Resignation of Bien

Vanilla Strawberry

Bien groaned as his phone vibrated on the side table. With his eyes half-closed, his hand fumbled to find the vibrating phone. Axel was calling.

"Hello?" Bien mumbled.

"It's your day off today, right?" Axel asked.

Bien made a noncommittal sound, another groan.

"Good. Come to the office today—" in the background, someone panickedly asked what Axel was doing "—the boss wants to see you. Okay? Bye!"

The call was cut off.

"What was that all about?" Bien whispered, looking at his phone screen. "He didn't even say what time."

Christian wants to see me? he thought.

His phone vibrated again, and a text notification dropped down from the screen. It was from Axel, telling him the time he needed to be there. Bien replied and got off the bed.

He opened the curtains, letting rays of sunlight flood his minimalistic room. He couldn't remember the last time he cleaned it, but it was surprisingly not messy. It wasn't exactly clean either—more like an organized mess. All his books were piled on one side, and papers were scattered, but only on his study table. Bien turned on the radio, stretched his arms, and fixed his bed.

It was a normal Saturday, but the weather looked exceptionally nice. The ambiance felt warm and cozy. Outside, the neighbors seemed unusually welcoming as they laughed and helped each other sweep the street.

Were they always like this? he wondered.

Axel called again.

"Sorry about that," Axel said, referring to the earlier interruption. "A fox stormed my cubicle. Anyway, you don't have to come to the office. Send me your location, and I'll come pick you up. We'll go scouting today."

"Scouting?"

"Explanations will come later. Send me your address; I'm on my way to the car. Okay? Bye!"

Once again, he cut off the call.

Thirty minutes passed and Bien was done preparing when his welcoming neighbors started buzzing outside on a gray sports car that was parked outside his apartment. Bien looked over his window and saw Christian in a black coat leaning by the hood of his car as though waiting for a certain damsel. Bien's neighbors were surrounding him like a pack of zombies ready to devour.

Why is he here?

Bien went down. He opened the door and as their glances met, he suddenly felt a bombardment in his chest. He already saw him from the windows, why was it so different standing before him? Christian smiled and Bien felt his face heat up.

"Are you okay?" Christian asked, moving closer to him. "You're turning red."

Bien nodded but he froze as Christian's hand touched his forehead.

"You don't seem to have a fever. Did you have your breakfast?"

Bien stuttered and couldn't complete one sentence until he shook his head and coughed. "Why are you here?" he finally asked. He realized it came out a little snappy, so he added "sir" at the end.

Christian scratched the back of his head as he tried to find something else he could focus on other than Bien's eyes.

"Umm... Axel went on ahead to the location. He asked me to pick you up."

So, you didn't come on your own... Bien shrugged. "Okay," he said. He survived one ride with him so far, how bad could it be?

It was bad. It was agonizing. It was nothing but silence—an hour-long silence stuck in traffic, Bien wanted to smash his head into the window. How did it come to this? Christian used to talk a lot, it wasn't a problem, the problem before was making him stop talking. But maybe it was for the best. What would they talk about? The confession seven years ago?