Copyright © 2018. All Rights Reserved.
Unknown Number: Come to the co op when you can.
Nic: I'm assuming this is Kieran. It's 11pm.
Kieran: Get over here ASAP or reap the consequences.
Nic: Shit, ok omw.
Nic had never... been to the Co-Op. And with all the signs on their trees and the weird log fencing... it was kind of creepy just in general. None of the frats had fences to begin with, so it stuck out on that semi-modern street, with their dark brick and pillars in the front. There was a balcony up above, but it was too narrow for people to walk out on. There were bikes kept up there, though, which was... weird. Especially in the dark. He felt like he was about to get murdered.
He climbed the steps of the Co-Op and wandered to the front door. It was surrounded by cute flower pots and such, and what looked like clay pottery that was hand made. He double-checked his phone before decided that not knocking was fine. Just walk right in, he says, it's not like this is your house or anything!
Nic propped open the screen door and pushed inside, and he wasn't sure what he was expecting. It just... looked kind of like a normal house. The foyer connected to a large living room, and a smaller sitting room to the left. It was all definitely not-modern, with a heavy brick fireplace and the old-fashioned floral couches. And it kind of smelled like sawdust in here.
"Who is it?" someone called out from another room. Nic brushed his feet off on the carpet and started to walk towards the sound.
"Uh, Nic?" he answered, cringing a little before being startled by someone popping out from around the archway leading into the kitchen. It was all white and yellow in there, and the woman's sweater just seemed to match it all. Yellow, with a pink flower pattern across it.
"Hey Nic." Kieran's voice sounded from the kitchen, but Nic couldn't see him anywhere.
The woman nudged him into the kitchen and towards the center island counter. Across it, he could see Kieran's legs stretched out on the tile, and the top of his head of black hair. "We were just making banana bread," the woman said, and held a hand out to Nic. "Bev."
"Nic, again," he laughed, shaking her hand. "You... live here?"
"Yeah. Kieran and I are in the same major and stuff," she explained, waving her hand. She was plump, and it showed in her round wrists and the softness of her facial features. She had heavy brown hair that was pulled back into a french braid, and as she turned to the oven, it swished over her shoulder where she pulled out a few long pans.
The smell of it was heavenly. It masked the sawdust scent and created a warm, homely atmosphere in an instant. He felt like he was in his Grandma's house, with all the old-fashioned appliances, the absurd amount of tea kettles, and the fact that the floor was tiled yellow and white.
He wandered over to where Kieran was sitting, picking apart sweat peas and tossing the shells into a bowl. "What's up?" he asked, and Kieran patted the ground next to him.
"Sit down and grab some peas," he ordered. Nic scoffed a little, getting onto the floor and leaning back against the counter. He shrugged off his jacket as they heard Bev nudge the pans onto the marble over their heads. "We're gonna eat banana bread," Kieran told him.
"It's... eleven thirty on a Wednesday night," Nic told him, and Kieran gave him a subtle glare before scraping a few peas into his mouth and tossing the shell. "Also, what kind of animal are you? You're supposed to eat the shell, too."
Nic grabbed the bowl of shells and started to pick through them and eat them himself. Bev told them that she was going to head up to her room while the bread cooled off, so Kieran waved farewell to her before letting his arm flop down onto his lap. "So Milo said he knows you and that you were worried about me actually signing up to take modeling classes."
Nic choked on the pea pod and coughed into his sleeve until he was actually able to breathe properly. He cleared his throat and Kieran suggested he grab a glass of water. "Cups are in the cabinet over the sink," he said as Nic pushed himself to his feet. The bowl of pea pods clinked onto the tile floor, and when he finally had some water to drink, Kieran continued.
"It costs a lot to take the class on it," Kieran confessed, picking at the seal of the pea pod to break it open. "But I'm thinking I'm gonna do it, ya know? It'd be worth it once all that's over with and I've got a modeling reputation down. 'Cause the classes hook you up with photographers and shit, and art teachers and professors get a list of our names and stuff to contact for figure drawing classes."
"And... you researched all this?" Nic said, voice hoarse at the thought.
