Chapter Text
Ingrid should’ve never asked Hilda about her love life because it reminded her just how boring her current life was and a little about just how long it’d been since she’d last gotten laid.
“And then–I swear to the Goddess this guy had suuuuch a complex because he kept talking about how expensive his jeans were and how much money his dad has–”
“Hilda,” interrupted Ingrid.
“Right. Anyway, I think he got condoms that were too big for his dick because I was afraid it was gonna fly off when he asked me to ride it.”
“That’s bad,” frowned Leonie. “That’s really bad. It could have slipped off and you could’ve gotten pregnant–”
“Right. And that’s why I’m dedicated to my birth control. And why I’m not seeing him again.” Hilda brushed her bangs out of her eyes. “Ugh. This is why you can’t trust people on Rellik. Or any dating apps–they all suck.”
“Then why are you still on them?” Dorothea tilted her head, half-curious, half-amused.
“Because I’m horny! Thea!” Hilda threw up her hands. “Duh!”
Dorothea laughed again. “Okay, well, maybe you should solicit a dick pic next time so you can pre-buy the size he actually needs.”
“Ask him to hold up a ruler next to it, too,” added Leonie. “To verify.”
Ingrid blinked, aghast. “Is that allowed?”
“What? Knocking down an ego or two?” The corner of Hilda’s mouth twitched.
“No. Explicit photos.” Ingrid gestured. “Like, wouldn’t that go against some kind of policy?”
Hilda fully turned to her from where she was sitting on the bed. She crawled forward by her knees until she was at the edge and reached out to grab Ingrid by the shoulders. Ingrid shifted in the chair, trying not to accidentally rotate and seem like she was running from the conversation.
“Ingrid,” said Hilda very seriously. Behind her, Leonie and Dorothea looked thoroughly amused.
She swallowed. “What?”
“It’s a sex app.” Hilda shook her by the shoulders once, and very gently. “Rellik is like almost exclusively for hookups. Of course a dick pic is allowed.”
“Oh,” said Ingrid.
“Oh.” Hilda smiled and leaned back. “The regular apps like Buzz and Swing don’t allow pictures, but yeah Rellik is for horny bastards like me.”
“Oh.” Ingrid kept her gaze solidly focused on Hilda’s wide eyes because she felt that if she looked away for even a second, she’d have to admit that she was flustered and then her whole face would flush red and Hilda would never let her live it down.
Another horrifying thought: she was actually curious about the app.
She must’ve been making a face because Hilda reached out to pat her shoulder. “It’s okay, Ingrid. I know this must be outside of your sensibilities, but this is what the kids are doing nowadays.”
Ingrid’s expression flatlined. “Hilda, I’m a year younger than you.”
“Oh, Goddess, I forgot that.” Hilda scrambled backward. “Forget I said anything. I can’t be tainting the youth!”
Ingrid rolled her eyes. “Why don’t you worry about getting your part of the communications project done first before you–”
“Hey! Did I tell you guys that there’s an update to the Agatha-Edith situation?” Leonie cut in strategically. “Turns out, Edith did have a girlfriend!”
“What!” Hilda shrieked and spun towards Leonie. “Holy shit. What was Agatha’s reaction?”
At the same moment, Dorothea shifted over to Ingrid’s corner of the bed and slipped their hands together. Ingrid saw the distraction for what it was, but it felt good to have her palm against Dorothea’s–a grounding force, a reprieve from the present moment. Dorothea tilted her head sideways until it landed on Ingrid’s shoulder. Then, she cast her glance up.
“Having fun?” she murmured.
Ingrid huffed a laugh as Hilda gasped loudly at whatever detail Leonie just revealed. “I am. Thank you for checking.”
Dorothea squeezed her hand again before settling in.
The rest of the night passed in a more safe-for-work manner. As Leonie closed up the story of the drama of two girls on her rugby team, and Dorothea then shifted into talking about her routine pining after the beautiful white-haired girl in her comparative politics class, Ingrid finally decided that the night had turned out peacefully after all.
-
Except that the moment Ingrid stepped outside, she installed that Rellik app that gave Hilda that mortifying hookup story. She was just checking it out, downloading it out of curiosity, wanting to see how this sort of app differed from the standard dating apps–or so she told herself. But in truth, Ingrid had tried apps like Buzz and Swing with “short-term relationship” listed as her dating goal, but really she didn’t want to date anyone right now. The mortifying thing to admit was that she was actually just losing her mind in this year-and-a-half long dry spell.
Glenn Fraldarius, her first and only boyfriend and long-term relationship, had broken up with her around a year and a half ago. Right around his graduation–though not immediately after graduation because that would look horribly tasteless from any outside perspective. Before that had happened, she’d asked him to come to her new apartment so she could give him a tour. He’d responded cordially, with about as much emotion as he usually did over text, meaning: very little, as he was quite the dry texter.
She’d smiled when she opened the door to greet him. Grabbed his wrists to tug him inside. When he didn’t take off his shoes, she looked up at him, only to find that he had suddenly started crying.
Ingrid had known, then, immediately. “Are you breaking up with me?”
He’d made a weak, keening sound instead of answering.
But nevermind that. The point was: a little over a year and a half ago was the last time she’d gotten laid, and it was frighteningly embarrassing to admit that. She knew there was no reason to be, considering how openly Hilda and her other friends could speak about it, but it was less embarrassing that she hadn’t gotten laid and more that she wanted to.
She could picture it now: Dorothea telling her she was proud of Ingrid for admitting it; Sylvain laughing his ass off before teasingly asking her if she wanted tips; Hilda toasting to the perfectly normal existence of Ingrid’s libido, and Ingrid crawling into the nearest sewer grate to drown and escape her misery.
The app prompted her to add photos to her profile.
She blew out a laugh as she started scrolling through her album. “Am I really doing this?” she asked to the air, to the cicadas, to the quiet streets of the residential neighborhoods surrounding GMU.
Another text banner answered her.
[23:11] headache #1: still out at girls niight?
Ingrid snorted. Sylvain’s timing was truly something to talk about.
