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“Hey dorm head, we’re borrowing the common room on Saturday.”
Ace spoke so casually Riddle blinked in surprise, stopping walking and turning so they were now face to face in the Heartslabyl dorm corridor. Although, he considered, should the lack of manners really be such a surprise to him at this point, with all he’s seen of these particular first years.
“Ace! Sorry dorm head, what ace meant to say is can we have your permission to borrow the common room for Saturday? Er, if that's ok, that is.”
Deuce responded much more politely, though it was clear looking at him that he held the same expectation for a ‘yes’ as Ace had clearly already decided to be fact. Riddle sighed, knowing these freshmen were going to be the death of him. Truly, with how disgraceful they can be so often, it should be off with their heads in order to teach them a much needed lesson in being grateful for what you have.
“You may. Just clean up whatever messes you make, and refrain from damaging things or disrupting the other students, if that is at all possible for you to manage.”
“Thanks dorm head!” Came the cheery reply in unison, followed up with big, cheeky grins as they began to walk off towards the first year rooms in a flurry of loud chatter.
Truly, these freshmen were going to be the death of him.
-
Saturday couldn’t come quick enough for the duo of first years. Their first (hopefully) monthly movie night was a go, the dorm head had approved their use of the common room, they had their pillows and blankets and had bought whatever snacks they could afford from Sam’s with their meagre 600 madol left over from making bad monetary decisions.
“Oi Deuce, chuck that pillow over here will you?”
“Catch!”
The pillow nearly socked Ace square in the face as it hurtled toward him at lightspeed, and from the shit-eating grin plastered on Deuce’s face it was definitely intentional.
“Hey, watch where you’re throwing that shit!”
“I was watching. Shame you’ve got good reflexes, or it wouldn’tve missed!”
The duo bantered back and forth for a while, re-arranging sofa cushions and adding their own until they landed on a very awkward realisation.
Their blankets suck.
Between them, they’d mustered up two blankets, but to call one of them a blanket was going a little far. Ace had brought along a red blanket, one which had clearly been fluffy a long time ago, which held in heat okay-ish, and sure it wasn't really big enough to cover your whole body but if you curled up a bit it could work. Deuce, on the other hand, had brought along a much smaller, much thinner blue blanket that really did not do anyone any good. This thing could cover either your feet or your upper body, take your pick, but you’ll end up cold either way.
“Ah.”
“‘Ah’? How do you not even own a real blanket! Come ooon…” Ace huffed, glaring at Deuce accusingly, “What are we supposed to do now? There is absolutely no way I’m sharing with you, not like I can anyway. My blanket may be better than yours, but it can't suit two.”
“I don’t want to share with you either!” Deuce responded back quickly, cheeks dusted red with embarrassment at the call-out on his blanket situation. He sat down carelessly with a sigh, Ace following suit. “I’ll message the group chat, see if anyone has any they can spare for the night…”
He fumbled with his pockets for a minute before pulling out his phone, blinking a few times as the bright light of the screen filled the darkening room before pulling up a familiar group chat.
-
“heartslabyl 5ever!!!”
10:39pm
lame of spades: hey does anyone have blankets they can spare
lame of spades: wair who changed my name
idiot 1: wair
cay-cay!: wair
cay-cay!: hii deuce!!! i’ve got some spare ;D
cay-cay!: also the nickname change was ace whoopsies :p
cay-cay!: whats this for?? give me the deets so ik how many to bring
idiot 1: woooow way to throw me under the bus
lame of spades: you guys are so mean to me
lame of spades: me and ace are having a movie night in the common room
idiot 1: deuce literally doesnt have any good blankets LMAOOO
idiot 1: he’s resorting to charity methods dont fall for it let him be cold
cay-cay!: i cant leave my fav freshmen all cold in their movie night now can i ( ᴗ͈ˬᴗ͈) !!
cay-cay!: i’ll b over in a sec!!!
idiot 1: cheers
lame of spades: thank you cater 👍
-
Ace and Deuce milled around on their phones, falling into a comfortable silence as they waited. Waiting didn’t take long, however, as after a couple of minutes their senior burst into the room, followed by two copies of himself, all carrying an array of blankets and pillows. And by an array, it means each Cater had about two blankets each with one thrown around their shoulders, the other folded carelessly in their arms, pillows hazardously chucked on top.
“Nice work, me!”
The real Cater grinned at the others as they dropped everything into a pile on the floor, the copies giving him finger guns before they disappeared. He rolled his shoulders back with a small ‘pop’ before adjusting the sleeves of his long sleeved pyjama shirt.
