A cold day in hell

I woke up to another miserable morning. The heat coming off Tara's back pressed against mine left me sleeping in an uncomfortable sweat all night. She's developed a new annoying habit of not letting her hair be under me, and waits until I'm sleeping to throw her hair back and cover my face in it. Waking up to my world covered in red as her hair encompasses my face and shrouds my vision of the early morning sun is quickly working to drive me insane. I can't use magic on her, lest Millicent make me suffer for it, but a swift elbow into her back get my disapproving message across, and serves as a brutal alarm clock for the snobby ginger.

Upstairs, Alice and Bit have grown to living in a lovers harmony. They fall asleep in each others arms and wake up in a dreamlike embrace. As opposed to my violent method to waken my roommate, the lovers wake one another up sensually with a welcoming kiss.

It has been a week since Millicent issued her threat to Tara and me, and we have been doing everything in our power to not lay any more curses on each other. But it has not been easy.

During the day, sure, we go away with our own friend groups that we have made in the sorority, which less and less involves Alice or Bit, they are more concerned with spending personal time together - I can't really blame them for that. Despite the feud I had with Bit, that was just circumstantial of her working with Tara; had Tara not been around, I probably could have been good friends with Bit too; but even in that theory I still don't know her very well, so who's to say?

When Tara and I are are in the room together, it is a test of endurance. Her condescension has returned in full swing, and through I am fully capable of matching wits with her, it's not difficult to match her wit after all, it is exhausting to be switched on all the time. Just one time, if I miss a retort, or fumble my returning insult, that's the seat of power relinquished and she will have the upper hand against me. I need to be vigilant, I need to be ready to counter everything she says and not let her have the upperhand against me.

This thought consumed my mind as I stripped off my sweat damp pajamas and climbed into the shower. This shower was my sole solace when were in the room together. We share everything bar a toothbrush now, and although we do share the shower, we thankfully don't have to share it at the same time. Our shared towel in place, and our shared toiletries on the shelf embedded to the shower wall, I got ready to wash the stink of that bitch off me again.

When I closed the shower door, I was so focused, in my own head about past arguments with Tara, which gradually evolved into imaginary ones that we may have in the future, that I did not notice the magical seal that appeared on the door as I closed it, nor the identical one that grew to life at the tip of the shower head.

I turned the shower on, and was greeted with a torrent of frigid, ice cold water.

I pushed against the shower door, but it did not budge. I moved the shower dial way into the red, but the temperature did not change. Short of literal snow being jetted out of the shower head, it could not have been colder.

And then, as if I willed it into being, the shower became to cover my wet skin in bitterly cold snow.

Cursed!

THAT BITCH CURSED ME!!

EVEN AFTER MILLICENT'S THREAT! THE GINGER BITCH CURSED ME!!

Aggressively beating beating on the door, to either make it open or to shatter the glass to free me of this frozen prison, the magic held strong and kept me confined, kept me suffering.

The bathroom door opened and the smug grinning lips of my evil roommate made themselves known.

"You know," she said with malice, "cold showers are really good for the skin."

"YoU BItcH," I tried to shout through chattering teeth, "OpeN THe FUCkiNG DoOR!!"

"Oh, sweet Nicole, you've barely been in there 2 minutes," she mused, "you're not clean yet."

I glared at her while shivering in my snowy torture chamber, I wasn't giving her the satisfaction of rising me.

The showerhead changed from dispensing snow and turned back to jetting out ice cold water. The sudden assault from the water shocked me out of my fortitude and elicited a blood curdling scream as I fought to escape the path of the water, but the shower head followed me wherever I went.

"FuuucKK YOuuuuu," I shouted in my shivers.

"Witty," she sarcastically responded, "Come now roomie, I'm only trying to help. Your skin will be so healthy after this, and it helps your mood too, the cold sends all of the gloom out of your mind."

"ThennNn, youu shouuulld," I began, but the brutality of the cold stole words from my mouth and left me chattering with nothing to retort with.

Tara's eyes slanted and her head tilted as she grew a mocking smile, "Aren't I a great roommate, helping you like this?"

There was so much I wanted to say back to her, so much I wanted to do to throw her words back in her face and shut her up. But as it was, with the assault of freezing water turning my mind blank, I had to let her win this battle of words. I had to, for the time being, let her hold the power between us.

"Listen, sweety," she began, "if you really want out of there, it's simple..." Her mocking smile turned into one of pure sadism, "... just shower."

I looked at the cursed showerhead, confused.

