Chapter Text
Vi sighed as she dropped her backpack on the floor next to the old couch of the students break room. She threw herself on her back and with one arm on her forehead she closed her eyes.
Before she could even assimilate what was happening Ekko and Powder entered the room chattering loud as two marmots.
- No, no, no, no, you KNOW that he's the best, bro can literally rewind time!!!
- Pfffff, you just say that because he's cute.
- WHAT?
- Yeah, you heard it right.
- No. Your favourite character sucks ass and you know it! It doesn't even have any powers!
- She is LITERALLY the main character of the thing!!! She explodes stuff!
- What?! Vi please tell your sister she's wrong.
Ekko and Powder looked at Vi who slowly opened her eyes and finally said:
- You two don't have a report or a work to do or something?
They looked at each other, then looked at Vi, then almost comically looked at each other again and Powder said:
- Damn sis, what have gotten into you?
With a sigh Vi said:
- It's just a headache…
And with a lower voice:
- That fucking girl…
- AHA! I KNEW IT WAS SOMETHING!
It was almost as if we could see a little light bulb drawing light on top of Powder’s head.
Ekko seemed kinda unbothered, and just took a sip of his lemon soda.
- Ughh.. No, it's just… She stresses me out so much… I don't know why she even bothers showing up when her dad owns half the city…
- I think someone's jealous…
- What?! No! It's not like that Pow…
- Hm, enlighten me then.
- It's just- I mean…
- Yeah, I thought so.
Vi let out another sigh. Today was a sighful day.
Before Ekko finished his soda he offered it to Pow and she drank the rest of it.
- What if I wanted a sip of that soda?
- Ops, too bad.
- You're annoying.
- And you're jealous because this rich girl and her classical art are making success and professor Heimerdinger didn't give you an A+ on that emo piece.
Ekko let out a little whistle and muttered “brutal”…
- Okay bye for you two.
- Wait, where are you going?
Vi picked up her backpack and stood up, going towards the door of the room.
- Eh, make another emo piece?
- Pffff…
The door opened. And then it closed.
Ekko looked at Powder and said:
- Why do you bother her so much?
- Isn't that what sisters do?
…
Vi was looking down when she entered one of the ateliers / study rooms, she thought she was alone and could finally make some progress on one of her “emo” projects (as Powder was saying), but as she closed the door she heard someone saying:
- You know, from 15h00 to 15h45 this room was reserved, by me.
- Well, I really have to-
Vi stopped as she turned around and realized who she was talking to.
- Oh. You.
- Yes. Me.
They both stared at each other for a moment that honestly didn't have to be so long, being interrupted only by Caitlyn’s voice:
- You know you can’t avoid me forever, right?
- I'm not avoiding you.
Fucking fuck. She couldn't think of one single good excuse.
- I'm just… busy.
Caitlyn furrowed one eyebrow and tilted her neck to the side just a little, very similar to when dogs are trying to understand something.
- You can just say you don’t like me, we don’t like each other, it’s ok, we don’t have to like everyone in the world - Caitlyn decided to break the silence and give a rest to Vi’s neurons.
- Yes. Ok. - Vi crossed her arms, still with backpack hanging on her shoulder - What now?
- We had two weeks for that paper, now we have four days. - Caitlyn stood up from the table she was sitting with a tiny jump and started wandering around the room - Considering that is quite a big paper to do in the few time we have…
Vi tried to not roll her eyes while listening to that accent.
- Ok, so I can do half of it and you do the rest - Vi said fast so that Caitlyn would shut up. But of course she didn't.
- You know that this doesn't work, it will look like that meme with the poorly drawn horse!
- Ah, right, you know everything about drawing… Horses. - Vi said in a lower voice again, speaking to herself.
- I, what? - Caitlyn put a real accent on that “what”.
- Nothing - Vi responded without looking up.
- Say it. - If you didn't know Caitlyn at all you could say she was angry, but she knew exactly what she was doing.
- I just said you know everything about drawing, and… horses. - And Vi said that “everything” in a very mocking way.
Honestly Vi didn't know anymore why she was talking about horses.
Caitlyn just stood there for a second, it was like her brain engines were processing something and fumes were going to get out of her ears.
In that brief moment of time, Vi thought to herself “Well, fuck”.
- I know you don't like me.
- Yeah, no shit.
- Let me speak. - Caitlyn said in a louder and serious tone, so Vi widened her eyes and put her hands up meaning something between “sorry” and “keep going”.
- As I was saying - she proceeded talking and started to gesticulate with her hands - I know you don't like me. And it's okay. We are past this. But if you're gonna be all funny and jokes all the time, I'm making this paper alone, and I KNOW you don't want that.
In fact, Vi didn't want that. Despite being all rebel and piercings and rock n roll and stuff, she was a dedicated student. She got good grades and rarely delivered a paper or a work late. So yeah, she didn't want that.
A few seconds in silence passed and she realized she had to say something, Caitlyn was starting to frown her eyebrows again and that shouldn't be a good sign.
- Okay… - Vi said, uncrossing her arms and walking a few clumsy steps - Let's do this - She lifted one hand as a truce handshake.
Caitlyn put on a little angry face, took a step forward and shook Vi's hand. - Okay, let's do this.