Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

You know that feeling when you’re doing something absolutely ridiculous, and you have to ask yourself, “Why am I doing this?”  

But then you see the pretty girl at the top of the staircase and she says, “Thank you so much, Violet!” so you decide it’s worth it?

Maybe that’s just Vi.  

She knows she’s in deep shit when the handle tears off the plastic bag she put the bottles in, and she has to tuck Caitlyn’s hard lemonades under her arm in a football carry just to keep from dropping the Jack Daniels down the staircase.  

Caitlyn starts to speak from the top of the steps.  “I can help, Vi-”

“I got it,” she grunts, even though she most definitely does not have it.  

THUNK!  

THUNK-THUNK-THUNK…

There goes the Sprite.  She needs the Sprite; Claggor never remembers to buy mixers, although Vi guesses that tonight’s drink menu is going to be fewer mixed drinks and more shots.  It’s Ekko’s twenty-first, after all.  They’re college kids.  They’re going to get plastered.  

“Violet, the Sprite…” Caitlyn trails off, picking at the hem of her floral dress.  Vi doesn’t have the heart to tell her she’s way overdressed for this party.  It’s her first one.  She might as well make it special, even if people will be dressed in sweatpants.

Caitlyn turned twenty-one a year before the rest of them, and Vi had no idea, so she never threw her a party, and now she feels like a crummy roommate.  Apparently, Caitlyn took a gap year before starting college and just neglected to tell everyone this.  Vi thought she was turning twenty-one this year with the rest of them.  Apparently, she turned twenty-two in January.  

“So mature,” Vi had teased her. 

So taking Caitlyn to a drinking party has been one of Vi’s goals all year, even though Caitlyn seemed determined to miss out on this essential college experience.  

She couldn’t go to Claggor’s twenty-first birthday in October because she had midterms to study for (lie), and she didn’t want to go out for Halloweekend because she had nothing to wear (lie), and she couldn’t make it to the end of the semester party before finals week because she had to study and then pick out a dress for House Kiramman’s annual Winterfest Ball.  Then, she’d bailed on Vi’s twenty-first birthday party because Powder would be there, and Powder wasn’t twenty-one, and Caitlyn didn’t want to get in trouble.  

That was all fine.  Vi understood.  She could give her the benefit of the doubt.  They’d have the spring semester, after all.  

And then they were still on winter break for Caitlyn’s birthday, so Vi promised to throw her a party when they got back, but then Caitlyn took over the planning, and they had some kind of steampunk murder mystery drug bust party with one bottle of wine to go around.  Gods, Caitlyn was such a dork.  

Vi loved that about her.  

They didn’t do anything for Saint Patrick’s Day weekend because neither of them got invited to the soccer house’s darty after the Media Day incident.  

Saint Patrick’s Day was overrated anyway.  

And then Caitlyn’s family went to Ionia or something for spring break, so she wasn’t able to go to Bilgewater with Vi and the rest of their friends.  

May is their last chance.  

Finals are over.  Caitlyn has no excuse this time.  

So Vi took her down the road to University Liquors, which is run by this old Ionian man who gives you a raffle ticket if you buy a case of whatever it is he’s trying to get rid of.  That’s how Vi got the Miller Lite neon sign in her bedroom.  

“Are you sure this is safe?” Caitlyn had asked as they crossed the street in the rain.  

“This looks like the location of a robbery in an action movie,” she’d said after they got inside, her fluffy coat a stark contrast against the flickering lights and linoleum aisles.  Surrounded by the towers of cardboard cases of beer and dusty floors, she looked expensive.  

Vi pulled a bottle of Jack Daniel's off the shelf.  “Ekko likes whiskey,” she’d said.  She grabbed Malibu; Gert would never admit it, but it’s her favorite.  She grabbed a twelve-pack of Busch Light since she’d get a raffle ticket.  

“What do you like to drink?” she asked Caitlyn.  She’d had a fruitful spree already, while Caitlyn somehow still hadn’t left the entryway.  “C’mon, Cupcake, the world is your oyster!”

“I… I had some champagne at my birthday dinner this year that was… nice.”  Because only Caitlyn Kiramman gets a birthday dinner.  

Vi figures her dining room table has a runner, a centerpiece, and creepy portraits of dead people that stare at you while you stuff your face with filet mignon and fingerling potatoes.  

“Do you have a favorite liquor?” Vi asked.  

Caitlyn stammered.  

“Have you ever drunk anything other than champagne?” she teased.  

Caitlyn furrowed her eyebrows and grabbed a bottle of white wine off the shelf.  “This will do.”

Vi took the bottle and put it back on the shelf.  “It’s not that kind of party.  C’mon, Cupcake.  You like sweet stuff, right?”

She nodded.  

Vi thought she might have picked out blue raspberry vodka.  White Claw.  Anything like that.  Caitlyn’s got a major sweet tooth.  

She grabbed a six-pack of Mike’s Hard Lemonade out of one of the coolers.  

Vi bit her lip to keep from laughing.  

“Will this do?”

She nodded.  “Yep.  Sweet like you.”  At least this way, Vi could open the bottles for her.  She picked out a few sodas to use as mixers, a couple of BuzzBallz, and a novelty shot glass to give to Ekko as a birthday gift, all while Caitlyn followed her around like a lost puppy, lemonades in hand. 

She doesn’t care to think about how much all of that cost, but for Ekko’s birthday, it was worth it.  

“Is that all you’re gonna drink?” Vi asked, gesturing to Caitlyn’s hard lemonade.  She was going to get bullied for bringing those.  It wouldn’t have been much worse if she had picked out those Bud Light Strawberitas Mylo’s been choking down for a month.  

She nodded.  “I don’t think I’ll want more than one or two,” she said.  “You can have one, if you’d like.”

Vi snorted.  “Maybe!” 

The gentleman she was, she let Caitlyn go in front of her.  

“You don’t want to see my ID?” she asked Lenny.  

Lenny’s eyes crinkled when he smiled.  He just put Caitlyn’s lemonades in a black plastic bag and ran her debit card.  She has one of those gold-colored debit cards that’s heavy in your hand.  Her family is rich-rich.  

“My ID?” she asked again, taking the bag.  

“‘Scuse me,” Vi said, unloading her bounty on the counter.  

When they left, Caitlyn complained about how Lenny didn’t check her ID, and then about the cardboard case digging into her palm.  

Naturally, Vi took the lemonades from her and carried them along with her stuff to Ekko’s apartment across the street from the campus.  It wouldn’t be that far of a walk, and she’d be able to set everything down in the elevator and take a break.  

But things never really go Vi’s way, so of course, the elevator had an OUT OF ORDER sign taped to it.  

“I chose the wrong shoes,” Caitlyn said, looking down at her kitten-heeled sandals.  She’d gotten a pedicure for this, but neither of them mentions it.  Caitlyn’s already going to feel out of place at this party.  Vi doesn’t want to make it worse.  

So that pretty much brings her to now, standing on the platform between the third and fourth floors.  There’s a door between the two of them and Ekko’s hallway, and a flight of stairs between Vi and the Sprite.  

She sets the rest of the liquor down.  “I’ll go get that,” she says to Caitlyn.  

“Vi-”

“I got it!”  She races down the stairs and retrieves the bottle, which already looks a little fizzy.  Mylo likes vodka and Sprite.  This could make for a pretty good prank.  Maybe Vander’s right, and everything really does happen for a reason.  

“Have you found it?” Caitlyn asks, holding the door open.  

Vi loads herself back up.  “Yep.  Thanks, Cupcake.”

“I can carry-”

“No need!”

And that’s the issue right there.  Vi is hopelessly, completely, and wholeheartedly into her roommate, and she can’t do anything about it but perform acts of service.  

Maybe it’s the easy way out, but Vi doesn’t want to ruin the friendship.  Caitlyn has never once looked at Vi the way she fears she looks at Caitlyn.  Maybe she isn’t even into butches.  All signs tell Vi not to shoot her shot with this one.  Caitlyn’s not like the girls she’s been with.  Caitlyn deserves more than a text at two in the morning or a teasing smack on the ass.  She deserves breakfast in bed and flowers just because.  

Vi’s not so sure she can give that to her.  

