I'll See You When I Fall Asleep

Chapter 3

The handle to the apartment door jiggled and a key unsuccessfully turned in the lock. After several frustrating jiggles, Savannah swung the door open, snapping Cammie out of her trance. The girl seemed to jump ten feet into the air. Savannah took one look at Cammie and frowned, noting the book in her friend's hand. She snatched it from Cammie and threw it across their apartment.

"The final is over, Cam. Put your books away."

"I know, I was just—"

"You need to relax; the test is over. Nothing you can do now."

Cammie's obssessive nature knew no boundaries and crossed all borders into all facets of her life. One obsession that took up a majority of her time was worrying how she performed on exams or papers until the moment they were returned to her hands. This included days of flipping through notebooks smeared with highlighter and inky notes crowding the margins every few hours and checking her answers to the questions on the test that faded from memory with each glance at the notebook. Savannah never could figure out why this girl worried herself sick because she always received perfects marks on her assignments. And when she didn't, well, Savannah made sure to make herself scarce and pray—although never having been to a single day of church in her life—for the unfortunate soul who thought that Cammie should not have a perfect score. After what Savannah referred to as The 99 Incident, she never wanted to be around Cammie when she discovered her grades again.

Cammie entered the apartment and made her way to the grab the notebook, but Savannah barred her way. In a battle of wits, Cammie was surely superior to her friend; in a battle of brawn—and perhaps stubbornness—Savannah had a four-inch advantage and the mind of a bull that gave her an unequal advantage over her friend. Savannah had also played lacrosse in high school, which gave her a bit more upper body strength than Cammie, proven over and over again whenever Savannah wanted to force Cammie into doing something, or in this case, prevent her from retrieving her notebook and checking her answers.

"Can't I just check if—"

"No."

Cammie sighed and chose her normal plan of action against Savannah: give up until Savannah was distracted, then strike. Cammie was much more patient than Savannah at least.

"We are officially on winter break and we don't have to worry about anything! Stop worrying about your test, you've got much bigger things on your plate."

With a shake of the head and an eye roll, Cammie dismissed Savannah's statement. She was not going to engage with her about the Dream. The two seemed to be at odds over the results of it, Savannah hoping dearly that her friend would had some spice to her life. Cammie refused to engage.

Cammie gave one last, nervous glance at her notebook and decided that it was probably a good idea to let it go.

"Are you getting nervous?" Savannah pressed.

"No, I'm not. There's no reason to."

Savannah hummed, her eyebrows doing a small jump up and down her forehead. It was as if her eyebrow jumps had their own language, much like Morse Code. But instead of dots and lines, her eyebrows used used jumps and furrows. This particular eyebrow movement roughly translated to: Yeah, okay, sure, Cammie. You can think whatever you want, but you know I'm right.

"Stop trying to spice up my life, Sav."

"Oh, c'mon, Cam. If you were a spice, you'd be salt. You need to add some paprika or oregano to your life!"

"Are you back on this whole 'What if you don't dream of Adam' thing?"

"Of course I am! Cam, listen!"

Cammie groaned loudly, hoping she would be able to drown out Savannah's rant; she had no such luck.

"How exciting would it be to have a new boyfriend? Someone you had to search for and then that spark would fly. You know the one? When you meet someone new and every touch sets your skin on fire and your heart is pounding and skips a beat whenever you see their name appear on your phone? And then there's the first kiss!"

Cammie was listening to Savannah with a blank expression on her face, resigning herself to endure the lecture until it was over. She most definitely did want to be oregano.

"No, Savannah. I am perfectly happy with my boyfriend. I love him very much."

Savannah muttered something sounding like the word "boring" under her breath, but Cammie pretended not to hear, shielded from another "boring" assault by her new tattoo.

"When are you finished with your final?" Cammie asked instead.

"It's from six to eight. So I'll probably be home at six-thirty. What time will Adam be here?"

Cammie glanced at her watch. "His flight lands in an hour. So I'll go get him in a bit."

"I'll see you in a bit then. Get ready to party!"

Cammie sighed with a grin on her face. After their last final each semester, Savannah somehow found a raging party somewhere around campus to forget about the stresses of the week, as she so eloquently put it.

