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Musa closed the door of her apartment exhausted, before heading to the living room where all her friends were gathered.
“And she's back ladies and gentlemen! The question is “did she find her keys?”
The brunette glared at the blonde girl while she got rid of her shoes before sitting down on the sofa between Aisha and Terra.
“Come on Musa tell us, did you find them or not?”
“Yes Terra I found them.”
All the girls applauded laughing while the young girl try to slap them gently,
“Girls, it was an obstacle course, I had never seen that. I believe it was the first time in my life that I entered a frat house during the day.”
Bloom, who was sitting on the ground, turned completely towards her friends, curious.
"What happened ?"
“Oh yes, tell us!” Stella settled back comfortably on the cushion. “You can start after the moment you came home to the apartment totally drunk, banging like a nag on the door at five in the morning because it was closed, and after waking us all up to have the door opened for you, you finally fell asleep on the sofa. Oh! No it's true, I forgot that you first vomited in the toilet and then fell asleep on the sofa.”
“You know what Stella, sometimes you’re not funny at all.”
The blonde made a face at her while the brunette tried to kick her.
“Anyway.”, Aisha patted Musa's shoulder lightly, "Tell us what happened when you went back there."
“Well, I arrived in front of the house and at first I just stood there, right in front of the front door. I mean this was a novel experience for me. The Omega Theta Alpha house. Broad daylight. Weird right.”
The girls nodded and Musa couldn't help but roll her eyes at the sight of Stella and Flora pretending to eat popcorn.
“A boy, presumably of the house, I never saw him before, asked me what I was doing. I told him that I had lost my keys in here last night and if I could go in and look for them. So he opened the door and gestured for me to come in, he just told me ‘Go wherever you want.’ and then left. Girls, I'd never seen a frat house post-party before. Wandering up the stairs and through the halls, I was surrounded by hungover and still-drunk frat boys stumbling around in their socks and gym shorts, seeking out food and showers like moths to a porch light. Never before in my life have I looked with puzzled glances like this morning. I'm pretty sure some of them thought I was some post-vodka hallucination.”
The girls laughed lightly.
“Then I entered one room where Timmy was drunkenly watching some Old Yeller-esque movie on a tiny TV in the corner of his room from his bed. He looked at me and asked me if I liked dog movies with a voice all mumbly from grogginess and also from the fact that his face was squished against his pillow and half-buried by his blanket. “
Terra couldn't hide her big smile, “this boy is so cute.”
“Yes he is, so I told him I did. Then, very pleased with my answer, he mumbled again and asked what I was doing, so I told him I was looking for my keys. He told me that he was sorry but that he didn't see any keys around here and I didn’t doubt him. But after that twenty minutes had passed, and I’d already searched just about every bedroom and nuclear-waste-dump-site of a bathroom in that house so I'd kinda given up on ever finding my keys and was prepared to beg all of you for forgiveness and get a new set copied."
"Drama queen."
"Don't give me that Bloom, I know very well that you would have put me through hell if I hadn't found them."
"..Maybe..."
The other girls were looking away, playing the innocent.
"That's right, anyway as I stood there in the hallway a particularly-burly frat boy approached me, you know the big one with brown hair who seems always scary but he's actually very nice, well he asked me if I needed help with something and I'd told him the story too, that I'd lost my keys here last night and that i couldn't find them even though I had looked everywhere. He asked me what they looked like so that he could ask in their group chat, I didn't even know that frat boys had group chat. And I was like, it's 10 in the morning, they are all hungover, no one will ever check the group chat, but it was still nice of him so I thought what the hell it was worth a shot, I didn't have anything more to lose. So I gave him the description, that it was just a ring of keys and that the keychain was a purple plastic cat, a big plastic cat. He just nodded, presumably typing this description faithfully into the group chat. Then he wished me good luck and with that, he turned and left."
"Okay...so not very helpful."
"Well, my dear Flora, I was thinking the same but a few moments later I heard a distant thundering. It was coming from upstairs and it was getting louder and louder...You see the moment in The Lion King when Simba saw the wildebeest stampede through the ravine?
Well it felt exaclty the same as a fucking horde of large young men all thundered down the stairs, making a beeline for me. One of them shouted, faceless in the mob.
“Someone tell the girl!”.
They were all screaming
“Girl! Hey, GIRL!! We found your keys, girl!!,
then they proceed to circle around me and I hadn’t felt that small since I was maybe eleven years old. One of them split himself off from the crowd...It was Riven-"
Stella jumped to her feet, throwing her pillow in Bloom's head, who glared at her.
