Madness In Literature

Three

Back in her dorm, Mel picked up her phone and dialled her best friend. Emily picked up on the third ring, panting as though she had picked up her phone in the middle of an exercise..

“What? What? What?”

“Are you running?” Mel asked with a frown. “Why do you sound so breathless?”

“The – bus. Ugh, fuck, wait –”

There was a clatter as something dropped and Emily swore again. Mel waited patiently as she spoke to someone else on the other side of the line, followed by more rustling sounds and a definite thud.

“Sorry,” Emily apologized as she came back on the line. “I was running for the bus just now because I’m late for a meeting with my Renaissance Arts lecturer. But now I’m seated, so speak.”

Emily was an art major – the kind of absentminded person who constantly forgot things and events, and was always searching for something in her bag or house or car.

“What happened to your car?” Mel asked.

“I couldn’t find the keys. Anyway what’s up?”

“Nothing much,” Mel replied, hesitating. “What are you doing Friday night?”

“Friday night…hold on, I need to check…wait, are you asking me out on a date?”

“No, Em.”

“Cos, you know, I’m totally open minded when it comes to that kind of thing, but I just think it would make our relationship dynamics weird, actually –”

“Just tell me if you’re free,” Mel said, fighting the urge to roll her eyes.

“Alright, alright, Ms. Prissypants. I was just joking. Friday…I was supposed to buy art supplies, but I could always postpone that. I mean, how sad is that anyway, spending your Friday night deciding if a filbert or a mop is better for your crappy B-grade artwork?”

“Your work is not B-grade, it’s amazing,” Mel replied automatically.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m the next van Gogh, bleh, whatever. You’re just saying that because you’re my best friend.” Mel wasn’t, but even if she told her that, Emily wouldn’t believe her. After half a heartbeat, Emily added, “You do realise van Gogh cut off his own ear to gift to his sweetheart as a declaration of his love, right?”

“No, I didn’t know that. But now I do. So which of your ears are you planning to gift me?”

“Haha, very funny, Mel. Your sense of humour is just deafening. Get it? Deafening, because of –”

“Got it, Em. I got it.”

“Good. So what are we doing this Friday night? Or more importantly, who are we doing?” she crackled at her own joke. Mel groaned.  

“Nothing. No one. It’s just…there’s a bar I wanted to check out. It’s called The Hodge. Have you been?”

“The one by the bay?” Mel could almost see Emily wrinkling her forehead in a frown as she thought about it.

“Yeah.”

 “Yeah, I’ve been there a few times with Kenny.” Kenny was Emily’s gay roommate. “Why the sudden interest in bars? Has the all-great, super resistant to the distractions and trappings of college life Melissa finally fallen prey to the desire to get pissed drunk and dry hump a chair?”

“I would never dry hump a chair,” Mel said in reply. She wouldn’t. She didn’t know where Emily got these ideas.

“That’s what she said. Until she did three shots of tequila for the first time and found herself rubbing up to a wooden armrest,” Emily said solemnly. “It was a life changing experience.”