Kayla swayed on the spot with her fingers clenched around the brim of her sunhat. Black and white polka dots splayed out over her thighs, down her chest, her new dress prim and proper as she could have ever made it in the two weeks she’d been afforded. The clasp to the white picket fence at the end of the walk rattled as a wind pushed against the posts. No one approached. Behind her vines spread out over the house’s white siding. She’d planted them two springs ago and they’d flourished over that time. Now the tendrils, gripping tight to the material, were beginning to encroach upon the house, overtake it. She hadn’t wanted to ruin the appearance of the house by tearing them away, though. There was nothing for it but to wait, and hope they never caused any serious damage.

Her eyes glazed over as she stared at a spot of blue sky out over the neighbor’s house, just above the graceful curve of the tree in their front yard, bursting green. When the knock came against the thin wood of the fence, she startled, head turning sharply down, and a hand flashed to her neck.

“Oh, Martha, you startled me!” she said, in a voice nearly too soft to be heard across the manicured grass. Martha’s grin never wavered, ferocious in its cheeriness.

“You’ve always been ever so jumpy, Kayla! It’s only me,” Martha said, and Kayla tittered into her hand.
“Of course, I know. I wasn’t paying any attention,” Kayla explained as Martha approached and stood in front of her at the bottom of the porch steps.

“So imaginative, too. You used to love to just stand around staring at the sky! I never did understand what was so interesting about it. It hardly ever changes!” Martha let out a loud guffaw, waving her meticulously painted fingers about as if she were showing them off. Kayla bit her lip. When Martha had sobered, she tilted her head with a shy smile.
“Oh, hello, darling Kay, it is ever so lovely to see you again! I do so look forward to these visits,” Martha said, and held her arms out with eyebrows raised, a silent invitation. Kayla stepped down from the steps and into the hug, letting Martha pat her gingerly on the back. Martha smelled like she’d been soaking in a perfumed bath, tangy and sickly sweet. Kayla pulled back too quickly, flustered and trying not to choke on the overpowering scent as it filled her nostrils.
“Well, come along inside. We’ve got a new rug in the living room I’d like to show you,” Kayla said, and turned away to dart up the stairs with her hands pressed to her sides, tapping with agitation. Martha followed behind her but Kayla didn’t look up from fumbling with the doorknob.
“Oh, but the last one was such a pretty shade of blue! Remember I went and helped you pick it out?” Martha asked, her voice twinging towards a whine. They stepped into the house, and Kayla flipped on the light and turned to take Martha’s coat, a prim white thing, still immaculate as though it had never seen dirt.
“Yes, of course. But we’d gotten a new lamp and it didn’t quite match anymore, and John wanted something that he didn’t always have to worry about getting dirty.”
“That John! Such a bully. Can’t let you keep anything nice around the house,” Martha said, frowning, “Now then, lead on to the living room! Let’s see what you picked out without my help.”
Kayla led her into the room just past the hall. The curtains were drawn and the lamp dim. “My goodness, it certainly is dark in here! I’ll open the windows, get some light in here so I can see it properly. I won’t look yet. I’ll wait till I could actually see it!” Martha said with a giggle, and strode across the carpet to the windows, where she pulled the curtains back with sweeping, dramatic arms.
“There now! Let’s see,” she said, turning. “Hm. I must say, it’s awful dark. What is that, maroon?”
“Mauve, I think.”
“Hm. Looks like maroon to me. The blue one was much brighter, really made the place seem full of light. And bigger, I think. Though I suppose this is… cozier.”
“Yes. Cozier. That’s what we really wanted out of this room. Somewhere to curl up with a book or something. You know.”
Martha laughed loudly. “Oh, Kayla, that is so you. To want a room just for reading! Well, anyway, let’s sit. You must tell me how you have been doing.”
Kayla sucked in a breath through her teeth, then tilted her head to the side, a smile thinly pressed to her face. She sat on one side of the couch, and Martha sat on the other, facing her.
“I’ve recently gotten into knitting,” she began, and Martha looked at her incredulously.
“Knitting? What are you, an old lady now? Why don’t you just go and buy clothes at the store?” Martha asked.
“Oh, well it’s a fun hobby for when I don’t have any work to do around the house.”
“My goodness, Kayla, you really have changed since I last saw you! You used to be so much fun, always coming along with us to the dances or the beach…”
“I did, didn’t?” Kayla said, contemplatively. “Well, you know, maybe I didn’t actually like those things. Maybe I just went along with them because you were my friend,” she said, beginning to let her voice slip up in volume, slightly confrontational, like she was daring Martha to disagree with her. Just as Martha opened her mouth to reply, neat eyebrows rising on her forehead, the door swung open down the hall.
“Ah, John must be home from work. He decided to come early today, since you were coming. Even though he’s been on a pretty tight schedule recently. Stressed all the time.”
“Well, I guess a break will be very nice for him, then. Help him to relax a bit.”
Kayla’s eyes narrowed. Martha’s features were hard and haughty. The two women heard his footsteps on the wood and turned to face the doorway. John stepped into the living room with his shirt collar unbuttoned, sleeves rolled up to his elbow, and shoes off, and Martha looked at him with an exaggerated expression of joking anger. 
“John! Kayla here has been telling me you made her get rid of that lovely rug I helped her pick out! Shame on you!”
John looked to Kayla, his face crumpling with confusion. “Oh, but I didn’t-- Kayla--” he halted his stuttering speech, seeing the closed off look on Kayla’s face. “Well, I didn’t think it quite matched the lamp.” He sent a quirked eyebrow in Kayla’s direction, but she made no response to his silent question.
“Nonsense! The lamp would have matched it beautifully.” Martha turned to Kayla again, her eyelid twitching, smiling harshly, falsely. “If you’ll excuse us, John, Kayla and I have some womanly topics we’d like to discuss which would probably just bore you to tears.”
John looked immediately to Kayla, saw her give the slightest of nods, and shrugged, leaving them alone. Martha rounded on Kayla, false smile abandoned.
“So it was you who hated the rug. Don’t deny it. I knew even the day we bought it that you didn’t really love it like you said.”
“Then why did you force me to buy it?” Kayla exploded, hands flinging forward in a release of suppressed rage.
“Because it was obviously better than anything you would have picked out! Just admit it, Kayla, you have horrible taste!” Martha’s voice was a self-righteous shriek. Kayla’s eyes widened at the blatant insult. Then a snarl furled up from deep in her throat and her fingers flexed into fists and then back out again.
“Ah. So you’ll finally say it to my face, then. Finally say what you really mean. What you always mean.” A slow smile began to creep up Kayla’s face. Then Martha tilted one eyebrow at her as though in confusion.
“What do you mean? Do you think I’ve been lying to you?” She said it like one would say it to a child, a slow person, a lunatic. Kayla’s eyes flashed and she lunged forward, fingernails digging for Martha’s face and eyes. Martha darted back and stared with wide eyes before lunging for the hallway, leaving her purse. She made it to the front door, Kayla in hot pursuit on her heels, before John appeared at the top of the steps, looking down at them with concern.
“What’s going on? I thought I heard something.”
“Oh, Martha is just leaving,” Kayla said, trying to pull back some of her dignity for view of her husband.
“Leaving? So soon? But you just got here, Martha! You must stay. At least for the rest of the week. Tell her, Kayla. Unless of course some emergency has come up.”
Martha, mouth gaping, looked from Kayla, panting back to her normal demeanor, to her husband above her, smiling genially. “I-- no, no emergency.”
“Well, stay then,” John said. Martha looked at Kayla and her mouth snapped closed again.
“Yes, of course I’ll stay.”