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More from The Mediocre Juicy Jay
Madame Fortune is Blind Part 1 - Comm for watermelonapple
Shun is a freshman at Eclectia Academy of Magic and Science, one of the most prestigious universities in the world. She doesn't believe she belongs there because she is a minor luck deity who simply had good fortune. While she struggles to convince herself whether she should be there or not, she meets someone who grabs her interest and simply won't let go.
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watermelonapple
Part 2
***
Enrollment at the Eclectia Academy of Magic and Science was among the most prestigious and exclusive schools a Yokai could attend. Thousands of years old, its alumni included some of the most accomplished magicians, spirits, and demons who went on to lead successful and well-accomplished careers. Students with the best grades, athletic talents, and well-connected parents were the only ones who made it through. They came from all over the world, ready to invest in a future for themselves and make their families proud.
The first day of classes was a chaotic one. The school yard was a flowing river of freshmen marching to their classes, toting their book bags and hugging their textbooks to their chests. They siphoned into the study halls, towering buildings centuries old, made with facades reminiscent of their medieval era. Wandering the pathways leading to them were folk of all origin and walk of life. Translucent spirits, lanky, pale faced demons, picturesque demigods, and floating imps all busied their way to the very first college class. Each one was startlingly unique to the person they walked next to.
Among them was Shun, a freshman catgirl who had lucked herself into enrolling at such a prestigious school. Fitting, considering her being a Maneki-Neko, a spirit of luck. She hadn’t tried very hard in school, yet her grades were exemplary. Jobs were unnecessary given her family’s wealth and political connections, no doubt a result of their good fortune. While never an upper-strata clan- they were only minor spirits after all -Shun’s family certainly never had to go hungry, thanks in large to a series of “wise” investments her mother and father both made. She figured that going to school was unnecessary. She could just make the same investments her parents did (or to any business really) and reap the benefits for the remainder of her life. Her father insisted, however, and forced her to go. She wasn’t quite studied enough to earn a scholarship, nor have grades that guaranteed her acceptance, but surprise, she made it in anyway.
She wasn’t too conspicuous among the crowd of eccentric monsters and spirits who attended Eclectia. Being short among a line of towering beasts meant she didn’t stick out. Normally folk her size would fly, but lacking any wings or levitation she was forced to walk on her pale two legs, something she got along doing just fine. A white dress drifted just above her knees. It was decorated in diamond shaped patches of red and orange. Her snowy hair was cut short into an airy bob that bounced as she walked. Dotting it were soft splotches of black and tan, a calico pattern that continued down her slender cat tail which sprouted from the back of her dress and flicked behind her as she walked. Her golden eyes were slashed by vertical slit pupils. She had a soft divot to the center of her lip, her most revealing feline attribute next to the two triangular ears that sprouted from her crown.
She felt as small as she looked among her throng of fellow students. Her fortunate entry to that school was more of a source of guilt than a badge of honor. All of the students she had talked to, including her roommate, were some of the most academically inclined folk she had ever had the pleasure of meeting. Valedictorians were everywhere, students with IQ’s closer to 200 than 100. Many of them had skipped grades and were younger than she was. No matter how smart they all were, however, every single one of them had put in colossal amounts of effort and work into getting there. Shun was the exception. When people asked what her grades were and how she had got in, more often than not she made up some nonsense about being the top of her class and even skipping a grade. Given her supernatural luck, nobody doubted her or tried to refute. That only made her feel worse.
She was out of place here. This was the school where people went to become politicians, scientists, future professors, and other various giants of academia. How many had gotten in through sheer luck? None, as far as she could tell. Tightening her book bag to her back and walking with a brisk pace to Renoir Hall she tried shoving it all out of her head. She was here now, and her family expected her to make the most of it. There was no point in lamenting her opportunity, not when it could reap so many benefits.
Renoir hall was a towering double-turreted building made of medieval brick and mortar. It was among the oldest at the school and home to much of the science department. There Shun would find her Basics in Physics class, taught by a Professor Kaesha. Dozens of students filed in at a time, marching up those concrete steps into the open maw of knowledge. Those who had a few semesters under their belt lounged nearby, chatting with their friends, hardly concerned with being late or not. Shun wondered if that would be her one day, unbothered by her less-than-prestigious method of being accepted.
She entered the front door to a lobby busy with the footsteps and chatter of a hundred or so students making their way to their first classroom. Sitting at a table besides the wall to her right were three staff members handing out directories and pamphlets to those who asked for them. Sitting on the table besides them were four stainless steel coffee dispensers for the students to take for free. Shun wasn’t a regular caffeine junky like so many people her age and older had become, but given her semi-frayed nerves she figured some warm refreshment would do her pretty good.
She got in line behind a towering reptile fellow whose amazing girth obstructed the view in front of her. She kept a wide berth between the two of them, conscious of his thick alligator tail resting on the floor behind him. Anxiety continued to gnaw at her. How many people were behind her? Did she have to wait much longer? Was the coffee for freshmen? It was free, right? It was purely paranoia, but convincing all the same. The fear of someone snapping at her that the coffee wasn’t for her was real, up to the point the alligator in front of her peeled out of the line with a tiny styrofoam cup gushing steam between his claws. Three of the dispensers were occupied. She hustled forward to the one that was open. A leaning tower of white cups sat behind it, half-wrapped in a sleeve of crinkled plastic. She reached up on her tippy toes and plucked the top one. She held it beneath the nozzle and depressed the handle. A measly drop of cruddy brown bled from the opening then plopped sadly into the bottom of the cup. She felt her heart thud. She lifted the handle and pulled it down again. She got even less this time. It was empty. She pulled the cup to her chest and held it in with both hands. Her cat tail curled on the floor behind her with mild panic. Now what?
All she had to do was alert the staff. The one closest to her was a skeleton spirit dressed in a suit that hung over their bones loosely. A quintet of purple flames flickered in a ring shape behind their head. Glowing white pupils hovered within a matrix of pitch black, focused on the student in front of them. Shun lifted her finger. “Excuse me.”
The skeleton didn’t hear her, or pretended not to. They pointed to the staircase. “Second floor. Third door on your right.” The student they were directing nodded and walked off.
“Excuse me.” Again the skeleton didn’t notice. Another student stepped up to them and asked them a question. She was becoming aware of the growing line behind her. People who had come up to the other dispensers after she did were walking away with their coffee. There she was still blocking one. Using one of the others next to her didn’t seem like an option, not when the line behind her seemed so urgent to fill their bellies with joe. Another “excuse me” was on the edge of her lips, but died as soon as the breath left her throat. The finger she had held up meekly returned to the styrofoam cup where it fidgeted.
Suddenly, someone behind the table stood upright. He came up so fast that Shun’s body and tail jerked. He was a human, pale skinned and tall, wearing a green polo shirt with the school’s logo over the chest. The man marched right up to behind the canister and grabbed the handle with a large, calloused hand. “Is this one empty?” he asked calmly. His jet black hair was nicely combed. A thin beard swept down his chiseled jaw. Even though his skin was pale, he had eyes so shockingly green that they stood out and locked Shun in a trance.
She was silent for a few seconds before she blinked and shook her head. “Oh! Yeah! It is.”
He hoisted it off the table and felt how light it was. “Ah! It sure is. I’m assuming you wanted some?”
Shun was starting to realize that the line behind her was moving along just perfectly, not at all hindered by her being there or the missing dispenser. She laughed to herself, mostly out of relief. God, I’m stupid. “Yeah, I did.”
“I’ll go fill this up then. What class are you going to?”
“Physics with Mr. Kaesha.”
“Awesome. The break room’s on the way there. If you want you can follow me there and I’ll fill you up.”
Anything to get out of that chaotic lobby. “Yes, please.”
He smiled, dissipating most of the rest of her fears. “Come on then.” She followed him as he walked out from behind the table and into the main hallway. Her legs kicked up the pace to be beside him, if just to be in that protective aura he had. He carried the dispenser in his arm and walked down the tiled floor casually. Students trotted by them in both directions, oblivious to their existence. Shun didn’t know which of the many doors they passed was the break room or how close they were to it, but she hoped that it was close.
