

Well, that would suck.

So, of course, there remained only one thing to do––go see Billie. Though, in all honestly, Felicity was half-dreading it. What if everything was screwed up and awkward?

Our friendship was already screwed up and awkward, Felicity reminded herself.

After walking several blocks and attempting to navigate the AC Transit, Felicity climbed on the #51 bus that ran all the way from the Berkeley Marina to Oakland, and at a stop relatively near Billie’s apartment building, pulled the cord to get off. She stuffed her transfer in her pocket as she stepped through the doors, and then set out down the street towards her destination.

Reaching his building, she hurried up the steps, but paused at the door. This was just Billie, after all. Nothing to worry about, right?

As she raised her hand to knock, the door suddenly swung open, her fist nearly making contact with Mike’s face. She jumped, startled.

“Oh, hey. Sorry, I didn’t know someone was at the door,” he apologized.

“It’s okay. And hi. I just came over because, well, is, um, Billie here?”

Mike grinned, “I don’t think you’d show up over here for anyone else.” He laughed as she flushed slightly, “Sorry, didn’t mean to embarrass you. But actually, I’m just on my way to go meet up with him and Tre. We’re making some spare cash doing a shift down at the restaurant.”

“Oh,” she nodded. “Well, I just wanted to see if he was...I mean...well, since he’s busy, I guess I’ll just go and––”

“No, hey, you don’t have to,” he shook his head. “I mean, you can still hang out here if you want. Billie’s only going to be a few hours.”

“Really? You wouldn’t mind me being in your house when no one’s there?”

“Hey, if you actually want to go in there, you’re more than welcome to it. Seriously. No one cares. In fact, if you show up when no one’s here, you can probably still get in because no one ever remembers to lock the fucking door. I yell at them about getting our stuff stolen, but honestly, I don’t really think we have any shit worth taking.” He glanced down at his watch, cursing under his breath, “I’ve got to go. I’m already late. So, uh, Billie will be back around...three? So if you want to stick around, cool. If not, I’ll tell him to give you a call or something.”

“I guess I could wait, but––”

Felicity never bothered finishing her sentence, for in the next moment Mike gave her a hasty goodbye and decamped, dashing to his car like a cheetah on extremely dangerous methamphetamines.

Shaking her head, Felicity pushed the door open, stepping into the dim living room and flicking on the light switch. She smirked at the now-illuminated mess. All those cans lying around made it look like one of them must have a fetish for mass amounts of aluminum in cylindrical form. Could they pick up anything?

She leaned over to neaten a pile of records scattered around the turntable. Felicity’s parents had recently purchased one of those increasingly popular CD players––perhaps such an item would be a good investment for Billie and his friends. And if not that, they could at least use a new record needle, as theirs was looking quite battered. She sifted through the various sleeves––The Beatles, The Ramones, The Clash, Sex Pistols, Operation Ivy, Van Halen, etc. She smirked, thinking of Rachel and Richard’s possible reaction to this collection. Doubtless they were the type who thought Paul McCartney singing about wanting to hold a girl’s hand was frightening hard rock––the rest of them might just warrant an aneurysm.

That done and all desires to clean exhausted, Felicity collapsed on the sagging couch. Her gaze wandered up across the ceiling, in particular fixating on the large crack that ran from the fan. This was an old apartment, so it may just have been there naturally, but she could only guess the real reason was that either Billie, Mike, or Tre had decided to have an Errol Flynn swashbuckling moment and tried to swing on the fan blades and come close to ripping the entire apparatus out of the ceiling.

Her conjectures were interrupted, however, by a slight rustling coming down the hall. Turning her head, Felicity could just make out Fatty calmly sauntering from his napping place atop an unfolded pile of laundry over to somewhere better suited to observe his visitor. He sat in front of her for a moment, his bright green eyes fixated on her as he gave a loud meow for no other reason than he seemed to want to display his ability to make noise.

