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wildviolcts · 3 years ago

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Flashes of red popped behind her eyes.

She couldn’t feel the heat of the fire behind her, but she could see it in her peripherals. She also couldn’t see her feet as she sprinted over the dirt path through the woods, nor did she register the sticks that must’ve been snapping beneath the balls of her feet, or the rocks that were digging into the skin of her heels. She couldn’t concentrate on any of that. All she could narrow her focus to was the beast that was pursuing her, only a few hundred feet behind. And though the fire raged in the trees around them, she didn’t have it in her to care when she knew that that thing was gaining on her with every step. The monster had come to her in the shape of a towering grey wolf when it caught her in the middle of her walk through the forest, and had begun whispering to her in tongues. She had made the mistake of running, engaging in a sadistic game of tag even knowing that it never ended well. She had tried to hide, but to no avail. The beast just continued its pursuit, racing through the woods to follow, despite how she weaved and bobbed. She whipped her head around to try to catch sight of the figure that had only just been snapping and snarling at her, blood dripping from its mouth, painting a vicious smile across its snout. Only, when her eyes set on what had once been a wolf, she saw in its place a contorted silhouette. The body that was still bounding closer and closer to her had shifted from the grey fur of a monstrous wolf, to a greasy, tangled dull-brown coat, its large backs paws having changed to hooves and its front paws to clawed hands that ripped through the earth below to propel it towards her. Its eyes were two piercing white rings sunken into hollow, black circles. Its face was still dripping with blood, but where a canine snout had just been, there was now only red, leathery skin stretched tight over a twisted smile of needled teeth.

Ice flooded her body, turning her limbs to heavy lead. She couldn’t rip her eyes from the horrid figure. Unable to turn her attention back to the uneven path in front of her, she couldn’t see the pit in the dirt until she had loped straight into it and had pitched herself forward, effectively skinning her hands and knees in the process. She couldn’t feel the pain that was surely lancing through her body; all she could feel was the gripping fear as she flipped onto her back, her hands flying up to guard herself from the beast that had been following. It didn’t matter, and neither did the screech that ripped from her lungs as teeth and claws pierced through her.

With a start, Violet jolted up in bed, fear welling from the pit of her stomach and sending shards of glass through her veins. Her heart was pumping faster than her mind was working as she threw her constrictive sheets off of her hot, sweaty body. Her throat burned as though she’d been caught in the black, sooty smoke from the fire that had just been surrounding her and on her cheeks were the sticky tracks of tears. The room around her was dark, though the moonlight that filtered in gave her enough light to see the familiar shadows of her bedroom. The smell of clean sheets brushed her nose, and she tried to focus on that as more tears began to swell. It was the second week of June; something about the hot weather always brought these nightmares with it. More often than not, this time of year was punctuated with screaming fits or sobbing spells that pulled her out of her nightmares and kept her awake until the sun had begun making its ascent over the morning sky. Her neighbors in her previous apartment had made several complaints, and eventually she’d had to move somewhere with thicker walls. That didn’t change the fact that it happened yearly, though. Almost on a repeating cycle.

It was always the same few dreams, and they always held the same two faces. The demonic figure, the same one that had taunted her throughout the entirety of her life, threatening her through whispers in a language that she didn’t know, but could understand. It was the same face that kept her praying, even when her faith started to waver.

Then, there was the blonde angel. In some dreams, the angel appeared to her in time to save her from the horrors her unconscious mind had conjured up, but in most cases, the angel was too late – or worse, she met the same end that Violet did. Even still, the thought of the angel alone was always enough to calm Violet’s erratic heartbeat after she’d awoken, or to cease the tears that dampened her pillows. She could never remember the angel’s face upon waking, but she could always remember the way her presence made her feel.

Turning over, Violet reached for the phone on her bedside table. 3:02am. She wasn’t surprised. If she were to look back over all of her text messages to Nova, there would be a definite pattern that spanned over a decade -- a few texts sent every summer night between the hours of 3:00 and 4:00. The routine then continued that Violet would turn over and try to get another few hours of sleep, but never could she keep her eyes closed. Of course tonight would be no different. It was the wolf dream again. He caught me this time.

Hope you’re sleeping well. Text me when you wake up xx

#reincarnation * / / !#self para #the way my brain stopped working two hours ago but we kept chugging along #i'm gonna have to come back to this to edit

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wildviolcts · 3 years ago

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@inflnite

Once upon a time, Violet had been of the opinion that humans never really changed; they were the same person at their core throughout their entire lives. She believed that bad people stayed bad and good people stayed good and that she’d hold her beliefs and principles and convictions until the day she died. That she’d stay the same morally righteous girl that she was so very proud of when she looked in the mirror. These truths about her had been hammered into her from the time she could sit up on her own on a church pew, so what could possibly be so earth-shattering as to change that? Nothing she could’ve guessed at. At least not until life had already thrown her into the thick of it.

Eight years ago, Violet had been a fundamentally different person. Eight years ago, she’d been bright-eyed and green. At the time, she wouldn’t have considered herself naïve, but if she were to look back at herself now, she’d find a gullible 18 year old who had no idea how the world worked. It was her hopes and her ambitions from that time that gave her enough will to survive, but just by the skin of her teeth. Eight years later and she knew that hopes and ambitions meant next to nothing. Money and power were what made the world spin. And for a young woman with no leg to stand on? There were very few ways to accrue the amount of money and power that she needed to lead any semblance of a life. It didn’t take very long after shedding the restrictive chrysalis of her sheltered childhood and unfurling herself unto the world that she very quickly realized she needed to find a plan and act on it, before she was crushed beneath someone else’s shoe.

There were a plethora of “sugaring sites” available, and out of necessity, she had come to know them well, though the real bona fide profiles were hard to come by. Eight messages out of every ten led to dead ends and a tremendous waste of time. One message out of the two left were usually from profiles of individuals she wouldn’t have been able to stomach if she tried; married men, men with children, men with interests that only made her sick, men more than three times her age. Small, one time arrangements made up the last tenth; they were hardly enough to pay her rent, but for the majority of the past eight years, Violet had come to rely almost solely on this last tenth, because so rarely did a long term arrangement work out. She had simply had to learn to save religiously, knowing that ups and downs came with every job, but there was no security in particular when it came to sugaring. During the good months, she’d start building up a nest egg, stashing and saving what she could. During the bad months, that money would dwindle back down to nothing. She always made it through, but any comfort she might’ve previously felt always went down the drain with the bulk of her earnings. It was a cruel world, but she worked doggedly, determined to get ahead eventually.

