mary of magdala

As if Parker sensed Rhia’s shifting eyes, the other looked away before Rhia could catch her eye. Instead, she observed her profile with silent tears as Parker rebuffed her statement. Even a girl as highly esteemed as she failed to see everything she offered, the influence she had on others. It was utterly tragic, watching as one of her idols broke the illusion of perfection, but also deeply cathartic. They were all broken, it seemed. Broken and lonely and somehow convinced no one else could understand. A new wave of sobs came on, this time for Parker’s sake. Parker was as damn near to Rhia’s ideal as possible, and yet her position didn’t guarantee the love they both sought. So then, how would Rhia ever accomplish her goal of being a beloved star? All she lived for was the stage, for romance and friendships. Her gigs were just as scarce as the number of people she truly trusted. “I love you, Parker,” Rhia declared resolutely. “I think I’ve loved you since the moment I saw you. It was effortless,” she continued with a laugh. She wiped fresh tears from under her eyes and looked down at her hands to find her mascara smeared. So much for that. “Maybe it’s just that most people don’t know how to express it,” she certainly struggled with it a fair share. To this day, she still couldn’t articulate her feelings for Nate. “You’re far more than tolerable,” Rhia reassured again. Hesitantly, her hand reached out and squeezed Parker’s. She smiled wistfully, grateful for the opportunity to reciprocate Parker’s gentleness.

oh, no. oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no.

It was easy now, to disregard the raccoon eyes and red splotches across her face, in favor for the love of another. That’s all Rhia had ever sought; the comfort of knowing she was cared for. Her Parker was, with no obligation but all the intent to understand and listen and heal. How could Rhia possibly feel unworthy when everything Parker did for her made her feel the opposite? “Ethereal,” she repeated with a laugh. It was a pretty image—like a woodland fairy floating through a luscious forest, or a ballerina poised and elegant on the decorative stage— one that soothed her self disdain even if only for a moment. “I like that.” Maybe Parker spoke more truthfully than both of them realized at the moment. Rhia had always danced the line of the ether and reality. She existed half in a fantastical dream and half in the harshness of the real world. It made her feel like life was her own personal fairytale, but her isolation and confusion had stripped her story of its magic.

who: @cinnamonfm where: uber, off-campus when: around 11pm

Silence this prolonged was rarely good. As a child, it had been indicative of a cold shoulder – an indicator of a misstep, an unspoken need for course correction. As an adult, Heni found it usually signalled something else. When people were quiet for this long, it was not because of some fundamental flaw within her, as she may have believed back in the day, but rather because they were mulling over something. Equally dangerous. A flame that needed extinguishing all the same. "I didn't say anything," she says, lips pursed slightly. "It was the radio, I think." A pause. "Are you ... okay? Is it, like, way past your bedtime or something? I can't imagine the rockstar life working out if you're dead on your feet after ten."

Her brows pulled together, and she put a lace-gloved hand over a warm cheek. “Oh,” she said flatly, aiming to smile but feeling as though the action took too much strain. She turned back toward the window, content to return to her distant wonderland if it meant she didn’t have to divulge her current train of thought. Heni spoke up again, interrupting her descent back into solitude. “Oh, well,” Rhia repeated again, the words glossy and dazed like the look in her eyes. She barely had enough energy to let out a light chuckle at Heni’s reprimand of her anti-rockstar behavior. “I think I’m feeling a bit feverish is all. It just hit me all of a sudden,” she explained, smiling to show it was nothing to worry about. “I think I’ll be fine once we’re mingling,” she reassured Heni. The least she could do was make sure the girl had a good time until the inevitable struck…

She felt humilated and ridiculed without a single word of disapproval from Ollie; she felt enough shame and disgust towards herself for the both of them. She slowly backed away toward the door, ready to make her swift exit upon the first opportunity. Ollie grabbed her before she could, insistent that she stay. She couldn’t look up and meet his eyes, though she didn’t protest. The conversation turned to something less personal, and Rhia was quick to express interest in an attempt to move on. “Really?” she questioned, her previous timid attitude dissipating to give way to her enthusiasm for gossip. “Who is it?” she whispered, mouth gaped in mock surprise.

