Not So Hot Girls Summer

9

We swarmed through the hospital door led by Mike, like a herd of uncontrollable beasts. In the waiting room we found Amelie, curled into a small, plastic seat in the corner. Frankie ran straight up to her, hurling her arms around her in comfort- ironic seeing as only hours before she wasn't concerned for her at all.
''What happened?'' Frankie asked, before I even had the chance to ask her how she was doing.
Amelie began to spill out a frenzy of words as she tried to piece together the accident whilst for once, Frankie listened attentively. As she did, I watched her cling tighter and tighter onto Caleb's arm, as she would have in anticipation for the climax of a horror film. As she listened, she instantaneously combust into tears.

Both me and Amelie shot a look of confusion and annoyance at each other.
''How is he?'' asked Josh, thankfully deterring the attention away from Frankie. I was beginning to see what Amelie had been trying to get away from.

Amelie didn't know. She hadn't seen him. She had been left here for over four hours, waiting alone to find out the damage of the accident.

Mike placed himself next to her and stretched his arm around her shoulders. They both looked as lost at each other, overwrought with pain, but unlike Frankie, withheld their emotion from the rest of the group.

I remained silent and useless as I had from the beginning.

Between aimlessly glancing at my phone and the floor, I caught glimpses of Mike and Amelie comforting each other. Although he no longer held onto her, the words they spoke between themselves appeared to have stopped the few tears that Amelie unwillingly released. Even Mike briefly broke the look of anguish that masked his face with a small smile.

They continued to talk.

Another hour passed until a doctor finally approached the group and Amelie was asked to see Jordan. Mike looked slightly lost at his request, for he was Jordan's best friend, then again, none of us knew Jordan's and Amelie's relationship status anymore, but it was becoming more and more apparent that they were more than just friends. She climbed out of her seat and proceeded down the corridor, only looking behind herself once as if for one last moment of comfort from Mike. But instead of receiving a look of reassurance, she captured the look of fear and despair on his face. In that exact moment, I watched as her emotions immediately changed. Not to fear, but to a brave smile- a façade in order to now reassure Mike.
''Don't worry. I'm sure you'll be following on as soon as I tell him you're here,'' she smiled.
We had all failed to forget that Jordan didn't even realise we was on mainland Bali yet.
Mike altered his gaze and smiled in return- his first real smile of the day.

With Amelie temporarily gone, and the rest of the group scattered across the waiting room, I found my opportunity to take Amelie's place in my own attempt of comforting.
''I bet Jordan will be relieved when he realises you're here,'' I said.
''Maybe. That's if he is awake.''
''I'm sure he is otherwise they probably wouldn't have allowed Amelie in.''
Mike had a point. Whilst I wanted to believe myself, I didn't know how true it was. The worst hadn't even crossed my mind. It never did. What if the injuries he had sustained were life threatening? What would I do then? How would I help Mike?

Instead of stammering our way through a conversation, we remained for the next thirty minutes scrolling our phones in silence, only interjected with the muffles of conversation from Josh and James. I didn't know who I had become, but I certainly wasn't the confident Mads that I used to be, especially when around Mike.

Whilst I was the first to sigh in relief when Amelie returned, firstly as it broke the cycle of overthinking circulating my head and secondly because it broke the silence, it was hard to react as I could not read her expression. She was neither relieved nor upset, just blank.
''Mike, Jordan would like to see you,'' she whimpered under a heavy breath.
That's when I heard it. The sadness in her voice which quickly triggered the fear in her eyes. She was about to implode with emotion. Maybe things weren't looking good. Maybe now was the time to start worrying.

