In Kamala Harris’s newly released book “107 Days,” the former vice president lists the effusive reactions of numerous politicians to her phone calls seeking support for her 2024 presidential candidacy in the hours after President Joe Biden’s withdrawal from the race.

“Saddle up!” former President Barack Obama said, according to notes she made that day.

“Oh my God, I’m so relieved! Send me anywhere!” former President Bill Clinton said.

And Gov. Gavin Newsom, her old friend with whom she came up through San Francisco and California politics?

“Hiking. Will call back,” he said in a text message.

He never did, Harris wrote.

Maybe that subtle dig was as “inconsequential” as Newsom said it was. Her call came from an “unknown number,” he told reporters in San Francisco last week when advance copies of the book first came out, and he texted Harris when he realized it was her. Besides, he endorsed her that very afternoon. (Something Harris didn’t mention in the book released Tuesday.)

But for two California Democrats, who may both have their eye on the same political prize when the Democratic primaries for president roll around in 2028, could this be a slight indication of a burgeoning political and personal rivalry? And if she is planning a third run for the White House, has she turned on allies in her assessment of what went wrong in her campaign against Donald Trump last year, blaming others at times for her loss?

“This is a literary gas can that she’s lit,” Sonoma State Political Science Professor David McCuan said. The book “has become basically this kind of tell-all, blow-up-the-bridge-behind-me. How you square that with running for president is somewhat beyond me.”

When it comes to her phone call to Newsom, reading the tea leaves from a half a line in a 304-page book may be a bit hyperbolic. But national polls already show them as the top two Democratic contenders. With Newsom playing the role of chief antagonist to President Trump in his viral, sardonic social media campaign and Harris leaving the door open for another presidential run, McCuan and others believe that their responses are surely deliberate.

“I don’t think these are the types of people who do things without thinking through how they will be interpreted and the consequences,” Menlo College Political Science Professor Melissa Michelson said. “It could all be for show, right? It could also be that behind the scenes, they’re still just as close as ever, and this is all just meant for public consumption. Or it could be that there is actually a growing rift between the two of them that is now maybe inadvertently at play.”

Their careers overlapped in San Francisco in the early 2000s, when Newsom was mayor and Harris was district attorney. Over the past two decades as Newsom rose to governor and Harris to U.S. senator, vice president and presidential candidate, they have shared voters, donors and political consultants and frequently appeared at events looking like the best of friends.

Before Biden named Harris as his heir apparent last summer — leaving Harris a truncated 107 days to campaign — Newsom was on the radar as a potential candidate himself. Could that missed phone call on the hiking trail, too, have been deliberate? (Newsom also told reporters he was busy trying to get more information of the Biden withdrawal when her call came in, apparently at the same time he was hiking.)

“If you look at how the dance has gone, they both have wanted to lead,” McCuan said. “But they both can’t be in that place. They have shared the same DNA, but these political cousins are not going to be breaking bread at Thanksgiving.”

But will they be sharing the same debate stage in 2028? Newsom will be termed out as governor by then and Harris has already announced she will not seek the governor’s office, as was widely assumed — leaving both top Democrats wide open for another political chapter.

The intense scrutiny her book has received even before its official publishing date “probably speaks to the fact that many people do see her still as a political figure with a future,” said UC San Diego Political Science Professor Thad Kousser.

Although Harris has been recognized for her candor in the book, she also has ruffled feathers with her comments, for instance, that Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro was too ambitious to be second in command, and that running mate Tim Walz, whom she praised, was her second choice. Her first choice, she said, was former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, whom she considered “too risky” to choose, believing voters wouldn’t choose a ticket with a Black woman and a gay man.

“She pulls no punches,” McCuan said. “That’s not exactly a recipe for building a team or alliances moving forward.”

Maybe none of it matters. Maybe her book was a farewell to her ambitions for higher office. But if not, the idea of a Harris-Newsom face-off in 2028 could make for interesting politics.

Would a deeply divided nation stoked up on Trump’s disparagement of all things California even consider giving a candidate from the Golden State another chance?

“Their brand names are as big as anyone in democratic politics,” Kousser said. “But they each have huge vulnerabilities and the great likelihood is that Democrats, at the end of the day, will steer far clear of having a Californian lead them.”