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The buzz of a static television couldn’t get any louder as it argued against the unusually heavy blizzard. Classes had been suspended for the day and students were advised to go home, for those who fortunately had nearby places, and tenants to stay at their respective dorms. The forecasts weren’t able to anticipate the thick layer of snow that had begun to pile quickly, but it was what it was. It was only the early part of the second half of the year and things were already quickly going downhill.
“Nice place,” Sasha wandered aloud as her eyes skittered across the decorated corners of Becky’s loft. She hadn’t known the other woman as deeply sentimental, and yet there they were; standing beside a cabinet of memorabilia.”What’s this, Jack Daniels?”
“Just turned legal, two years ago I think. First shit I bought, yeah?” Becky launched herself onto the couch, finding comfort in the softness of its cotton. “Look, make yourself at home. There’s food in the fridge and a microwave beside it. I’ll probably cook breakfast tomorrow morning if the shit doesn’t stop by dark.”
Embarrassment grew from Sasha’s cheeks. “No it’s okay! I- It’s bad enough that I have to invade your private space, I’m- I think I’ll be good with some of the ramen that we bought on the way.”
Becky quickly glanced over Sasha and back to the blank television that she had intended to turn on. A sly smirk made its way to her face which evolved into an amused grin. “Jesus, we’ve been friends for years, relax . Now get your ass in here!”
Looking down and shaking nerves out of her body like the snow that fell from her thermal coat, Sasha unwrapped her scarf and made her way to the couch. She shyly took the little bit of space on the left corner, noticing just how boisterous Becky’s posture was. It was, after all, Becky’s place. The other girl sat in front of the television with legs spread open and stomach out, and if she didn’t look the way that she did, Sasha was sure Becky would have been a gross forty-year-old man. The thought made her chuckle.
“So uh… there’s not a lot to do in here, but it’s home. Do you perhaps wanna’ watch a movie or…?” Becky looked at Sasha from her left shoulder as she searched the nervous wrack of a pink-haired human being for some answers. Sasha looked visibly awkward, and she wasn’t exactly sure why. “You can also sleep if you’re tired too.”
“No!” She exclaimed, stammering into a clear thought. “I-we- we can do whatever it is that you want. There’s not exactly any homework that was assigned, plus I’ve already submitted all of my requirements.”
“Holy shit?”
“Yeah…”
“Three weeks early?”
Really now? Sasha chuckled, “Mhm.” At this point, her attitude towards studies should not be surprising for Becky at all. And yet there they were, on the same exchange for whenever she would mention anything related to being early.
“Well,” Becky’s legs moved closer together, as her head shook to the tune of embarrassment. The fact was that most of her school work had been left a quarter finished as she jumped from one project to another, never quite satisfied with her progress for each other them - always anticipating working on the other when she was working on one. She grinned. “I’ll have you know that I’m almost done with mine as well.”
It was so automatic for Sasha to raise a brow at the crust of Becky’s fragile bravado. She hoped it wasn’t condescending for her to giggle like a little girl who had just been told the world’s corniest joke, and fortunately Becky’s toothy grin was a response that it was taken well.
“So what do you wanna’ do?” Becky requeued, still attempting to comprehend the time that Sasha told her that she was okay with doing absolutely nothing. Becky didn’t believe it, and she hasn’t yet.
“Well… finals are coming up in a week, I can help you with your requirements?” It was the least she could do, Becky was too gracious of a host to even let her stay and offer her an open invitation.
“Yup. We’re watching a movie.”
It was late into the afternoon, the ungodly hour where the last class of the day for most students had to end and they could barely make it through without yawning. Becky had picked out an old movie, which, had surprised Sasha, really. Vintage taste wasn’t exactly what she had expected from the woman who didn’t care about her white pants as she sat on the bleachers yelling ugly curses against the football team.
People can really be surprising.
“What are you looking at?” Becky had taken notice of the amusement that kept Sasha’s mouth ajar in front of the piles of CDs and DVDs that boasted the names of classics that she had always thought were decent.
“Oh this !” Becky followed Sasha’s gaze until the realization struck her. “These were… my dad’s collection. Hah. They were the only inheritance I got from the bozo. Guess that’s what happens when you’re the second family.”