But when she squeezes past her, pressing her frame against the door ever so slightly, Vi catches a whiff of her perfume, and, oh, it’s heavenly.  

It’s sinful.  She shouldn’t think about her roommate like this.  She shouldn’t think about the white dress strap falling from her pale shoulder, or the way she bites her lip when she’s nervous.  They’ve been friends since freshman orientation.  They had to talk to someone wearing the same color shirt as them during some kind of icebreaker, and they both happened to be wearing black: Vi in an old band t-shirt and Caitlyn in a windbreaker because she was afraid it would rain.  Vi had friend-zoned herself with the help of a cheesy icebreaker!

But it’s Caitlyn!  How could it be wrong to care for someone so lovely?

Caitlyn knocks on Ekko’s door so Vi doesn’t have to.  

“Normally, there’s elevator music,” Vi says as they wait for Ekko to answer.  Or someone.  Anyone could answer, really.  

Caitlyn fixes the dress strap that had fallen off her shoulder.  “How’d he manage off-campus housing as a junior?”

“ADHD,” Vi said.  “His old man got him diagnosed when he was a kid.”

“I have autism, and you don’t see me trying to get special housing accommodations.”

Vi snorts.  “I think the Kiramman name would be enough to get you off campus.  But you wouldn’t be able to live with me!”

“Oh, yes, I would miss picking up your stinky gym socks and listening to your weird music at the crack of dawn.”

“European house music is the future!”

“I feel like I’m at a club.”

“You’ve never been to a club,” Vi says.  “The clubs around here don’t play music as good as mine.  They just play ‘Anaconda’ over and over again so the straight girls start twerking on drunk guys.”

Caitlyn grimaces.  “Maybe I shouldn’t be here…”

This again?  “You’re fine, Cupcake.  It won’t be like a club.  Honestly, not a whole lot of people will be here.”

“What if I get overstimulated?  Violet, when I said I couldn’t make it half an hour at my high school prom, I meant it.”

“This is way different than prom,” she says.  She tries to add more, to tell Caitlyn that they can go if she wants, but then Ekko finally answers.  

“Hey, party people!”

“Esslay on the artypay,” Vi says, even though Ekko probably doesn’t have any concept of Pig Latin.  

“Come in, come in.”  The birthday boy takes the soda from Vi and places it on his kitchen island.  

“You have a lovely home,” Caitlyn says, looking around at Ekko’s NBA posters and model cars.

“And you have a lovely…” Ekko scans her outfit, “time at my… party…”

“Am I overdressed?” Caitlyn asks, finally seeming to notice Ekko and Vi both wearing cargo jeans and hoodies.  

Vi narrows her eyes at Ekko.  

“No!” he says, putting the beer in the fridge.  “You look great!  I just haven’t gotten to change yet!”

That seems to help Caitlyn relax.  

“Vi, can you help me unload all this?” he asks.  

“It’s not that-”

“The others are playing video games in the living room.  That way, Cait.”  Ekko points to the living room, where everyone else yells at each other and plays Mario Kart.  Vi can’t hear the video game music over the punk rock music playing from Gert’s Bluetooth speaker.  

“That sounds nice.”  Caitlyn doesn’t budge.

Vi smiles.  “You go ahead and join them.  I’ll catch up.”

Caitlyn walks into the living room on uneasy legs, like a baby giraffe who really doesn’t want to be taking its first steps.  

When she’s out of earshot, Vi hisses, “Why’d you send her in there alone?”

“Relax, Claggor’s in there.”

That actually does help.  

Vi sighs.  “Look, Caitlyn hasn’t been to a drinking party before, and I don’t know what kind of drunk she gets.  I don’t think she even knows.  I want her to have a chill, non-judgmental space.  We can give that to her, right?  Please?”

Ekko shrugs.  “Dude, I don’t care that you brought her.  She’s surprisingly cool for a Topsider.  She’s the one who brought us the leftover Olive Garden from the Poli-Sci event.”

“Okay?  So why the hush-hush kitchen conversation?”

He closes the refrigerator and crosses his arms, leaning against the kitchen island.  “You,” he says, pointing to Vi, “are absolutely whipped.”

“Am not!”

“Yuh-uh,” he says, picking up one of Caitlyn’s hard lemonades.  “Bet you didn’t even make fun of her for these.”

“Those are mine.”

“They’re not.”

Vi raises her arms in surrender.  “They’re not.”

“You’re defending her bad drink choices, and you carried all of this stuff up three flights of stairs.”  Ekko fills two shot glasses with vodka.  

“I didn’t want her to get pit stains in her dress.”

“You didn’t have the heart to tell her she could have shown up in jeans and a t-shirt because you like how she looks in those ruffly sundresses.”

“I-”

Ekko doesn’t let her finish.  Instead, he pushes a shot glass in her direction.  

“To your twenty-first,” Vi says, picking up her glass.  

Ekko shakes his head.  “Mine is for my birthday.  Yours is for confidence.”

She clinks the glass against the counter and then throws it back, feeling the vodka burn her throat.  “Ye of little faith,” she says.  

Ekko pours himself another one.  “And this is so I don’t remember you fumbling your girl when I wake up tomorrow.”

Vi rolls her eyes and joins the rest of the party.  Caitlyn is just about hugging the wall; one could put a lampshade on her head and mistake her for a piece of furniture.  

“How you doing?” Vi asks, low enough so only Caitlyn can hear.

“They’re playing Mario Kart,” she says.  “We can just play that in our dorm.”

Vi watches as Gert chugs a White Claw and picks up her Switch controller. 

Mylo’s already falling off the beanbag chair.  

Claggor keeps looking back at Caitlyn and then turning forward again as if that might stop her from noticing.  

“You ready for this?” Vi asks.  

Caitlyn frowns.  “I’m awfully nervous.”

“Just stick with me.”

Claggor finishes the race before the others and then stands up.  “I’m grabbing another beer.  Anything you guys want?”

“I’ll take a beer, too, I guess,” Vi says.  She’s trying to go easy, just in case Caitlyn ends up being a lightweight; someone has to get her back on campus safely.  So just a beer it is.  

Claggor disappears into the kitchen.  

Before Vi can say something stupid, Caitlyn says, “It’s more intimate than I thought it would be.”

“These are the best kinds of parties,” Vi says.  “It’s better when you know everyone.  These people are gonna make sure we get home safe and that we have a good time.”

“I like that,” Caitlyn says.  

Claggor comes back, two beers in his right hand and one of Caitlyn’s hard lemonades in his left.  He passes the beers to Vi.  “Hold these.”

And then, with just his apartment key, he pops the bottle cap off Caitlyn’s hard lemonade.  “Ta-da!”

Caitlyn claps her hands and then takes the drink.  “Thank you!”

“No problem!” he says.  “Not every day I get to show off that trick.”

That’s Vi’s trick.  She taught Claggor how to do it when they were freshmen in high school, sneaking their first beers.  She was going to impress Caitlyn with that.  She would have flexed while doing it.  She had a plan.  

“Hey, Vi!” Mylo says from the floor.  “Are you gonna teach Ekko how to play Ride the Bus or what?”

Where Claggor is her sweet brother who brought her cookies after her first heartbreak, Mylo is her annoying younger brother who probably said something along the lines of, “She probably couldn’t put up with your smell.”

And so what if Vi wore Axe body spray instead of deodorant as a kid?  It was funny when the boys did it!

So she just rolls her eyes and claps back, “Oh, is that the real reason I’m invited, then?”

“Well, duh!” Mylo shouts, wrapping an arm around Ekko, who, at some point, had replaced his hoodie with a polo t-shirt.  

The things Vi did for Caitlyn didn’t even begin to compare to the things she made other people do for Caitlyn.  

She shrugs.  “Sure.  You got a deck of cards, Little Man?”

Ekko reaches into a drawer and pulls out a deck of cards with little comic book characters drawn on them.  

Vi pulls off the rubber band and shuffles them in her hands, admiring the finish on the cards that makes them shuffle so smoothly.  “Perfect.”

“Kitchen?” Claggor asks.  

“Kitchen,” she confirms.  “C’mon, you too, Gert!”

Gert, already swaying from drunkenness, gets up from her spot on the couch and trudges to the kitchen.  

