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“Scar,” Grian said as he pulled up the stool beside his roommate. “So, I was thinking of potion ideas you could try.”
Scar instantly pulled the wormwood closer towards his cauldron and laughed, “Now Grian, why should I listen to your opinions on the art of potions. Last I recall you told me to stay out of your architecture homework. Does the same courtesy not apply to me?” he began to cut the wormwood with a specific knife Grian was not allowed to touch because he ruined all the magic properties or something.
Grian shrugged and shuffled the stall closer so he was breathing on the potion. Scar pushed him back “If I need bad breath instead of dragon’s breath, you will be the first person I call.”
“Is there even a difference? I mean chemically they’re the same-” Grian was cut off by Scar handing him the lettuce. Grian smiled fondly and tore off a leaf and stuck it in his mouth. He moved away from the stove and pulled out the chopping board from one of the drawers.
Their kitchen was split into two halves. One side was tightly padlocked, although nothing a bobby pin couldn’t break past, and a piece of paper written on with bright red sharpie stuck on the cupboards that read: “Grian I don’t want to die today.” or “Grian it’s my finals don’t make me fail.” because Scar’s current theory as to why his roommate had failed elementary potion classes was that he was cursed and thus, shouldn’t dabble in magic ever. The other half was filled with normal person stuff. Like food, and four chopping boards for the meats, the vegetables and the bread. While it wasn’t on display, Scar was banned from that half of the kitchen after the: Great Pizza Incident of ‘20.
The only thing the two halves shared was the stove.
“So, will you finish soon if you want me to cook so bad?” Grian asked, raising an eyebrow. “I was thinking about chicken and salad? Since I’m assuming you won’t let me make peas.”
Scar laughed, “Chicken and salad sounds good! I will be needing the stove. I need to cook this at an exact temperature or else I could end up with a potion that makes your hands sticky instead of luck elixir. So if you’d leave me alone?”
Grian nodded, and the conversation tampered off.
Ten minutes later, Grian said, “You know I still don’t get how potions are any different than cooking. Surely a few degrees or a bit of lettuce wouldn’t make that large of a difference.” He picked off another leave from the lettuce and shoved it in his mouth as he pulled over the peppers.
Scar stopped what he was doing and stared at Grian. “I know what you’re thinking. Don’t.”
Grian removed the lettuce from his mouth and laughed and stepped so they were up close and both in front of the cauldron. He dangled the half eaten leaf over the potion. He snickered as Scar tried to pull his arm as far away from his course work. “Grian!” he begged, “Think of the magical properties in that lettuce!”
Then, Scar tried to pull the lettuce out of Grian’s hand. Grian tightened the hold because he was joking and didn’t actually want to drop it in the potion. Scar thought he had a firm grip on the salad and tore it when he tried to make sure Grian couldn’t drop it in retaliation for not playing along this one time. The lettuce ripped with a sickening crunch. Half of the lettuce floated into the cauldron. Grian’s eyes widened by half an inch. Scar’s mouth opened but no scream came out. The potion bubbled for one, two, three, four then five seconds before it slowed down, revealing the grass green mixture and no lettuce to be fished out.
Grian shut his mouth instantly. He turned to Scar with his hands raised, “In my defence,” he said, voice straining as he tried to not sound like the guilt was eaten away at his chest, “I didn’t realise lettuce would actually be magical-”
“It’s not the lettuce that made it react like that!” Scar exclaimed, “It would have been fine if you hadn’t put in the lettuce you’d half-eaten!”
“At least we know it’s not my DNA that makes me a potion killer. I’m sure you can find the potion that you’ve accidentally made and work backwards..?”
“No one who’s making liquid luck is dumb enough to put in half eaten lettuce oh my god! Grian give me half an hour. I need to figure out how to fix this before I have to make the elixir so I don’t fail myself to the moon!”
Grian backed out from the kitchen, “I’ll order takeout.” before he sprinted to his room in the house.
Half an hour later, the pizza Grian ordered had arrived. Pepperoni for Scar and Hawaiian for Grian. He sent a tip to the escort with the simple note: potion accident. Where a gas mask. The delivery driver did indeed arrive with a mask and he shoved the pizza’s at Grian and asked that the money was slid under the door. Or at least that’s what Grian thinks he said, it was slightly muffled by the mask.
Grian walked into the kitchen to find it had been snowing in the half an hour he’d been gone. White powder decorated the walls and it was floating in the air like spores might. Scar knelt in the middle of it all, shirt abandoned on the floor and had his arms tightly wrapped around himself.
“Scar?” Grian called into the hallways. “Scar how disastrous is it?”
“It’s cold!” Scar called and as Grian stepped into the kitchen he could feel Scar’s teeth chattering. Grian bit his lip and walked over to Scar. He dropped the pizza boxes on the table and lifted Scar up by the armpits. Once his roommate was back on his own two feet, Grian let go.
“Why are you shirt- You know what, I don’t want to know. You go shower. I’ll clean up this mess.”
“Thank you Grian.” Scar mumbled as he walked off into the shared bathroom.