The most boring part of her job was stalking profiles, hands down. Back when she had been a greenhorn, she had been more than happy to let the old, rich men come to her, but since then, the sites had found more popularity and had become oversaturated, making them the perfect playgrounds for scammers. She’d become unnaturally good at sniffing them out, but, ever vigilant, she became less and less likely to answer the messages in her inbox unless there was some kind of genuine hook that set them apart; there was no use in letting anyone who wasn’t serious about her waste her very precious time. Still, it was tiresome to read profile after profile, search picture after picture, vet bachelor after bachelor. Over the recent years, they all seemed to run together into a muddied mess, and Violet was left looking for a needles in haystacks and waiting on blue moons. Vi had spent the better part of her Friday evening -- her Daddy had canceled, leaving her alone to sip on a bottle of red, something she was quietly thankful for -- clicking through and searching for a pair of kind eyes and a high but realistic yearly salary. She was at the point in the evening where she could barely get through a paragraph without sighing, and at the point in her bottle where another sip would have her head spinning. She was due for a headache, and she could feel the beginnings of one starting to creep into her left temple. She heaved one more groan as she clicked out of James’ profile, moments away from moving her cursor to the ‘x’ in the upper right hand corner of her screen, when a sudden pop of red caught her eye. Following it with her eyes, she found a ‘1’ sitting above her inbox icon, indicating a new message.

Half of her wanted to ignore it and start running her bath instead. She deserved it. But thinking back to earlier that morning when her debit card had declined at the coffee shop and she was forced to pull out her credit card instead, she knew better than to ignore it. It was getting to be that time where she needed to start accepting dates, whether they sounded like fun or not. Frowning, she moved her mouse to click into her inbox, mentally preparing herself for whatever disgusting message she might’ve received and the phony show she’d have to put on, pretending as though she liked it even if it made bile begin to build up at the back of her throat. Surprise and intrigue met her instead. Something had been purchased off her wishlist; that wasn’t entirely outside of the norm, though most people waited to send gifts or money until after they had begun chatting with her. What was outside of the norm was the profile picture itself; it was cropped so that no faces were showing, but Violet could see everything from the neck down. It was very clear that it was a photo of two women, women who had been dressed to the nines. She clicked into the profile with little hesitation, inhaling the concise bio and taking note of the stats, trying not to let her heart jump into her throat with excitement. She had barely finished reading through when a second red ‘1’ appeared above her inbox icon. Curiosity burned as she followed it back to her conversations, catching sight of the newest message. It was short, but it was enough to coax a smirk onto her face.

She didn’t take more than a moment to begin typing back.

#unicorn sugar * / / !

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wildviolcts · 3 years ago

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@inflnite

Being the new kid was never easy. She had learned as much in high school, following being sent to take care of her sickly great aunt in an entirely different state, an instance in which she understood she was being forced to leave behind everything she knew. The main difference in her expectations between then and now was that this was college. Everyone was new. So why was it proving so difficult to find somewhere to fit in?

Violet had always been a good student: the type to put her head down and study, the type to take lead - and by default, take over - on mandatory group projects, the type to do whatever it took to answer the questions she had to master the content, and even to the chagrin of her fellow students, the type to remind the teacher to stay on track, or let them know when it was possible they might’ve forgotten to assign homework. The setting may have changed, but that hadn’t. She had a scholarship to keep, and though part of her longed for friends, it was a specific longing - she wanted to be surrounded by people who were dedicated and driven. She wanted someone who could keep up. She wanted an equal - and she had dreamt about finding one in a place that should be teeming with intellectuals, philosophers, winners, but as of Tuesday of week two, she had yet to find a single person who seemed to fit the bill. The first class of her Geology lab was an absolute snoozefest. Science had never been Violet’s strong suit, and rocks especially were of no interest to her, but even though she would work with dogged determination to finish any class with the highest possible grade, she also knew there was no point in setting herself up for a headache - or worse, failure - with one of the more difficult lab courses. Knowing from experience how important picking the right desk partner could be, Violet had sized every single person up as they walked in the door. If they looked like a slacker, a stoner, a loser, or any combination of the above, she simply glared daggers at them until they got the hint and found somewhere else to sit. As they filed in in singles or pairs, it took only half a moment to examine them before staring each and every one of them down until they wilted, scurrying with their tails between their legs to the tables around her. Two minutes to 8:00 am, and the open seats were beginning to dwindle. The trickle of people had come to a gentle stop and she wondered if the open spot next to her would remain open. Had she done her job in scaring off the slacker/stoner/loser population? One minute and thirty seconds to 8:00 am. With a sigh, one that could only be described as half smug, she resigned herself to spending the rest of the semester alone. Finally feeling comfortable enough to let her guard down, Violet began digging around in her bag for her favorite pen, something she was quite particular about. She had only managed to sift through about half the bottom of the bag with no luck when she caught sight of a pair of upside down feet making their way to the edge of her lab table. She stifled a low, irritated sigh as the spotless flats gently scuffed against the floor and the seat beside her squealed against the linoleum. Annoyed, she straightened back up, forsaking her hunt for a writing utensil in favor of sizing up the poor soul who had wandered into Violet’s bubble. Based simply on how her first week had gone and the kind of people she had met in that time, Violet expected to meet the vacant blue eyes of a ditzy blonde in a low cut top and low rise jeans. She expected to have to have a conversation before the class had even started, letting the surely vapid girl who had shown up with the hopes of piggybacking off her lab partner the whole semester know that Violet was not the one, and that if she were looking for someone to keep her afloat for the entire course, she’d better find a seat elsewhere. She expected to be able to snap in typical Violet fashion, establish herself the way she always had - as the insufferable bitch who took schooling far too seriously - and use that to get her way. It had always worked before, and she was happy to let the routine continue to do its job. She expected it to be easy.

Instead, she was stopped in her tracks by liquid gold eyes and a smile as warm as any she’d ever seen, despite the way it sent goosebumps up her arms and a shiver down her spine. For the first time probably ever in her life, Violet was shocked into silence. Her mouth, which had opened with intent to maim, vitriol already dripping from her tongue in preparation, instead sat motionless as she looked the woman up and down. Glossy chestnut hair fell in gentle waves against slender shoulders, framing soft, dewy, unblemished skin. Perfect plush lips pulled easily against perfect white teeth. She tried to keep her eyes on that, on the flawless smile, rather than the flawless body, but it was difficult to say the least. Soft curves, long legs, feminine hands with gorgeous nails that Violet clocked as likely straight. She would’ve considered the woman olive-toned in complexion if not for the blueish undercast to her, making her look almost frigid. It would’ve been quite striking if Violet’s brain weren’t already short-circuiting. She was stunning. If she’d had any sense, Vi probably would’ve offered a hand to shake or something equally as stupid, but as it was, she didn’t have enough control of her body to move it, not until the knowledge of her jaw sitting slack became more mortifying than the urge to ogle the woman was entrancing. Swallowing, both to provide relieving hydration to her now dry mouth as well as to rid her throat of the lump that had formed, she tried to find her voice. Eventually, little more than a whisper came out, probably sounding more like a squeak than anything. “I’m Violet.”

