sugar & spice

link's pen stilled mid-line, head tilting just enough for one eyebrow to lift. "a duck," he echoed, like he was making sure he'd heard her right. a grin crept in almost instantly. "bold. not exactly the first animal people immortalize in ink, but hey, points for originality."

She's seated, on the very edge of the tattooing chair, feet barely scraping the floor. Is she losing it? Is this the beginning of some slippery-slope descent into losing her grip on things? Grief manifested itself in weird ways - she'd read that on the back of a book somewhere, but this could not be one of those? "You don't want my sob story?" She laughs. There wasn't one, but she could make one up should the need arise. "Isn't that half the job? Listening to the reasons why someone wants their exes name etched on them forever?"

Ollie was totally read to run through the whole story again. Though stopped short when Heni voiced her disbelief at… a part of the story that Ollie didn't think was really that unbelievable. "Yeah. I mean she didn't specifically say that, but it was heavily implied," he said, nodding his head. "Why? Not into older men? I mean the Dean was hot as hell. I would have fucked him if he weren't a homophobe." Well, even that had never been such a hard line for Ollie at times. But with the Dean there was Mari he'd have to think about, and she was his friend. So, he probably wouldn't have. But if the opportunity arose he would have thought about it. "Anyway, it sounds like she did it to gain favor with him so she could get some help in the student election. Is that really…? Is that the part we're talking about? Not the Dean killed Penny, and maybe Greer parts?"

"Even if he weren't, he'd still be ... Mari's dad." Among other things. She shakes her head, though it is followed by an attempt to soften her own judgemental angle with a laugh, as if to say: either way. I'm getting us sidetracked here.

who: @cinnamonfm when/where: spring fling gala

She had not consciously moved in his direction. Henrietta would be able to put her hand over heart and swear to the veracity of that statement. But she is not entirely sure why she is in this corner of the venue. Respite from the constant talk of graduation, maybe? The balcony having its own gravitational pull? Even so. He's said practically nothing, and she can all but feel the headache coming on. Fuck's sake. "Why would I? Last I checked, this wasn't a charity event."

obviously, the two of them were staunchly team—well, team not-come-back-to-ogden. sure, the institution and degrees on their resumes would undoubtedly get many of them places, but that didn't exactly begin to make up for zero student protections, a fired dean, welcoming a televised event onto campus to exploit it all...

Whenever people recounted their time at college, there was that distinct feeling that their experiences had become airbrushed by nostalgia. That somewhere, between the occurrence of an event and its inevitable appearance behind rose-tinted instagram filters, a nontrivial amount of mental contortion had been performed to make things seem more tolerable than they were. Late night breakdowns, last-minute essays and teenage squabbles all washed away with the tides of passing time, until all you were left with was the glossy brochure. "We could always go back to France."

"Ah, thanks," Diego said, taking the glass with a grin and tilting it to her in cheers before downing it. He managed not to grimace too hard, either from the shot or the question. He chuckled a little and shook his head. "Definitely not the normal college experience, that's for sure." The first couple years had been alright. "It feels like any of our petty drama from the first couple of years was so quaint, now." And High School really felt so nostalgic. He could understand the desire to return for reunions. Would he be? … Yeah, he probably would. "So, if you could go somewhere else, would you have, or do you think this was all worth it? I think back about going to Columbia regularly now…"

"I'm trying this new thing where I help people, even if it is just to get drunk," she quips, tipping the contents of her own glass into her mouth, face screwing together into a grimace at the sensation. Gross. Grim. Awful. What was this stuff? "You know, Rhia asked me if Greer and I ever fought. And I was forced to relieve this really quite embarrassing story about how we didn't speak to each other, for a week, because we both wanted to wear the same dress to prom."

He shook his head at the question. He hadn't liked whatever it was, he didn't imagine Heni, or anyone would. But after that he fell silent again, trying to figure out how to even go about explaining… There was a lot to unpack. "Okay, so, the other week Diego told me that G told him to look around for stuff to do with Greer in the Dean's stuff." Ollie specifically mentioned it was Diego because he knew that him and Heni were close, and he imagined that he probably wouldn't have a problem with discussing this more with Heni if she wanted to talk to him about it later. "He found correspondence between Penny and the Dean talking about those letters that were sent out. How Greer had given them to her to deliver later. And I was like 'what the fuck?' Why would Penny tell the Dean that? Like of all people?" Ollie, once again, looked around to make sure no one was around to overhear because this was the more damning part. "Then I was talking to someone else," he left Link's name out of it, "they were also sent to look through the Dean's shit. And they also found correspondence between Penny and the Dean. It sounded very … intimate, and flirtatious. Like it was about her thanking him for helping her win the election. Like she sounded really smug about it," he explained, being a little coy about it before stating, "it felt like they were fucking." That had been implied.

Increasingly, Heni had found herself wishing that real life came with a transcription service. The story surrounding Greer's disappearance and the events that transpired in its wake, was a logic tree from hell. It kept branching and branching and branching and branching, and in the end, it was all loose ends. She would find herself wide awake at night, staring blankly at the ceiling, Coco's soft snoring audible through her thoughts, trying to make sense of things. How good would it not be to be able to revisit things. To mull them over anew, without the information having been glossed over with a layer of human forgetfulness.

