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High Point University



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Sun Aug 22, 2021 1:33 am
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Mageheart says...



"But ice cream," Daniel protested.

"Old men is even worse than ice cream," Benji said. He glanced between Daniel and Kayla. His lips were drawn in a thin line, but their tips were twitching like he wanted to give an amused smile. Add in the little twinkle to his eyes, and it was kind of...cute-

Daniel froze at the thought.

"...I do think it's a creative idea," Benji relented, oblivious to Daniel's current train of thought.

xXx

kartiel → bo
[Text]


kartiel

hi, bo. i'm not busy

kartiel

what's wrong?
mage

[ she/her, but in a boy kinda way ]

roleplaying is my platonic love language.

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Wed Sep 01, 2021 12:24 am
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soundofmind says...



Bo started typing quickly.

so like, if a girl u like calls u hot and then runs away cuz she probably didn't mean to say it out loud cuz she's a little drunk do u let her go so she can like, breathe for a min or do u go after her like what would u do in that hypothetical situation


And send.

--<>--


"If you wanted a really creative idea," Kayla said, leaning a little more into Carter's shoulder as they sat on the couch. "One of you could be King Kong, and one of you could be Godzilla."

"Wouldn't that make them rivals, though?" Carter pointed out.

"Not in the fanfiction I read," Kayla said with a little laugh.

Carter nodded.

"Fair point," he said.
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Mageheart says...



Daniel blinked.

"You read fanfiction?" he asked, eyes wide. Daniel was very much the type to read fanfiction—after all, he was one of the two cosplaying as a fictional character right now. He just hadn't expected that Kayla would be into it, too.

Then the first part registered.

"You read fanfiction about King Kong and Godzilla?" he asked. He was too preoccupied with that to notice how confused Benji was looking next to him.

xXx


kartiel → bo
[Text]


kartiel

bo
you know i'm gay
i wouldn't be going after girls in the first place

kartiel

but if i was in your situation
i would let her breath for a little
and then go talk to her

kartiel

she's probably panicking for the reason you guessed
but since it's mutual i don't think you should totally avoid her

kartiel

...who's the girl?
mage

[ she/her, but in a boy kinda way ]

roleplaying is my platonic love language.

queer and here.





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Mon Sep 06, 2021 10:47 am
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soundofmind says...



Bo → Kartiel
[Text]


Bo
her name is Jerica

Bo
she's this really badass football player and she's really funny and pretty and ngl i feel like she's like way out of my league

Bo
am i panicking?

Bo
maybe
yes


Bo
i will be okay tho im an ADULT... ha... ok i will hav to go talk to her... in a bit yes. how long is too long to wait like how do i FEEL THIS OUT

--<>--


"Yeah, I read fanfic," Kayla said matter-of-factly. "What, and you don't?"
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Tue Sep 14, 2021 12:36 am
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Mageheart says...



"Not about them," Daniel said. Maybe he should. He didn't know too much about either of them, but he was always in search of new fics to read.

And he was intrigued by the potential of that ship...

He looked Kayla over again. He hadn't ever been able to spring this question on someone before, but he was sure he had found a kindred spirit. Kayla would know what cryptids were. Even better, she'd have an opinion.

"Slight change of topic," Daniel said, "but I've been waiting to ask someone this for a long time. If you had to get together with a cryptid, which one would you get together with? Mine would be Mothman-"

Nearby, Benji, for reasons even Benji couldn't quite explain, almost choked on his soda.

xXx

kartiel → bo
[Text]


kartiel

you're definitely panicking

kartiel

but i think she's probably thinking the same thing, bo
she probably thinks you're out of her league, too.
you're a good kind person with a good sense of humor

kartiel

and you know how to cook, too
which is tragically something most people our age still can't do

kartiel

maybe you could talk to her in thirty minutes?
that seems like a good time to wait
mage

[ she/her, but in a boy kinda way ]

roleplaying is my platonic love language.

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Tue Sep 14, 2021 2:20 am
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veeren says...



Before Lordy could figure out what was going on, he was being tugged away from his first class seats on the young love express- where the football star and the chef were just beginning to feel the waves of infatuation crash over one another like a tsunami hitting a mailbox.

Lordy stumbled around behind Mel as she pulled him and Rek away from the kitchen and back towards the living room. He glanced over at Rek to see if he had any idea what she was planning, but he seemed just as taken aback as Lordy was.

"By chance, do you think we can make a u-turn and grab a few drinks?" Lordy asked to no one in particular.

Before he could do any real convincing, though, he noticed a group of his students sitting on a couch chatting together. Unfortunately, even in a rat suit, he was still recognizable and had a reputation to keep up for the sake of his academic credibility.

