#i hope i score just as well in econ and law finals as i did in the mock 🤲🤲

[jaeyunverse]

bagged 84/100 in law 🫡 top of the class in the subject and i am extremely satisfied amigos

[iconic-ponytail]

there's always money in the banana stand

riverdale promptathon week 3: yellow + business

Even as the sun sets, even as the breeze blows, the hell furnace of July in Riverdale burns on. It’s triply as sweltering inside the tiny booth running three freezers, offloading heat to sustain the frozen merchandise inside. “How can it be so hot in there when we are supposed to be selling frozen bananas?” JB complains, at least twice a week.

She’s twelve. Complaint is her new first language. She complains about being left in Riverdale while Gladys went back to Toledo. She complains about living in a trailer park that usually does not have warm water. She complains about their father being imprisoned for covering up a gruesome murder. But most of all, she complains about working in the banana stand.

Child labor laws aside, Jughead can’t blame her for that one. He hates the damn banana stand, but it’s their best shot.

Gladys’ monthly check covers rent and utilities for the trailer. Everything else is on him, now. The idiot eighteen year old who decided to petition the court to be his sister’s legal guardian. Well, and his idiot mom who signed off on it. So he needs money, and the Jones family has never been particularly flush with cash, just trampled over by FP’s failed “business opportunities.”

Enter: the banana stand.

It’s not the fastest revenue stream, Jughead finds. But it’s got potential.

Initially, Dilton doesn’t let him sell during the Twilight Drive-In’s concession stand hours. Before or after the movie, sure, but no overlap. “I’m not worried about competition, Jones. It’s just too humiliating for me to watch you sweat through that horrible yellow polo you call ‘branding.’”

But when customers asked him more than twice a night when the banana stand would be open, Dilton caved.

It’s not like being open during the screening hours is a whole lot more preferable. He only just transferred from Southside to Riverdale High last spring; now he’s the rising senior who hands out phallic symbols from inside a giant phallic symbol. Not exactly a boon to his popularity.

Still, recently the money is enough to pay the internet bill and keep JB fed for dinner when she can’t go to the summer breakfast and lunch program at the local park district. It’s still not enough for him to eat particularly well, and the smell of hot dogs and slurp of his classmates’ slushies makes the heat feel like a minor inconvenience.

He eyes the tip jar, willing himself to wait on rampaging the concession stand until the beginning of the film roar dies down. It’s a double feature tonight, which means maybe he can score enough cash to cover those damn college application fees his counselor will start hounding him about week one of school.

Then he sees her—Betty Cooper. She’s laughing, watching Archie Andrews try to catch popcorn in his mouth, tossed by his paramour, Veronica Lodge. She pauses to sip from her slushie straw, her lips—which he’s watched argue against homophobic and racist comments in their advanced lit class, or pressed to the cheek of her other best friend, Kevin Keller. Which he’s imagined, doing slightly less savory things, though the mere thought of said imagining has his heart pounding wildly.

(Jughead’s been eating way too many fucking bananas. Someone needs to check his potassium levels.)

His absolutely pathetic gaze, once available three times a day in their shared classes where Jughead has still not managed to exert any confidence whatsoever regarding speech, eye contact, or general acknowledgement of Betty Cooper’s existence other than whatever drooling may or may not be happening, all of which he finds he has no control over… is all interrupted by the absolute polar opposite of Betty Cooper. Hiram Lodge zooms up to the banana stand on his segway, angling to a stop just before taking out the stand’s foundation.

“Still getting a hang of that, Mayor Lodge?”

Hiram grimaces. “Just checking that you’ve renewed your business permit, Jones.”

They do this once a week. It’s still the same permit.

“You know,” Hiram starts as Jughead rustles for the paperwork to make him go the fuck away, “I could find you an arrangement with a better banana supplier. For a discount. If you’re interested.”

Jughead rolls his eyes. “I’m not interested in your GMO, black market bananas, Hiram.”

Hiram gives him a pointed look. Jughead rolls his eyes even harder. “Mayor Lodge.” He proffers the papers, Hiram waves them away. “I’ll take one chocolate peanut butter dip. With peanuts.”

Jughead kisses his teeth. “That will be $3.50.”

Hiram’s whole face goes serpentine. “Not between business partners, Jones. Put it on my tab.”

Jughead grits his teeth, handing the finished banana so aggressively he hopes that the chocolate splatters and stains Hiram’s $500 tie. It is only slightly worth it to watch Hiram struggle with navigating the segway one-handed, frozen banana in the other.

He muffles a chuckle before realizing he’s used the dead end of the chopped peanut topping, and exits the stand to update the order board hanging on the outside. It’s mostly an excuse to feel a ten degree drop in temperature, a sweet relief he might be able to extend by grabbing a hot dog before the intermission rush.