He pressed his lips together, considering whether to say who or not. He felt kind of bad. He didn't like to gossip too much. But it wasn't like Sassa and Monty weren't publicly being seen out together. Rhia might have been able to put two and two together eventually. He had full faith in her!! "Sassa," Ollie said, shrugging his shoulders like it wasn't a big deal or anything, "Like I said I don't think it's like an ongoing thing. I think they're just… maybe hooking up sometimes. But not because of drugs or anything. I think might have just been an excuse in the first place."

The sound of Sassa’s name from Ollie’s mouth sent a surge of annoyance through her, though she didn’t find herself much surprised. “Ugh,” Rhia groaned. “I knew it!” she said with a balled fist. “Isn’t she your friend?!” Rhia demanded, much too angrily for her lack of involvement. If she examined it deeper, it was her own guilt and complicated history with (and admittedly just as complicated current feelings towards) him that made the stakes feel personal. Rhia could have just as easily chosen the casual comfort of Monty’s arms, but she hadn’t allowed herself for Ollie’s sake. And Sassa’s decision to overlook all of that irritated her. It was selfish.

“No, that’s so sweet! Have you been friends long?” Rhia asked overly friendly. Her eyes twinkled with the question she dare not ask; is that all? “Must be pretty close to wanna come matching and all,“ Rhia said with a sly smile. The words lingered stalely in the air before she realized how judgmental they might have seemed. “So cute,” she tacked on, bringing her shoulders up to her ears. She also had no idea Sassa had a boyfriend which made this whole situation with Monty more distasteful. “Oh wow. That’s a bummer,” she responded amiably. “He’s not the jealous type, is he?” she asked with a raise of her eyebrows and a watchful gaze.

Sassa's head angled towards one shoulder, her smile not budging even as she stared at Rhia a beat too long, the increased friendliness only being met with an increased chill in the opposite direction from her. "What do you mean?" she asked, voice purposefully rising, a girlish cluelessness infused into the words. If Rhia wanted to play that game, Sassa could absolutely play along - she'd play dumb until the other girl outright said whatever she was trying to ask with all the subtlety of a bulldozer. "Thanks," she cooed at the other girl before lifting her drink to her lips, the sip from it hiding the scowl that briefly crossed her face. "Anyways," Sassa said once she had lowered her glass, ignoring the rest of what Rhia said as she exaggeratedly scanned over the party. "I suppose I shouldn't leave him on his own for too long." Not that she really cared too much about actually finding Monty again. She just wasn't in the mood to be interrogated over her date decisions. Surely they had all had enough of that with the murder investigation.

“Oh, you know,” Rhia said lackadaisically, as if discussing her plans later for the day and not potentially the other’s infidelity. “Must be pretty close if your boyfriend’s okay with you going on a date with another person,” she said with characteristic animation. Albeit, she knew how hypocritical the words sounded as soon as she said them, considering in essence that was her chosen career…

What she thought was a blossoming friendship between her and her dance partner ended up being yet another farce to test the validity of Rhia’s rumored profession. Except they almost always considered themselves an exception to payment, their enthusiastic participation the justification of their exemption. Rarely did they realize how low their chance of success was, if it wasn’t accompanied by cash and couture. Donovan Hart was always very generous in that department.

You're probably not going to like this one – that's her immediate thought. Heni allows herself a brief moment to wonder what Rhia thinks might be waiting in store for her. Have you ever kissed this person? If you could go back in time, what would you change? G had stripped almost every conversation on campus of frivolity. Even when it was not life-or-death, there was an undercurrent of something sinister. Because could you really trust that whoever you were speaking to, was not also your tormentor? Or, perhaps simpler yet – that they would not give your secrets up to save their own skin?

Her question, innocent sounding enough, alluded to a night Rhia tried everything to forget. Her left eye twitched, though her smile eerily remained etched on her face. It seemed Rhia found herself in yet another precarious situation, and this one not so easily escapable as the last. “What?” she asked stunned. What exactly had G told Heni, and was it enough to incriminate her? Every nerve ending stood at attention, and she was ready to flee at the first sign of distraction. “Sometimes, yeah. Didn’t you go off campus with her too?” Rhia asked, ending the question with a high note. She cleared her throat and pushed a strand of hair behind her ear. “Not often though. We mostly hung out here. Well, not here, but like on campus and stuff,” she explained, wondering if this was another situation she could talk herself out of.