"WHAT'S UP NERDS??" He shouted over at them.

---

A familiar voice cut through the room, and Morri noticed Lordy beelining straight towards a couch full of what he assumed, and hoped, were his students.

Morri shook his head, "Thankfully, he didn't see us here." He turned to Evaline, "I figure the last thing you want is for me to have to smack him again."

He turned back and scanned the room. The house was fairly large. Then again, it was a frat house, and for guys like this, it was always go big or go home.

"I feel like Lordy has had enough drinks to not be allowed to walk about unsupervised now, so I'm going to give you two options," Morri took a sip of his beer, "We can either go over there and run the risk raising our blood pressure, or I can help get you to who- I'm sorry, where you really want to be."

Morri gave Evaline a soft smile, "Unless of course you'd actually prefer to stay here and watch everyone make a fool of themselves for the rest of the night."
"Love is the name for our pursuit of wholeness, for our desire to be complete."
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Tue Sep 14, 2021 3:06 am
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soundofmind says...



Bo → Kartiel
[Text]


Bo
that's a good and wise idea u are very level headed yes thank you okay

Bo
i will do that

Bo
i will b ok

--<>--


Kayla looked like she was seriously considering Daniel's question for a moment, but Carter was more entertained by Daniel's apparent flustered reaction at Daniel's monster-f***er question. Carter laughed, and was amused when Kayla responded with little hesitation.

"I think I'd go for bigfoot," she said.

Carter raised his eyebrows at her, and she turned to meet his eyes with a smile and a snort.

"Second choice would be King Kong," she said.

"King Kong isn't a cryptid, is he?" Carter countered, and Kayla was about to reply, but was interrupted by a drunken slur. Or rather, a giant rat.

Lordshire.

"Professor?" Kayla's voice came out high-pitched, unsure.

"I see you've embraced your rodent energy," Carter said to Lordshire with a small nod.
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Tue Oct 05, 2021 4:22 am
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Carina says...



Evaline had to suppress a groan when she followed Morrigan's eyes and saw a tall, distinguishable face out of the crowd -- or rather, a rat head. It was Lordshire, but luckily he seemed to beeline towards others before he could harass them.

But what really had Evaline on edge was Morrigan's eerie ability to sense that she was avoiding the question and not telling the whole truth. What was he, a part-time therapist on the side?

Was it actually that bad to tell him the truth, though? The truth that she truly did want to see James right now? On one hand, Morrigan was inviting. On the other, it was a little weird to tell James's English teacher about this...

She should just talk to him. Not Morrigan. James.

"It's, um -- it's fine. Really," Evaline said half-reassuringly while she reached in her dress pocket and picked up her phone. She quickly unlocked it and opened her texts that was (perhaps unashamedly) already opened at James's contact, but before she could type anything, her eyes caught sight of the people who were previously herding Lordshire around.

And she froze, phone still in hand, with a deer-in-the-headlights look.

---

Although Mel lost Lordy, she didn't abandon her mission to show her friends around. She rolled her eyes as Lordy went off to rattattatata Elias and the others, but then beamed when she saw Morri and Evaline's heads poking out through the crowd. She pushed through while still holding on to Rek's hand like a ragdoll until they were finally in front.

"Hey guys!" she said with a big smile, finally letting go and setting her hands on her hips. She decided to ignore Evaline's weird gawky stare at Rek... for now. "We just came back from shots. Rek, did ya bring some more for your new friends?"

---

Elias may or may not have been following the conversation happening with the guys right now. Or maybe he was lost in his own world. What was time, anyways, if not a social concept?

Suddenly a random rat man showed up and called them nerds. Ah yes, just a normal day here in the frat house.

"Hey man, I like your costume," Elias said with a toothy grin as he dino-pointed as his own inflatable costume. "Could've been an inflatable rat, though."
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Mageheart says...



Benji froze when Lordshire suddenly came over.

He was already feeling flustered for reasons he couldn't really explain, but seeing that professor—who was dressed as a rat—at a place he didn't expect to see a professor at made him feel even worse.

"You know who that is, right-" Daniel started to say to Elias, only to pause when he seemed to realize that Elias really different. Benji, who was desperately hoping Lordshire hadn't noticed him yet, started to inch his way over to behind Daniel. If he stood in just the right place, maybe his professor wouldn't see him. Maybe he was already drunk and wouldn't question why someone was hiding behind Daniel.

Daniel glanced over his shoulder.

"Are you okay...?" he asked.

"I'm fine," Benji quickly and quietly said.
mage

[ she/her, but in a boy kinda way ]

roleplaying is my platonic love language.

queer and here.