A scoff sucked through her teeth. Stop being so ornery. It’s just college, geez. She looked up at the very handsome fellow she happened to be shadowing. Just… Keep looking at this guy, I guess.
He caught her staring at him out of the corner of his eye and smiled at her. A flash of blush overcame her cheeks and she looked away. They finally made it to the break room where he opened the door and stepped halfway inside. “Wait right here. I’ll be right back out with a piping hot new batch.”
She clutched the styrofoam cup more tightly, sinking her sharp claws and nearly puncturing it. “OK.” He walked the rest of the way inside. The door fell shut behind him with a click. Shun took a deep breath. Relax. Relax. Reeeelax. She knew the first day was nerve wracking, but this was just silly. When was the last time she had been this antsy? She was a spirit of luck. What did she have to worry about? Things always went her way.
Her mind was trapped in that staff member’s pleasing face. All he did was guide her to get some coffee, something she usually didn’t even drink. Here she was acting like she had saved him from a dragon. Was this her intuition telling her something? What exactly? Stay away from him? Learn more about him? Coffee’s bad for your teeth?
The conclusion didn’t come to her before he reappeared from the break room with a dispenser full of coffee cradled in his arm. “Here we go!” he chirped. He turned the arm carrying it towards her and grabbed the handle. “Put your cup right there,” he said, nodding towards the nozzle.
She realized how tightly she was holding onto it. Thankfully it wasn’t punctured, but not via lack of trying. Shun held it up to the dispenser and the man pumped the handle. A thick stream of liquid mud gurgled out and spilled into her cup. She felt the warmth creep up past her fingers and then top out just below the cup’s rim. A ghostly funnel of steam wisped out of it. She pulled it beneath her chin and took a deep whiff. Immediately she was hit with the caffeine shivers, scrunching her petite face and making her tail go kerfluff.
The man laughed. “Careful! It’s strong stuff!”
Shun shook it off, wearing a pinched smile. “It’s been a while since my last cup of real coffee.” She took a timid sip. Bitter lava sizzled her tongue and delivered another round of caffeine jitters. She decided that it was best to take her time with it, if she was able to finish it at all.
“Well, you picked the right day to get into the habit. Lots of kids start guzzling this stuff once college hits them.”
Shun couldn’t imagine how people got addicted to such a foul beverage. “Yeah. It looks like I might start too.” She took another tiny sip and pretended to enjoy it.
The man pointed down the hall. “Kaesha’s lecture hall is right down that way. Classes start in 10 minutes.”
She suddenly remembered that she was in a school. “Oh yeah! Thanks, and thanks for the coffee.”
“My pleasure. Take care, now.” He wandered back towards the lobby, lugging that heavy steel canister of coffee.
Shun watched him go, focusing on his upper back and shoulders. His trap muscles bulged against his green shirt. The trunk beneath it slimmed down into a rigid waist. She noticed the hair on his arms and wondered how soft they were. She shook her head violently. Stop it! She spun around in place, shipping her tail out behind her and splashing some of the coffee out of her cup. She marched down the hall to her first class, unconsciously taking a sip of her coffee and vowing to forget the very handsome looking gentleman who simply gave her some coffee.
That proved difficult once she discovered how boring physics class was going to be. The lecture hall it took place in was like a miniature auditorium. The Professor’s voice was drull and dreary, hardly carrying itself halfway up the steps. Shun felt like she had sat just outside of his speaking range. She had to strain her sensitive cat ears to really hone in on what he was saying. Most of it was just orientation and introduction. Professor Kaesha was an ancient ghost whose remaining corporeal form was a translucent head floating over a white veil that shivered and waved in a nonexistent wind. Shun thought for a guy who looked like he was hiding a big stick underneath his head he was pretty damn boring.
Naturally her mind wandered back to the gentleman who had helped her earlier. That’s how her mind referred to him, a “gentleman”. For crying out loud. All he had done was refill a dispenser for her. He would’ve done the same thing for literally anyone else. Greater acts of kindness had been done for her and garnered less of her thought. Why was this guy so ingrained in her mind?
Well, for one thing he was pretty easy on the eyes. Such a nicely cut and trim human was rare, at least when you went to a school full of eldritch demons and beings from the astral plane. The humans who attended and taught there were usually all eccentric wizards and witches who had probably violated a Geneva code or too in order to get the knowledge they possessed. People like them liked to wear gaudy cloaks or raggedy tunics, not well-fitted polo shirts with the school’s logo on them. Not to mention the men liked to grow their beards out to their crotches. This gentleman was much more nicely shaven. Shun wondered what his routine was. She pictured him in front of the bathroom mirror, jaw lathered in shaving cream, razor scraping across his skin, naked to the waist, towel around his-
Her head shook hard enough to alert the people behind and beside her. She clutched her coffee cup and took a big enough swig to singe her tongue. The awful taste that stained her throat didn’t bother her anymore. She adored it, if only because it washed her mind free of that guy’s (not a gentleman) face. As the lecture went on, she continued downing sip after sip, each instance a reaction to her benefactor’s face popping into her mind.
Shun had successfully downed her cup of coffee by the end of the school day. Once the last drop of warmth had fallen into her tummy the man’s face had more or less been purged. If it wasn’t the bad taste of the coffee distracting her, it was definitely the perpetual buzz of caffeine that kept her attention zipping from thing to various thing. She was fortunate, per usual, that the inevitable crash came after her last lecture of the day. Her journey to the dorm was slowed halfway by a series of mouth-splitting yawns. She passed out on her bed the moment she flopped down on it.
That night she and her roommate idly discussed the day they had. Isomi was a human witch, short in stature like Shun but far, far more garish in her style of dress. She kept the right side of her head completely shaved with the rest draped over by a cascade of purple hair. Her side of the room was a disorderly mess, strewn here and there with her clothes and school stuff. This was only her third night living there and it already looked like the room of a seasoned college vet.
“I don’t know, they’re all fine, I guess,” she rambled on to Shun, referring to her classes. She was lying on her back in her bunk on the wall opposite to Shun’s. She had her leg kicked up over the other, rocking her bare foot up and down and making the bell of her pajama pants waft up and down around her ankle. “All the exciting stuff is in level two classes, but I don’t know any of that stuff yet.” She shrugged. “I just want to get this semester over with. Call me impatient.”
Shun was hardly listening. She was bundled up underneath her comforter, head on her pillow, white hair spilled out into a halo. Her eyes drilled into the ceiling, one that seemed to morph into the face that had been plaguing her so severely. The nap she had taken alongside Isomi’s chatter robbed her of any sleep. Now wasn’t the time for coffee either. “Yeah,” she said absentmindedly.
Isomi chuckled. “You think I’m impatient?”
Shun blinked and looked over. “Huh? No.”
“You said ‘yeah’.”
“Yeah, sorry. My mind is somewhere else.”
“I see that. Everything OK?”
“Yeah! Just trying to focus on something else, I guess.”
“Oh, so you’re ignoring me?” Isomi teased.
Shun grinned. “No.” She sighed. “I kinda met someone today and now they’re all I can think about.”
That got Isomi’s interest. “Oh? On day one? Already? Who is it?”
Shun shook her head to herself. I shouldn’t have said anything. “That’s the thing. I don’t know his name. I didn’t tell him mine either.”
“Did you even talk to him?”
“Yeah. He helped me get some coffee.” It sounded even worse when she said it out loud. It was enough to make her cringe. “It was in line for free coffee at Renoir. One of the cans ran out and he refilled it for me.” She left out the part about how nervous she had been when it happened. Shun scoffed. “I know it’s stupid.”
“No way. It sounds cute.” Isomi rolled onto her side to face Shun and propped her head on her fist. “So… was he hot? What is he? Catboy?”
“No,” But if he was I’d probably die. “Human, as far as I can tell. And yeah, he was pretty cute looking.” She remembered how green his eyes were. Her tail swished underneath the blanket.