#twilight verse * / / !#listen #you get what you get and you don't throw a fit #also miss nova i would do anythign for u #so would violet

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wildviolcts · 4 years ago

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inflnite * / / !

@wildviolcts

Morgan could not remember the last time she had sat in an interview. It had been years since anyone had asked her to tell them about a time when… Nor had she updated her resumé since the heels of her shoes first clicked against the marble floors of the Charles Schwab lobby. Associate Financial Consultant, Global Equities was the entry-level role her Bachelors in Finance from NYU had afforded her. Twenty-five thousand hours spent pouring over financial models and equities. Twenty-five thousand hours spent calculating liquidity, assets and throwing around numbers with more zeros than any morality should allow. Twenty-five thousand hours spent missing sending apology cards and flowers for missed dates, calling her mother to disappoint her with her absence from Thanksgiving, Christmas and Birthday dinners. She was no longer the same greenhorn finance graduate, who wobbled in heels and fingers trembled when she spoke on the phone with investors.

She was a competitor, and it was the single advantage she had in the finance world dominated by men. Morgan expected perfection from her colleagues, and even more of herself. After all, they worked in a business of risk and assurance. Risk was always found in the unknowns- the single enemy of a good investment opportunity. Always first to the office, and last to leave, she stepped on the neck and suffocated any word to question her abilities, her determination, or her drive. Morgan presented herself as an assurance, a straight-forward, early investment opportunity for the firm to capitalise on. It was the reason she had risen above the rest of her graduate peers. She would win no popularity contests, but her insights had fattened the wallets of her clients, and added zeros to the portfolio of her firm.

Morgan prided herself on her keen eye, an ability to see value before the writing was scrawled on the wall. Something she was sure Maxwell from Human Resources lacked. She could only guess by her dismissal of her third executive assistant in as many months. (One mistake was forgivable. Two, however, was banishment. She could not miss investor meetings simply because of her assistant’s moment of scheduling forgetfulness at best, ineptitude to operate a simple fucking calendar at worst.) ‘A difference in selection criteria’ was how she had carefully worded her nebulous rebuke of the failure to hire a competent candidate. Her email was polite, before closing with a demand an assurance that she was more of capable of conducting the selection process again, herself. She made multi-million dollar decisions, she could pick out an assistant that could answer her calls.

At least, that’s what she had told herself. But after sifting through the first few resumés that had landed on her desk, with a hundred more still printing, the blue pen she had carefully selected for annotating and striking through the lifetimes of achievements, lulled in her hand. What was she looking for? An equal. Meticulous, driven, thick-skinned and not afraid of doing the work. Someone who would understand the pressure of her job, and clear the path of the menial, and trivial work that pulled her focus away from the decisions only she could make. Someone who could put up with her temper, and her direct words, and still perform at their best. She couldn’t help but smile to herself, at the absurdity of it all. She doesn’t exist. As far as her dating exploits had informed her- her equal was not wandering New York.

Of the few resumés that had not been culled for various reasons (spelling or grammar mistakes, menial college alma mater, unsuitable font choice, inappropriate use of colour on a formal document, an email address that was certainly set up as a teenager in the early 2000s, to name a few,) a single round of interviews began. She had scheduled them one after another, determined not to spend more than a day (let alone the entire week HR had taken previously). By the time she walked out of the building for the evening, she was confident she would have called to make an offer.

Midday had passed, as had half of the field of candidates. The sleeves of her neatly pressed dress shirt were folded up her forearms, her top button undone- signs of frustration by the lack of chemistry her efforts had yielded.

She stood in greeting from behind her uncharacteristically tidy table, unusually bare of the documents that required her sign off, investor reports, contracts from legal and the rest of the paperwork that plastered her broad, lacquered wood desk. Morgan noted the unusual light in her office- the early afternoon sun, streaming in from the floor-to-ceiling windows of the corner office, reflected off of the empty surface of her desk and arms of her cream leather sofa. All but four items had been cleared from her desk; a resumé, a notepad, a blue pen and her coffee cup. She appraised the woman as she had walked into her office- on time and neat in her appearance. A pretty face. A firm handshake. Morgan smiled politely as she gestured for the woman to sit across from her. “Miss Doss,” she spoke to herself, her fingers finding the freshly printed resumé with the small blue asterisks and circles she had added in her preparation the evening before. Morgan let the silence linger as her eyes scanned the resumé, as if she needed a reminder of the life achievements of the candidate in front of her. As if she had not studied them carefully over tea late yesterday evening. After a few moments pause, she cleared her throat. “I must say, your resumé reads well. Scholarship at Barnard. Bachelors in English. Your letter of recommendation… Your professor speaks to your abilities. More than my own professors would have spoke of mine.” She placed the resumé on her table, and picked up the pen, tapping the nib on the blank piece of lined paper. Her eyes locked with Violet’s- the resumé sung, as did the commendations of her professor. There was assurance. But what was her risk? What was her unknown? “You tell a compelling story with all of these pieces put together. But there is one thing I’m left questioning. Why do you want this job? Judging by your major, and your extracurriculars, I don’t see an interest in Finance, nor an undying love of organising someone else’s professional life. By your professor’s account, you have a promising set of skills for your area of study. So, why are we meeting today?”

From an early age, Violet had been taught that the world would hand her nothing. Starting from childhood, through adolescence, and into adulthood, she’d learned time and time again that promises were worth nothing, and placing her fate in the hands of another was only a recipe for disaster. Even her parents, her supposed built-in support, offered her very little - and what she did take from them, she always paid dearly for.

Through years of conditioning, Violet’s naivete had been whittled down to but one solid belief, one unyielding truth: if she wanted something, she would have to work to get it. And work she did.

Laser-focused on school, Violet had had her sights set on Columbia; as an Ivy League located in the Novum Caput Mundi, it had not only one of the best English programs in the country, but also came hand-in-hand with the prestige and connections that she would need to be able to enter the highly competitive field of post-secondary education. Even more appealing than that, it was far from home. It was the one chance she’d have to get out from under her parents’ thumb and finally allow her the freedom that she so desperately craved for so long. New York had been the start of so many lives, and she was desperate to have her shot. The world was going to make way for Violet Doss whether it wanted to or not.