[23:11] You: Just left. I have class at 9 tomorrow
[23:12] headache #1: are u wit doroateha?
[23:13] You: No, she decided to stay longer because she doesn’t have class until noon
[23:14] headache #1: want a walking buddy?
[23:14] headache #1: it’s dangerous to go alone!! take this!!!
Sylvain’s contact photo–a shot of him at eighteen, sitting on the couch while he tried to drink applesauce post-wisdom teeth removal through his swollen cheeks and drooling mouth–suddenly lit up her screen with two buttons at the bottom corner to either accept or deny the call.
Ingrid couldn’t help herself–she laughed. Then, she slid up to accept and held the phone to her ear.
“Hello?” She didn’t bother to keep the amusement out of her voice.
“Hiiiiiii, Ingrid,” he sang through the phone.
“Are you drunk?”
Sylvain scoffed. “What? No, not on a school night.”
“High?”
The phone went silent for a moment, then a laugh. “How did you know?”
She snorted and shifted her phone to the other ear. “I need to record you sometime just to show you how you sound and act when you’re high. Also, your texting gave it away.”
“Whaaaat? No way!”
Ingrid rolled her eyes. “Okay, check your texts tomorrow when you’re sober, then.”
Sylvain made a series of disgruntled noises before settling. He sighed into the phone, a little breathless exhale that came from physical exertion rather than sorrow.
“Grid,” he said.
“What?”
“What are you up to?”
Setting up my profile on Hilda’s sex app. Except now, she was talking to Sylvain, pretending like nothing had happened and feeling mildly ashamed of what she’d done.
“Walking home?” she settled.
“Right, right, right, right, right, right.” Sylvain hummed through the phone. There was a sound like he’d risen from the couch or the bed or wherever he was and was now shuffling through his apartment. “How was girls’ night?”
Ingrid let out a quiet sigh. “It was good. I, once again, learned way too much about Hilda’ sex life.”
Sylvain laughed.
“Leonie updated us on the Agatha-Edith situation–Edith did have a girlfriend, by the way–”
“I fucking called it! Did you tell Leonie that I called it? Because I did–”
“And Dorothea still won’t ask Edelgard out.”
Sylvain let out a disgruntled sigh that half sounded like a snarl. “Coward. I’ll do it first and see how she likes dealing with the consequences of hesitating–”
“Do not. Dorothea will throw out your guest towel and scrub the toilet with your toothbrush.”
Sylvain groaned, long and pitifully into the microphone until the last of his breath hissed out. Then, he mumbled, “Fine, fine. What about you?”
The question startled her. “What about me?”
“What were your life updates for girls’ night?” Another muffled sound. He must have rolled into his pillows, which meant he was likely laying on his bed.
“You already know everything that’s going on with me.”
Ingrid looked both ways before quickly crossing the street. She kept her eyes on the passing houses before she spotted the alleyway between them that cut into the next street and followed that down.
“Yeah, but what did you talk about with them about you?”
The next street down from Hilda and Leonie’s place was always startlingly dark compared to theirs. This also happened to be the street that she and Dorothea lived on: narrow, cramped, canopied by trees that turned into a beautiful fire in the fall, and crammed full of cars. In the thin sliver of sky where the tree branches were crown shy, the yellow moon peered down at the street like some great eye.
Ingrid chewed her lip, thinking. After a moment, she said, “They asked me about Glenn. Like, how I was doing.”
“Yeah?” Sylvain’s voice was neither carefully neutral nor vibrantly alarmed. Maybe it was the weed, or maybe he really was calm about the Glenn situation. “How are you doing with that?”
She started counting houses again, glad, at least, for the fact that he wasn’t treating her delicately. “I’m okay, I think–no, I am doing okay. Really. It doesn’t hurt to think about him anymore and he almost feels like this stranger in my head and I feel like when I picture him, it’s hard to pull up his face sometimes. I feel more grateful to him now, and I’m glad that he was my first boyfriend because he was a really good one. I just think our lives didn’t match up and I understand that.”
She reached the bottom of her apartment complex. Ingrid shifted her phone to her other ear and used her right hand to grab the railing as she climbed the stairs.
“That’s good. That’s amazing! I’m really happy for you.”
There was a genuine smile in Sylvain’s voice, so infectious that she couldn’t help but return it, even if he couldn’t see it.
“Thank you, Sylvain.”
“Always, Grid.”
When Ingrid reached the third floor, she was only a little winded. She fumbled to pull out her keys before she spoke again, “I made it home.”
“Without a kidnapping.” Sylvain sounded self-satisfied. “You’re welcome.”
“I could’ve made it fine without you,” she scoffed through her smile as she pushed the door open. “I’ve done it before.”
“You’re welcome for my company then. That you can’t get on your own.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Ingrid kicked her shoes off. “Goodnight, Sylvain.”
“Goodnight, Ingrid.” He was smiling again. She could hear it. “Don’t stay up too late studying.”
Then, before she could make some kind of comment about how he was the one to talk, Sylvain hung up.
Slowly, Ingrid pulled the phone away from her ear. The screen woke quietly at the new distance, and when she unlocked it again, she found herself right where she had left off before Sylvain’s call–Rellik’s profile creation screen.
Goddess, she’d gotten sidetracked. Ingrid considered the time, then considered her alarm and how she had almost six and a half hours until it went off, and finally decided to call it. Maybe this hookup app was a stupid idea, born from the frothing turmoil of her fatigue-addled brain. She wasn’t going to make a profile and she wasn’t going to make a rash decision to sleep with a stranger who could murder her or give her herpes or had bad breath or didn’t know how to kiss without shoving their whole tongue in someone’s mouth. That life was for Hilda and Sylvain, and she truly applauded the both of them for staying safe and alive every single time, but it wasn’t for Ingrid.
Spurred on by the sudden clarity of her decision, Ingrid rose from her spot on the ground and went to get ready for bed, now certain of her resolve.