“Awww.” Isomi frowned. “Maybe he’ll be there tomorrow. You can introduce yourself properly.”
A shade of red came over Shun’s face, one far too dark for her liking. “Yeah, but he’s a staff member, I think.”
“Oh.” Isomi shrugged. “Can’t stop you from saying ‘hi’ again. Or hell, even having a crush. Just say ‘hi’ again and tell him your name. Who knows what’ll happen. You’re a lucky girl.”
Shun’s eyes were back on the ceiling, chiseling the gentleman’s face out of the flat drywall. “Yeah. I am.”
Shun’s first class the next morning wasn’t in Renoir. The next one was, but the man wasn’t there, nor anybody to hand out directions or free coffee. The students were on their own now. Welcome to the jungle. Good luck. The classes that day were mercifully less boring than her physics class, but not quite the exhilarating lessons she could’ve hoped for. Her mind continued to wander, either to the gentleman’s face or a nagging need for some caffeine in her system.
Her last lecture of the day was in Beginner’s Dark Arts. It wasn’t her most avid subject, so she sat further in the back. Piquing her interest instead was the hushed chatter going on right in front of her. A gaggle of students were discussing an upcoming party. Open house, everyone’s invited, weed, alcohol, hot chicks. Shun couldn’t place the ages of the students based on their wild variety of shapes and species, but she guessed them to be sophomores at least.
She leaned forward in her seat and whispered. “Hey. I hear there’s a party?”
The fellow closest to her whipped his head around. His head was a bare deer skull atop a withered human body. The dry corners of his jaw lifted into a more sinister grin than it already was. “Yeah. Wanna come?”
Shun, still unsure, nodded.
His bewildered eyeball looked her up and down inside of its hollow socket. “I dunno. You’ll be the only minor spirit in there. I don’t think you’ll be too welcome.”
Shun scowled. “So? I’m a big girl.”
He scoffed. Snickers rolled echoed around him. “Yeah, OK.”
“You gonna tell me where it is or not?”
He thought for a moment, then nodded. “Yeah, sure.” He told her what building. “Bring a friend, some booze if you can.”
Neither was guaranteed, but she would try. “Got it. I’ll be there.”
The wendigo nodded and turned forward in his seat. “See you then.”
Isomi was the friend Shun planned on bringing with her. She refused. “Don’t you think it’s a little soon to be going to parties?” she asked Shun.
“I mean, we’re college kids now. Why wait?”
Isomi shook her head. “Sorry. Not for me. Only cool kids go to things like that.”
Shun didn’t think either of them were quite qualified to be in the “cool kid” club, or even that parties were exclusive to those kinds of people, whoever they were. Undeterred, Shun went to the party on her lonesome. It started at dusk at a frat house just outside the campus. Walking around the corner she saw two sidewalks loaded with cars. The thrum of music beat out from the open windows several houses down. Beneath it she heard the leisurely laughter of kids already past their first or second drink. Shun took a deep breath. Her first real party. Couldn’t go that bad, right?
Dressed in a frilly crop top and a short skirt she made her way down the sidewalk where the budding party grew louder with each approaching step. She saw a dozen or so partiers piled on the porch, drinks in hand. People wandered in and out through the front door freely. More ruckus was bleating out in the backyard where she heard there had been a pool. Maybe some people would be swimming, or if not someone would topple over into it comedically. Or maybe that was just Hollywood cliche. She didn’t really know. It was her first college gig, after all.
She marched up the front steps and past two men leaning against the porch railing. She felt their eyes on her as she strutted past. Her habit of thinking about things rather too deeply made her wonder if she was dressed too provocatively. Looking at the gals around her who were similarly covered, she realized that it wasn’t an issue and that she had to relax. Walking through the front door, her mind found another pressing priority: Where were the drinks?
Everywhere, apparently. Every room, from the TV room to the kitchen, had some product ready and able to make someone tipsy. There were coolers in every corner, drink sets on every counter, and at least two or three kegs, one of which she saw being used by a fellow hovering upside down via his or his buddy’s magic. Shun stood by and gawked as he gurgled an exorbitant volume of booze, bobbing his thick adams apple with each chug. His friends cheered him on, pumping their fists in time with their chants of “Go! Go! Go!” Shun couldn’t help but smile at the absurdity of it. She mouthed along with the chant until the fellow was done and flipped midair and let back down onto his feet. A trail of fizz oozed down his chin. He stumbled left, then caught himself. After a wipe of his wrist across the jaw, he threw his arms up in the air above him. The crowd went wild. So did Shun.
She grabbed a soda from a nearby cooler, holding off on the funny juice for now. A few students she recognized said ‘hey’ and called her over for a chat. With her nerves dissipating, she joined them and partook in their conversations, whatever the subject. She finished her soda, tossed the hollow can into a bin, then grabbed her first beer of the night. As she walked through the kitchen where she got it she eyed the tray of shot glasses and towering bottles of hard liquor behind them. Maybe not tonight, she figured, right before joining her friends again. Isomi’s really missing out!
The group herded to the backyard where the disappointingly empty pool was. There was a game of beer pong and corn hole. A friend suggested they call the next game of beer pong. They stood by and watched the current game end, cheering on whoever happened to make the last shot and hooting with every splunk of the orange ping pong ball. The last red solo cup was claimed by an expert bounce, and the game was over. The winner celebrated, and Shun got into place at the other end of the table.
A chorus of “ooh’s” rang out at the sight of the new contender’s diminutive frame. Emboldened by the small bit of alcohol in her system and her natural luck, she didn’t let it faze her. They set up two pyramids of solo cups in front of each player. Each one was filled halfway with some light beer. As the challenger, she got the first shot. She bent her elbow in front of her and held the ball between her fingers. She had to at least make it look like she was trying. With two preliminary pumps of the arm, she let the ball fly.
Kerplunk!
It landed dead center in the top cup of her opponent’s pyramid. The few onlookers hooted. Her opponent was impressed but undeterred. “Beginner’s luck,” he declared before chugging the cup she had landed the ball in. His turn. He assumed his pose and took his shot. The ball ricocheted off the rim of a center cup and tumbled harmlessly off of the table. He and his buddies sighed.
She plucked the ball off the grass and took her next turn. A single cat ear flicked. Her tail swerved behind her. Off the ball went, forming a perfect arc and plopping into another cup. Shun pumped her arm while her friends squealed. Her opponent swore under his breath and downed another cup.
“OK…” he huffed to himself. He shot the ball. No dice. Another muttered cuss.
Shun grabbed the ball. She fired. Direct hit. Applause and nods, groans and swears. The crowd around had grown somewhat. People wanted to see the cute cat girl dethrone the resident beer pong champ. His friends hollered his name and told them that he had it. He ignored them, drained the cup, and took his next shot.
He was luckier this time, landing in one of her corner cups. His bony fist clenched as a grunt of relief blew out of him. Shun was hardly bothered. She took her sweet ass time drinking the beer, all to further throw her opponent out of his game, lest he garner a hot streak, as was his supposed method to success. Shun dropped the cup from her mouth to reveal the ball clamped between her teeth, making a few folk laugh. Dainty white fingers pulled it free and then casually landed it in yet another cup.
The resulting cheers were louder than usual. The party around them had mostly stopped in order to get a good view of the game as it went on. People from outside ran into the house to announce what was happening. A ring of students and party crashers had stopped whatever they were doing to watch history in the making. Shun thought it was all a little silly. Just a game of beer pong, after all. All you needed was a little luck.
Her opponent missed again. Shun did not. He was down to his last two cups. She was still holding on to five. By the time he brought it down to four she had knocked him down to the very last one. It was time to put things to bed. She hoisted the ball in front of her. The dull patio lights shimmered across its beer-soaked surface. She closed one eye, turning the last cup into a singular flat image. Her ears flattened back against her scalp, draining out all other sound. It was unnecessary given the palpable hush that had fallen over the crowd. The blaring music had even been turned down. What had started out as an average college party was now the night some random chick made beer pong history. She knew she was going to make it, but why not give the people the show they wanted? She took a deep breath. Her tail went still. She pumped her arm once… twice…
“COPS!”
