A Magical Bond | 4

Cassie arrived in Britechester for her first trimester of college tanned and toned from a rejuvenating summer spent in Sulani. Of course, she was also jet-lagged as hell from the long international flight. She'd been expecting to spend her freshman year in a dilapidated and cramped dormitory, but Sione had called halfway through the summer to tell her he was renting a house - an entire house (a perk of having parents with money) - in downtown Britechester and that, if she could chip in on the rent, he had a huge spare bedroom with her name on it.

She suspected Nani and Noelani had put him up to it, considering the last time she and Sione had been in each other's vicinity they were only just barely on speaking terms. But he didn't seem entirely opposed to the idea as he laid it out to her. His voice even sounded friendly. Maybe they could make it work. After all, they were adults now. All that petty adolescent drama was behind them. Besides, anything would be preferable to sharing a communal bathroom with sticky floors and clogged toilets with dozens of other students. And she was definitely over that stupid crush she'd harbored for him in high school... wasn't she?

Sione was in an unexpectedly chipper mood when he greeted her, no doubt in part due to the steaming cup of coffee he held in his mildly tremulous hand. Classes hadn't even started, and he'd clearly already developed an addiction to the stuff. He offered her a cup, which she politely declined. Taking in the state of him, it seemed he'd changed in other regards, too. He wore a t-shirt, ripped jeans, and ratty sneakers, a far cry from the preppy style he'd been previously sporting. His face looked like it hadn't seen a razor in a few days, and his hair was shaggy and unwashed. She'd never seen him look so purposefully disheveled. "Is there not anywhere to get a haircut around here?" she quipped.

He laughed heartily, his previously uptight demeanor replaced with carefree breeziness. Who was this person? She couldn't help but notice how every time they met again after an extended time apart he seemed to be trying on a different version of himself. "Good one," he responded and then grew abruptly somber. "Listen, I wanted to apologize for how I've treated you the past couple of years. You're really important to me, and I let a bunch of meaningless teenage bullshit get in the way of our friendship. What do you say we let bygones be bygones and start all over again?"

She eyed him suspiciously, thrown off by everything about this new and improved Sione. "Sure," she finally said carefully. "I'm over it if you are."

His overly conciliatory behavior suddenly make sense when she went outside to collect her bags and returned to the house only to find that some other girl had materialized from thin air in the few minutes she'd been gone. Of course. He'd only told her all those things to butter her up before he rubbed his latest fling in her face. "Who's this?" she asked, not really wanting to hear the answer.

"Hi!" the girl exclaimed in a bubbly voice. "I'm Amanda. You must be Cassie." She turned to Sione questioningly. "What did you say she was, babe, your cousin?"

Cousin. That was how Sione was describing their relationship to people? She wanted to crawl under a rock and die.

"Roomie, I've got a huuuuge favor to ask you," Sione said, and suddenly the fake-nice quality of his voice was obvious. "I hope you don't mind, but we're throwing a Spooky Day costume party here tonight-"

"You're throwing a party?" Cassie blurted out. "Since when do you even go to parties?"

"You got me again," he chuckled. Then he winked at Amanda. "Isn't it nauseating what a studious little rule-follower I used to be?"

"But you've become such a rebel ever since I got my hands on you!" She wiggled her eyebrows lasciviously. Cassie felt like she might throw up.

"Anyway," Sione continued, "we've got to go pick up our costumes. Mandy knows some people in the theater department who are hooking us up. It would be such a big help if you could get started on the decorations while we're gone. The stuff's all piled in the corner."

Cassie muttered a few grumpy syllables in response that could only be loosely interpreted as agreement, but Sione shot her a thumbs-up as he and Amanda headed for the door. "Oh, Cassie, do you bake?" Amanda shouted on their way out. "I'm hopeless with anything involving an oven! Maybe you could whip up a batch of cookies or something?"

The door slammed behind them. Cassie turned to stare down the assortment of party supplies and sighed miserably. If she had any backbone at all, she wouldn't lift a finger for them and would barricade herself in the upstairs bedroom until the party was over. But a not insignificant part of her brain told her that if only she did enough nice things for Sione, if only she helped make his life as easy as possible, then someday a light bulb might turn on in his head and he'd realize how much he appreciated her, how much he needed her. It was a delusional thought, obviously, but Cassie lacked the willpower to push it away. So that ridiculous crush of hers was still going strong, after all.