"Yeah, I already signed up for it," Kieran snorted, smirking as he flicked a pea into his mouth and munched on it. "But I'm kinda nervous. Would you want to come to the first meet up with me? You wouldn't come into the room or anything—just hang out outside, work on homework or somethin'."
"Um..." It's not like this is my worst fear or anything! It's not like my heart is about to combust or anything like that!
"What, are you jealous or something?" Kieran said, and his voice turned far more serious this time around. It caused Nic to panic because he hadn't even considered that. He never even pegged himself as a jealous person. Was that the reason why his brain was on maximum overdrive?
Nic decided, "No, of course not. It's your decision."
The tension from Kieran's voice vanished instantly, and translated into his now relaxed shoulders. "Thank God. I was worried. So you wanna come with or what? It's on Saturday."
"Um, sure. I wouldn't mind," Nic said. If he wasn't jealous, then what was he? So what if other people saw Kieran naked. Pff, what a ridiculous concept. So what if people had permanent images of Kieran in the nude on their fancy DSLR cameras? Of... course Nic didn't care about that...
"You're not okay with it," Kieran commented, and before Nic could argue against that, he continued, "It's fine! It's fine. You're just a bit more traditional than I thought you were."
Nic scoffed and blurted out, "Traditional? I am not traditional—my Grandma would be considered tradition, definitely not me."
"Cool. So third date then?" Kieran suggested, and Nic was so startled that he fell quiet all over again. Weren't they... supposed to argue more on that topic? Nic had to admit, it was a bit stuffy of him to tell Kieran not to just go ahead and take modeling classes... But then again, maybe Kieran somehow knew Nic's brain was arguing against him now. Kieran didn't even have to do any of the work.
"Wait—third date?" Nic repeated. "Is... this a date?"
"Hell yeah. Want some banana bread?" Kieran pushed himself up and went to where Bev left the bread to cool off. Nic turned his head so his eyes could follow after Kieran, and the way he pushed up the sleeves on his black sweatshirt that read... Seriously, what the hell did his sweatshirt say?
"Mind turning this way for a sec?" Nic asked, and so Kieran did, dropping his hands to his sides so Nic could read, "'I hope that frog in your car is okay.' What the hell kind of sweatshirt is that? Where do you even find shit like that?"
Kieran looked down at it, and laughed to himself. "Shit, I forgot what I was wearing. Bev likes to print random quotes on shirts and stuff. She made this for me last Christmas."
Nic came to stand against the counter, his forearms leant against the cool marble surface as Kieran took out a knife and cut around the edges of the loaf. "So... how long have you known Bev then?"
"Well, we're both sophomores. We were lab partners in our introductory propagation class, and... yeah. Friends ever since freshmen year, first semester," he said as he lifted the bread out of the pan and plopped it straight onto the counter. "She's pretty cool and artsy. You'd like her—maybe when she comes down again you can ask her about her photography project last year. I was in it."
"So you have a history of being a model for art projects, you liar," Nic laughed, and Kieran smirked at him. "What was it on?"
"Bathtubs. It was cool. We went to Lush and got a much of these bath bombs because neither of us had used them before, and she wanted to test 'em out. We were friends with some of the people already living here, so we got to use their tub," he explained, meticulously divvying up the bread into equal slices. "Freshmen aren't allowed to live here. They're required to be in the dorms so the University can leech off of freshmen corpses after they pay for all of their hundred-dollar textbooks."
"That's a bit grim, but it's accurate," Nic mused quietly as Kieran passed over a slice of bread to him. "Thanks."
"No problem. I hope you aren't allergic to nuts—probably should've asked sooner. Everyone here is crazy about nuts in banana bread and cookies and shit, so we had to put 'em in," he explained, and tapped Nic's glass of water. "Finish that. I'm gonna put milk in it."
When they settled on the floor again, legs spread out beside one another, it was with banana bread and glasses of milk. It was pitch black outside, so the window over their heads just reflected the kitchen. Nic tore bits of his banana bread apart and nibbled on them. It seemed to melt in his mouth, all creamy and warm with butter and a hint of cinnamon.