-
Except for two hours later when she found she couldn’t sleep. In another moment of weakness, Ingrid turned over and grabbed her phone. She opened the Rellik app, and fortunately (or unfortunately) saw that her profile had saved despite being in the middle of editing.
Ingrid sighed. With more curiosity now than resolve, she uploaded her remaining photos, typed a few non-committal answers into the prompt windows, and saved her profile before sending it into the atmosphere. She tossed her phone onto the nightstand. Then, she closed her eyes and sent a prayer to Seiros herself that Hilda would not find her on that app.
-
“And after I said that I liked contemporary poetry more than old poetry, she agreed with me! And then–” Dorothea held her finger out for silence, even though Ingrid had not spoken in the past five minutes. “She asked me if I wanted to go to that new indie bookstore in the market with her!”
“So, she asked you out.”
Dorothea’s face, already spectacularly pink, deepened into a violent shade of red. “I–well. She might have–I mean, we’re just friends, so–I don’t want to assume–”
Ingrid sighed and turned back to her laptop. “Dorothea, there’s a certain amount of delusion I’m willing to entertain, but my fifteen problem p-set is due on Friday and I still need to figure out what questions to ask before I go to office hours tomorrow. So, all I can say to you is that Edelgard definitely asked you out on a date.”
Dorothea squeaked. Then, “...Are you sure?”
Ingrid gave her a flat look. “Dorothea. Yes–”
Her phone dinged.
“One second.” Ingrid held up a finger before grabbing her phone and unlocking it. There was a single notification on the screen from Rellik:
You and K matched. Tap here to read K’s message.
Ingrid’s heart thumped in her chest. With careful nonchalance, she opened the app and read the message.
[11:36] K: Heard u needed some help finding someone who could fold you in half?
Her chest burned. Ingrid had written something lame and horny in her bio about wanting to get folded in half because she didn’t want to have nothing written there, but now that her senseless words were being thrown back at her, she could feel her face heating from embarrassment.
“What?” Dorothea jerked her upper body over the table to try and see Ingrid’s phone. “What? What is that?”
Ingrid jerked back and hid her phone, which was absolutely the wrong move because Dorothea’s eyes lit up with mischief and curiosity.
“Is it a boy? A girl?” Dorothea grabbed for the phone again.
“Nothing!” Ingrid batted her away. “It’s nothing.”
Dorothea slid back into her seat after that because she was a sweetheart and could hear the seriousness in Ingrid’s tone. She gave Ingrid a gentle smile. “Alright, alright.”
Ingrid blinked. Then, she took a deep breath and pulled her phone away from her chest. She read the message again, heart still hammering against her ribs, and realized very quickly that she had no idea how to respond.
She’d been in one relationship in her life and very little flirting had been involved on her part. She’d simply had a crush on Glenn for most of her life and then one day he’d randomly asked her out and the rest was history.
This, though, was a complete stranger and she couldn’t come up with a single witty, flirtatious, or inviting response that didn’t make her cringe to hell and back. She had no practice in this. What the fuck was she supposed to say?
She glanced up. Dorothea was back to staring at her laptop screen, tapping the head of her pen against a burgundy lip, eyebrows furrowed. She must have been deep in thought if she didn’t even notice her lipstick coming off on her pen.
“Dorothea,” said Ingrid before realizing with a stuttered realization that she’d spoken aloud.
Dorothea’s green eyes slid over and caught on Ingrid’s. “Yeah?”
Ingrid swallowed. It was too late to change her mind now.
“Can…can you, um, help me with something?” She clenched her fingers around her phone.
Dorothea gave her an easy smile. “Yeah, of course! What is it?”
Ingrid took a deep breath and handed Dorothea the phone. “What, um, what should I say to this?”
Dorothea’s eyes sparkled again, but she pressed her lips together to keep calm as she grabbed the phone. However, the moment she read the message, her eyes lit up.
“Did you install Rel–”
“Shh!” Ingrid looked around furtively. They were sitting at a table outside the library to enjoy the nice weather that straddled between the end of summer and the start of fall, and though most of the students around them were either walking past them to class or going directly into the library, the idea of any strangers eavesdropping on their conversation made her want to combust. “Yes, yes I did.”
“Ingrid!” Dorothea covered her mouth with her hand as if scandalized, but her eyes were smiling.
“Thea,” said Ingrid flatly.
Dorothea took the hint and grabbed Ingrid’s phone before she could snatch it back. She leaned back in her seat, eyes scanning back and forth across the screen, presumably reading the message. Then her thumb lifted up and tapped across the screen.
“What are you writing?” Ingrid sat up anxiously.
“Nothing,” said Dorothea. “I’m just looking at your profile.”
“What?” Ingrid lunged over the table, but Dorothea dodged gracefully. “Wait, no, no, no, you’re not allowed to look at that–”
“These pictures are so cute, Ingrid.” Dorothea stood up to dodge Ingrid’s next attempt at grabbing the phone. “Aww, did I take this picture?”
Ingrid paused. “Which one?”
Dorothea flipped the phone around. “This one! You look so happy.”
In this photo, Ingrid was standing under a tree, three-quarters of her body turned toward the camera, mid-motion, as if someone had called her name. Dorothea had called her name in the gardens that day, but it was immediately followed by Sylvain yelling, “Shit, fuck. Fuck, shit. Ingrid? Ingrid! INGRID, TELL HILDA TO STOP TRYING TO TAKE MY SHIRT OFF!” And then, from Hilda, “Stop being a coward and lemme see those Gautier milkers!”
Ingrid had burst out laughing, and Dorothea had caught that on camera: her smile, unpolished and unbridled, wrapped in the sunlight that had broken through the trees. She’d been wearing baggy overalls that day and her hair was still long, pulled into a thick braid; and it was the first time in a month, post-breakup, that she’d left her apartment in more than a T-shirt and gym shorts, because Sylvain and Dorothea had forcibly dragged her out of her bed, one arm each, and told her to get dressed for the gardens downtown.
“I was.” She smiled at the old photo. “It was a good memory.”
Dorothea smiled, too. “It was.”