She decided against voicing it, but the line of conversation indicated to Rhia Coco was being a bit of a buzzkill . Every invitation, every playful incitation was deflected. What was going on with them? Usually they weren’t so frigid. They weren’t being rude, in fact Coco was never anything but infinitely generous with their courtesies. “The fresh air’s all around you, silly,” Rhia pointed out obtusely. She gestured all around them, before looking back at Coco with a raised brow. She wasn’t used to this dismissive attitude, and her interest slowly died upon realizing they were unwilling to match her enthusiasm. “What’s up? Who shit in your Cheerio’s this morning or whatever?” she asked briskly.

"Wh-what?" Court asked again, sounding like a broken record at this point, his chin tucking in ever so slightly as their eyes widened at Rhia. "Nothing's up. I was just...getting air," he said, his denial starting off strong but quickly fading off lamely, not quite able to meet Rhiannon's eyes. He knew coming to this party was a bad idea. And he couldn't exactly explain that to Rhia, could he? "I just meant you didn't have to come with me - I don't want to interrupt," Court continued after an awkward breath, gesturing towards the people she had been with. "You were in the middle of something, don't feel like you need to keep me company."

Rhia eyed Coco skeptically, not believing their poor attempt to find an excuse but not wanting to torture them all the same. “You’re not interrupting,” she said with a shrug. “If I wanted to stay a part of that conversation so bad, I would,” but she didn’t, and this was as good an excuse as any to get out of it. She linked her arm with Coco, inviting herself on his journey to find fresh air. She strolled along the sidewalk with them, half dragging them along with her until they fell into step beside her. They’d talk a walk around the block and Rhia would see if she could get anything more out of Coco. “I was happy to see Link and Ollie in good spirits… Mari not so much,” Rhia observed aloud.

“Boo,” Rhia volleyed instantaneously, her face already settled in a dramatic pout. As if the look would extort romanticism from the depths of Anya’s soul. “We were put on this Earth to love. Or is it to be loved? I forget which,” Rhia stated matter-of-fact. Either way, it was evident that a human could never thrive in an environment without love. Heat went straight to her cheeks at her blunder, the emphatic passion she held for romance causing a major oversight in her scheming…

"Not to be a cynic," they shoot back, head tilted slightly backwards, next extended as though in an effort to release the tension of the last two years. She could feel it in her shoulders, sometimes. The stress and uncertainty having rooted itself in their body. "But I do not believe we were put on this planet for any particular purpose. It's what you make of it that matters, I guess." The latter part added as a softening of the blow, not wanting to entirely deconstruct this romantic notion of love as an inevitable terminus.

“Well, that’s very cynical for a non-cynic,” Rhia teased, reaching a pleading hand toward Anya. Still, it was hard to argue with the logic of one of the smartest people she knew. Yet, love and connection was innately wrapped in the human experience, and Rhia saw it everywhere from music and media and all around her. She wasn’t willing to give up her rose-tinted view of the world just yet. “Maybe you’re right, maybe you’re not. But I think it’s more fun to live life like there is a point to it all, yanno?” she ascertained with a nonchalant shrug.

“You’re being naughty. A promise is a promise though!” It was nice to play along with no stakes. That’s what they did, after all. Shoot the shit and dance around each other only to fall short anything actualizing. Most times. There were a few occasions the lines were blurred then tossed away, only to disappear from view upon their next encounter. She liked it better that way anyway. There was no pretense to pretend this was something it wasn’t. She stiffened at the mention of her string of bad moods, though she brunt the offense silently. She offered a tight smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes and set the bottle beside her. “How could I not be? We’re celebrating a few of my favorite people, after all,” she mused, giving Link a tap on the nose so that there was no doubt they were included in that group.

he rolls his eyes at the tap to his nose, but his grin was still formulating with nowhere to hide it. "oh, don't remind me. i think it's ridiculous that people celebrate getting a little older and losing more time." and every year, he was sounding more bitter than the last. the only time aging seemed fun to link is when he would be in his sixties, being the bitter old man that yells at kids. at least that's one thing in life to look forward to. "it is possibly the last time the three of us will get to celebrate together after we graduate. maybe there's some sentimentality there." deep down, link will miss this — if it wasn't mari and ollie, he would be glad these celebrations will be gone. but no matter how much he didn't want to, he cared about them. "you'll be one of the two people to miss me when we've graduated, won't you?" he asks in a playful tone.

