Birds of Paradise

February 21st, 2009

 Birds of Paradise

February 21st, 2009

  

The car came to a halt in the familiar driveway and Elea’s brother turned to her. “You have everything?”

            She smiled, and secured the strap of her bag to her shoulder. “Yes.”

            They said their goodbyes and she walked up the steps leading to her best friend’s house.

            One week ago, Marilyn had broken up with her boyfriend of two years. A complete a-hole as Elea liked to call him. She was glad for her friend to have finally gotten the sense of getting rid of him. He made excuses for everything and did not believe in the whole “there is more pleasure in giving then receiving”. If there was one thing Elea was certain, it was that her friend deserved better.

            Of course, when the blond beauty opened the door for her, she was still in the crying stage of her break up—Elea wondered why her friend had been so held bent on still having everyone over. Wouldn’t it be wiser to keep her tears to herself?

            Still, she hugged her friend and told her everything would be alright. Just like any good friend, she followed Marilyn and listened to the entire story—though Cassandra had already called her and told her everything. Her eyes caught on a vase with flowers. “Where did you get these?”

            Marilyn wiped her eyes lazily. “Liam dropped them off. He felt bad when he heard about me and Julian. A sweetheart, isn’t he?”

            Elea nodded and looked at the bouquet. The bird of paradise stood out the most. It was a strange choice. They were peculiar flowers—Elea liked peculiar things.

            Her friend noticed it. “You like the orange ones? They’re Liam’s favourite.”

            It was such a tiny thing, a favourite flower, but Elea put away the information in a corner of her memory. Everything about that boy was safely locked in her brain.

            But then something else occurred to her. “As he already arrived?”

            “Oh no, he dropped them off the other day. He was just in the neighbourhood.”

            Elea refrained from pointing out that he lived two hours away from here and that there were really slim chances that he actually was just in the neighbourhood. He was a nice guy. This was the kind of things he’d do. It saddened her though, to know he had been around and she hadn’t seen him. She saw so little of him. She hadn’t worked up the courage to actually ask him out yet, but part of her hoped that this weekend would be the one.

            “Anyway, Julian is an idiot,” Marilyn stated, bringing Elea back to the present. “Can you believe he told me he didn’t want me to keep inviting my friends over for the weekend? Did he not understand I’m a social bird and love having all my friends around?”

“Sounds to me like he was jealous,” Elea replied absentmindedly. She was trying to guess what Liam would be wearing when he’d walk through the door and already imagining his sweet smell.

            “You bet the greedy bastard was,” Marilyn shot back as the doorbell rang.

            The two young women rushed to the door and Elea protectively stood in front to show with her face to the newcomers that Marilyn wasn’t exactly in the best psychological mindset just yet.

            Liam was the third one to walk in. He hugged her as he said his hello and Elea was already floating on cloud nine.

            But too quickly he went to comfort Marilyn too and it the shy brunette almost pouted. The weekend was just starting though, so there was no reason to wallow.

            Or was there?

            At first, Elea put it on the account that Marilyn was sad and Liam was a good friend—he was trying to be there for her and to comfort her. But as the hours went on, things were looking bad. He was almost always with her, and he seemed to constantly find reasons to touch her or hug her.

            During dinner, while she sat at the complete opposite of them, she couldn’t help but glare their way while they chatted happily and ate out of each other’s plates.

            “He should hide his happiness better. Everyone knows he was madly in love with Marilyn but not reason to throw himself at her so quickly,” Cassandra whispered to her.

            Elea dropped her fork on the table. “Excuse me,” she whispered and got up and rushed out of the restaurant.

            It was raining outside. She took her glasses off and raised her eyes to the sky, letting the tears fall on her cheeks, mixing with the rain.