“What’s Ride the Bus?” Caitlyn asks quietly.  

“Drinking game,” Vi says.  “It’s easy to pick up on.  Just stand next to me, and I’ll deal so you can go last.”

That seems to make her feel better, even though she’s still picking at the label on her bottle.  She’s barely made a dent in her drink, but maybe that’s for the best.  

Vi stands at the head of the table and gives the cards a better shuffle.  “The rules of the game are pretty simple,” she says.  “There are five rounds.  You mess up, you drink.”

“Shots?” Gert asks.  

“Not yet,” says Vi.  “Let’s start small so Ekko can learn.”

She rolls her eyes.  

“This first one’s easy,” she says, turning to Gert.  “Black or red?”

“Black.”

Vi flips over the card.  Black.  “Nice job.”

Next is Mylo.  “Black,” he says, rubbing his hands together.

The Eight of Diamonds.  

“Rough start, buddy,” Vi teases.  

Mylo takes a swig of… whatever it is he’s drinking.  

Claggor’s turn is next, and even though he’s notoriously good at card games, he has to drink.  

“It’s just ‘cause it’s too soon for me to card count.”

“Card counting is cheating, man,” Vi says.  “Ekko, go.”

Ekko also guesses correctly.  

Caitlyn guesses red, and thank the gods, she’s right.  

“Why is this called ‘Ride the Bus?’” Caitlyn asks amid the commotion.  

“You’ll see,” Vi says, winking.  She takes a sip of her own drink.  “This next round is higher or lower.  Gert?”

She looks at her ten of clubs.  “Lower.”

Vi draws the Ace of Diamonds.  

Gert pours herself a shot of vodka and drinks.  So she’s drinking hard tonight.  

“Lower,” Mylo guesses.  

Vi draws an eight.  

The card already in front of Mylo from the last round is an eight.  

“Now what?” Ekko asks.  

Claggor says, “I think you gotta drink, man.”

Mylo makes a disgusted face.  “No way!  Vi-”

“He’s right,” says Vi.  Is that a house rule that she made up?  Maybe, but she’s the dealer, and she can talk with enough authority to make that sound legit.  

Mylo takes a drink, but he doesn’t look happy about it. 

Claggor guesses that the card will be higher than the six he has.  It’s lower, so he drinks.  

Ekko’s first-round draw was a king, so of course, he guesses correctly this round.  

Caitlyn also doesn’t have to drink.  

“You’re pretty good at this, Cupcake.”

Caitlyn’s face turns red, but it’s probably just from the alcohol she’s been sipping.  Maybe she’s onto something with those hard lemonades.  

The next round is outside or in between, where players just guess if the next card’s value will be outside or in between the cards they currently have.  Gert doesn’t have to drink, and Mylo’s is a given since he has two eight cards, so he doesn’t have to drink either.  For once, Claggor is safe.  

“Outside or in between?” Vi asks Ekko.  

He looks at his King of Clubs and his Nine of Diamonds.  “Outside.”

Vi draws the Five of Diamonds.  “You’re gonna need to drink at some point, here, Birthday Boy.  You too, Cupcake.”

Without even waiting for Vi to ask the question, Caitlyn says, “In between.”  Any rational person would guess that the next card would be between a queen and a three.  

Vi doesn’t want Caitlyn to black out by any means, but she’d like to find out what alcohol might bring out in her.  A hidden bubbly side?  Candor?  

She draws the motherfucking King of Diamonds.  

“Holy shit!” Gert shouts.  

“Drink up, Topside!” Mylo slurs.  

Caitlyn takes a sip from her hard lemonade.  

“Is that any good?” Claggor asks.  

She shrugs.  “It’s sweet.”

“I’ll trade you a Busch Light for one of those,” he says, not bothering to acknowledge that he’s bartering away Vi’s beer.  

She crinkles her nose.  “I don’t really care for beer.  You can just take one, though.  I doubt I can make it through all six.”

“Thanks.”  Claggor grabs two from the fridge and opens them both, taking a sip from one and supplying Caitlyn with a second round she isn’t ready for.  It only urges her to drink faster.  

“Can we keep going?” Gert asks.  “Or does someone else want Caitlyn’s posh drinks?”

“They’re not posh!” Caitlyn says.  

Vi looks at the little cartoon lemon on the label.  “Yeah, these are kinda janky, not gonna lie.  I bet there’s barely any alcohol in them.”

“Hey!”

“Five percent,” Vi says, reading from the label.  “About the same as a Busch or a Miller.”

Caitlyn snatches her drink back and finishes it off in one long swig.  “Gert’s right.  Let’s play the next round.”  She pushes the empty bottle to the side and grabs the new one.  

“This is the one that gets everyone,” Vi says to the group.  “You have to guess the suit.”

“Some people would think you have a one in four chance of getting it right,” Claggor says, “but really, the odds are all mixed up since we already removed some cards from the deck.”

“Okay, nerd,” Mylo says.  

“Spades,” Gert guesses.

“Diamonds,” Vi says as she draws the card.  “Drink up.”

Gert takes another shot.  

Mylo guesses Spades, too, and then has to drink.  

“It’s highly unlikely that it’s Diamonds since you both just drew Diamonds,” Claggor says.  He’s drunk now.  Damn, he’s usually the last one to get drunk.  He must be chugging Caitlyn’s hard lemonade.  

Vi likes this game because you can get derailed easily and just chug the rest of your drink even if you’re not technically supposed to.  The game treats having to drink like a punishment, but really, everyone wants to get drunk.  That’s what drinking parties are for.  

“So with that in mind, I’ll be guessing Clubs,” Claggor finally finishes.  

Vi draws the Ten of Diamonds.  

“Fuck,” he says, draining the hard lemonade Caitlyn gave him.  

“Ekko?” Vi asks.  

“I dunno, Hearts?”

“Good job.”

Ekko drinks anyway.  

“I liked Claggor’s logic,” Caitlyn says, “so I’ll go with Clubs.”

“Two of Hearts,” Vi sings, even though nobody but her knows that stupid song.  It’s on her workout playlist.  It’s silly, but she feels like she hits the bag harder when Stacey Q sings to her.  

Vi gives the remaining cards a good shuffle, then lays them out in a pyramid shape with five at the base.  

Gert, Mylo, and Claggor collect their cards.  Caitlyn and Ekko don’t really know what they’re doing, but they seem to catch on alright.  

“This one’s a little harder,” Vi says, “but basically, each row corresponds to several drinks, and if you can match a card in your hand to the card I flip over, you get that many drinks to hand out to anyone you want.”

“The bottom row is one drink each,” Claggor explains, “and the top card is five.  I would not want to be that person’s victim.”

“Right,” Vi says.  She turns to Ekko and Caitlyn.  “If you get multiple drinks to hand out, you can split them between players if you want to, or you can just dump them all on one person.  Maybe someone who’s been pissing you off all night?  Like, they have a really annoying voice, and they don’t know when to shut up-”

“Hey!” Mylo shouts.  

“Notice how he just assumes I’m talking about him?”

Caitlyn snorts.  

Vi flips over the first card on the bottom.  

“Do we match the color, or just the number?” Ekko asks.  

“Got it,” Claggor says, matching nines.  

“Number it is…” Ekko mutters.  

“Drink up, Mylo,” Claggor says.  

Ekko matches the five in his hand to the Five of Clubs and then tells Mylo to take a shot.  

Mylo matches the next four cards.  Everyone gets a drink, himself included, for some reason.  

Gert matches a card and gives a drink to Mylo and a drink to Caitlyn, who seems to fight back a gag on the vodka shot.  

“You good, Cupcake?” Vi asks.  

She nods.  “This tastes like battery acid.”

“We have whiskey if you wanna try that,” Gert slurs, pushing a bottle towards Caitlyn, who unscrews the lid and fills her shot glass, spilling a little onto the cheap marble countertop.  

They keep going like that, matching cards and removing them from the pyramid.  Ekko’s kicking butt.  

Caitlyn only has one lemonade left, thanks to Claggor, but she seems to really like whiskey.  

Vi finishes off her own beer.  Was this her second or third?  She’d been too distracted by the game.  

Caitlyn’s eyebrows furrow, and Vi knows better than to ask what’s bothering her.  