“I find it rather special. One of the inexplicable rituals unique to being human,” she countered amiably. Though, she knew she would lose any battle when it came to convincing Link of the sentimentality of life itself. “Most of us fear death, yet we celebrate the passage of time without truly understanding what that means.”

Something about Lola’s inquiry almost felt like condemnation. It embarrassed Rhia, made her feel like her family’s faults were easily pinpointed. She knew her family situation wasn’t an admirable one, but having that negligence exposed frightened her more than her reality. “Well, sometimes,” she fibbed with a shrug of her shoulders. Her father tried. But since his health took a drastic downturn, he hadn’t the energy to listen to the raves and ramblings of his young daughter. “They’re just busy mostly. And my mom never really understood the whole singer/songwriter thing. She thinks I’m just wasting my time with it.” Only because she couldn’t understand it. And how could she? Being a woman with such grey, wicked, lifeless dreams.

"Of course you're not wasting your time," Lola is quick to reassure, in spite of not actually having been asked for her opinion. It was instinctual, almost, the need to make people feel at ease. Heightened to its most extreme when she got a whiff of her behaviour having had the opposite effect. A vicious cycle, and one that she did not possess the necessary analytical skills to figure out existed. "When you're up on that stage, and the lights are all on you, she'll have to own up to her error in judgement. There's no greater motivator than proving someone wrong? That's why I started swimming."

Rhia smiled wistfully, her heart touched and raw from the sincerity of the other. Lola reassured her in a way she tried countless of times for herself, but it was a different feeling to have someone else believe in her. “You’re right. We’ll prove them all wrong,” she said in a small voice. She reached out and grabbed Lola’s hand, giving it a tight squeeze to show their camaraderie. “You’re tiny yet mighty,” Rhia teased. “I’ve seen what you can do out there,” though she was admittedly there mostly to ogle at Nate.

“Must have been the garment of my dreams, to have caught both your attention,” Rhia speculated. Pre-teen girls were already notorious for being the harshest of critics, she couldn’t imagine the ruthless taste of Heni and Greer at age 13. At that age, Rhia had neither the sensibility to participate in age-appropriate activities, nor the public appeal of having anyone that would have liked to accompany her to a dance. She mostly sat out from those events. Half by choice and half by knowing no one cared to have her there anyway. “Sounds like an invaluable lesson, though,” perhaps indicative that a lack of compromise could be a bigger plight than receiving exactly what one sought.

"The worst thing is, I believe it would be terribly dated now." Like the spat itself, the dress had been emblematic of a time in their life. And while half a decade was a long time in anyone's book, it was not enough for the dress to have passed through the phases of acceptability. To go from being en vogue, to being a marker of a specific time period, to finally being considered vintage. The frilly, pastel thing was still firmly in that awkward middle stage. The one where you caught a glimpse of yourself in an old photo, and your heart rate picked up out of embarrassment. "Do any of us really learn from the fights we're in as teens?" The only thing that had come from that particular disagreement, was that Heni got her dress from Paris the following year.

She laughed with hearty delight, certain that Heni was right. Anything trendy from years ago likely wouldn’t hold up to the scrutiny of the public eye now. “No, I don’t think we do. I’m not even sure I learn from my fights now, honestly,” Rhia admitted. Not that she had many fights to go off of, besides her frequent ones with both Cara and Nate. She wasn’t even sure if Cara could be considered a friend at this point.

