Moments by Elisabeth Carrey Dee was trying to remember the last time she was happy. It was hard to say, really. It had started out as a way to pass the time while she sat in her car, nibbling on a energy bar and waiting for her 5:30 class to start. The clock on her dashboard now read 6:17. And Dee had still come up with nothing. She could pick out moments she'd felt contentment. Trophies from various maritial arts tournaments. Travelling to Africa and trekking through the rainforests. Moments of stolen kisses on Jenny's bed. Jenny. A small name for such a person. If there was happiness in the world, Dee was certain Jenny was the key to it. Trouble was, the key wouldn't cooperate. Wouldn't turn. The lock was broken. Whatever. End of metaphor. Most of the contentment Dee could remember involved her beautiful best friend and the time they spent behind closed doors, away from the judgement of everyone else. And from Tom of course. Dee grimaced. She thought back to when a certain Shadowman had kept them all dangling at the edge of his whims. All because of his love for Jenny. At the time, Dee'd wanted to fucking smash in his pretty little face. Now she thought if he was still around, she'd take him out for a beer and they could drown their mutual sorrows and plan new ways to get rid of Tom. Because Jenny would never get rid of him; she needed the stability that Tom offered, the normalcy. After the game was over, and Julian was gone, Jenny had changed. She'd become quieter, more introspective. She'd also become less demonstrative about her feelings for Tom. It was as though a part of her had died with Julian in the basement of her grandfather's house. Tom turned a blind eye to it. Ignore it and it didn't really exist...that was Tom's philosophy. Dee had liked him at one time. They'd had a lot in common: a love for sports, scary movies, Chinese food. . .and Jenny. But then something had changed. There'd been a moment one day in which she and Jenny had locked eyes and Dee had just known. Known that it was right. She still knew it. . .just as she now knew that Jenny liked to have sex in the morning, but only after brushing her teeth. And that if you pinched her nipples just as she was about to orgasm, she'd mewl like a kitten. Dee had a lot of information like that stored in her memory banks. Jenny brushed her hair exactly seven times a day. She hummed Disney songs in the shower. Everytime "It's a Wonderful Life" came on television, she had to watch it. Anytime she a pen and paper in front of her, she drew the same doodle that had been her nightmare in the first game against Julian. Lying in bed most nights, awake long after the other girl had gone to sleep, Dee would twirl strands of Jenny's dark blonde hair around her finger and try to figure out exactly where it was that she went wrong. Exactly when it had become about this mission of obsession rather than her own happiness. How she could fix it and make the problems obsolete. "Sunshine," she'd say. "Let's go away together." Jenny would laugh and say, "Oh, Dee." But they'd go. Skiing in the Alps. . .swimming with the dolphins in Cancun. . .backpacking through Italy and the Netherlands. But in reality, Dee would accidentally tug on that strand of Jenny's hair a little too tightly, and the blonde would wake up suddenly, squint at her in the dark and say, "You'd better go, Dee. Tom's going to be here early in the morning." And Dee would remember her place. She watched idly as the clock on the dash blinked over from 6:35 to 6:36. It was too late to go to class now. Dee sighed and crumpled up the wrapper for the energy bar she'd been eating. Time to go home instead. Home to wait for a call that might not come. To wait for happiness to follow.