Chapter Text
Bryn blinked at the card in her hand and looked doubtfully at the door in front of her. It was the same number, sure enough, and peering up and down the hallway crowded with excited freshmen moving into their rooms everything looked normal enough. Except for her door. Unlike the standard prefab doors on either side, hers was a heavy wooden door with black metal hinges and handle. It looked like something out of a medieval castle.
“Oooh- lucky! You got the old RA room!” Bryn blinked slowly and turned to the peppy girl leaning over her shoulder. “They moved all the RAs into suites- ours are right across the hall.” Bryn glanced over her shoulder and winced at the door wrapped in bright pink paper and covered with silver glitter and… feathers?
“I wish I had a door with iron in it,” the girl sighed wistfully. “So, what name did you choose? I’m Marva!” She pointed excitedly to her name badge. Bryn felt like she was moving underwater, everything slow and a little unreal, and was still hung up on the door. She wanted to ask “Why iron?’ but all that made it our was “…iron?”
Marva frowned. “That’s probably not a very good name for around here.” She glanced up and down the hallway and gave Bryn a nervous smile. “How about, uh, Irony! That’s a bit better right?!” There was something fragile and a little desperate about her grin, so Bryn just nodded.
“Sure, Irony. Why not?” It was somehow fitting. She shouldered her way in the door, not missing the sigh of relief from Marva who eagerly followed her in. Was this what living in a dorm was going to be like all the time?
“You’re so lucky! You won’t have to share your room- it can be tough keeping good roommates around here…” Marva trailed off as she poked around the mostly empty room. It was a bit smaller than the other dorm rooms, but with only one bed and desk it felt a lot larger. Irony felt some tension melt out of her shoulders- she’d hoped for a single room but knew that they were almost never assigned to freshmen… she’d gotten lucky.
Marva kept chattering as Irony dropped her stack of boxes on the desk with a “Oof!” and dusted off her hands. This shouldn’t be bad at all.
“Don’t forget your moving-in gift basket!” Marva crowed, and Irony stared at the small basket with a “Welcome to Billingsley Hall!” tag on it. Inside were the usual little gifts and trinkets, along with some odd items, most noticeably a container of Morton’s salt and instructions for lining the door and window-sills to “keep pests out”. It didn’t say what kind of pests, but considering how old the building was she wasn’t really surprised. She wondered about ants for a moment- she knew they were attracted to sugar. Would salt keep them away? Maybe it was slugs, she knew salt was bad for them…
Marva drifted out the door, still chattering and Irony gratefully shut it behind her and let out a sigh. Slumped against the door it was surprisingly quiet in her room, another thing to be grateful for. She took a deep breath to head back out into the hallway to find her suitcases… maybe Elsewhere University wouldn’t be so bad, after all.