Shun’s body jerked as her arm made the forward leap to launch the ball. It missed wide right, bouncing off the flat surface of the tennis table and landing in the grass below. Nobody bothered to pick it up. They were too busy running. The younger students scattered like roaches. People were pushed and shoved. Obscenities were yelled. Shun looked around in shock as the once orderly ring of people disintegrated into a frantic mob. Parting through it like a charging animal were a team of campus guards, decked out in their uniforms and utility belts. While they didn’t arrest anyone, they made good efforts to shove people out of the way and tell them to get lost. There were three of them, one was a hulking stone gollum who had a hunched back and a cinder block jaw. The other was a scarecrow demon whose straw innards blossomed out of his barrel chest and sleeves.
The third was the gentleman who had refilled the coffee for Shun.
Shun’s heart plummeted a hundred stories. The hair across her body was zapped into a frizz. Her cattail rocketed into a line out behind her. While everyone scattered and shouted, Shun just stood there, staring at the face that had so pleasingly haunted her those past few days. He was clearly the leader of the trio, jabbing his finger at students and barking at them to scram. They did in quick succession, more out of fear than respect. Common sense screamed at Shun to do the same, but her feet remained fixed to the earth. The crowd was all but gone, and yet she remained planted next to the tennis table, a field of incriminating detritus laid out around her.
A dagger of ice pierced her chest as those hauntingly familiar green eyes found her. He came to a stop, seemingly shocked by her being there. He felt his stare cling to her like an electromagnetic pull. Her tail sank into a curl between her legs while her ears fell back on her scalp. Her ramrod back fell into a fearful quiver.
The gollum noticed her and made ready to yell at her, but the man stopped him by holding his arm out. The man calmly stepped forward towards her, making her cower where she stood. He stopped just arm’s length away from her. “Hey there,” he said calmly.
Shun said nothing. Her throat was a vice. The beer she had been chugging sat in her gut like a vat of molten lead.
“Mind telling me what you’re doing here?”
Another round of silence. Her words came out timid and shaken. “Beer pong…”
He managed a laugh. “Yeah, I see that.” He looked over at the table. “Looks like you were doing pretty good! Sorry I had to stomp your hot streak.”
Her fingers fidgeted in front of her chest. “It’s OK.”
The man took a deep breath and nodded back at the house. “Come on. Let’s get you out of here.”
She gulped and bowed her head. “OK.”
“OK, then. Follow me.” He walked around her and finally forced her out of the spot by her shoulder. They walked through the house which was now conspicuously empty of party goers. Beer cans, solo cups, bottles, and paper plates were all discarded at random, not to be cleaned up until the following morning. They walked through the living room where the man’s two partners were arguing with the guys who ran the house. The frats would plead their case, only to be refuted by a curt shake of the head. Shun’s guide stopped them with a polite tap on the scarecrow’s shoulder. “I’m gonna take this one back to the campus. You guys got this?” His buddies nodded, so him and Shun walked out to the front porch.
The three security vans they had driven with were parked in the very center of the street. His was the one in front. He opened the back door and gently guided her inside. She felt like a child climbing in on the leather seat cushion and buckling in. He plopped in the front seat, sparked the ignition, and drove off.
Silence followed for the first few blocks. Shun kept her head hung low while she looked out the window and watched the neighborhood pass by. She sat in the seat behind him. Her tummy clenched under the raw tension that hung between them. He broke it with a polite question. “You’re the girl I helped get coffee earlier this week, right?”
Shun shifted in her seat. “Yeah.”
“Ahhh. I thought I recognized you. What’s a freshman like you doing at a frat party playing beer pong?”
They had stopped at a light. She focused on a mailbox a few meters away. Her thin window reflection looked back at her. “I don’t know. I just wanted to have some fun.”
“I see. Well, did you?”
“A little while.”
“Heh, that’s good to hear.” He spun the steering wheel around in a circle as they rounded a corner.
“Are you going to arrest anyone?” she asked, looking up from the window and into the gap underneath his headrest. In the dark she thought she could see the border of a tattoo on the nape of his neck, mostly hidden by the collar of his security jacket.
He shook his head. “I don’t think so. We just had to break things up because of a noise complaint, although things were pretty quiet by the time we got there. Looks like people were really invested in that game you were playing.”
She remembered the way they had cheered. A smile found her. “Yeah. It was pretty cool.”
“You know, I used to play that game a lot not long ago. Seems like yesterday I was doing the exact same thing you were.” He shook his head again. “Shouldn’t have dropped college. Ain’t no good just being a guardsman.”
She eyed the back of his neck where she swore a tattoo was peeking back at her. “Um… What are you? If you don’t mind.”
“Human,” he said casually. “Through and through. Not a drop of magic in me.” He turned his head slightly, as if to face her. “You?”
“Minor deity. Luck and fortune.”
He nodded with newfound understanding. “Ahhhhhhhhh, I get it. That’s why you were so good.”
She pouted and looked back out the window. “Maybe. I don’t know. I’ve played the game before, you know.” That was a boldfaced lie.
He didn’t argue. “OK,OK. I believe you. I guess it makes sense. Isn’t that lucky we had to break up the party right before your big win. Or hey…” He shrugged. “Maybe it was.”
Shun thought about it more deeply. Of course it had been her luck to perform so nicely in that game. Sports, no matter how big or small, was not her thing. Regardless, whatever she picked up was an effortless task. But if her luck had really taken hold, the game wouldn’t have stopped until after she made the last shot, or not at all. Was them showing up a part of her luck?
They passed through the last block of the neighborhood and peeled into the road that led back to the canvas. Silence pervaded them the whole way. It was Shun’s turn to break it. “What’s your name?”
The man jerked in his seat, almost like he had forgotten she was there. “My name?”
“Yeah, if that’s OK. I just wanna know.”
For whatever reason, he was silent. “Ken. Name’s Ken.”
Ken. The handsome face finally had a name. Ken. She said it in her mind repeatedly. Ken. Ken. Ken. “Shun,” she said.
“Shun? That’s your name?”
She nodded. “Mmhmm.”
“Well… I’d say ‘nice to meet you, Shun,’ but we’ve already met, haven’t we?”
The first time she saw his eyes materialized in her mind. “Yeah, we sure did.”
She saw his ears perk up as he smiled. “Yeah.”
They made it to the campus. Ken drove her to the front door of the dorms. It was late in the evening now. The streetlamps were on, accumulating small swarms of moths and other tiny fliers. Shun climbed out of the van and closed the door. Ken rolled his window down and rested his elbow on the door. “You have a good night, now.”
She held her hands together in front of her legs. The fingers no longer fidgeted. Her tail swished behind her gaily. “You too. Goodnight, Ken.”
In the dark, she thought she saw his throat gulp. “Yeah. Goodnight.” He backed his elbow into the van and rolled the tinted window up, replacing the sexy profile of his face with Shun’s small reflection. The van drove off. Shun stood there and watched until she couldn’t see the van anymore. She walked through the front door and took the elevator to her dorm room. She felt like she was floating on air the entire way. It wasn’t entirely clear whether it was either the booze she had consumed or… something else.
She opened the door to her room and sauntered inside. Isomi was on her bed, beneath the covers. A flame she had summoned hovered over her to illuminate the book she was reading. She saw Shun walk in and close the book. “You’re back early,” she said. “So, was it fun?”
Shun closed the door behind her softly. She drifted to her bed silently, wearing what looked like a thousand yard stare. She sat down, calmly took off her top and skirt, then laid down underneath the comforter. Once her gaze was firmly locked on the darkened ceiling above, she answered Isomi’s question. “Yes. I did.” The blank space above her began to morph. Two marbles of green beamed back at her. “Ken,” she said blankly.
Isomi frowned. “Who?”
“Ken. The guy I met. His name is Ken.”