Immediately after the photo, Sylvain had full-body slammed into Ingrid, nearly knocking the both of them to the ground. She swore at him up and down after that asking if he was five, asking how the hell was he almost a Bachelor’s degree holder, asking if it’d been so long since she last beat him up as kids that he needed a reminder of what it felt like.
Sylvain had grinned at her through the whole tirade. At the time, she thought he was being insolent. Looking back on it now, he’d probably just been happy that she yelled at him because it meant she was opening back up again after the breakup. He’d thrown his arm around her shoulder and tugged her close afterward, saying something cheeky and obnoxious like, “Hilda can’t grab my shirt if you’re shielding me.”
Dorothea swiped her finger up the screen. “This one, though, is kind of giving choir performance. Why are you wearing tights in this picture–”
“Dorothea!”
“I think you need some more exciting photos for Rellik–”
“What’s Relic?”
Sylvain’s voice felt like a thunderclap in her ear, no static or wind to warn of his arrival, just the split second of his shadow falling over hers before his disarmingly amiable voice sent her tumbling to the ground in alarm.
“Ingrid?”
“Holy shit are you okay?”
Ingrid blinked the black spots out of her vision until she could see the paved ground where her elbow had scraped against the pavement. Little pebbles bit into her palm from where she was bracing herself against the ground, her bones a little knocked around, the sudden jolted panic from earlier suddenly lost in the muddlement of her thoughts.
A hand appeared in her vision. Ingrid took it without fully registering who it belonged to until it pulled her up and put her face to face with Sylvain’s chest.
“Where the hell did you come from?” She blinked a few more times.
“The union.” His voice came above her. When she looked up, his gaze snagged on hers like a magnet. “You good?”
Ingrid blinked and shook her head, taking a step back. “Yeah, fine. You just startled me.”
Sylvain let out a snort. “No shit. Are you sure you’re good?” He gestured to her elbow.
Ingrid covered it with her hand, careful not to touch any of the parts that were actually bleeding. “I’m fine.” She scrutinized him because she didn’t know how else to divert the conversation, and realized that he was wearing a white button-up and black dress pants. The sleeves were rolled up to his elbows very professionally, and his hair was artfully slicked back. “Why are you all dressed up?”
“The career fair was today.” Sylvain nodded towards the student union across the quad. “I had to dress up to impress my future employers.”
“You look nice.” Dorothea nodded.
Sylvain brightened considerably. “Really?” He looked at Ingrid. “What do you think, Ingrid? Do you think I’ll be able to get a job?”
“Looking the part is only half the battle.” She tugged at the side of his collar so it looked a little more crooked, a little more like the Sylvain she’d grown up with. “You also have to be competent at your job.”
“Which I will be once I get one.” He grinned at her.
“Don’t sound so smug until you actually get one, you nepo baby.”
Sylvain scoffed. “I am not a nepo baby. You know my dad sucks.”
“He sucks, but you still have his name attached to your resume.”
“I can’t not put my full name on my resume, Grid. That’s even more suspicious!”
Ingrid laughed, and even though Sylvain was rolling his eyes, she could tell that he was pleased he’d made her laugh.
He turned back to look at Ingrid’s phone in Dorothea’s hand. “You never answered my question: what is Relic?”
The warmth from her amusement quickly leeched out of Ingrid.
“Oh! It’s…” Dorothea shot her a questioning look.
Ingrid only sighed. She’d known Sylvain since they were young enough to both need naps. Hell, she, Sylvain, Felix, and Dimitri had even taken naps in the same room! They had all had temper tantrums together, had been placed in timeouts because of each other, had gone through puberty with each other, lived through embarrassing first crushes and then dates and then whatever else. They’d all made it to Garreg Mach together and they were still friends. It wasn’t worth the energy trying to hide Rellik from Sylvain now, no matter how mortifying it would end up.
She gestured with her hand in Dorothea’s direction, as if to say, Go ahead.
“It’s…like a dating app,” said Dorothea slowly.
A spark of energy zipped down her spine, the way confessions felt when first dropped, before hitting the ground.
One beat. And then Sylvain’s eyes widened. “Holy shit. A dating app? You?”
Ingrid bristled, crossing her arms self-consciously. “What about it?”
“Nothing! Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.” Sylvain’s eyes darted around, as if frantically trying to find words. “I just meant–like, do you think you’re ready to date again?”
Another zip. “Uh, I…”
Ingrid glanced at Dorothea helplessly. Dorothea looked back at her, making the kind of expression that seemed to suggest, You have to make that choice.
“What?” Sylvain’s voice didn’t sound anymore confused or urgent, but Ingrid could feel some invisible clock ticking down inside her.
“Um,” she said. “Not…necessarily.”
Sylvain furrowed his eyebrows. “What does that mean? Are you just looking for a short-term thing? Dates? Hookups?”
Ingrid blanched. “Well–”
Sylvain’s eyes widened further. “Holy fucking shit. Ingrid Brandl Galatea, are you on this dating app for hookups?”
“So what if I am?” She glared at him, feeling defensive. “I always hear about your hookups but the moment I decide to–”
“Wait, wait, no, Ingrid. Stop. I’m not judging you.” He held his hands out in surrender. “I’m just–surprised. I just never thought you’d be the kind of person who’d be into that.”
“I’m not–” Her face flamed. “Just–just come here.”
She gestured jerkily for Dorothea and Sylvain to come back to the table. When she sat down, they followed. Then, she leaned forward.
“I,” she began very spectacularly. “Have been…a bit…um…”
“Horny?” offered Sylvain.
She kicked him under the table and ignored the subsequent pathetic yelp that came out of his mouth. “Yes. I mean, it’s been over a year since Glenn broke up with me, so I thought…”
“You could get yourself a dick appointment?” Sylvain snickered.
Ingrid kicked him hard enough to pull out a string of curses and a wounded, “Ingrid!” noise.
“If you make fun of me again, I’m aiming for your balls,” she threatened.
“I wasn’t making fun of you!” Sylvain still pulled his backpack protectively into his lap, though.
