Work Text:
Ingrid is lying on the floor of the apartment when Sylvain gets home. He’s absolutely exhausted and he’s pretty sure he’s got a crick in his neck that will literally never go away thanks to being hunched over a desk in the library for almost eight hours. He almost doesn’t see Ingrid on the ground until he sees Mercedes sitting on the couch, flipping through one of Ingrid’s veterinary science books.
Sylvain pauses and stares at Mercedes and then he catches sight of the sushi socks that are peeking around the side of the couch. He knows those socks because he bought those socks for Ingrid for her birthday last year. Sylvain waves to Mercedes and she smiles at him brightly in return. He walks up and leans over the couch, taking in the sight of his roommate lying face down on their floor.
“Everything okay?” he asks. The question is open and directed to either Mercedes or Ingrid, whoever feels more up to answering it.
“Ingrid has had a rough day,” Mercedes supplies helpfully.
Sylvain raises an eyebrow. “Oh? What kind of bad day?”
“My supervisor rejected my most recent project plan,” Ingrid grumbles, not even lifting her head up. “I stayed up literally all night finishing it and the only thing he said to me was that the conclusion needed work before he could approve it and that he wanted a new draft by Thursday.”
Mercedes smiles sympathetically. “I ran into Ingrid on campus after I dropped Annie off and gave her a ride back here.” She checks her watch. “I do need to run to the hospital to drop off something before tomorrow.”
Mercedes stands up and walks over to him, patting his arm. Sylvain smiles at her, looking between his miserable, blob-shaped roommate and their mutual friend.
“Thanks for staying, Mercie,” he says quietly.
“My pleasure,” she replies.
Mercedes drifts past him and head for the door of their apartment and then Sylvain is left staring down at his grumpy roommate who is still lying face-down on the rug.
“Ingrid,” he says, “surely there are more comfortable places to mope?”
“Too far away,” she grumbles.
He rolls his eyes and finally walks around the couch. He bends down and grabs her under the arms and literally hauls her up. Ingrid shrieks and immediately flails in his grip. Her leg swings out, kicking at his shin and Sylvain grunts. Unfortunately, due to his own tiredness, he isn’t quite ready for a flailing Ingrid and she manages to take them both out, sending them crashing to the couch.
Sylvain twists so he doesn’t land on top of Ingrid and they land side by side on the couch. Also unfortunately, the couch is not built for two people and since Sylvain lands closer to the edge, he immediately rolls off of it, landing straight on his ass. Ingrid sits up on the couch, blinking her wide green eyes at him.
Sylvain’s tailbone hurts from the sudden impact, but he bursts out laughing. Ingrid laughs too, swinging her legs down so she’s sitting properly on the couch. She leans forward, her lips curling into a half-smirk.
“Nicely done,” she teases.
He rolls his eyes at her and pushes himself to his feet using the edge of the couch and the coffee table. “Hey, I was just trying to help you. You’re the one who flipped out.”
Ingrid shoves him as he sits on the couch next to her. “Whatever. I was comfortable.”
“No, you weren’t,” he counters. “The floor is wood. The rug is thin. There is no way that was comfortable.
Ingrid huffs and tugs on the sleeves of the hoodie she’s wearing, pulling them down over her hands. “I was lazy, then,” she corrects herself.
She twists, reclining on the couch and throwing her feet up across his lap. Sylvain gets a good look at the hoodie she’s wearing and he blinks in surprise as he recognizes it. It’s an old dark teal hoodie with their high school crest in white. There’s a black ink stain on the right sleeve from where Felix broke a pen when Sylvain had been in his senior year.
“That’s my hoodie,” he says dumbly, still staring at it.
Ingrid blinks and looks at the sweater. She seems just as surprised as he is to see that it is. “Oh, it is, isn’t it.”
Sylvain stares. “It’s been missing since I was in my freshman year of undergrad! How do you have it?”
Ingrid taps her chin as she thinks about it. “You know, I think you left it at my house when you went off to university and I meant to give it back, but I just forgot to.”
Sylvain rubs his forehead. “Wait so we’ve been living together for four years and I haven’t seen you wear it?”
She looks down, her ears turning pink. “I, uh, normally sleep in it, not wear it out and around.”
Sylvain feels his own neck get hot and he clears his throat. “Yeah, uh, right.”
He drops his gaze down to his lap where Ingrid’s sock-clad feet are resting. The socks are navy blue and covered in cartoon pieces of sushi. He had thought they were hilarious when he saw them in December so he had bought them and sat on them for a month until her birthday. Ingrid had cracked up as soon as she had opened the present because they were socks, but she wore them fairly often.
“I like your socks,” he says dumbly.
She just laughs. “They’re comfortable. I’m still sad you didn’t buy those matching hot dog ones the other day.”
Sylvain practically snorts a laugh. “God, but those were ugly. There’s a difference between cute graphic socks and bright yellow graphic socks with wieners on them.”
She wrinkles her nose. “How do you make that sound dirty?”
Sylvain blinks and lifts his hand from where it had rested on her ankle without thinking. “I guess it kind of did, didn’t it.”
Ingrid rolls her eyes and swings her feet off his lap, standing up. She walks back around the couch into the kitchen and opens the fridge. Sylvain turns, throwing an arm over the back of the couch to watch her as she rifles around in the fridge. After a second, she shuts the fridge and twists her face into what Sylvain can only call a pout.
