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Everything in this world comes down to money. "Money rules the world," "Money is the anthem of success," and other lines from popular pop songs. Anyway, Mona doesn't have any money. Well, of course she does, but very little, she has to pay for dorms, tuition, food, and booze. Mona reads tarot cards on instagram and on tiktok, and states in her bio that she is inextricably linked to the cosmos, the universe and astrology, but she doesn't mention that astrology comes in her life with only first syllable - Mona is studying to be an astrophysicist. It only helps her speeches about Mercury in retrograde to be more convincing (oh how many people have paid her to explain what the fuck it is).
So, money.
"There's a banquet hall booked in our cafe, I can't handle it alone, why don't you work with me for an evening and I'll give you 30% of the proceeds?"
Scaramouche laughs loudly in her face.
"I wouldn't even agree for 50%."
"I wouldn't offer more, there'd be no point in me going out to work then."
"It would be in making sure you don't get fired. I'll take 60%."
Mona rolls her eyes and exhales loudly through her nose. They agree on 50/50.
If the dorm rules allowed, they would have long ago knocked out a shared room and never talked to anyone but each other again. Unfortunately, the boys and girls are still separated, so Mona has to put up with the company of freshman Barbara, and Scaramouche keeps promising Kazuha that one day he will definitely go to jail for smoking weed. Kaedehara laughs and shares a joint with Scaramouche. Sometimes they kiss stoned. But that's not important.
What matters is that Scaramouche was a loner at school and didn't socialize with anyone but Mona either. Back then he didn't even have a roommate, so there was no point in making acquaintances either. Unlike Mona, who maintained friendships with a small group of girls and therefore knew more than one person at school, Scaramouche was not interested in trying to make new friends. He was comfortable with Mona, was comfortable alone. He saw no point in changing anything.
The only time he ever spoke to anyone was in his senior year in the courtyard behind the school, in what was unofficially called the "smoking room."
There, Scaramouche snagged a cigarette from some redheaded boy. The boy introduced himself. Scaramouche didn't bother to remember.
"Are you the rich boy with the mammy issues?" With a huskiness in his voice the red-haired jerk laughed. "I heard about you, I wanted to meet you!"
"I'd like to insult you back, but I don't know who the fuck you are."
The boy complimented Scaramouche's haircut. Scaramouche shaved off all his hair at the beginning of the next school year.
"I wasn't trying to be insulting! We rich scions should stick together. We don't want others trying to take advantage of us, do we?"
Scaramouche finished his cigarette, threw the filter on the ground, smiled, and grabbed the kid by his red hair and banged his head against the school fence. Maybe that's why Scara didn't have any friends, and he didn't try to make any, either. Mona, at least, didn't talk that shit, just some stupid facts about Capricorns (in which Scara didn't recognize himself at all), but it was bearable. At least Mona didn't talk about his family, and that was the most important thing.
When Scaramouche was called to the principal's office for a broken nose, his mother didn't show up. When the red-headed boy's older sister threatened Scaramouche with a trial and "an eye for an eye, your kidney for his nose," his mother did not intercede for him. When Scaramouche came home, his mother did not meet him. She did not return at all that night. Only Miko ran in to get his mother's coat and gave the boy a very unhappy look. She left without saying a word. Didn't even lock the door behind her.
So Scaramouche loved Kazuha, at least this boy acknowledged his existence in their dorm room. And nothing helped fight stress and lack of money and the opportunity to go to a therapist so well as Kazuha's handrolled cigarettes. Kazuha was everything Scaramouche dreamed of. Maybe that's why he's been kissing him, as if in gratitude. At least it wasn't disgusting, but Scara couldn't feel his lips.
Anyway, Kazuha left a handrolled cigarette in Scara's jacket. Kazuha was a good friend.
"You're at the banquet hall tonight, and I'm with you and the rest of the cafe. Lumine called in sick, so we're minus one waiter tonight."
Scaramouche remembered Lumine, but he remembered her brother even more. Lumine was friendly, and Scaramouche even stopped himself from being rude to her. Aether, on the other hand- Aether was mean. He once purposely didn't catch Scaramouche when he tripped over a step and flew down. Didn't even put out his hand to help him up, asshole.
