✶nini✶

you huff an over-exaggerated sigh of annoyance, shoving your pillow over your face in a desperate attempt at blocking the sleep fatigue that threatened to seep into your skull. you peel yourself from your bed with the unwavering force of a toddler on a tantrum, clad only in short-sleep-shorts and an oversized sweatshirt. 

“you’ve got to be kidding me,” your words are swallowed by darkness. you search blindly for your phone, finally grasping onto it only to be met with the unforgiving brightness as the screen displays 1:27 AM. no notifications. no service. no power. fantastic!

you slip on your slippers before braving opening the door.

the hallway is brighter than your room, moonlight spilling through the stairwell windows at the very end. doors crack open one by one as sleepy, disgruntled students poke their heads out, mumbling confused curses to one another before retreating back inside.

someone down the hall dramatically groans, someone else cheers because they “don’t have to finish their paper now.”

you roll your eyes before ultimately deciding to step out into the hallway and lean against your closed door. an unlocking noise brings attention to your left, your neighbor—who you could only describe as sweet and painfully awkward. 

you see her step out, wearing an oversized (spiderman?) t-shirt and baggy sweatpants. her eyes appear startled as they catch onto yours and she huffs out a small: “hi.”

”hi, ellie.” you respond. and, in ellie’s mind, you seem as cool and as calm as one could possibly be. in her mind, she wants a sinkhole to miraculously appear beneath her figure and swallow her whole. or—she thinks—an alien invasion can take place and she’ll be ripped from the ground and sent up skywards. just so she doesn’t have to bear with her own self.

”…powers out.” she says, still refusing to look directly in your eyes. she brings a hand up to tuck a loose strand of hair behind her ear before immediately bringing her hand down to her side because, you look like a loser! idiot idiot idiot. 

you laugh, ellie notices the way your nose crinkles and makes a mental note of it. “yeah i… hadn’t noticed.”

she laughs along with you before abruptly stopping, and you can tell that she feels stuck in her head. nerves, anxiety, and the fact that it’s the dead of night, can do that to a person. albeit your initial thoughts, you start to worry if it’s you that’s making her feel like this. if she sees you as the annoying neighbor making too much noise—but then you’re pulled back to when she slipped that paper under your door, and you’re met with a feeling of glee that you can and you will continue this conversation, and drive it to a point of meaning.

“i don’t think we’ve ever really talked,” you start, “how come?”

ellie can practically see the moment she shuts down, pulling on her ring and pinky finger with her other hand as she constantly shifts weight from one foot to the other. “well—“ she clears her throat. “i mean.. there’s never been a good time to,” she finally looks at your face then, stationary enough that you can start mapping out the constellations of her freckles adorning her nose.

“now’s a good time, don’t you think?” she gives a small nod in response, and you pinch your lips together. you never considered yourself an extrovert—far from that, actually—but you figured you’ve heard ellie be holed up in her dorm for far too many hours out of a day, feeling a spark of confidence to get her to actually talk. “what’s your number?”

ellie mentally scolds herself for jumping to the conclusion that your words echoed your actual thoughts. she stammers enough that she abides to just shutting up and grabbing her phone out of her pocket before handing it to you.

“perfect!” you exclaim sweetly, handing the phone back to her.

she takes it and tries not to think about the slight contact between your hands.

her eyes glance downwards at her own phone and she laughs to herself as she gives you a look, as to say ‘really?’. you opt to just smile at her in return.

coming to an embarrassing stop in thought, you no longer know how to drive this conversation.

luckily, as a surge of electricity sounds overhead, you no longer have to. as fluorescent lights begin to shine, you and ellie look around yourselves to see all hallway lights begin to shine. people groan at the blinding lights, while others cheer at the sight of power. you and ellie laugh breathlessly.

“oh thank god,” you mockingly cheer.

“yeah, i know.” she raises her hands slightly to accompany her words. so she talks with her hands, got it.

you come to a slight realization. “hey, you’re a sophomore, right?” she hums. “does this happen a lot?”

“umm,” she starts, in genuine thought. “once or twice, yeah. shitty electricity but there’s always a backup. seattle.. rain.. yeah.”

“mhm,” you raise an eyebrow at her, bursting out in a fit of laughter.

“wha—hey!” she gets angrily defensive once she realizes you’re laughing at her mannerisms.

“sorry, sorry,” the time must have seeped into delirium, must have brought you a high of giddiness as you couldn’t fend off the last dying fits of laughter.

”yeah yeah, keep laughing.” she crosses her arms and pokes her tongue against her inner cheek. the hallway has dimmed by now, replaced by exhausted college students.

“it was nice meeting you, ellie.” her face flushes and yours feels warm in return. “but, um… it’s like two in the morning and my bitch of a past self signed up for morning classes, so..”

“shit, yeah, of course,” she says, coming to the realization herself that all doors are closed and the hallway has been replaced with serenity. “have a nice night.”

you utter a small thank you in response before heading back into your dorm.

— ✎ neighbor!ellie who, now that you have her number, you text often for various reasons. a dorm upstairs blasting music way too loud and way too late in the night is your best option for a conversation starter!

— ♫ you also often text her before you start practicing any sort of instrument, insisting that it’s human decency to warn her and say that if she’s doing anything you can practice elsewhere. without fail, she’ll always let you. she insists that that’s human decency.