“Oh… OK.” Isomi opened her book and resumed reading. She occasionally glanced at her roommate. She was still staring up at the ceiling, head empty except for a name and a face that refused to leave. A grin crept onto Isomi’s lips. She decided to leave Shun alone in her thoughts, at least for now.
Commission for
watermelonapplePart 2
***
Enrollment at the Eclectia Academy of Magic and Science was among the most prestigious and exclusive schools a Yokai could attend. Thousands of years old, its alumni included some of the most accomplished magicians, spirits, and demons who went on to lead successful and well-accomplished careers. Students with the best grades, athletic talents, and well-connected parents were the only ones who made it through. They came from all over the world, ready to invest in a future for themselves and make their families proud.
The first day of classes was a chaotic one. The school yard was a flowing river of freshmen marching to their classes, toting their book bags and hugging their textbooks to their chests. They siphoned into the study halls, towering buildings centuries old, made with facades reminiscent of their medieval era. Wandering the pathways leading to them were folk of all origin and walk of life. Translucent spirits, lanky, pale faced demons, picturesque demigods, and floating imps all busied their way to the very first college class. Each one was startlingly unique to the person they walked next to.
Among them was Shun, a freshman catgirl who had lucked herself into enrolling at such a prestigious school. Fitting, considering her being a Maneki-Neko, a spirit of luck. She hadn’t tried very hard in school, yet her grades were exemplary. Jobs were unnecessary given her family’s wealth and political connections, no doubt a result of their good fortune. While never an upper-strata clan- they were only minor spirits after all -Shun’s family certainly never had to go hungry, thanks in large to a series of “wise” investments her mother and father both made. She figured that going to school was unnecessary. She could just make the same investments her parents did (or to any business really) and reap the benefits for the remainder of her life. Her father insisted, however, and forced her to go. She wasn’t quite studied enough to earn a scholarship, nor have grades that guaranteed her acceptance, but surprise, she made it in anyway.
She wasn’t too conspicuous among the crowd of eccentric monsters and spirits who attended Eclectia. Being short among a line of towering beasts meant she didn’t stick out. Normally folk her size would fly, but lacking any wings or levitation she was forced to walk on her pale two legs, something she got along doing just fine. A white dress drifted just above her knees. It was decorated in diamond shaped patches of red and orange. Her snowy hair was cut short into an airy bob that bounced as she walked. Dotting it were soft splotches of black and tan, a calico pattern that continued down her slender cat tail which sprouted from the back of her dress and flicked behind her as she walked. Her golden eyes were slashed by vertical slit pupils. She had a soft divot to the center of her lip, her most revealing feline attribute next to the two triangular ears that sprouted from her crown.
She felt as small as she looked among her throng of fellow students. Her fortunate entry to that school was more of a source of guilt than a badge of honor. All of the students she had talked to, including her roommate, were some of the most academically inclined folk she had ever had the pleasure of meeting. Valedictorians were everywhere, students with IQ’s closer to 200 than 100. Many of them had skipped grades and were younger than she was. No matter how smart they all were, however, every single one of them had put in colossal amounts of effort and work into getting there. Shun was the exception. When people asked what her grades were and how she had got in, more often than not she made up some nonsense about being the top of her class and even skipping a grade. Given her supernatural luck, nobody doubted her or tried to refute. That only made her feel worse.
She was out of place here. This was the school where people went to become politicians, scientists, future professors, and other various giants of academia. How many had gotten in through sheer luck? None, as far as she could tell. Tightening her book bag to her back and walking with a brisk pace to Renoir Hall she tried shoving it all out of her head. She was here now, and her family expected her to make the most of it. There was no point in lamenting her opportunity, not when it could reap so many benefits.
Renoir hall was a towering double-turreted building made of medieval brick and mortar. It was among the oldest at the school and home to much of the science department. There Shun would find her Basics in Physics class, taught by a Professor Kaesha. Dozens of students filed in at a time, marching up those concrete steps into the open maw of knowledge. Those who had a few semesters under their belt lounged nearby, chatting with their friends, hardly concerned with being late or not. Shun wondered if that would be her one day, unbothered by her less-than-prestigious method of being accepted.
She entered the front door to a lobby busy with the footsteps and chatter of a hundred or so students making their way to their first classroom. Sitting at a table besides the wall to her right were three staff members handing out directories and pamphlets to those who asked for them. Sitting on the table besides them were four stainless steel coffee dispensers for the students to take for free. Shun wasn’t a regular caffeine junky like so many people her age and older had become, but given her semi-frayed nerves she figured some warm refreshment would do her pretty good.
She got in line behind a towering reptile fellow whose amazing girth obstructed the view in front of her. She kept a wide berth between the two of them, conscious of his thick alligator tail resting on the floor behind him. Anxiety continued to gnaw at her. How many people were behind her? Did she have to wait much longer? Was the coffee for freshmen? It was free, right? It was purely paranoia, but convincing all the same. The fear of someone snapping at her that the coffee wasn’t for her was real, up to the point the alligator in front of her peeled out of the line with a tiny styrofoam cup gushing steam between his claws. Three of the dispensers were occupied. She hustled forward to the one that was open. A leaning tower of white cups sat behind it, half-wrapped in a sleeve of crinkled plastic. She reached up on her tippy toes and plucked the top one. She held it beneath the nozzle and depressed the handle. A measly drop of cruddy brown bled from the opening then plopped sadly into the bottom of the cup. She felt her heart thud. She lifted the handle and pulled it down again. She got even less this time. It was empty. She pulled the cup to her chest and held it in with both hands. Her cat tail curled on the floor behind her with mild panic. Now what?
All she had to do was alert the staff. The one closest to her was a skeleton spirit dressed in a suit that hung over their bones loosely. A quintet of purple flames flickered in a ring shape behind their head. Glowing white pupils hovered within a matrix of pitch black, focused on the student in front of them. Shun lifted her finger. “Excuse me.”
The skeleton didn’t hear her, or pretended not to. They pointed to the staircase. “Second floor. Third door on your right.” The student they were directing nodded and walked off.
“Excuse me.” Again the skeleton didn’t notice. Another student stepped up to them and asked them a question. She was becoming aware of the growing line behind her. People who had come up to the other dispensers after she did were walking away with their coffee. There she was still blocking one. Using one of the others next to her didn’t seem like an option, not when the line behind her seemed so urgent to fill their bellies with joe. Another “excuse me” was on the edge of her lips, but died as soon as the breath left her throat. The finger she had held up meekly returned to the styrofoam cup where it fidgeted.
Suddenly, someone behind the table stood upright. He came up so fast that Shun’s body and tail jerked. He was a human, pale skinned and tall, wearing a green polo shirt with the school’s logo over the chest. The man marched right up to behind the canister and grabbed the handle with a large, calloused hand. “Is this one empty?” he asked calmly. His jet black hair was nicely combed. A thin beard swept down his chiseled jaw. Even though his skin was pale, he had eyes so shockingly green that they stood out and locked Shun in a trance.
She was silent for a few seconds before she blinked and shook her head. “Oh! Yeah! It is.”
He hoisted it off the table and felt how light it was. “Ah! It sure is. I’m assuming you wanted some?”
Shun was starting to realize that the line behind her was moving along just perfectly, not at all hindered by her being there or the missing dispenser. She laughed to herself, mostly out of relief. God, I’m stupid. “Yeah, I did.”
“I’ll go fill this up then. What class are you going to?”
“Physics with Mr. Kaesha.”
“Awesome. The break room’s on the way there. If you want you can follow me there and I’ll fill you up.”
Anything to get out of that chaotic lobby. “Yes, please.”
He smiled, dissipating most of the rest of her fears. “Come on then.” She followed him as he walked out from behind the table and into the main hallway. Her legs kicked up the pace to be beside him, if just to be in that protective aura he had. He carried the dispenser in his arm and walked down the tiled floor casually. Students trotted by them in both directions, oblivious to their existence. Shun didn’t know which of the many doors they passed was the break room or how close they were to it, but she hoped that it was close.
