The Aberrations of S.I.D.E.

No. 30: Memories and Mishaps

"Goodbye, pride," Remus said gloomily. "It was fun while it lasted."

Janus patted his shoulder. "I think you look adorable in that, lovely."

Virgil wiped his face and sat down. "Okay, continue."

"See, me and Remus went to a Catholic school before we went to the Academy," Roman explained. "And our third-grade teacher was... strict about punishments."

"Literally all I did was draw a mustache on my face!" Remus groaned. "It wasn't even in permanent marker!"

"Thankfully, I had a habit of carrying around a little red travel camera with me everywhere back then, so I was able to capture that while we were heading out to recess," Roman said, pointing at The Picture with a grin. "And now, it's forever an instrument in tormenting my brother."

A tentacle popped out of Remus's back and snatched The Picture out of Virgil's hand, tossing it into the fireplace.

Roman walked over and plucked it out. "Word of advice---do that when it's actually on."

"I hate you," Remus grumbled.

"Aw, c'mon, big guy, I thought you'd be proud," Virgil said, grinning. "I mean, sure, you got an extreme and embarrassing punishment, but you defined the expression 'pouty-face.' That's a win in my book."

"It's not a win in mine."

Roman shrugged. "On the bright side, that teacher learned her lesson after she put a bar of soap in Remus's mouth for saying a bad word."

Virgil blinked, confused. "What, did he spit it out or something?"

"Our little bundle of chaos is allergic to most types of soap," Janus explained. "From what I heard, that little incident got the woman fired, and for good reason."

"I ended up in the hospital for a month," Remus clarified.

"You're allergic... to soap." Virgil sighed, rubbing his eyes. "That actually explains a lot."

"Hey, I'm not allergic to every kind of soap!"

"No, but you pretend to be to avoid taking a shower," Janus said. "I can't even begin to count the number of times I've had to go to the nurse's office and confirm what you can or can't use just so I can at least get you to take a sponge bath."

"I keep telling you, you're already neat enough for the both of us," Remus told him, getting to his feet. "Besides, I get along just fine with one five-minute shower per week."

Virgil gave him a mildly horrified look. "Speaking as someone who takes a twenty-minute one every other day regularly---dude."

"What the fuck did you expect from me?" Remus dusted off his jeans. "Okay, we'll probably be staying in our old rooms, assuming Daddy Dearest hasn't burned all of our shit and turned them into office spaces."

"Oh, give him some credit," Roman scoffed, waving a hand. "They're probably guest rooms."

"Well, he definitely fumigated them," Remus said. "Can't have any of those gay pheromones affecting others."

Roman let out a snort. "Gay phero---oh my god, imagine if those were real?"

"You can only see them if you're queer! They're rainbow and help you find other gay people without embarassing yourself by flirting with straights!"

"Okay, seriously, our rooms have probably gone through a lot," Roman said. "We should go check them out and prepare ourselves."

............