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artificialqueens · 9 months

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🏳️‍🌈 Conflict of Interest, Chapter 1 (Raja/Yvie Oddly) - Dartmouth420

summary: At the RuPaul Charles College of Art and Design, Yvie Oddly is an ambitious fashion major grappling with anxiety and trying to survive her senior year, and one of her professors this term is really getting on her nerves. Raja Gemini is the head of the fashion department, trying to keep the program afloat while struggling with her recent divorce, and one particular student seems determined to get under her skin. Will cynicism, bitterness, and power dynamics keep them apart or will unexpected similarities draw them closer than they ever expected? Lesbian college AU. Multichapter.

a/n: this was inspired by a request for raja/yvie from last year, I finally got around to writing it and of course it's a multichapter slow burn lol, hope the anon who wrote in is still around! beta-read by the wonderful Saiphl, thank you <3 <3

content warning: eventual student/teacher relationship with a significant age gap

CHAPTER 1: Never meet your heroes

“Hello everyone, welcome to Advanced Fashion Studies,” announced Raja, attempting to summon some enthusiasm from her seated position at the table at the head of the studio.

Hellos and nods echoed back from the students who had taken seats in the large, familiar room. Raja taught in the college’s central fashion studio during the fall, winter, and occasionally summer term, and had for the past several years of her career. The wide, padded work table sat in the middle, and the walls were lined with tables with sewing machines on top, one station for each student in the class. Shears, rulers and other shared tools were in a cupboard at the end of the room, each neatly labelled. Rolls of basic fabrics were on the wall, a collection of dress forms in the corner, and other supplies were hidden away in cupboards.

The room was set up to be the ideal version of a working fashion studio, similar to the ones she’d been employed in before going into teaching. The design was intended to prepare the students for whatever came next after graduating from The RuPaul Charles College of Art and Design.

The bank of windows at the far end of the room backlit her, hopefully enough that the students wouldn’t notice the dark circles under her eyes.

“Anyway, before we get started let’s get attendance over with,” said Raja, tucking a loose lock of her long grey hair behind her ear and glancing down at the sheet. She recognized a few names, one or two of the students who had grabbed attention in their sophomore year had continued through the program, but during her sudden leave of absence last winter she’d lost track of the cohort currently heading into their senior year.

She much preferred teaching senior year students; they were smarter, more consistent, and took her criticism better. Well, most of the time.

She went quickly down the list, reading each name aloud and receiving a response: Jaida, Brock, Vanessa, Scarlet, Jan, Jackie, Yuhua, Jinkx, A’keria, Violet-

“And…Yvie?”

No one responded.

But Raja recognized the name. This particular student had been making a splash at the college since she’d arrived, and Raja vaguely remembered the skinny punk with the wild creations and determined attitude. But she wasn’t in the room at the moment. Maybe she’d dropped the class.

Raja continued, putting the sheet aside. “Well, it looks like Yvie isn’t here, so let’s get started-”

The door at the far end of the room burst open.

Raja pursed her lips as Yvie strode in with total confidence, not appearing even remotely embarrassed about being late. She raised her chin to Raja across the room, her septum piercing glinting in the sun streaming in the window. Her hair was sheared short and dyed a bright green. She wore black jeans ripped at the knees, a tight-fitting crop top across her rope-like torso, a patchy messenger bag over her shoulder and a sarcastic little smirk that Raja didn’t particularly appreciate.

“Sorry I’m late,” announced Yvie without sounding sorry at all, meandering over to one of the chairs by the sewing machines and flopping down into it like her long limbs were made of rubber.

The students Raja had identified as Jaida and Scarlet glanced over her shoulders, waving at Yvie and whispering greetings.

“You must be Yvie,” said Raja, unable to keep her tone from becoming dry and unimpressed. “Thank you for joining us.”

“Oh, you’re welcome,” replied Yvie, with a shit-eating grin.

A few of the students giggled.

Raja shrugged dismissively, refusing to give Yvie another glance, and sat up straighter, keeping her gaze ahead. Normally a student being late wouldn't bother her much, but her patience was limited these days. But she couldn’t quite keep the tinge of sarcasm out of her voice. “So now that we’re all here, come take a syllabus and we’ll go through it.”

The students got up and milled around the edge of the table, Violet reaching out and snatching the first syllabus off the top of the pile with a perfectly manicured hand. Brock rolled his eyes at her, took three and passed them back to Jaida and Scarlet respectively.

Aside from Yvie’s dramatic entrance, this batch of students seemed okay, about as present and respectful as a group of twenty-one(ish)-year-olds could be.

Yvie wandered up to the small crowd and snuck through, leaning over and snatching the last syllabus from the stack with an ironic flourish. Raja resisted the urge to roll her eyes, but Yvie’s hands caught her attention; her fingers were long and deft, short nails decorated with chipped black nail polish, a few reddened hangnails showing the evidence of a bad habit.

Raja took her time to go through the syllabus. Advanced Fashion was a heavily weighted course, requiring many hours of both in-class and studio time. Taken in the fall, it finalized the technical skills required for the students to take their Open Fashion Studio course in the winter, which was largely self-directed, to construct their final collections for the graduate show in the spring.

Yvie sat slumped in the faraway chair like she didn’t give a shit, legs haphazardly splayed, flipping over the page of the syllabus and frowning at it. Without even seeming to notice, she started to pick at her nails with her opposite hand, her thumb anxiously worrying at the nail bed on her fourth finger. Hm. Raja had guessed correctly. Her right knee twinged and she adjusted her position on the stool again.

“...and that’s about it,” said Raja to the room of visibly overwhelmed students as she closed the final page of the syllabus. “As you know from your other classes, we do group critiques for every assignment. It’s one of the best ways to really interrogate your concepts.” She chuckled, gesturing at the class, who all stared at her nervously. “Don’t look so scared, my criticism is always constructive.”