Having planned on her acceptance to Columbia nearly her entire academic career, her grades fell nothing short of exceptional and she worked doggedly to create a well-rounded exterior that any college would consider exceptional. The day her acceptance letter arrived in the mail was the happiest day of her young life — until the words partial scholarship struck her like a hand to the cheek. A partial scholarship to one of the best, but simultaneously one of the most costly universities in the whole of the United States. She’d never be able to afford it on her own, and she couldn’t simply ask her parents to pay.

It was upon reading those two words that Violet’s entire being seemed to shift and shake, and though she was left reeling, she couldn’t entertain it for too long. She still had to get out. She had worked so hard for so long to make space for herself, and she’d be damned if she let it set her back.

Three more acceptance letters filed in, each offering more money than the last, until finally she received a letter offering her a full ride. Barnard College. Still prestigious. Still connected. Still a shot.

She loved every minute of her experience, and when the day came that she was able to walk across the stage of the auditorium that felt more like home than her own ever had, she knew that those halls were the ones she wanted to roam forever.

Graduate school, she’d been warned, would not be so kind.

Despite fantastic grades throughout university, the scholarships for graduate school were slim to none. The programs she applied for offered very little, and she once again found herself back at square one. And that was how she ended up in the lobby of Charles Schwab.

Violet sat with her ankles crossed, her right foot bouncing nervously over the ankle of her left, as she glanced around. It was a lovely office, but the warm lighting did nothing to soothe her anxiety. She’d arrived ten minutes early, leaving ten minutes to sit and think and think and think. She checked her watch every few seconds, nervous that she’d gotten the time wrong, nervous that she’d made some kind of mistake, nervous that she hadn’t made a mistake and that she’d be forced to sit through an interview for a position that she wasn’t necessarily qualified for, nervous that she was going to walk out of the building with nothing to show and nothing to give.

Just as she was checking her watch for what was likely the fifteenth or sixteenth time, Violet caught sight of a quick-moving figure in her peripheral. It was a woman, looking somehow even more anxious than she herself felt, scuffling across the marble floor towards the door. Violet swallowed thickly. The other girl didn’t look particularly happy – in fact, she looked quite ruffled. She didn’t raise her head to meet Violet’s eyes as she walked out the door, and suddenly, the anxiety in Violet’s veins had frozen into ice in her blood. She wondered if this must be her turn. She rose, smoothing the front of her crisp, white button down, hands flattening the fabric of the black pencil skirt that covered down to the tops of her knees, and though her heart stuttered in her chest, she forced a small, but confident smile onto her face.

In most cases, Violet would’ve been content to say her hello, followed by a peek around the office that might potentially become her next workspace, but as she waltzed into the room, her eyes immediately focused in on the woman stood across from her. She was tall. Intimidating. Beautiful.

Offering a hand, she tried her best to remember what she’d been taught. Eye contact, and a firm shake. Flimsiness, a soft grip, a glance away - any could be taken as a weakness that she could not afford to show. “Good afternoon,” she somehow managed clearly, enough so that she surprised herself. “I’m Violet Doss; it’s a pleasure.”

She took the seat offered to her, crossing her ankles once more so that she could sit straight; in spite of the charged silence – was it charged? Or was it just her anxiety? – she refused to wilt under the scrutiny of the golden eyes that stared up at her from the resumé that sat between them.

When it came her turn to speak, Violet took what felt like her first breath since coming into the office, but before it could make it to her lungs, it caught in her throat. She had prepared herself for most interview questions – what are your weaknesses? What strengths would you bring? How do you work under pressure? Would you consider yourself a team player? How do you handle stress? – but this felt like another ballgame. She considered for a second attempting to lie, but one glance at the woman across from her and she knew she would be caught out before it could even leave her lips.

“To be very frank with you, Ms. Jarrett, Finance is probably the furthest thing from my goals. I’m looking forward to beginning a graduate program — as soon as I’m able to afford it. In the meantime, however, I have rent to pay, and believe it or not, a bachelors in English and a lovely recommendation from my professor won’t get me very far in many other circumstances.” Despite the flips in her stomach, she pulled her lips into what she could only hope was an easy smile. Casually, comfortably, she waved her hand through the air, trying to force a facade of confidence. Was it too casual? Too comfortable? “That being said, I feel confident that this is the kind of work that I can do. I pride myself on being punctual, organized, and driven. I am comfortable taking initiative. I put forth my very best on all occasions. We are meeting today because I believe that due to those qualities, I can make your life easier while I’m saving up to start mine.”

#boss au * / / !#i did not edit either bc :)

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wildviolcts · 4 years ago

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@inflnite * / / !

Violet always thought she had known grief.

She had been stripped from her parents, from her school and friends, from her life, and most importantly, from the one person who had ever understood her — all before her Sweet 16. She’d been made to start again with little to no support from those around her. She had struggled. She still struggled. It had changed the very nature of who she was, and not for the better. And yet, once the first wave hit, Violet realized that the grief she’d known and the sorrow she’d endured were so very trivial in relation to what she would come to know. Once the first wave hit, everything she’d built up from scratch, made whole with her own two hands, was once again stripped from her. But this time, there was no chance at revival. Violet was on her own.

***

She didn’t know the date; she hadn’t seen a calendar in ages, and wouldn’t be able to count back precisely even if she could find one. Based on how long the days were becoming, she figured it was nearing mid-June, or perhaps had even passed into July. As Violet walked by the bank of the lake, following the line where the grass met the sand in search of her new home, she pictured what the lake must have looked like at this time of year. Swimmers in shallows, boats and kayaks out in the middle of the crystal blue, tents on every side as the smell of bonfire and roasting meat and s’mores danced in her nose. Maybe there’d be fireworks on the water to celebrate Independence Day, and maybe, if she’d been here, she and her friends would have had sparklers and would’ve been matching in red, white, and blue. The fantasies fueled her, pushing her forward as they had since the beginning of the end. Four months since she’d seen her first Infected. Four months and everything, everything had changed.

In any other situation, Violet figured she’d probably look at the reflection that showed in the mirror nowadays and see the prettiest version of herself she’d ever had the pleasure to look at; she was skinny as ever (scrawny was probably a better descriptor, more often than not going days without food, weeks without a full belly), and the blinding rays of the California sun had burnt her raw on many an occasion, at first leaving angry blisters that had healed into an even tan, giving her the color she had always envied on others. Her large doe eyes now looked nothing short of cat-like. Really, had she even a sprinkle of makeup on, she wondered if this all might make her model-material. Instead, she was streaked with dirt, her once soft hair now matted and greasy, it’s balayage from Christmastime darkened into a lackluster brown. Of course, how she looked to other people was hardly the most pressing issue at hand. In fact, the only person who’d seen her in weeks had been the rather unlikely friend she’d made in Nova Reeves. The taller woman who was so much smaller than Violet in every way but physical had proven herself a loyal ally, and in spite of her sensitivities, she’d made it further than any other human in Violet’s life. And that was enough, if only because it had to be.