“I… I’m sorry,” Sasha murmured. She had completely forgotten about that situation and found herself stepping into miniature landmines in a place within their conversation that she hadn’t at all intended to step into. “I didn’t mean to-”
“Nah, it’s okay. I mean I guess I hated them at first but the internet didn’t exist then so I didn’t really have a choice. I’ve grown to love them though, they’re pretty cool.” Becky popped in a remaster of an obscure Western that Sasha didn’t recognize well.
It was one of those films. The boring kind. The one that you pop in just because there’s popcorn and soda in front of you and there’s not really much else to do. Becky had noticed Sasha try to repress her complaints for most of the time. It was an uncanny sight. And Becky wasn’t going to admit that half the reason she picked that movie because of how adorable Sasha looked when she was furious, and not because ‘it was on top of the pile’ or that she ‘hasn’t seen it’.
“That’s…” Sasha trailed off, her head complete with thoughts but her mouth gagged by respect.
“-stupid, I know.” Becky laughed. “What can I say? 1960s people were a buncha’ idiots.”
“Yeah,” Sasha yawned. “Bunchaa’ idiots.”
Becky paused the movie, observing Sasha from where she sat. Her immovable smile quickly softened at the sight of her friend whose eyes had narrowed into a feline-like shape just trying so hard to stay awake. “Anthropology?”
“Anthropology.” Sasha murmured. “That bitch. ”
“Hate it when minors act like majors.” Becky wasn’t going to ask why she was exerting too much effort on a terror-type of professor who taught a subject that was negligible to her degree. “You know… you don’t have to stay up right? I’ll tell you if they say that you can come home.The bed’s just over there, you’re definitely free to catch some Z.”
Sasha’s eyes shot open as she instinctively tried to wipe the non-existent drool on the corner of her mouth. As she sat up straight, she stole a quick glance over the window to see that the blizzard held no signs of stopping. In fact, it had gotten worse as Sasha started to feel frost send a chill down her spine. She shivered. “No it’s okay, It may stop soon anyway.”
The fuck are you kidding? Becky shot her a smile of disbelief; eyebrows raised, and a slight head-shake. With that, she resumed the movie, standing up to get the discarded blanket from her bed. As much as pride had looked good on Sasha, it just felt wrong to see her shiver - too shy to demand anything out of Becky. “S’your funeral man.”
Throwing an armful of the fat blanket towards the couch Becky joined Sasha bounced back to her old corner.
“Thanks,” Sasha whispered. “You didn’t have to.”
Idiot , Becky thought. She just smiled at Sasha, re-occupying the temporarily abandoned spot on her couch. You know I would have anyway.
The blankness of the television’s screen illuminating the darkening skies left Becky with a slight feeling of disorientation as her eyes fluttered open. She wasn’t exactly sure how she fell asleep, or who scooted closer to who - but she woke up to Sasha’s head peacefully nested against her shoulders. The lack of significant height difference between the two of them ensured that Sasha would probably wake up with a stiff neck, Becky was much certain of that.
She glanced at the digital clock, it was past eight and it was still snowing - albeit lighter.
“Sasha,” She rasped, wakened air blowing hot, and intimately close against Sasha’s ear. Her own hands laid awkwardly against her lap, as Sasha was uncomfortably close. Becky was just happy that her arms’ tendency to wander in her sleep didn’t exactly set off. “Sash.”
Thankfully a light sleeper, Sasha stretched into consciousness, immediately feeling the numbness of her limbs and the tension that formed in her neck. “-ow.”
“You okay?”
Sasha pushed a stray hair away from her lips. “Yeah, what time is it?”
“It’s past eight.”
Fuck , Sasha almost audibly muttered, but thankfully her lips were quick to catch it, lest Becky misinterprets. Against her own body’s requests, Sasha carefully put her part of the blanket away and towards Becky as she attempted to stand from the couch. “I… I have to get going.”
“Are you serious?” Becky sat dumbfounded. “You’re going to freeze out there. Come on Sash, why don’t you just stay?”
“It’d be too much.”
“Stay or I’ll be offended.” Becky sterned. “Plus, I’m making dinner.”