"Oh, honey," fake sympathy eclipsed in her eyes and her grin turn to a frown of fake concern, "do you not know how to shower?"

Hugging my body, I glared bloody daggers into her.

"You see those pretty bottles on the wall?" She pointed to the toiletries on the shower shelves, my glare did break from her, "you use what's inside them to get yourself clean. Rub them into your hair and on your skin, and it gets all the dirt off." She giggled and looked up at the showerhead, "don't forget to rinse all the suds off too." She laughed loudly, "oh, and don't worry about frostbite or anything like that roomie, this is a shower to help you, it can't hurt you," she blew a kiss and turned for the door.

She paused and turned back towards me, "Oh, sorry, I forgot what I came in for," she said with fake sincerity, "I'm heading to the pool with some of the sisters, so I'll be needing the towel." And she snatched the towel off the rail, leaving me with nothing to dry the frost off me when I finally escaped this frozen over hell.

I glanced at the toiletries on the wall and then at the magical seal on the door. Releasing a shivering sigh, I reached for the shampoo and began lathering it into my hair. As I did, the showerhead changed to start filling the shower with snow again.

I had to stand there, shampoo lathered up in my hair, and wait for the showerhead to starting dispensing water again. As the snow laid on me, the dry power absorbed the cold water on my skin and gradually dried me. My skin became so dry that when the shower turned back to water, the thermo shock of the cold water engulfing my dry skin elicited another pained scream.

I needed to be quick, rinse my hair and move onto the next product.

Picking up the bottle of conditioner, nothing came out, I squeezed the bottle as hard as my freezing muscles could manage, but the bottle refused to relinquish its contents.

A glow caught my eye, and I turned to the shampoo bottle. On the side, the instructions "Later, Rinse, REPEAT" glowed brightly.

I cursed out Tara with every vulgarity I know and snatched the shampoo bottle off the wall. As I lathered my hair again, the showerhead switched back to snow again, and I screamed loudly in anger.

This went of for a tortuously long time. Products glowed in the order I needed to use them. Conditioner, bodywash, moisturizer, always a double lather and rinse, even for products where you don't need to do that. The constant loss of water, being replaced with snow, only made the whole ordeal take longer than it needed to, and then I finally finished in the shower, to the curse's liking, the jet of freezing water finally stopped. I burst through the shower door and fell to the warm floor, dripping in icy water with no towel to dry myself with.

Just because the curse stopped any long term harm from befalling me, doesn't mean I wasn't still freezing.

I ran into the bedroom and invaded Tara's side of the shared closet, taking her clothes and using them to dry the ice cold water off my body.

Even dry, I couldn't stop shivering. The cold had sunk deep and had nested in my soul. I needed to get warm.

Too afraid of my shower, I quickly got dressed and ran all the way up to Alice and Bit's room. Banging on the door, I pleased for Alice to open the door. Hearing some movement, my beautiful blonde best friend, wearing nothing but a rope, opened the door. Behind her, in the bed, I could see Bit, covered only in the duvet.

Still shivering, unable to escape the chill, I pleaded with my friend, "Alllicceee," I said through frozen lungs, "pleassseee, C-c-cannn I uuuuse your showwwer?"

"Jesus, Nicole, are you okay?" My concerned friend asked.

"T-T-Tara." I chattered.

"Did she curse you again?" She pondered, "Really?"

"She probably did," Bit called from the bed, "If she want's to do something, she will." She developed a sultry smirk, "we're alike in that sense," the implication made Alice blush.

"Come on in," Bit called to me, "use our shower."

Alice grew a happy smile and invited me in, but I paused, unsure of Bit's sudden hospitality.

"What's wrong?" Alice asked.

I glared at Bit, "I-i-it's fi-fine" I shivered.

Bit raised herself in the bed, the sheet barely covering her naked chest. "Look, Nicole, I know we had our fights last week and all, but I'm past it now," she said, "I have other, more important, things to concern myself with now than some silly pranks."

"Yeah, Nicole," Alice added, "You can trust me, come on in."

I turned to Alice, "s-sorry. I-I-I'll asssk sommeone elssse," and turned to knock on someone else's door.

Alice, heavy heartedly closed the door and turned with tears in her eyes to Bit, "Why didn't she trust me?" She asked her ex-rival.

The next sister I asked was very hospitable and let me in to use her shower. As I sat, under the steaming hot water, I plotted how I would get revenge on Tara. Where did she say she was going? To the pool?