“Anyway!” Ingrid swallowed, once again trying to muster the courage to continue. “I just–I installed this app because Hilda was telling us about it. And–I just matched with this guy. And I didn’t know what to say. So, I asked Dorothea to help me answer, but then she just started looking through my profile.”
Sylvain brightened. “Can I look at your profile?”
“NO!” Ingrid covered her phone screen in Dorothea’s hand. Dorothea then laid her other hand on top, as if in solidarity. “You cannot.”
“What the hell? Why not?” Sylvain furrowed his eyebrows again. “Have I not known you since birth, Ingrid? Have we not been there for each other for all our lives? Did we not become knights under Dimitri’s rule when we were children and did we not fight alongside each other to vanquish our foes? Did we–”
“Oh, fuck yourself.” Ingrid didn’t kick him this time, though she desperately wanted to. “I just don’t want you to judge it.”
“Ingrid, I would never judge you,” he said very sincerely. “Have I ever truly judged you for anything before?”
She automatically gave him a flat look, but when she thought about it, nothing really came up.
“Then, I don’t want you to make any stupid comments,” she finally said.
“I would never–”
“Sylvain.”
A beat. Then, Sylvain sighed. “Okay, proposal: You let me look at your profile and I won’t say a word about it. Then, I can help you and Dorothea help you figure out what to say to that guy.”
“Why would I need your help?” She crossed her arms.
“Because I don’t think Dorothea’s dated a man in at least a decade and I happen to know a thing or two about flirting.”
“Hey, I went on a date with a guy in my geometry class in high school,” protested Dorothea.
“The same guy that you left halfway through because you got bored of talking to him?”
“That–” Dorothea’s face flushed a pretty shade of pink. “It's not my fault that he was boring. A lot of men are terrible at conversation, which is why I don’t bother with them anymore. And anyway, I resent the fact that you think you’re qualified to give better advice just because I don’t date men anymore. I know flirting, and I could pull any of your past girlfriends with less effort and lame pickup lines–”
“Is that what you’re doing with Edelgard?” Sylvain snickered. “Staring at her from across the lecture hall until she feels your flirting?”
Dorothea’s eyes flashed. “Sylvain, I am going to end your family line with you–”
“Guys!” Ingrid slammed her hands on the table, loud enough that it sent the birds streaking out of the trees away from the noise. Some students sitting on the quad sat up to look in their direction. She just ignored them and resigned to rubbing the headache out of her temples. “Can we have the dick waving competition not in front of the library?”
Dorothea sat down, red. Sylvain, as usual, didn’t look the least bit ashamed.
“Also, Edelgard asked me out today, so it’s working in some capacity,” muttered Dorothea.
“No shit?” Sylvain brightened. “Hey, congrats!”
“Thank you.” Dorothea sniffed delicately. “Anyway, I think flirting is mostly the same no matter what. You just have to show that you are interested and invite more conversation.”
“Yup,” agreed Sylvain.
Ingrid glanced back and forth between them. Dorothea still had her phone, but the screen was off now. Ingrid figured that it wouldn’t hurt to get more input since the both of them were already here; so, she sighed and grabbed her phone, unlocking it before she slid it towards Sylvain.
“Don’t judge me,” she repeated. “And you’re not allowed to like anyone or message anyone or go anywhere else on my phone except my profile.”
“I would never,” said Sylvain solemnly.
She cut him a half-hearted glare before she leaned back in her seat, opening her laptop back to the paper she’d been in the middle of working on. She rifled through a couple tabs to make sure all of her sources were in order before she started writing again, but it was no use; all she could focus on was Sylvain in her peripheral, more silent than he’d ever been in his life as he swiped through her phone.
“This is a good photo,” he finally said.
Ingrid slammed her laptop shut just in time to see Dorothea lean over and nod. “Yeah, I pointed that one out, too.”
“Are you done looking?” snapped Ingrid, more on the pleading side than the irritated side.
Sylvain shot her a devious little smile before he set the phone back down. “Alright, Ingrid. What is the message you need help with?”
Ingrid sighed heavily. This was absolutely the most mortifying thing she’d ever done in her life and she wondered why she thought showing Sylvain was a good idea, but he and Dorothea were sitting there now with her secrets exposed and she almost felt like all this stress had to amount to something, or it would have been a waste.
Idiot, thought Ingrid to herself as she swiped out of her profile and into her messages. Fool.
She read K’s message one more time, felt a rush of white-hot humiliation burn through her, and then shoved the phone back across the table.
“Just–” Ingrid covered her face. “I don’t know what to say. I don’t know how to flirt. Should I joke? Am I supposed to be witty to that or is that cringe and roleplay-y? I don’t know. I don’t know. Don’t judge me.”
“We would never,” said Sylvain.
“I would never,” said Dorothea pointedly.
“I wouldn’t either!”
“I’m going to delete this stupid app,” groaned Ingrid.
“No, don’t!” Dorothea grabbed the phone again. “I would just say something like, ‘Oh, and you could help me find someone?’”
“No, don’t say that.” Sylvain shook his head. “Say something more direct. Guys are stupid like that.”
Ingrid and Dorothea raised their eyebrows at him.
“Except for me, of course,” he added. “I’ve picked up on every cue a woman has ever given me ever.
“And the cues they don’t give you,” muttered Dorothea.
“Excuse me?”
“Oh, do you want me to remind you of what you said to me when we first met when I was clearly talking to my then-girlfriend on the phone–”
“I couldn’t hear her voice, okay? I already said I was sorry–”
“What do you think I should say, then, Sylvain?” interrupted Ingrid.
Dorothea and Sylvain looked at each other again, then at Ingrid, and then sheepishly moved away from each other again. Dorothea handed him the phone without looking at him.
“Hmm,” he murmured after a moment. “I’d just say yes and ask when he’s free.”
“Boo, that’s boring,” said Dorothea.
“And terrifying.” Ingrid stared at Sylvain, appalled. “That’s so–direct. I feel like that’s way too fast.”
He gave her a flat look. “You’re on a hookup app, aren’t you?”