Pulling through the terminal, Cammie scanned the crowd searching for her boyfriend. She soon spotted his mess of blond curls in the crowd and forced her way through traffic to pull off near Adam. She popped out of the car and greeted him with a kiss.

"Thanks for braving that LAX traffic for me; true love," he said.

Cammie laughed. They both knew Cammie wasn't the best driver and was incredibly tense and nervous while driving busy streets. That meant in LA, where crowded streets were just as common as sunshine in Southern California, Cammie was always tense. She much preferred to bike everywhere.

"How was your flight?" Cammie asked, slipping into the passenger seat. Adam agreed to drive the two back to their small neighborhood in the suburbs. Mostly, Adam insisted that he drive because Cammie could develope quite the road rage, especially in traffic.

"Quick, as always. I was just reading." Adam quickly delved into an explanation of his book, the characters, the plot, what he loved about it, it's flaws. Cammie enjoyed listening to Adam tell her about his books. She loved to read, but she found that she rarely had time between her classes, studying for the LSAT, and her extracurricular activities. She felt that she read through Adam when he told her everything that happened in his book. She often felt that Adam told the story of the book better than the author did themselves. The way his eyes lit up as he described each scene and his carefully chosen words enchanted Cammie.

Adam had dreams of becoming a published author. He was majoring in Communications and Journalism at UC Davis. He mostly worked on sports broadcasting and writing, but he loved to flex his creative muscle at the end of each day. He had been working on a story about a time traveler the last time they spoke. When he read novels, he used everything from what he was reading to make his own stories better.

"It sounds like it's getting really good," Cammie commented, a bit jealous that she had to hear about this book secondhand. She told herself that she was going to read more over the winter break, even if that meant putting down her LSAT study book for an hour each day.

"Hey, I missed you." Cammie said. She gave Adam another kiss.

"I missed you too. I'm so happy to be home."

*

When Cammie and Savannah were juniors in high school, Savannah pointed Cammie toward the love of her life. (If you asked Savannah the story, she'd tell it differently. But this isn't her story.) This is how it happened, roughly: Lake View was a small town in Southern California, so small that people drove near it and through it and around it without ever knowing it was there. Due to its inexplicable invisibility, there were rarely new faces in the grocery stores, at the parks, and especially in the schools. So, on a September day, when a tallish, handsomeish new boy set foot on the campus of Temescal Canyon High School, more than a few students (and teachers) thought about checking themselves for heat stroke. Ultimately, it was proven the the new boy in school was not a mirage, but a real boy, who went by the name of Adam Silverstein. When he said that his family had just moved from Philadelphia, everybody assumed it must have been on accident.

"Who would move to Lake View?" Each student asked each other. The residents of Lake View did not move into the city; rather, they ended up there, for whatever reason. Most of the students at the school had been born there, as had their parents, and their parents' parents.

For this reason, Adam was a school mystery for about a month. Everyone was curious about him, of course. There isn't much excitement in the day-to-day monotony of high school, except for perhaps what was being served in the cafeteria. Now, there was a new boy, who moved into town on purpose. It gave the student body something to focus on for a while, instead of their teenage angst.

Adam Silverstein didn't say much — in class or out — but he would always hang around the school after the last bell of the day had sounded. Most students thought this was strange—who you would want to stay at school any longer than they had to, especially Temescal Canyon, that wasn't particularly nice, or new, or interesting. In fact, it was the second oldest school in the town, and there were probably an infinite amount of Health Code and Building violations on the grounds. Yet, he'd saunter toward the sport's field, check out the ceramic teacher's workshop, wander through the administration office, chatting up the school officials, peruse through the library shelves, and chat with the coaches. Eventually, though, he found his favorite spot on the entire campus: the press box at the school's football field, which doubled as its soccer field.

Adam enjoyed this spot first and foremost because he felt like her could observe the organs of the school from his perch above campus. Up there, students would not stare at him, and he was free to watch the others unnoticed. It was also a quiet spot to catch up on reading. Adam devoured books, especially because he was the New Kid. The New Kid generally did not have many friends so Adam generally had a lot of extra time to read.