A few students let out sighs of relief, while others raised their heads, accepting the challenge. Raja considered herself to be a chill, relaxed instructor; she always gave unique, relevant, and constructive feedback. She just didn’t especially care about being nice about it, and she didn’t like seeing boring work. She’d seen so much boring work over the years. Sure, her standards were high, but she was easier on the students than Bianca, for example. Yvie cocked her head to the side, narrowing her eyes at her from across the room.

“Just don’t show me something boring,” said Raja in her most reassuring voice. “Now let’s get started with the first demo…”

She quickly directed the students to go over to the central drafting table for her first technical demonstration. Although this class was largely for the students to practice and perfect the technical skills they’d learned in the previous years, she still had a few advanced technical sewing and design concepts to teach. The students talked amongst themselves, not paying particular attention to Raja as she got up slowly, cautiously putting weight on her right knee.

The injury last winter had been a blow to both her ego and her sense of mortality. However, Raja hadn’t been able to take any more leave into the fall, given that it was her turn as department head this year. The role circulated among the faculty in the fashion department, Bianca had come off her term as planned, and with it Raja received a smaller teaching load and extra administrative and organizational responsibilities. But she outright refused to use crutches at work, so her knee would just have to speed up its healing according to her schedule.

Just a twinge of pain, it was fine, and she straightened up. No one had noticed her hesitation, except. Ugh. Raja frowned.

While the other students were chatting with each other around the central table, Yvie watched her. Her expression was indiscernible, but she'd definitely noticed her moment of caution. Raja met her eyes briefly, like a shot across the room. Yvie’s mouth twitched with what looked like scorn, and Raja offered her a petty sneer in response as she walked confidently over to join the group at the table and deliver the patterning demonstration.

“Ugh, that class was so long…” Yvie let out a groan as she pushed open the door at the end of the hallway and left the building, turning her face up towards the sun. It shone bright and lovely, and she tried to let its warmth soothe her feeling of annoyed embarrassment, glad to be out of the confined indoor space for the brief lunch break before her afternoon class.

“It’s only the first day, what the hell do you have to groan about?” teased Jaida, a step behind her.

“Term literally just started,” added Scarlet, on Jaida’s other side.

Mondays were going to be brutal this term, given her work schedule; she had a closing shift on Sunday nights. She glanced back at them. “I know, but I barely got a break this summer, I was working like all the time.”

“I know, we like barely got to spend any time together…”

“You went to multiple raves, and like three music festivals,” said Jaida dryly, leading the little group over to a bench in the courtyard, near a twisted tree that grew out of the patch of dirt surrounded by stone. At least September was warm, practically summer, the sun high in the sky.

“Hey,” protested Yvie, before she laughed, shrugging. “Okay fine, we partied a little…”

“Just a little,” chuckled Jaida, sitting down primly on the bench. “Yeah, all our jobs sucked this year, those early shifts just about wrecked my sleep schedule permanently.”

Yvie joined her and Scarlet sat on her other side, so close she was practically in her lap, taking out her phone. Yvie didn’t particularly like being sat on, well, not unless Scarlet was sitting on her face. They’d had some fun this summer: she’d done a reasonable amount of MDMA, danced all night a few times, and gone out to clubs to perform and be seen. Yvie, Scarlet and Jaida (and her on-and-off-again girlfriend Crystal) had gone to one particularly good music festival and had ended up covered in paint and mud, exhilarated and high, sore from dancing all day, escaping reality for a glorious weekend.

But still, the rest of the time she’d spent working. And ruminating.

Yvie took out a cigarette and put it to her lips, digging around in her bag for her lighter.

“Do you really have to smoke?” complained Scarlet, scrunching up her nose.

“Yes,” replied Yvie dryly. “It’s an addiction.”

“But like, I thought you were trying to quit.” Scarlet slung her legs onto Yvie’s lap, and pouted. “You said you’d quit for me…”

Yvie caught Jaida raising an eyebrow in her peripheral vision as her manicured fingers typed rapidly on her phone. Yvie sighed with mild guilt that was mostly covered by familiar irritation creeping up her shoulders. She didn’t remove the unlit cigarette from her mouth, instead she rested her hand on Scarlet’s legging-clad thigh. Sure, keeping her girlfriend happy should be closer to the top of her list of priorities, but instead she was thinking about when her student loan was going to come in, the distinctly low number left in her bank account after this month’s rent, the upcoming semester’s material costs, her stupid job, her follower count, and how her phone bill was a month overdue.

As the final week of summer had passed and everyone had tried to get in one last hurrah before school started up again, Yvie had still been anxiously hustling. So she deserved a cigarette.

“Personally, I’m looking forward to Advanced Fashion,” said Jaida, changing the subject, “I think it’s going to be intense, but in a good way.”

“Me too,” agreed Scarlet, leaning forward slightly to look around Yvie. “But it's going to be a lot of work. Did you hear the prof describe how much time she’s expecting us to put in? I know it’s a triple-credit course, but Jesus.”

“Yeah, she seems like kind of a bitch,” added Yvie, taking the cigarette out of her mouth so the filter wouldn’t get soggy, and twirling it between her fingers. She wanted to get up and smoke, but Scarlet had trapped her.

Jaida and Scarlet fixed her with dual disapproving looks. “Rude.”

“Come on, everyone says she’s the worst,” kvetched Yvie, digging her heels in anyway. Raja had definitely seemed like a cold bitch sitting at the front of the room in a crisp white shirt, grey hair sitting loose on her shoulders, dramatically back-lit by the bank of windows, making everybody have to squint to even see her. “I heard she acts like she’s all chill and blasé, and then she’s really harsh in critiques. Did you hear her say ‘just don’t show me something boring?’ What a drama queen, and she was sarcastic with me when I came in.”

