One Roof

Chapter 8

A notification came into my phone, causing my phone's screen to momentarily light up. I took my phone and read the message, finding Caleb's name on the top end of the message.

"Wanna play?"

I glanced at Emily, who returned to her tasks after dinner. She noticed my gaze and turned her head toward me.

"Something up?"

"A friend invited me for a game."

A multiplayer game relied on how well its players communicate, which required me to speak. If I accepted Caleb's invitation, I may be forced to speak in tense situations, giving information to my teammates. I would be disturbing Emily's work, but if I kept rejecting game invitations, then Caleb would probably be worried about me. I couldn't guarantee that by the time Christmas arrived, I would be living my normal life again, and I couldn't exactly deny him with excuses like 'a lot of tasks' when it was the holidays.

"Give me a few seconds."

Emily said as she turned back toward her book and started scribbling something.

"Are you sure?"

She didn't reply but instead closed her book and started sorting her things.

"I could do some rearranging. I hope you don't mind me staying a bit late, though. Still have some things I need to study."

She said as her hand moved from the empty space down to another space. I could see as she grabbed and let go of things, even though I couldn't see the item myself. As I saw her go and forth and then moved something to the side, I couldn't help but wonder which item counted as clothing and I could see, and which item would stay invisible even when touched.

I do feel grateful that all the clothes were visible. Both of us would die from embarrassment had it not been the case. I threw those thoughts out of my mind and returned my attention to the Fine app opened on my phone.

"Still, are you sure?"

"Don't worry. I could postpone my study session, but you can't."

"Be there in five minutes."

I typed it in and sent it to Caleb.

"Thanks, sorry for disturbing you."

"Don't worry about it, we'll both need to get used to disturbing each other. I also wanted to try this."

She held something up and brought it to my face, before quickly pulling it back.

"Sorry, I forgot. They're earphones."

She plugged them into her ears, still staying invisible. She fiddled with her phone and went to bed. She lay down and held her phone above her face. I couldn't hear what she was listening to, nor could I see the phone and earphones.

"Can you still hear me?"

She looked toward me.

"Loud and clear."

She replied. I let out a frown, realizing just how tough things would be moving forward. There was no telling how long this whole ordeal would last, that and we couldn't keep minimizing our words. We would be forced to learn to ignore the other and focus on our individual worlds. I could only hope the entire thing would be easier than I expected because I sure as hell expected a lot of confusion and misunderstanding facing our path.

I couldn't even call it my path anymore, dammit.

I opened up my game and turned on Chatcord. I hopped into our personal server and started a call with Caleb.