She still has a full hand.  She hasn’t made any matches.  

She looks adorable with her face scrunched in concentration.  

Emboldened by the alcohol, Vi fixes the dress strap that fell from Caitlyn’s shoulder.  

She flips the next card on the pyramid over.  

“Yes!” Caitlyn squeals, slapping her Ace on the table.  “That’s four drinks!”

“Yep,” Vi says.  “Who do you want to give them to?”

She bites her lip in concentration, and then she looks at Vi with a devilish grin.  “You haven’t had any yet.”

Mylo snorts.  “Are you that drunk?”

“You can’t give your drinks to the dealer,” Gert explains, clutching the counter for support.  

Caitlyn’s smile disappears along with her confidence.  “Oh, uh-”

Vi takes the shot glass in front of Caitlyn and pours herself some whiskey.  Should she be worried that they’ve all been swapping germs?  “It’s fine.  I gotta catch up, anyway.”

Caitlyn starts to say, “You don’t have-”

Vi throws back the first shot.   

It burns, but in a good way.  She doesn’t usually do shots if she doesn’t want a hangover the next day, but if this night has taught her anything, it’s that there isn’t much she wouldn’t do for Caitlyn Kiramman.  

She takes the second shot.  

What is it they say about beer before liquor?

She pours another one.  

“I can give the next two to Ekko,” Caitlyn says.  “He hasn’t had much-”

Vi throws back the shot.  They’re not really tasting like anything anymore, which is a shame because she got her favorite whiskey to share with Ekko.  Dammit, was he going to get any?  Ekko was easily the most sober person at his own party.  

“Last one,” she grunts.  She takes it easy on herself and pours this one a little shallower than the first three.  Three is usually her limit.  Three shots are how many it takes for her to call Ahri, and she’s determined not to call Ahri tonight.  

She put the shot glass back on the table, the glass clinking against the hard marble.  “There.”  She did it.  For anyone else, she wouldn’t have, but the impressed, wide-eyed look on Caitlyn’s face is everything.  

“Damn,” Gert says.  “You good?”

Vi flips over the next card.  

Claggor has mercy and gives two shots to Ekko, plus one to Mylo and Caitlyn each.  

“Last card,” Vi says.  

“Last chance to get it together, Topside,” Ekko says.  

“Whatever do you mean?”

Gert snorts.  “She gets more posh when she’s drunk.  How about that?”

“I do not.”

“You definitely do,” Claggor says.  

“I’m not even that drunk!”

Vi flips over the last card.  

Eight of Clubs.  

Gert slams down a card from her hand.  “Fuck, yeah!”

“Nice,” Vi says.  

“All to Topside,” Gert says.  

Vi can feel her eyes widen.  “C’mon, Gert, have mercy-”

“Nuh-uh!  Them’s the rules…”

Ekko sighs.  “Why don’t you sleep on my couch tonight, Gert?”

“Pour the shots, Vi!” Mylo shouts.  “I wanna watch her ride the bus!”

“You good with this, Cupcake?”

Caitlyn nods.  “I do have at least one lemonade, right?”

“You’ll want that later,” Vi says, lining up whatever shot glasses she can find.  She pours them pretty low.  She took all the precautions earlier today.  She made hamburgers for dinner and made sure she and Caitlyn both drank lots of water.  

Still, Mrs. Kiramman would absolutely skin her alive if Caitlyn had to get her stomach pumped.  

Caitlyn gasps after draining the last shot.  “Is that the game?  Are we done?”

Gert and the guys howl with laughter.  

Vi can’t do this.  

“It’s time to ride the bus!” Mylo shouts, pumping his fist in the air and sloshing his drink.  

Gert clinks her Solo cup against Mylo’s and then takes a long swig, not realizing that Vi had replaced her rum and Coke with just Coke a long time ago.  

“What?” Caitlyn asks.  

“So since you have the most cards left in your hand, you have to ride the bus,” Vi says.  She feels like she’s telling this woman her dog got hit by a car.  “So you have to play through the rest of the cards.  It’ll be like the first four rounds by yourself.  If you can make it through without messing up, you can be done.”

“And if I don’t?”

Poor Caitlyn.  She sways like a buoy on a choppy sea.  Her cheeks are flushed, and her lips are red.  She looks so kissable, yet so, so wasted.  

She is going to have a nasty hangover tomorrow.  

“If you don’t,” Vi repeats, tuning out the laughter from the rest of her friends.  “You have to drink and start over.”

“Okay,” she says.  She sighs.  “I’m ready.”

“Are you sure?” she asks.  “I can get you out of this.  The others aren’t even paying attention.”

“No,” she says firmly.  “I’ll do it.”

“Clagg!” Vi shouts.  “Get Cait some water!”

“No way,” Ekko says.  “She’s actually gonna do it?”

“She’s actually gonna do it,” Vi repeats, feeling mostly terrified but also a little proud of herself for getting Caitlyn to come out and have fun.  

Vi saw Cassandra Kiramman once.  She FaceTimed Caitlyn while she was polishing her rifle.  Every time Vi thinks about telling Caitlyn how she really feels, she remembers this.  

Vi gulps.  “Red or black?” she asks.  

“Red.”

Seven of Clubs.  Black.  

Caitlyn takes a sip from her last hard lemonade.  

Vi asks again, “Red or black, Cupcake?”

“Red.”

Seven of Diamonds.  “Higher or lower?”

Caitlyn purses her lips.  “Lower?”

“Lower,” Vi confirms.  “Outside or in between?”

“Outside.”

“Jack of Clubs,” Vi says.  “Just one more.  Suit?”

“Diamonds.”

Claggor winces.  

Ten of Clubs.  

“Shit,” Caitlyn says, taking a long swig of her drink.  

Vi asks her again, “Red or black?”

“Red.”

It’s the three of hearts.  

Caitlyn messes up again when Vi draws two sixes in a row, which is decidedly not outside or in between six and three.  

Caitlyn messes up on the suit again and has to drink.  

Caitlyn has to drink again immediately when she guesses the first card in her new sequence will be red.  

And then Vi draws the Two of Diamonds followed by the Two of Spades, which makes for an immediate loss.  

“Are you still okay to keep going?” Vi asks.  

Caitlyn hiccups.  Vi had no idea she knew how to do that.  “I’m still in this fight,” she slurs.  

Caitlyn messes up on every single one of the last three cards, leaving her with an empty bottle of Mike’s Hard Lemonade.  

How much had she had to drink tonight?  At least five shots, plus three or so of those lemonades…

Caitlyn smiles.  “Can we play that again?”

“Cait,” Vi says, fixing the strap on her dress again before she flashes everyone.  “We’re the only ones in the kitchen.”  Everyone else got bored and went back into the living room to play Beerio Kart.  

“We can play just us?”

“No, we can’t,” Vi says, grabbing Caitlyn’s glass of water and handing it to her.  “Drink this.”

Caitlyn crinkles her nose.  “This smells like tap water.”

“You do get more posh when you’re drunk,” Vi notes.  

“You’re not drunk enough,” she says.  

“Someone has to get you home safe, Cupcake.”

“We’ll Uber,” she drawls, leaning against Vi for support.  “I’ll get the extra-large one so we can put our legs up on the seats, and the driver will let us pick the music, so we can listen to Seraphine…”

Caitlyn probably can’t remember the passcode to get into her cellphone, but Vi appreciates the thought.  

“Let’s just hang out here and get you sobered up,” Vi says.  

Caitlyn follows her into the living room, walking heavy enough for Ekko’s downstairs neighbors to hear.  “I like Seraphine…”

“I know you do,” Vi says.  

“I like Twilights the best…” she rambles.  “Wait, no, I like Relentless…”

“Those are two very different albums,” Vi says, plopping Caitlyn on the couch next to Claggor.  

Immediately, her body turns to Jello, and she falls onto Claggor’s shoulder.  

“You wanna play Beerio Kart?” he asks, handing Caitlyn a controller for the Nintendo Switch.  

“Oh, yeah!” Mylo shouts.  “I wanna see Drunk Caitlyn play Beerio Kart!”

“I love this game!” she shouts, taking the controller.  “Can I be Yoshi?”

“I’m Yoshi!” Mylo yells from a beanbag chair on the floor.  

