High

Chapter Ten-Unreasonable Doubt

Doubt.

A feeling of a lack of certainty or conviction. Doubt had been categorized as unwanted passengers, throwing nothing but unsolicited questions down your way, inevitably preventing you from reaching your destination for clarity.

Those questions don't stop until they break our wall of defense:confidence and certainity. One thing about doubt is that it's sneaky, quiet, slowly slipping into your mind from time to time to ask questions that plant a seed of doubt in the mind.

If you're sharp enough, it will be easy to nip that seed in the bud. After all, it's easier to kill something while it has barely started developing. For others, though, who can't spot it out immediately, the seed develops slowly until it's a full-blown tree. Your confidence has been its nourishment. The small whispers of doubt had been it water, and your mind, its sun.

Uprooting a tree of doubt takes so much more effort than destroying a seed. Even if you manage to uproot that tree-which does take a lot of time - the roots still linger... waiting for the opportunity to grow again once more.

"Elliot," Christopher sighed once again, rubbing his hands over his face. He let out an excerpted sigh, "You have to believe me. I had no idea that Max was gonna show up."

Silence hung in the air again, making Christopher, who was all the more anxious about my reaction or lack thereof, opened his mouth to explain further. To remove the seed of doubt in my mind. But he closed it shut again, realizing that he had nothing more to say. The only thing that he could do was hope that I believed him.

My eyes were firmly planted on the ground, tracing the simple design of my mat.

I took a deep breath in and looked at Christopher, whose eyes communicated that he was indeed waiting with baited breath. "I believe you." I said quietly, and he sputtered, "R-Really? That's it?" His tone held a twinge of doubt.

It was almost as if he couldn't believe his ears, and he had every right to doubt me feeble accepance. I wasn't known for accepting things at face value. Granted, under normal circumstances, I would've done some sort of investigation, but this wasn't under normal circumstances.

Maxwell, albeit that I haven't been in his life for years, had never been the type to step foot into a club. It wasn't his scene, and I bet that still wasn't. 

However, it would be quite convenient to deal with private matters at a place where people  would least expect it to be. In the eyes of society, he was a golden boy of some sorts. And if you were to tell someone that their golden boy was in the same vicinity of a strip club, you'd have a full-blown riot on your hands.

I nodded my head, "I meant what I said, Christopher, " My tone was solemn but was unwavering as I took a shaky breath in, "I believe you. But that doesn't mean that I won't question as to why Maxwell was there. He's the society's golden boy. So there's no way in hell  that he would step foot in a strip club. He was there for a reason, Christopher, and you might not know, but I do."

His eyebrows knit together, his eyes were wide, "You think that he went there to see you?"

"I don't think, Christopher. I know." I said, leaning back on the couch with my eyes set into stilts

A myraid of questions run rampant through my head and all of them related to why Maxwell would want to talk to me about.

"Perhaps it was a coincidence? I mean, what are the chances that you two would be at the same place and at the same time?" Christopher hypothesized, and I hummed, "Exactly, what are the odds that he would be at the exact place that I was and at the exact time?"

I thought aloud, unknowingly causing Christopher to  tense up in his chair, "Society's golden boy and his ronounced ex best friend meeting up in an inconspicuous setting to hash things out Sounds like the perfect place to meet up to me?"