Worlds Apart

In the motorway service station, Jasmine heard a scream.

Jasmine cried out, “Chloe! I thought someone had died for a second there. How lovely it is to see you.”

“And you too,” shrieked Chloe.

“I’m so pleased you could make it.”

“I would have made it here even earlier if it wasn’t for your directions,” said Chloe.

“I said to meet by the map,” replied Jasmine.

“Unfortunately there is more than one map here as I have just found out. While maps are very useful most of the time, they do not tell you where other maps are, so I had to do a lot of guesswork.”

“Well you’re here now.”

“Just about. I always get things wrong when it comes to directions.”

“Why don’t you ignore your first thought and do the opposite then? That way, you might be more likely to get it right.”

“I’ll bear that in mind. Anyway, why don’t we meet up with that friend who you were telling me about this morning,” said Chloe.

“Who? Beatrice?  I don’t think we should,” laughed Jasmine nervously.

“Come on, don’t be shy. It will be a laugh. If she gets along with you, she’s bound to get along with me too,” replied Chloe.

“I said no,” said Jasmine firmly before she suddenly stopped in her tracks as she felt someone reach into her bag, snatching her phone away.

“Beatrice!” yelled Jasmine.

“Here you go,” smiled Beatrice handing the phone back to Jasmine. “I tried calling you but you didn’t seem to hear me. So I thought pretending to steal your phone would get your attention.”

“It certainly did,” gasped Jasmine.

“Who’s that with you?” asked Beatrice.

“My bessie Chloe.”

“Hi Chloe. I like your dress sense about as much as I like criminals,” said Beatrice.

“And Beatrice really loves her criminals,” explained Jasmine.

Beatrice smiled, “It’s true.”

“Oh…that’s nice,” said Chloe nervously.

“I’ll go draw up some chairs for us. As far away from those working class bastards as possible I think,” said Beatrice.

“Huh?” said Chloe as Jasmine shrugged her shoulders.

“So Chloe, tell me more about yourself. What is your view on guns?” asked Beatrice.

“I don’t really have a strong opinion on them,” said Chloe.

“Well, I think they’re very important. We desperately need more guns in this country,” replied Beatrice.

Chloe reluctantly nodded out of politeness, even though she strongly disagreed.

Beatrice continued, "Did I tell you Jasmine, that I'm dating again?"

"That's brilliant!" screeched Jasmine.

"Yeah, the person I was after rejected me, so I started up a relationship with my love rival instead. I'll introduce you to Alex soon. We'll all have to spray graffiti together some time. I find that to be a nice bonding activity. I insist that you come along too, Chloe. Anyway, let’s get some drinks. I don’t know whether to have lemonade or coffee?” said Beatrice.

“I’m going to have some coffee, so why don’t you get the same?” said Jasmine.

“But what about lemonade? It’s so tempting,” said Beatrice.

“OK , have lemonade then,” replied Jasmine.

Beatrice squealed in delight, “Any excuse to have lemonade. Thank you for justifying my choice.”

After a few minutes, Beatrice had brought some drinks for everyone.

“That is so kind of you,” said Chloe.

Beatrice replied joyfully, “It’s no problem. I hope you enjoy them my lovelies. I’ll come and sit in between you two. You know, I’m really hoping that taxes are put up heftily as soon as possible. There are so many people out there getting an easy ride. Oh yeah another thing, in my opinion all minority groups need to be made extinct Any group that represents less than a fifth of the population should be punished severely, and should not have any of their worthless feelings taken into account. I’m looking forward to the day when diversity is extinguished and every being on this planet will be like a twin to me.”

Jasmine gave an awkward look. “Well I don’t know about that.”

Beatrice laughed. “Oh look at that Chloe. Our mutual friend is being all sympathetic again. That’s the thing which I don’t understand about her. She picks up people who have fallen in the street. She says hello to strangers. She even saved someone’s life last week. The only words I can think to describe her as are just… plain nice. What’s with that?”

