Played like a Guitar

Chapter 20 : Hanging by a Thread

"There is nothing better than a friend, unless it is a friend with chocolate." - Linda Grayson

***

The scanty summer breeze did little to save us from the gigantic heat wave spreading quietly throughout the city. Sipping on my ice cold lemonade right next to an old fan on our balcony, I was supposed to be in a relaxed state of mind now that my Master's degree was completed, finally done with college and able to begin my journey as an independent adult. Except I wasn't. My motivation drained to zero, everything seemed so neutral and irrelevant, my life was slowly falling apart. Most importantly, I was clueless as to how to find a job and where to search for one. Manchester, Rome, here or somewhere else even? So many possibilities yet none interested me.

"I'm dragging you to work with me today, with a forklift if I have to! You look like someone sucked the life out of you and left you to rot in a basement for three months. Get your shit together, Noah!" Oh brother, why did I call her in the first place? Oh right, so she could bring me back from the dead. Worst decision ever.

"I don't want to." - I wined like a little baby, falling flat on my bed, too lazy to even breathe.

"It wasn't a question. C'mon, let's have a fun little makeover moment! You know what I always say, if you look good, you feel good. Now get your boring ass up, I can't be late again or else they'll fire me!" I could tell that for a second she was considering whether or not her job was even worth arriving to on time. Typical Elektra. How did she even get the position? Sure, she's into fashion and her mother's recommendation came to aid but holy cow was she disorganized.

"Can't we just sit in bed and eat ice cream all day?" - I mumbled through my greasy pillow.

"What do you think I've been doing all this time while you were gone?" Fair enough. She pulled me in for a hug, kissing me on the cheek while I was throwing a fresh oversized T-shirt over myself, since my current one was reeking for God knows how long. She was trying her best to cheer me up, feeling bad over the way our friendship ended after the first year. Especially now that I've learned what the poor soul went through recently.

Apparently it took her two years to realize she was hanging out with the wrong set of people who kept dragging her down into failure. After several alcohol-induced nights, her widowed mother found her unconscious on the floor from severe alcohol overdose. Fortunately, the ambulance arrived on time and put her on IV fluids for hydration - the reckless bastard nearly choked on her own vomit. She was sent to a rehab program against her will soon after, but continued sneaking out at night with her 'friends' nonetheless. As expected, her studies were neglected and her reputation pivoted downwards. Names like 'crackhead' and 'slut' were often used to label her in the college auditoriums. One night, however, a guy ended up in her pants, only this time she wasn't fully conscious. Total blackout. A month later, her pregnancy test was positive. He slipped off the condom during sex. Just when her mother thought things couldn't get any worse, that's when the real drama started, from the abortion to the lawsuit against the guy who sexually abused her. She won, thankfully. Justice was delivered but the damage was too severe and trauma was yet to be faced.

Something clicked in her afterwards, though, a complete behavioral change. She stopped drinking, smoking, she tried to catch up with her studies and managed to barely pass a couple of exams. Her mother found her a position as a sales assistant in a brand new shopping mall to pay for her treatments and get back on her feet. Elektra still tries to act like her old, crazy self but I could tell she had suffered a lot lately behind that fake bright smile of hers. I'm glad she adopted this new lifestyle, but the cost was too high.

"Imagine me having one of these in my room some day. I'd probably wipe my ass with it." - she joked, reading my Master's diploma glued to the wall like a Hannah Montana poster. She was still passing some exams from the second year and had an abundance of lectures to catch up to. I felt partially guilty over her setback, thinking how she might've finished her own degree if she had me by her side all these years. Similarly to how our friendship started, she was still exploiting my excelling academic skills to pass her summer exams in return for her moral support and upbeat nature. To think I barely graduated with Honors because of that worthless scumbag! Thank goodness Leo was there to encourage me to fight until the end, otherwise I would've failed the last semester. I was a mess, in dire need of an escape as everything reminded me of him. Music reminded me of his voice, paintings of his work, couples evoked thoughts about what we could've been. He was everywhere, even a thousand miles away. Like an infectious disease, inescapable.