Overblown

LEONARD:

I’d checked the footage a dozen times, and not a single frame showed the lifeless Erica switching places. Yet here she was, appearing in my house, in the same outfit, trying to make another fool out of me. 

Not this time. If they had discovered the cameras and played smart to manoeuvre around them, I would have to play smarter.

“Leo?” Jimmy’s voice came over the phone.

“Let’s meet up,” I said.

Jimmy is my assistant. We share a mutual friend from the States. While our friend stayed back, Jimmy and I returned to the country together.

He got a job with the Federal as a field technologist—at least, that’s what he told me. Worked for the government for six years until last year, when he called me, sounding regretful.

“It’s happened, Leo…” he’d said. “I’m finished.”

I had warned him about working under the ridiculous rules he’d described. It was an open trap for anyone. But Jimmy has always loved serving more than himself. Then, just when he’d grown comfortable, the scandal hit him.

I bailed him out. Paid the greedy to clear his name and set him free. Out of gratitude, or maybe because he didn’t know what to do next, he decided to join my company. I had no vacancy, but for Jimmy, I could always make a room.

He does everything, oversees projects, makes decisions in my absence without anyone objecting. He isn’t just my assistant, he is family.

He is the one person I trust with this whole Erica and her double situation. And aside from sharing the story, I want his help. Jimmy may be talented in many things, but his greatest skill is spying and stalking.

Truth is, he was never a field technologist. I didn’t find out until after his “official problem” that he’d been a government spy.

“They could be twins,” he said, sipping from his tumbler.

“I thought so.”

We are at the Rabbies. A clubhouse that runs all day. Never short of customers. Not too busy in the morning, like now, but I wouldn’t want to see it at dusk.

“And it could be one person messing with you, Leo.”

“Do you also think I am a fool?”

“How else was she able to drug you?”

“I wasn’t drugged.”

I hated that he suggested it, and even more that he confirmed my surveillance was tampered with. I didn’t notice the footage skipped five hours until I showed him.

The truth? I believe I was drugged, and the two Ericas would pay dearly for it. But admitting it felt humiliating, especially since I probably drank it myself.

“And if I bring evidence that they’re two women,” Jimmy said after a long silence, “would you want to know their true intentions, or just fall for that one?”

I shot him a knowing stare.

“What?” he scoffed. “Look at you, Leonard. I don’t even recognise you anymore. Maybe this is why you’ve never loved anyone, you knew it would make you this tattered…mad enough to leave your house in mismatched shoes.”

I looked down, sure enough, one black shoe, one brown shoe.

Jimmy grinned from ear to ear.

“I was drugged,” I muttered, finally admitting it. “The effect got me bad.”

“Drugged to love, you mean?”

Love? Hardly. Among all the chaos exploding in me, love wasn’t one of them.

“Jim! Leo!”

We turned to see our friend Bernard. Jimmy stood at once to welcome him; I stayed seated. I’d told him to wait until I was ready to smile at his return, but Bernard was never one for patience.

“Come on, man,” Bernard said, arms wide. “Don’t give me the cold shoulder after abandoning me last night.”

“You should’ve listened,” I said, cold but warm.

I was happy to see him. I stood, laughed softly, and hugged him.

“Welcome home.”

“It’s good to be back.”

Just like Jimmy, Bernard is everything to me—a brother, my closest friend. We met in the States through a professor’s silly habit of mixing up our names. Eventually, we stopped correcting him and bore each other’s name for the professor.

Bernard keeps a lot of friends. Jimmy among them. Jimmy and I connected, and soon, it became the three of us.

He pulled back to look me over. His eyes dropped to my shoes, then to Jimmy instantly.

“You didn’t tell me it was this bad.”

“Wait until you hear half of the story,” Jimmy replied. They laughed like schoolboys.

I might have overblown our friendship. Jimmy and Bernard are the only friends. I am just the attachment.

Sitting, Bernard took my drink, downed it, and turned to Jimmy. “Tell me everything.”

And the parrot talked. Even added that I’d slept with Erica 2.

“He had sex?!” Bernard blurted, eyes wide.

“Nearly.”

“So he’s still a virgin?”

“Barely.”

“In love?”

“Surely.”

See? We are a company of three, but friends of two.

After they’d had their laugh, Bernard urged Jimmy to hurry with the assignment. Not to save me from the mess, but to save my potential love story.

“I have good news,” Bernard announced much later.

“You bought the auctioned cruise?” I asked.

“Leonard,” he said, offended. “I didn’t fly in here to work my ass off. Told you guys, I am here to settle my heart. My home. I’ve come to find my love.”

“And the good news?” Jimmy asked.

“I’ve found him.”

For once, Jimmy and I were in sync. We both reached for our tumblers. Jimmy took a sip; I set mine back down, realising it was empty.

“I am serious,” Bernard stressed.

“Is he the pilot from your flight?”

“Our pilot is cute, but this guy…” Bernard’s eyes lit. “He is beautiful. And excellent in bed.”

Jimmy splattered his drink all over Bernard’s face.

“Yes.” Bernard didn’t even flinch. “I said in bed.”

“You just got back yesterday?”

“God works in mysterious ways.”

Bernard is openly gay—alpha, confident, quick to seduce. He fvcks anyone available. He’s been in more relationships than I can count. But I’d never seen him talk this seriously about anyone.

“Does he know you never last with anyone?” I teased.

“He is smart. He knew me at a glance. That’s why he is playing hard to get.”

“You are serious?” Jimmy asked.

“I am, bro. If I see him again, I will pregnant him.”

Jimmy laughed. Almost bitterly.

Bernard’s phone beeped. He looked, then grinned like he’d just won the lottery.

“I knew it! He is mine.”

Jimmy and I watched. Waited.

“He says he had another fight with his boyfriend. Wants me to come cheer him up.”

“He has a boyfriend?!” I asked.

“For now. Because I am about to make him my wife.”