Together the women had trudged through the entirety of California, up through Oregon and into Portland, only to double back upon reaching Nova’s ransacked apartment. They’d trekked together for months, they’d laughed and they’d lost, and in that amount of time, Nova’s ambitions had become her own. Once Violet’s hopes had been dashed in the form of blood streaks across a dorm room floor, no note left behind, there was little she could do but follow the older woman in hopes that wherever they ended up, it was somewhere safe. And from what Nova had said, there was pretty much only one chance they had at finding safety: Robin.

Of course, never did she think that finding “Robin” would be staring down the barrel of a gun that poked between a thin space in the slats of the 6 foot tall, man-made fence.

#zombieverse * / / !

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wildviolcts · 4 years ago

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@inflnite * / / !

The kids at school didn’t like Violet Doss. She knew that. Really, she didn’t particularly care for them either. The boys were stupid and the girls were mean, and as desperate as she was to survive teenagedom as unscathed as possible, she knew that she didn’t have to play nice with them to make it by. Violet had adopted a way of living: she did what she liked and made damn sure that she liked what she did. When she wanted something, she’d go for it, in spite of what anyone had to say. And though the girls of North Oak’s cheer squad were some of the cruelest she’d ever met, once Violet caught sight of the try-out fliers, she knew exactly what she wanted.

Regardless of the fact that she didn’t know the first thing about cheerleading, it was a lifetime of ballet, years of gymnastics, and the unbelievable feeling of her parents off her back that made her a shoe-in at tryouts. She knew her body well enough to follow the routine with little difficulty, and the smug smile on her face was likely bigger than any of her peers had seen from her before. Three days later, a real smile of a similar caliber graced her features as she caught sight of her name carefully printed in glittery pink gel pen, top of the varsity list.

***

It was less than an hour into the first practice of the year that Violet began to regret ever trying out in the first place. The team was made up of nineteen of the cattiest girls Violet had ever met, and she’d spent so much of the practice rolling her eyes that she almost worried that they were going to get stuck at some point. The main issue was the tall, blonde captain, Chelsea. It was clear that she had her favorites, and even more clear that Violet was far from one of them. She and her two helpers stood with their backs to the bleachers as they watched the rest of the girls stumble through the first bit of a routine that Violet had gotten down within the first five minutes. The words of the cheer were a jumbled mess, smiles had dropped from nearly every face, and almost every third step was punctuated with a cry as someone tripped over their feet or rammed directly into the person next to them. All in all, it was an absolute mess.

“All right,” Chelsea called, seeming just as agitated as Violet felt. Her shrill voice pierced the flat surface of the track where they practiced, echoing out over the turf to catch the eyes of the soccer team that had spread out across the field. “That’s break. Be back in five,” she huffed before pivoting on her heel to huddle with the other two girls. Though not in earshot, Violet knew exactly what the topic of conversation was. She also knew she didn’t care.

Venturing over to the spot on the bench where she had earlier set her water bottle, she stared off towards the treeline, making note of the way the leaves were already beginning to change. She sighed, mind starting to churn as it drifted to thoughts of parents, stuck in a place where the leaves didn’t change at all. Not that things were much better here, but at least there were seasons, she supposed.

She was brought back to reality by a flash of yellow in her peripheral. Snapping her attention to the figure on the field, she caught sight of narrowed eyes watching her, squinting against the harsh light of the sun. For a split second, there was no expression on the woman’s face, nothing to indicate what she could be thinking or why she was staring. She just seemed to be considering. Only then did a slow, easy smile take over her features as she gave a friendly nod. Violet met the look with a glare of her own, taking another swig of her water before promptly turning on her heel. She hadn’t come to make friends.

#high school verse * / / !

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wildviolcts · 4 years ago

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@inflnite * / / !

By the time Violet had gotten to be any good at it, her routine had become second nature; everything from locating the perfect mark right down to the clothes she’d wear and the words she’d use. It was a script that she rarely deviated from, as once she had mastered it, the results spoke for themselves.

It was always a dingy but busy bar in a dingy but busy town. One where, when she wanted to slip away, she had the ability to, but without all the trouble that came from snotty wealthy people. She’d originally thought them to be the perfect targets, but she quickly figured out that they were always stingy with their money, and always an incredible waste of her time. Counterintuitively, it was college towns that suited her best; most of the people - whether drunken frat boys or inebriated locals - were typically bored enough to humor her, and when she batted her false eyelashes and pouted her plush pink lips, it didn’t take much in the way of words to bring them flocking.

It wasn’t often that Violet was presented a challenge; of course some nights were more interesting than others, but it was rare that men ever caught wise when she was purposefully dressed like she was meant to undress. She knew they couldn’t keep their eyes off her ass long enough to catch what she was doing on the table, not until they were already hundreds in the drain. But once Violet had become comfortable in her routine, the idea of being figured out had never even occurred to her, until she came face to face with it in the form of a leather jacket and a 500-kilowatt smile.

#hustler * / / !

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wildviolcts · 4 years ago

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inflnite * / / !

She had been awoken time, and time before, but never had the gentle hold of a dreamless hibernation been shattered with such brutality. Her daze ended abruptly, the limbs her limbs convulsed, suddenly under her command.

Her lungs burned, too full and aching from the force of her heaving ribs. Nova was sure they would’ve expanded further, had her knees not tucked themselves into her chest, locked in place by trembling arms. Her fingernails bit into her biceps, the sting barely registered in the fray of her awakening. The fluorescent tubes of the hospital room was too harsh for her adjusting eyes, refracting and scattering in the tears trapped in her eyes. Her heart hurled itself against her ribs, aching and beating itself with a rapid violence, no matter how desperately she begged it to be gentle.

Her body was an act of violence in itself. It itched, it ached, it burned and it shook. What had she done?

If there had been any room left in her body, doubt would have crept in and taken hold. Doubt over leaving the flowers, and their gentle ways. Her body was drowning her in emotions she had yet to experience, yet to know their names.

Agony. The word came to her with clarity, and would not leave her. Agony.

Agony was laced with desperation- to find a way out. To find a way home. The panic would not subside. Her mind consumed with the memory of this body’s demise. You’re being chased. Her head shot up, bleary eyes widened and blinking rapidly to focus on the door of the sterile room.

She was alone.

Nova tucked her chin back to her chest, forehead resting against her knobbly knees. She screwed her eyes shut, wishing for sleep to gently cradle her ruthless and exhausted body.