"I mean, you were late," commented Scarlet.

Jaida added contemplatively. “I don't know, she was gone for most of last winter, only a handful of people in our year have had her as an instructor before. Jinkx said she gives really critical feedback, but that can help you grow.”

“Or piss you off, I know my work is good, I don’t need someone who’s just going to bully me-”

Jaida smiled, glancing up from her phone as she finished typing out another rapid text. “So you just want everyone including her to pat you on the back because you got featured in i-D Magazine?”

“Ha! I sure did,” replied Yvie, with a proud smirk. Seeing her name, her face and her creations published had been such an exciting moment. She’d caught the publication’s attention on Instagram through a performance at the last remaining punk club downtown. A journalist had contacted her, asking if she’d be interested in being part of the feature, which had been called Young Americans by the British publication. It had been so exciting, a big step; and her follower count had tripled. A sense of delirious hope had lodged itself in her gut. Maybe she could really make it.

“That was so cool, it’s like you’re almost famous,” said Scarlet, tilting her head back as if to luxuriate in Yvie’s peripheral almost-fame. “And if you really don’t like Raja then just wait and take the class next semester when someone else is teaching it.”

“I can’t, I need this class to graduate on time.” The anxious feeling that Yvie had been trying to manage all summer rose up, and she kept going, needing somewhere to dump it. “I mean, she acts like she knows so much more than everyone about fashion when it’s like, okay sure, maybe you were cool twenty years ago and now you’re just some teacher. Like, chill the fuck out.”

“Why are you so annoyed with her again?” replied Jaida, frowning worriedly down at her phone like she was only half-engaged in the conversation. “She seems more relaxed than Bianca was. Bianca nearly failed us both in Intro to Pattern Drafting.”

"Well, yeah..." Yvie felt a little guilty as she compulsively rolled her cigarette back and forth between her fingers. She did feel annoyed, and disappointed, she should just let the argument go, but-

“What Jaida said,” added Scarlet disinterestedly, playing with a lock of her hair. “Like, give her a chance or whatever.”

Yvie opened her mouth to continue her rant and realized she needed her cigarette right now. “Can you let me up so I can suck on my cancer stick?”

It came out more harshly than she’d anticipated, and she immediately felt bad. Scarlet made an insulted ‘hmph’ noise and removed her legs from Yvie’s lap, scowling. Yvie stood up and took a few steps away from the bench.

“Sorry, I just…” muttered Yvie. She’d felt trapped, but didn’t know how to say it.

“Whatever.” Scarlet crossed her arms, not looking at her.

Jaida didn’t say anything, once again typing rapidly on her phone.

Yvie sighed, digging around in her pocket for her lighter, and lit the cigarette. Scarlet was only three years younger than her, but sometimes she seemed ridiculously immature. Things weren’t quite clicking between them the way they had last year.

Yvie had been doing her own thing more or less since she was fourteen and refused to stop or listen to anyone who told her what to do. But the feeling that she only had so much time left to figure things out was creeping up on her. Maybe it was because she’d started college a few years later than everyone else. She took a deep, steadying drag on her cigarette.

Despite her hopes, Raja was just going to be another barrier to get over this term.

Several years ago Yvie had been a bit lost, she’d been surfing the internet and had discovered a 1994 documentary telling the story of the alternative fashion and underground queer club scene in L.A. Raja had been featured in it, the story following her among a handful of other people in the scene. Like a switch had flipped in Yvie’s brain, she’d latched onto the footage of the young, androgynous club kid; embedded in the subculture, making totally out-there clothing, a party monster at every rave. It showed all the glory of rebellion, love and art pushing back against a capitalist hellscape. All of a sudden Yvie saw what she wanted reflected in an aesthetic and a community that had started fading from existence when she was only an infant, and had watched Raja’s transfixing appearances in the documentary over and over.

Luckily, nothing could stop Yvie from doing her own thing, so she started performing at clubs, making her own clothes, playing music with a couple of different bands, and pouring all her creative energy into whatever alternative scenes she could find, with a sharp eye on 1990s grunge and punk nostalgia. All the while slogging through a series of depressing day jobs. But with her unexpected social media popularity and degree of success, in an attempt to take seriously a future career in fashion she’d re-thought her decision not to go to college. After a bit of research, she’d discovered that the club kid from the documentary had grown up and turned out to be a fashion instructor at RCCAD. The desire to finally meet Raja had been a large part of the reason Yvie had chosen to give college a shot, move half-way across the country, and take on student debt.

But what she’d hoped to be an important, impressive, meaningful moment hadn’t happened yet. Or maybe it had already passed. Raja didn’t teach freshman or sophomore year classes, and Yvie’s attempts to introduce herself in passing had been awkward. Last year Yvie had hopefully signed up for one of her classes only to have Raja go on unexpected leave just before the first day, with Bianca as a last-minute replacement.

Three expensive years had sped past since Yvie had made her decision, and now she was twenty-four - which felt old somehow - and the energy that had always whirred under her skin manifested as a constant, nagging dialogue in the back of her mind, questioning her choices, making her doubt herself, afraid that things wouldn't work out how she’d hoped.

And now, now that she finally had her opportunity to meet and learn from Raja, she’d managed to be late for the first class, attempted to be blasé about it only to be met with hostility, and the whole situation had left her feeling embarrassed, irritable, and anxious. ‘Never meet your heroes' was good advice, it turned out.

“Who are you texting?” asked Yvie, jutting her chin at Jaida. “None of your business….”