“So, what's the plan!” Cater spoke cheerfully, pouting when the other boys furrowed their brows at him. “Come on, now! Surely you’re not planning on leaving your poor senior out after he so kindly went out of his way to get you blankets~” He grinned cheekily, in such a way that let the others know he had, in fact, invited himself and they could not, in fact, take back the invite.
“Fine, fine, whatever. You can stay, just don’t take all our- hey!”
Ace gawked as Cater dropped onto the sofa and carelessly tossed a handful of spicy crisps into his mouth, before he looked back at him with an innocent slow blink.
“Eh? What's mine is yours, right Deucey? You’ll back me up on this right! Ace needs to work on his sharing skills~”
Deuce’s face flushed with embarrassment yet again at the nickname.
“Cater… please can we leave that nickname in the past…”
Cater just laughed in reply, stealing a few more crisps. No way in hell was that nickname ever disappearing now.
“Relax, relax. I’ll hit up Trey and see if he knows about any snacks we could snag from the kitchen! I’m sure there's something or other laying around!” He smiled while waving a hand dismissively, before deftly grabbing his phone out his pocket. Ace and Deuce watched as he deftly unlocked it and typed at light speed, eyebrows furrowing as he waited for a reply before his face lit up as a little ‘ding!’ sounded, signifying a response.
“So… Has Trey got something we can snack on or..?” Ace questioned, equal parts curious and impatient.
“He’s checking now! He said apparently he’s got some things that might work… buuut he didn’t specify further.” Cater rolled his eyes fondly and chuckled. “You know Trey though, he’s probably gonna walk in with some totally magicammable treats he made and call them ‘things that might work’!”
“Would it be rude to say I wish?” Deuce asked, borderline drooling at the mention of Trey’s baking work. “It makes me wish I could bake like that, sometimes…”
“We wish you could bake like Trey too,” Ace said bluntly, “The last time you tried to bake was…” Ace and Cater both shared a look, physically cringing at the memory of Deuce’s adventures into baking. To no-one's surprise he’d managed to get himself banned from the kitchen for a week - how you even manage to both undercook and burn a single cake was beyond the both of them.
“Oh ha ha Ace.” Deuce huffed slightly, pride slightly damaged, “I’ll ask Trey for lessons some time, plus it’s not like you’re some big-shot baker yourself!”
“True, but I’m better than you!”
“Not like it takes much,” Cater mused quietly, putting his hands up in a surrendering motion when cyan eyes landed on him accusingly, “Nothing, nothing! No need to stare, Deucey~!” And at the nickname, Deuce returned to embarrassment, earning another sly comment from Ace. Cater quietly, yet fondly observed the duo bickering while absentmindedly flicking on his phone to keep himself busy. Eventually, the door to the common room clicked open again, to a surprisingly empty-handed Trey.
“Eh? Trey, where’s the stuff?”
“Yeah, Cater told us you were bringing snacks, no fair!”
Deuce said nothing, but he may as well have with the very visible disappointment on his face.
“Woah, woah! No need to hound me when I’m barely through the door,” Trey chuckled, moving closer to the other three boys while carefully dodging the messy pile of blankets and pillows that had splayed out even further across the floor. “I came to check what you’ve got on you already so I know how much to bring.” His eyes glanced over to Cater who had his hand stuck inside the bag of crisps he’d stolen.
“Cater, can you please not steal snacks from people for five minutes?” Trey asked sarcastically, cocking a brow and smirking. Cater wilted dramatically for a second at the callout, before giving in, breaking the farce and laughing.
“Since you asked so nicely, I’ll give it a shot,” He winked over at the freshmen then, grinning, “No promises, though~!”
Trey snickered as Ace and Deuce gawked. He scanned carefully over the spread of snacks cluttering the small table. It wasn’t a huge amount, a few bags of crisps and some bags of gummy sweets. Nothing out of the ordinary. His focus broke when he became aware of the whispering going on between the others, but he didn’t look over just in case it was something he wasn’t supposed to be privy to. He wasn’t about to invade on their private conversations, even if he was in hearing distance. His head did snap up to look at them, however, when Ace called his name.
“Hey, Trey? You’re welcome to join us, by the way,” Ace’s grin was lazy, but genuine as Trey blinked in surprise. “Cater invited himself in anyway, I thought I may as well invite you before he does it himself.”
Cater feigned being hurt as he put the back of his hand to his forehead, leaning back into the sofa. “Such cruel words, Acey…It’ll be a pleasure to have you though, Trey!” He quipped back, shooting trey finger guns.