Ingrid paused. Then, her face heated. “Yeah…”
“Besides, I think a lot of guys prefer directness. I know I do.” Sylvain set the phone back on the table. “Quick. Less room left for doubt. Time efficient.”
“‘Efficient,’” scoffed Dorothea. “And here I thought you enjoyed the game of it all.”
“I do,” said Sylvain. “But I enjoy the game more in certainty.”
“You are such a fuckboy–”
Ingrid picked up a phone to give herself an excuse to ignore them. She stared at the message. As she watched the cursor in the textbox blink in and out of existence, she thought of the two options presented to her: coy and direct.
The former she did not have the patience for and the latter not the courage. The hard part about asking your friends how to respond to messages was the way it created this false persona you had to uphold in the rest of the conversation. Ingrid couldn’t ask Dorothea and Sylvain to proofread every message Ingrid would send to K because they were all busy people and, quite frankly, Ingrid still couldn’t get over the embarrassment.
What could she say?
The answer found her only a moment later. To the backdrop of two of her best friends arguing loudly in the open outdoor air, Ingrid typed a message.
“Okay, I sent it,” she announced.
Dorothea and Sylvain froze.
“What?” asked Sylvain.
“You did?” Dorothea shot up from her seat in delight. “Ingrid, I’m so proud of you! Let me see, let me see!”
Ingrid set her phone on the table and quickly opened her laptop again as if to shield herself from their judgment.
There was none, though, because a moment later, Dorothea slid the phone back. “Perfect. Great response.”
“Thanks,” said Ingrid, face warm.
“What did you think, Gautier?” Dorothea cut a glance at Sylvain.
“I don’t know. You didn’t let me read it!” He looked at Ingrid, then her phone, then back at her again. “Can I read it?”
Another rush of embarrassment flushed through her and she yanked her phone back. “You missed your chance.”
A devious grin pulled at the corners of his mouth. “Oh? Then should I only assume the vulgarity of your language? I bet you wrote something like, ‘Oh K, I was just wondering about who could fold me in half when I thought of your huge, enormous, ginormous, engorged, vascular, swollen, throbbing, weighty, girthy, engorged–”
“You used that one already.”
“Normally, you stop me by now.” Sylvain tilted his head.
Ingrid chuckled. “I just wanted to see if you were actually brave enough to finish the sentence.”
Sylvain raised a challenging eyebrow at her. Then, before she could stop him, he tipped his head up to the open skies and yelled, “PENIS!”
The word echoed through the air in time with the wingbeats of birds fleeing from the trees. A few heads on the quad turned to look at them before quickly returning back to whatever textbooks they were bleeding over.
“I did it. What do I get?” Sylvain tipped that grin at her again.
“Get out of here.” She shoved at him, palm to face. “I know you have class at four.”
Sylvain laughed into her hand as he stood and scooped his bag up off the ground. “Yes, Mom.”
She rolled her eyes.
As she opened her laptop to work on her paper again and give her an excuse to stop giving Sylvain attention, she heard Sylvain’s palm land on the table one more time.
“Hey, Ingrid.”
She sighed loudly and looked up. “What?”
Sylvain was grinning at her with all of his teeth showing. There was an amused glint in his eye as he said, very earnestly, “I’m proud of you.”
She shoved her hand at his face again. “Don’t be. Just get out of here.”
Sylvain laughed again and stepped back. He gave the both of them a perfunctory wave before disappearing down a trail on the quad.
“I’m never telling him about this again,” muttered Ingrid.
“It’s okay.” Dorothea placed a sympathetic hand on her wrist. “At least you have me.”
And thank the Goddess for that.
-
[11:36] K: Heard u needed some help finding someone who could fold you in half?
[12:02] IG: I am. Are you offering your services?
-
A few hours later, at the Faerghus Four weekly movie night, Ingrid’s phone buzzed with a notification.
[20:02] K: I am. U wanna see what I’m working with?
She screamed and fell off the couch.
Felix winced and glanced back. “Ahhh, what the hell, Ingrid?”
“Sorry! Sorry.” She scrambled to climb back into her seat next to Dimitri. “Just, uh, Dorothea is having a crisis.”
Dimitri turned his head. “Oh no, is she alright?”
“Yeah, just–” She could feel Sylvain’s eyes on her all the way from where he was sitting on the floor. “Dating crisis. She–”
“Oh, did she finally ask Edelgard out?” continued Dimitri, mild-mannered and pleasant.
“Edelgard asked her out. But yes.” Ingrid stood. “I’m. Going to go text her. You guys can keep the movie going, I’ll be back.”
She stood and hurried down the hall to the bathroom, fully intending to sit catatonically on the floor until Dorothea texted her back on what to say when she heard:
“...Alison wants to call. I’ll be back in a second…”
Then, heavy footsteps came clomping down the hall. Ingrid panicked and whipped around to find Sylvain watching her with a raised eyebrow.
“He’s not coming back for the next hour,” came Felix’s muted voice. “If I have to hear him baby-talking some random girl again I’m gonna–”
“Let him be,” said Dimitri. “At least he’s going to his room…”
“Is Dorothea still having her crisis?” snickered Sylvain, leaning over to look at her phone.
Ingrid mimed kicking him, but didn’t let her foot connect to keep the sound down. “Leave me alone. Don’t you have to call Alison?”
Sylvain snorted. “I broke up with her last week. Did your guy respond?”
“None of your business!”
She froze for a moment, worried that she’d hissed too loudly, but the movie kept playing in the living room. After another moment, instead of giving her a response, Sylvain grabbed her wrist and dragged her down the hall into his bedroom.
“Sylvain!” she hissed.
The door slammed shut. Sylvain let go.
“What’d he say?” he asked.
She waved irritably at him. “Let me text Dorothea first.”
[20:08] You: DOROTHEA.
[20:08] You: WHAT DO I SAY
[20:08] You: [image.png]
[20:10] Dorothea <3: kudos to him for seeking permission before sending the dick pic even tho it’s the bare minimum, but also points off for the boring response and for trying to send a dick pic 3 messages in. he could’ve at least asked how your day was first
[20:10] You: DICK PIC???
