Melony and Alex: Unfortunate Caller
Author's note: Because some people seem to have a problem with it, Melony is spelled that way because it's Greek (as explained in the first story). It's also the name of a big tiddied Pokemon somebody? Bunch of nerds.
Alex was dead. Melony had killed him.
She'd called and left a message on his phone two hours ago to confirm that they were getting together that night and she hadn't heard back. Laying on her bed, she was drowning herself in one of her sad song playlists named "Whore-ton Hears a Whiner" that had started with the deceptively upbeat "Never Been Any Reason" by Head East (which she kept calling Heading West because for some reason her brain would combine it with Stabbing Westward). She was convinced it was about a guy trying to win back his ex girlfriend that had found out about him cheating by eating her out really good. This is about all she'd been able to do for the last hour and a half.
While singing along off key to The Mountain Goats "International Small Arms Traffic Blues" she was imagining Alex burning alive in his car or crushed under a tractor because he was in a field for some reason. Maybe to pick flowers for her. Either way she was now convinced the reason he hadn't responded must be that he had met some horrible end and it was because he had met her and made her happy for a few weeks. Logically she knew that wasn't true (probably), but once an intrusive thought marries with deep seated insecurity they set up shop and refuse to leave no matter how much you beg or demand or threaten.
Mel saw that the song coming up was "Little Black Submarines" by the Black Keys and had to shut it off. She sat up and rubbed her face because the irony was too much. Irony? Coincidence? Dammit Alanis, has any one human since Shakespeare done so much to change the meaning of a single word? Did Shakespeare change the meanings of words or just make up new ones? She was too depressed to Google it when she dropped her phone as it started to buzz like an ambushing hornet.
The phone lied and said it was Alex, but when she answered, it was doing a very good impersonation of his voice. "Hey, sorry I missed your call earlier. My phone was being weird and it didn't show that I had missed one. What's up?"
She had been wrong. He wasn't dead.
He had been kidnapped by terrorists and was trying to signal to her to call... the cops? Didn't they always say that if you tell the cops they'd kill the hostage? Was there some other group that dealt with this kind of thing? In the movies it was maybe the FBI... Usually it was a Hemsworth or Gerard Butler. Wait, that was the Secret Service and Alex wasn't the president and didn't look anything like him.
"It's no biggey. I was just checking on tonight," she signaled back, coding that she read him loud and clear. Obviously they must be listening in and he knew that she had been in panic mode because that's what normal people did when they didn't hear back from the person they lllllooo... looked forward to seeing for two hours.
"Yeah, can't wait. I'll see you around, what, 7:00ish?" Did that mean he thought there were about seven people holding him? Or they would be calling with demands at seven? Or they wanted $700? Those cheap bastards!
"Sounds good. See you then, big dog." She'd never called him that before so he would be able to catch on that she was gonna call in the big dogs to get him out. Fuck, the saying was "big guns" wasn't it.
"Oookay, later then, I guess," he responded like she was speaking with some weird accent all of a sudden, which she most certainly wasn't doing this time. The phone clicked as he hung up.
Mel sighed out loudly in dismay, much to Silly Strings enjoyment as it meowed, always eager for the sweet taste of tears. She wasn't worried anymore, now she was just pissed off at herself for always getting carried away at everything. She wanted to claw her own face off in embarrassment and frustration, or go spend a bunch of money online to teach herself a lesson.
After the night when Alex had casually pointed out that Mel had been suffering unknowingly from a developmental disorder her whole life like there was a sign hanging over her head that she never noticed before, they had done a bunch of YouTube watching and some online quizzes and she was somewhere between 85-99% likely to have ADHD. Or she just had clinical depression. Or maybe a concussion. Or she was bipolar. But most likely her problems ADDed up to ADHD. Everything she looked at made sure to point out that she needed to hunt down a head doctor to find out for sure.
A bunch of stuff popped up about ASD and the high comorbidity as well. "How can there be a higher amount of people with ASD and ADHD than ADHD and ASD? Aren't those saying same thing? This thing plus this thing. It's like saying you're more likely to have a broken leg and a broken arm then a broken arm and a broken leg." Mel had asked in exasperation to no one in particular.
"Don't look at me, I'm not a doctor," had been Alex's unhelpful response.
"That's unhelpful," she pointed out, "You're supposed to be the smart one."