Rising Shards

“And that’s how Ovie kicked my ass the second time.” Risa said.

Kalei leaned back in one of the lounge chairs in the girls’ dorm and tried very hard not to wince. She also had to restrain herself from getting up to find Ovie and get revenge for beating up her friend.

Well, wait, she’s like a wolf monster now, so trying to beat her up would be bad for a number of reasons. And in that first story Risa said she ripped up Ovie’s family photo so…I hate to even think it but maybe she had that one coming.

That first story made Kalei actually wince. Less for the fight Risa described in graphic detail, but more the glee she had in talking about wrecking one of Ovie’s personal belongings. The last time she saw Risa, her friend was goofy and non-confrontational. Now Risa seemed to think acting sleazier, ruder, and much more self-deprecating was the way to go for dealing with problems. Was Wildfire Hearts that corrosive to someone’s personality that Risa found it easiest to become like this so quickly? Or was it from reuniting with her family? Were the Taramins just awful? The answer Kalei liked the least was that this was who Risa was all along, and Kalei just couldn’t see it for whatever reason.

“I got back at Ovie though, was a total wrench in her plans,” Risa said. “When I was flying them around.”

“Flying them around?” Kalei asked.

“Yeah, yeah! I got my void ship license.” Risa said.

“Damn, for real? Aren’t those super hard to get?”

“Wasn’t for me. I don’t have my driver’s license yet, though.”

“How do you have your void ship license and not have your drivers?”

“The written test is super hard!” Risa said. “Anyways, yeah, I flew around Ovie, 09, a few others. Well, I guess you saw them all because it was the same group that got you."

“Yeah…” Kalei said, thinking of when Ovie, 09, Aira, and Laenie brought her into the void for reasons she didn’t fully understand even after Ovie explained her plan.

“Yup, I was totally messing with their minds, getting in their heads,” Risa said, holding her hands out like a wizard casting a spell.

There’s that sleazy side again. “How’d you do that?”

“Ovie’s easy, she’s filled to the brim with emotional issues. You can just bring one thing up and she loses it,” Risa said. “I mainly focused on her, but I was also putting some wedges between the others. I so was gonna get a kiss from one of them.”

Kalei’s head snapped upwards. “Huh? What?”

“Yep, they owed me a favor for flying them, so I was gonna kiss somebody. It would’ve been so good, dude. If I kissed Ovie, she has a girlfriend and would have fallen apart, vengeance obtained, but 09 has a thing for Ovie too, right? So she’d be jealous, or confused if I kissed her, and then maybe Ovie would be jealous, because they had some sparks between them. Laenie because I have wondered what kissing an Exa Cani would be like, but mostly because she and Aira have issues too and watching them deal with that would have been fun.”

What the hell happened to you? Kalei couldn’t picture Risa saying anything like that in summer. The way she gleefully talked about causing drama made Kalei’s stomach churn a bit.

“Ah, maybe someday I can get that kiss.” Risa said.

Man, I could’ve been playing some cool retro game Marms likes instead of this.

“That’s probably enough stories from me for now,” Risa said. “Unless you wanna hear how I went like totally feral on Fang Moon Web.”

“I wanna hear that one eventually,” Kalei said.

“Right, right,” Risa said. “So how have you been? Aside from the whole getting kidnapped into the void deal.”

Kalei wasn’t sure she even wanted to talk about how the last few months had gone for her. Risa had a bunch of stories of her struggling in the Wildfire Hearts social scene, about getting into fights, about hurting people. While Kalei’s stories were a lot happier. About the new awesome friends she’d made. About finding herself. About her first major crush that she was actually aware even was a crush.

I can’t tell her about me probably having a crush on her, too. That crush felt like a distant memory, fluttery feelings Kalei purposefully ignored, either out of ignorance or not wanting to accept her truth.

“Dude.” Risa said. “You’re staring way off into space right now.”

“Ah. My bad,” Kalei said.

“No, I mean that’s so nostalgic,” Risa said. She put her feet up on the coffee table in front of them. “It feels like old times when Kalei starts staring blankly ahead. Gives me time to think, too.”

“Huh…” Kalei said. The two then got quiet. Even though there were plenty of people around, Kalei felt like she was entirely alone with Risa.

“What did we say we were gonna do when we got our fangs in?” Risa asked.

“Uhhh. We said we were gonna do something?” Kalei asked.

“I don’t remember what, but I’m pretty sure we had a plan.” Risa said.

“Oh, wait,” Kalei said. “We were gonna test our reflexes to see if we gamed better with the Cani power up.”

“Ahhh, that’s it!” Risa said. “I don’t feel like my reflexes are any different.”

“We could test it out now,” Kalei said. “You got your eGame with you?”

“The eGame Portable, yeah,” Risa said. “Well, not on me, in my room. My here room, not the Wildfire one.”

“We don’t have to right now,” Kalei said.

“Right, because we’re definitely hanging more soon, right?” Risa asked.

“Yeah dude.” Kalei said. She sounded a bit more melancholy than she wanted, but Risa didn’t notice.

Kalei decided that she did want to hang out with Risa more. Things weren’t the same, and they probably wouldn’t ever be. Risa was different, and maybe worse, but she was still Risa.

She hoped they could completely mend things between them. If not get back things where they were, then they could at least stay friends. That was a comforting thought. Kalei had been dreading seeing Risa again, and even though Risa said some very troubling things, it wasn’t a regretful way to spend a day.

After the two parted ways, Kalei walked around, zoning out on her own to gather her thoughts. I’m glad I went. We may not be like we were, but that doesn’t have to be bad. I didn’t have myself figured out, and now I know me better. So that’s different on its own. Maybe she can figure herself out more too. Even if that means she’s kind of a jerk now, she’s still my friend. And if that friend thing doesn’t work out in the long run, I can say I tried. And I have plenty of other friends to pull me through if it goes that way.