She snapped a selfie with the decorations and shared it on Simstagram, in the hope that the temporary rush of online validation would overshadow the guilt she felt for caving so easily. Who's coming over to my house for Spooky Day? ;), she captioned the photo. #NoTricksOnlyTreats, #WitchPlease, #HauntedHangover. She felt like a complete fraud.

The last type of college student she thought she'd be was the one tapping a keg when it was barely even noon, drenching herself with beer before she finally managed to get it right. The rebellious phase of her life had been short-lived, and she had no interest in revisiting it. Then again, wasn't that part of what college was supposed to be about? But she wasn't sure she could be like Sione, constantly reinventing herself, shifting colors like a chameleon just to fit in.

As much as she didn't want Amanda to get used to bossing her around, she also went ahead and whipped up an entire assortment of Spooky Day themed treats. Weirdly, the act of preparing food calmed her more than anything else. By the time she was finished, she'd decided her best plan of action was simply to go with the flow. She would cobble together a last-minute costume and try to have fun, Sione and his perky new girlfriend be damned. It was stupid to let her college experience be spoiled by a boy who didn't like her back, even if she'd known that boy forever.

Cassie was beginning to think Sione and Amanda would be late to their own party when they finally waltzed through the door with barely 15 minutes to spare. They seemed shocked she had actually accomplished everything they asked her to do and then some. "Wow, it looks amazing in here," Amanda exclaimed, sounding genuinely impressed.

"Great job, roomie!" Sione echoed.

"Thanks," Cassie replied breezily. "Next time, though, I'm not going to do it for free." Then she skipped upstairs to rummage through her suitcase for something to wear.

Luckily, she'd packed the perfect ensemble, though for an utterly embarrassing reason. She'd spent a good deal of the summer daydreaming about finally discovering the portal from her childhood dreams and entering the magical universe on the other side, where she would surely learn the secrets of spellcasting at last. It was lame and unlikely, she knew, but she needed a special outfit for the occasion regardless. At least when she ultimately had no choice but to accept the cold hard truth that magic didn't exist in the real world she could take comfort in the knowledge that she'd found a use for the dress after all.

Meanwhile, Sione fired up the grill and tossed on a few burgers, which he flipped at lazy, haphazard intervals, the bare minimum extent of work he was willing to do to contribute to the success of his own party.

Nauseatingly, he and Amanda were both in pirate costumes, lest anyone forget they were a couple. Cassie was determined not to let their googly-eyed flirting ruin the rest of her night, but it was impossible to avoid them. She binged on plate after plate of her homemade snacks simply to have a distraction.

While a few of the party-goers put real effort into their costumes, just as many were clearly only there to take advantage of the keg. One guy had even shown up in what was surely his own pizza delivery uniform. Soon, the house was packed. Sione booted up his expensive new video gaming system (surely another gift from his parents) and started drunkenly challenging everyone to play against him. Whenever he won, he cackled like a cartoon villain and started explaining in barely intelligible tech-speak how he had rigged the game's code in his favor.

At one point, Cassie grew so bored that she pulled out some of the reading material for her archaeology elective and started scribbling notes in the margins while the party raged on around her. "Girl, are you really doing homework?" one girl asked, her voice dripping with disdain. She wore what was essentially a sexier version of Cassie's own costume. "The trimester hasn't even started yet!"

"There's no time like the present to get ahead!" Cassie insisted lamely.

"Someone's desperate to be teacher's pet," a guy dressed as a Roman centurion said, causing everyone else at the table to laugh uproariously, like he'd just told the funniest joke in the world. Cassie slunk off into a corner to wallow in embarrassment alone. At least she hadn't given into the whims of her younger self and asked the sexy witch if she was a Henry Puffer fan. She would've never lived that down.

She swiped an abandoned beer from the counter and stared down at it contemplatively. Maybe the key to winning the rest of the party over was in that plastic cup. "Ah, what the hell," she muttered to herself and gulped down as much as she could tolerate of the bitter, lukewarm liquid. If you can't beat them, join them.