There was something tantalizing about being associated with holiness. For most of her life, she belonged solely to the world of earthly sin, heaven and goodness simply out of reach. She was neither chaste nor humble nor honest. She was both an object of desire and an entity motivated by lust and overindulgence. Or so her history would lead her to believe. but she was changed. Things were changed now. Her periods of reflection brought her to this path toward redemption. “That’s fine by me. Love having a good party to crash,” Rhia cooed. In high school, that tended to be all the parties she attended. There was something thrilling about having all eyes on her when she walked in a room, even if those eyes looked at her with disgust and hatred. She curled her arm around Monty’s hand and rest the other atop his. She let out a yelp of surprise when their foreheads touched, not having expected such an intimate view of Monty’s brow bone. “Yeah!” she enthused, touched by initiative to have her along. That familiar sense of gratitude for him returned to her tenfold. Initially coaxed by Monty, she tugged on his arm to take the lead toward the dance floor. “You think the person on aux will let me make a request? I swear if I hear one more Travis Scott song tonight, I’ll lose my shit…”

Monty laughed as Rhia's eager steps overtook his own, letting her expertly cut through the crowd and guide them towards the center of the clumsy dancefloor that'd sprung up instantaneously at the start of the party, as if born all on its own. Like immaculate conception, he thought dizzyingly, Mother Theresa still on his mind, and then, huh, how Catholic… Religion aside, it was even stranger to remember that this space had once been Dean Zuko's living room. Not even 24 hours earlier, it'd still been occupied by him and his things; donors had been schmoozed in this very room, student-teacher luncheons carried out, and now? It was theirs to obliterate. "What?" Monty asked, sounding almost as if he was asking Rhia to repeated herself, but he was grinning from ear to ear when their eyes met again. "You're telling me you don't wanna hear the billionth-trillionth remix of Goosebumps? Rhia!" He was laughing again as he crowed her name in mock offense, glancing away and skimming the room for sight of anyone who might be the amateur DJ on duty. As he did so, though, a swell of fear overcame him, telling him to not let of her. That if he did, he'd lose Rhia to the convulsing bodies surrounding them and wouldn't see her for the rest of the night. Monty couldn't decipher where the paranoia was coming from (likely too many uppers and the news that Ollie had Japan on the horizon), but it had him talking fast and tugging her closer. "Okay, okay, but wait," he said with a tumble of a chuckle, his hand finding hers to coil their fingers together, "any artist, any genre, any era - what would you pick as your personal theme song?"

“No, I think I’m okay. Really,” Rhia said distastefully, squeezing his upper arm to discourage any more shenanigans. She had spotted a figure on the couch next to the speakers that seemed enthralled with their phone, an indication they might be the one she was looking for. Before she could act, Monty tugged her closer to him, and she giggled giddily at their closeness. Her cheeks enflamed almost instantly, though her hand still came to press his cheek against hers. It was hard for her to articulate this feeling in her stomach, something different than romantic love but stronger than platonic affection. She thought she might provide whatever it was Monty needed from her, and felt rather confident he would never exploit that. Her smile widened, ever so eager to jump at the opportunity to talk about herself. “D’ya really have to ask? It is my namesake after all,” Rhia allowed her silence to build the anticipation. “Rhiannon by Fleetwood Mac, of course. My parents’ favorite song. The story is they’d watched Stevie Nicks perform it off a quad of shrooms, and the rest is history.” She didn’t feel like delving into her mother’s much too detailed account of Rhia’s conception, and how that song played its part then too. She also didn’t feel like she could boast of her parents’ lackluster love story. “Now. Tell me yours.”

While expected, his silence still weighed on her like a question long pondered but never answered. How apt, that even now, prepared to lay her soul bare to him, he remained an enigma to her. Her courage seemed to deflate with every second that passed that he didn’t speak. Then she blinked and he was on her, hands wrapped around her in that familiar, intoxicating way. Rhia felt faint, her knees threatened to buckle and send them tumbling to the floor. She fought to stay standing, clutched both his hands in a desperate attempt to prevent him from untethering himself from her. For the first time in months, Rhia’s chest heaved and her lungs filled completely with air and she found she could breathe with ease, finally. She was grateful to be alive and breathing, and wrapped in Nate’s arms. His forehead tilted and rest against hers, the gentle movement from Nate sent a stabbing pain through her chest, her heart. Tears slipped silently from her eyes and then came relief. Finally, her mind quieted and all that existed for her was the love they shared. How silly they were to deny it.