— ✎ this slowly turns into a somewhat-friendship with her. texts become more frequent, slowly learning more and more about eachother through your phones—despite only a wall between you two.

— ♫ one evening, the faint smell of weed drifts through your open door. you don’t think, grabbing your phone and using the scent as an excuse to talk to her.

you brave yourself, simultaneously giving yourself a mental pat on the back for actually saying yes. you glance once in the mirror, before deciding that it would be awkward if you actually did fix yourself up considering she’s right next door—and then you decide that you’re thinking way too much of this and you need to quiet your mind.

crossing over a mere doorway, you knock on her door once before it swings open in your face. instead of ellie—you’re met with a shorter brown-haired girl, internally scolding yourself that you’re barging in on someone else hanging out with ellie.

needless to say, you’re introduced pretty quickly and the conversation slews into short small talk whilst ellie stays quiet, having known where you grew up; your family; your dating life (which was a rather fast topic to be brought up by dina); and your music taste from the short time you two were friends.

by the time you three were situated across ellie’s dorm (read: ellie on her bed, your back against it, and dina sprawled on the floor), you’ve begun to feel afloat; senses overloaded yet dizzingly calmer.

it’s been silent for a bit, chatter calming down as the three of you focus on other things. ellie seems to be lost in thought staring at the ceiling whilst dina types vigorously on her phone. it continues, both the silence and her typing, before she aggressively gets up and sighs, “jesse’s giving me shit. i have to go, el, sorry. it was nice meeting you as well,” she waves to you and you smile in return. ellie gives a noncommittal goodbye.

without any thought, you ask ellie, “jesse?”

“mhm,” she says, before realizing that wasn’t any form of an answer. “boyfriend.” she states simply.

“oh.” in all honesty, you thought that maybe ellie and dina were a thing. a thing once maybe—you hadn’t expected dina to have a boyfriend, you thought she seemed like the type to either have a flirty friendship or a secret girlfriend. you can’t really make an assumption on someone when you’ve only seen them high, either, so you push your thoughts backwards.

ellie’s voice pulls you from your head. “m’why’re you down there? come up here, s’nicer and i can see’your face.” she states simply, words rushing together.

without any second thought, you climb up to her bed and collapse beside her, arms and legs touching. as you look up, you start to wonder what part of the ceiling was so interesting to her. or what thoughts occupied her mind—if any of them contained fragments of you.

it seems now you are the one lost in their head. because when you turn to look at ellie, she is already looking in your direction. you are met with verde eyes—yet there is a red hue surrounding the iris that makes her look absolutely gone, and thus you are sent into a fit of laughter.

ellie poses a mock-offended expression, as you explain through a fit of laughter: “dude, you are such a lightweight!”

she stutters and hits you playfully in the arm instead of attempting to string together coherency.

“you had like—two hits and you’re giggling like a fucking idiot so you must be a fucking… lightweight too.” she laughs lightly alongside with you, eyes blown wide.

“god, i have tears in my eyes, holy shit,” you continue.

if you could describe how you felt right now in one word, it would be flying.

you wake with a dry mouth, blaring headache, and a weight pressed down on you—that ellie takes the form of. her head is nuzzled in your neck, body curved awkwardly against your side as she breathes quietly, dead to the world and most certainly in a deep sleep. you bring a hand up to shield your eyes as they adjust to the brightness, trying your hardest not to jostle the girl on top of you awake.

your efforts prove futile, much to your dismay, as ellie wakes with a strong inhale and an arm instinctively wrapping around your waist as she tries to bury herself further into you.

the sun was ellie’s biggest enemy, for it dawned its brutal breath on her sensitive features and stabbed at her retinas. her mind was racing, thoughts barging at the edge of her skull, frantically chasing around—the total opposite of the sluggish feeling of her movements. her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth as the lingering ash settled in the back of her throat.

she fights against her lethargic state, trying desperately to untangle the knot of her body on top of yours; all the while your hand stays planted between her shoulder blades in an attempt of comfort. “fuck—m’sorry, i don’t know when we..” she trails off, looking off in embarrassment.

you wave it off and pull her down towards you again. “no, s’fine. we can sleep, ‘still early,” your words are sluggish, failing to catch up with the spinning room around you.

“what about your morning classes?” ellie asks, slowly blinking herself awake, body snug comfortably in your arms and head resting against your collarbone.

you groan dramatically and whine her name, “don’t wanna think about that right now,” you complain, eyes slipping closed.

“why, rather think about me?” she teases, her grin wrapped around her speech practically audible. all she receives is a muffled sigh of annoyance from you. she slightly shakes you, “come on, you actually do need to get up.”

“says who? can’t even get up—you’re practically on top of me.”

“did you want me to get up?”

“no, i want to sleep—“ she starts backing away from you, “—ugh, ellie—“ you pull her forearm. she nearly topples over you, thighs braced on either side of your waist, face mere inches from yours. a hand reaches up on the mattress beside your face before moving to cup the side of your face. it heats under the weight of her palm.

“say stop and this ends right now,” she mutters, voice merely a whisper.

you glance at her lips, deciding you don’t trust your voice enough. you practically see the thoughts running in her head—her eyes flickering between yours.

you pull her face down onto yours, allowing her lips to fall gently yet impatiently against yours. she smells—tastes of—danger, of weed, of everything you hate and everything you could possibly need. her remaining hand comes down to cradle your head, pulling away for a moment only to gaze at you before she connects your lips again.