A couple beers later, she didn't find the taste any less disgusting, but her head did feel pleasantly light and floaty and her vision was blurry around the edges, like in a dream. She watched as Amanda fearlessly hoisted Sione up into a keg stand. After a few heroic seconds, his head shot up, mouth spewing a slow-motion arc of foamy liquid that stickily splattered in all directions. Was this what it took to be one of the cool kids? "I'm next!" Cassie found herself declaring, before her brain could catch up to her mouth.

 

She poured herself one more beer for bravery - and to allow time for some equally attention-seeking soul, maybe even Sione, to step out of the crowd and volunteer to lift her. Oh, God, she panicked internally, am I really going to do this? But it was too late to back down now. "Come on, guys! Let's do this! Who wants to help me keep this party going?" Her eyes darted desperately back and forth, begging for an assist, but all of a sudden the party seemed to be breaking up. Without warning, the life had completely drained from the room.

"Come on, roomie," Sione said softly, gently prying the plastic cup from her grip. He grabbed onto her shoulder to steady her. "You're embarrassing yourself."

She flinched angrily away from his touch. "I'm embarrassing myself? Everybody loved it five minutes ago when you did it! What's the big difference now?"

"Listen, it's obvious you're not very good at holding your liquor."

"No, what's obvious is that you're a massive hypocrite! I'm only trying to have a good time." She scoffed in disbelief. "How am I the one having to explain my actions right now? Why do I keep letting you get away with treating me like shit?"

"Roomie-"

"Stop calling me that! My name is Cassie!" If she heard another condescending word from him, she was sure her head would literally explode. Before he could open his mouth, she bolted for the stairs and stumbled up to her room as fast as her wobbly legs would carry her.

She was grateful she'd thought to inflate her air mattress earlier because it required every last iota of energy she had to rip off her stupid costume, change into her sweats, and fling herself under the covers. The first day of her life as a college student had not gone at all how she expected, and it didn't bode well for the future. She didn't understand. Somehow, even when she tried to fit in, she ended up getting it all wrong anyway. It seemed she was destined to be a loner, no matter what. Maybe she would be better off if she just accepted it.

The next morning, Cassie woke up determined to have a better day, but her hopes were immediately dashed when she was confronted by the remnants of the party and every uncomfortable memory came flooding back. There were empty cups and plates still carrying bits of spoiled food littered everywhere. Of course, why would she have expected Sione to have everything cleaned up? He was unconscious on the sofa, almost certainly sleeping off a killer hangover.

She rolled up her sleeves and got to work, though she once more found herself asking, Why? How long would she put up with literally and metaphorically cleaning up Sione's messes? He'd proven time and time again that nothing she did could make him like her the way she wanted him to.  Her brain knew this to be true, but why couldn't it get the message through to her stupid, stupid heart?

Finally, Sione roused himself enough to take a shower, change his clothes, and plop down at the kitchen table with his laptop - but not enough to lift a finger to help her with the dishes, naturally. "Thanks a ton for doing those," he said offhandedly as he smashed away at the keyboard. "I've got a load of practice coding to catch up on before my programming class starts tomorrow." She didn't respond, waiting to see if he would go on. He didn't. Clearly, he had no intention of apologizing for how their conversation had ended last night.

Well, in that case, she had no intention of getting down on her hands and knees and begging him to say sorry. She had more important things to do, like scope out the thrift shops in downtown Britechester for some knick-knacks and oddities to make her bedroom feel more like her own. It would be too complicated to back out on living with Sione now. But if she had to stay, she at least wanted her part of the house to feel like a sanctuary, since she would surely be spending most of her time there in order to avoid him.

By the time she was finished with it, the room no longer looked like a bland, empty shell but like a relaxing and homey space that actually belonged to her. Considering she'd spent the last couple years squeezed into the tiny corner of an apartment, a room so spacious felt like a real luxury. She even spent the entire afternoon sticking gold foil stars all over the walls. Sure, they were only renting, and it would probably void the security deposit, but that was Sione's problem.

Finally, as darkness fell, she set a fresh new canvas up on her easel and began to paint. This was the reason she was really here, she told herself. She couldn't lose sight of her art. Even if she left Britechester as friendless as she arrived, at least she'd still have what she came for: a degree. That was what she wanted, wasn't it? No distractions, she promised herself. With her certain, confident brush strokes, the white void of the canvas began gradually blooming into full color.