A scoff sucked through her teeth. Stop being so ornery. It’s just college, geez. She looked up at the very handsome fellow she happened to be shadowing. Just… Keep looking at this guy, I guess.
He caught her staring at him out of the corner of his eye and smiled at her. A flash of blush overcame her cheeks and she looked away. They finally made it to the break room where he opened the door and stepped halfway inside. “Wait right here. I’ll be right back out with a piping hot new batch.”
She clutched the styrofoam cup more tightly, sinking her sharp claws and nearly puncturing it. “OK.” He walked the rest of the way inside. The door fell shut behind him with a click. Shun took a deep breath. Relax. Relax. Reeeelax. She knew the first day was nerve wracking, but this was just silly. When was the last time she had been this antsy? She was a spirit of luck. What did she have to worry about? Things always went her way.
Her mind was trapped in that staff member’s pleasing face. All he did was guide her to get some coffee, something she usually didn’t even drink. Here she was acting like she had saved him from a dragon. Was this her intuition telling her something? What exactly? Stay away from him? Learn more about him? Coffee’s bad for your teeth?
The conclusion didn’t come to her before he reappeared from the break room with a dispenser full of coffee cradled in his arm. “Here we go!” he chirped. He turned the arm carrying it towards her and grabbed the handle. “Put your cup right there,” he said, nodding towards the nozzle.
She realized how tightly she was holding onto it. Thankfully it wasn’t punctured, but not via lack of trying. Shun held it up to the dispenser and the man pumped the handle. A thick stream of liquid mud gurgled out and spilled into her cup. She felt the warmth creep up past her fingers and then top out just below the cup’s rim. A ghostly funnel of steam wisped out of it. She pulled it beneath her chin and took a deep whiff. Immediately she was hit with the caffeine shivers, scrunching her petite face and making her tail go kerfluff.
The man laughed. “Careful! It’s strong stuff!”
Shun shook it off, wearing a pinched smile. “It’s been a while since my last cup of real coffee.” She took a timid sip. Bitter lava sizzled her tongue and delivered another round of caffeine jitters. She decided that it was best to take her time with it, if she was able to finish it at all.
“Well, you picked the right day to get into the habit. Lots of kids start guzzling this stuff once college hits them.”
Shun couldn’t imagine how people got addicted to such a foul beverage. “Yeah. It looks like I might start too.” She took another tiny sip and pretended to enjoy it.
The man pointed down the hall. “Kaesha’s lecture hall is right down that way. Classes start in 10 minutes.”
She suddenly remembered that she was in a school. “Oh yeah! Thanks, and thanks for the coffee.”
“My pleasure. Take care, now.” He wandered back towards the lobby, lugging that heavy steel canister of coffee.
Shun watched him go, focusing on his upper back and shoulders. His trap muscles bulged against his green shirt. The trunk beneath it slimmed down into a rigid waist. She noticed the hair on his arms and wondered how soft they were. She shook her head violently. Stop it! She spun around in place, shipping her tail out behind her and splashing some of the coffee out of her cup. She marched down the hall to her first class, unconsciously taking a sip of her coffee and vowing to forget the very handsome looking gentleman who simply gave her some coffee.
That proved difficult once she discovered how boring physics class was going to be. The lecture hall it took place in was like a miniature auditorium. The Professor’s voice was drull and dreary, hardly carrying itself halfway up the steps. Shun felt like she had sat just outside of his speaking range. She had to strain her sensitive cat ears to really hone in on what he was saying. Most of it was just orientation and introduction. Professor Kaesha was an ancient ghost whose remaining corporeal form was a translucent head floating over a white veil that shivered and waved in a nonexistent wind. Shun thought for a guy who looked like he was hiding a big stick underneath his head he was pretty damn boring.
Naturally her mind wandered back to the gentleman who had helped her earlier. That’s how her mind referred to him, a “gentleman”. For crying out loud. All he had done was refill a dispenser for her. He would’ve done the same thing for literally anyone else. Greater acts of kindness had been done for her and garnered less of her thought. Why was this guy so ingrained in her mind?
Well, for one thing he was pretty easy on the eyes. Such a nicely cut and trim human was rare, at least when you went to a school full of eldritch demons and beings from the astral plane. The humans who attended and taught there were usually all eccentric wizards and witches who had probably violated a Geneva code or too in order to get the knowledge they possessed. People like them liked to wear gaudy cloaks or raggedy tunics, not well-fitted polo shirts with the school’s logo on them. Not to mention the men liked to grow their beards out to their crotches. This gentleman was much more nicely shaven. Shun wondered what his routine was. She pictured him in front of the bathroom mirror, jaw lathered in shaving cream, razor scraping across his skin, naked to the waist, towel around his-
Her head shook hard enough to alert the people behind and beside her. She clutched her coffee cup and took a big enough swig to singe her tongue. The awful taste that stained her throat didn’t bother her anymore. She adored it, if only because it washed her mind free of that guy’s (not a gentleman) face. As the lecture went on, she continued downing sip after sip, each instance a reaction to her benefactor’s face popping into her mind.
* * *Shun had successfully downed her cup of coffee by the end of the school day. Once the last drop of warmth had fallen into her tummy the man’s face had more or less been purged. If it wasn’t the bad taste of the coffee distracting her, it was definitely the perpetual buzz of caffeine that kept her attention zipping from thing to various thing. She was fortunate, per usual, that the inevitable crash came after her last lecture of the day. Her journey to the dorm was slowed halfway by a series of mouth-splitting yawns. She passed out on her bed the moment she flopped down on it.
That night she and her roommate idly discussed the day they had. Isomi was a human witch, short in stature like Shun but far, far more garish in her style of dress. She kept the right side of her head completely shaved with the rest draped over by a cascade of purple hair. Her side of the room was a disorderly mess, strewn here and there with her clothes and school stuff. This was only her third night living there and it already looked like the room of a seasoned college vet.
“I don’t know, they’re all fine, I guess,” she rambled on to Shun, referring to her classes. She was lying on her back in her bunk on the wall opposite to Shun’s. She had her leg kicked up over the other, rocking her bare foot up and down and making the bell of her pajama pants waft up and down around her ankle. “All the exciting stuff is in level two classes, but I don’t know any of that stuff yet.” She shrugged. “I just want to get this semester over with. Call me impatient.”
Shun was hardly listening. She was bundled up underneath her comforter, head on her pillow, white hair spilled out into a halo. Her eyes drilled into the ceiling, one that seemed to morph into the face that had been plaguing her so severely. The nap she had taken alongside Isomi’s chatter robbed her of any sleep. Now wasn’t the time for coffee either. “Yeah,” she said absentmindedly.
Isomi chuckled. “You think I’m impatient?”
Shun blinked and looked over. “Huh? No.”
“You said ‘yeah’.”
“Yeah, sorry. My mind is somewhere else.”
“I see that. Everything OK?”
“Yeah! Just trying to focus on something else, I guess.”
“Oh, so you’re ignoring me?” Isomi teased.
Shun grinned. “No.” She sighed. “I kinda met someone today and now they’re all I can think about.”
That got Isomi’s interest. “Oh? On day one? Already? Who is it?”
Shun shook her head to herself. I shouldn’t have said anything. “That’s the thing. I don’t know his name. I didn’t tell him mine either.”
“Did you even talk to him?”
“Yeah. He helped me get some coffee.” It sounded even worse when she said it out loud. It was enough to make her cringe. “It was in line for free coffee at Renoir. One of the cans ran out and he refilled it for me.” She left out the part about how nervous she had been when it happened. Shun scoffed. “I know it’s stupid.”
“No way. It sounds cute.” Isomi rolled onto her side to face Shun and propped her head on her fist. “So… was he hot? What is he? Catboy?”
“No,” But if he was I’d probably die. “Human, as far as I can tell. And yeah, he was pretty cute looking.” She remembered how green his eyes were. Her tail swished underneath the blanket.
“Awww.” Isomi frowned. “Maybe he’ll be there tomorrow. You can introduce yourself properly.”
A shade of red came over Shun’s face, one far too dark for her liking. “Yeah, but he’s a staff member, I think.”