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Shady says...



This was why he didn't come to parties.

'I'll stay with you Rek'
'It'll be fun Rek'
'The time will fly by, Rek'


And here he was. Without Jerica. Not having fun. With time frozen in place as he gaped at Eve. He shook his head, trying to shake away all the angst that had suddenly replaced all his blood and was coursing through his body instead.

"I..." He cleared his throat. This couldn't be happening. Jerica might be drunk enough for awkward conversation, but he certainly wasn't. "No, sorry guys. I'll go grab some!"

He stumbled backward a step, eyes still locked on Evaline.

He wasn't coming back.

"u and rina are systematically watering down the grammar of yws" - Atticus
"From the fish mother to the fish death god." - lehmanf
"A fish stole my identity. I blame shady" - Omni
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veeren says...



Inflatable. Lordy pondered the though for a moment, stroking his beard with one hand while resting his other on his hip.

"You're right, I very much could have." He looked at the talking dinosaur, "Where did you even get that thing?"

Before waiting for a response, he looked at the crowd around him. A couple of girls who he didn't recognize were also on the couch with the dinosaur. Then there was Carter, the flaming sack of everything that Lordy would despise, if it weren't for the fact that it was Carter, wrapped up into one small package.

Right beside him, however, were a couple of his other student, "What are you two lovebirds up to? Where are your COSTUMES?"

---

Morrigan looked back and forth between the kids. There was certainly some unspoken tension among them, and while he'd love to dig deeper into the backstory for nothing more than the sheer banter of it all, he had come here to be the babysitter.

Once Rek announced that he was going to grab some drinks, Morrigan's abandonment issues began to resurface and worries bubbled up that Rek wouldn't be coming back.

"Bring me a beer if you will, my boy!" He locked eyes with Rek, "I'm quite thirsty so if you could put some pep in your step, that would be lovely. Can't keep these young ladies waiting, can you?"
"Love is the name for our pursuit of wholeness, for our desire to be complete."
-Plato's Symposium





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Sat Nov 06, 2021 7:26 am
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Shady says...



Oh, but he could. He could keep them all night and wouldn't feel one bit bad.

Okay, he would feel guilty. But he'd rather face his guilt than talk to Eve in front of a professor. Gods only knew how that conversation was going to go. It certainly didn't need witnesses.

A professor.

The horror of the situation dawned on Rek at once.

Professor Morrigan had specifically asked him to return with a beer. He could ditch his friends with no repercussions, except for being called a 'Party Pooper' -- which was basically his professional title at this point.

But a professor?

What would even happen if he flaked on a professor? If it had been Professor Lordshire, he'd fear for his grade -- he'd witnessed many threats against grades by this point in the semester. But Morrigan wouldn't resort to that... would he?

"I, um, ah, yeah!" Rek stumbled backward another step, eyes wide and still locked on Professor Morrigan. He bumped into someone behind him and muttered an apology, but still couldn't seem to look away. "Of course! For sure! I, um... will... be back?"

That was still to be decided.

How much did his grade really need for him to endure this awkwardness? He had precisely a 99.73 in the course (he'd checked on all his grades just this morning). He could probably get all C's for the rest of the semester and still keep his A. He didn't enjoy his transcript being tarnished with A-'s but it would be worth it to get out of this.

Morrigan surely wouldn't give him lower than C's. Surely. And if he did, then Rek would simply escalate the matter. His work was always impeccable -- there was no way that an external party would sanction giving Rek grades lower than C. He'd just take it to Dean... Lordshire.

Fuck.

"Soon?" he added uncertainly, then turned and started back towards the table where he'd left Jerica and Bo.

Jerica.

That was the answer.

Evaline and Mel could fend for themselves. Rek would simply task Jerica with taking a beer to Morrigan. That would get him off the hook as the beer go-for, and also get Jerica away from Bo before she did something that Sober-Jerica would come to regret. And it probably wouldn't even be that hard to convince her to go along with the plan.

She'd come home from her girl's night out with Mel drunkenly rambling about how Morrigan liked her poem. Like, for real - for real. Like he said that he liked it. And he brought it up so he must have been telling the truth because otherwise, he wouldn't have brought it up. And he liked her poem!!!

Rek wasn't sure exactly what had happened, but Jerica grumbled about Morrigan's class far less than she did any of her others ever since that night. And she actually seemed to put effort into her work, which was rare for her in courses outside of her major.

Yes. Okay. Just go back to the kitchen. Make Jerica take Morrigan a beer.

Easy.

