Chapter Text
Everyone always has incredible stories of their first night of college. The first taste of freedom away from their parents. The chance to become someone other than the child everyone remembers. The unexpected meet-cute that turns into a lifelong friendship or a world-altering romance… at least, that is what it seems like in all the TV shows I've watched and books I've read on the subject. And those same books always have it that the plucky freshman is almost immediately taken under the wing of a wiser, knowledgeable, better connected upperclassman who can show them the ropes and get them into the best parties. However, none of the frankly embarrassing number of books and shows I have consumed on this topic have prepared me for a mentor this reluctant to take up her rightful place as my chaperone into the world of higher education and adulthood.
“Go back to your dorm, Pink,” my sister says in a monotone after finally opening the door to my insistent knocking. I can't stop myself from cringing at the name, not that she sees as she turns around to go back to her desk so she can keep messing with her makeup.
“Red, just because you decided to be known by your mother’s nickname for you while you’re here doesn’t mean that Pink does. Remember that she asked us to call her Piper? She doesn’t want Pink to catch on here and you know it.” Red’s childhood best friend turned roommate Chloe reprimands as she reclines in her desk chair playing with what I pray is a butterfly training knife rather than anything with an actual blade. How she has managed to get so many gems on her face before my sister can manage a decent smokey eye is anyone’s guess. Chloe had practically grown up with us. She and Red were more sisters than friends, leaving me firmly in the role of the “annoying little cousin.”
“She’s wearing pink. Her hair is pink. Her dress has hearts on it. Trust me, people are going to land on 'Pink' even without my help,” Red responds, giving me a once over and a smirk in her mirror without bothering to turn around. I instinctively let go of the pink streak framing my face and smooth my matching dress. I'd dyed the front strands on a whim after seeing celebrities do it, never once considering any color besides pink. Despite trying to push away my childish nickname, pink has always been my favorite color… but as usual my sister knew the exact way to make me feel self conscious despite her bright red hair matching her red leather jacket that is way too hot for the late August temperatures but did annoyingly look rather cool.
“You’re going to Eta Kappa tonight, right?” I had heard Luis, Red’s boyfriend in everything but actual title, invite her to his frat’s start of semester party as he helped us bring in everything to my dorm room just a few hours ago. Apparently the theme was “Down the Rabbit Hole,” a nod to Alice in Wonderland, which is why I had dressed in my pink dress covered in hearts alluding to the Queen of Hearts for the occasion. I didn't have enough time to get a full costume like I would have preferred for a themed occasion, but at least I can give a nod to the party’s focus. However, as I look at both Red and Chloe’s outfits, I realize that both of them were just in more or less their normal clothes rather than wearing anything leaning into the occasion.
“No,” Red says, actually turning around to look at me rather than sticking with my reflection in the mirror, and if I didn’t know better I would think I can see a flash of worry creep into her expression. “I am not bringing my baby sister along to a frat party. Absolutely not! Go back and bond with your roommate or something.” I feel my eyebrows raise, thinking of the empty side of my room that is assigned to a girl with apparently no social media as far as I am able to tell. I feel certain we are destined to be extremely close friends upon her arrival, that’s what ALWAYS happens with roommates in college after all, but I have no interest in burning my first night of college sitting in a half empty room waiting for Desdemona Tremaine to suddenly arrive.
“Red…” Chloe sighs, deftly flicking the butterfly knife-situation closed and getting up. “What is the harm?”
“I don’t want to babysit,” Red all but whines. “She doesn’t know the protocols.” As she says those words, I can see she her shoot Chloe one of their “telepathic looks” that makes me aware that there is more to this exchange than what she is willing to say to me. I can always tell when they communicate this way, but since they never bothered to indoctrinate me into their club enough to learn their shared communication style, I have no clue what the actual message was that passed between them.
“And how will I learn them if no one bothers to teach me? Please, Red, I just want to be in on all the fun! If you don’t take me, I’ll just find my way there myself and stay glued to your side all night. I already know the location is Eta Kappa, and you know I could use either Luis or Robbie’s name at the door to get in without any issue. If you help me get there and let me know basically what to do, I swear that I’ll watch from a safe distance just to observe and get the lay of the land.”
“Don’t eat or drink ANYTHING that wasn’t given to you by Chloe or I,” Red warns after a pause, shoving her keys into her pocket, and heading towards the door behind me. “Luis and Robbie’s frat is a lot of fun, but you’re underage and it is better that your first time being drunk or high is in a less intense environment.“
“You’re underage,” I snap back. She may be older, but only about 15 months. She stops in front of me, smiles from ear to ear in a way that reminds me of Mother’s cat, and bends over so we are the same height.
“I've been doing this for years. I would bet my allowance that you haven’t drank a drop of alcohol or know what weed even smells like. That's the difference. Be safe, kid, just say no to drugs,” she says as she pats me on the head the same way she did when Mom always took her side in family arguments. I shoved her hand away, doing my best to fix my curls.
“I don’t eat or drink anything there either, Pink. Sorry, Piper! I promise I am trying to remember to call you Piper, but 18 years of Pink is hard to shake. It is still a fun time even without that stuff, you won’t miss out I promise,” Chloe says grabbing the back of Red’s coat to give me some breathing room before shoving us both out the door. “Now let’s go before everyone gets too sloppy, it goes from party to biohazard, and I force you both to leave for our communal safety!”