His freckled, toothy smile cut through the shrieking panic, and her heart stopped. Danny. The name came to her without a struggle. Like it belonged on the tip of her tongue. A soothing, familiar thought, never far from her mind’s reach. She could not keep the sobs from wracking her body. His face sparked a new wave of emotion - a new twisted mix of feelings, bright and consuming. A warmth struck her, love, an unquestionable, devotion to this boy. Did she feel this way? She could not think, nor separate her thoughts from the small comfort the thought of him provided. The ache in her chest was sharp, sorrow, but she clung to the warm feeling. Warm, like a slow, thick trickle down her arms

“Stop it. Stop it,” she pleaded in barely a whisper. Her body would not let go of the breath she was holding- starving her of the air that was greedily sucked into her lungs. Nova didn’t know who she was asking for mercy. Agony? The body? Danny? She could not say. All she knew was it had to stop.

After everything that had happened during her last few years of life, Violet couldn’t help but to admit that her faith had been shaken. The God that she had prayed to, the God that she trusted in, wouldn’t have done this to the earth. He’d had His plans for the human race, surely, but this was clearly outside of His control. He wasn’t the all-knowing, all-commanding figure she’d been led to believe. She’d sat with it a few times, trying her best to work it out in her head, but it often led to nothing but an anxiety that never lifted, only shook her to her core until she was reduced to a trembling, pathetic heap of a person. Thus, she tried not to give too much thought to what would happen after life; she could only try her best to outrun it for as long as she could.

Even still, this was the furthest thing from what she would have imagined.

The very first thing she felt was an immediate peace - she felt weightless, suspended in nothingness. This new beginning, whatever it was, was a disconnect from everything she knew: all of the panic, the pain, the terrifying finality of what she’d experienced at her end. There was a fog that had taken over whatever was left of her, thick and heavy on her, but soft and pillowy as cotton. She had the urge to open her eyes, to look around and see where her soul had been led, but as she struggled to find them, she realized that they weren’t within her reach. In fact, she couldn’t find anything.

That was when it started.

Just as she had resurfaced, shiny and new and ready for whatever was next in store for her, she was shocked into a new reality. Like ice water being poured over top her head, Violet was pulled down into the icy depths of gripping, clawing fear; it threatened to drown her as she was forced into recounting her last moments on earth. The images played for her in widescreen with surround sound, projected onto the matter of her brain. Though she had no eyes with which to see, she watched herself in twisted, stuttering snapshots as she ran down hallways and gripped at pieces of glass. All that panic, that pain, that awful, awful impending finality, as searing heat was forced up the inside of her arms, and thick warmth trickled back down them. She tried to move, tried to twist away from it, from the horror movie that had been her own end, but she was stuck as the images froze, rewound, and then played again on a ruthless repeat. And though she wanted to, she couldn’t even cry.

Then she heard it. A voice, her own, begging for mercy. A consciousness, not her own, writhing somewhere inside her head, somewhere beside her. She hadn’t been aware of it before, but now it was painful; this other thing sharing this space with her, making her feel claustrophobic. As though she’d been shoved into a box half her size.

Eyes that did not feel like hers opened to a bright, bright room; blinded, she instinctively attempted to recoil from it, but once again found herself unable to do so. She tried to move her hands, hands that did not feel like hers, to shade herself from the light, but they stayed glued to her arms. She stirred then, trying her best to thrash against the box she’d been packed inside, but it would not budge. In fact, the perimeter only seemed to grow smaller, caving in on her until she couldn’t breathe.

Violet had heard rumors, stories of what the parasites were doing to her kind. How they euthanized a mind to make way for a new awareness, one that would command a body until it’s final days, when the leech would only latch on to it’s next host body. Violet knew the horrors they had inflicted on her people. Her neighbors and peers and friends and family. What she hadn’t known was what would come after. She had figured that once her people had come under control of the alien that sat at the back of their brain, they would fade into nothing. They would cease to exist. Never had she heard of life after what had, essentially, been her death.

She tried to focus on whatever it was beside her, and the way the body around her - not attached to her - reacted to it. Beneath the agony it experienced, the very same horror that she felt at the awful movie flickering in the forefront of her brain, there was confusion. Whatever it was that was sharing this space, it didn’t seem to understand.

You’re being chased, she explained, watching the same clip of memory. She didn’t want to watch the rest, she didn’t want to have to relive it, but she felt powerless to stop it. Her heart beat painfully in it’s cavity, her breathing shallow and harsh, as if she were still running, but she couldn’t calm herself. Once again, the box around her shrunk a size, and she wanted nothing more than to cry out for someone. For someone specific.

Danny.

His face, his unbearably beautiful face, flashed over the snuff film for a brief second, flickered off, and then appeared once more and stuck, a defiantly beautiful projection against the violent acts that had just been on display. A gentle warmth spread over her, and she realized with a small sigh of relief that it had seemed to soothe whatever was beside her as well. Just barely did her body’s breathing steady, and just barely did her body’s heart slow, but she was thankful for the distraction, for the small relief that accompanied it.

#anyways its 5am and this is poop but we're out here havin fun am i right ladies #host au * / / !

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wildviolcts · 4 years ago

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@inflnite * / / !

Blood. She could taste blood in the back of her throat; the hemoglobin from the red blood cells that kept her running. Kept her breathing. Kept her alive. But for how much longer?

She’d never been much of a runner, and she cursed herself now for having taken up ballet rather than a more useful sport. Her body, though used to contorting and contracting in on itself, had not been conditioned for distance nor speed. Her muscles, though they could propel her into the air, hold her suspended on her toes, flex and unflex and flex again for hours on end, had never meant to carry her to the ends of the earth.

She realized with a sickening drop of her heart that that’s how far they would follow her. To the ends of the earth. They had the equipment and the numbers and the time. She had nothing.

Violet willed herself faster, but she was growing too tired too quickly. She veered right, her body acting before her brain could fully catch up, when a sudden passageway opened up to her. She hoped that she’d be slick enough to disappear before they could follow, but they were so close and she was so tired. As she sprinted down the wide hallway - barely making sense of the doors on either side, only fearing they’d be locked and she’d be wasting time - she briefly considered just giving up. Reaching the end of the hall and taking the pistol that sat in her pocket of her jacket which was currently flapping wildly against her thigh, holding it up to her own temple, and taking what those greedy, ravenous hands behind her were so desperate for.

Just as quickly as the thought came, another followed behind it, twisting agonizingly in the softness of her stomach.

Danny. What would he do without her?

She thought to him then, still small enough that she had to remind him not to suck his thumb, or his teeth would grow in wrong. Still small enough that sometimes, when he dreamt of their parents, he would wet the bed. Could she blame him? What would he do when she didn’t come back?

She blinked heavily, trying to combat the tears that were stinging the corners of her eyes almost as much as the wind that whipped against her face stung. She had no use for tears; they would only serve to further slow her down.