“Is it Crystal again?” teased Yvie, a smile curling on her mouth as she flicked the ash from her cigarette. “I told you to play it cool this time.”

Jaida scrunched up her face in a way that indicated she’d been caught. Scarlet laughed and nudged her, teasing. Jaida glanced to the side, eyes going towards the side door the three of them had exited earlier and Yvie looked over her shoulder, following her gaze.

“Hey, look, speak of the devil.”

Pride Challenge Points: 5178

#rpdr fanfiction #dartmouth420 #conflict of interest #raja x yvie #scyvie #yvie oddly #raja gemini #jaida essence hall #scarlet envy #lesbian au #college au #slow burn #enemies to lovers #angst #rare pair #eventual student/teacher relationship #fic challenge

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zwritestuff · 21 hours

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it's just casual (it's pathetic)

Scarlet and Yvie aren’t a thing, they hook up every now and then, and go for late night fast food at whatever chain is open on the rare occasion they go home at the same time and don’t feel like hooking up, and occasionally go to cheap bars to drink cheap drinks and Yvie will draw circles on the back of Scarlet’s hands while talking about her childhood and teenage years, and Scarlet sometimes will send her TikToks that remind her of her, and Sugar and Spice snicker and scurry away when Yvie comes near her during work hours—but they’re not, like, a thing. It’s just casual. (It’s pathetic). or: Scarlet's actions blow up in her face, Yvie is a stone cold bitch for all she knows, and neither knows what "communication" means. (ao3)

a/n: do people still post fics directly on tumblr? anyway.

Word count: 5513

“What do you think about our new bartender?” Sugar and Spice ask, doing that weird synchronization thing that freaks Scarlet out and makes her nearly jump out of her skin.

Scarlet is currently leaning against the far corner in the main room, where Widow put an inside plant some time ago that hides Scarlet just fine. She looks up from her phone screen and cranes her neck to try and catch a glimpse of the new hire, but that proves difficult since she’s facing the other way talking to the other bartender, Kameron. The only thing Scarlet can make out are the red braids and her white t-shirt.

“Dunno, haven’t met her yet.” She shrugs, going back to reading the PDF of the textbook she put off for the past few weeks.

“She’s, like, hot,” Sugar says, with that ditzy giggle Scarlet still can’t quite figure out if it’s fake or genuine. “I’m positive she was looking at my tits when we went to introduce ourselves.”

“Would it kill you to not fuck any more of the bartenders?” Scarlet replies, finally putting her phone away. “What, do you have, like, a bingo or something, Sugarella?”

The twins cackle, more so Spice, who receives a swat on the arm by Sugar. Their banter is cut short when they receive a glare from Widow who’s passing by, checking everything is running smoothly, and the twins quickly scurry away to the kitchen while Scarlet stays put in her place, pretending to fix her uniform.

Widow fixes her a stare that means get up and do your job and Scarlet immediately emerges from behind the plants she’d been hiding in.

It’s not a busy day, not at all, but Scarlet has an exam tomorrow and this textbook reads more like anything other than English. It also doesn’t help that she’s not up to date with the texts, but whatever.

She goes around taking and delivering orders, chatting with the twins and the rest of the staff every now and then, and when no one’s listening she recites latin declinations under her breath while the mayhem of the restaurant roars around her.

She’s been working for Widow for a little more than a year now, since these are her final years of uni and her classes are far less now that graduation is on the horizon. Scarlet never thought about working in the service industry before, but she needed a job and this was the only place that called her back.

It’s… Nice. As nice as a restaurant with a blatant clique of co-workers slash friends can be. There’s this old group of waitresses that go all the way back to when Widow owned a restaurant in a different side of the city, it feels High School-y, in a way. They’re so tight knit they don’t really make space for new people, or at least they never made any space for Scarlet.

Whatever, at least the twins like her.

“Good evening, ladies, I’ll be your server tonight, what can I—”

“Oh my god, bitches, you’re here!”

When Jackie shoves Scarlet off with all the force her body can manage, it takes all of Scarlet’s willpower to not grab Jackie by her hair and drag her around.

Out of nowhere, all of the old waitresses gather around the table Scarlet was about to serve and their overlapping voices make for a very annoying scenario. Soon Widow is marching up to them, and Scarlet hopes, for a brief second, that they’ll get an earful about proper workplace behavior, but much to her disappointment she joins them in the chaos.

It takes her a couple of seconds to guess the pair of women were part of the original waitressing staff and that the blonde doesn’t just have a few pounds on her, she’s pregnant.

The moment Jackie and the rest start sobbing is the moment Scarlet turns on her heels and gives herself a cigarette break.

“Fucking absurd,” Scarlet mutters, kicking open the back-alley door with a cigarette in one hand and a lighter in the other. “If she weren’t Widow’s favorite, I’d—”

“You’d what?”

“Jesus fucking yellow penguins!” Scarlet exclaims, turning around to look at the stranger. When her heart stops pounding against her chest like it wants to come out of it, she recognizes the red braids. Oh, yeah. The new bartender.

“So? What would you do if ‘she’ weren’t the boss’ favorite?” The newbie prompts, a cigarette dangling from her lips, like a damn bad boy from the 60s movies where all the bad boys have leather jackets and pounds of gel on their hair.

“Like I’d tell you,” Scarlet answers, fetching her cigarettes and lighter from the ground. “Who’s to say you’re not a snitch?”

“Do I look like a snitch?”

“You look like a lot of things,” Scarlet retorts, eyeing her up and down.

She’s hot, she has to admit that. She’s taller than her, just a little bit, her arms are leaner, and she’s rather thin. Her arms are covered in tattoos, and if Scarlet forces her eyesight a little bit, she can make out finger tattoos.