Caitlyn selects Princess Peach instead and slumps back in the seat.  The plush couch threatens to absorb her completely.  

Claggor passes her a Busch Light.  “This is all we have left.”

“That’s okay.”  Caitlyn takes the beer.  “Where’s Ekko?”

“Watching Gert throw up in the bathroom,” says Mylo.  “Vi, you in?”

Claggor tosses her a controller without waiting for an answer.  

When Vi sits down, Caitlyn flops her limp but warm body onto her shoulder.  “I’m going to win…” she teases.  

“I sincerely doubt that,” Vi says, selecting Bowser as her racer.  “Sit up, Cupcake.”

Cailtyn flops against the back of the couch, spilling some of her beer onto her dress.  

Claggor, who somehow got Player One privileges, selects the racetrack and says, “No drinking and driving!”

“You have to put the controller down when you drink,” Vi explains, “but you have to finish your drink before the end of the race.”  The words leave her mouth before she realizes how bad an idea this is.  Caitlyn’s drunk, but she’s not ready to black out.  

She could be ready to black out, though, and Beerio Kart is just the thing to do that to her.  

“We could just play regular Mario Kart, though,” she says, fixing Caitlyn’s fallen dress strap again.  She needs to get this dress altered, dammit!

Not moving from her spot nestled against Vi, Caitlyn looks up and says, “But I’ve never played it like this before.”

And isn’t that just enough to make Vi’s heart melt?

“Yeah, Vi, let the grown-ass woman play Beerio Kart!” Mylo shouts from the floor.  

Vi kicks his beanbag chair.  

Claggor shrugs and hands Vi a beer.  “She’ll have a nasty hangover, but she’ll be alright.  She’s got you.”

“I will not,” Caitlyn interjects.  “I have never been hungover in my life.  I don’t get hangovers.”

“You’ve also never had hard liquor until tonight,” Vi says, even though Caitlyn’s busy selecting her car.  Oh, the motorcycle.  

“Good choice, Topside,” Mylo says.  

“I always use the motorcycle.  My mother bought me one for my eighteenth birthday…”  She hiccups.  “But she didn’t ask my father first, and he practically begged her to return it.”

Vi raises her eyebrows.  “I never knew that.”

Caitlyn tries to smile, but with her face squished against Vi’s arm, it comes out more like a smirk.  “There are a lot of things you don’t know about me.”

She feels heat rise to her face.  “Oh, yeah?”

“Mylo, hurry up and pick a car!” Claggor shouts.  

Mylo selects the egg, and then Claggor starts the race.  

Vi should be Player One.  She’s always Player One.  Caitlyn lets her be Player One when they play together.  

“Up you go.”  Vi helps Caitlyn sit upright with her back against the cushion again.  

Caitlyn’s eyes widen.  

“You good?” Claggor asks.  

She shakes her head.  “Yes!  I just… sat up too quickly.”

“Don’t be afraid of a glass of water,” Claggor says, ever the dad friend.  

The countdown begins.  

Three…

“I’m gonna smoke your asses,” Mylo says.  

Two…

Caitlyn flops sideways against Vi again.  

One…

Claggor helps her back up.  

Start!

Vi cracks open her beer and presses it to her lips.  Her strategy for winning overcomes her strategy for staying relatively sober.  They can suck it up and call the campus shuttle.  Some freshman kid can drive them back to their on-campus dorm.  

Vi gasps when she finishes the beer.  “Let’s-a-fucking-go,” she says, steering Bowser ahead.  She grabs an item box.  Red shell.  She passes the computer-controlled Luigi.  She knocks the computer-controlled Toad off the track.  

“Shit…”  Caitlyn drives Princess Peach over a gopher hole.  

“Cait, drink while you’re recovering!”

Caitlyn fumbles with the tab on her can.  

Vi drives Bowser past the computer-controlled Baby Mario.  Mylo’s Yoshi is stopped just ahead of her.  

He puts his beer down and steers Yoshi ahead.  

Caitlyn fumbles with the can tab.  “I’m going to chip my nails…”

Fuck.  

Vi puts her controller down and opens Caitlyn’s beer.  

“Simp!” Mylo shouts as he gains a solid lead.  

“My hero!” Caitlyn shouts as the foam spews from the can.  She presses it to her lips.  She’s clumsy.  The foam rolls down her chin and onto the flushed cleavage peeking out from her dress.  

Vi knows she’s the exact opposite of Caitlyn’s hero, but it’s hot.  

She begins the second lap, but can’t help but peer into the second screen as Caitlyn drives Princess Peach through the mud.  She’s in eighth place.  

Vi passes Mylo.  Finally!  “Suck my dick!” she shouts.  

“You don’t have one!” Mylo shouts back.  

This kind of trash talk is normal for them.  If Powder were here, it would be tenfold.  

The beer tucked in the crook of Caitlyn’s arm starts to tilt over.  

“Shit,” Vi mutters and then leans over to set Caitlyn’s drink upright before it can spill into her lap.  

She’s like a space heater.  Vi hasn’t even touched her, and she can feel the heat.  Caitlyn usually runs so cold that she has to double up on blankets during their movie nights.  

Does Vi fantasize about warming her up by pulling her in close and snuggling?  Yes.  Anytime Vi needs to make these kinds of thoughts go away, she just thinks about Caitlyn’s mom polishing her rifle.  

She shudders at that thought and slowly pulls away from Caitlyn.  

“I can’t see!” she complains, trying to angle her head over Vi’s shoulder.  “Move!”

Vi moves, and not only has Mylo passed her, but so has computer-controlled Baby Mario.  Fuck.  

Claggor passes the finish line.  

If Vi really focuses, she can beat Mylo.  

A siren tone plays through the speaker, signaling that someone is going the wrong way.  

Caitlyn squeals, “I’m in the bushes!”

She’s in eighth place.  

She hates to lose.  

Vi’s already going to lose to Mylo.  

She swaps controllers with Caitlyn.  

“Am I Bowser now?” Caitlyn asks.  

“Yes,” Vi groans even though she’d do this sober.  

Mylo clears his throat.  “Simp!”

Ekko finally emerges from the bathroom.  “Hey, guys, Gert’s good, but she should really get to bed soon, so if you don’t mind-”

“Not now!” Vi hisses.  She drives into an item box and equips a Bullet Bill.  

Princess Peach zooms past computer-controlled Donkey Kong, computer-controlled Luigi, computer-controlled Shy Guy…

Out of the corner of her eye, she watches Bowser trip on a banana peel.  

“Yahoo!” Princess Peach shouts when she crosses the finish line.  

Fifth place.  Not too bad.  

“Yay!”  Caitlyn wraps her arms around Vi’s neck and rocks them both back and forth.  “We did it!”

Bowser actually still hasn’t finished the race.  The screen just shows the car ramming into a wall.  Repeatedly.  

Caitlyn’s not that great at Mario Kart when she’s sober, but she doesn’t suck this much, normally.  

It’s kind of fun watching Caitlyn have so much fun while being so terrible at something.  

“Is she okay?” Ekko asks.  “I gave the air mattress back to Benzo, so I really don’t have space for another person to sleep over.”

“She’s fine,” Mylo says, clearly annoyed.  “Clagg, start the next race.  I’m gonna fuck up Cheep Cheep Beach!”

Vi fixes the strap on Caitlyn’s dress.  “Are you okay?  Do you feel nauseous?  Does your head hurt?”

She laughs.  “I’m good!  I’m so wonderful, actually!”

“Not sick?”

She’s so warm, and Vi can’t really smell her perfume anymore.  

Caitlyn nods.  “Can we play again?”

Ekko starts to object.  “Wait, guys-”

But how can anyone say no to Caitlyn?

***

Vi isn’t sure how many beers she’s had, and she’s even less sure of how many prixes they’ve done.  The one thing she’s confident of is that she could have won every single race if not for Caitlyn.  

“I’m stuck in the mud!”

“I can’t turn around!”

“Three red shells in a row is not fair!”

Vi feels like she’s been playing Princess Peach more than her own Mario Kart main.  

“I’m in the lead!” Caitlyn shouts.  “I’m winning!”

Ekko facepalms from his spot in the corner.  “No, Claggor just lapped you.”

