Episode1-Part2

Parisian lights, flickering. My 18 year old self marveled at the world's most romantic city's picturesque view from my hotel room. But the spell was broken when I looked on the pavement below...A girl and a guy kissing...torridly. I wanted to scream at them, to tear them apart from each other. But the voice that resounded was not mine.

"Fire!"
I shot up from the bunk bed, my senses in red alert.
"Where?"
When I was finally able to focus, an unmistakable musical laughter got me confused.
"In your head! God, Jitka. You look fried. I thought you said your new crib is a dream house. Judging by the condition of you eye-bags, you could audition for the new vampire movie. Have you been sleeping at all?" Jam said.
"Tried. Unsuccessfully though. My housemates..." I couldn't find the right words to describe them.
"What did they do?"
I dunno where to start telling her.
To be fair, I slept for a few good hours on my first night even though my stuff were scattered all over the room. Just when I was drifting into the deepest annals of dreaming, I heard a horrendous booming sound so loud that I thought someone was blowing into my ears. I ejected from my bed, bolted out the door and searched for the source of the noise. Incidentally, I wasn’t the only one whose repose was disturbed.

"I swear to you, I'm gonna whack your door to oblivion if you don't stop hammering at your stupid drums!" a disheveled girl was yelling at a guy standing at his door frame.
"Its called music...I'm trying to finish a song,Cynth. Can't we wrap up this discussion for tomorrow?" the guy said. He himself looked so haggard.
"We'll I'm trying to sleep. And so is the rest of this house." the girl retorted.
"Yeah, Mike. I have a photoshoot tomorrow. I badly need sleep. Tone down the volume, will you?" Issa interjected. She then shut her door.
"I just came out to witness you fight, so don't mind me." Blessed yawned hugely and then he grinned.
"Listen, Mr. Gage! I have a musical tomorrow afternoon and my director will kill me if I don't hit those damn high notes. So, if I can't get a decent sleep tonight, I'm gonna come to your room and I'll murder you in your bed!" the girl Cynthia threatened.
"Or you can sleep with me if you want. My bed is big enough for both of us." the guy taunted.
"Right on, Mike!" Blessed commented..
"When hell freezes over! Now, if you have one single brain cell in that cracked skull of yours, you are gonna do as I say. I'm not asking, I'm telling." Cynthia then slammed her door with reverberating force.
"I think she likes me." Mike remarked.
"Dude, she whacked her door because of you." I couldn't help but state the obvious.
"Exactly. She spends so much energy on me. You know, the way she's always yelling at my face like that." Mike actually looked calculating.
"So passionate. I think she's dying to kiss you, Mike." Blessed egged on.
"If you say so..." I said.
"Hmm.. You're the new Lady in the house, right?"
"Yeah. Dr. Jitka Evans. I'm also your next door neighbor whose ears you're trying to destroy."
"Nice. I mean meeting you, not destroying your ears." he clarified. " I would wanna stay and chat but as I've said, I'm kinda busy. I promise I'll keep it on low decibels. Goodnight, fellas." And then Mike went back inside his room.
"I hope he tries really hard. I have surgery by 7 am."
"You can always doze off while you're pretending to hold a scalpel or suctioning blood, you know."
"Sure. If I wanna kill my patient."
Blessed shrugged his shoulder. Just then, Ember emerged from her room. She stretched her arms upward and gave out a huge yawn.
"Oh, we're you actually sleeping?" Blessed said to Ember, sounding sarcastic.
"Yeah. That was my longest snooze in 10 years. Record breaking 5 hours! Can you believe that?." she waved 5 fingers in one hand at blessed.
"You're an alien. You and the rest of the extraterrestrials in the kitchen are nutters." Blessed said, shaking his head.
"FYI Bless, we're in NYC, the city that doesn't sleep. So jump on the bandwagon, why don't you?" Ember retorted.
"In that case, I resent being a Newyorker.I'm Texan. And I'm gonna go back to my cozy bed. Ciao, girls." And on that note, he disappeared behind the door.
"Seems like Mike pulled you out of dreamland, too. Wanna ride my spaceship so we can traverse to another galaxy?" Ember turned to me.
"Huh?" She grabbed me by the hand.