Rek was still caught up in his own head as he walked towards the kitchen. And then he spotted Bo standing next to the wall, looking at his phone. Jerica was nowhere in sight.

Uh oh.

Either things had gone very poorly. Or she'd gotten distracted and wandered off. Or she was passed out on the floor somewhere.

He didn't know which one to hope for.

"Hey, Bo!" Rek said, holding up his hand in an awkward wave. What was he even doing? He probably shouldn't talk to Bo until he heard from Jerica what had come of her drunken-compliments-that-were-possibly-flirting. Still, Bo was the last person who had seen her -- which would exponentially speed up the process of finding her, rather than having to scour each room of the house. "Where's, uh... Jerica?"

"u and rina are systematically watering down the grammar of yws" - Atticus
"From the fish mother to the fish death god." - lehmanf
"A fish stole my identity. I blame shady" - Omni
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Sat Nov 06, 2021 8:29 am
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soundofmind says...



Bo was trying to simultaneously sort out his thoughts and build up courage for the conversation he already knew needed to happen. He was glad Kartiel was a good friend and gave him the push, though. Now that Bo had a moment to panic, the panic was starting to fade and he felt like he could think more rationally. There was still lingering anxiety, sure, but he felt a little less like a deer in the headlights and more like a deer on the side of the road watching the car go by, and he was just waiting for the road to be clear.

Thirty minutes. He could wait that long.

Bo took in a deep sigh, starting to rehearse what he might say in his head, but mid-potential-i-like-you-confession-rehearsal, Rek's voice burst his bubble.

Bo blinked, not realizing he'd completely spaced out with his phone still in hand.

"Oh," he said, quickly pocketing it away, straightening up a little so he was no longer leaning on the wall. "Hey, Rek. Yeah, uh... Jerica kind of ran off. I was going to go look for her... in a bit. Wanted to give her some space. She seemed pretty uh, flustered. To say the least."

He flashed a small, shy smile, not quite able to meet Rek's eyes.

"She, uh... ran off?"

Bo felt his face burning a little bit.

"Yeah, well, uh," Bo said slowly. "I think she might've been embarassed. She uh, complimented me a lot. But didn't really give me any chance to reply, because she ran off into the crowd."

"Oh." Rek was silent for a moment. "That sounds, uh... heh. How did you, uh... I mean..."

"React?" Bo asked.

"Um, yeah." Rek buried his hands in his pockets.

"Well, I was doing fine until she called me hot," Bo said, his face likely very red even in the weird Halloween eerie lighting. "Then my brain short-circuited and I froze for a hot second. And in that hot second, she uh--"

He made his pointer and middle finger run off into the air like little legs.

"Ya know," he said.

"She..." Rek's eyebrows shot up, but he quickly recovered, mostly. He nodded awkwardly. "Yeah, she does that when... she uh... sorry about that. That must have felt awkward."

"Bro, you don't have to apologize for Jerica," Bo said.

"Cool, yeah, I'm just... well... I don't know how that felt for you is all."

Bo wasn't sure he knew either. He was in the process of figuring that out, still.

"Well," Bo said slowly. "Uh. What are good emotion words."

He hummed, leaning back against the wall again as he put his hands into his pockets.

"Surprised, at first," he said with a small sigh. "And uh... well. Okay. You know when all of a sudden your stomach is full of a bunch of butterflies and it's like, not anxiety, but kind of anxiety, but it's like good, but also you're freaking out, but it's not bad necessarily? You know, like that?"

He looked to Rek for confirmation.

"No, yeah, I gotchu." Rek nodded encouragingly. "Totally know what you mean... so, uh... conflicted, then?"

"Not conflicted," Bo said probably too quickly. "I mean, yeah. Not... it's more like..."

Bo paused again to let out a long sigh.

"I'm verbally processing this so just bear with me," he said.

"Go for it, man."

Bo nodded, more to himself.

"I don't know, you know when like... you have friends, and you're like, well, it would be really cool if they were interested in me but you just kind of assume it'll never happen? Sort of as a way to protect yourself, I guess, because, I mean, like... Jerica? She's... man, I, hah--" he shook his head, lifting up his hand to his face and dragging it down. He could be dramatic, just for a treat.

"I guess I just assumed she only ever saw me as a bro and that's all she ever would see me as. So I'm just... processing," Bo said, looking back to Rek. "Because I mean, I don't know what that means, you know. Just 'cause a girl throws compliments at you... does that mean she likes you? Would it be wrong of me to assume that? I don't want to make it worse by being like, 'hey, I like you too!' and then she's all, 'oh, I didn't mean it like that,' and then bam. I just made it even more awkward, and threw a bomb into that friendship."