Bev came back down, along with a friend of theirs' that was attracted to the kitchen by the utterly mouthwatering smell coming from the banana bread. They all sat on the floor together, and when newcomers came, Nic could see them through the reflection on the window over their heads. They finished off the first loaf between six people total, and talked until nearly one in the morning.
It felt so... weird being out and about so late at night—on a school night for that matter. His Ma would never permit such a thing in high school. Back then, the thought of staying up past ten was just unheard of.
"Have you shown Nic around the house yet?" Bev asked Kieran as the conversations were winding down, and people had to leave to get ready for bed.
Kieran shook his head, and glanced over at Nic. "Would you want to stick around and look around the house? I mean, everyone's gonna be asleep and shit."
"I wouldn't mind," he admitted as they all stood up. Before they could leave the kitchen, though, Nic was convinced that they couldn't leave the kitchen in this state—people went and took out glasses and left them dirty on the counter, and there were plates form the banana bread, and not to mention the pan from baking it.
Bev helped clean up, and before she headed out, she wrapped Nic up in a hug and kissed him on the cheek. "Thanks for helping out. I'll be up for a bit longer, so y'all can stop by my room to check it out, I wouldn't mind."
"That'd be awesome," Nic said, smiling as he watched her twirl out of the kitchen before realizing that Kieran was staring at him. "What?"
"I'm just surprised everyone liked you. You've got them fooled," he remarked, and his smirk suggested he was joking, but either way Nic gawked and punched him in the arm.
They left the kitchen and moved down the hallway, and down the stairs into the basement. "When we have parties, all the dancing is down here. It's usually a mess, so..." Kieran said, folding his arms over his chest to ward off the cold in the basement. It was decently sized—about the size of the frat living room—with concrete floors and decorative lights strung across the ceiling. "There's a few people who live in the basement, but I'm up on the first floor with Bev. Sophomores get the first floor, usually."
"Why's that?"
"Because at parties people aren't allowed on the top floors. Sometimes people wander into rooms that aren't locked. My room's always locked, though, so it's not really an issue," he explained as they made a loop through the basement, into a strange side room where it looked like the water heater was, and at last to another set of stairs. It was in a narrow nook with three other doors down the hallway—other bedrooms.
The lighting was freaky, and kind of horror movie-esque, and Nic had to convince his heart that he wasn't about to be murdered down there. He was quick to follow Kieran up the steps, who didn't seem at all terrified. "You're a bit skittish, huh?" Kieran laughed as Nic surpassed him on the stairs.
"Scared of the dark, more like," he confessed. "Also, doesn't it worry you that you basically live on the set of a scary movie?"
Kieran smirked at him, saying, "Sometimes, but not so much anymore. I've just been around here longer than you have." He stepped down the hall to knock on one of the doors. They heard Bev's voice on the other side, telling them to wait a moment.
When she opened up, Nic realized that he wasn't at all sure what he was expecting. He supposed something along the lines of the frat house he saw Kieran at, in the basement with the spacious room including a bed and a futon. But this was smaller, more condensed, and fit for a double bed, a closet, and a desk. Not much else.
But even so, Bev ushered them in with a, "Tada! Welcome to my humble abode!" and Nic was all the more impressed by everything complimenting the basics.
She had a massive astronomy tapestry hanging over her bed, and tucking against the wall. It was absolutely riddled with Christmas lights, all across the walls and ceiling. She had hanging plants pretty much everywhere, and they took over the entire window sill beside her bed.
She had a plain cream-colored comforter, and climbed over it with her bare feet. "Come on in! Just take off your shoes when you hop on the bed," she told Nic, patting the comforter and ushering Nic onto it.
He kicked his shoes off behind him and crawled onto the mattress. It was fluffy, and all-consuming, and he loved it. "This is incredible," he told her, staring at the walls in shock. The bed dipped where Kieran sat, claiming a small corner to himself with his legs crossed, hands clasped over his ankles.
Bev beamed at them, and said, "Really? You like it? Gosh, 'cause I was worried. You're an art student and all, and I was afraid it wouldn't be up to your standards."
"Are you kidding me?" he gawked, throwing his arms up as if to say, "Are you blind?!"
