“Just give him a chance to say what he wants, okay? And then I’ll get rid of him…” Sonia walked in circles around the tree, hands pinching her forehead. “Yes… he won’t fight back, I mean, he can’t.” His eyes drift to her bag, and its silky black contents. “You know how he’s like, and you know damn well- no- I get it- Ok- Wh- Imagine if you never gave me the dress and apologised! How terrible would I feel?” By the time she hung up, Joe was completely dried up.

“You have approximately five minutes to say your piece before you have to leave, unless you can convince her to not chase you away.”

“Ok.” Five minutes offered more than enough time to express his apologies.

Honey wore the widest smile when she arrived, squealing in typical fashion and giving Sonia a warm embrace, and then immediately changed her expression to a bloodshot stare as they locked eyes. “You have five minutes to say whatever nonsense you wanna say, and then leave or she’ll break your jaw.”

Sam gulped, feeling intimidated by Honey for the first time, “Ok. I just wanted to say I’m sorry.”

“Mhm.”

“For… scaring you and Sonia… and for pushing her…”

“And?”

“And for destroying the set that she worked hard on to create.”

“And?”

“And for being proud and insulting her.”

“And?” She raised her voice, baring fangs on both ends of her mouth.

“And for being a terrible team leader before, and for treating you like a prize and snooping around your cupboards and drawers and finding out about your secret bottle of perfume.”

“And?” She screamed. Sam thought he had covered every one of his crimes. He noticed the clenched fists by her sides.

“I know I can do better, and I should’ve. I was being stupid and proud, and I regret what I did, I really did, okay? You’re my friend! And I can’t believe I did that to you… I wasn’t thinking straight… I was…” He refused to admit the truth to himself, but knew he had to. “I was Hulk-ing out. This is my club, hulk smash…” He mocked unenthusiastically.

“And?” She shrieked, which made Sonia close her ears on instinct.

“I… I don’t know. I just wanted to apologise, I guess I’ll leave, let’s go Joe.”

“Wow!” She clapped her hands violently. “You’re gonna apologise for everything except the one big thing? Even as you say how oh… how much you regret it… and oh… how much you hate yourself. I cannot believe I ever- ever thought you’d make a good boyfriend to me, or to anyone!”

“What! What else do you want me to say?”

“Really? That’s how conceited you are? You just can’t even think of it?”

“No! I’ve said my piece, I’m leaving okay? I’m happy that you two are together now, and I hope your couple stuff goes well.”

“So you’re really not gonna apologise for molesting her?” She pointed to Sonia.

“What?”

“Or did you forget where your slimy hands were when you pushed her!”

“I already said, I pushed her shoulder! Shoulder!”

“Oh, oh, my mistake, it’s okay when you touch her on the shoulder… Ah I see, you didn’t touch the no-no zone, so you did nothing wrong…” She pierced deep into his eyes.

“Ok… Ok, I’m sorry for touching her at all, okay?”

“Oh, so now you’re apologising? After I painted the entire picture for you and guided you here with a map? So only now you’re apologising for it? So you only apologise when you see the error of your ways? Oh, oh, okay, okay, yeah, okay. Go kill yourself.”

“Help me…” He mouthed to Sonia.

“I’m not interfering.” She said. “And Honey’s not wrong.”

“Ok, what can I say to make it better?”

“Nothing! I don’t need you- to make it better. Leave!”

“Look, episode one of Raft released, can we at least watch that before we go? Come on, I know I messed up but we’re still friends right? I promise I’ll change, I swear!”

“Right… because when you change, we magically forget what happened and we’re magically okay again?”

Sam hit a dead end. “Can we just watch it together? Please?” He felt like crying. “Sonia’s forgiven me.”

“So I’m just gonna follow my girlfriend’s footsteps like I’m her slave or like I’m codependent or something? I don’t know why she would forgive you but you got lucky! And you better hope she doesn’t change her mind. Leave.”

“Can you say something?” He looked to Sonia.

Sonia placed a hand on Honey’s shoulder, “She gave her answer dude, leave. You promised.”

“But…”

“My answer remains the same provided you leave right now.”

“Joe, we’re going home.” He announced.

With nowhere left to turn, he obliged. Joe quickly tagged along, and they made their pathetic trip to the cab station. He turned back, seeing the two girls shrink to the size of ants as they leaned onto each other. From his deductions, he guessed that Honey began crying.

The cab took an eternity to arrive, and he continued watching the two ants. They sat down, presumably for a picnic at the wrong time of day, and then one ant quickly ran off. It came back a few minutes later, sending the other ant in awe. The ants held hands, and then all of a sudden, their heads joined together, and then their bodies, merging into one shadow for a brief moment. He slammed the bench in anger, cursing himself out for not making a better apology. He ruined the two, and now they left him behind in ruins.

**

He staked out the lecture hall on Monday afternoon, waiting for everyone to leave before sneaking in. His goal there was still unclear, but he simply wanted to see the venue again, and take one last trip down memory lane. Completely deserted, it looked exactly like it was the day they entered.

“How are we supposed to film in a lecture hall!” Sonia immediately complained upon first sight. Sam only saw opportunities back then, already unzipping his camera bag. Honey sat down immediately, eyes glued to her phone.

“We don’t have to film here, this can just be where we meet, and then we just film elsewhere.” Sam suggested. Her whining began to grow repulsive. “But at least we have an official club! Now all we need is obviously more people to sign up and an idea to film.”

Their first film was so atrocious they didn’t bother to title it. ‘Untitled Romance Movie’ became the nickname, and it told the short and simple story of a breakup between Honey and Ben. The script was two and a half pages long, and in Sam’s eyes, was simply a trial run to test the waters. Sonia rolled her eyes at every step of production, having gripes over every little imperfection. “The film won’t be perfect, nothing is perfect.” He advised, but he should’ve known it’d be harder to rid her of her perfectionism.

