Chapter Text
Carmilla scowled at Laura’s back as the vampire flopped onto her bed. Laura Hollis, naive cupcake extraordinaire. The girl who thought that sunshine and chocolate were all it took to keep the world going. But as silence filled the room Carmilla’s scowl quickly faded into a smirk.
She’d won. Maybe, at last maybe, the cupcake would stop hunting down her roommate and listen to wisdom on how the world really works. Then Laura would stop being so very Laura and righteous and sunshine and Carmilla could go back to this being just another normal assignment.
No such luck.
“Maybe that’s just the way it is” Laura said at last, “ but that does not mean that I have to accept it. I deserve better. Betty deserves better. Hell, even you deserve better.”
Carmilla froze and Laura glared at her for a moment. Carmilla knew that she was waiting for some kind of snarky response but her mind couldn’t quite come up with anything beyond confusion. When no response came, Laura spun around in her chair and slammed down a button on her computer, posting all of her videos online.
Sitting up onto her elbows, Carmilla heard a faint pop just behind her. Still, she kept her eyes fixed on the back of Laura’s head.
Moments later, klaxons burst to life in the hallway and Laura rushed from the room to the town hall. Carmilla continued to sit on the bed. Staring at the space where Laura had just been.
Something bumped her softly in the back of her shoulder, jolting her from the words that were still rebounding through her head. Carmilla turned. Floating just behind her, at head height, was a small yellow heart.
Carmilla frowned and grabbed it from the air. The heart was small, fitting neatly into the palm of her hand. It was warm to the touch and had almost a soft foam squishiness when she pressed softly against it with her thumb. She squinted at the colour, a vibrant yellow.
Letting it go, she watched the heart float up from her hand and hover by her head before she snatched it back. With a quick glance about the room indicating that she wasn’t about to be molested by a tiny army of hearts, Carmilla raised an eyebrow and stared at the little heart. She gingerly poked it with her other finger and the heart released small puff of chocolate and cinnamon scented air.
She poked it again.
“Carmilla?” Laura’s voice was in the room.
Carmilla jumped, nearly dropping the heart. Fumbling with it for a moment, she scanned the room with the sudden need to stash the heart somewhere safe.
She stuffed it down her shirt.
“What? No. I wasn’t doing. There was nothing. What?” Carmilla stuttered and turned.
Laura’s head was poking through the doorway, still frowning, “You need to move. Laf says that harpies will eat anyone who isn’t at the town hall.” She placed a hand on the doorframe.
“Yeah sure,” Carmilla got shakily to her feet, “you go ahead. I’ll be there in a minute.”
Despite the frown, Laura hesitated, “Well don’t take too long.” She disappeared again.
Carmilla made her way slowly towards the door. Her hand absently brushed against the doorframe where Laura’s hand had just been. The hallway was empty. Completely cleared of students except for the distant footsteps that had to be Laura making a mad dash down the stairwell. Late. Not with the ginger twins. In danger of being eaten by harpies.
A small smile drifted across Carmilla’s face.
*Pop*
She looked up. A second small yellow heart was hovering over her head. Carmilla shoved it in her bra with the other one, “At least I’ll be even,” she mumbled, heading for the stairs.
#
If hung by her ankles over a bubbling pit of piranhas with a stake to her heart and a giant spider crawling towards her foot, Carmilla might have admitted that she was fond of Laura Hollis.
Might have. And just fond.
None of that sentimental mushy crap.
Carmilla sat on her bed and held out her hand for Laura’s so that she could put the batwing charm on it. the look on the girl’s face was pure skepticism. Actually, Carmilla found it hard to believe that anyone wouldn’t be fond of Laura Hollis. The girl was condensed sunshine shoved in a vessel far too tiny to be filled with that much energy. And goodness. And adorableness. And adorkable hotness. And…
So she might have been fond of Laura. But only in the same way that everyone was fond of a genuinely good person. Nothing special.
For example, when Laura had strolled into the dorm room and started dancing, it was nothing special that Carmilla had smiled to herself at the girl’s antics.
And there was certainly nothing special about how Laura’s pillow smelled exactly like Laura and was the fastest way for Carmilla to fall asleep after her nightmares.
Or yesterday. Yesterday there was nothing special about how cute Laura looked when she made that bunched up face of aggravation as she yelled at Carmilla about the hair in the drain.
That was just Laura Hollis and Carmilla possibly being fond of her was nothing special.
No matter what those stupid yellow hearts kept trying to imply. There are getting a little out of hand. The other day Carmilla had been stuck with three yellow hearts popping up behind her head after Laura had sympathized with her after the Dean’s visit. And, on top of it, the cupcake had even defended her to Xena.