She tucked a stray strand of her brunette hair behind her ear, and grinned at him. "I mean, if I wasn't an environmental science major, I totally would have been in fine arts or something."
"Show him your photography project," Kieran told her, and she blushed a little. "What? It's good."
"Yeah, but..." she murmured, turning pink at the ears as she glanced over at Nic and back at Kieran. Kieran rose his eyebrows at her. "Okay, fine. Hang on."
She reached across the bed to where her desk sat at the foot of it. She pulled her laptop off and slid it across the comforter, flopping onto her stomach as she rapidly typed in her password. "I dunno. I feel like... Well, I was the only non-art major in the class, so it was a little weird being surrounded by all these hyper-creative people. So I felt like I needed to really step up my game, ya know?"
"Dude, art students are trash. I don't know what you're talking about," Nic scoffed, leaning in as she laughed a little.
"High standards, huh?" she mused humorously. "Well, I got Kieran and this other girl from the Co-Op to help me out. We got a bunch of bath bombs from Lush to make the water all opaque and weird-looking. And 'cause we have access to all the greenhouses, we snatched some vine plants and shit so... here it is!"
She pulled up the photos, and Nic's jaw dropped. He leaned in closer and took control of the trackpad to sift through them himself. He was distinctly aware of Kieran sitting there, gauging for his reaction, and... Nic could see why.
The photographs were so... raw and authentic—but so staged at the same time. There was something so glossy and appealing to them in the most bizarre, chilling way possible. The water was a range between evergreen to blood-red, and even dark, musty pink—something like mauve, but not quite. The tub itself was lined with leaves and vines, dipping in and out of the water and surrounding the two faces in the water—Kieran and some anonymous girl with her pale white hair hinting out of the water, and encompassing them both.
Nic pinched his fingers over his lips to keep from saying anything as they came to a photograph of Kieran cradled to the girl's chest, under the water, his shoulder exposed and pale white against the red water. Her hair was enveloped in green leaves, or rather—the leaves were enveloped by her hair as it dripped into the water. Kieran's eyes were closed, but Nic found himself staring into the striking green eyes of the girl staring directly up into the camera, as if aching to say something.
There were dozens of spare photographs of Kieran and the girl half underwater, their faces framed perfectly, and their hair sticking to their cheeks and foreheads, or slicked back into the water. Bev had photographs of their dripping with vine leaves and water, emerging from the clawfoot tub. But there were so many intimate, raw images of the two of them sitting together in the tub, faces stoic, staring at one another, and a few spare ones of them laughing and smiling, pink with embarrassment from bathing together in the same tub for Bev's photography project.
"—And it's cool because Kieran's so chill about that stuff. I was gonna ask my boyfriend to help, but he's so immature and would crack sex jokes the entire time," she admitted with a laugh. Kieran didn't say anything, just smiled at the remark and glanced at Nic as he rubbed his hands over his mouth before clasping them under his chin. "The girl, Ellen, is basically Instagram famous. She has the most aesthetically pleasing photo style, so she was all in," Bev continued to explain. "She's a junior now, and she's studying plant genetics, I think."
"Yeah, she is," Kieran said, tucking his thumb between his lips as he looked between Bev and Nic, who seemed to have lost all motor function. "I think your awesome photography broke him."
"Really? Did you think it was good?" she asked Nic, nudging him in the arm gently to get him back into motion.
He cleared his throat and murmured, "That was the most beautiful thing I have ever experienced in my entire life."
Bev squealed and enveloped him in hugs and kisses, hollering, "Yay! I'm glad you like it! I got an A- but I don't even care! Everyone said it deserved a better grade, and I couldn't care less about my professor's opinion!"
Nic wasn't at all surprised. Photography professors were brutal at Arnette, at least from what he heard.
"Yeah, and he was kind of a bastard. I think he discriminated against you because you weren't an art student," Kieran commented as Bev smothered Nic in her affection before finally backing off to shut her laptop and push it back onto her desk. Kieran admitted that they should keep moving on, so Bev let them, and was sure to get Nic's snapchat before wishing them a good night, then shutting and locking her door.
