Work Text:
You know those times where everyone else was partying because they were done with finals, but you still had one left? There was a party across campus, everyone I knew had gone, but I was still here, studying. I thought everyone in the dorm had left, gone home or gone out. My music was on, I was focused, just one more night of this and I was done for a few months. But I was also so tired. I was too anxious about this all, too high strung, I needed to do something other than read and write. I needed to see the blue sky again, breathe air again. The song wound down and the silence between songs was sharp and empty, until an ear piercing scream cut through the emptyness. I took this as an excuse to stop. Some one could be dying, I couldn't just study through that. I grabbed my roommate's basketball trophy, it seemed like it would cause some damage if it needed to. The sound came from a room down the hall but I wasn't sure which until a sound came from it. I burst through the door to find, not a murder as expected, but instead, a grown man standing on his bed covering his eyes and a spider crawling towards him.
"Who the hell are you?" He shrieked, taking his hands off his eyes but only just enough to see me.
"Poe, I live down the hall. Are you ok?"
"I- yeah." Out of the corner of his eye he must have seen the spider move again because then he squealed, covered his eyes, moved closer to the corner and shouted, "NO!"
I grabbed a piece of paper and a cup from the desk next to me.
"Ok, I'm going to try and catch it, but it might run. Are you ready to sprint to the other bed?"
He nodded and moved one finger away from his eyes. "You can't kill it though, it's my roommate's pet."
"How have you survived this year?"
I moved to the bed, kneeled down to eye level, and quickly slammed the cup onto the bed. The guy squealed, yet again, and jumped-JUMPED-to the other bed. I stared at him in shock for a moment until I was interrupted by an inhuman squeal and crazy pointing, bringing me back to task. I slid the paper underneath and he opened the habitat just in time for me to drop the spider inside.
"That was amazing, how did you do that?"
"All I did was catch a spider, how did you jump across the room?"
"Why did you even come here, who are you?"
"I heard the screaming and thought you were getting murdered."
"Was that out loud?"
I laughed and brushed my hair out of my eyes, breathing properly for the first time since the scream rang through the halls.
"I'm Finn. Thank you." he breathed, almost a whisper, as he held out his hand.
"Always happy to procrastinate through spider catching."