She barely returned for more than a minute when she disappeared again down the corridor, quickly ejecting herself from her seat before making her way into the toilets- her place of solitude. Naturally, I followed, eyeing Frankie to follow behind me. She understood the sign.
''Amelie,'' I loudly whispered through the cubicle doors.
She didn't answer. But I wasn't going to leave after the first attempt like Frankie had nudged me to do.
''Amelie.''
After another five seconds of silence, she made herself heard.
''I'm in the end one,'' she eventually replied through a snottted muffle.
She slid the locked bolt with a crack and slowly opened the door to reveal our faces behind it. Her eyes were red with dampened tears, and her cheeks flustered where she had quite obviously rubbed against them to remove all evidence of emotional weakness.
I wanted to hug her like the old times, but knew, just like I knew with Mike, I couldn't.
''Are you ok?'' I asked.

''I'm ok,'' she replied.
She wasn't I knew she wasn't, but she clearly didn't want to talk about it.
''Ok. Well, if you need to talk, we're here,'' I replied, allowing her the opportunity to release whatever anger and upset had been building inside of her.
But seeing as she didn't want to talk, and I was in no position to encourage her to, it seemed a reasonable time to return her notepad.
''You left something behind when you left,'' I said, retrieving the notepad from my bag.
Her face instantly dropped in horror when she realised what it was; clearly out of fear for the things we had read about ourselves. That wasn't my intention.
''Thank you, did you read it?'' she asked, the nerves now evident in her voice.
''Yeah. Some.'' Frankie replied, unable to control herself.
Although I wanted to return the book, now was not the time to start speaking about the content, especially with Frankie.
''We're sorry,'' I said.
Frankie looked at me with a look of confusion.
''We didn't realise you felt like that. I knew that me and Frankie were more on the same wavelength (with some things), but we didn't realise that you felt so lonely all the time, nor were you struggling so often. You could have spoken to us Ame. We're not horrible people,'' I continued.
Although Frankie was confused at my apology, it seemed only right to. I had no intention of making her feel so secluded, nor did I realise it was happening, but I felt hideous that I had.
This was our Hot Girls Summer. Mine, Frankie's and Amelie's. The three of us.

Her face continued to melt in embarrassment and upset. It wasn't my intention at all.
''If it makes you feel better, I'm also going to remove myself from the adult site...I will be keeping the sugar daddy's though- they're hard to find. Maybe you can add that to the new chapter of your notepad,'' I laughed trying to lighten the tone.
I didn't know how much of that was true. I loved the money I was earning, and it was already too late for me and Mike, so there seemed no point in stopping now. But it seemed like something she would have wanted to hear having read how she felt about my career choice.

She smiled back. The same smile she gave to Mike as she left the waiting room earlier.
''Sorry about the timing as well, we know it isn't ideal with what's going on, but we wanted to return it in case you needed it to get those 'quirky thoughts' as you call them down. Anyway, once we know Jordan's ok, we're going to head back to Gili to collect our things then come back to Uluwata for a couple of days. You're welcome to join us if you like,'' Frankie added.
Wow. That was the kindest thing I had heard Frankie say in months. I didn't know she still had it in her at this point. Maybe she did feel emotion.

''Thank you. But I'm going to stick with Jordan. I don't think I have quite as much party soul in me as the both of you two,'' she laughed.
Again, an expected response from Amelie, but also completely understandable. I did want to tell her of our plans not to party, but instead, to go to the monkey temples and rice fields and the fact that she was actually the one to inspire me to do it, but at the same time, I knew she didn't want to leave Jordan. She had planned to finish her own journey with him, so that's what I wanted to allow her to do without putting her under any pressure.

''Well stay safe. Maybe we will see you when we're back home,'' I said, desperate that we would all be able to rekindle some kind of friendship.
''Definitely,'' she replied.
It sounded sincere.

We left the restroom for Amelie to sort herself out and returned to the waiting room. Mike had also returned looking calmer and more relaxed than before.

''How is he?' I asked, now feeling confident that the answer would be positive.
''He will be fine,'' he smiled. ''Very lucky mind you.''
I placed my hand onto his arm and squeezed it before signing to Frankie to leave. We knew Jordan was going to be ok, which meant Mike and Amelie were also going to be ok. I had nothing left to worry about, but also nothing left to stick around for.
It was our time to leave and get the show back on the road, even if I did just want to go home.