The Happy Project » m.c au / on hiatus

The Help

Chapter One: The Help

Michael sat by his desk, his feet kicked up on the table as he leaned back, throwing the bouncy ball up to the ceiling and catching it back with both hands. He didn't have anything particular to do or any paperwork to complete - if he did, he would've procrastinated as usual.

"Hey," Calum, Michael's housemate greeted and sat across him. He looked at Michael's lazy attire that consisted a crinkled red flannel, dark jeans and a pair of dirty boots. He laughed, "You look appropriate for the occasion."

"Says you with the ripped jeans." Michael snarled at the hole on Calum's jeans, exposing his knee.

Calum shook his head and dug into his bag. He took out a bright blue sticky note and placed it on Michael's desk, "Poppy and Savannah left me a drunk voicemail at like 2AM last night."

Michael leaned in and looked at the sticky note, Calum's messy handwriting scribbled across it. He could barely make out what it said. Reading Calum's handwriting was always a big challenge. He lifted it up and squinted at it, "Are you still?"

"Still what?" Calum looked up at him as he struggled to zip up his bag.

"Going out with, uh, that flower named girl." Michael explained as he held up the paper to the ceiling lights, "What the hell does this say?"

"Yes, I am," Calum replied, "Poppy's friend Carmel just moved in and she's having a terrible month and through Savannah's Celine Dion performance, I realised they were requesting for help. I thought you wouldn't be too busy to barge in."

Michael scoffed, "I am busy."

"Are you really?" his friend raised an eyebrow, making Michael to fall silent.

"Okay, fine. I technically came into the office and done nothing but stare at the damn ceiling for the past few weeks. Nobody looks at us for help anymore, you know? You can't gulp down countless alcohol as if all your problems will go away with it. Somebody needs somebody." Michael rolled his eyes and resumed back at throwing the bouncy ball at the ceiling.

"Well," Calum stood up and patted Michael's shoulder as a sign of good luck, "Prove them wrong. Carmel needs you."

He rolled his eyes again with a frustrated sigh as he catches the ball back into his hands. He put down his feet back on the floor, "Alright. Whatever. It's my job to make someone happy."

"And you're going to feel damn good about it later." Calum grinned as he watched his friend head towards the door with the bright blue sticky note.

•

The sound of the oil crackling on the pan was all that could be heard throughout the house as everyone was currently asleep trying to recover from the hangover. Carmel sighed and attempted to move the eggs around the pan only to have the oil to bounce off the metal surface and burn her skin on her hand.

"Shit," She swore as she turned off the stove and rushed to the sink, placing the red skin under the cold running water, "Just great," Her eyes rolled at the luck she was having that month, "What else can go wrong next?"

Switching the water off, Carmel walked to her liquidly mixture of what should've been scrambled eggs and dumped the inedible product into the bin. Instead of having another try, she took out a Coco Puff cereal bar, unwrapped it from it's bright yellow packaging and took a bite.

"You're up early..." Savannah mumbled, her wobbly legs took her to the cupboards as she took out a Panadol and a bottle of water from the fridge.

"Yeah, well I couldn't get much sleep from your beautiful rendition of Titanic." Carmel jokingly said as a light chuckle escaped her.