To himself, Grian muttered, “No problem.” Before he dragged out the vacuum cleaner from the cupboard Scar believed the plates were kept in and powered it on. Parts of the potion, powder, pollen, still hovered in the air but Grian paid them no mind. You had to inhale a lot of a potion for it to have any effect and with the worst of it gone within ten minutes, Grian was pleased to say he felt nothing more than the slight urge to wear a coat. He rubbed his hands and blew his hot breath onto them before opened the window, took the pizza’s, shut the kitchen door and moved the pizza’s over the couch.
Equipped with a blanket and a warm pizza, Grian settled on the couch, bringing his legs up to his chest and clicked play on whatever Netflix had decided to autoplay. Scar wandered in fifthteen minutes later, took a slice of Grian’s pizza but pulled off the pineapple and threw himself on the couch.
“What are we watching?”
“I’m not even sure. I haven’t been paying attention.”
“Will you share the blanket?”
Grian lifted the corner of the blanket up and let Scar shuffle closer to him. Scar brushed his arms over Grian’s own and for a brief second everything burnt, thawing the ice that Grian hadn’t even realised had settled in his bones. By Scar’s harsh gasp, he had felt it too. When Scar moved back into his own personal space, the cold came back full force.
Grian bit his tongue, hard enough that droplets of blood built on his tongue as he surpressed a scream at the bucket of ice cold water that had doused him. Everything burnt but instead of being too hot it was too cold. Even the blankets felt like nothing but an imitation of something warm, although he could still feel their softness. Scar was whimpering besides Grian and the two made eye contact.
The issue was, neither of them were stupid. Grian could hazard a guess at what had triggered the blueness that wanted to climb up his skin despite the heating being on. Scar’s face had fallen in horror. It was only rational to assume he’d figured it out as well.
Grian said, “I’m going to bed.” before he wrapped the blanket around himself and walked into his bedroom.
The ice stings. Grian can feel the hypothermia set in but his lips aren’t blue and his teeth aren’t chattering. It’s in him. The cold is consuming him from within. It’ss going to freeze his heart or maybe his heart was already frozen and it’s only now that he’s sat near a heater he can feel the chill.
The blankets do not help. The cold is almost definitely coming from within him because Grian only has this many blankets in the house for when he feels like a bird and needs a buffer between himself and the floor. Fifty or so blankets is enough to kill a man. Grian will die from heatstroke or hypothermia it’s just a case of which one gets to him within the next ten minutes or so. He curled into a ball to try and preserve body heat. There isn’t actually any heat gained, Grian guesses, just more heat conserved. It soothes the cold a little. Not a lot. Enough that Grian might be able to sleep whatever concoction of a potion caused the mess.
That is what Scar walks in on. An hour or so had passed when he peaks his head around the door and asks, “Grian, have you seen any of the-” before he must finally spot Grian in the bundle of blankets. He chuckles and tugs one off of him.
Grian fucking growls.
“Okay okay!” Scar concedes letting go of the blanket, “But I am cold too so if you can't spare one blanket I’m joining you.”
In response, Grian curls deeper into the blanket web he’s created and huffs, “Clearly you’re not that cold. I’ve been struggling for years!” the words are mumbled. Grian’s entire body screams and he can feel the heat Scar gives off. Grian’s roommate isn’t cold. He can survive one night without blankets.
“I nearly threw myself into the fire Gri! Now let me in.” Scar claims. He also says ‘let’ which is a mocking term considering the next thing he does is climb right in, letting all the meaningless warmth out.
It’s ironic that even though the cold air cuts into Grian’s skin, he feels no different. That is until Scar presses himself against Grian and excuses it as: sharing the warmth!
Now. If you have ever had the luxury of stepping into a warm building after playing in snow you may know this feelings. If you ever had to walk a dog down the beach at six am in the middle of winter then walked into the girls cloakroom in school, you definitely know this feeling. Okay, so imagine this feeling, the bliss of being warm. Now multiply that by 28 quintillion. That is what being hugged by Scar felt like in that moment.
Any fight drained out of Grian. He pressed his forehead closer to his tits. Scar laughs and hugs Grian which inadvertently pushes Grian’s entire face into Scar’s chest. Grian doesn’t want to move so he wraps his arms around Scar’s chest and squeezes. The warmth of Scar melts all the ice from Grian’s heart and he goes limp in his roommate's arms.
Scar similarly goes limp and he sighs a breath of relief. Scar pressed his chin up against Grian’s forehead. His breaths are hot and Scar’s long hair lays across Grian’s cheek; everytime Scar moves it tickles.
The proximity burns. It might scar and imprint itself on Grian’s skin. He doesn’t even think he’d mind as he traces the scars down Scar’s back and sinks into the fire surrounding him. They don’t move. At one point one of them kicks the blanket off. Grian isn’t sure who because at this point he and Scar feel one of the same.
He thinks to himself as they lose the final blanket that they will be freezing when they wake up. However at that moment, being held by Scar is like being shoved in a microwave for an hour. With that, Grian falls asleep.
He wakes up to Scar’s alarm clock. He reaches over to turn it off and instantly feels the chill inside of himself grow back. Grian shoves his head back into Scar’s chest and says, “Call in sick.” he has to repeat that motion several times because his words are muffled. When the message does finally get through, Scar laughs and calls his professor to explain: his roommate messed up his potion and now they have to ride out the consequences. He will also need an extension.