“Oh.” Isomi shrugged. “Can’t stop you from saying ‘hi’ again. Or hell, even having a crush. Just say ‘hi’ again and tell him your name. Who knows what’ll happen. You’re a lucky girl.”
Shun’s eyes were back on the ceiling, chiseling the gentleman’s face out of the flat drywall. “Yeah. I am.”
* * *Shun’s first class the next morning wasn’t in Renoir. The next one was, but the man wasn’t there, nor anybody to hand out directions or free coffee. The students were on their own now. Welcome to the jungle. Good luck. The classes that day were mercifully less boring than her physics class, but not quite the exhilarating lessons she could’ve hoped for. Her mind continued to wander, either to the gentleman’s face or a nagging need for some caffeine in her system.
Her last lecture of the day was in Beginner’s Dark Arts. It wasn’t her most avid subject, so she sat further in the back. Piquing her interest instead was the hushed chatter going on right in front of her. A gaggle of students were discussing an upcoming party. Open house, everyone’s invited, weed, alcohol, hot chicks. Shun couldn’t place the ages of the students based on their wild variety of shapes and species, but she guessed them to be sophomores at least.
She leaned forward in her seat and whispered. “Hey. I hear there’s a party?”
The fellow closest to her whipped his head around. His head was a bare deer skull atop a withered human body. The dry corners of his jaw lifted into a more sinister grin than it already was. “Yeah. Wanna come?”
Shun, still unsure, nodded.
His bewildered eyeball looked her up and down inside of its hollow socket. “I dunno. You’ll be the only minor spirit in there. I don’t think you’ll be too welcome.”
Shun scowled. “So? I’m a big girl.”
He scoffed. Snickers rolled echoed around him. “Yeah, OK.”
“You gonna tell me where it is or not?”
He thought for a moment, then nodded. “Yeah, sure.” He told her what building. “Bring a friend, some booze if you can.”
Neither was guaranteed, but she would try. “Got it. I’ll be there.”
The wendigo nodded and turned forward in his seat. “See you then.”
Isomi was the friend Shun planned on bringing with her. She refused. “Don’t you think it’s a little soon to be going to parties?” she asked Shun.
“I mean, we’re college kids now. Why wait?”
Isomi shook her head. “Sorry. Not for me. Only cool kids go to things like that.”
Shun didn’t think either of them were quite qualified to be in the “cool kid” club, or even that parties were exclusive to those kinds of people, whoever they were. Undeterred, Shun went to the party on her lonesome. It started at dusk at a frat house just outside the campus. Walking around the corner she saw two sidewalks loaded with cars. The thrum of music beat out from the open windows several houses down. Beneath it she heard the leisurely laughter of kids already past their first or second drink. Shun took a deep breath. Her first real party. Couldn’t go that bad, right?
Dressed in a frilly crop top and a short skirt she made her way down the sidewalk where the budding party grew louder with each approaching step. She saw a dozen or so partiers piled on the porch, drinks in hand. People wandered in and out through the front door freely. More ruckus was bleating out in the backyard where she heard there had been a pool. Maybe some people would be swimming, or if not someone would topple over into it comedically. Or maybe that was just Hollywood cliche. She didn’t really know. It was her first college gig, after all.
She marched up the front steps and past two men leaning against the porch railing. She felt their eyes on her as she strutted past. Her habit of thinking about things rather too deeply made her wonder if she was dressed too provocatively. Looking at the gals around her who were similarly covered, she realized that it wasn’t an issue and that she had to relax. Walking through the front door, her mind found another pressing priority: Where were the drinks?
Everywhere, apparently. Every room, from the TV room to the kitchen, had some product ready and able to make someone tipsy. There were coolers in every corner, drink sets on every counter, and at least two or three kegs, one of which she saw being used by a fellow hovering upside down via his or his buddy’s magic. Shun stood by and gawked as he gurgled an exorbitant volume of booze, bobbing his thick adams apple with each chug. His friends cheered him on, pumping their fists in time with their chants of “Go! Go! Go!” Shun couldn’t help but smile at the absurdity of it. She mouthed along with the chant until the fellow was done and flipped midair and let back down onto his feet. A trail of fizz oozed down his chin. He stumbled left, then caught himself. After a wipe of his wrist across the jaw, he threw his arms up in the air above him. The crowd went wild. So did Shun.
She grabbed a soda from a nearby cooler, holding off on the funny juice for now. A few students she recognized said ‘hey’ and called her over for a chat. With her nerves dissipating, she joined them and partook in their conversations, whatever the subject. She finished her soda, tossed the hollow can into a bin, then grabbed her first beer of the night. As she walked through the kitchen where she got it she eyed the tray of shot glasses and towering bottles of hard liquor behind them. Maybe not tonight, she figured, right before joining her friends again. Isomi’s really missing out!
The group herded to the backyard where the disappointingly empty pool was. There was a game of beer pong and corn hole. A friend suggested they call the next game of beer pong. They stood by and watched the current game end, cheering on whoever happened to make the last shot and hooting with every splunk of the orange ping pong ball. The last red solo cup was claimed by an expert bounce, and the game was over. The winner celebrated, and Shun got into place at the other end of the table.
A chorus of “ooh’s” rang out at the sight of the new contender’s diminutive frame. Emboldened by the small bit of alcohol in her system and her natural luck, she didn’t let it faze her. They set up two pyramids of solo cups in front of each player. Each one was filled halfway with some light beer. As the challenger, she got the first shot. She bent her elbow in front of her and held the ball between her fingers. She had to at least make it look like she was trying. With two preliminary pumps of the arm, she let the ball fly.
Kerplunk!
It landed dead center in the top cup of her opponent’s pyramid. The few onlookers hooted. Her opponent was impressed but undeterred. “Beginner’s luck,” he declared before chugging the cup she had landed the ball in. His turn. He assumed his pose and took his shot. The ball ricocheted off the rim of a center cup and tumbled harmlessly off of the table. He and his buddies sighed.
She plucked the ball off the grass and took her next turn. A single cat ear flicked. Her tail swerved behind her. Off the ball went, forming a perfect arc and plopping into another cup. Shun pumped her arm while her friends squealed. Her opponent swore under his breath and downed another cup.
“OK…” he huffed to himself. He shot the ball. No dice. Another muttered cuss.
Shun grabbed the ball. She fired. Direct hit. Applause and nods, groans and swears. The crowd around had grown somewhat. People wanted to see the cute cat girl dethrone the resident beer pong champ. His friends hollered his name and told them that he had it. He ignored them, drained the cup, and took his next shot.
He was luckier this time, landing in one of her corner cups. His bony fist clenched as a grunt of relief blew out of him. Shun was hardly bothered. She took her sweet ass time drinking the beer, all to further throw her opponent out of his game, lest he garner a hot streak, as was his supposed method to success. Shun dropped the cup from her mouth to reveal the ball clamped between her teeth, making a few folk laugh. Dainty white fingers pulled it free and then casually landed it in yet another cup.
The resulting cheers were louder than usual. The party around them had mostly stopped in order to get a good view of the game as it went on. People from outside ran into the house to announce what was happening. A ring of students and party crashers had stopped whatever they were doing to watch history in the making. Shun thought it was all a little silly. Just a game of beer pong, after all. All you needed was a little luck.
Her opponent missed again. Shun did not. He was down to his last two cups. She was still holding on to five. By the time he brought it down to four she had knocked him down to the very last one. It was time to put things to bed. She hoisted the ball in front of her. The dull patio lights shimmered across its beer-soaked surface. She closed one eye, turning the last cup into a singular flat image. Her ears flattened back against her scalp, draining out all other sound. It was unnecessary given the palpable hush that had fallen over the crowd. The blaring music had even been turned down. What had started out as an average college party was now the night some random chick made beer pong history. She knew she was going to make it, but why not give the people the show they wanted? She took a deep breath. Her tail went still. She pumped her arm once… twice…
“COPS!”