“Hey, Fatty,” Felicity murmured as the corpulent cat suddenly jumped up onto the sofa and nudged her hand with his head, in a request for some affectionate petting. Absent-mindedly, she scratched behind his ears, her mind off elsewhere––elsewhere being Billie, of course. Deciding that her lack of attention was not acceptable, Fatty climbed up onto her lap, settling there, his large paws draped over her leg and his wide bottom not quite clearing her lap and having to make do with part of the sofa.

“Oof!” Felicity gasped as the eighteen pounds of fur unexpectedly made her legs his new home. She looked down at him glumly, petting his back and discovering his lack of a scruff due to his bodyweight. “Oh, Fatty, what am I supposed to do? What am I supposed to say to him?”

Fatty responded in purr form.

“Well, that might be charming if Billie was a tom-cat, but...oh God, I’m talking to a cat. This is so weird.”

Suddenly the phone rang. Felicity let it run through and the machine pick up, as she wasn’t about to go answering the phone in someone else’s house, and even if she’d wanted to, there would be no removing Fatty’s girth from her lap.

The answering machine clicked on, an odd medley of Mike playing the bass chords from The Beatles’ “I Want You (She’s So Heavy),” Tre’s loud belching, and Billie doing a fair imitation of John Lennon before screaming at the end, “I’ve got blisters on my fingers!!” When the greeting was finished running through, it beeped and Billie’s voice came over the speaker, “Felicity? Are you there?”

She jumped up best she could, an unfortunate Fatty giving an offended meow before stalking off to eat some more, and she picked up the receiver, “Yeah, I’m here! Hi. Let me turn off the answering machine.” She leaned over and clicked the stop button. “Hey.”

“Hey. So...” he paused, searching for something remarkably clever to say, “um...what’s...new?”

“Nothing much. You?” she replied awkwardly, realizing their conversation was already veering into the weird and inane.

“Look, I’m going to try to get off early,” Billie said abruptly, “and then I’ll be back and we can––”

But he never finished whatever he was going to say, for suddenly through the receiver Felicity could hear a series of terrific crashes and wild shrieks, in the manner of a small village being brutally massacred by invading Huns.

“Shit!” Billie yelled. “Sorry, Felicity, I got to go––dishwasher crisis.” Before she could even manage a goodbye, the other end was filled with Billie cursing and someone screaming like a banshee on crack, followed by what sounded like a minor explosion. Cringing slightly, she hung up and resumed her place on the sofa.

Sometime later a knock sounded at the door, a female voice calling out, “Hello, anybody home? It’s Cat.”

“Um...come in?” Felicity offered.

“Hey,” Cat poked her head in the door. “Thought you might be here.”

“Oh, hi,” Felicity waved at her. “Sorry, Tre and Billie and Mike went out...somewhere. I’m just hanging out here because I don’t want to be at my house.”

Cat grinned. “They’re ‘working,’” she made air quotes. “No, actually, I think they are working––busing tables and such––and battling a schizo dishwasher. At least they were when I left the restaurant.” She shrugged. “But, anywho, Billie said you were over here, and I came over to see if you wanted to hang out?”

Felicity blinked. “You...you want to hang out...with me?”

“Yeah,” Cat laughed. “Come on, let’s go do the girl-bonding thing.”

“Um...okay,” Felicity picked up her purse, following Cat out the door. They walked down the stairs to Cat’s car, a midnight blue Toyota Corolla that had seen far better days last decade.

As Felicity reached for the handle, Cat cried out, “No, wait, don’t! The door jammed last year when some asshole slammed into me on Ashby and it always sticks now!” She ran around to the other side and went through the driver’s door, crawling over the passenger seat and jiggling the remains of a hanger she had wedged between the window and the door until it jimmied the lock and the door gave. Felicity climbed in, trying not to cringe as she avoided putting her shoes on any of the junk that littered the floor of the car.

“I’m sorry, I know my car is absolute shit,” Cat apologized, turning on the ignition. “I’m so busy or lazy that I can never be bothered to clean it out and I can’t afford to take it in or buy a new one. I should really haul this boy off to the junk yard though. Total POS.”

“POS?”

“Piece o’ shit.”

“Oh.” Felicity paused, glancing around the car’s interior. “So...thanks for inviting me out. I was a bit worried my day would consist of socializing with Fatty.”