"The kitchen transforms to a different dimension during the wee hours of the night. Hiya, Capt Kirk, Darth Vaders, Amidala and the rest of the army..." Ember announced when we reached the dinning hall.
"Hullow, obi-one.." June waved her hand, her eyes not leaving her laptop.
"C'mon kids, where are your manners? We've got a visitor.."
"Manners? What's that?" Rob quipped.
"Something your mom never taught you, Rob." June answered. "Anyways, welcome to the -allnighters- Jit."
"Thank you." I took my seat. "So, are you guys like a covert team for operation dessert storm part 2?"
Ember sat opposite me.
"Not exactly. But close enough." Rob relied. "We're trying to rebuild NASA's mainframe computer and reformat the hypertext transfer protocol."
"Speak English please." I begged Rob.
"HAHA! We're the nocturnal animals in this house. The hours of the day are not enough for our business so we extend 'em. Take for example June here. She's trying to remap the whole Manhattan, I think."
"Don't listen to rob. I'm just scribbling stick drawings. Feasibility study presentation's tomorrow so gotta hustle up." June explained, smiling and finally darting shortstop her gaze at me.
"Ole ala carte Caffeine...who wanna grab?" a guy declared. He had a tray full of steaming mugs of coffee.
Those left around the table except me raised his hand.
"Black's mine." Mel said with authority. The guy passed it on to him. The rest was picked up by each of them.
"Please Cliff, don't hand me Mel's again. I feel like my mouth was anesthetized with bitterness last time." Ember complained.
"I'm really sorry about that." Cliff apologized, grinning.
"You should. I had to rewrite my whole strategy for the Bradford case coz Ember spluttered my scratch paper with coffee and saliva mixture. I gave up 40 hours of sleep for it."
"Your extradition case? Thanks to you, my girlfriend finally uttered a swearword once in her life. She called you a goddamn spiteful shark for even defending Bradford in court." Cyrus said.
"Something finally made your Mother Theresa girlfriend tic? That's one point for my JERK moments score. Go tell Rhea. She keeps tab of it." Mel suggested.
"Their department was extremely disappointed. They were hoping to finally nail that bastard. The numbers of his nuclear power plant leak related diseases is steadily climbing. Even the Malaysian government is helping to win the case." Cyrus explained.
Mel's smile was thin. "You can tell Alvey I never really liked Bradford. He was an ass. But I'm his lawyer. I just did my thing." Mel closed the discussion.
"So you don't care how many people suffer from radiation cancer, mutation and God knows how many other toxins as long as you win a highly publicized case to prove your caliber as a lawyer?" I challenged Mel. There was an uncomfortable silence hovering over the crowd.
Mel drank his coffee empty before he turned to me. "That's exactly why women barely survive the court. They wear their emotions on their heads like a hat and place logic inside their Gucci bags. If you can win me over through reason and not through cries of miseries, then I'll listen to you." He rose from his chair. "I gotta go fetch my book. Be back." He walked away.
"Did he just say we women didn't have logic?" Ember cried in disbelief.
"No. He said you women keep them in designer bags." Cy clarified.
"I don't wanna mince with words this time. What's that suppose to mean?" Ember said testily.
"He just means he's doing his job." Cliff saved Cyrus from answering.
"Yeah. And he doesn't care what stands on his way. I knew Mel's always been a self-important bastard but I never gave it a moment's thought that he'll take the Bradford case. Its evil. Even for him." June commented.
"Well then, he just proved you wrong. He's evil enough for it. Tsk." Ember said.
"That Malaysian province will be inflicted with illnesses that will be too advanced for science to contain. Its gonna be a rough ride for the victims. All forms of cancer will be cropping up everywhere. It'll be a biological crisis." I stated.
"Its a medical issue to you. Its a legal issue for Mel. We will deal problems according to our profession. That's why I'm not judging him." It was Cyrus. The matter-of-fact tone unnerved me.
"Last time I heard, we will tackle problems according to our morals." I rebutted.
"Won't work for the whole universe. Some people don't have that." Cliff interjected.
"I know that. And some of them are residents in this house." Ember said.
"Oh, C'mon girls, grow up. The world is not split into good girls and bad guys." Rob said, rolling his eyes.
"Really? I have no idea." June shot back.
"So, do you wanna continue this prehistoric battle or are you ready to discuss the McKinley Heights Proposal? Or Me and Cliff should wait forever until you get off your high horse of morality?" Cyrus turned to June.
The girl sighed. She then picked up her laptop and rottring. They settled in the other end of the 14-seater dinning table. "Let's roll.."
"Late night convention for them? June doesn't look happy working with those guys." I commented.
"Nah. Cyrus is an Engineer by profession, but he works as a real estate developer. Cliff, on the other hand, is an executive in the same company. They've got this huge project that got them together as a team. A property in Delaware, I heard. June and Cyrus are gonna reconstruct the site, or whatever they call it, to make it available for market. That's where Cliff comes in. He contacts buyers, you know, try to sell the goods.." Ember filled me in.
"Hmmm... Big stuff, then." I said.
"Yep. They work their ass off. Its not their first project nor their last." Ember remarked.
Just then, Issa came in, with a comforter wrapped around her. She looked harassed.
"Where are you going?" Ember asked her.
"Camping out in my car." She brandished her keys at us. "Mike is going way overboard. My walls are screaming with his drumming." she complained.
"Tell him to stop." Ember advised.
"No chance. He told me he's got a deadline tomorrow. He's supposed to record that song first thing in the morning. You know how he gets when he's in the mood." Rob interjected.
"Yeah, I do. I've been his housemate for 2 years and I know perfectly well, all right. I think I'm deaf already, thanks to Mike, so trust me, I know. Anyways, I don't have to yell at him anymore. Cynthia got there first. And I don't have the energy for pointless arguments. I'll just crash in my car, for now..Tomorrow, when photoshoot's over, I'll think of ways to cut off his windpipe..." she muttered darkly. Issa traversed towards the backdoor, and was gone.
Next to show up was Cynthia, storming. Her face was puffed, contorted with rage. She had her car keys with her. Not one of us bothered to ask. Her heavy footsteps and loud banging of the door shut told the tale.
"So Mike is a composer?" I inquired Ember.
"Yep. He's the plays drums, guitar and keyboard. He's with the Holocaust band."
"Really? Alternative music, if I'm not mistaken?"
"Real mystery,huh? Even I don't get it. He creates earthquakes every time he's composing and when the songs come out in the mainstream, they sound soothing." Ember thought out loud.
"Tsk. Yeah. They're pretty famous, right? My brother's a fan of theirs. Why is he here? Aren't they supposed to be on tour?" I pried on.
"Mike said he stayed to finish their next album." Ember replied.
"Note to myself: A rockstar in the house means shorter sleeping hours." I said in monotone.
"Only when he's composing. So don't worry much. When he's not writing songs, he's more like Bless." Ember appeased.
"That's a real comfort, then." I said.
But I wasn't comforted, if I have to be honest.