Shun’s body jerked as her arm made the forward leap to launch the ball. It missed wide right, bouncing off the flat surface of the tennis table and landing in the grass below. Nobody bothered to pick it up. They were too busy running. The younger students scattered like roaches. People were pushed and shoved. Obscenities were yelled. Shun looked around in shock as the once orderly ring of people disintegrated into a frantic mob. Parting through it like a charging animal were a team of campus guards, decked out in their uniforms and utility belts. While they didn’t arrest anyone, they made good efforts to shove people out of the way and tell them to get lost. There were three of them, one was a hulking stone gollum who had a hunched back and a cinder block jaw. The other was a scarecrow demon whose straw innards blossomed out of his barrel chest and sleeves.
The third was the gentleman who had refilled the coffee for Shun.
Shun’s heart plummeted a hundred stories. The hair across her body was zapped into a frizz. Her cattail rocketed into a line out behind her. While everyone scattered and shouted, Shun just stood there, staring at the face that had so pleasingly haunted her those past few days. He was clearly the leader of the trio, jabbing his finger at students and barking at them to scram. They did in quick succession, more out of fear than respect. Common sense screamed at Shun to do the same, but her feet remained fixed to the earth. The crowd was all but gone, and yet she remained planted next to the tennis table, a field of incriminating detritus laid out around her.
A dagger of ice pierced her chest as those hauntingly familiar green eyes found her. He came to a stop, seemingly shocked by her being there. He felt his stare cling to her like an electromagnetic pull. Her tail sank into a curl between her legs while her ears fell back on her scalp. Her ramrod back fell into a fearful quiver.
The gollum noticed her and made ready to yell at her, but the man stopped him by holding his arm out. The man calmly stepped forward towards her, making her cower where she stood. He stopped just arm’s length away from her. “Hey there,” he said calmly.
Shun said nothing. Her throat was a vice. The beer she had been chugging sat in her gut like a vat of molten lead.
“Mind telling me what you’re doing here?”
Another round of silence. Her words came out timid and shaken. “Beer pong…”
He managed a laugh. “Yeah, I see that.” He looked over at the table. “Looks like you were doing pretty good! Sorry I had to stomp your hot streak.”
Her fingers fidgeted in front of her chest. “It’s OK.”
The man took a deep breath and nodded back at the house. “Come on. Let’s get you out of here.”
She gulped and bowed her head. “OK.”
“OK, then. Follow me.” He walked around her and finally forced her out of the spot by her shoulder. They walked through the house which was now conspicuously empty of party goers. Beer cans, solo cups, bottles, and paper plates were all discarded at random, not to be cleaned up until the following morning. They walked through the living room where the man’s two partners were arguing with the guys who ran the house. The frats would plead their case, only to be refuted by a curt shake of the head. Shun’s guide stopped them with a polite tap on the scarecrow’s shoulder. “I’m gonna take this one back to the campus. You guys got this?” His buddies nodded, so him and Shun walked out to the front porch.
The three security vans they had driven with were parked in the very center of the street. His was the one in front. He opened the back door and gently guided her inside. She felt like a child climbing in on the leather seat cushion and buckling in. He plopped in the front seat, sparked the ignition, and drove off.
Silence followed for the first few blocks. Shun kept her head hung low while she looked out the window and watched the neighborhood pass by. She sat in the seat behind him. Her tummy clenched under the raw tension that hung between them. He broke it with a polite question. “You’re the girl I helped get coffee earlier this week, right?”
Shun shifted in her seat. “Yeah.”
“Ahhh. I thought I recognized you. What’s a freshman like you doing at a frat party playing beer pong?”
They had stopped at a light. She focused on a mailbox a few meters away. Her thin window reflection looked back at her. “I don’t know. I just wanted to have some fun.”
“I see. Well, did you?”
“A little while.”
“Heh, that’s good to hear.” He spun the steering wheel around in a circle as they rounded a corner.
“Are you going to arrest anyone?” she asked, looking up from the window and into the gap underneath his headrest. In the dark she thought she could see the border of a tattoo on the nape of his neck, mostly hidden by the collar of his security jacket.
He shook his head. “I don’t think so. We just had to break things up because of a noise complaint, although things were pretty quiet by the time we got there. Looks like people were really invested in that game you were playing.”
She remembered the way they had cheered. A smile found her. “Yeah. It was pretty cool.”
“You know, I used to play that game a lot not long ago. Seems like yesterday I was doing the exact same thing you were.” He shook his head again. “Shouldn’t have dropped college. Ain’t no good just being a guardsman.”
She eyed the back of his neck where she swore a tattoo was peeking back at her. “Um… What are you? If you don’t mind.”
“Human,” he said casually. “Through and through. Not a drop of magic in me.” He turned his head slightly, as if to face her. “You?”
“Minor deity. Luck and fortune.”
He nodded with newfound understanding. “Ahhhhhhhhh, I get it. That’s why you were so good.”
She pouted and looked back out the window. “Maybe. I don’t know. I’ve played the game before, you know.” That was a boldfaced lie.
He didn’t argue. “OK,OK. I believe you. I guess it makes sense. Isn’t that lucky we had to break up the party right before your big win. Or hey…” He shrugged. “Maybe it was.”
Shun thought about it more deeply. Of course it had been her luck to perform so nicely in that game. Sports, no matter how big or small, was not her thing. Regardless, whatever she picked up was an effortless task. But if her luck had really taken hold, the game wouldn’t have stopped until after she made the last shot, or not at all. Was them showing up a part of her luck?
They passed through the last block of the neighborhood and peeled into the road that led back to the canvas. Silence pervaded them the whole way. It was Shun’s turn to break it. “What’s your name?”
The man jerked in his seat, almost like he had forgotten she was there. “My name?”
“Yeah, if that’s OK. I just wanna know.”
For whatever reason, he was silent. “Ken. Name’s Ken.”
Ken. The handsome face finally had a name. Ken. She said it in her mind repeatedly. Ken. Ken. Ken. “Shun,” she said.
“Shun? That’s your name?”
She nodded. “Mmhmm.”
“Well… I’d say ‘nice to meet you, Shun,’ but we’ve already met, haven’t we?”
The first time she saw his eyes materialized in her mind. “Yeah, we sure did.”
She saw his ears perk up as he smiled. “Yeah.”
They made it to the campus. Ken drove her to the front door of the dorms. It was late in the evening now. The streetlamps were on, accumulating small swarms of moths and other tiny fliers. Shun climbed out of the van and closed the door. Ken rolled his window down and rested his elbow on the door. “You have a good night, now.”
She held her hands together in front of her legs. The fingers no longer fidgeted. Her tail swished behind her gaily. “You too. Goodnight, Ken.”
In the dark, she thought she saw his throat gulp. “Yeah. Goodnight.” He backed his elbow into the van and rolled the tinted window up, replacing the sexy profile of his face with Shun’s small reflection. The van drove off. Shun stood there and watched until she couldn’t see the van anymore. She walked through the front door and took the elevator to her dorm room. She felt like she was floating on air the entire way. It wasn’t entirely clear whether it was either the booze she had consumed or… something else.
She opened the door to her room and sauntered inside. Isomi was on her bed, beneath the covers. A flame she had summoned hovered over her to illuminate the book she was reading. She saw Shun walk in and close the book. “You’re back early,” she said. “So, was it fun?”
Shun closed the door behind her softly. She drifted to her bed silently, wearing what looked like a thousand yard stare. She sat down, calmly took off her top and skirt, then laid down underneath the comforter. Once her gaze was firmly locked on the darkened ceiling above, she answered Isomi’s question. “Yes. I did.” The blank space above her began to morph. Two marbles of green beamed back at her. “Ken,” she said blankly.
Isomi frowned. “Who?”
“Ken. The guy I met. His name is Ken.”
“Oh… OK.” Isomi opened her book and resumed reading. She occasionally glanced at her roommate. She was still staring up at the ceiling, head empty except for a name and a face that refused to leave. A grin crept onto Isomi’s lips. She decided to leave Shun alone in her thoughts, at least for now.
To be continued...
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