"OH MY GOD NO WAY !"
"Stella-"
"WAIT wait... Riven is the one that had your keys all this time !"
"...yes"
She began to squeal with joy while jumping on the spot, in front of the blasé, laughing and lost looks of her friends.
"Wait up."
The girls turned to Aisha,
"Why is that weird or anything, he could have just found them. No ? Am I missing something here ?"
Stella approached her friend and put her hands on her shoulders, a serious look on her face but a hint of playfulness in her eyes.
"My dear Aisha. It could be a total coincidence, yes. But! Last night Musa and Riven spent a lot of time together, haven't you Musa?"
"I'm going to kill you."
The brunette tossed her the first thing that came to hand, an old t-shirt that Bloom had left lying on the sofa. The blonde dodged the projectile gracefully.
"And of course when I say a lot of time I mean that they spend all the party kissing each other and probably make out in every room that was empty."
"Okay we get it Stella we don't need details.”, Bloom threw back the cushion, which had violently hit her head, to Stella who, this time, could not avoid the object, “So Riven had your keys, he gave them back and then what."
Stella finally sat down while combing her hair and Musa had never mentally thanked Bloom so much before that day,
"Well I thanked them because yes it was my keys and they all just went EYYYYYYYYYYYY !!!". Turns out he found them in the bathroom upstairs. No comment Stella. So I thanked them again profusely. There was a scattered round of “no problems” and then, just as suddenly as they descended, they all dispersed, like ships in the night. And I went home, that's all."
"Goodness”, Terra made herself comfortable on the sofa again, “that was an adventure."
"Yes it was Terra, it really was."
Aisha imitated her before taking her cup of tea in her hand, which she had placed on the living room table, too absorbed in her friend's adventure.
"Those guys are really something else, like five days ago a little group of them walked past me, and all I heard of their conversation was" - she changed her voice - "he’s got that anxiety disorder bro so I went with him so he’d be more comfortable" and it made my day. Like they can say anything they want to those guys, I know that they're good guys and I'm not the only one, I mean so many people on this campus can tell a story about the OTA boys and most of them are just hilarious or very sweet."
"Oh yeah totally”, Flora settled back lightly on the sofa, “I never told you that story but you know the pet store where I work.", the girls nodded, "well we have a pen with rabbits near the front door and on every side of the pen there is a huge signs saying "You can pet me, but don’t pick me up !". One day two OTA guys came in, I think it was Brandon and Timmy, and Timmy immediately reached into the pen to grab a rabbit. But before I could say anything Brandon grabbed his arm and asked him "did you see the sign ?" , so Timmy said "yeah ! It says that you can pick them up but don’t pet them !" . Then he went quiet for a moment and softly said "I didn’t read it right did I ?" And Brandon just puts his arm on his shoulder and said " ok, I know you’ve got that thing where words get mixed up. Let's just pet these cute lil shits." And then proceed to pet the rabbits for like fifteen minutes before leaving the store. I swear I nearly die for holding up my laugh"
The girls burst out laughing and Aisha almost spilled her tea on Musa who decided to put the cup back on the table before she got soaked
“Oh my God, Brandon never told me this story.”
“Bro code Stella, Bro code.”
The laughter redoubled and Flora was on the verge of tears so Bloom passed her the tissues taking one too.
"You know what”, Terra put, in turn, her drink on the coffee table too scared into spilling everywhere, “I was at the park with my dad the other day and we were sitting in the grass when I saw these two guys talking. I didn't recognise them at first and then it hit me, it was Riven, Helia and Dane. One of them, I think it was Dane, had a bike next to him and was looking rather teary-eyed and Riven was holding his shoulder and saying something to him. Now you know that they're pretty big guys, like lacrosse players and everything, so the three of them are nearly around 6 feet tall. Anyway I finally saw Riven and Helia help Dane onto the bike and take his hand and hold his back while guiding him down the sidewalk, then I saw the bike start shakily moving. It toppled over once they got going faster, but Riven, who was still on his feet helped the other two up, gave Dane a big hug and said something along the lines of "you got this, let’s try again." . And then they just disappeared in the park, but about thirty minutes later Dane was riding around the park laughing while Riven and Helia just watched him and smiled. I swear I nearly cried. It was so cute."
"Aww. That is really cute actually, I didn't even know that Dane didn't know how to ride a bike."
"Yeah don't worry Flora, I don't think anyone except the boys knew that."
Stella raised her arms and Flora dodged them at the right time..