"So the guys are getting to you?" Jam clarified.
"Yes." I admitted.
"Are you dreaming about that summer in Paris again?" I heard Jam throw the question.
"Where did that came from? I was talking about my housemates." I told her.
"You were talking about your male housemates..."
"And your point is?" I asked, attempting to drive where she was getting at.
“You don’t hate your hour housemates and its not that you don’t like them either. It’s just your manhater syndrome kicking in. Remember your tendency to stereotype? Especially when a guy is arrogant or exudes an air of superiority. THAT is what you loathe." Jam analyzed.
"Hey, you're not my shrink." I told her.
"I'm your bestfriend. I know better than Dr. Gerald Durham when it comes to you,"
"Well then, I'll stop seeing him. God knows I can do well if I can save the hundred bucks I pay my shrink for my OCD and other psychiatric problems." I suggested.
"He's doing good with you. I'm just helping out. Take your meds. Attend your scheduled sessions. And I'm not giving up being a Neurosurgeon for anything, as you know well." Jam said. "Speaking of, I need you to scrub up right now. We need to be in the OR in exactly.." she read her watch. " 20 minutes..."
"How many metz in the last count?"
"Fair few. Its gonna be a tough day, I need you to keep her alive, whatever it takes while I'm evacuating the cancer cells. Dr. Novy Cranmer will be assisting, of course. We gotta meet up with the family. Things to discuss.." she briefed me. "You sure you're up for this?" she ensured when she saw me stifle a yawn.
I squared my shoulders. "Bring it on."