Not too long after he began sitting in the press box, football practice started. Adam loved watching the game, but never cared for playing. His love for sports was baseball. He had always been fascinated with Sportscasting and played with the idea of having a career in it. Once he thought that maybe he could do this, he decided to seek out the football coach and ask him if needed any help announcing games. The coach, of course, shot him down, not needing to be bothered by another wannabe.

Adam was never much bothered by anything, so he took the reply with a grain of salt and returned to his perch. He couldn't help but still run play-by-plays though; he had quite the imagintion and imagined himself in a huge stadium crowded by screaming fans with their faces painted. Adam had no idea that the button on the microphone actually worked. One day, the football coaches picked up on a hardly-audible mumbling from overhead, and, upon inspection, discovered that Adam was practicing his play-by-play announcing as the team ran its drills. This eventually led to a full-time announcing gig with the team, but the real reason behind Adam's affinity for the press box was the event that immediately followed football practice, which began a few months after the school year had began. As soon as the lumbering, sweaty players jogged away from the field, they were replaced by twenty of the fiercest, most athletic girls in the whole school. If the district rules allowed, each of them could have taken a boy's spot on the football team.

Adam's instinct to announce was overwhelmed by his captivation. The way the girls zigzagged, passed, and scored mesmerized him. Football was so little action and so much analysis; soccer was fluid, gorgeous. He looked on in awe as the team practiced their penalty kicks, their offensive plays, and their passing drills. Cammie and Savannah were there too, of course — Cammie had become a league-best goalkeeper since her glory days of youth soccer, and Savannah, who never quite discovered a personal love for the game, always found her way into the stands to support her best friend—and also wait for her ride home. During breaks, Cammie would sprint over to Savannah who was perched on the aluminum bleachers.

"You see who's decided to become the team's number one fan?" Savannah asked, gesturing with her head in the direction of the press box. Cammie actually hadn't noticed, and shook her head. "Isn't that the football announcer?"

"I think I'm going to go talk to him while you guys are finishing up," she said, a devilish look in her eye. Cammie rolled her eyes. Savannah had a bit of a reputation around campus. Not that she was promiscuous, but she did like to have a little fun with the students at the high school, girls included.

Cammie couldn't be bothered with Savannah's newest schemes, trying to down as much water as possible before the next whistle blew. She had just witnessed Savannah play with a poor boy's heart for the last few weeks. But per her loyalty to the Best Friend Code, she was always on supported her friend (perhaps with a few disapproving frowns every now and again).

"Be careful," Cammie warned. "He's cute, but don't you think he's a little... I don't know... creepy? Or at least a little strange?"

"I stopped listening at 'he's cute,'" Savannah said. "You've got that right."

"Who just sits up in the bleachers and watches practices?"

Savannah shrugged, unintereted in the finer details as to why Adam continued to sit in the announcer's box after football practice.

"Whatever," Cammie said, glancing over her shoulder at the rest of her team congregating on the sideline. She glanced up at the boy who appeared from across the country, hovering above the stadium from the announcement box for the last two weeks. She wasn't quite sure what to think of him.

When the whistle blew, Savannah bolted up the bleachers toward the press box as Cammie rejoined her team. For the rest of the practice, Savannah tried to engage Adam, but all he cared about was the action on the field. Trying to find common ground, she started to talk about Cammie, and how they'd been friends for years, and how she once tried playing soccer but hated it, and how Cammie was the best of the best and she was always a little jealous of her athleticism—although she was quite good at tennis, but probably because she played doubles with Cammie.

While Savannah's intentions were good (and selfish), her execution backfired: from that point onward, Adam's focus lay squarely on Cammie, and her exceptional prowess in net. How her legs exploded as she dove to stop a shot; how her long, blonde hair flopped around in its ponytail as she ran to get ready for a full-field punt.

The rest, to Savannah's chagrin, was history. Although she will always claim it was all a part of her mastermind plan to get Cammie a boyfriend. She would never admit defeat. Savannah never imagined, however, that their relationship would stay so strong that they would be together four years later.