And the banquet, it turns out, was in honor of their university's cheerleading squad. The same guys who ran around the stage in traditional costumes and sang silly one-syllable songs at university events, were partying today in a booked hall and didn't recognize Scaramouche at all. Who cares, he didn't recognize them either. It was for the best.
"Scara?"
It was for the best exactly until the broken nose from a little over a year ago (which is looking normal now, thanks to plastic surgery and money) smiled all too happily, jumping up from his seat and deciding to give him a hug.
"I didn't know you were a student here, too!"
"I'm sorry, do I know you?"
Scara is a cunt. Scara has a good memory especially for people who annoy him, so of course they know each other and of course he remembers that redhead. But how funny the stranger's smile slides off his face and how much fun it is to watch as the joy of meeting slowly evaporates into the air and is replaced by an awkward silence.
"Can I get you another bottle of soju?"
Scaramouche smiles contentedly.
"Yes, thank you."
This guy gets drunk quickly. Scaramouche calls quietly to Mona, points his finger at the redheaded boy, and laughs. "He went to school with us, didn't he?" Mona doesn't remember him well. Scaramouche only nods faintly and whispers softly: "Tartaglia."
Tartaglia was a year younger than them, so they never went to the same classes, only occasionally seeing each other in the canteen and hallways. After that incident, Tartaglia smiled as if happier and friendlier, saying hello in the hallways every time. Scaramouche was always silent, waiting for this torment to end. It ended exactly the day he graduated from school.
"Will you let me go out for a smoke?"
Mona sighs irritably, but nods, going to the banquet table. Scaramouche finds his jacket behind the bar, throws it over his shoulders, goes outside, and stands to the right of the entrance so as not to disturb the people entering the café. It turns out that the lighter was left somewhere else.
"Want a light?"
It's as if Tartaglia hadn't disappeared from his life for a day. They meet again in the smoking room, where Scaramouche again needs something from the redheaded guy. This time Scara doesn't even laugh at the pink lighter, because this time it's blue. With whales. He wonders if Tartaglia is a pisces.
Tartaglia himself smokes a grape-flavored vape pen. Scaramouche likes the smell.
"How's your mommy issues? How long has it been since you last talked to her?"
Scaramouche chokes on his cigarette smoke and coughs loudly, trying to hide his surprise and fuckin' astonishment. Tartaglia doesn't even look at him, continuing to inhale quietly and smoke his grape. What an abomination.
But unlike last time, by this day Scaramouche has learned enough interesting facts from the red-haired spiky's biography. This time he's got a lot to say.
"How are your daddy issues? When was the last time you jerked off to Zhongli? Or which of our teachers did you hit on?"
Tartaglia's eyes glow with stars, and you can see all twenty-nine teeth behind his smile (yes, that's how many, Scaramouche managed to count). His face says, "So you remember me!" and "Did you asked about me?". Tartaglia is not offended by other people's words, they only amuse his ego.
"Isn't it rude to joke about my dead father? At least your mother is alive."
And Scaramouche could apologize, really. But first of all, he doesn't give a fuck, and secondly, he's too amused by what's going on. And he hasn't finished his cigarette yet, so he needs a few more minutes. That's why he won't shut up.
"At least you knew who your father was. I still don't know mine."
Tartaglia doesn't laugh anymore. Tartaglia puts on an insulted look on his face and is unwilling to concede.
"Of course I'm lucky," he says sarcastically. "After all, when I was five years old, I saw my father first drunk and puking in the middle of the living room and then at the bottom of the river. What a lucky man I am!"
"At least your godmother took you and your sister under her wing. My godmother said it would have been better if my mother had had an abortion."
"Well, if she had, my nose would be better off."
They look at each other for a few moments before bursting into loud laughter. They don't notice the strange looks of people passing by the café; they don't calm down until about two minutes later.
"If I were you, I'd watch my words. This time there will be a wall instead of a fence."
Tartaglia looks at Scara like it's the cutest thing he's ever seen in his life.
"Why are you like this?"
Scara realizes that Tartaglia doesn't mean any harm. Tartaglia has a drunken look in his eyes, and though he is on his feet, but he doesn't think for a long time before he speaks. Tartaglia is fine, Tartaglia just wants to chat and understand Scara.
