InsaneJournal

Okay Rosemary. You can do this. Your cabin door is right there and no one will suspect anything. Why would they? You’re their prefect… Which will make it so much worse if they do suspect anything, oh god, you’re their prefect.

Rosy took a deep breath to compose herself as she stood next to her cabin door, smoothing her ruffled hair for the thirtieth time, smelling her overly-perfumed clothes once more to make sure she didn’t smell like she’d been up to anything illicit in the last couple of hours. She was super chill, you guys, and her flushed face and the smile that she couldn’t stop was just because she was totally at the dance and she’d had a wonderful time, just like the rest of you (there were no falling chandeliers, right? Or anything she should know about and be reacting to properly because she was totally 100% at that dance?). She had even tried to leave Coppertale early so she could be one of the first people back at the cabin, so it wasn’t so obvious she wasn’t exactly coming from the Lodge, but what if she timed it wrong?

No, no, she was fine. You’re fine, Rosemary, just go inside.

Composure (mostly) regained, she pushed open the door to her empty cabin, and wandered inside to collapse on one of the armchairs. Composure (mostly) ungained again. She didn’t care very much. It was so comfy, and with a muttered “accio” she also had a big, warm blanket, and with another muttered spell she had a fire in the fireplace and this was better than going to any dance, or climbing the ladder all the way up to her bed with its cold sheets. She was fine waiting here until her roommates came back, and she made sure they were all here before she went to sleep.

Or, well. Before she deliberately went to sleep. She kind of didn’t mean to drift off to sleep like she did.

Chloe wasn’t trying to be loud as she made her way into the cabin, she just didn’t think anyone was in there. As soon as she saw Rosy napping by the fire she switched into stealth mode, tip toeing over to her part of the cabin to shimmy out of her dress and into fuzzy flannel Mario pajamas. She wasn’t sleepy yet, though, so she climbed into bed and opened a package of chocolate chip cookies. A really loud, crinkly package. She winced. But didn’t stop eating them.

Rosy wasn’t so asleep that she couldn’t be woken up by someone with a low level stealth skill, and the sound of a crinkling bag did that almost instantly. What, she’s up, she’s here, she wasn’t sleeping on the job, is everyone okay and happy and had a great time? Great, awesome, cool, who was even here right now?

Squinting against the lights in the cabin, Rosy followed the sound of cookies and saw Chloe, eating the world’s loudest cookies. And her usual response, to ask her to keep it down so everyone could sleep (and also don’t forget to brush your teeth before you go to bed), was kind of pushed aside. She opted for a slightly more bearable response.

“Hey,” she said, pushing herself up to a proper sitting position and smoothing her hair for the thirty-first time. “What kind of cookies are those?”

Chloe’s eyes went wide and she froze, because everyone knows prefects can only see you when you move; they are exactly like t-rexes.

“Sorry,” she blurted automatically, “I’ll-” ...brush her teeth? “Uh, chocolate chip. I have oreos, too.”

Rosy lost sight of Chloe for a second there. Weird. It was like she could only see her when she moved.

“I haven’t had Oreos in ages,” she said, and when she moved to stand up the blanket crumpled to the floor and she almost tripped over it. Whoops. Rosy suppressed a very uncharacteristic giggle as she wrapped the blanket around her shoulders again. “Someone told me they have root beer flavored ones, which sounds—” actually kind of good right now, “you know, I’m not gonna judge them, it sounds like an innovative idea.”

If Rosy was acting a little different, Chloe didn’t acknowledge it. Instead, she got down from her bed and dug the oreos out of her stash.

“I haven’t tried those, but the peanut butter ones are good. Oh, and strawberries and cream! And pumpkin spice, but that’s only in the fall,” she said, handing over the Oreo package while holding the Chips Ahoy in her other hand.

“Ah man, I love pumpkin spice,” Rosy said, even though she was pretty sure she had never previously admitted to her love of pumpkin spice aloud. Crap. Next she was going to mention that sometimes she wore leggings as pants when she was in California and her true nature as a basic bitch would be revealed to the world. She grabbed the Oreos from Chloe and retreated a few steps back to the couch, sinking down on it before she even bothered to read the package. “But—damn, are these dulce de leche? Screw pumpkin spice, dulce de leche is fucking delicioso.”

She looked up at Chloe, with the Chips Ahoy still in her hands, and smiled, her good manners overriding the awkwardness of being kind of fucking high right now. “I’m gonna make myself sick if you let me just go to town on these, you gotta save me from myself.”

“I ate twelve cupcakes earlier,” Chloe admitted with a little grin, “You’ll be okay.” She walked over and sat down beside Rosy on the couch. “They came from Argentina. They have flavors in other countries that we don’t have here. I ordered green tea ones from Japan, I’ll let you try them when they get here.”

Rosy ripped open the package of Oreos and shoved at least two in her mouth at once, not resembling an animal in the slightest. “Twelve cupcakes? Jesus Christ,” she said through a mouth of chocolate and something at least kind of resembling dulce de leche, just like the polite high society lady she was raised to be. “How are you even still eating? Did you just throw it all up and start over?” she continued, mouth still full of Oreo as she grabbed another two cookies and crammed them in her gullet. The lack of dignity here did nothing to disguise the fact that Rosy was actually kind of impressed.

Because, like, she could probably have done thirteen cupcakes if she had been there.

Maybe even fourteen. Fourteen kind of felt like the number to beat, for some reason.

Chloe shrugged, chewing thoughtfully on a cookie. “I’unno. I didn’t throw up, believe it or not. I just had to sit for a bit. That was a couple of hours ago, though. I was hungry again.”

Rosy cocked her head at the explanation, because it kind of sounded like Chloe had eaten about 2000 calories in pure sugar today, and she should probably say something about that. But it was kind of hard to judge someone for their sugar consumption when you were currently shoveling imported Oreos in your mouth.

“At least tell me it was for a contest, I can get behind bad choices for a contest.” She pried apart an oreo and scraped the filling off with her teeth. “I once tried to eat a crapton of mangoes for a dumb contest, and I’m really allergic to mangoes.”

“It was for a contest,” Chloe nods with a giggle. “I don’t usually like contests, but…” But anonymity. But getting to not be herself for a night. “It was kinda fun. Probably more fun than an allergy-off.”

“Dude, don’t knock it ‘til you try it,” Rosy said, and if she was smiling a little wider (and with a lot more chocolate on her teeth) than was normal for her, she sure as fuck did not notice. Which made it harder to take her seriously when she cleared her throat and continued with, “But, I mean, also don't try it. Stick to cupcakes. But also maybe don't eat so many at once. But--”

Rosy held up a hand, directed at no one but herself. She took a second. She was still kind of smiling. “I'm glad you had fun tonight. It was a good night.”

“Yeah, Chloe agreed, pulling up the blanket and munching on cookies, “I hope you had fun too.”