Savannah was happy that Cammie was dating someone. Before Adam, there had been no one; Cammie had not seen a point in dating someone when it could end the night of their twenty-first birthday. Cammie also claimed that she didn't have time for a boyfriend, between class and soccer. But somehow, Adam had wooed her and kept her happy for four years.

Much to Savannah's annoyance, she knew the two of them were a good couple, happy even. Savannah had thought that introducing Cammie to Adam would be a fun little high school fling for her friend. Savannah was not even sure that Cammie had ever developed a crush on anyone. Savannah was a serial dater, despite Cammie's constant protesting. They came from two very different school of thoughts: Cammie did not see the point in dating, especially since there was no point when you were guarenteed to know who your Soulmate was at twenty-one. Wasn't the point of dating to figure out if someone was marriage material? Savannah did not share this sentiment. Savannah figured that if she was guarenteed to know who her Soulmate was at twenty-one, why not have fun in the mean time?

But Savannah's plan for Cammie to "have fun" completely backfired now that the two had been inseparable for four years. Savannah tried to love the two of them as couple (and for the first year or so, she did) but for whatever reason, Savannah could not see the two of them together. She had no idea how to explain this to Cammie. It was a gut instinct, something Savannah thought to be sacred. Cammie had no such feelings about the gut; if it made sense on paper, in her head, then she would do it, as long as her pros on her Pro-Con list outweighed the cons. She thought the whole "gut thing" was bologna. Despite the pros of Adam far outweighing the cons (Savannah had seen Cammie's list and had even made her own when this gut feeling first bloomed), her friend was happy. Why should she ruin it by telling her she didn't think Adam was right for her? And all she had to go off was this gut feeling, nothing scientific that would satisfy her friend.

Savannah's only hope for Cammie now lay in the Dream; she desperately hoped that Cammie would see someone else. Cammie needed someone different from Adam, someone more adventurous, someone who would challenge her and push her out of her comfort zone. Adam was too kind, too comfortable, too compliant. Adam was too easy; Cammie needed a challenge.

*

When Savannah returned home, she immediately pulled Cammie into the bathroom with her while they got ready for the night. Cammie didn't much care about how she looked, but Savannah dressed herself up to the Nines, hoping to go home with some lucky fool, as she called them. She always called the people she slept with "fools" for falling in love.

Meanwhile, Adam changed his shirt to a button-down and ran his fingers through his hair, calling it good. He sat on the couch reading.

"Does he ever stop reading?" Savannah asked, poking her head out of the bathroom.

Cammie laughed.

After what felt like hours, Savannah finally declared themselves ready and they headed out to conquer the night.

The three of them made their way downtown to find a place to hang out for the evening. Savannah was chatting Adam's ear off, babbling mostly about her semester and Cammie's (and complaining about how difficult it was to live with Cammie through finals week--thought of course she was being dramatic, made obvious by her wink and nudge at Cammie).

"Are you excited for Monday?" Savannah asked. She had this horrible talent of bringing up exactly what made everyone uncomfortable.

"Savannah has been bugging me about my Dream for the last month," Cammie answered instead. "Just ignore her."

Adam smiled good naturedly. He was used to Savannah's teasing. He put an arm around Cammie.

"I'm very excited."

Savannah gagged. "Yuck. You two are disgusting."

Cammie laughed, giving Adam a comically loud kiss on his cheek. "Don't worry Sav, maybe Mister Dream will be at the party tonight."

"I wouldn't mind waiting a little longer for Mister Dream." Savannah was eyeing a tall boy from across the room. "I'll catch up with you guys soon." Savannah made her way across the small house, grabbing a drink along the way, her prey in sight.

"I have no idea how Savannah does that," Adam said.

Cammie shrugged. "I don't either. That girl does whatever she feels like."

Adam grabbed Cammie's hand. "I couldn't imagine trying to serial date—or whatever it is that she does—when I have you."

The two made their way through the house and found a table piled full of drinks. They each grabbed one. Cammie nursed hers, but Adam drained his bottle easily. Cammie noticed, but declined to comment. The two mingled, drank, played a few games here and there. These types of events were much more Adam and Savannah's pace than hers. She oblidged in going, to appease them, but it was never her first choice. Both of of them were extroverts and craved this type of interaction. Adam, who knew not a soul at this party beside the two girls he attended with struck up a conversation with a group of people. Before long, he was completely absorbed and forgot all about Cammie.