Cat laughed. “Yeah, you looked like you needed to get out. I mean, when’s the last time you went out with a friend?”

“What do you mean? I go out with Billie all the time,” Felicity shook her head in confusion.

“No, no, a gal-pal. Billie totally doesn’t count.

“What do you mean he doesn’t count? He’s my friend!”

“‘Friend,’” Cat made air quotes again.

“Excuse me?”

“Aw, come on,” Cat smiled, “you’d have to be blind to miss all that sexual tension the two of you have going.”

“We do not,” Felicity shifted uncomfortably in her seat.

Cat grinned at her, “Aw, you like him, don’t you? Don’t you dare say no. I can tell you do. It’s written all over your face.”

“What?”

“Well, the second we started talking about Billie-boy you turned all shades of maraschino cherry.”

Felicity crossed her arms over herself and sunk further into her seat, hoping Cat wouldn’t notice she was blushing even more.

“Come on, tell me! This is what girlfriends do! Tease each other about boys!” Cat begged, drumming her fingers on the steering wheel.

“We’re friends?” Felicity stared at her.

“Well, yeah, aren’t we?”

“I...I guess. I’ve never really had friends, exactly. I mean, unless you count the kids my parents’ friends have, and I don’t think it’s really bonding to being treated to fist-eatingly boring speeches about what prep school so-and-so just got accepted into.”

Cat laughed, “Sure we’re friends. I like you. You’re cool.”

“You think I’m cool?” Felicity gaped at her. Cat was the epitome of “cool” with her blue-streaked hair, black pants, knee-high black suede high-heeled boots, black leather jacket, and top just short enough to reveal her pierced navel––as well as her eyebrow ring. And she was thought Felicity “cool” and worthy to be friends with?!

“Sure. Come on, it’s not every day you see someone with a fashion sense that says she raided the hell out of Sandra Dee’s closet.”

Felicity colored a little, pulling at the sleeve of her little blouse. “Um, I don’t quite choose to dress like this. It’s sort of...my mom’s doing.”

“Oh. You don’t like it?”

“Not unless by ‘like’ you mean hating it so much you want to scream.”

“So why don’t you say...” Cat began, but trailed off, seeing the look on her face that clearly stated it was not in the cards to argue her mother’s ensemble selection. She hesitated for a few moments, then smiled wickedly, knowing a much better subject to switch to. “Okay, so now that you managed to dodge the subject of Billie for several minutes, back to business. Tell me all about this enormous crush you’re harboring for your fair laddy-me-love.”

“Um...”

“Please don’t give me that bullshit about there being nothing going on. I know that’s crap.”

“Um...” Felicity repeated. This wasn’t exactly a topic that was normally open for discussion...with anyone.

“Okay, you do admit you like him, right?” Cat tried a slightly different approach.

Felicity relented. “I...I suppose. I mean...” she faltered, flushing again. “He’s really amazing,” she whispered, smiling lightly.

“Aw, I knew you liked him!!” Cat gushed. She turned serious again, “So, now as for Billie-boy’s feeling towards you...has he ever made a move or anything? ‘Cause if he hasn’t––” Cat stopped, seeing the reaction Felicity had as her eyes widened and she blushed scarlet. “Oh my God, he has made a move! I knew it! I knew it! What did he do??”

“I never said––”

“You didn’t have to. I can tell from your expression that he did. Did he kiss you?”

“I kissed him, actually.”

Cat stared at her. “Wow. You made the first move?”

“Well...well...it was just nothing and I started stammering about how sorry I was that I had just gone temporarily insane, and then he leaned in and kissed me...like, really kissed me.”

“And did you like it??” Cat grinned wickedly.

Even though she was embarrassed as hell, Felicity smiled back, “It was absolutely unbelievable.”

Cat gave her another grin. “That’s awesome. Seriously. So when did this happen?”

“Um...last night.”

