19
HARLEY
Harley had stepped through the door for precisely three seconds before being pounced upon by Annabel. She was dressed in a high-collar ivory wool jacket paired with a short black skirt and boots of the same colour. There was also the shoulder bag in hand that signaled she was going out.
“I have been waiting for you to get home for like hours now, but we’re going to be late!” Annabel said, hurriedly. “Come on, go get changed.”
Annabel pushed her towards the stairs but Harley turned around in confusion.
She asked as much, “Can you at least tell me what it is I’m late for?
” It wasn’t uncommon for Annabel to spring up last minute plans for them to do.
She had dragged her to Portobello Road Market one Saturday morning with sleep still in her eyes.
“To see the comet!” she replied, smiling brightly in excitement.
“Is that the Parliament Hill stuff you mentioned earlier? I assumed that was just you and your mates going to get pissed again.”
“Noooooo, well yes but noooo,” she groaned, flopping and bouncing simultaneously. Harley couldn't help but laugh, she was so animated. It was a wonder she wasn’t a Theatre student. “It’s a group thing, the whole uni will be there.”
“The whole university?” Harley asked skeptically, an eyebrow raised.
“Have you ever been introduced to the word exaggeration?” Annabel answers. “Maybe not everyone but a good chunk of people are, this will be your first proper uni event. It’s going to be fun and I need this; between ballet, classes and teaching so much of my time is filled.”
Harley thought about it; it’s true they had barely seen each other during the weeks because when she didn't have practice, Annabel locked herself inside her dance studio, hardly eating. And watching the comet would be cool, she had always enjoyed looking at the celestial beings in the sky but never had the equipment to see them closely other than at a museum. Now she couldn’t help but wonder when Annabel mentioned the whole university, if that meant Scarlett would show up too.
They had been making excuses to stay longer at the cafe to be around one another and whenever they saw each other at uni they found themselves in one of the art rooms, painting or in Harley’s case, sketching, in silence. Even when they texted it wasn’t just about her work schedule.
Scarlett hadn’t talked about going tonight when she saw her yesterday at work and group events did not seem to be her thing. Still, Harley held out hope that maybe she would be there.
“Alright, I’ll come,” she gave in and Annabel squealed and began to jump up and down. “Only because I have never seen a comet before, also what’s wrong with what I’m wearing now?” She looked down at her hoodie and jeans.
“Don’t make me answer that,” Annabel said with a pained expression. She pushed Harley again towards the stairs, “I’ve left some options out on your bed. Go go go!”
An hour later, they arrived there after struggling to find a place to park, the path it took to get to the viewpoint wasn’t far. The sun had already set not too long ago and Harley could see and hear the chatter of people as they neared.
Annabel carried a thick mat and blanket while Harley held the camera she got on a trip to Covent Garden with her.
There were more students here than Harley had expected.
This was probably a much bigger outcome than they themselves thought possible, at least five hundred people.
They had to weave through everyone to get to where all four of Annabel’s friends stood; Daniel, Devon and MJ were talking as Arden kept looking about until he spotted them both, relief on his face. As well as a smile.
Harley turned to Annabel to see she had a similar expression on her but was shyly pretending not to. And she couldn’t help but suspect there was even more going on here than she had been privy to.
“Any longer and we would have had to send out a search team,” Arden voiced as she and Annabel came into view. “And here I assumed you were the responsible one, Harleen.”
At the same time they both growled out, “Oh bore off, I’m thirty minutes earlier than I said I'd be here.” and “Don’t fucking call me Harleen.”
“Vous êtes s?res que vous n'êtes pas jumelles?” MJ pondered at the startlingly similar expressions on their faces. Is it possible the two of you are twins, instead?
A question clearly meant for Annabel but Harley answered without thinking. “Definitely not.”
MJ gasped, “You understand me?”
“I didn’t know you spoke French?” Annabel asked her. Harley spent a lot of time with her head in books instead of her phone growing up so she spent a lot of it learning languages. She could speak six, other than English, and French was one of them.
“You never asked.” She shrugged as they both finished their set up to the left of Arden and MJ.
“Shocking news: Girl speaks more than one language. So do the rest of us,” Devon piped in.
“I have never heard a positive sentence uttered from you,” Harley countered.
“The sight of you has me leaving positivity at the door.” A taunting saccharine smile appeared and Harley couldn’t help but note that she currently looked like a beautiful version of the Joker.
“Ignore her, she’s especially high-strung because we made her skip practice for this,” MJ told her, and pointed to Annabel, “She’s like that one in this regard. Obsessive. I always tell them it’s not healthy. Better to live life freely than whatever the fuck they’ve got going on.”
Harley couldn’t get a read on MJ. She always had a smile on her face and seemed to be a good friend to Annabel but there was a niggling feeling that made her resistant to being around her.
It wasn’t like Devon who just bluntly said what she thought, she was open and clear.
Despite the petty arguments, she actually liked her.