As she reached the end of the long tunnel, the hallway branched into two different wings, and though the building was large, Violet knew that it wasn’t large enough. She was running out of places to turn. She chose the wing to the left, wondering if she would even be able to recognize an escape if she saw it, or if she only had the brain power to keep running until her legs gave out on her. She was just so tired.

Within a matter of paces, one more passageway stretched into view, this one narrower. She took the opportunity easily, hoping that this might be a way of doubling back, zig-zagging enough that she could disappear on them. Hide out. Eventually make her way back home. It was only after she had already turned to begin her descent down the hall did she realize just how much shorter it was than the ones she’d just been sprinting. In the process of skidding to a stop in order to keep herself from running into the wall that blocked her from her freedom, she felt her ankle roll out from under her, sending her sprawling to the marble tile.

The wail that surely burst from her lips could not be heard in her own ears, completely drowned in the pain that roiled through leg, zapping up her spine, but she couldn’t stop to blubber. She glanced over her shoulder. Though she could not see their faces, she could feel the steady thudding of a dozen feet against the floor, moving ever closer. She realized, fear slowly dissolving into resignation in her veins, that even if they hadn’t seen her slip down this way, the echoing cry that still bounced off of the cold white walls would have alerted them to her.

She scrambled to her hands and knees, trying to push up onto her ankle, which was surely sprained if not broken, but as she jolted into a standing position, her body protested, and she tipped clumsily into the rough stucco of the wall. This time, she couldn’t blink away the plump tears in her eyes; they streamed down her face on their own accord, dribbling past her lips, salting her tongue.

She managed to hobble a step or two backwards, barely containing the whimpers, towards a door that led to what seemed like an empty office. Her heart jumped into her throat, effectively choking her with hope as she grabbed at the knob, knowing that this was her only chance.

The silent prayer that had crossed her lips was answered; the momentum of her body against the door sent her flying as it swung inwards, the knob colliding with the wall on the other side and leaving a sizable hole in the plaster.

She tried to steady herself from the sudden lurch, but could only wobble shakily towards the window on the other side of the room. Raw hands gripped frantically, desperately attempting to move the glass up and out of her way. It mattered very little what was on the other side; whether her feet found purchase directly beneath, or her body collided with the ground far below, anything would be better than whatever fate was following her. But even as she pulled, pushed, and eventually thrashed desperately against it, the thick glass would not make way for her. It stood its ground, finding no sympathy for her pleading.

In the recesses of her brain, which was far too oxygen deprived to fully focus, Violet thought to Samara. Sweet Samara. The reason she had come. The face that flashed behind her eyes was comforting, as was the thought that, had Samara been in the building, she had surely heard the commotion. If she was still alive, she would do the smart thing and seek asylum elsewhere. She’d always been clever. That’s why she’d made it this far. She’d be okay, and Violet was stupid to think she had ever needed saving.

Morgan had been right. Morgan had been right and Violet had been wrong, and that fact would be the death of her. In any other case, Violet would’ve never lived it down - she was always right, something she always made sure of. It had even been in their vows, nestled in between the promises of ‘in sickness and in health,’ and ‘till death do we part.’ The irony. A hearty laugh would’ve billowed up from her belly and into her throat, had there been any air to keep it aloft. Instead, she could only hiccup pathetically.

Behind her, the pounding footsteps continued, and she could tell they were closing in now. Breath rushed and ragged, the taste of dizzying failure in her mouth, she turned to face her end.

She had said her goodbyes to her wife and her brother, but had never intended for them to be her last. How she wished she could reach out for them now, kiss them, tell them all the wonderful things they needed to hear before she could no longer speak. She should’ve spent more time with them. She should’ve held them tighter and closer and longer. She should’ve stayed. She felt a guilt well up in her stomach, sitting right above the icy fear like oil on water. She was right to sit with it, knowing how she had damned them both with the selfishness and stubbornness of her actions, but even so, the regret would do none of them any real good. She could only perform one final act of love to keep them safe.

A trembling hand slipped into the pocket of her jacket, which now felt heavy and suffocating on her shoulders, and where her fingers sought cold steel, they found nothing.

Nothing.

Panic stabbed through her like a knife to her chest, sending her thoughts spiraling. She must’ve dropped it during her fall, but that didn’t matter now. What mattered was that she had no way to end it. No way to make her body unusable. If the worms got their hands on her…. Morgan, Danny. They wouldn’t see the silver behind her eyes until it was too late. They’d be too late.

The image of them being swarmed by bodies of people they had known and trusted, bodies that were now empty shells void of any life besides the horrid puppeteers that sat behind their eyes, playing their carcasses on a string, only further served to blur Violet’s vision as her tear tracks turned into small rivulets down her flushed cheeks. She didn’t have time to dwell, though, and the image evaporated as she was confronted with the sounds of the footsteps that made their way down the very hall that she had loped through just moments before.

She wasn’t going to wait around to become a sack of skin.

Violet searched for something, anything of use, but there was no viable weapon in sight. The grubs had wiped the planet clean of anything even remotely dangerous, likely never having seen the irony of it. Not thinking clearly, just needing something in her hands to fend off the bloodsuckers until she could come up with some kind of a plan, Violet grabbed the nearest, heaviest thing: the four-legged metal chair that sat behind the office desk.

As they closed in, she could see their figures approaching in the reflection of the glass window in the door. A shudder ran through her, her fight or flight responses firing off in her head only to meet a dead-end wall of panic as she flipped through her options - options which currently sat at zero. She had nowhere to run and no real method of attack. In the glass, they moved closer, their jog slowing to a crawl as they realized that the chase was over. The game was won.

Unless….

With a grunt that seemed to stop the stalkers in their tracks, Violet hurled the chair over her shoulder, wielding it as a club, and metal met glass with an earth-shattering crash. She closed her eyes, bracing against the bits and pieces of shard as they danced through the air and scattered over the ground. She didn’t have time to waste as she dropped the chair and bent at the hip, grasping at the biggest, sharpest piece she could find, knowing that as soon as their shock wore off, they would be on her toes. And she was right.

The reflection of their eyes set fire to the marble floor of the hallway in brilliant kaleidoscopes as they edged closer, and she watched as six nervous faces rounded the corner, the silver gleaming in the sunlight from the window behind her as they held their hands up, as if they were the ones surrendering. Several mouths opened to speak, but she couldn’t make out the words they were saying, only that there sounded to be genuine concern in their soothing tones.

She didn’t hold the glass out to them, didn’t threaten. There were too many of them, and these ones, the ones who hunted humans, always carried firearms. It wouldn’t matter if she jumped forward and took one down with her; the other five would still carry her off to her fate, and her memories would still carry them straight to Morgan and Danny. She still only had one option.