“What?!” Cat stared at her. “Oh my God, that is bloody fabulous! So now the two of you have, like, romantic drama!” She shook her head. “Did I just use the words ‘bloody’ and ‘like’? You must think I’m a British valley-girl. We’re a rare breed, you know. Moon Unit Zappa can eat her heart out.” Seeing Felicity’s blank expression, Cat gave a nervous laugh, “Um, don’t mind me. I’m just a little...off.”

• • •

“So how long have you been dating Tre?” Felicity asked sometime later, the two of them having stopped at a little cafe for lunch.

“Six months,” Cat smiled, her face taking on a rather dreamy expression. “I think he’s...wonderful. I mean, crazy, too, but so am I, so it works.”

“He’s shorter than you,” Felicity remarked.

Cat burst into giggles, “Everyone is taller than poor Tre. But we’re actually about the same height when I don’t have my shoes on.”

“How’d you guys meet?”

“Oh, that,” Cat waved her hand. “We didn’t, really. I mean, I’d always kind of known him. Gone to school with him...when either of us showed up, that is. I mean, I just always kind of wrote him off as this goofy guy I was more than acquaintances but not quite friends with, you know? And then last year Mike invited me to a party, and I saw him, and something was just...different.” Cat spun her glass around, watching the water swirl. “So...I started hanging out over at their place all the time and suddenly those three were my new best friends. Of course, I wanted to be more-than-friends with Tre, but I was way too embarrassed to say anything. We went for a few months like that. I actually started to think nothing was ever going to happen and I should just give up when one day the four of us went to the movies and then Mike and Billie ditched us. I mean, they knew how I felt about him, and I guess he liked me too and they had been pressuring him to make a move forever. He was shy too, you see. So there we were, just the two of us, and there was all this chemistry and...that was that.”

• • •

Following lunch, Felicity accompanied Cat as she made her rounds down Telegraph. In Amoeba she stood awkwardly next to a Rolling Stones record sleeve while Cat chatted with the multi-pierced cashier girl; in a small clothing accessories/tattoo parlor she stood awkwardly next to a case of belt buckles while Cat argued with an enormous bald man over the price of a red belt, his head so shiny it looked like he had waxed it; and then simply staring wide-eyed as one of the people working a tie-dye shirt stand on the sidewalk offered her a plate of ganja cookies. Finally, “errands” run, the two returned to Billie’s apartment, collapsing on the couch.

“Oo, you know what would be fun?” Cat suddenly exclaimed.

“Um, what?” Felicity had become a bit wary as to Cat’s ideas of “fun.”

“Not to sound complete valley girl here––damn, I seem to be doing that a lot today––if you let me give you a makeover.”

“Beg pardon?”

“Come on, let me! It’ll be fun! You got to stop dressing like you’re nine...or like you lived several decades ago.”

“What...what do you want to do to me?” Felicity asked nervously, eyeing her. She thought Cat looked fantastic, but she wasn’t exactly sure if she could pull off blue highlights and facial piercings. That wouldn’t be fantastic on her so much as...bizarre.

Seeing her expression, Cat laughed. “Don’t worry. I’m not talking drastic or anything. I’m not going to put you in spikes and chains like you just pulled up in front of a biker bar or anything. I just want to, I don’t know, put you in a pair of jeans. Put some makeup on you. Make you uber-fabulous for your darling laddy-me-love.”

“Billie’s not my darling laddy-me-love.”

“Fine. Your makeout buddy. Same difference.” Cat just giggled at Felicity’s open-mouthed expression of horror. “Oh, don’t you dare try to talk your way out of that one! If he’s not your darling laddy-me-love, but you’re still getting...schmoozy, what would you call it? Believe me, I could have made it worse––would you have rather if I had called you ‘friends with benefits’?”

“We’re not!”

“Right.” At that, Cat picked up one of the throw pillows on the sofa and gently embraced it. “Oh, Billie Joe, kiss me, you fool!” she cried before giving it a long, impassioned kiss.

But in the middle of her pillow smooch, Cat’s eyes popped open, her gaze frozen in the direction of the doorway where Billie, Mike, and Tre had just walked in, eyebrows raised. She pulled the pillow away from her mouth, gaping at them. “Um...hi, guys.”