proscenium — yan & uly / college au
Dec 28, 2023 17:02:08 GMT -5
Post by fox on Dec 28, 2023 17:02:08 GMT -5
❦
The classrooms smell like chalk dust and old wax, the shiny veneer on the ancient wood floors dulled now by a month of winter boots. He pushes open the heavy doors of the East Hall, and the air is sharp and stinging on his lungs.
It’s Friday evening now. The clock tower on the hill tolls at six p.m. Redwater College in Redwater, Massachusetts.
Weaving between the small colonies of students filing out from the last few classes of the day, Ulysses walks across the eastern quadrangle of campus towards the dormitories by the hill, shivering against the chill. December is always ugly in Redwater. This year hadn't snowed much, and the ground is damp with rotting leaves, thawed and frozen and thawed again until it was deader than dead.
Funny, he feels like he's perpetually sick in the winter, the scent of cherry menthol clinging to the collar of his coat, loose pills of acetaminophen lost in a pocket, and they stain his fingers red each time the enteric coating melts to the heat of his skin. He grew up in the suburbs of Connecticut. Ivied brick, the twisted forms of dark trees, and the jagged, teethy beaches, all lived in his bones in familiarity, all lived in him like the sickness of winter.
Born with one lung. What the doctors said.
He feels it on a day like this.
“You have to come,” Juliet says on the payphone. His pager had lit up during recitation. Silas was always on the dorm floor phone, screaming or sweet-talking at his girlfriend from California. Often, he couldn't figure out which it was by tone and cadence alone.
The sky goes gunmetal gray, a kind of dreary yellow murk behind the clouds as the sun sets.
His fingers are cold. He thinks about hanging up. “I'm busy.”
“Half the school of TDM will be there.” Party after the Winter Productions.
The cord gets twined in his hand. Blue of his veins faint under the dim light. He stares at minutes, leaning against the cool pane of glass. For a moment, he's thinking about pressing down on the switchhook until there's only the hum of silence. And for a moment, he's thinking of a boy on a stage, the briefest second of contact when he peered inside Theater H-1 while waiting for Juliet.
Snow begins to fall outside the booth. It's the lightest coat of white. His mouth tastes bloody, cheek chewed raw.
Ulysses shrugs into his scarf. The smell of cherry menthol again.
“Fine.”