The moment the one in front, a smaller, rounded woman with a bobbed haircut and dark brown eyes, took a step forward, Violet made her peace. She didn’t hesitate to plunge the sharp point of the glass into the pale flesh of her inner wrist, dragging the edge up as she slashed through veiny blue. The worms jumped forward, shaking their heads and waving their hands, but they were too late. As the blood began flowing, thick and warm and tickling down the length of her arm, black spots clouded Violet’s vision from her peripherals inward. She was sure, with the way she was bleeding, they’d never have time to make it to a hospital. She’d be dead within minutes, if she’d done her job. She had to have done her job. Morgan and Danny were counting on her.

With what strength she had left, she used her other hand to drag the serrated edge up the inside of her other arm, just catching sight of the sticky puddle that had begun to pool at her feet before the black spots became black clouds became just black.

Lights flashed behind her eyelids for a few moments, the clamor of voices becoming just a clamor, and her body jolted, her heart unknowingly pumping the last of its life supply out of the open gashes in its flesh. She struggled to think of the people she had lived for - the people she was dying for - against the pull she felt dragging her downward, but as she sank, she couldn’t remember their names and couldn’t see their faces.

#cw: blood #cw: suicide #cw: gore #cw: cutting #n e ways #host au * / / !

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wildviolcts · 4 years ago

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@inflnite * / / !

Violet’s one issue in life had always been the one thing she could never seem to escape: other people. Though she’d been raised to be self-critical enough to filter her cutting words and scorching temper lest she upset one of the adopted extended family members she and her parents had found in the church, she’d never been able to harness that ability when it came to her own peers. Labeled tempestuous by nearly everyone her own age that she came into contact with, it was a rare occasion in which Violet found herself able to hold a conversation that could be considered anything more than strictly civil, and even rarer an occasion that Violet actually made a positive lasting impression. And maybe it was because she didn’t exactly try; why should she? No one impressed her until they impressed her. The delinquents and degenerates of her generation rarely held a candle as far as she was concerned. There were always the exceptions to the rule, but as few and far between as they were, she figured it was a waste of effort to even attempt to source them. So she simply didn’t.

Of course, after Samara, everything changed. Knowing there were genuine people in the world was entirely different from knowing one of them, and the more Violet drank the woman in — everything she could ever begin to want — the more dependent she became. It wasn’t until Samara was ripped from her in an act of pure cruelty that she understood what she had gained, and so much more importantly, what she had lost. Violet would never admit to it, but after experiencing the world in color for the first time, she was in no hurry to go back to the cold monotony of black and white. It was a good part of why the idea of college had become so important to her. In all ways, it was a rebranding of herself. Whether that was letting go of her biological family, or the search for a new, self-made one, she was looking to find new meanings to the word ‘connection.’ She wanted all of the things she had never let herself have before, and she was certain that if she just tried hard enough, she could find them. But of course, after 18 years without any kind of practice, she hadn’t a clue where to start.

---

Violet walked into the spacious dorm with little more than a grimace, taking in the plain white of the walls -- which looked clean enough, she supposed, but hardly spotless -- and tried not to let the sad emptiness of it get to her. She shuffled further in, the door closing unceremoniously behind her as her footsteps muffled against the grey of the carpet, which looked much the same way the walls did -- hardly spotless. Trudging through the doorway on the back wall, the brunette found herself standing in a decently sized bedroom, two frames sitting opposite of each other against the walls, the mattresses thin and entirely unwelcoming. Huffing a sigh, she tossed her bags onto the bed closest to the door, thankful that among the few precious items she owned, a mattress pad and some sheets that smelled like home — or as much like home as anything could smell at this point — were some of them. She glanced at the other bed, eyeing the slim amount of space between them, wondering if she’d ever be able to get over the closeness. If she’d ever be able to get used to sharing her space with someone. She didn’t like the idea of it, but what else was she supposed to do? She had called, called, and called again requesting a single, but after months of attempting to negotiate, plead, beg, borrow, and steal, the most the student housing office could offer her was a remodeled dorm in Jefferson, the hall meant for the athletes. Really, with all things taken into consideration it was nice, she figured. Surely better than a room in any other dorm. But still not entirely up to her standards.

She barely stifled another sigh as she wandered further into the room, past the barren furniture that sat forlornly against the walls, waiting to be filled once more. Just beyond them sat another doorway, slightly ajar. Behind the doorframe stood a small but functional bathroom. She noted the fact that the shower also had a bathtub with a small, smug smile, as she had previously figured that moving onto the campus had meant forsaking any hope that she’d be able to well and truly bathe until it was all over. The sink left a bit to be desired, with no real counter space. Violet would’ve liked to place a cup on the porcelain to hold her toothbrush and toothpaste, but it seemed as though she would have to carry them back and forth in her bathroom caddy, lest she wanted to trust the dirty metal toothbrush holder that had been through God only knew what. No, she’d much rather get into the habit of bringing her things in and out with her. Following another door back out to the main area, she finished her circle, somehow simultaneously both under and still entirely overwhelmed. Pursing her lips, she pivoted on her foot, trying to take in all of the details of her new home and feeling smaller than she’d ever figured she would.

Outside, laughter echoed in the hallways, and she couldn’t shake the loneliness that settled inside of her chest.

---

After some twenty minutes of sitting on her “bed” prison cot weighing all the pros and cons of staying, Violet was somehow able to fully talk herself out of walking right down to the office to officially withdraw so that she could crawl back home to the only life she could really count on. Instead, she did her best to push the thought of leaving failure failure failure out of her mind by plugging her phone into the outlet nestled snugly between the wall and the frame of her bed and selecting a carefully crafted playlist, letting the plucky guitar riffs and lazy country drawls of Patsy and Loretta and Hank fill the room as she got busy. By the time she heard the swell of voices in the hall, and the swing of the front door, she had already tidied her side of the room, filling it with the few but extremely dear things she owned. She hurriedly yanked her sleeves back down into place in preparation of the surely awkward meeting to come, sloppily dragging her hands down the front of her shirt for any clingy dust bunnies, and pushed the long strands of hair that had since fallen from her hopeless, now lopsided bun back behind her ears. Taking a step forward and stopping, she briefly wondered if she should approach the people that had entered her new home, or allow them to approach her during their own tour, but wondered if that might just be too creepy. For a moment, she wished she'd just not come to the room at all and had waited for her roommate’s incredibly loud fan club to clear out before moving in herself. But the wishing would do nothing to remedy the situation now, so she tiptoed towards the door, peeking her head out before stepping over the threshold and into the living area, taking in four faces, all similar enough, and all alight with smiles except for the blonde who stood in the middle of them.

#collegeverse * / / !

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