Vi sighs and holds out her hand.  

Caitlyn swaps their controllers.  “Yay!”  

“Isn’t she supposed to be an honors student?” Mylo asks from the floor.  

“She’s in the Honors Program, the Capstone Program, and she’s an ambassador in the political science department,” Vi says.  “She’s also president of the ASPCA chapter, treasurer of the Gender and Sexuality Alliance, and president of the period club.”

“The Menstruation Equity Society!” Caitlyn corrects.  

“Simp!” Mylo hollers again.  

Claggor raises an eyebrow.  “Stalker, much?”

“Do you keep copies of her resume?” Ekko asks. 
Vi stammers, “I…”  Yes, she does.  If she ran into some prominent lawyer and didn’t give them Caitlyn’s resume, she’d regret it for the rest of her life.  

“Can we play again?” Caitlyn asks.  

Vi shrugs.  “Clagg-”

“No,” Ekko says, moving to stand in front of the TV.  “Do you guys realize what time it is?”

Caitlyn laughs.  “It must be past ten o’clock!”

“Two,” Ekko says.  “It is two in the god damn morning.  There isn’t even enough beer for another game!”

“Yeah, okay, we’ll get out of your hair,” Vi says, shifting against the cushions.  “Just let us sober up-”

“This couch is officially Gert’s bed, now!” Ekko says, grabbing the blanket from behind Claggor.  “Time to go!  Thanks for coming!”

“Happy…  Happy birthday!” Caitlyn says.  

Vi can do this.  She can get herself and Caitlyn across the street and back to their on-campus apartment.  Nobody is going to call campus security on them for being publicly intoxicated.  Everything is-

“Whoa,” Vi says out loud when she stands up.  

The patterns on the carpet form a kaleidoscope beneath her.  Her eyes feel like they’re going to melt out of her face.  

She sits back down.  

“Violet?” Caitlyn asks.  

“You let her call you by your full name?” Mylo asks.  “Simp!”

So Vi has had a little more to drink than she initially thought.  

“Up!” Ekko shouts.  

Caitlyn tries to get up, but keeps sinking backwards onto the cushions like a turtle stuck on its back.  

Claggor gets up and offers her a hand, bringing her to her feet.  

“I chose the wrong shoes,” she says again.  

“I didn’t drive,” Claggor says.  “Will you two be okay walking?”

“Yes, thank you!” Caitlyn says.  

Vi’s head is buried between her legs, so she doesn’t know if anyone’s looking at her.  Once she gets into the fresh air, she’ll be okay.  There’ll be a little chill.  That always makes her feel better.  

“Mylo and I have an Uber waiting, so we’re going to head out,” Claggor says.  “Text me when you get back safe, okay?”

Caitlyn is never going to remember to do that.  Or maybe she will. 

“I will!” she says.  “You’re too kind.”

Ekko clears his throat.  “Time to go!  Not my birthday anymore!”

“Where are your shoes?” Caitlyn asks, looking at Vi’s feet.  

“Uh…”

“Oh, here!”

Caitlyn gets on her knees and enters Vi’s line of sight.  Is she…

“Cait, you don’t have to-”

“I can do it!”

“I don’t doubt that you can, but…”

Caitlyn ties the laces on Vi’s tennis shoe and then unties the laces on the left shoe, even though Vi hasn’t touched them since she bought these shoes.  

She ties her knots funny.  She makes two loops and ties them together.  Vi never wants to undo this knot because Caitlyn did it.  

“Up you go!” Caitlyn practically sings.  

Before Vi can register what’s happening, she and Caitlyn are locked outside Ekko’s apartment.  

“I still can’t believe he lives in that massive apartment by himself,” Vi says, squinting her eyes in the harsh hall light.  

Caitlyn sways.  “That was fun!”

Vi takes her in.  One of her dress straps has fallen from her shoulder again.  Her eye makeup is smudgy, and her pupils are somewhat dilated.  Vi can imagine her hair is a mess, too, but she can’t tell because of the-

“Whose hat is that?” she asks.  

Caitlyn adjusts the top hat on her head.  “I don’t know, but it matches my outfit, don’t you think?”

“It’s…”  Vi is supposed to be worried about something, but she can’t remember what it was.  Huh.  “It’s perfect,” she says, pushing the brim over Caitlyn’s eyes.  

They start the climb back down the stairs, arms around each other so they don’t fall down the steps.  

They got to the first platform.  “Shit!” Caitlyn shouts, grabbing her breasts.  

“What?” Vi asks.  

“My cigarettes!”

Caitlyn Kiramman has only attended one drinking party in her life, yet she can’t fall asleep without her evening cigarette. 

Vi doesn’t smoke, but she has considered buying a pack of cigarettes so she can have one if Caitlyn needs it.  She already wears a hair-tie on her wrist, even though her hair is too short to tie back.  

Caitlyn left her coat behind, too, but Ekko will know it’s hers.  The cigarettes are as good as gone.  

“We can’t go back,” Vi says.  “Ekko will kill us.”

“What am I supposed to do?”  she despairs.  “Take melatonin?”

“We’ll stop by the gas station,” Vi says.  

“I can’t go to the gas station at this hour!” Caitlyn whines, her steps echoing in the corridor.  

“Do you think we can DoorDash cigarettes?” Vi asks.  

Caitlyn trips on a step, and Vi catches her before she can hit the ground.  

“Shit, should we call someone?” 

Caitlyn just laughs.  

Vi joins in.  Caitlyn’s laugh is so pretty.  Everything about her is so pretty, even the stupid hat she found at Ekko’s party.  

It sort of does match the purple flowers on her white dress.  

Vi fixes the strap on that dress again.  

They try to keep it together through the apartment complex lobby, and then they’re out in the May breeze.  

“It’s so nice out!” Caitlyn shouts, waking up a homeless man sleeping at an outdoor Starbucks table.  

Vi pushes the button to cross the street, but no cars are coming, so she grabs Caitlyn’s hand and pulls her across the street and back onto the Piltover University campus.  

The campus is lit up with blue security lights and the occasional streetlight.  There’s a little more life on campus at three in the morning than there had been on Progress Avenue.  Students kick a ball across the University Mall.  The lights are on at the Heimerdinger Library.  A pizza man tries to find a dorm building.  

They pass the Janna Center and a statue of the university founder.  

“My feet hurt,” Caitlyn declares, taking off her sandals.  She gives them to Vi to hold.  

“Let’s cut across the Law School Lawn,” Vi says, nodding her head towards the green space in front of the Piltover University School of Law.  At least this way, Caitlyn won’t scrape her feet on the concrete.  

Fun fact!  There is a parking garage under that lawn.  Claggor used to keep his car there until he found out you can just park at the deli across the street for free.  

The fountain in front of the law school is lit from below, and the water adds a peaceful noise to an otherwise quiet night, save for Caitlyn and Vi’s rowdiness.  

Caitlyn looks at Vi, and then she looks at the fountain.  “I’m getting in,” she declares.  

“Okay, Cupcake.”

“I’m doing it.”

“I believe you.”  Vi does not believe her.  

Caitlyn wiggles her way out of Vi’s hold and then steps into the fountain.  “There are coins in here!” she shouts.  

Vi looks around; Caitlyn is not going to be happy tomorrow if she gets caught swimming in the prestigious fountain.  

But she looks so cute in there, and Vi kind of wants to snap a photo…

Cassandra Kiramman.  Rifle.  Big rifle, actually.  

“C’mon, Cait,” Vi says.  “I’ll heat up some mozzarella sticks.”

Caitlyn backs further into the fountain.  “Not until you get in!”

“I don’t want to get in.

“Please.”  She takes another step and shrieks when the water sprays her back.  “It’s chilly!  Violet, come swim with me!”

“Cupcake, we should really get back before Campus Security shows up.”

“Not until you swim with me!”  She puts her new hat on the concrete edge of the fountain and dips her head under the water.  That cannot be good for her hair.  

“Violet, please!”  She only uses Vi’s full name when she wants something, and gods, Vi can’t resist it.  

Her dress is completely soaked through.  It clings to her thighs and her stomach.  Water drips down her legs.  Vi can see… more than she should.  