“Fuck,” she grumbles.
Sylvain chuckles. “You all out?”
Ingrid brushes some of her short hair behind her ear. “I definitely told Felix yesterday that I would make dinner tonight since he has fencing, but I also definitely forgot to buy anything that’s actually worth eating for dinner tonight.”
Sylvain stood up, stretching his arms above his head. His shoulders popped satisfyingly and he strode into the kitchen. He stepped around his roommate to the fridge and opened it, scanning his own side of the fridge.
Similar to Ingrid, he also seemed to be lacking in actual edible food. There was some milk and a tub of yogurt as well as a couple of bell peppers, but no protein and nothing that he actually wanted to eat after having spent a full day in the library studying corporate law. And since it seemed Ingrid had had just as poor a day as he had, he knew there was something they could do that would cheer both of them up.
“Text Felix and ask what he wants from McDonald’s,” Sylvain suggests to Ingrid, closing the fridge.
He leaves the kitchen and heads down the hallway towards his room. Ingrid stares at him for a moment before she chases him, following him all the way to the door of his room. She stops in the doorway and stares at him as he strips off his shirt, pulling on a dark grey long-sleeved t-shirt. He turns around and sees Ingrid is still staring at him.
“McDonald’s?” she repeats, sounding confused.
Sylvain tugs his shirt down to straighten it and grins. “Sure! You’re telling me you don’t want to relieve the stupidest things we did in high school tonight?”
Ingrid’s mouth opens and closes and then she frowns. “I didn’t budget this in this week.”
Sylvain rolls his eyes and walks over to her, throwing an arm around her shoulder and spinning her around, guiding her back down the hall towards the front door of the apartment. “Don’t worry about it. It’s literally just fast food. I can cover you.”
Ingrid sighs, but her interest in getting cheap fast food is apparently stronger than her dislike of Sylvain paying for things since she doesn’t resist as he leads them to the front of their apartment. He grabs his keys and wallet from his bag at the door and pulls on his shoes. Ingrid slows down as she walks to the door, typing a message out on her phone to Felix.
Sylvain straightens up and waits for her by the door, spinning his keys on his lanyard idly. Ingrid slides her sock-clad feet into athletics scuffs and shoves her hands into the pockets of her poached sweater. Sylvain grins and opens the door, leading the way out of the apartment. Ingrid pauses as they leave to lock the door but then she follows him to the elevator.
Sylvain unlocks his car and slides into the driver’s side. Ingrid gets into the passenger side and he starts the engine. His car’s Bluetooth beeps, confirming its connection to his phone and he steals a glance at Ingrid, smirking. Immediately, her brow knits in suspicion.
“Play the High School Musical soundtrack,” Sylvain says gleefully.
Ingrid groans and drops her arms and head forward onto the dashboard. “Oh my god, Sylvain.”
“Hey, we’re emulating being stupid high school days, aren’t we?”
The music from the first song in the movie starts playing over his car’s speakers as he pulls out of the parking lot. Ingrid leans back from the dashboard and glares at the speaker. Sylvain just smiles to himself and turns the volume up louder.
“You’re ridiculous,” Ingrid grumbles. “A twenty-five-year-old man and you put on High School Musical in your car.”
“Only with you,” he teases back. “Besides, it’s not like we all didn’t absolutely love this movie when we were younger.”
Ingrid huffs. “When I was eleven, maybe.”
Sylvain laughs. “Aw, come on, I was just trying to distract you. Get your mind of everything.”
He steals a glance from her as he stops at a red light. She looks less annoyed when he says that, her green eyes softening.
“Yeah, I know,” she mumbles. “I appreciate it.”
He takes one hand off the wheel and pats her shoulder. “You’ll knock him dead next time, Ingrid,” he assures. “If I can get my studiously lazy ass into Law School, you can knock your supervisor dead with this project plan. Besides, even if it takes a few more days, it’s not going to derail your entire Masters.”
She huffs out a breath. “I know, it’s just frustrating.” She turns towards him and it takes every ounce of driving knowledge he has to keep his eyes on the road and not to meet her gaze. “Weren’t you supposed to be busy tonight?”
“Nah,” he says. “I was going to go on a date, but I called it off earlier when I was three hours deep in corporate law with no end in sight.”
Ingrid shudders. “Oh god. How long were you even at the library today?”
He shrugs and turns on his turn signal to turn right into the McDonald’s parking lot. “Too long,” he grumbles.
Ingrid laughs at him. “Yeah, I don’t think I’m the only one who needed this break.”
Sylvain shrugs. “Hey, I’m just hungry.”
She fiddles with the sleeve of the hoodie as he parks and he turns towards her, grinning.
“If I buy you a 50-pack of nuggets can I have my hoodie back?”
She scoffs. “No way. This is mine now.”
He snaps his fingers, but he can’t disguise the amused look on his face. “Darn,” he drawls sarcastically, killing the engine. “Guess I’ll just have to play the High School Musical 2 soundtrack on the way back to the apartment.”
He yanks his keys free and jumps out of the car before Ingrid can lash out and whack him. He jogs away from the car towards the McDonald’s laughing. She staggers out of his car, scowling.
“Sylvain!”
He picks up the pace, letting his laugh carry back to her. It feels good.