Alice and Kathrine are thinking

Kathrine Smith was walking home to her freshman dorm back on campus, deep in her own thoughts. She had been quite confused when John had been a no-show at lunch today, and had considered it her sisterly duty to go and check on him after classes were finished for the day.

She frowned since, apparently, so had Alice for whatever reason. She was not sure where she and Alice stood, all things considered. She knew of Alice, was aware of her, but she had to admit that she hadn’t spoken a word or seen her face in years. And obviously the experience was mutual. The awkwardness between them was palpable.

“Kamila?” she said, imitating Alice, and snorted. She knew that it wasn’t particularly fair for her to be so prickly with Alice, but she was obligated as a good sister to take her brother’s side in this sort of thing. She hadn’t dated anyone in high school, but she was quite sure that if she had had a bad breakup, that John would return the favor and be just respectful but acidic towards her ex as she had been towards his.

Dating, she thought, glancing at a couple of students walking the other way, probably no older than her, hand in hand and chatting. She had to wonder when her big college glow up was supposed to happen, because she was expecting it any day now.

Of course, her eyes narrowing, there were still unanswered questions to ask John, like why Alice was even there. Or what he had done to make the place smell so weird, and what was that other, almost overpowering smell that had been in his room? It wasn’t every day that you just smelled something that made your brain become pulsing white noise, something like ammonia, or maybe seafood? She felt her stomach get hot and knotted again, just thinking about it.

That smell and what it did to her was weird and mysterious in a way that Kathrine knew she did not like and would make sure to get to the bottom of. She had friends who knew all sorts of things, she was sure that at least one of them could help her out, she thought as she walked through town, passing a shorter, lithe blonde girl carrying a backpack and shopping bag.

The blonde girl walked her own way along the streets, tracing nearly an identical path back to the apartment directly below yours as Kathrine had just taken, putting down a shopping bag at her feet, and fumbling for her keys. She patted one pocket after the other until she found them with a relieved sigh, and opened the door to her shared apartment.

“Who dares enter my private chambers?” hisses the hooded figure sitting in the middle of the floor of their shared living room, criss-cross applesauce, a heavy book open in front of them.

“It’s Beatrice my Lady, I bought the candles and incense that you asked for,” she casually says, while closing the door behind her.

“Oh,” the hooded figure replies sweetly, “thanks Beatrice. Money is on your desk.”

Beatrice sets the shopping bag down on the couch and walks through their apartment to their shared bedroom to set down her school bag, sighing and raising her arms above her head in a stretch. She blinks at the stack of bills sitting on her desk, wondering if her roommate actually knew how much candles and incense sticks cost, or if she was just getting really good at her manifestation spells, and flopped down on her bed, flicking on the string lights that were the main source of illumination in the room, the blinds all drawn tightly closed and covered with a tapestry.

“Do you remember if we are still going to have the club movie night here tonight?” she called through the apartment to the living room while pulling out a book.

“We decided last night to move it to tomorrow night,” the voice came back, “Felicity won’t be able to make it, she has a meeting happening this evening with the Anime and Manga Club that she can’t miss.”

“Oh,” Beatrice replies, “ok.” She snuggled up under her covers, reaching over to turn on her candle warmer, and settling in for a cozy afternoon with a sigh.

Alice tapped her finger against the steering wheel of her car anxiously, lost in her own thoughts while sitting at a stop light. She didn’t know exactly what she had expected from going to John’s apartment out of the blue. At first she was just relieved that he wasn’t a vegetable from some brain trauma he had suffered last night. Then she was embarrassed. She still felt embarrassed. Firstly, from gawking at him in his sleep clothes. Secondly, from coming face to face with John’s sister named― she’d already forgotten her name again.

“Shit,” Alice snapped, gripping the wheel. She had also forgotten in the years since last seeing John’s family how tall and imposing that girl could be, even if it seemed unintentionally. She was always so dour and quiet, and just as painfully awkward as she was. And she had seemed, what, off? Weird?

“Well,” Alice sighs, thinking that it would be kind of rich to go after John’s sister for being weird, considering both herself, and more now than ever, John. Thirdly, she thought, he had walked out there in front of her, and accidently his sister, either unaware or not caring that he was popping a stiffy that made it look like he was trying to hide a cucumber in his shorts.

Alice felt her throat suddenly go dry. She didn’t want to admit to herself that her insides had tensed at seeing that very very clear impression of his manhood straining against fabric. And then, still hard as a rock, he had inhaled an entire pot of soup. Part of her wanted to point out that that was weird and also kind of gross. But another part of her had been quite pleased by the feeling of satisfying his hunger, hoping that he’d need her to satisfy his other―

“I need to get laid,” she chuckled to herself, anxiously tapping the steering wheel again, and pushing the offending thought away. She frowned. It was not her fault, she thought, that between classes and the archive project that she had been unable to find the time to even go out and flirt with college boys. It was not her fault, she thought, that college boys seemed immune to her charm, or otherwise completely ambivalent to it, even after she had down a couple of jagerbombs and done her best to look as **** as possible.

“Nothing to be done about it now,” she sighed again, pulling into her apartment parking lot. She’d have the weekend to digest and then repress what she had seen over the last 24 hours, ready to go back to the same old way things had been between her and John since the start of the semester, mutual disinterest and détente.

She parked her car and went to unbuckle her seatbelt and notice the apron that she was still wearing.

John’s apron.

“Well shit,” she huffed.