She forces the memory of Cassandra Kiramman polishing her rifle over FaceTime again.  That’s not sexy.  That’s the consequence of actions Vi has yet to commit.  

She looks around again.  No sign of campus security.  

“I’m not leaving until you get in, and you know how I don’t like it when my fingers get pruny.”

“Cupcake-”

“Do you want to trigger my sensory issues?”

Vi sighs.  There really is no escape.  

So she sets Caitlyn’s sandals down next to her hat, takes off her own shoes, and then gets in, feeling her jeans grow heavy with water.  

Caitlyn throws her arms around Vi, getting her whole front wet in the process.  “You’re here!”

Vi finds that she doesn’t care.  She’s close to Caitlyn.  Caitlyn is hugging her.  

So Vi hugs her back, feeling the small of her back and the curve of her waist.  She can smell her lavender shampoo and the beer on her breath, and she just wants to bottle the whole thing up so she can remember this night forever.  

“You smell so good,” Vi says.  

“My grandmother bought me this perfume in Ionia.  It’s called Essence of Cherry Blossom.”

“I like it.”

“Do you?  I usually wear something a little more muted…”

Vi can’t really smell the perfume anymore, but she’s pretty sure she liked it earlier.  “It’s great.”

Caitlyn whispers in her ear, “I was hoping you’d notice.”

Maybe she’s just cold from the fountain, but a chill creeps down her spine when Caitlyn’s lips brush against her ear.  “Me?” she asks.  

Caitlyn nods, and then she pulls back, her smile fading.  “Are you… Are you going to call Ahri tonight?”

“Probably not,” Vi says.  “I don’t want to leave you.”

Caitlyn nods.  “Good,” she says.  “That’s good.”

“It is?”

She steps out of the fountain, and Vi looks at the stars in the sky so she doesn’t see anything she’s not supposed to.  She’s done Caitlyn’s laundry.  She knows what kind of underwear her roommate wears.  

Caitlyn slips her sandals back on and puts her hat on.  Vi decides to just carry her shoes so they won’t smell tomorrow.  

“It’s very good,” Caitlyn says again.  

“Why is that?”

She picks up the pace, walking back towards their building.  “I’m cold!  Hurry up.”

Vi catches up with ease.  “Let’s warm up, then.”

***

Caitlyn’s student ID card was with the pack of cigarettes she left at Ekko’s, so Vi has to use hers to swipe them into the building and then into the elevator.  At least this elevator works.  

“Are you sure you’re not going to call Ahri?” Caitlyn asks as she pushes the button.  

Vi sighs.  “Cupcake, I am not calling Ahri.  Gods, this is why we shouldn’t live together next year.”

Caitlyn’s eyes widen.  “What?”

Normally, Vi would mock the way she says, “Wot?”  Instead, she just says, “I’m sorry.  I… I think we need space.  You can move off campus.  We won’t have to coordinate hookups or anything like that anymore.”

“I haven’t hooked up with anyone in our space,” she says.  “I usually do that over breaks.  Not recently, but…”

“You shouldn’t feel like you can’t ‘cause of me,” Vi says.  

“But why can’t we live together?” she asks.  “I want to live with you next year!”

“I want to live with you, too!” Vi shouts back.  

“Why can’t you, then?” she slurs.  

Vi says, “Because I have feelings for you!”

Shoot.  

The elevator dings.  

They’re on their floor.  

Silently, as if they hadn’t just drunkenly shouted at each other in an elevator, they walk back to their room, and Vi fumbles with the keys.  

At least their last night as friends was a good one.  Caitlyn had fun playing drinking games.  Vi had fun watching Caitlyn play drinking games.  

Vi closes the door and turns the lock.  She sighs.  Maybe she didn’t tell Caitlyn about her feelings.  Maybe she made it up in her head.  Is she really that drunk?

Yes, she is that drunk.  

“So,” she says, clapping her hands together.  “About those mozzarella sticks…”

Caitlyn, who’s halfway to her bedroom, suddenly turns around.  Her bare feet slap against the wooden floor as she charges Vi, taking her face in her hands and-

“Shit,” she swears when the brim of her hat smacks Vi in the forehead.  

She turns her head to the side to try again, and she honestly looks ridiculous, standing there with her lips puckered and her stupid top hat standing crooked but tall.  

Vi takes her stolen hat off and lays it on the counter.  

Caitlyn wastes no time.  She grabs Vi’s face and pulls her in, practically smashing their mouths together.  

Caitlyn seems to realize she isn’t going anywhere; her muscles relax beneath Vi’s touch.  

There isn’t much Vi can do pinned against the doorway, so she lets Caitlyn take the lead, trying and failing to hold back a moan when Caitlyn’s warm tongue traces her lips.  

She tastes like whiskey and beer, and her hair and clothes drip onto the cheap tile floor, although Vi can imagine she’s also dripping.  

Their hands wander, and Vi allows herself to touch Caitlyn in places she hadn’t let herself even think about these past few months.  

Her waist is warm and soft.  Her butt tenses under Vi’s large hands.  

Vi squeezes a handful of her supple ass, causing her to gasp and break the kiss.  

Their shared space is cluttered; Caitlyn’s textbooks are on the bartop counter, and they left their dishes in the sink when they rushed off to the liquor store.  Vi’s family photos stare at them from the refrigerator, and Caitlyn’s favorite Yordle magnet from Bandlewood City watches from the freezer door.  

There aren’t any crumbs left on the counter from dinner, so Vi hoists Caitlyn onto the surface and steps into the space between her legs.  

Caitlyn grasps at Vi’s back and tilts her head when Vi kisses her neck.  

“You taste so good,” Vi grunts.  

“Been wanting this…” she gasps, “forever…”

She licks a long stripe from Caitlyn’s jaw to her ear and then nips the cartilage, not caring that she’s poking her tongue with a silver earring.  

Caitlyn wraps her legs around Vi and squeezes, pulling her in closer.  

She groans at the feeling of Caitlyn, wet from the fountain, pressed flush against her abs, breasts squished against her chest.  

Caitlyn seems to feel the same way, because she throws her head back and-

“Ouch, shit,” she swears, rubbing her head where she bumped it against the cabinet.  

Wordlessly, Vi pulls her closer and grabs her by the ass, carrying her… somewhere.  Anywhere else.  

Onto the university-issued couch!

They can’t be the first people to do this on top of the cheap dorm furniture.  

“Violet,” she all but moans.  

Vi lies her down on the couch, and it’s almost comical how her legs dangle off the edge.  It’s a good thing the only person who sleeps on this couch is Powder, who is short.  

Caitlyn must have slipped a hand under Vi’s shirt when she wasn’t paying attention because now her fingers are tickling her abs.  “You’re so strong,” she says.  

“You’re so hot,” Vi says into the crook of her neck.  She bites the skin and then sucks.  She’ll have a hard time believing this is real in the morning if there’s no evidence.  

Hopefully, Caitlyn’s okay with a few marks.  

She squirms beneath her on the couch.  

“Is this okay?” Vi asks.  

“There’s a spring in my back.”  She sits up and stretches.  Her back makes a cracking sound that probably means she should see a chiropractor, but Vi doesn’t want to risk ruining the mood.  

Caitlyn’s eyes narrow and her lips form a pout.  “I’m not too drunk to go to your bedroom,” she says.  

Vi smirks.  This is a good idea.  This is the best idea they’ve had all day.  This might be the best idea Caitlyn’s ever had.  Like, even more than putting free pads and tampons in all the campus restrooms so trans men and gender non-conforming people can have them, too.

“What are you thinking about?” Caitlyn asks.  

“Just how sweet you are,” Vi says.  

She blushes.  “Do you not want to?”  

Vi asks, “Want to what?”

“Go to your room.”

“Oh!  Yeah!”  She scoops Caitlyn up bridal-style and carries her down the hall.  They laugh when Vi accidentally knocks Caitlyn’s legs off the drywall a few times.  One of her certificates from a shooting contest falls to the ground, but neither of them cares.  They’ll take care of it in the morning.  

Vi pushes the door open with her foot and drops Caitlyn onto the bed, immediately climbing on top of her.  It’s like all her pent-up feelings towards her best friend have finally been given permission to be expressed, and she’s choosing to express those feelings by jumping Caitlyn’s bones.  