Their second film, titled ‘People’, fared even worse. Thanks to the insistence on improving the writing, the project didn’t even make it to production. He’d write a draft, and Sonia would burn it to the ground, and then he’d make edits according to her suggestions and she’d still burn it to the ground, all the while Honey stared at her phone while Ben stared at his sketchbook. A student joined them briefly, but after enduring one quarrel; he left.

Third film, ‘Blood Orange’ , also referred to as ‘Sonia’s worst nightmare’. An overly ambitious action film, it somehow made Sonia a more dreadful and cynical team member. She despised the action genre like he had never seen before, going on rant after rant about its absence in worth and craft and other mumble-jumble terminology she came up with. She went after all his favourites, then all his cousins’ favourites, and finally, just when he had enough, she went after him. She insulted his taste, she insulted him as a filmmaker, and she even dared insult his hero Uncle, calling his films cliche. From that day on the two waged a war.

Fourth film, ‘Singing Doll’, he-

“Oh hey.” Erin said. He somehow missed her.

“Uh… hi.”

She packed her belongings on the front row. “What’re you doing here?”

He rubbed his eyes, which had gotten wet. “Uh… nothing.”

“Are you okay?”

He nodded profusely. “I’m not here to do-do anything bad or whatever… just…”

“Uh… ok. I have to lock the door once I leave… so…”

“How’s the um- premiere coming along?”

“Good. I’m making popcorn for it.”

Sam sat beside her in the front row.

“Sonia said you turned it into a mini-series.”

“Yeah… I mean… why not right?”

“How’s the um… reception for episode one so far?”

“Oh my god, the entire school is going crazy-” She dug her head into her bag, “-look at all these forms! I’ll have to interview them or something…”

“Why not let Sonia do it… She has a good eye for talent.”

“Oh yeah, definitely. But I wanna do some too.”

“Can uh… It’s okay if you’re busy or whatever… but uh… can I watch it?”

“Uh yeah… I’ll send you a link-”

“On the screen… I mean. The projector screen.”

“Oh… uh…” She checked her phone. “Yeah, okay… why not?”

Erin headed to the stage and flashed the finished product on the screen with a few clicks. “Ok… volume should be good… and… play!” She dashed back to her seat and yawned a little, “Sorry, long day… Exams are coming.”

“It’s okay.” Sam watched it as attentive as he could, clearing his mind from any biases or pre-conceived pride. Surprisingly, the green screen looked more realistic than he expected.

“Oh my god, this scene took forever!” Erin let out. “We had a head-ache trying to get the lighting right in post- just ugh- that’s a day of my life I’ll never get back.”

“Can’t fix everything in post.” Sam said.

“Damn right you can’t.”

The film continued with Erin providing insightful director’s commentary, despite not being the director. By the time the credits rolled, Sam was hooked and craved more.

“Wow… that was actually not bad.” He said.

“Aw, thanks. I thought it was garbage…”

“No it’s not, it’s actually good. Be easier on yourself.”

“Yeah, I know… and thanks.”

They gave each other an affirming nod.

“Oh! Oh! And I also got like a bloopers reel if you wanna watch that.”

“Sure.”

Erin put it on, and cheesy guitar melodies played. “I couldn’t be bothered to score a blooper reel with a cello.”

It showed Honey forgetting her lines, which would’ve made him livid and flip out in rage, but instead he heard everyone laughing at her blunder. Honey then accidentally bumped into a light stand, almost causing a second accident.

“Oh my god, thank god Sonia was there to catch it.” Erin commented.

“Yeah… she’s a pretty good actress.” Sam said.

“She is, isn’t she?”

“The best one I know.”

“Hey… thanks for recruiting me into the club… like so many months ago. I never knew filmmaking could be this fun.”

“Yeah, you’re welcome. And I’m glad you’re the leader now. You’re running things pretty well.”

“Stop it, everyone keeps saying that!”

“Sonia and I gave you a pretty low bar to hit.”

“Oh yeah, you three kept fighting and fighting and fighting, it’s insane.”

“Yeah… well… we won’t be fighting anymore.”

“Oh! You guys sorted your stuff out?”

“You could say that.” Sam smiled painfully.

“Ugh… now I gotta think about how to follow up that ending!” Erin complained. “I know Sonia’s the writer and all but I wanna pitch ideas, but I have no idea what else they’d do after they get on the raft. And oh my god, making an ocean set, oh dear god… As if the green screen wasn’t already making life hell in the editing room.”

Sam chuckled, “Maybe we can brainstorm a little bit. Why not? I got some ideas.”

“Hm… sure, thanks.”

“Maybe… after they get on the raft, they start trying to swim somewhere else, but they keep arguing on where to go.”

“Ooh… yeah, and then there could be a shark and it could be like a ‘Jaws’ parody…”

“And then one of them gets eaten by the sharks.”

“But then they somehow survive and get superpowers, okay this is getting insane but I love it.” Erin giggled.

“And then he’s half man half shark, and he wants to eat his friends but he can’t…”

“And then the other sharks are like a bad influence and he runs off with them and leads a new life.”

“And he becomes like the king of the ocean and gives his friends a nice play to stay in his palace.”

They continued building on the ridiculous plot, compounding on ridiculousness until the narrative collapsed under its own weight. They laughed their hearts out, jotting these ideas down on the board as they went, turning a simple story about survivors at sea to a global conspiracy surrounding a specific species of superpowered shark-people. Neither of them would remember the story’s humble origins of the raft until they went home, reflecting on the monstrosity of a tale they fabricated and realising how far it deviated from the source material. Erin concluded that it might be better to let Sonia do the brainstorming for episode two.