Rek's shoulders visibly relaxed a bit and he offered an encouraging smile. "I mean... I can't speak for Jerica, necessarily... but, I mean, you could maybe take her at her word?"

Bo was quiet for a moment, thinking about it.

"That would be the kind thing to do," he said to himself. "I think."

"The... kind...?"

"Like, to just take her at her word and believe she means what she says," Bo said. "And not overthink it? Or should I overthink it?"

"I, uh... I mean... no need to overthink things," he said hesitantly. "Like... if you like her... and she said she likes you...you know?"

Bo hummed in the back of his throat and squinted into the hall, over Rek's head.

"I mean... I do," he said quietly. "Like her, I mean."

"That's great!" Rek said a bit too eagerly. He sobered a moment later. "I mean, like... you're a great dude. She's a great... not-dude? And, uh, yeah, um... I mean, I ship it."

"Did you--" Bo stuttered, about to ask why Rek called her a 'not-dude' but then his brain tripped up on the 'I ship you' statement once it finally processed.

Bo let out a small laugh as a knee-jerk reaction that just kind of flew out of him.

"Um. Yes... yeah. Yes. Ships. We can discuss ship names later after I figure out... like, after I-- I need to talk to her, first, man," Bo said with the nervous laugh still lingering in his voice.

"Yeah," Rek agreed. "Talking to her seems like a good idea."

"After I find her first," Bo said.

"She's outside," Rek said with no hesitation.

Bo blinked.

Had Rek... planned this? Or did Rek just ship them that hard? Bo didn't want to think about being shipped. He was going to forget that concept and just focus on talking to Jerica, because his brain didn't have room for both at the moment.

"Oh," he said, looking down the hall. "Well. I guess uh, I'll be off, then."

He paused as he turned, glancing back at Rek.

"...Wish me luck?" he said with at least five question marks implied.

"I wish you all of the luck," Rek said with a smile. "Oh, by the way, she's... well... she's gonna need some encouragement, you know? Like... she probably won't want to be the first person to... continue? You know?"

"Don't worry," Bo said, working up the confidence in his own voice and in his gut. "I've got this."

It was potentially a bluff, but wasn't that just, like, all of life? Who really "had" anything? Everyone was just pretending all the time. He just had to do it.

"You most certainly do, my friend," Rek answered. "You got this."

Bo nodded and gave Rek a small, confident smile before he spun down the hall towards the kitchen, heading to the backyard.
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soundofmind says...



“Oh please, we’ve been over this,” Carter droned to Lordshire, who was harassing Benji and Daniel about their costumes. “They’re characters from a TV show. It’s basically cosplay.”

At that, he pushed himself off the couch, slipping out from under Kayla’s arm.

“I’m going to grab some food,” he said, glancing back at Kayla to share a quick smile with her. “I’ll see you all again, I’m sure. Don’t pick on the Supernatural lovebirds too much.”

With that, he departed, off into the crowd - not just to get food as he’d claimed, but curiously seeking out a pitifully dressed devil who stuck out in the crowd by a certain english professor.

He slipped through the kitchen to grab a drink and weaved his way through the steadily growing crowd until he spotted Morri’ head.

He popped out from behind Morri’s back.

“Fancy seeing you here, Professor,” he said with a smile. “And you, Evaline, I don’t believe we’ve ever formally met. I’m Carter Haddon, though I’m sure you’re also familiar with my name.”
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Carina says...



Evaline could feel embarrassment pool in her cheeks when she thought back to the day she first met Rek. She was a hot mess, lashing out and desperately needing stability even though she consistently self-sabotaged herself. She better understood herself now and can acknowledge her problems and work to improve herself, but it can be hard to do so when talking with someone who only knew an ugly side of her.

Rek was one of those people. Even when he tried to reconcile things, she had pushed him away.

Evaline knew what she had to do. She had to go after him and apologize, even if it was clear he was trying to avoid her. She didn't blame him.

Evaline snapped out of her trance on Rek and was about to make the excuse of helping him get a drink (for Morrigan, his professor...?), but was interrupted before she could.

By Carter, dressed in a knight in armor. How ironic, since James had described him to be a narcissistic, controlling, manipulative man far from being a chivalrous knight.

Then again, she shouldn't be the one to talk since she was dressed as a devil.

"No... sorry. The name doesn't ring a bell. Who are you?" Evaline asked innocently with a hint of being creeped out since Carter already knew her name.

James had warned her enough times about his roommate, and Evaline was far-too-familiar with people like him. Carter was clearly trying to fish her for information...

But she wasn't going to give him any of it.
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