Work Text:
Jazz sits in the window nook of her dorm room.
Rain hits rhythmically against the window.
A soft staccato against the quiet violin music playing from her mini radio.
A soft knitted blanket with little cartoon ghosts lays draped over her lap.
On the table next to her sits the mini radio and a mug of tea on a keep-warm pad and a small plate with a slightly glowing cupcake.
She sits, settled amongst half a dozen pillows and about as many plushies.
A book the size of an encyclopedia rests against her knees.
She flips a page.
Next to her, on the floor, sits her roommate Laura with a large sketch pad sketching away.
Laura looks up momentarily, dropping the charcoal stick in her hand to grab a different one.
Checking again, she makes a couple of quick motions on the paper, slowly forming the image of Jazz reading on the page.
Jazz reaches out to take a sip of the tea before settling back as she was before.
“You know,” Kelli says on the couch behind Laura, “If she didn’t move for her tea or to change the page she was on, I would have thought she was a statue.”
Sarah tilts her head, “Well she did summon that creepy ghost knight that one time. Are we sure she’s part of the living?”
“I can hear you, you know,” Jazz comments, flipping a page but not looking up.
“Then can you please finish our debate? Are you dead or living?” Kelli says, putting her own book down.
“I died and then I got better,” Jazz takes a sip of her tea.
“Ah yes, that makes so much sense,” Sarah throws a piece of popcorn at her which she catches. “How exactly did you die?!”
“I got better, don’t worry about it,” she shrugs.
Laura groans on the floor, “Please stop making my model move! I have to finish this study by midnight!”
“But this is important!” Kelli throws up her hands.
“My GPA is important!” Laura tosses her kneadable eraser at her.
The door opens and Michelle walks in.
“Hey, ya’ll having fun here?” she asks, kicking her shoes off.
“We’re currently trying to have an existential crises over Jazz,” Kelli says,
“Why?” Michelle frowns at the lot of them.
“Cause she apparently died!” Kelli exclaims.
“I got better, clearly!” Jazz says, a little exasperated. “But we can have a serious conversation if you want.”
“Please,” Kelli says.
“I’m all ears,” Sarah agrees.
“Oh this, I have to hear,” Michelle says, stepping over the back of the couch to sit between the two.
“Can it be quick? I’m so close to finishing this,” Laura asks, putting her sketch down.
Jazz shrugs, sitting up a bit and setting the giant tome of a book to the side.
“So, long story short, my parents ripped a hole into the fabric of reality to make a portal to hell in our basement. This led to a small war between the living and the dead and my brother became king of the ghosts and as his older sister, I had to die to claim my right as First Princess. But it was only temporary.”
“The being dead part or the princess part?” Sarah asks.
“The being dead part.”
“That-” Kelli shakes her head. “No wait, go back, what the actual fuck Jazz?”
“That’s the brief summary, if you want more details, we have to take a trip to see Clockworth.”
A sticky note appears on her forehead.
She blinks and pulls it off.
“Sorry, we have to see Clockwork.”
“How did- where did that come from?” Michelle asks.
“Clockwork is the physical embodiment of time itself.”