"Girls, wait, I have better."
Bloom chuckled lightly while she looked at the rest of her friends rolling her eyes.
"And now I'm scared."
"Haha funny, anyway I was at the grocery store because I ran out of avocado and mozzarella and I ran into some OTA guys: Dane, Riven, Timmy, Helia and Sky. And you know I have known some of them for a long time so I was going to say hello when I noticed that Helia and Timmy were holding hands."
"What ? Helia never told me that story."
"Don't worry Flora, he was not cheating on you with Timmy."
"Oh my GOd you are so funny Stella."
"Yeah I know. Why the sarcastic tone though?"
They stuck out their tongues and Musa sighed. "Please stop you two, back to the story Stella !"
“Yeah, so they noticed me and said hello and I said it back but I was a little confused because they were still holding hands and one of them is, like the boy of one of my girls you know."
The blonde winked at Flora who couldn't hide her smile.
"And I think Helia must have noticed my weird face because he looked at Timmy and their hands clapped together and he said to me "Oh! Don’t worry. I’m not cheating! I’m not gay.""
The girls burst out laughing, half falling on top of each other.
"Wait wait, that's not even the best part ! So Héelia said that but then Timmy added "Not that being gay is a bad thing! It’s a good thing!""
The laughter increased even more, and Terra started massaging her cheeks from smiling too much.
"Oh my GOd I can't !"Musa was nearly crying on the floor, Aisha holding her, barely breathing.
"And then I think they realized that they were just sounding really weird so they explained all the story to me and oh my god, those guys are either geniuses or dumbasses ! Helia was the one who started the story and he went like "Listen. We aren’t together, we just hold hands in public sometimes." and then Timmy added "Especially on Friday nights. And weekends. And at away games." , and then Riven just came to save them and explained "Because sometimes people will say shit and then we can fight them! And if the fight started because someone was being homophobic, coach won’t get mad at us." "
Stella had to take a break because she was laughing so much so the girls took the opportunity to calm down too, taking deep breaths and massaging their sides. Once the laughter had died down the young blonde resumed her story.
"Then Sky was the one to ended the story by "Always nice to threaten a homophobe." and he point at Dane "And maybe they’ll think twice about saying something to Dane if he ever gets a boyfriend and wants to hold his hand for real." "
"Aww that's actually very sweet"
"Yes Terra it fucking is, and then Dane looked at me with a big smile and said "I’ve decided it’s sweet and not really fucking weird." and that's how the story of Helia and Timmy being a thing ends."
"Girl you were right", Aisha put herself back on the sofa, "this story wins."
All the girls nodded, their ribs still sore from laughing so much. Bloom, now lying on the floor, propped herself up on her elbows.
“I got one too.”
“Oh yes, tell us everything Bloom !”
The redhead chuckled lightly.
"One day I went to their frat house to see Sky, and I swear it was the most awesome shit I’ve ever seen. Like I'm kinda used to just entering in the house and going to Sky’s room right away, but this time I was holding back by some singing in their living room, so I went to see what was happening and swear to you, half of the boys were on the couch tucked in blankets, cocktails in their hands, hyping up the other half of the boys who where singing with all of their soul "I want to know what love is" ! And then when they finally spotted me they fucking throw me out, yes Musa even Sky, because it was a “Guys night" and "no girls allowed". And it's still the most awesome thing that I’ve ever seen!"
“I still can't believe they threw you out.”
“Yeah well Sky had a hard time believing it too when the next day I made him crawl all day for closing the door in my face. Asshole.”
The girls began to laugh at the sulky face of the redhead and Stella took her friend's face in her hands, playing with her cheeks like a mother with her baby.
A vibration in her pocket made Musa look at her phone, and she couldn't help but smile at the message on the screen.
"Who is this?"
The young girl came back down to earth while all her friends looked at her curiously.
"Nobody."
She picked up her phone quickly,
"Otherwise what are we doing this afternoon ?"
"She's changing the subject there."
"Yes, she totally changes the subject."
"Musaaa...who was it ??"
"Nobody I told you, why you insist like that."
"That's fishy...Grab the phone girls !"
Musa scrambled up from the couch as the girls attempted to steal his phone. A chase then began in the apartment, which ended when the brunette took refuge in her bedroom and locked her door. The others let out cries of frustration followed by slight threats that she wouldn't escape a questionnaire, but the young girl was already not listening. Her eyes were fixed on her screen as she read the message again.
new message
From: Riven
So, when are you buying me a drink for finding your keys?
The girl smiled,
"Dickhead."