Contemplative silence just looked Becky in the eyes as Sasha licked her lips. “Please? I’d be more comfortable if you went home safe… tomorrow .”
“Oh come on, I’ll make hot chocolate!” Becky added.
“...Fine.” Sasha tried so hard to suppress the smile that tugged at the corner of her lips, feeling an unfamiliar warmth settle in her chest in the midst of the cold evening. “But only if you let me help you finish your quarter-baked projects.” She raised a high brow and a challenging smirk towards Becky. Yeah. I know.
And Becky caught the look. Bitch .
The smell of cocoa awakened every nerve that slept in Sasha’s bones as her face was inches too close to the screen. She needed her reading glasses replaced soon as research paper after essays had probably dulled her eyesight once again. At this rate she could grow blind a little bit earlier than seventy.
As Becky approached the dinner table where Sasha’s laptop blended into luminescence against the other artificial lights, she sat down two mugs of hot chocolate and a plate of carbonara with varying cuts of meat as the star of the dish.
“Smells good,” Sasha remarked, her gaze never leaving the screen as she sipped from her warm hot chocolate drink.
A smug look creeped into Becky’s face. The sweat that had formed from the heat of the pan quickly evaporated into cold sweat and into nothing. “You can’t consume anything Becky Lynch had made and not think it’s perfect.”
“Your essay certainly isn’t.” Sasha gave her a knowing glance.”Becky how do you have three thesis statements on the first paragraph?”
And the sweat was back. Becky flushed with veritable embarrassment. Sasha was indeed the smarter one but she, for the sake of their extremely equal friendship, needed to look the least bit competent. “Ahh… I-I was probably drunk.”
“Listen, why don’t we go eat first?”
“One more minute, I’m just fixing the outline.”
“Sasha.”
“Becky?”
“Come on, the pasta’s gonn’ get cold. Plus relax… it’s like you’re constantly looking for a reason to not take a break.” Becky pouted, because maybe truths were served better with a farcical appearance. “Look, it’s snowing, we have hot cocoa and some damn good pasta. Why don’t we just enjoy the momentary break huh?”
Sasha sighed as her shoulders slumped in defeat. “I guess you’re right.”
The pasta was incredibly hearty. It absolutely, definitely, positively did not escape Sasha that Becky deliberately cooked white sauce because it was Sasha’s favorite type of dish. The ingredients displayed on the quaint wooden cupboard told her that Becky could have cooked literally anything else. But she was not going to call that out.
“It’s kinda’ cold around here…” Sasha rubbed her own arms. “How do you survive on winters?”
Becky pointed towards the liquor cabinet. “That. Do you want some?”
“Is that a good idea?”
It definitely wasn’t a good idea.
Becky had originally planned to give Sasha full control over the mattress and she was fully content on sleeping on her couch for the night, but alcohol made damn sure that they’d collapse and immediately fall asleep. As she woke up into the ungodly hour of 3:42 AM she realized this. Thankfully, Becky was not drunk enough to stay within the corner of the bed, too scared to be that close to Sasha.
Fuck…
She had never imagined in her entire life that they would be sleeping beside each other, regardless of the context that had brought Sasha in her place. Even with dusk shrouding most of the other woman’s features, she looked like she had been born from the stars. The curves of her features and the hair that flowed so free. If such a human being existed as an argument that God was an artist, it was certainly her friend.
Friend.
Becky shook her head to push the three a.m. thoughts away as she pushed herself off of the mattress, creating a drastic shift in weight that seemed to have slightly rattled the other woman’s sleep.
“Where are you going?” Sasha murmured.
A warm smile blossomed from Becky’s lips. Sasha had sounded so childlike. “To the couch, Sash. I’ll just be around, don’t worry about it.”
The girl’s half-narrowed eyes attempted to adjust to the sight of Becky as her right hand rubbed sleep off of her lashes. Sasha was slightly shivering.
“Stay here?” She whispered lowly, the alcoholic burn rasping the fuller voice that she brandishes in mornings. “Please?”
Becky stood dumbfounded for an entire minute before the request fully registered in her head. She slowly climbed back to the bed, as if cautiously still asking for Sasha’s permission to be in such close proximity.
“Can you hold me?”