MJ felt false. But perhaps she was overthinking it, that the concept of someone being so jovial all the time was new to her.
Arden cleared his throat to interrupt, “It’s time.”
He held a large megaphone in hand and began to speak into it.
“Everyone, there’s a telescope carefully placed at multiple sections of the area.
Stay in your section and with the telescope you’re given, you can all see the same damn thing.
They’re expensive, if you break it you will fucking buy two of it. ”
Harley wanted to ask how he got voted president of the student union considering how rude he was, but remembered it was his school after all.
He continued laying out instructions when she finally saw her reason for coming.
Scarlett was a bit further down talking to Anika, well rather Anika was talking and Scarlett was nodding along but she had a smile on her face.
She hadn’t realised they knew each other.
“Would it be okay if I leave you for a second?” Harley asked Annabel who was practically bouncing to get a clearer view of the comet through the telescope. The group did rock, paper, scissors to see who would go first and Daniel won.
“Where are you going?”
“I saw a friend from class and wanted to say hi.” Her eyes narrowed suspiciously but her excitement must have overshadowed her usual intrusive instincts, “Alright, but be quick.”
Annabel started hassling Daniel which was when Harley walked the path to Scarlett. Anika noticed her first as Scarlett’s back was to her.
“Harley!” Anika waved her over, “We were just talking about you.”
“Trying to decide whether or not to be scared,” she remarked.
“Scarlett was telling me that you were the expert on all things and I was wondering if that included comets?” She turned to Scarlett, who shrugged in admittance.
“A little.”
“Perfect, you can be our guide for the night.”
“I would but I came with them,” Harley said. They both looked in the direction she pointed, where Annabel was currently piggybacking on Daniel. “I saw you both and just thought to say hi.”
“Oh my god, Daniel is here. Does this mean I can finally get that introduction? You know what, I’ll do it myself. Do my boobs look okay? Never mind, of course they do. Bye!” She rushed all of that out in under a minute, and left before she could blink.
“Wow.”
“My thoughts exactly.”
Both of them laughed, she truly was like a manic pixie come to life.
Once their laughter died down they faced each other like they were seeing one another for the first time that night.
Harley took account of the faint glitter that lingered on Scarlett’s eyeshadow, it matched the colour of her shirt.
“Hi.”
“Hey.”
“Did you know that the first notable recorded comet in England was in 1066 after King Harold’s coronation which served as a powerful omen so they made the decision to put it on the Bayeux Tapestry?” Harley said.
“Thank you for the history lesson, Encylopaedia. I didn’t know that, I was a bit shit in history.”
“I was brilliant in history. An expert if you will,” she said the last bit teasingly at the comment Anika made earlier.
Scarlett grinned, “I only said that because you know everything about anything and clearly I wasn’t wrong.”
Harley accepted that because she was right, but it was also worth it to mention that she had an eidetic memory. “Eternally willing to serve as your human Internet.”
“How did you meet Ani?” she asks after.
“She’s friends with Lily. Their parents were best friends growing up, so they have always been in each other’s lives.”
Harley wasn’t aware of that. “Is Lily attending TUL next year?”
Scarlett nodded, “She’s applying for the scholarship. She can’t afford it otherwise.”
“I hope she gets in.”
A comfortable silence ensued. “I’m a little surprised to see you here. This doesn’t really count as an exciting or real comet, definitely no Halley so…” Harley drawed out, her question obvious.
“Why did I come? I knew you’d be here,” Scarlett answered with a shrug. She said it so plainly that she didn’t realise she had rocked Harley’s world by admitting she came out to the most ridiculous gathering in the hopes of seeing her. Especially because she was here for the same reason.
“Cool.” Aiming for casualness but a smile peeked through regardless.
“Come on expert, show me how to get a look at this thing. At least while Ani distracts them.”
She linked their arms but as they were about to go to an empty telescope, as a good half of the students were now drinking and chatting amongst themselves, she felt a hand yank her away.
Annabel.
She hijacked her without a word but a scathing look aimed at Scarlett and started to drag her across the open field. Her golden hair flew in different angles.
“Let go of my fucking arm,” Harley said through clenched teeth and she obeyed. Annabel was annoyed, that much was apparent by the way she had been initially stomped away.
“You lied to me.”
“I didn’t lie. I told you I saw a friend, she’s a friend.”
“Omission of details still counts as a lie.”
“This is childish. I’m allowed to have friends.”
“Of course, but why does it have to be her?” Annabel whined.
“Because your friends all have trust funds stuck down their throats and it’s nice to talk to a normal person.”
They had a standoff, people walked by them trying to listen in on their conversations but neither of them paid them any mind. Eventually, Annabel relented. “Fine but I just have to add in my sage opinion that I still don’t think she’s any good for you.”
“Most things aren’t.”
“Text me when you want to leave because I plan on blacking out.”
“So like any other day?” Harley yelled.
She gave her a middle finger in response and Harley ran back to Scarlett with a smile on her face.