“Is it a requirement to get tattoos to be a bartender?” Scarlet blurts out, fixated on making out what her finger tattoos say.

She flexes her fingers, looking intently at Scarlet. “No, but it helps with tips.”

“I suppose so.” Scarlet tries to light up her cigarette, then realizes her lighter ran out. “Got a light?”

The bartender holds out a vintage lighter, one that makes Scarlet whistle in appreciation, and leans closer with her cigarette trapped between her lips while the hot newbie lights it.

Once she gives it a first drag, she says, “‘M Scarlet, by the way.”

“Yvie,” she merely says.

“Welcome to the family, Yvie,” she says, holding up the cigarette like one holds a champagne flute to make a toast. Yvie chuckles, then imitates her.

“My pleasure, Scarlet.”

***

“Yveeeeees, I need a gin tonic, a virgin daiquiri and a mojito,” Scarlet drawls, handing Yvie the order.

“This is the fifth time you’ve come here during your shift,” Yvie points out. “What, are you pushing cocktails onto your customers so you can come see me?” She flirts like it’s her second nature, and Scarlet rolls her eyes and sighs in an exaggerated way.

“Oh, yeah, like I’d want to come see your annoying face.” Scarlet waves her off, placing her tray under her arm and walking away from the bar, with Yvie’s laugh echoing behind her.

She’s definitely pushing cocktails onto her customers. Instead of suggesting one of the many expensive, fancy wines they have in store, she’s suggesting cocktails under the premise that, Well, it’s Friday! Why not have some fun? It helps that the cocktails are much, much cheaper than the bottles of wine they sell.

Scarlet knows it’s a little pathetic, high school-y even, the way she wants to find any possible excuse to perch herself against Yvie’s bar, trying to find the perfect angle that makes her hot enough in her hideous waitressing uniform, pulling down her cleavage just a little bit so Yvie has a good look of the beauty mark on her left breast.

It’s not a sin to want to fuck the very hot, very lesbian new bartender that everyone else has their eyes on—not in Scarlet’s mind, at least.

Sugar and Spice caught on to this pretty early, when they saw her one time trying to fix her stupid bun falling apart before approaching the bar.

“Since when do you care about your looks while you’re on your shift?” Spice pointed out with a giggle.

Scarlet didn’t dignify that with an answer. “Don’t you have tables to attend? Why are you always up my ass?”

The twins held up their hands in mock surrender at the same time, and the following times they interacted with Yvie, Sugar didn’t try to hit on her. Scarlet couldn’t say why she was so relieved that Sugar refrained from going after Yvie, but she thanked her anyway during one of their breaks.

So whatever, now she tries a little extra to look put together on the nights she’s working with Yvie, playing up the annoyance façade, sizing her. Bartenders are flirty by nature, and she’s not planning on making a fool out of herself by making a move based on flimsy evidence.

“Scarlet, Blair called in sick,” Jackie tells her the moment she steps foot into the kitchen. “Do you think you can cover for her tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow’s her turn to close, no?” She mutters, chewing on the inside of her cheek. Jackie nods. “Well, fine, yeah I’ll do it. Put me down for it. I need the money.”

Jackie smiles, pleased. She’s been an assistant manager for a month and she brings that iPad everywhere she goes, it’s like it’s an extension of herself nowadays; her and that iPad run this place like the navy. Nothing is ever out of place, out of time. Sometimes she wonders if she was always this methodical, if she was more laid back when the restaurant was still a small thing hidden among skyscrapers.

Scarlet goes to ask Dusty for some fries, when Jackie speaks again. “Oh! You’re closing with Yvie tomorrow.”

A cheshire cat-like smile blooms on Scarlet’s face.

***

She looks mad, positively crazy, she’s sure of that: here she is, at 1 A.M on a Sunday, sweeping floors and humming tunes like a Disney princess. The twins weren’t working this shift today, and thank fucking god for that, she doesn’t need them nagging her more than they do.

The majority of the girls working the Saturday night shift, including Blair, are part of the cliqué Scarlet will never be part of, and although they didn’t even attempt to make conversation with her during the beginning hours, Scarlet couldn’t care less.

She’s going to fuck Yvie. She doesn’t care if it’s on one of the tables, on the bar, or in the refrigerator but she’s gonna do it. It’s been five months since Yvie started working here, and now she finally has her golden opportunity. Tonight she’s a woman on a mission, and nothing can deter her.

Once the waitresses start filing out, saying goodbyes in general and never just towards Scarlet in particular, excitement starts to bubble up in her stomach. It’s like she’s back in High School all over again and she plotted to be alone with her crush at one of the many house parties she has no recollection of, the only thing still within her memory reach being hot lips against hers.

She’s just sitting at the hostess chair, swinging her legs back and forth, with child-like excitement. Yvie is finishing at the bar, doing whatever she’s supposed to be doing, and she’s waiting for her. Her plan is simple: unbutton the first button of her blouse, approach Yvie, say something seductive, gauge her reaction and go for the kiss.

It’s simple, it’s easy, it’s worked all the time for her.

“Are you all done here?” Yvie asks, her footsteps being the only noise left—for now.

“Yup,” she replies, “You? All done at the bar?” Scarlet straightens her spine, indubitably making her tits stand out. Yvie’s eyes wander down there for a brief second, but they go back to her face. Step one, done.

“Uhm, oh, yeah, all done. You?” She says dumbly.

“You already asked me that, silly,” she laughs in that sultry southern way that’s known for making women fall to her feet. “What, do I make you nervous, Yves?” Scarlet throws her hair back, uncovering her neck.

Yvie gulps, now unabashedly giving her a once-over. “Not the word I’d use.”

“Oh? What word would you use, then?”

