She found it down the dark and be-tinseled stairway, packed into a tight space that also housed Fern and, according to the guy in the queue in front of her, five other flatmates, occasionally with partners. Least that number went a little toward explaining how this place worked; it’d been bugging her, just a little in the back of her mind, the size of the building and how art student Fern could possibly afford to live here. The mural and the trapeze and other things that pointed toward the fact it wasn’t even a rental. Just a little tiny bit of discomfort, maybe even a little envy, though as she waited in the bathroom queue the envy tipped easily into fantasy. The things that Lyra would do if she owned a place; shiiiit.
She leaned back against the wall, looking up at the coloured bulb and smiling as she dreamed about it. Definitely a trapeze, wouldn’t even need to have a huge swing on it, she could just use it for workouts. And a workshop, definitely, and an office for Avery that wasn’t their bedroom, and art, and lights, and enough comfy furniture she could host things without being crammed, and roof access, and somewhere to put a car so that whenever they wanted, they could take off together, maybe chasing some story or maybe just driving without destination, Lyra’d love that, the freedom to cut loose and travel. She’d love a lotta things that were outta reach, for the moment. It wasn’t like she needed any of that right now anyway, she and Avery had proven a while ago they were happy enough curled together on a couch in a stable, so long as it was him she was curled up against and no one else tryna barge into their space. That, there, was why the envy didn’t stick; she liked her life too much.
The queue was long, but chatty and funny and warm, and it was quite a while before she made it back to the roof, stopping first to pull her coat out of the pile on the floor (and out from under someone who’d been having a nap, so the coat was toasty) and second to cruise past the kitchen island. Someone had just taken the lid off a slow cooker filled with mulled wine, and how was a girl to resist the rich smell of spices and fruit, or the chance to warm up her hands (the water in the bathroom had only run cold.) She considered getting Avery a cup too, but he could just share hers if he wanted ( Best wife, she thought to herself). And for then, figuring they were gonna wanna munch something, she swiped an open, half full bag of buttered popcorn, then she was climbing out the window again.
She came back into the conversation on Mackenzie’s laugh, and her “Wait – did they collapse the bridge on purpose, to stop it getting further away?”
“Stop what?” Lyra asked, decided that Avery looked like an appealing (and warm) place to sit, and slid into his lap.
“Moth— corn,” Mackenzie’s eyes widened, and Lyra laughed at Mothcorn and passed the bag over.