Chapter 7

[vibe track: lean on - major lazer & dj snake, feat. mø]

Cameron heard the front door creak open and close, even over Invasion of the Xurgons, some shitty black-and-white sci-fi movie from the ‘60s she had playing on her laptop. It was just background noise. Not a lot of action in their apartment on a Monday evening.

She was sitting on her mattress, rereading the email, trying to figure out what exactly it meant.

How much money do I have to make to not qualify? Do I fill this application out to find out, or only if I know I do qualify?

Her frustration was mounting, and the opening door meant that she was about to get even more frustrated.

Sure enough, Kendra poked her head around the doorframe, her hair one neat, long braid today.

But if I didn’t want her to come in, I coulda just kept the door closed, couldn’t I.

Kendra had been gone all day yesterday and most of today in Sacramento. She was pretty sure it’d been Sacramento, anyway.

To check out some cosmetology school? She wasn’t certain that was right, but it rang a bell. Cameron had had other things on her mind.

She called up all of her patience now, though. Kendra always deserved better than Cameron gave her, so the least she could do was try ... sometimes.

“Hey,” she said. “How was Sacramento?” She lowered the volume on the movie.

Kendra took it as an invitation to come in and chat, which, Cameron supposed, it was.

“Eh, still mostly there, but I didn’t bring my ‘A’ game.” She smirked, eliciting a snort from Cameron, which was about as much as anyone could really hope for.

“Sooooooooo,” Kendra said in the most annoying voice possible.

Fucking ... why does everything have to always be a thing with her?

“You knowwww,” Kendra said, trying to get into Cameron’s eyeline, “you got it backwards. A sugar daddy’s supposed to give you sugar, not stay at your shitty apartment and throw a fit about you not gettin’ him milk and sugar.”

“He didn’t throw a fit.” Cameron glared at her, and immediately regretted engaging.

Ugh, you always do. You always engage and then swear to yourself, “never again.”

“Come on, I ain’t never seen you make coffee for nobody,” Kendra said, crossing her arms and smiling. “I’m your best friend! Can’t you gimme a little somethin’? What’s his name, how ‘bout that, Selena?”

Cameron rolled her eyes. “Henry.”

Kendra snorted. “Yeah, he looked like a Henry. Like he’s an accountant or some shit.”

“Teacher,” Cameron corrected without thinking, eyes back down on her phone.

“Teacher?” Kendra smirked. “How’d he end up in your pussy? He get lost or somethin’?”

“Jesus, it was just a fucking thing that happened, okay?” Cameron snapped at her, looking up to drive home her point. “Is it really breaking fucking news if I do something a little bit nice for somebody once?!”

Kendra was unfazed by the outburst, as usual. “You really want me to answer that?”

That hurt. Only because they both knew no answer was necessary.

I’m such an asshole that when I fucking make coffee for someone else one fucking time, my best friend acts like I was having a fucking seizure or some shit. Fuck ... and I’m being an asshole to her right now, too.

Tearing her gaze away from the arrival of the aluminum-foil-wrapped Xurgons on Earth, Cameron took a deep breath, put down her phone, and gave Kendra her full attention and her best effort.

“Look, please just — please don’t make a big deal out of it, okay?” she pleaded, exasperated that Kendra was pressing on something she didn’t want to analyze too much. More than that, though, she just was dealing with more important shit right now. “I did a nice thing because he did a nice thing for me, okay? And fine, maybe I don’t do that very often, but can you please, please not make me never wanna do something like that ever again? Just let it go.”

Cameron was being earnest, and she hoped that was coming through. She wasn’t sure because it wasn’t something that came naturally. But she was ... trying something new, even if it made her uncomfortable.

Kendra definitely noticed that Cameron was trying, and her expression softened, sitting down on the carpet across from her.

“ ... what did he do for you?”

She just can’t help herself.

Cameron didn’t answer, just picked her phone back up and rested her eyes on the cardboard cutouts that did double duty as massive planetary shields — no match for the Xurgon onslaught.

The two friends mostly had similar tastes, especially in music, but Kendra had never understood Cameron’s weird preoccupation with shitty old sci-fi. Cameron didn’t really either, but sometimes she just wanted to relax with something that was goofy and stupid. Or maybe it was because they were the only videotapes that had worked in Gram’s ancient VCR when she was a kid.

Kendra seemed to be doing some kind of math problem in her head or something, which took her only a few seconds of muttering to solve.