[20:11] You: WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO SAY TO THAT?
Ingrid buried her face in her hands.
“What?” She heard Sylvain move closer. “What did she say?”
“Do you think this sounds like he’s trying to send a dick pic?” She thrust her phone at him and let him read the screen with Dorothea’s messages. Sylvain held the phone where it was touching her fingers.
After a moment, he let go and leaned back. “Oh, yeah, definitely asking to send a dick pic. I agree with Dorothea that the response was okay and that he could have waited a few more messages, but I mean, this is a hookup app…”
“Sylvain!” Her throat felt strained from the way she was holding back her scream. “What do I say?”
“Oh.” He handed the phone back to her. “I mean, do you want to see it?”
Ingrid choked. “I–”
Her phone buzzed again.
[20:11] Dorothea <3: depends on if you want to see his dick or not. you can tell him no if you don’t want to.
[20:11] You: Why are you and Sylvain saying the same thing
[20:12] Dorothea <3: ???
[20:12] Dorothea <3: is sylvain with you??
[20:12] You: Yeah. It’s Faerghus Four movie night
[20:12] You: K texted in the middle of it and I freaked out and got up and Sylvain followed me because he’s a freak
[20:13] Dorothea <3: he is a freak. i’m so sorry, ingrid
“Are you texting K?” Sylvain leaned towards the phone.
Ingrid held it up unabashedly. “No. Dorothea and I are making fun of you.”
“What the hell?” Sylvain grabbed the phone again, his palm slapping against the back of her fingers when he pressed the video call button.
Dorothea’s face popped up on screen with a view of her face below chin level. She seemed to be wearing a headband to keep her hair out of her face, the rest of it pulled back into a low messy bun as she took off her makeup.
“Yes?” she cued flatly, unfazed.
“At least call me a freak to my face,” pouted Sylvain.
“You’re a freak. Anything else?”
Ingrid pulled the phone back down. “What do I say to K?”
“You have to answer our question first, which is whether or not you want to see the dick or not,” said Dorothea, matter-of-factly.
“I mean–” Ingrid’s face heated. “I’m not–opposed–”
“Then go for it.”
Ingrid leaned back from Sylvain, feeling faintly embarrassed that she’d admitted to two of her friends out loud that she somewhat wanted to see a stranger’s dick. Then again, Hilda had told her much worse stories and Sylvain was equally as unabashed about all the girls he slept with, so why couldn’t Ingrid stop freaking out about it?
She braced herself, then typed a simple, Yeah.
Sylvain clucked his tongue over her shoulder. “You could at least show some more enthusiasm.”
Ingrid elbowed him backwards.
[20:13] K: Yeah?
[20:13] K: [image.png]
“Seiros!” Ingrid chucked her phone across the floor.
“Hey, hey, careful!” Sylvain hurried to where the phone had slammed into one of his desk legs. A small flower pot tipped sideways, but he managed to catch it before it fell off the desk. “My mom got me this pot.”
Ingrid blinked, heart still hammering, and said, “I thought Maria got you that one.”
“Why would I keep anything from Maria?” Sylvain furrowed his eyebrows and set the pot back on the desk. “She was waaaaay too clingy.”
Ingrid watched with wide, adrenaline-flushed eyes as he grabbed her phone off the floor. She saw, in slow motion, the smooth and unhurried rotation of his wrist, revealing the glare of her brightly lit screen and the messages and the photo–
“Stop!” Ingrid lunged across the room and grabbed her phone, folding her legs up and pressing her torso down to clamp around Sylvain’s arm and her phone.
“What’s going on?” Dorothea’s voice came out staticky through the phone. “Ingrid, why did you scream?”
“She saw his dick,” said Sylvain, laughing. “She saw how massive it was and freaked out–”
“Oh my god, how big is it?”
“I didn’t see it!” Ingrid squeezed her eyes shut, despite her phone being currently engulfed by her entire body.
“Sylvain, send me the photo,” said Dorothea.
“Yes, ma’am,” he affirmed solemnly.
“What? No!”
Sylvain shifted into a stance with more leverage. Ingrid opened her eyes in horror to watch her own demise: how helpless she was at the sudden force of his arm ripping out of her hold, tugging at her sleeves, his watch digging into the flesh and bone of her wrist as Sylvain pulled the phone up to his face.
“Huh,” said Sylvain.
“What?” shrieked Dorothea.
Ingrid spit through her exasperation. “Sylvain, do not–”
“That’s crazy.” Sylvain used his fingers to zoom in on the screen. “He is actually kind of huge.”
“How many inches?” pressed Dorothea.
“I can’t tell from this angle,” said Sylvain. “Should I ask?”
Ingrid screamed. “No!”
Sylvain paid no mind to her agony and typed a quick message. Ingrid gathered her wits about her and snatched the phone right as it made a whoosh sound to signify the sending of a message. She whipped the screen around, nearly dropping it again as she saw the dick pic, but quickly focused on the message Sylvain had sent.
[20:16] IG: How many inches of that do u think can fit in me?
“I came up with that on the fly,” said Sylvain, almost proudly.
“I hate you,” croaked Ingrid. “I hate you so much.”
Another notification.
[20:16] K: Ahaha
[20:16] K: I could definitely get all 8 in their if u think u can handle it 🤤
Ingrid wanted to die. She wanted to break her phone and never get a replacement. She wanted to hop on the next train to Almyra and toss her passport into the sea. Why was she here? Why did she do this? Why was the Goddess placing these things in her path?
“What is going on?” Dorothea was glaring from the top right corner of the screen where her image was minimized. She’d finished taking off her makeup and was now waiting for her facial mud musk to dry, frowning at Ingrid and Sylvain through the phone. “Can someone please send me a screenshot?”
Ingrid sighed and did so. The image of the dick pic automatically censored itself in the screenshot and Dorothea made Ingrid promise that she would show her when she got home. Ingrid refrained from making any disparaging thoughts until Dorothea finished reading.