“No need to talk as though he’s already accepted!” Deuce called Cater out, frowning before nervously turning his attention to Trey, “Er, unless you already decided want to stick around without me noticing. Or something.”
Trey grinned back in the same way he did to his siblings, full of affection towards their antics. He responded simply as he walked toward the door, “I’ll be sure to grab some extra snacks then, thanks for the invite guys.” He waved a hand to say thanks as he walked out the door, before carefully sneaking a glance back at the others; Ace and Deuce were exchanging a grin, while Cater had his gaze fixed on him, and met their eyes with a smile. Softly, he closed the door behind him, walking with a new warmth in his chest to the Heartslabyul kitchen.
-
The moment the door closed, the room fell into silence. It was, to be honest, fairly awkward, until Cater spoke up, twirling a stray lock of ginger hair around his finger.
“So.. what movie are we watching, huh?”
He didn’t seem to be too bothered toward whatever the answer would be, more focused on breaking the silence. Both Ace and Deuce went to answer, but exchanged a look as they noticed the other going to speak; furrowing one brow, while raising the other, before they both went to speak, voices overlapping.
“Scream”
“Fast and Furious”
“Woah woah woah adeuce! Those are two totally different movies, which one are we actually watching?” Cater asked, though he presumed he already knew the answer from the disgusted looks Ace and Deuce were shooting each other.
“Scream!”
“Fast and Furious!”
Cater looked between the two, smirking. Leave it to them to plan a movie night and not pick the movie.
“No need to squabble! I’ll decide for you~!” He spoke with a wink.
“No.” came the reply in unison.
“Alright, alright..” Cater put his hands up, sighing dramatically, “I’ll get an unbiased opinion for you!” he went to grab his phone, swiping it open and flicking through it routinely. “By the way, Scream? You didn’t strike me as a slasher fan, Ace?”
Ace raised a brow, “Eh? I mean, i'm not really. I just like films, and haven't seen it before. Felt it was too much of a classic to not have watched, even if I end up disliking it.”
Cater hummed in response, pulling up a group chat within his texts.
-
“nrcs coolest club!!”
11:08pm
cater 🎸: hiii guys i need you to help settle a debate for me
cater 🎸: please + ty :3
kalim 🥁: HII whats the debate abt?? if idk anything abt it i can always go ask jamil :D
cater 🎸: nono its fine if u dont know you dont know! no sweat ;D
cater 🎸: basically which movie: scream or fast and furious!!
cater 🎸: or tangled ;p
lilia 🎤: scream
cater 🎸: that was fast
lilia 🎤: (;
cater 🎸: i do Not like the sound of that!
kalim 🥁: i wasnt so sure because i havent watched some of those so i asked around scarabia and the verdict was scream!!!!
kalim 🥁: i think???
kalim 🥁: i may or may not have lost count :(((
cater 🎸: all good thank u kings !
-
“Alllright! Verdicts in!” Cater chirped, closing his phone with a satisfying ‘click!’.
“So.. what is it?” Deuce asked, clearly excited. Ace raised a brow cooly, though the suspense of not knowing what would be picked had clearly gotten to him too with the impatient glint in his eye.
“The verdict waaas..! Sc-”
“We’re back.”
The trio turned around quickly at Trey’s voice, before freezing at the figure stood next to him. Riddle himself was shifting slightly from foot to foot, dressed in a matching set of red silk pyjamas. A slight frown was cast over his features as he gazed around the room, deftly dodging everyone's eyes.
“D-dorm head! Er… don’t mind the mess! That was Cater’s fault!”
“Whaa-! How! …Riddle, can I just say how much I love… your pyjamas?”
“We’ll clean it up right away! Oh man.. What would Mom say…”
Riddle awkwardly coughed in an attempt to cut them off. The room fell into silence.
“I don’t mind the mess. I’m sure you’ll all clean it up later. I was wondering if perhaps… I might join you for your movie night? I’m aware Trey and Cater did, I was curious if I may do the same.” He spoke, stiffly, but hopefully. The silence held thick in the room for a minute, before Ace spoke up.
“Seriously, how many people are gonna join in? Who’s next, the rest of Heartslabyul? Yeah, sure you can join in.” He said with a sigh and an eyeroll, though it was clear the situation didn’t really bother him one bit.
“Trey? What’s that you’ve bought with you? Is that the snacks?” Deuce inquisitively piped up as Trey set down some plates on the table. He nodded in return.