It happens in a flash: Yvie ducks down, captures her lips in a kiss, and it’s not in the sweet, gentle way of the romance movies Scarlet watches until her retinas burn. It’s anything but; it makes her insides churn with lust and that’s way more fun.

They don’t fuck inside the restaurant, but in Yvie’s car. Yvie’s tiny car barely manages to contain both of their tall bodies; maneuvering themselves to be in a position where both are comfortable goes exactly how Scarlet thinks Circus De Soleil rehearses go.

Scarlet’s toes are touching the roof of Yvie’s car and she’s pretty sure she’s going to get a cramp, but Yvie’s tongue is licking at her folds and, really, her brain can’t register much else right now.

“You’re beautiful,” Scarlet says, sincere, looking at her through half-lidded eyes.

Yvie smirks, with her fingers still inside her, and a thought rattles in Scarlet’s mind about liking the way Yvie smiles just for her, but that thought goes out the window the moment her orgasm starts to build up in her stomach.

***

“We should close together more often,” Yvie says, from the driver’s seat, while Scarlet is putting her clothes back on.

“We’re a great closing team,” she replies, putting on her blouse and then realizing—“Shit, I can’t find my bra.”

“Just leave it, I’ll find it and give it back to you.”

“You better! It’s a love & lemons one, those are expensive.”

“Awh, you wore your expensive bra to work? I’m flattered,” Yvie jokes, winking at her through the rear view mirror.

Scarlet doesn’t dignify the implications with an answer.

***

She blurts it out to Sugar that she fucked Yvie the other night, and Sugar tells Spice, who tells Brianna, who tells Crystal, and that is how she gets pulled into the cleaning supplies closet by Heidi during the Wednesday lunch shift.

“Scarlet, didn’t you know?” Heidi starts, as if Scarlet has any clue what this is about.

“Know about what?”

“Yvie is Crystal’s ex,” she says, like it’s common knowledge.

“Okay. And?” It’s not like Crystal is single and pining for her ex; she’s engaged to some blonde seamstress called Gigi who used to work for Widow four years ago, she has her own clothing store now, she reckons. Pretty sweet catch, if Scarlet says so herself.

Heidi seems caught off guard by Scarlet’s indifference.

“Well, friends exes are usually off limits—”

“Crystal is not my friend,” she points out, because she isn’t.

“Yvie’s never serious about anyone,” she says this time. “You shouldn’t get your hopes up. She only sleeps around.”

“God, we fucked once! It’s not like I want to marry her,” Scarlet groans. “None of you ever considered me a friend, why do you suddenly care? I didn’t even know she’s her ex, because, again, she and all of you are not my friends.”

Heidi seems positively mortified, but they both know Scarlet is right. So she simply apologizes—Scarlet isn’t sure if she’s apologizing for casting her aside or whatever this intervention was—and they go on about their lives.

“Hey, hot stuff!” The twins say in sync, when they run into Scarlet just moments later. “We just wanna remind you of our birthday party, it’s three weeks from now down at our parents’ house!”

“Our tiny flat would never be able to hold in so many guests,” Sugar comments, handing her the invitation.

“Yeah, good thing mom and dad are leaving that weekend.” Spice winks, and soon they’re off to do whatever it is they do when they’re not pestering Scarlet.

Scarlet inspects the envelope; for a pair of girls who are obsessed with social media, handing out paper invitations seems like a paradox, and then she remembers they’re also obsessed with Y2K, so, whatever, it figures.

The sparkly pink envelope with all types of stickers manually placed on it reminds Scarlet of when letters were still a thing and she would spend her lunch money sending letters to her friends who lived just some neighborhoods away, just for the thrill of it. When life was good and easy, and she didn’t have a bartender taller and hotter than her watching her every move from her very empty, very lonely bar.

“Hey, Jackie, this place is dead,” Scarlet comments when she runs into Jackie in the kitchen. “Can I leave early? I don’t think you’ll need me.”

Jackie looks at her, then at her iPad, then she chews on her lower lip and agrees. “Just do your side work before you clock out.”

Scarlet goes to take her things from the little storage room they keep for the staff’s personal belongings, and lingers there for a bit when she hears a pair of footsteps behind her.

“Hey, Starlet! You’re leaving early?” Kameron’s voice asks. Scarlet turns around, an attempt at a relaxed smile on her face and sees Kameron and Yvie on their way outside, they're probably going on a smoke break. Yvie is eye-ing her up and down, with her hands stashed in her pockets.

“Yup. It’s pretty dead here, so Jackie let me go already. I’m clocking out before that changes. See ya!” She makes her exit with her heart beating in her ears, her face getting as red as her hair. The high-pitched tone with which she spoke makes her insides churn with shame. God, Yvie must think I’m pathetic.

She stations herself outside of the restaurant, lightning up a cigarette to calm down her trembling body. It’s summer now, and the humidity makes her feel so gross and sticky she actively hates herself when she lights up the cigarette and makes herself sweat a little more.

I’ll quit it when I want to, she told herself some years ago, but here she is.

She’s about to start walking to her bus stop when she hears the restaurant’s door ring, and a distinct pair of footsteps she’s come to recognize like one recognizes the sound of birds in the morning.

“Hey, ‘Starlet’,” Yvie says, nonchalantly, “need a ride?”

Scarlet turns around, ready to say no because Yvie is giving her that lust-filled look that promises that her ankles will end up on her shoulders, and she really really can’t, because it was a one off time to quench her thirst and now that’s all done.

“Yeah, sure,” she says, however, thinking with her imaginary dick rather than with her brain.

Yvie holds out the car door for her, like a gentleman, and she sits with her legs pressed tightly when she looks through the rear view mirror and sees her lacy pink bra resting on the backseat.

