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Millie thought she had never felt better than the last time she left the exam hall after her final A-Level. She was done. It was over! She could relax until her results came in the post. It was out of her hands now. She’d done her part now.
St Andrews University? Here she came. She had this in the bag. Her future geology degree at the same university as her girlfriend was in sight. So close she could touch it. It was relieving. And also slightly terrifying. A lot terrifying, actually.
When she made it back to her shared room with Sakshi, she immediately collapsed on her bed, fully prepared to become dead to the world for a few hours at least. There was a lump on her index finger from holding the pen through exams and studying and very particular calluses on the pad of that finger, and bruises too. How did you get a bruise from holding a pen? At the very least you should only get finger bruises from slamming your hand in a door or something. That was ridiculous.
But instead of a nice post-exam nap, her girlfriend burst through the door, just as she was lying down, probably for one of the last times in this bed. She was not going to miss its lumpy mattress. Her back was going to start punishing her permanently if she kept forcing it to lie in such conditions, and she wouldn’t blame it, frankly.
“Quint!”
“Hi, Flora,” Millie didn’t usually grumble at her girlfriend but at that point she couldn’t find it in herself to put on a brighter tone. She opened her eyes again and saw that she was smiling.
“Where’s Sakshi?” Flora looked around for her although she very clearly wasn’t there. Then again, there had been a few less than dignified incidents where she hadn’t checked hard enough and Sakshi had seen more of them than she ever would have wanted probably. Millie really owed her apology flowers for that. It had taken her two days to look either of them in the eye.
“I saw her leave with Perry. I don’t even want to know what they’re doing right now.” They’d been giggling entirely too much, but whatever. As long as she didn’t have to find out, and no one saw them. And Sakshi didn’t get pregnant either. That was actually a number of caveats but whatever, her head was still sore. Flora joined her on her bed, sitting at her feet, grinning widely. Millie hadn’t seen a single person smile so widely since she’d come to Scotland. It was mildly unnerving, but it was Flora and she loved Flora, so it was fine.
“My hands hurt so much, you would not believe the size of the bruise on my finger.” She lifted her hand up, showing a dark purple line all the way down her forefinger, and pouted dramatically, as if she was going to get any more attention for it already.
“We match,” said Millie wryly, showing her own writing bruise. However, while Millie’s fingertips were tinged with dark blue ink and her nails were ragged at the edge from nervous chewing, Flora, aside from her forefinger, looked like she had just had a manicure, as usual. Unfair.
“Did you remember all your quotations all right? I think I forgot some of the analysis for mine. I hate how complicated they make writing these essays. I mean! It’s an essay, for god’s sake.”
“The only one I struggled on was: But soft! What light through yonder window breaks?/It is the east, and Juliet is the sun./Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,/Who is already sick and pale with grief. I forgot the second part entirely until we left the hall. Honestly, I really wanted to hit myself because of it.” The fact that these exams were so focused on being memory tests was really annoying because she knew university wasn’t like that at all.
Regardless, she’d still managed to make the point she’d wanted to. Hopefully the rest of her work in that section made up for not entirely getting the whole quote. She hoped so, the requirements for St Andrews were pretty steep, but they were known for that. Apparently it was 5 As at Higher, but given that Gregorstoun were weird, they had to do A Levels for it instead. And her personal statement had been a bitch to write. Apparently you were only allowed one rock joke maximum, and you had to talk about the other reasons you wanted to do geology, and that puns weren’t valid unfortunately. Her tutor had kept sending back her drafts with big red marks around those sections. Which was a shame because those were pretty solid jokes, in Millie’s opinion.
Flora quirked an awkward smile, “You’ll be fine, Quint, you’re one of the smartest people I know and I’ve met several Nobel Prize Winners.” She actually looked as tired as Millie felt, but they’d both been cramming for days, and hadn’t done anything particular other than a few kisses here and there for… weeks. Not even walks together. They’d have the whole summer now. The time that they could spend together for it. It was all worth it for their marks. But it had sucked so much. She never wanted to do another study marathon like that again, but that was on her, at least partly, for not keeping up with memorisation at the start of it. Never again, she promised herself.
“I know you’re lying but thank you.” Millie shut her eyes and yawned loudly. “You and I are the modern day Romeo and Juliet.” Was she ever going to get her nap? She could just fall asleep here and see how long Flora took to notice.
Millie couldn’t see her but she knew her girlfriend was grinning, mock-touched. “Awww. Why? Is it because we're destined to be together? You sap.”
“No, because we’re huge idiots.”
Flora pretended to think about that for a second. “Hmm, okay fine. I’ll give you that.”