Chloe smiled at Jasmine, “I didn’t know you saved someone’s life.”

Beatrice continued, “Yeah, well that’s the only thing that Jasmine and I don’t have in common. I’m still waiting for the day when she gets into a fight with someone. In the meantime, she sometimes hangs the phone up on me and she can be brutal with a few of her comments, so she has a lot of good points too.” 

“Thanks. So, how has your day been so far?” said Jasmine.

“I’ve had such fun this morning, thanks for asking. I got such pleasure out of watching the news, hearing about host countries having to pass on the Olympic Torch elsewhere due to corruption. Anyway, back to this country. Wouldn’t it be absolutely brilliant if everyone had to pay extortionate rates for the health service? The poor weaklings would not be benefiting for much longer if that were to happen. If I was in charge of this country, I would only allow people to stay in hospital for a maximum of three hours. Oh, and I almost forgot to say, I’ve recently joined an anti-environment campaign. My first action will be to leave the tap on constantly for 24 hours.” Beatrice cackled before continuing. “Anyway enough about me. How are your drinks my darlings? I hope I got you the right ones. I can get you more milk or sugar if you need it? My lemonade is fantastic.”

“Yes, it’s good thanks,” said Chloe who looked like she was about to choke. She was pretty certain that it wasn’t the drink which was causing her discomfort.

Beatrice replied, “Brilliant. Anyway, what do you think about the lack of jobs at the moment? I couldn’t care less except for those soldiers who have lost all their jobs due to the fact that there is no war. There’s not even any army practice going on as all the countries seem to be getting along fine at the moment. I feel it’s my duty to try and stir up something.”

“I guess,” said Chloe uncertainly.

Beatrice clasped her chest and began to giggle hard.

“What is it?” said Jasmine who was also now laughing.

Beatrice spat out some of her drink before composing herself temporarily. “Your notebook was open so I saw all your bank account details. I was almost going to use your details but thought better of it as you’re someone I actually like. I was so tempted to open your bank account though at one point.” Once she had finished the sentence, Beatrice began to laugh even more hysterically as Jasmine looked on in horror.

“I guess she’s honest,” muttered Chloe in disbelief.

Beatrice continued, “Anyway, let me know what you all want to eat, I’ll pay for it all. It’s such a lovely place here. Look at those people on the next table. They look like easy targets for a theft. In the meantime, I’ll order us some grub while I plan how I can nick a quid or two. The both of you can stay here if you like. I wouldn’t want you to waste your energy. Can you smell the curry from over there?”

“Yeah, it makes me want to have salad,” remarked Chloe.

Beatrice started to get up from the table before quickly adding, “I have to say Jasmine, your friend is great. I think she has the potential to be a right cow.”

“Oh, thanks,” replied Chloe.

“That’s alright. So you’re having salad Chloe. What do you want Jasmine?”

“Some pizza would be nice.”

A few minutes later, Beatrice could be seen crying in the food queue.

“Brilliant,” said Jasmine.

“What? She’s clearly upset. Can’t you at least be a little sympathetic, even if she is a little harsh on some people. You’re morphing into her now,” said Chloe.

“It’s OK, I’m not morphing into her. When she’s upset, it tends to mean that something good has happened. You know, our kind of ‘good’.”

“Oh right,” stammered Chloe.

Jasmine began shouting over towards the queue, “Is everything alright Beatrice?”

“No it isn’t. I just saw the ultimate act of kindness. This mother dropped her child out of her pram, and someone came over to help her put the child in the pram. Then they bought a new toy for the child to cheer them up.”

“So there was a happy ending then,” said Chloe.

“No it wasn’t a happy ending. The mother and child were alright. No harm whatsoever,” replied Beatrice as more tears streamed down her face. “I wish I could have broken one of their possessions at least.”

“Come on Beatrice, it could be worse. Everyone could be in a stable job. The economy could be flourishing,” said Jasmine.