“It isn’t much, let me know what you think, though. They’re mostly all leftovers, if I’m being honest.” He stepped back to let everyone else have a look at what he’d brought with him. The plate closest to Cater held a selection of mini quiches and other similar bitesize savoury snacks, whereas the plate nearer to Ace and Deuce held jam tarts and sweet little snacks in a large variety. The latter gasped while Cater simply reached out to grab and eat a mini quiche with a wink.
“They’re good as always, Trey~!” Cater hummed as Trey sat beside him and Ace.
“Trey’s skills at baking and cooking will never cease to amaze me.” Riddle stated fondly, moving to take a seat in an armchair near the sofa everyone else had gravitated towards before he felt a grip on his arm.
“If you’re joining us for movie night, you gotta actually join us for movie night, dorm head.” Ace said with a smirk, pulling Riddle over until he was seated between Ace and Trey. Riddle went to ask Ace what he thought he was doing until Trey cut him off.
“Hm.. Where’s the remote gotten to..?”
And thus the first and second years scramble for the remote began. Cater laughed as the trio searched desperately, with an occasional curse thrown out every few seconds until Deuce victoriously produced the plastic rectangle. Trey let out a laugh of his own.
“Nice job, guys.” Trey said, standing up, much to everyone's confusion before they realised he was heading for the light switch. Everything was calm, soft chatter descending on everyone as the lights flicked off, and pillows and blankets were tossed over toward the sofa - two landing in succession over the first years heads, much to the others amusement. Soon enough, Trey turned the TV on and then returned to his spot, Cater taking the chance to lean on him casually.
“Right then..” Deuce spoke, flicking through the genres casually in search of his choice of movie.
“Since when were you allowed to be the one to decide what we watched?” Ace said with a snort, grabbing the remote out of his hands, “I don’t remember you getting pick of the movie.”
“No one had pick of the movie, you idiot! Cater never got to finish his sentenc- Hey, you’re just putting on your movie now!” Deuce gasped incredulously, mouth hanging open.
Amidst the chaos, the remote was deftly pinched from Ace’s hand as he gloated to Deuce. “I’ll take that, if neither of you can come to a decision, thank you.”
Riddle calmly ignored the 'what!'s from the first years as he turned on the first movie to catch his eye, before setting the remote down.
“No fair, this isn't even your movie night…”
“And who’s letting you use this room again, may I ask?”
Riddle smirked. The others laughed.
-
Suddenly, the commotion was cut off by a bright flash of phone screen light. Cater.
“Cater.” Riddle glowered.
“Sorry, sorry! Didn’t realise the screen brightness was up that high- wait, Trey, what’re you doing? Give me my phone back- Trey!”
With a smirk, Trey unceremoniously dropped Caters phone into the mess of blankets and pillows. Everyone laughed again as Cater let out a childish “come ooon…” at the loss of his phone. Blankets 1, Cater 0.
With that out the way, Riddle pressed the play button and set the remote down on the table. Soft chatter formed around the group before it died off with hushes from everyone in turn, until the room was still once again.
-
Time passed, and eventually the credits began to roll, knocking Ace out of the focus he had settled into during the movie. He took the time to begin to say something about his thoughts on it, rubbing his eyes as he did so. But the second he voiced his first syllable, he was cut off by a chorus of ‘shh’s from the third years. Confusion settled on his face at the soft smiles his seniors wore, before he took notice of his surroundings in the dim lighting from the TV.
To his right, Deuce had his eyes closed, and was leaning against him for support, mouth slightly open and soft snores escaping every so often. Riddle was squished in between himself and Trey, face the calmest he’d ever seen it. This would totally be the moment to take a blackmail picture, if he could.
He turned his attention back to Trey and Cater, giving them a soundless snicker and a smile, which they returned. He reached for the remote, moving to put on Space Jam before sitting back, leaning a little more in return toward Deuce. Surely, closing his eyes for a second wouldn't hurt, right? He can afford to miss the start of the movie, he knows it well enough by now.
The third years exchanged a fond look as they watched all their juniors fall asleep.
-
Cater opened his eyes, lashes fluttering open gently. Even before he had opened his eyes he had been vaguely aware of the warmth he was enveloped in, the weight he was leaning on.
He smiled as he pulled himself off of Trey, unlatching the older mans arm from around his shoulder before standing up, careful to not make a noise in fear of disturbing the unfamiliar peace they had created.
He stretched gently, rolling his neck and shoulders with a satisfying 'pop' before rummaging through the blankets, eventually pulling out his phone. He pulled open the camera and flipped it to selfie mode.
The photo of him framing everyone else's peaceful slumber was so going in his favourites folder.
He smiled fondly one last time before beginning to take careful strides out of the room. Lovely as the night before may have been, clean up duty was so not his style!