Aluminum Stars [Merida & Anna]

[ALICE MOYRA CARROLL]

MERIDA LIAN DUNBAR & ANNA LEISLE LARSEN

Dusk was edging over the horizon as Alice rushed herself home. She had to stay after in school to make up for homework she had conveniently forgotten to do. The teacher was on to her, she was sure of it. Only so many more assignments could be skipped before she’d get into serious trouble. Whatever that could be. It wasn’t like any of this mattered anyways. Her talents were in tennis, and knowing how to do mathematical equations had nothing to do with that. Physics was a little different, obviously, because that could be applied to the sport, but she really didn’t care at the end of the day. School was sort of pointless and kept her from doing what she wanted to. And today that happened to be getting home at her normal time. Being held after completely ruined her plans to go to the park and practice serves, her racket clinking on her backpack reminding her with every step she took.

Thankfully home wasn’t far from school. Thinking back on it, Alice realized that she probably could have ran from the teacher right after school let out. Once she was off school property it wasn’t like they could drag her back on. Obviously it would be a problem for tomorrow at that point, but she had pushed things like that off plenty of times before. Taking the last turn onto the street that Behr House was located on, Alice picked up her pace. The soft glow of the lamps inside would be in view soon, and then all she had to do was waltz right into her room and be done for the night. The decision to take the first floor bedroom had been a good one; easy access to the front door and the kitchen. She could eat whenever she wanted to without having to do stairs, and know exactly who was going in and out of the house. It was genius and scratched her curiosity constantly.

In a matter of minutes, the house loomed over her, and Alice took the shortcut along the side of it in order to enter from the back door. That door was closer to her bedroom after all, and she’d hate to expend extra energy walking around her roommates when she could skip all of that. They were all great, but sometimes she needed to just avoid them. Especially today. Not being able to burn off her frustration with a few swings of her racket had her bordering boiling point. Entering the house would be the start of cooling down, hopefully.

Two doors later (the back door and her bedroom), Alice dropped her backpack onto the ground, tennis racket rattling on the wood floor as she flopped face first onto her bed and let out a loud groan into her comforter. She maintained her position for a few more minutes, until she looked up to see that the light from outside had disappeared completely. Her room was pitch black. Stretching her arm out to try and reach the lamp on the nightstand next to her bed, she whiffed, forcing her to scooch a little more across the bed in order to reach it. On the second go, her fingers caught the chain and she pulled a bit harder than she probably should have, the lamp crashing down on the floor below it, porcelain shards scattering across the bedroom before she could even process what had happened.

[ANNA LEISLE LARSEN]

Anna hadn't been spending a lot of time at home recently. She wasn't really a home body and tried to keep busy with other things and people, and mostly only went home when she was hungry or otherwise in need of a basic need being met. This time, she was wet and sandy and desperate for a shower by now. She had plans to hang out with Jack after school, and they had decided to go to the beach, where he splashed her, so, naturally, she had to retaliate by tackling him into the ocean. Both of them came out soaking wet. Anna felt pretty good about herself for it though, it wasn't always that she was able to one-up her friend like that.

The red head walked into the house with a confident smile and dropped her bag at the door before making a been line for the kitchen to get a quick snack before going up to take a shower and get some of this dried sand off of her, which was falling off with every step she took. It was everywhere, in every fold of her clothes, attached to her skin and shoes. She knew she was leaving a trail, but there was no use cleaning it up until she was clean. Anna pulled a granola bar out of it's box in the pantry before she heard the crash from her roommates room. She paused for a second to determine if there was any sort of scream or whimper of pain along with the crash before she walked over to the door and knocked. "Alice? You okay in there?" she called through the door. 


ALICE MOYRA CARROLL  MERIDA LIAN DUNBAR

[ALICE MOYRA CARROLL]

MERIDA LIAN DUNBAR & ANNA LEISLE LARSEN

The room was pitch black, her only hope for light dashed along the floor of her bedroom in tiny, unfixable pieces. Alice was stood on her bed, afraid of hopping off and stepping onto one of the lamp shards. The lamp body itself wasn’t that bad, but the jagged edges from the smashed light-bulb and a few smaller porcelain pieces had her worried. One of those suckers would leave a nice hole in her foot and possibly keeping her from going to school for the next few days…

She bit down on her lower lip as she contemplated stepping into the mess, her right foot dangling precariously off the edge of her bed. She stopped short when she heard the knock on her door. It was Anna, asking if she was okay. “Uhh yeah…” Alice called hesitantly over her shoulder, bringing her foot back under her, and backing up into the middle of her bed once again. “I knocked my lamp over and can’t see anything. Can you get a flashlight?” She was sure she could get off the opposite side of her bed and make it to the door without any problems, but now that help was here there was no reason to put herself into danger. Hopefully they had another lamp she could put in the room. The darkness was fine during the day and evenings, but come nighttime (like right now), it was literally impossible to see anything in her room. Sitting down on her bed, she waited for Anna to either fetch a new light, or come barreling in to see the damage.