Carmilla had taken three steps into the hallway before 3 little pops forced her to look up at the hovering hearts. She grabbed them, cradling them in her arms and shielding them from the world with her body. Two doors ahead, the science ginger had burst from their room. In a panic, Carmilla had literally chucked the hearts out the nearby window to avoid being caught.
The hearts had come back. Of course. She had maybe ten of the blasted things stuffed under her mattress, one in her backpack, and one stuffed in her back pocket from her conversation with Laura not ten minutes ago. She could feel them now. Bubbling under the mattress like ten tiny yellow inconvenient problems. The one in her pocket warm and buzzing.
Laura’s skin was soft under her thumb as Carmilla slid the charm into place, tying it loosely. Carmilla held onto Laura’s wrist for a beat too long when the cupcake looked up with a small smile and asked where Carmilla went at night.
She totally glossed over the fact that Carmilla had accidentally called her OCD. And Laura asked the question in the most awkward way, leaving the hand with the batcharm just dangling oddly in the air.
*POP*
Carmilla couldn’t quite help it. She leaned in close to Laura’s face, covering the action by standing up but not quite missing the little inhale Laura gave when their noses almost touched. One pithy line later and Carmilla was strolling casually out of the room.
Or as casually as one can stroll while trying to corral a small yellow heart that was desperately trying to break free of Carmilla’s fist and reveal itself.
#
It was 3am, there was a heart floating around Carmilla’s head and she didn’t care. In fact, she was smiling up at the little yellow heart dancing circles through the air.
Laura had asked her to a party. Carmilla didn’t even care that the cupcake had brought it up as two roommates getting to know each other. That was more than enough. More than anyone else in recent history had cared to know.
Perhaps that was even better. Carmilla had been asked to thousands of parties by thousands of girls because of the cut of her jaw and the tightness of her pants. Not that Carmilla minded necessarily, it was a good distraction, but there was something nice about being looked at as a person.
*POP*
Not that Carmilla actually wanted Laura to be looking at her jaw or her pants anyway. That would be ridiculous. Laura was Laura. All innocent eyes and kind smiles and to turn her simple act of kindness into anything more was wrong. A perversion of the kindness that was Laura Hollis.
The girl who could be kind to an evil vampire and sometimes smiled at her like Carmilla actually made her happy and who sometimes made Carmilla smile little smiles back.
Pure sunshine Laura Hollis.
*POP*
Who innocently asked her to a party to be friends.
*POP*
Who was snoring right now with little exhales that sounded like tiny chainsaws.
*POP*
This time Carmilla looked up. These stupid hearts were getting the entire wrong idea. But there they were. Five tiny yellow hearts prancing about in the dark above her bed. Carmilla sat up and swatted at them. Trying to corral them into submission before someone noticed.
They danced away. Her movement only sent them floating across the room where they hovered over Laura. Carmilla’s eyes widened as the hearts danced slowly downward, nearly brushing Laura’s nose. Leaping out of bed, Carmilla rammed her hand into the space between the heart and the cupcake, keeping the two from meeting.
Laura mumbled something as Carmilla looked down at her. Her brown hair impossibly adorably messy as the girl rolled over and squished her nose into her pillow, smiling as she embraced the yellow monstrosity.
Carmilla frantically grabbed at the air, catching four of the hearts. The fifth hovered stubbornly out in the open, just beyond her reach.
There was no way Carmilla was leaving it out in the open like that. Moving as lightly as possible, the vampire stepped up onto Laura’s bed. With one foot on either side of the sleeping girl, Carmilla flailed her arm as she tried to grab the last heart without releasing the four she’d already captured.
Just out of reach.
Carmilla jumped slightly, using the springs of the bed to get just enough height to catch the heart with the tips of her fingers.
“Carm?” Laura spoke softly through a sleepy drawl. The girls fingers crept out, wrapping themselves around Carmilla’s ankle. Laura’s fingers gently brushed against her skin.
Holding the hearts to her chest, Carmilla locked her body in place and said quietly, “Hey creampuff, go back to sleep.”
Laura rolled slightly, curving around Carmilla’s foot as her fingers ran slowly up and down Carmilla’s ankle, “What’re you doing?”
The hearts in Carmilla’s arms bounced, trying to free themselves. She thought fast, “Reallly big spider on the wall cutie. Couldn’t let it get you.”
“Ok,” Laura retracted her hand and nestled back into her pillow, “my hero eh?”
Carmilla slipped off Laura’s bed. Rummaging through her closet, she shoved the five hearts into her old giant rucksack. One of the few things she’d brought with her. She tied it shut and shoved it back into the bottom of the closet.
Out of sight. Out of mind.
Carmilla perched back on the edge of her own bed. Staring at her sleeping roommate. Her sleeping Laura. Absently, her fingers trailed over her ankle.
*POP* *POP* *POP*
“Oh come on!”