It’s obvious and redundant to say Yvie drives them to her own place instead of dropping Scarlet off, and that she can’t quite stomach it when Yvie calls her gorgeous when she’s between her legs and moments later tells her they should keep this casual.

***

Scarlet feels stupid, completely and irrevocably pathetic.

Here she is, being eaten out on her friends parents’ bed by a pretty woman on a house party, a house party that’s supposed to be kept a secret because the twins didn’t have permission to throw it in the first place, and the secrets of the universe are being revealed to her as said pretty woman keeps looking at her like she’s some sort of prey.

“God, you’re so pretty when you’re needy for me like that,” Yvie says, coming up to kiss her. Scarlet tastes herself on her lips, and gives a low whine.

Part of why she feels so pathetic is down on the first floor of the house, probably sitting all angry in the living room couches, looking like a cheap replica of Scarlet, most likely complaining to her friends about Scarlet, not discarding just yet searching for another body to make her company tonight.

Yvie is a gorgeous woman, Scarlet knows that; she attracts attention wherever she goes, so naturally there was someone else interested in her at the party. Scarlet doesn’t know Irene Dubois personally, she’s a friend of the twins and they’ve gone clubbing as a group once or twice before, but she’s not her friend (Scarlet thinks the way she looks so much like her is a little freaky, so she keeps her distance).

Irene was flirting very openly with Yvie, who, although not as enthusiastic, was flirting back.

(It’s pathetic).

So Scarlet couldn’t really go up to Yvie, intimidate Irene and very subtly tell her to fuck off, drag Yvie up towards an empty room and slip out of her dress before Yvie had fully closed the door behind them, because she’s twenty-fucking-five and not a petty high school girl falling in love with the girl she sometimes fucks.

No, she couldn’t. So she didn’t.

Irene finished her drink, Yvie went to get more vodka from the kitchen, and Scarlet just so happened to drop her cup, so she also made a beeline for the kitchen. She batted her eyelashes, said nothing about the other redhead staring at Yvie across the room, and it took Yvie all of five seconds to ask her to “go to the bathroom with her”.

The pathetic satisfaction she felt upon seeing Irene stare daggers at her as Yvie took her hand and led her up the stairs made her feel like she’s sixteen all over again, petty and wild and stupid.

Scarlet redresses herself with Yvie’s help, and when her hands linger on her waist just for a moment longer, she knows this, whatever she has going on with Yvie, is bound to hurt her.

***

“Doesn’t it bother you that your ex works in the same restaurant as you?” Scarlet blurts out, while she’s laying on Yvie’s sheets.

Yvie’s perched by the room’s window, wearing nothing but pajama bottoms, smoking. “Who, Crystal? No, she’s chill. We broke up a long time ago.”

“Like how long?”

“Uhm, I was still an art major, so…” She looks up to the ceiling. “Like, six, seven years ago?”

Scarlet sputters, turning to face her instead of looking at the ceiling cracks.

“What? Are you kidding me?”

“Nope. Why?”

Scarlet opens her mouth, then closes it again. Would it bother Yvie if she knew half the restaurant knows about whatever is going on between them?

“Just curious. Do you think she might have unresolved feelings from that?”

Yvie scoffs. “I would hope not, isn’t she getting married in two months?” Scarlet nods, remembering the way Crystal reluctantly looked at her when handing her the wedding invitation a week ago. “Why are you asking, anyway?”

Scarlet thinks back to the night where Heidi warned her that Yvie just sleeps around, never looking for anything serious, some three months ago in July. Thinks of the burning ache in her heart when Yvie reminds her they’re just hooking up, the self-pity she wallows in every time she watches romcoms on Sundays and yearns to go on stupid museum and park dates with Yvie and getting to call her her girlfriend.

“Curiosity,” she says instead.

Yvie hums, acknowledging her answer and goes back to smoking. In the silence of the night, tangled in Yvie’s sheets, Scarlet wonders if Yvie thinks about them as much as she does. If she also yearns for something they’re not, or if she’s content enough with their arrangement, not sparing another thought towards her as soon as she’s out of the door.

The thought makes her feel like throwing up, so she silently gets up and starts rummaging for her clothes among the pile.

“What are you doing next Saturday?” Yvie asks out of the blue.

“Next Saturday?” Scarlet pretends to think about it, knowing damn well she has a hot date with her couch and a new K-Drama she got hooked on. “Not much, why?”

“My mom invited me for brunch. I love her, but I don’t think I can stand her for hours alone, my sister moved across the country and—”

“What are you asking me, exactly? To go to brunch with you and your mom?”

“Well, yeah.”

Scarlet pauses, at a loss for words. There’s many things she wants to say, like, does she know who I am? Who am I to her? A daughter-in-law, friend of her daughter? What am I to you that you’re asking me this?

But Scarlet’s dignity flew out the window some months ago, so she simply nods and says, “Sure, text me the time and place.”

***

Scarlet thinks, honest to god, that the whole brunch ordeal was a fever dream.

She expected to meet some sort of wasp-y woman, uptight and slightly homophobic by the way Yvie spoke about her mother. She met, instead, a normal, fun, laid back woman in her sixties with nothing out of the usual about her. Yvie’s mom was just a normal suburban housewife who loves her daughter very much and tries to keep an open mind with what she’s doing with her life.

And she loved Scarlet, too. For some reason, Yvie’s mom found her so fascinating, she wouldn’t stop asking her questions about her, her life, what she’s studying in uni and her two moms back home in Kansas. She ordered mimosa after mimosa for the pair of them, at times forgetting her own daughter was sitting just across her.

It was so lovely, and so, so painful.

