On A Night Like This

Chapter Five

They held each other gazes for a long, earth-stilling pause until Kai, with his eyes still locked on Ambrose, reached for the lamp and turned it off plunging the room to darkness. Ambrose heard him roll to the other side.

The room fell eerily silent.

⁂

Kai woke from the alarm beeping incessantly beside him. Groaning irritatedly at the shrilling noise, he slapped the device shut before sitting up, rubbing his face with a yawn.

He glanced at Ambrose's bed surprised to see it already made with no sign of him anywhere. He left his bed and trudged sleepily to the bathroom, rubbing his palm against his morning whiskers wondering if he should shave or not, then decided the latter.

He took a quick shower, dressed up, grabbed his wallet, phone and satchel with books and left the room, locking it after him before checking his phone as he left the dorm.

A quick ding of notification sounded and he checked the message. Mortimer wanted to see him at their practice room so he took a detour from the cafeteria.

He had time to spare.

⁂

Ambrose watched everyone present in the room. The air was heavily charged with hostility and male ego save for Meredith and Kochs who seemed indifferently calm.

"Where the fuck is he?" Dimitri growled with annoyance.

"Hey. He said he'd here, alright? Just give him a few." Sage shot back.

Kai walked in at that moment. "Hey, guys. What's up?" he greeted cheerfully before disdain overshadowed and crusted his face at the sight of the AMADEUs members present. "What are they doing here?" he directed the question to Meredith who shrugged.

"For the concert." She said before returning to the topic of their conversation. "Okay guys, as Kochs and I were saying earlier -"

"Kai!? Kai, you would not believe that Nathaniel broke up with me for some whore he met at the bonfire." Dyana's shrill voice interrupted.

Kai turned back, watching an anger-flushed Dyana storm into the room, interrupting their meeting with Meredith.

"Uh, excuse me. This is a meeting with no outsiders or GIRLS allowed." Meredith sassily cut in.
Dyana slowly turned towards the direction of the voice and lazily strode towards a defiant Meredith with a mixture of livid irritation, rage, and amused scorn. A suddenly wary Kai stalked behind her, ready to snatch her in case she decided scratch Meredith's eyes out. "But you're a girl, aren't you? Or a boy?" She felt Meredith's chest ignoring her squawk of outrage, "I'm sorry I just can't tell the difference. Is this the body of a grown woman or an eleven-year-old barely scarping through puberty? They're just so flat. Like plywood." She remarked with a sardonic pout of her lips.

Meredith's face turned molten. "How dare you?!"

Dyana brushed her off. "Oh, please. I'm sure Charlie here -" she jerked her head to Kochs, "can't tell the fucking difference."

"Uh...it's Kochs." He corrected.

"Not that it's any concern of mine." She snapped before turning to her attention back to Meredith. "Now as I was saying: You need to save your money and invest it on something worthwhile, say, your obscenely bland body, because frankly..." she let her voice trail, raking dissatisfied green eyes over Meredith's slim frame. "You look anorexic. It's highly unappealing...like an uncooked weenie."

A large hand shot out with the speed of lightning and clamped forcefully around Dyana's nape. Mortimer's expression was thunderous yet deadly calm as he muttered, "That's about enough of your bullshit."