The Myriad Misadventures of a Midgardian Queen-In-Training || Loki x Reader

Chapter 31

You rip a piece of paper out of your journal and crumple it, before tossing it off the side of your bed. It lands on top of the others with a soft rustling noise. You've amassed quite the pile of bad first drafts in the last...how long? Checking the clock on the other side of the room, you see you've been sitting on your bed writing (or, rather, trying to write) for four hours . Jesus.

Four hours, and all you have to show for it is nothing. Zip, zilch, nada. The talent show is in two hours, and you have to use some of that time to get ready. Throughout your academic career back home, writing things last-minute was kind of a specialty of yours, from one-paragraph reading responses to eight-page research papers. But this? This is hard.

It had been a good idea, but what if you couldn't produce the goods to back it up?

No. No, you're going to do this. The product doesn't have to be perfect, but you are not going up on that stage tonight entirely empty-handed. You sigh, and hop down, gathering up the small mountain of balled-up papers and dumping them unceremoniously on the bed. One of these must have something I can work with...

You unfold and read page after page, and are about to give u - Okay. Okay, this is...well, it's not good , exactly, but it's something. You open up to yet another page in your journal and begin writing again, spitting out as many ideas on the page as possible. Twenty minutes later, you start editing, adjusting syllable counts and drawing arrows to indicate where you want to switch around different stanzas. By the half-hour mark, you're able to rewrite the whole thing, and even though you still have what feels like a rock sitting in your stomach, you're finished, at least.

And now for the hard part.

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Meg smooths one last hair down, looks you over to make sure there are no stray pins or threads to be seen, and nods, satisfied. "Perfect. Are you ready?"

You pretend to admire your appearance in the mirror - with your hair pulled up in a ponytail rather than a bun, the ends lightly curled, and eye makeup applied with a very light hand, you look perhaps a bit more casual than would be fit for a ball, but that's what you'd requested, and Meg, as always, delivered. "Thank you." The rock in your stomach is more-like a two-ton boulder at this point. Your reflection in the mirror blurs, and you realize that it's because you're close to crying. "Meg?"

"Yes?"

"I don't know if I can do this," you confess, a few tears rolling down your cheek right before your face crumples up. You're embarrassed, really - you never had much stage fright at home, but for some reason the idea of what's about to happen is sending you into a dizzy spin.

"Oh, no." She tsks gently, and steps towards you, hesitating for a moment before sweeping you up into a hug. After a moment she pulls back, and, pulling out a handkerchief, dabs gently at your tears, so as to not ruin your makeup. "None of that. Would you rather I have His Majesty summon some some monsters, and have the audience see you fend them off with a fork?"

You giggle, though it sounds more like a hiccup through your tears. "Honestly, at this point..."

"Well, that request would have had to be put in earlier than fifteen minutes before the event, so..." she teases. You crack a smile. "There you go. We'll wait a moment for you to collect yourself, and then it'll be time for you to go downstairs."
You nod. She's right, there's no point in getting upset now - in a few hours, this entire ordeal will be over, and you'll never have to think about it again, no matter how poorly you may do. "Thank you, Meg."

"Of course." She smiles kindly at you. "Shall we go? And please, do try to refrain from crying again - I won't be there during the ball to touch up your makeup again."

You've never known Meg to have this strong a sense of humor, and you find yourself chuckling again. "I'll do my best."

"Good." She gestures at your reflection in the mirror. "Your nose isn't red anymore. Shall we?"

You take a deep breath, grab your things from your bed, and head for the door. Once in the hallway, you hear Meg wish you good luck before she shuts the door.

Here we go.