Scarlet is obviously girlfriend material; they get along well, Yvie’s mother likes her, and the sex is great. There’s no reason for Yvie to cave in and ask her to forget about the “casual” bullshit, because they both know there’s nothing casual about going on late night car rides, with Yvie’s index tracing the letters m-i-n-e on her thigh, talking about their hopes and dreams for the future, letting Scarlet babble excitedly about her independent research projects for school, pretending she doesn’t notice when Yvie sketches her in one of the many sketchbooks she has laying around, in sneaking to the back alley to make out during dead shifts, in spending days off together somewhere far away from the city.

She doesn’t know what else has to happen for Yvie to change her mind and just ask her to be official, be serious about where they’re going together.

So, the next logical reason why Yvie doesn’t want anything serious, is that she doesn’t like her like that, doesn’t want to commit to her and have the quiet, domestic Sundays and brunch with the in-laws with her. It hurts more than it should.

“Take me home,” Scarlet says when they’re in the car, drunk on mimosas and feverish with yearning.

“Wanna make a stop at my place?” Yvie suggests, squeezing her knee.

Scarlet inhales sharply, willing herself to be strong and not let herself falter.

“No, I think I shouldn’t.”

“You sure?” They come to a stop at a red light and they lock eyes. Yvie has her brows slightly furrowed, trying to gauge what’s wrong, and Scarlet feels like a wild thing, trying to decipher how does she do it, how does she keep her cool so well when Scarlet is melting against the carseat, the blood boiling in her veins with longing and fighting every atom in her body to stay strong on her no.

“Hundred percent,” she says through gritted teeth, peeling her gaze away.

“Hm. Whatever you want, princess.”

Scarlet barely keeps it together. It’s so cruel to call her that right now, when she’s trying and failing to make her escape before her longing kills her.

Yvie drops her off at her apartment complex, and once Scarlet slams the car door shut, she decides that fuck it, she's going to use her vacation days for once and go back to Kansas to regain some semblance of control over her life. Her friends can lend her class notes later, when she doesn’t feel like a soulless puppet at Yvie’s beck and call.

She dials Jackie not ten minutes after and books the flight tickets in less than an hour.

***

[yves !!] hey is everything ok?

[yves !!] can i come over to talk?

[yves !!] fuck please. talk to me

[yves !!] starlet

***

Scarlet hasn’t talked to Yvie in two days, and she’s never used drugs to know what withdrawals feel like, but she supposes this must be akin to that. She feels every cell in her body yearning to reach out, to go right back to her sheets and learn to be satisfied with it as long as she’s with her. But she has to have some dignity, so she asks her moms to take her phone from her while she’s desperately sobbing to prevent herself from reaching out to Yvie.

She feels like the pinnacle of stupidity, getting herself so hurt over a fling that she sought out, that she plotted to make it happen. Now, she’s truly sixteen all over again, locked up in her childhood room crying over a girl that hurt her precious princess feelings when things blew up in her face.

Her moms don’t tell her to get over it, you’re twenty-five already, but instead offer her many, many chocolate chip cookies and silent cuddling sessions where the only thing she does is cry with her gaze lost in the distance.

By the fourth day she feels good enough to come out of her room and go to the supermarket with her moms, but she has to go back to the car in the middle of it because she saw a pair of women that looked like her and Yvie pushing a baby-stroller in the frozen foods section, then proceeded to bawl her eyes out.

When she inevitably has to go back to New York, her moms promise they’ll come visit her in a few weeks to check on her, and send her on her way with a tupperware full of chocolate cookies and some semblance of autonomy back in her mind.

***

AUGUST.

“You’re so weird,” Scarlet giggles, sitting across Yvie’s lap. “How did you even manage to get that many socks to make a floor length gown?”

Yvie shrugs, trying to play it cool. “Many thrift stores and a stubborn head,” she says, making her laugh again, and she feels a sort of pride wash over her.

It’s been two months since they started sleeping around, and she knows it’s pathetic from her to keep giving in and inviting Scarlet over just because she wants to hang out with her using the excuse of having sex, but she’s too much of a coward to invite Scarlet on a proper date and get told no. It’s easier to pretend there’s no strings attached and this is just casual, lest she’ll scare her off.

Although Scarlet was the one that flirted with her back in June, if the way she acted around her at work afterwards was anything to go by, she didn’t want anything else to do with her, and yet, like a fool, Yvie sought her out again.

Yvie knows, is very aware, that despite being somewhat attractive, the oddness that makes her stand out is also the reason why the women she likes never like her back. And that’s just personality wise; on the odd chance they like her back, her disability is enough of a reason to scare them away. It was easier to just sleep around, dating casually and not giving much of herself away.

Then Scarlet came in, very blatantly interested in her, and once she was a hundred perfect sure she wasn’t just another flirt bored during work hours—thanks to Kameron, who assured her Scarlet had never ever tried to hit on her, at all—she decided that, fuck it, why not?

But then Scarlet became like an intoxicating presence in her life, pulling her in and leaving her wanting more, making her dream of dates that didn’t start with having sex or them being too tired after a shift to do much else than go for take out, and Yvie couldn’t do much else aside from trying to hide how much she wanted—wants—her in more than a sexual way.

Now she’s stuck in this loop where she’s the one that keeps reaching out to her, against her better mind. Why Scarlet came back time and time again, Yvie’s not sure. She supposes the sex is good enough to make her want to keep her around.

Scarlet bids her goodbye after a while, giving her a last kiss before she hops on her Uber, and Yvie is left feeling like a pathetic coward, who dreams of being courageous enough to ask the woman she sleeps with to be her girlfriend.

One day she’ll do it, she just hopes it’s not too late by then and Scarlet has lost interest.

#scyvie #my fanfiction #rpdr fanfiction #scarlet envy #yvie oddly #i got possessed by 2019 me and wrote the rest of this in a day

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