“That’s true,” said Beatrice who started to look happier. “You really do know how to cheer me up. Things haven’t been wonderful recently. I mean I had a torrid day yesterday. This stranger had a go at me in the supermarket. He was walking around the place, talking loudly on his mobile.  I didn’t agree with his behaviour, so all I did was to ram into his trolley in the supermarket. I did that only the three times just to make a point and he called me a very, very selfish person. He went on to shout the odds for what must have been well over half an hour. I was severely shaken by the whole episode. I mean what would you have done in such a situation?”

Chloe whispered to Jasmine, “Come on you deserve better friends than that. I wish that we met up with my friend Clive instead. He’s a very decent person. His husband Geoffrey is a philanthropist you know.”

“We can do that next time. Beatrice needs company too you know. I’m not just going to abandon her. She’s a friend after all,” said Jasmine defending her friend.

“How on earth did you and Beatrice even become remotely close in the first place?”

“She’s always been nice to me. And she always turns up to events. More so than my other friends. I wouldn’t want to betray her,” replied Jasmine in an equally low voice.

“She doesn’t have any feelings. She’s out of control. Can’t you see that?” said Chloe.

“Well I guess she has upset a few people over the years. Last week, she even had a bunch of mediators swearing to get their revenge on her. But she is still my friend.”

“What are you two whispering about?” asked Beatrice.

“The fact that you are a complete bitch and that Jasmine doesn’t want to be your friend anymore. She’s too good for you,” snapped Chloe.

“Chloe!” gasped Jasmine.

Beatrice cackled. “Oh Chloe, I knew you would be a complete cow. You’re even more amazing than I thought you would be. I love two-faced people.” Beatrice embraced Chloe who began to wince.

“How’s your meal?” asked a member of staff.

“We all think it’s a load of crap and hope that this place is shut down soon, so there won’t be any tips coming your way. Can you pass us the bill?” smiled Beatrice. The staff member hurriedly skulked away to the till.

“It wasn’t that bad actually,” said Jasmine.

“I’m glad you liked yours. I just hope the other customers in here don’t enjoy their food. Anyway, I’ll have to go once I’ve had the bill. We’ll have to meet up again soon? Are you on holiday next year?”

“Yeah I am,” said Jasmine.

“Oh right. So I won’t see you then.”

“It’s not like it’s for the whole year you idiot. I’m only going away for a few days.”

“Oh right, well either way we should meet again very soon. In fact, why don’t you come round mine tomorrow? Don’t worry about parking spaces, you can run over the neighbours. I’m going to hunt down the last red squirrels. I haven’t seen any in ages.”

“That sounds nice about the squirrels. They’re so rare aren’t they? I’ve been trying to look for some too,” said Chloe feeling slightly happier now that she had finally found some common ground with Beatrice. “I know a good place where we can find them.”

“Yes it does sound nice. In fact, we can meet at the gun shop, where I need to top up. Don’t want to give the squirrels any chance of escaping. I know your names so I’ll sign you both up on the membership list tomorrow. In fact, I think we should make a day out of it, how about we meet up earlier at around 10ish? You’ll have to show us this place where we can hunt down the squirrels Chloe.”

After a few seconds of stunned silence from both Jasmine and Chloe, Beatrice got up out of her chair beaming. “Great that’s settled then. I look forward to seeing you both tomorrow. Here, I’ll leave enough cash to pay for the meal.”

After Beatrice left, Chloe exclaimed, “God, I only wanted a cup of coffee. What have we got ourselves into?”

“I know. Beatrice is very good at persuading people. She almost convinced me the other day that it would be a good thing for everyone on this planet to go to war.”

The table assistant returned with the bill, “Right, I hope you horrors are happy with yourselves. You have caused my colleague considerable distress with your nasty remarks. You are all now banned from this restaurant, however you are still free to roam around the rest of the service station.”

Beatrice could be seen in the distance with a huge grin on her face. Jasmine’s heart began to race; something wasn’t right. Jasmine looked down at the money which Beatrice had left, only to be confronted by images of Prince Charles staring at her.

She groaned, “Damn fake money.”