There was another knock at the door, and Monique made her way to it. That's one thing she liked about this group of friends, they were all extremely punctual. She was greeted by James and David who were smiling wildly. She could tell they had already been to a bar drinking, that's just what they did.
“You two look like you've had fun” she said smiling back at them, unable to quite match their maniacal grins.
“Ha, well a couple of Session Ales does that for you” James said as they entered.
“Hey guys” David shouted over to the others as he entered the living room, “How are you? Happy Birthday Chief”
Samir thanked him and raised his wine glass in their direction.
“Hey, maybe we should give them a heads up about Danny?” James said to David.
David agreed, he had been acting strange and he was supposed to be heading over here soon.
“Yeah okay” David replied turning back to everyone else, “Well we just saw Danny while we were grabbing a couple of beers, he was acting weird. He ran in and started asking us where Olivia was, like we knew who that was. He then started saying that we know her from years back. We really didn't know what to say, it was strange. Anyway, he's popping over later so he's probably going to bring it up with everyone here, so we thought we'd let you know in advance”
“I don't know what he was smoking” laughed James, “But he seemed so sure we should know her. It's probably a quick fling he had and was perhaps drowning his sorrows.”
They changed the conversation back to normal subjects; what they had been up to, had they seen a new film that was at the cinema and so on, as the other guests slowly filtered through the door to join the party. They relayed the same information to each guest as they arrived, and not one of them there could remember anyone called Olivia. They were all in agreement that if Danny brought it up, they couldn't pretend to go along with it and would just be honest that they didn't know her and maybe stop taking these quick flings quite so seriously. But where was Danny? He was normally the most punctual, but was going to be the last one to arrive.
It was fifteen minutes later before he finally knocked at the door. Monique opened it and gave him a big embracing hug and a kiss on the cheek.
“How are you Danny?” She asked, “We were getting worried, you're quite late”
“Sorry, I don't know what happened. I seem to keep missing five minutes here and there and then suddenly I'm running behind. I must just have too much on my mind, plus I keep noticing things that seem out of place, it's strange” he said looking a little confused, “I need to ask about Olivia”
Here we go thought Monique. He had only just stepped in the door and it was going to start already.
Danny approached the lounge and saw everyone was there; Samir, the Birthday boy, David, James, Mike, Emma, Mateo, Gina, Jarrah and Brandon. It was quite a gathering, practically the whole group of friends, except no Olivia. She should be here, Danny thought.
“We know what you're going to ask” said David, “But we have discussed it with everyone here and none of us know anyone called Olivia”
Danny was now more annoyed with David, this silly joke had angered him at the bar, why is he carrying on with it he thought. Was this all a big joke to him? Obviously David and James had continued their funny little charade and told everyone here to go along with it before he got here. That's what has happened. But then that doesn't explain where Olivia was and the state her house was in. He needed to stop this stupid joke first and foremost before he could try and find out where she was, so called over to Monique.
“Have you got the old college yearbook?” he asked. He knew there was a picture of her in there, with him, Monique, David, Brandon, Jarrah and Mateo. It was a group photo taken a few weeks before they graduated, sitting on a grassy bank. This would shut David and James and their pathetic little joke up once and for all.
“Of course” Monique said before disappearing into another room to look for it.
There was an uncomfortable silence while she was gone, no-one wanting to change the subject quite yet. In the silence, Brandon handed Danny a beer. Brandon and Danny were close friends in childhood, they stayed friends throughout but they had never quite reclaimed those sunny glory days of being ten years old, playing out in the woods, pretending to be action stars, performing dangerous stunts from trees. Brandon was an athletic black guy, the hundred metres sprinting champion on any sports day, and two hundred metres, or whatever distance you told him to run. Damn, this guy was fast. He was also clever, after College he started studying cell Biology and ended up being a Cell Biologist, his research was cutting edge and he was well regarded as the top DNA/Cloning Expert in his field. They still shared a bond from those glory days, but it was something that just simmered underneath the surface. They weren't best friends; it was