"It's just that I was born when Mercury was in retrograde."
"What is Mercury retrograde anyway?"
"It's the illusion that Mercury is moving backwards," he calmly repeats Mona's words stuck in his head. "But I really don't know how it can somehow influence our moods and actions."
Tartaglia really doesn't give a fuck about Mercury, Uranus and Venus. Tartaglia just smiles as he looks at Scaramouche, as if he has found again what he once lost long ago. Scaramouche doesn't know it, but even after two months of his first year at university and a bunch of new acquaintances he's made, Tartaglia still thinks no one will understand him better than that strange boy from high school who graduated a year early. How lonely Tartaglia was in his senior year.
Tartaglia involuntarily looks a little lower, focusing on his lips.
"Does your face miss hitting hard objects?"
Tartaglia rounds his eyes, looking away from the his face in panic. He inhales awkwardly, holds the smoke in his mouth, lets out a grapey tang somewhere toward the back alley, where there are no people. Then he says quietly.
"Sorry, I'm not trying to seduce you or anything-"
Scaramouche involuntarily remembers that awkward compliment and the attempted hit on their first meeting in the smoking room. He laughs.
"Do you want me to seduce you or something?"
Tartaglia almost blushes, but you can't see it in their back alley. He watches in amazement as Scaramouche takes one last puff, tosses his cigarette onto the pavement, and, with his back against the cold wall, raises his arms, crossing them.
"Think of it as an apology for your broken nose. Now it's your turn to ruin my face."
And while Scara smiles contentedly at his actions and words and the effect they have on Tartaglia; and while the alcohol and courage has not yet weathered from the redhead's boy. Scaramouche's eyes are laughing, expectant and supple, and he looks up at him, his lips stretched in a smile that is about to burst into Tartaglia's face.
There is no strength to hold back.
Tartaglia approaches Scaramouche quickly, while Scara himself widens his eyes in surprise. Their lips meet, and Scaramouche is involuntarily lost in the way Tartaglia wraps his face, kissing him softly, slowly and sweetly. A desperate moan, unbeknownst to Scaramouche, bursts from his throat, but it is just surprise, nothing more, really. There has been a yearning and disappointment from life built up inside him for years, but then when Kazuha or Tartaglia kisses him, it is as if he becomes more needed and loved, as if there is a reason to continue living and fighting for his place under the sun.
The feeling is almost healing. Scaramouche's lips feel exactly as Tartaglia has always imagined: smooth and soft, as if they fit him perfectly. Scaramouche tastes of tobacco and something heavier and unfamiliar, but Tartaglia enjoys it as he runs his tongue over the boy's lower lip. He smiles as he feels Scaramouche's hands go down, digging his nails into his waist.
Scaramouche is aroused, he is nervous, he tries to follow Tartaglia's movements, trying not to melt at how delicately he is handling him, and he lets himself moan under Tartaglia's tongue. Tartaglia swallows the sound and moans back, the stranger's grip on his waist growing tighter. The way Tartaglia maneuvers his lips and tongue is like a man caught in the rain after years of drought. He is calculating yet hurried, as if he has been waiting for years for Scara to be in his grasp, so he tastes every inch of Scaramouche's mouth that his tongue can reach, absorbing every sound that bursts out from him. Their kiss quickly turns from shy and restrained to hungry and disorderly, saliva coating their lips, and sighs of pleasure bursting from their mouths.
The smoke break ended five minutes ago. Mona waits back up.
And Scaramouche laughs, wiping his mouth of drool.
"What's your major?" Suddenly he asks.
Tartaglia is lost for a few moments, trying to realize he's been asked and figure out what to answer.
"Uh, political science."
"Loser," Scaramouche laughs loudly, finally breaking away from the wall and heading for the entrance to the café.
And before he goes inside, he throws:
"I'm in astrophysics. Don't forget to leave me a tip."
Along with the tip, Tartaglia also leaves a napkin with his phone number on it. Now he has four more years to spend in the hallways with Scaramouche. Who knows, maybe one day they'll even have lunch together?
Tartaglia really hopes so.