They went down the hall by one door, and Kieran took out a keyring from his back pocket to open it. "If Bev getting all touchy-feely makes you uncomfortable, don't feel bad about telling her to stop," Kieran reassured Nic, who was still recovering from it. But he couldn't deny the fact that her room had been so warm and fuzzy and inviting. This hallway was so cold.
"I don't mind. She's nice," he confessed, smiling as he glanced down the hall and then back towards Kieran's door.
He pushed open the door, and he stepped back to reveal the space equally as small as Bev's, but no less appealing. The walls were red, and decorated with strings of lights diffused by round, semi-opaque orbs. They covered the areas of the walls draped with red curtains, and the space where his corner-desk was by the door. There were shelves mounted over his desk, covered with what looked like sci-fi books.
"Holy fuck," Nic said and gestured with his hand to ask if he could enter. Kieran shrugged, so Nic stepped over the threshold and down the narrow space between Kieran's bed and his closet. His closet consisted of those red curtains instead of doors.
Kieran stood by the door, scratching his scalp as Nic inspected the place. "It's... It was all kind of Bev's idea. She helped me decorate. I swear she planned everything over the summer before we were even assigned rooms," Kieran explained.
"I'm honestly so jealous right now. I wish I could live in a place like this," Nic admitted, laughing a little as he pushed his hands down on Kieran's raised mattress. It was at hip level, and underneath there were storage compartments hidden by the comforter.
Kieran checked the time on his phone, and hissed a little. "Y'know, it's kinda late. One thirty."
"Yeah, I've sort of given up on staying awake during my eight AM," Nic confessed. "But you probably need to sleep."
"I don't have to wake up until eleven," he said with a shrug. "You wanna stay here the night? I mean, it's kind of a walk to get back to Kingsley and all."
Nic's brain stuttered for a moment, thinking, Wait, but that doesn't make sense. When Kieran didn't expand upon it—like, where Nic would be sleeping—his mind jumped to the conclusion that... well... the only place in Kieran's room available to Nic would be Kieran's bed, which was a double, and...
"I..." Nic started, but in a matter of seconds his habitual night routine came to mind. He couldn't even consider sleeping until he washed his face, brushed his teeth—waking up with morning breath! It would be too much of a disaster for Nic to even consider staying the night with Kieran. And besides, it was just their second date, among other things.
"I shouldn't," he admitted, wincing a little as he did. How old-school did he sound, exactly? So he continued, "I mean, I didn't bring my backpack or anything, and it'd be a hassle to go back to Kingsley tomorrow morning and stuff. Sorry."
"That's fine," Kieran reassured, offering one of those dazzling smiles as he nodded out into the hallway. "I'll walk you out then. Also, I think you left your shoes in Bev's room."
Kieran went to grab them for Nic while he navigated his way back to the kitchen to grab his jacket. Just as he was zipping it up, Kieran came in and handed Nic's sneakers over. "Sorry about ruining your chances of six hours of sleep," he apologized.
"I don't mind. S'not like I've been sleeping much anyways," he confessed with a shrug.
"Honestly, I can tell. You seem very prone to eye-bags, no offense. It's kinda cute," Kieran commented, and Nic would have rolled his eyes had the compliment not come from Kieran, of all people.
"Th-That sounds like something my Ma would say to make me feel better about myself," Nic stammered out, and Kieran burst out laughing, "Glad to know I remind you of your mother!"
When it came time for Nic to finally leave, they just sort of faded away from one another. They didn't linger out on the porch wondering, Man, is he going to kiss me or what? Nic just wandered down the steps while Kieran waved, an arm crossed over his chest to ward off the chill. He wandered back inside, and Nic walked through the opening in the Co-Op fence before heading back towards Kingsley.
It wasn't until he was back inside the warmth of the lobby that the clock struck two AM on his phone, and he realized he had a Snapchat waiting from his newest addition to his Snapchat Family. His fingers were still numb, so he waited until they stopped tingling to open it.
It was a picture of Bev holding up a piece sign, smiling so wide her eyes were squeezed shut. The text banner read, "You did it! You passed the test! Will update you on date #3."