It didn't much bother her at first, because she would much rather observe, people watch, and nurse a beer that tended to last her all night. Adam, however, tended to forget about her completely, absored in a conversation with strangers. He would check in on Cammie every now and then to make sure it was okay for him to keep talking. Cammie would never tell him that she felt excluded or uncomfortable.

She continued to stare around the room, watching the people. Most seemed to be out of it. There were a few people who looked bored, a few who were deeply entangled in another's mouth—including Savannah—and a few that were chatting, nursing drinks. As she scanned the faces, she noticed a girl across the room who made eye contact with her. She quickly looked away, embarassed by the unspoken "never make eye contact with a stranger on accident rule." After a moment, she stole another glance to find the girl still staring. She was too far away to make out any features, but she seemed to be staring at her as if she had seen her face somewhere before but could not quite place her finger on it.

Cammie looked away, trying to absorb herself in the conversation Adam was having. Something about baseball. Nothing Cammie was particularly interested in.

Before long, she had realized her drink was empty. Nervous habit of figting when she was anxious. The fidgeting became tipping her bottle into her mouth. She excused herself and slid through the maze of bodies and rooms in the house to find another drink. She found another bottle of beer that was to her liking and realized she could not find a bottle opener. She searched all over the counters but found nothing.

"Need a bottle opener?"

Cammie turned to find the girl that was staring at her earlier offering her an old bottle opener. It seemed to once be red, but the paint was chipping and metal piece used to brace against the caps was chipped away and worn from what seemed to be years of use.

"Thanks." Cammie gratefully accepted and cracked open the bottle.

The girl made no attempt to leave and Cammie felt obligated to stick around. The girl had offered a bottle opener when she needed one. She owed at least some small talk. That was the social exchange rate. She took a much larger sip of her drink than she had intended.

"All done with your finals?" she asked.

"Yeah, I mean, that's why we're all here, right?"

The girl laughed.

"I suppose."

Before the conversation could go much further, Savannah seemed to materialize from thin air.

"Hey who's this?" she asked.

The girl offered her hand and introducted herself to Savannah.

"You're really hot." Savannah said. Cammie almost choked on her drink, Savannah's brazeness never ceasing to amaze her.

"I think this might be my queue to leave." Cammie said. "Thank you for the bottle opener." Cammie excused herself, slipping away from what was sure to be another intense make-out session featuring her best friend.

She joined Adam again, who seemed to be waiting for her to return. "Who was that?"

"Who?"

Adam pointed to the girl Savannah was now engaged in coversation with. Cammie shrugged. "She opened my beer for me."

Adam scoffed.

"What?"

"She was just opening your bottle for you?"

Cammie rolled her eyes, exasperated. "Are you serious, Adam? That was a girl."

"Did you see the way she was looking at you?"

"Jesus, Adam. Why are you so fucking jealous all the time?" After a particularly long week with little sleep and a second bottle of alcohol, Cammie found herself unable to push away the fight that was brewing.

"Cam, c'mon! You'd have to be blind not to see that she was drooling all over you."

"Adam, stop." Cammie commanded.

He scowled.

"Maybe when I finally have my Dream you'll drop this whole jealousy thing."

Adam's retort died on his lips.

Savannah returned. "Swing and a miss," she announced.

"Not interested?" Cammie asked.

"Not at all." Savannah smirked. "But she did seem pretty interested in you." Savannah looked at Cammie.

Cammie could feel Adam's anger from her side.

"People are allowed to be attracted to me. And to you for that matter." Cammie shot at Adam.

Savannah realized her mistake and decided that it was time to pull Cammie away. "We're going to go get more drinks."

As soon as the girls were out of earshot, Savannah began to talk. "He's still jealous?"

"Yeah and I have no idea why."

Savannah put an arm around her friend's shoulder.

"It's okay. It'll all be better on Monday."

"Hopefully," Savannah muttered under her breath, barely audible.

*

Thanks for reading!