His head was bobbing along, already on the same page as Heni. "It's the work of someone with no life, that's for sure." It was Monty's turn to sigh then, deep enough that his shoulders raised with the pull of an inward breath before slumping on the exhale, gaze ticking around the party like he was looking for someone he knew. "But, then, of course, you start to wonder who that could be" -- or, at least, he did -- "and it's almost creepier to imagine someone none of us can really name still having always been there, just lurking in the periphery…" Sidelined and jealous, righteous in their vengeance all because they felt some kinda way about Greer. Monty frowned at distant faces he couldn't make out before shaking his head roughly. "Wan'a drink?" He raised his Solo cup that was little more than slivers of ice floating in an inch of lukewarm vodka, turning back towards the kitchen while inviting, "C'mon, I'll make you a Monty special!"

You start to wonder who that could be. The words echo in her mind like it's an empty hallway. Had any statement rung more true, ever? Sometimes, it felt like all she had the capacity to think about. Who was behind it all? And, more diffuse still, why? It was a bottomless pit, an endless void, yielding nothing but more questions. Something to lose yourself in, to ponder the unponderable, to constantly run into the same wall like it might crack if only approached at the right angle. It's a relief, then, when Monty steers the conversation back onto safer shores. "What on earth is a Monty special?"

link lets out a low whistle, impressed but not surprised. "discipline and punish references while threatening my livelihood? god, you really do know how to talk dirty." he flicks the cigarette away, watching it arc into the gutter before turning fully to her. the grin on his face is all teeth now: mischief, approval, the faintest hint of challenge.

There was still time, she heard that little voice in the back of her mind pipe up, to run for the hills. Nothing had yet been etched into the fabric of reality. If she left, Link might think a little less of her, but that she could stomach. Still, she trails after him. Kitten heels clicking against the linoleum floor.

parker released a scoff-like breath of laughter. the dream ogden had undoubtedly sold them—and their parents, and the town, and god only knew who else—on had swiftly devolved into nothing short of a nightmare. yet, here they still were, reapplying lipgloss and adjusting accessories in the gala restroom. it was an unspoken agreement they all had, wasn't it? that, for the love of christ, they'd loooove to leave, but none of them actually had taken any steps to do so prematurely.

"Oh, don't you worry. They'll stitch together our clips from the time capsule, and the tv thing, until they're unrecognisable. You won't even need to be here in person to chime in on how much you loved your time at Ogden, and how .... they nurtured you, intellectually and pastorally." Had she, at some point along the way, become bitter? The more she listened to the words that left her, the more it sounded like it. But it was hard to insist everything was perfectly alright when they clearly weren't. Though, there was solace in realising that most everyone on campus felt equally bitter.

Monty made a mental note to start asking around later, maybe sniff out someone who knew Heni better than him, and actually find out who she would've deemed worthy of kissing recently. He liked to know people's business, he couldn't help it! He didn't continue to pry, though, already beginning to shrug as he easily agreed, "Absolutely." He'd assumed G was a girl since the beginning, especially in the strange transitionary period of realizing that G wasn't actually Greer herself at all. Talk about a mindfuck. "Ollie's said a few times that he thinks G could be Dean Zuko, but I dunno now. Even if he's in on it, or being just as blackmailed as we are," - they already went over that, so Monty waved a careless hand - "all the secret notes and texts… I can't imagine some old dude writing like that." He cracked a little bit of a smile, holding onto it even as he reluctantly admitted, "I get real freaked out when I start to think G might actually be one of us, y'know?"

"The Dean's a loser, but he's not that much of a loser." The words tumble out of her before she's had the chance to consider whether she really means it. An instinctual reaction, more than anything. "Sorry. My bad. Former dean."

"Suit yourself," Ollie said, with an airy shrug. He managed to down the rest of the lemon water (was sparkling water with lemon just fancy lemonade?) and setting it on some nearby surface as he lead the way out of the event venue and into the breezy night air. He was quiet for a while. Allowing the two of them to pass a group or two before he turned back to look over at Heni with a grimace. "So, I told you that if I found out anything else about… everything going on that I'd tell you," he said, tone switching to much more serious, now that they were alone. "I found out something else… Well, I didn't find it out, people found it out and told me about it. But it kind of seems pretty important, and I thought you would want to know."

Sassa was already standing and moving away from the mirror when Henrietta turned her down, pausing in her movement as she glanced towards the girl who had so often been someone she considered her arch nemesis. Besides Greer for a moment. She had figured when the moment broke, the tenuous olive branch would be broken along with it, but she hadn't expected it to happen...quite that sharply. Once the surprise past, Sassa offered a tight smile, the expression not reaching her eyes as she nodded her head once. "Sure. See you down there," she said, brushing past Heni out of the room, not glancing back.

Sarcasm wasn't exactly Coco's strong suit, as earnest as he was, so at Heni's words, his eyes widened, starting to stammer, denials nearly tripping over themselves on their way off his tongue as a flush came to his cheeks. Her next words made it clear that she didn't mean it though, the flush only deepening as he realized it, though Court just bobbed his head, offering his roommate a shaky smile. "Yeah. Let's go get food!" he said, trying to do his best to sound like his normal, chipper self.

"That man only gives a shit about himself," Cara agreed with a throaty laugh, her eyes rolling as she answered Heni. Though that certainly wasn't the only reason Cara hadn't spoken to him - her parents would literally rather she died too then have their families dirty laundry aired publicly like that. Honestly, she had been surprised they hadn't slapped the entire thing with a cease and desist. Must've gotten a hefty sum for that one.

The thing about closed doors, Heni finds herself thinking, is that they offer the illusion of privacy. Whatever happened here - no one on the outside of the closet needed to be in the know. Or, at least, she could delude herself into thinking no one would ever know. That Cara wouldn't tell anyone. That she wouldn't drunkenly allude to it in the same way that she'd drunkenly alluded to previous hookups.