***
Frat parties are supposed to be fun. All of my research indicated that they would be fun. I mean, there is a theme… that no one seems to have given much thought to besides writing “Drink Me” and slapping it on the beer bottles, writing “Eat Me” on some cookies, and a few frat brothers walking around with like white rabbit ears on their heads. And there is dancing… that all seemed to have devolved into dry humping WAY earlier in the evening than I would have bet. But there are games… which all involve drinking that I honestly have basically no personal interest in whatsoever.
Red and Chloe stayed with me just long enough to get me through the door, gave me a quick tour of the main areas, and were now halfway across the room as Red challenges Luis to a game of beer pong while Robbie and Chloe cheer on the side. There are a ton of people milling around, but all of them seem to be in stages of a few different kind of drug/alcohol-induced fogs in a way that made me give up trying.
So that leaves me on the couch, holding the empty cup Chloe had forced into my hand when we passed through the kitchen to act as my prop throughout the night so no one made my choice to be sober a “thing,” heavily considering the merits of simply going back to my dorm room to see if Desdemona had arrived. I find myself examining the one piece of furniture that appears to have any sort of taste or history within the space, an old mantel clock that seems stuck on 6:42. Is a clock still a clock if it is no longer able to tell time anymore, or at that point is it just a decorative paper weight?
I was drawing a bit more attention than I had hoped with my outfit choice... or I guess the more apt thing to say was I was drawing a different type of attention than I would have wanted. “Wow, that is such a FUN reference” is a very different vibe than “Wow, you actually tried? That is embarrassing!” Note to self: being perceived as “trying too hard” is looked down on here just as much as in high school apparently.
I do my best to keep my cheery demeanor up, not allowing the sour turn of my thoughts to cause me to lose out on any chances of a decent conversation if anyone seems interested in approaching me, as I scan the room to see if there was anything present that would make it worth staying here any longer.
Suddenly, my eyes snag on a kid that is talking to Robbie rather animatedly while facing away from me. He has a long purple coat that extends past his knees, fingerless gloves, and a little top hat that had to be a nod to the Mad Hatter. I felt my “stage smile” melt into something more genuine realizing that someone else had taken the theme a bit more seriously.
I watch as the mysterious boy slides off his hat, offering it upside down for Robbie’s inspection. Robbie rolls his eyes at the boy, then the boy surprisingly turns to Luis, disturbing the game to seemingly summon him over. After a bit of a chat where the new boy stays irritatingly turned away from me and for some reason keeps his hat off and situated between himself and the other two boy, Luis takes the hat from him quickly in a rather odd grip before forcing it back into the boy’s hands in a blink of an eye, gestures somewhat pointedly to the back wall and then the door, and the pair simply return to their game of beer pong as if nothing had happened.
I blink, not sure what to make of the interaction as Robbie and Luis, possibly the nicest people I have ever met, seemed visually irritated by the third boy’s presence. My attention follows the boy as he weaves through the crowd towards the door as he had been directed, but not before stopping briefly at the fireplace mantle and quickly swiping the mantel clock I had been admiring earlier into his arms almost immediately ducking through the door after.
I shot to my feet before processing what I am doing, or that I likely should get Robbie or Luis’ attention considering they both seemed to know the guy, I race through the front door after him.
“Stealing from your hosts doesn’t exactly show good manners,” I chastise loudly the second I get onto the stoop with the mysterious boy only about 10 feet in front of me. I had expected him to freeze and turn around horrified, being caught doing something wrong red-handed certainly is an embarrassing experience. However, I was instead shocked when he starts laughing.
“I should have known with her coming last year you wouldn’t be far behind,” he laughs with little apparent amusement. I feel my brows furrow in confusion, knowing this boy is referencing my sister but unsure about why he feels he should have expected me. He turns around, and I am immediately struck by his appearance. His jaw is defined without being overly sharp, softened by his knowing smirk. His cheekbones are subtly pronounced, and his expressive eyebrows add to his clear amusement of me confronting him. Bright eyes are framed by thick lashes that I can see even in the darkness that surrounds us, and his dark hair is clearly tousled beneath his miniature top hat that is perched at a jaunty angle on his head. His eyes appraise me in a way that seems knowing, but nothing clicks in place for me as I stare at him holding the old clock in his hands.
“You know my sister?” I ask, needing to understand the look on his face and am frustrated that when I was trying to catch him off guard about his stealing, he managed to knock me back on my heels instead.
“I knew her a bit once upon a time, we were acquaintances I guess you could say. But, you were the one I knew better, Princess.” I feel my brows furrow further in confusion before everything releases in sudden understanding when the nickname clicks in place and all my facial muscles dropped at once in shock. I quickly do some math calculating ages, my eyes flick around the boy's appearance for anything familiar before getting stuck on the eyes that I do in fact recognize with this new context. I feel myself reflexively take a step forward, grabbing onto the handrail on the side of the steps as if to force myself to stay in place as the boy’s smirk only deepens upon realizing he made the connection before I did.
“Hatter?” I croak, my voice breaking embarrassingly on the second syllable. In response, he skillfully takes off his miniature top hat with his left hand and holds it out to the side as he bows with a flourish as he has done in my direction so many times before. I know deep in my bones he wore that hat as his own fashion statement and not at all for the party still blaring in the forgotten house behind me, it was an article of clothing that should have given him away to me immediately but had been so out of context I can't seem to blame myself for overlooking it. As he straightens up, his eyes once again meeting mine, still holding the old clock in his right hand, the door suddenly crashes open behind me and noise breaks the spell around us in an instant.