Nate backed Rhia further, pushing her until her back hit the wall, his knees pushing between her thighs so she was pinned in place by him. One hand ran down her body, brushing along her side from her jaw to her waist, grasping at her, clutching at her like she was something like he might be able to keep.

The moment lingered for a breath of awkwardness, Rhia's coughing lapsing, Nate's hand still hovering over her back before he let it fall back to the couch. He shifted slightly as she slumped back into the cushions, the movement having put them too awkwardly close to his arm being slung around her - there was a former ease in the position that he no longer could bring himself to find, to caught up in what it meant and what she would want from it. Nothing he could give her, he was sure.

"Business as usual then," Rhia nodded light-hearted, disappointed in his impersonal answer and more so with her flaccid response. She tried not to notice the way he practically ran from her proximity. "Too busy for your friends, I guess," she attempted to tease. The bitterness that crept in made her sound humorless, revealing the underlying seriousness of what was supposed to be a light-hearted complaint, an invitation back in her life. She watched Nate silently for a few moments, circling her upper arm soothingly with her nails. "I haven't really heard from you. In awhile," she pointed out bluntly. Her face remained neutral, though her insides turned upside down as she waited for his excuse.

"so true," parker agreed, giving an enthused nod. she then looked back down at her bag, one hand holding it upright while the other plunged inside and started retrieving things. tools. for what, she had yet to disclose. a couple pens (one silver with a sense of place spelled out on it that she'd snagged from the carlyle, one thin and red that she'd lifted from szimpla kert last summer), a matchbook that had some bemelmans bar art on it, various scraps of paper she'd taken from the valentines roses table. such a collection might incline someone to call her out on a small kleptomania streak. she preferred to call it a penchant for ephemera—romanticizing the little things, holding onto them longer than they were meant to be held.

Rhia watched with vast amusement as Parker expertly laid out her tools one by then, then inched a set toward her. The stationary paired with a matchbook might seem unrelated to the untrained eye, but Rhia immediately picked up this was some sort of ritual she prepped for the two of them. When was the last time a friend went out of their way for a grandiose gesture such as this? Nothing recent came to mind but rather than lament the fact, she only felt grateful to experience it now.

parker couldn't help—nor desired to, really—the way her eyes went wide, only reverting when the space between them came to crease. her? easy to love? it would've been laughable from her perspective had the mood of the room not made that entirely inappropriate. but, of course, rhia didn't know that. parker had worked unimaginably hard to make sure that was the case, for everyone. to the point of deep, unspeakable isolation. but that didn't mean the love was real.

As if Parker sensed Rhia’s shifting eyes, the other looked away before Rhia could catch her eye. Instead, she observed her profile with silent tears as Parker rebuffed her statement. Even a girl as highly esteemed as she failed to see everything she offered, the influence she had on others. It was utterly tragic, watching as one of her idols broke the illusion of perfection, but also deeply cathartic. They were all broken, it seemed. Broken and lonely and somehow convinced no one else could understand. A new wave of sobs came on, this time for Parker’s sake. Parker was as damn near to Rhia’s ideal as possible, and yet her position didn’t guarantee the love they both sought. So then, how would Rhia ever accomplish her goal of being a beloved star? All she lived for was the stage, for romance and friendships. Her gigs were just as scarce as the number of people she truly trusted. “I love you, Parker,” Rhia declared resolutely. “I think I’ve loved you since the moment I saw you. It was effortless,” she continued with a laugh. She wiped fresh tears from under her eyes and looked down at her hands to find her mascara smeared. So much for that. “Maybe it’s just that most people don’t know how to express it,” she certainly struggled with it a fair share. To this day, she still couldn’t articulate her feelings for Nate. “You’re far more than tolerable,” Rhia reassured again. Hesitantly, her hand reached out and squeezed Parker’s. She smiled wistfully, grateful for the opportunity to reciprocate Parker’s gentleness.