“I don’t like the way he texts, but mostly because he’s just a horny man,” said Dorothea finally.
“He used the wrong ‘there,’” Ingrid bemoaned.
“He’s got an 8-incher, though,” said Sylvain.
“No one asked you!” Ingrid lobbed a pillow at him.
While Sylvain started cackling, Dorothea looked somewhere over the camera thoughtfully. Then, she asked, “Is he a no-go then?”
Ingrid blinked, processing the question. “Uh…”
“It’s okay if it is,” said Dorothea. “There’s more people out there and also you don’t need to follow through with all this Rellik stuff if it’s stressing you out.”
“No,” said Ingrid, with little pause. “No, it’s not that. It’s just a little overwhelming, but I don’t think I want to stop talking to him.”
“That makes sense,” said Dorothea.
Behind her, Sylvain had stopped laughing and seemed to be listening to the conversation. The silence grated on her.
Ingrid turned to him and flatly asked, “Do you have any input?”
His eyes darted to hers at the sound of her voice. She couldn’t quite read his expression, but under her scrutiny, the corner of his mouth began to twitch into a smirk.
“You want my input?” he gasped with mock surprise. “After all this time you spent trying to get the phone away from me?”
“Sylvain.”
He snickered. “Do you know how rare an eight-inch dick is? You’d be giving up the equivalent of competing in the Olympics or founding a successful startup company.”
She frowned at him. “Why do you know those statistics?”
“I dunno. Read it somewhere?”
Her phone dinged.
Sylvain, Ingrid, and Dorothea all jumped at the sound. Ingrid quickly lifted her phone.
[20:20] DIMITRI ALEXANDRE BLAIDDYD: Is Dorothea doing alright? We can pause the movie for you until you two resolve her crisis.
“What did he say?” Dorothea asked urgently as Sylvain peered over Ingrid’s shoulder.
“It’s Dimitri.” Ingrid sighed. “We’re taking too long. Okay, before I head back out, what should I say to K?”
“What is the vibe you want to convey?”
“I don’t know! How the hell do you respond to something like that?”
Her phone dinged again.
[20:17] K: Do you u have a big ass
Ingrid sighed loudly as Sylvain burst out laughing.
“What did he say?” Dorothea asked urgently.
“He asked if I had a big ass.” Ingrid, swiped out of the Rellik app. “I’ve had enough of this. I’ll figure out what to say tomorrow.” She turned to Sylvain, who was still laughing on the floor. “Are you coming?”
He let out two more breathless laughs and theatrically wiped an invisible tear from his eye before sitting up. “Nah, I’m good. I think it’ll look suspicious if we walk back into the living room at the same time anyway. Just head out and I’ll be there in a few minutes.”
Ingrid narrowed her eyes at him, but then decided she was too tired to protest. She looked back at her phone. “I’ll see you at home?”
“Yes, you will. I’m not sleeping until you show me that picture.” Dorothea gave her a significant look.
“I thought men disgusted you.”
“In the way raw meat disgusts me. That doesn’t mean I can’t look at it.” Sylvain snorted from his spot on the floor. “Go watch your movie. Bye, Ingrid, I love you.”
Ingrid sighed. “Love you, too.”
She hung up. Ingrid wiped her damp palms on her sweats and left the room without a backwards glance.
When she walked into the living room, she saw that the movie was already paused. Dimitri seemed to be talking about some topic from his polisci class while Felix was pretending not to listen by scrolling on his phone. At the sound of her arrival, they both looked up.
“Hey,” she said, a little breathlessly. She moved back to her original spot next to Dimitri.
“Hello,” said Dimitri. “How’s Dorothea? Is everything all sorted?”
“Yep.”
Ingrid made up some inane explanation about how Dorothea still wasn’t certain Edelgard had asked her out on a date or as friends, so she needed Ingrid as a sounding board of how she should dress to show that she liked girls.
Dimitri laughed good-naturedly. Felix scoffed and made a comment about how someone could only think Dorothea was straight if they were blind and deaf. Ingrid also tried to laugh to exude normalcy, but it ended up coming out thin and high-pitched. Either way, the movie started up again and she tried to focus on the movie without twitching towards her phone.
The racing of her heart and her nerves rose to a crescendo in her ears when Sylvain finally emerged from his room.
“Look who finally decided to join us,” sneered Felix.
Sylvain laughed heartily. “What can I say? It’s been a few days since we last saw each other so Alison wanted to call and tell me about her day–”
Felix rolled his eyes. “What did you actually talk about? I seriously doubt you’ve ever intentionally listened to your girlfriends before.”
Sylvain’s mouth fell open in offense. “Wh–well. I–that is not true, Felix. I–”
He made a series of offended noises and half completed words that made everyone in the room laugh. Ingrid tried to hide hers by coughing into her fist, but that just pulled Sylvain’s attention toward her. He stared at her for one long, intense moment before speaking again.
“Fine. I asked her when her sister was coming to visit campus.” He sighed heavily as if greatly aggrieved.
“The married one?” asked Dimitri. “With two children?”
“Yeah, that one. I just think motherhood gave her such a beautiful glow–”
“Alright, that’s enough.” Ingrid knew he was baiting, but she decided to take it and threw a pillow at him. “Go sit down so we can actually finish the damn movie.”
Sylvain dodged it and then looked at her, amusement glinting in his eye. “Whatever you say, Ingrid.”
She rolled her eyes as he took a seat, but found that she felt lighter after yelling at Sylvain. Even though Dimitri and Felix had stopped questioning her already, nothing felt entirely right until she got the chance to yell at Sylvain for being a skirt-chaser, which was much more normal than Sylvain and Dorothea giving joint judgments on a stranger Ingrid had matched with on a dating app.
She glanced at Sylvain and found him focusing very resolutely on the TV–no side eyes, no barely contained laughter, just the dark room and her childhood friends and an old movie that gave away its time period from the audio to the color-grading. Ingrid was relieved to find that she felt normal.
She focused on the movie again with true sincerity and made it through the rest of the night without checking her phone once.