Actually, that’s exactly what’s happening. 
Caitlyn guides Vi’s hands to her breasts, and her mouth falls open as Vi kneads them through her soaked dress.  She doesn’t bother to fix the fallen dress strap again.  

“Wanna get this off of you,” Vi says.  Her voice sounds foreign, the way it might in a recording.  

Caitlyn nods and sits up for a moment.  

Instead of fixing the fallen strap on her shoulder, Vi grabs the hem of the dress and peels it off Caitlyn’s body, and damn, the sight of her in just her underwear is overwhelming.  She’s a goddess.  

Caitlyn snorts.  “You’ve folded my underwear before.”

“Yeah, but I’ve never seen it on you,” Vi says, her voice muffled by the hoodie she’s trying to pull over her head.  

When she’s finally free, she realizes she’s taken her t-shirt with it, so she’s left in just the nude-colored tape binding her breasts.  No matter.  Caitlyn’s not someone she has to explain this to; she’s let Vi use her Amazon Prime account to order tape.  

Vi presses her lips to Caitlyn’s again and pushes her back onto the bed with a little more force than she means to use, but Caitlyn doesn’t seem to mind.  

She kisses Caitlyn’s cleavage, and Caitlyn starts to pant, each breath accentuated by a little moan.  

Vi yanks the cups of her white bra down to her stomach and continues to lavish her breasts; how had she shown so much self-restraint for so long?  Caitlyn is the most beautiful woman she’s ever seen, and she deserves to be told that every day.  She deserves flowers, picnics, and Valentine’s Day plushies.  

She deserves hickies, ruined sheets, and orgasms.  

Caitlyn rests her forearm against her brow while Vi takes a nipple into her mouth and sucks.  

“Violet…”
“You’re so beautiful,” she says.  

Caitlyn takes her hand from Vi’s back pocket—when did it get there?—and feels blindly around her belt buckles until she finds the fly of her jeans.  

Vi pulls back, giving Caitlyn space to move and fumble with the button.   

She freezes when she gets to the zipper.  She seems to disassociate for a minute, the way Vi does whenever she’s in that history class that’s so boring, and she can see Caitlyn and her friends studying on the lawn, just a wall away…

“Cait?” 

Caitlyn sits back, leans over the side of the bed, and proceeds to vomit all over the floor.  

Suddenly more sober than she’d felt a minute ago, Vi rubs circles on Caitlyn’s bare back, trying to focus on her friend—friend?—in need and not how soft her skin is or the gentle protrusion of her spine.  Under that soft skin.  Maybe that expensive moisturizer isn’t a dumb thing to have.  

Caitlyn gasps for air, and tears prickle at the corners of her eyes.  “I…”

She doesn’t get to finish what she’s about to say because she throws up again.  A tiny splash gets on Vi’s comforter, but she chooses not to mention that.  It’s just a cheap twin bed comforter from the department store.  She can wash it.   

Knowing Caitlyn, she’ll probably feel so bad that she offers to wash it in the morning.  

Caitlyn opens her mouth to speak, but then throws up again.  

“Get it all out,” Vi says.  “We’ve all been there.”

Caitlyn wipes her mouth with the back of her arm.  “I’m sorry… I-”

“Don’t apologize,” Vi says.  She fiddles with the clasp on Caitlyn’s bra.  The cups are still tugged below her breasts.  “I think you’ll feel better if I take this off.”

Caitlyn gives a small wave of approval, so Vi takes off the offending garment and slingshots it into the laundry basket.  Caitlyn must be feeling awful because she doesn’t even act annoyed with that.  “Go shower,” she says, helping her roommate out of bed.  “I’ll get you some clothes.”

“I have to clean up,” she protests.  Vi can’t tell if her speech is slurred from how tired she is or if she really is still that drunk.  

Vi’s head kind of hurts, too.  

Maybe they’re both drunker than they thought.  

“I’ll clean it up,” Vi says.  “I’ll leave your pajamas and a towel outside the door.”

Caitlyn trudges off to the bathroom, and Vi winces at the sight of the vomit on the floor and her phone charger in the middle of it.  

It’s a good thing she has a backup.  

She cleans up the mess and doesn’t mind it as much as she should; Mylo’s voice is in her head, calling her a simp.  

“Shut up,” she says to his annoying voice as she washes her hands in the tiny kitchen sink.  

She can still hear the water running in the bathroom, and checks the time on her phone.  She doesn’t think she’s ever seen Caitlyn stay up this late; it’s four in the morning.  

She tells herself if Caitlyn’s in there for… fifteen more minutes, she’ll check on her.  

And if Caitlyn doesn’t answer when Vi checks on her, she’ll just pick the lock with a paper clip.  She learned how to do that freshman year when she and Caitlyn got locked out of the Jack and Jill-style bathroom in their suite.  

The water stops.  

Caitlyn’s fine.  Nobody’s picking any locks tonight.  

Vi gulps down the rest of her water bottle, then throws it in the sink to wash in the morning.  

Caitlyn can be kind of anal about doing the dishes, but Vi has a feeling she won’t care tonight.  

On her way to her bedroom, she knocks on the bathroom door.  “Goodnight, Cupcake!”

It looks like Caitlyn found her clothes outside the door because they’re no longer there.  At least Vi doesn’t have to help her dress… not that there isn’t much she hasn’t seen at this point.  

She blushes at the thought of Caitlyn’s breasts.  She’d been so close.  She’d touched them.  

She’d like to fall asleep using them as a pillow.  

She leaves her bedroom door cracked just in case Caitlyn needs her and then turns down the sheets on her bed.  She says a quick little thank-you prayer to Janna that Caitlyn managed not to throw up on them too much.  

She tosses a throw pillow onto the floor and climbs under the covers, yanking them over her shoulder and turning onto her side.  

She sighs.  Tonight was nice.  She hopes she remembers it in the morning.  She hopes Caitlyn remembers it in the morning; they probably have to talk about it.  

Vi will be sad if she doesn’t get to talk about it with Caitlyn.  

Tonight’s one of those nights where she’s going to fall asleep without any trouble, and without any dreams.  She just has to find that comfy spot and think about something that makes her happy.  

Like Caitlyn.  

Doing homework with Caitlyn.  

Watching movies on Caitlyn’s nice laptop.  

Sitting across from Caitlyn at the dining hall.  

Showing Caitlyn how to put out a grease fire.  

Caitlyn standing in the fountain, wet and drunk.  

“I threw up.”

Vi’s eyes snap open, and she thrashes around, trying to untangle herself from the covers.  “Holy shit.”

Standing above her in her silky blue pajamas is Caitlyn.  She has dark circles under her eyes, and her hair is wet and tangled.  

Caitlyn pulls the covers off of Vi.  

“I’ll clean it,” Vi says.  She could wait, but it’ll be harder to clean tomorrow.  

“I made it to the toilet…” she says.  

Vi stills.  “That’s great.”

Caitlyn sits on the side of the bed and then pulls her legs in behind her.  

“What are you doing?” Vi asks.  

“My bed is lofted,” she says matter-of-factly.  

Right.  Caitlyn is throwing up, and climbing a ladder to get to the toilet is probably not the best idea.  

“We can trade-” she starts.  

Caitlyn grabs Vi’s old stuffed bunny and hugs it against her chest.  “You stay.”

“Oh, um, okay,” she says, sliding backward against the wall so Caitlyn can fit on her pillow.  There isn’t enough space in the twin bed for them not to touch, and Vi’s worried about how to share this bed in the most appropriate way possible.  

Caitlyn takes a deep breath.  “Your bed smells nice.”

“I Febreezed it after… You know.”

“Smells like you.”

“Hope that’s a good thing.”

But she never gets an answer because Caitlyn is smiling in her sleep, plush bunny in her arms, and her legs tangled with Vi’s.  

And she decides right here that it doesn’t matter whether Caitlyn remembers this night or not when she wakes up.  It doesn’t matter if tonight meant something to her or if she just got caught up in the moment and doesn’t actually have feelings for Vi.  

Even if she doesn’t like Vi back, being with Caitlyn and getting to take care of her is enough.  The fact that she trusts her is enough, and Vi would clean up Caitlyn’s vomit a thousand times if it meant keeping that trust.