He’s crossing off peanuts from the topping list and spinning around when he hears a shriek and a sudden, cold slosh across his chest. The yellow polo drips with artificial blue slushie, but Jughead swallows his fucking hell when he sees that the shriek, gaping stare of horror, and stumble in question all belong to his very own blonde kryptonite.

“Oh my god. Oh my GOD, jesus, shit, I’m so sorry!”

Jughead is frozen while Betty grabs about half his napkin dispenser and starts pawing at his shirt in a vain attempt to right the giant sticky blue mess all over his chest.

Finally, Jughead swallows the golf ball in his throat and chokes out. “Honestly, it’s fine. That stand is a sauna. I needed that.”

Betty stops, both her blotting and her stream of apologizing (which includes a fair bit of cursing, and he is a little revolted with himself by how much this turns him on).

“It’s going to get very sticky, soon. Maybe I should buy a bottle of cold water?”

Jughead can’t help himself. “Oh, impromptu yellow t-shirt contest?”

Betty grins.

I did that.

“Do you have any employees who could bring you another shirt?”

Jughead shakes his head. “Just my sister. She’s playing video games at home. There’s no earthly way she’ll bring me a spare.”

Betty cocks her head. “I had a feeling you were more than the silent back row kind of guy.”

The fact that Betty Cooper has, at any point, considered what kind of guy he is triggers full-on nervous blathering. “I’m usually very tired at school. I have this little sister—but I’m kind of um, her guardian. So I’m doing this stupid banana stand thing because it’s like one of the three assets to our entire family name I guess? Anyway, it’s hard to engage with Haggly’s basic discussion questions at eight in the morning when you spent the whole night dreaming about wholesale banana margins.”

He’s essentially vomiting words, but Betty is still smiling.

“Anyway, I should crawl back into my fruit-shaped purgatory and let you go back to your friends.”

She’s biting her lip, hedging. “Honestly, they’re probably using the alone time to make out in the car, and I’d rather let them get all their sexual tension out so that I don’t have to feel it radiating off of them for the whole second half of the double feature.”

Jughead laughs and tamps down the impulse to offer her a frozen banana, because he cannot possibly say something like that without making it sound sexual.

“What are frozen banana profit margins like, anyway?” Betty asks, either genuinely interested or legitimately flirting with him. Jughead finds both potentials baffling.

Jughead hesitates, then ducks inside the stand, pulling out his spiral bound notebook. “I’m still kind of figuring it out. All my records are in here.”

Betty sidles up to the stand, taking up the whole window. They’re both leaning over the scribbled line items on college ruled paper; he can smell her shampoo. She takes the notebook, scanning thoroughly.

“Do you have a pencil?”

He hands her one and observes her going to work, writing out some algebraic formula and calculating quickly in her head. There is a calculator within his reach, but he thinks handing it to her might come off as an insult. (Jughead wouldn’t know; he assumes Betty is in an advanced math class. Jughead is not.)

After a few minutes of watching her devoted focus, thinking about her hands touching his pencil, thinking about her hands wrapped around his hand, or his—

“I don’t know how to tell this to you, Jug.”

The shortening of his name stops his heart for a jolt, and his response is embarrassingly delayed. “What is it?”

Betty winces but smiles through it, a combination she’s surely learned to use when delivering bad news. It’s well earned, it really does soften the blow.

“There’s no money in the banana stand. At least, not with these margins.”

Jughead finds himself less than devastated by this news, mostly because it makes a hell of a lot of sense. The messenger doesn’t hurt, either.

“But,” she interrupts. “I don’t know if you’ve nailed down your course load for senior year. But I’m taking AP Econ? This could be, um, a good project. Like, if you want to take the class. Or even if you don’t. Not that you’re like a project or… whatever. I’m just saying we could figure it out. Make lemonade out of… bananas.”

Betty Cooper is extremely cute when she stammers.

Jughead doesn’t know what to do, so he gives her an easy out. “I can’t like, hire you, if that wasn’t obvious by the whole… deficit spending or whatever the whole negative circled number at the bottom of the page really means.”

She flushes. “No, that would be highway robbery. I just thought there might be an… opportunity. For um, us. I mean, for you and I. I mean—” she clears her throat, as if it’s closing up. “An academic opportunity. Or, in your case, professional. Well, a betterment of your livelihood. Okay, um, shit, just… I should go!”

She turns away, her face the deepest scarlet he’s ever seen.

“Betty, wait.”

She pivots back, eyes down at the ground.

“How about I buy you a new slushie and you come back into the booth. Tell me everything I’m doing wrong for the rest of the night.”

Betty looks up, biting the corner of her smile. “Sounds like a deal.”

They shake on it.

[lolcat76]

MIGHT i suggest Kiss at Pine Lake: an executive is sent by her boss/boyfriend to buy out her old summer camp so they can build developments on the land, only the camp is now run by another former camper she had a thing with back in the day (but lost touch with due to Tragic Circumstances), who can't pay his bills but has no intention of selling? Is this not actually perfect?

I love you. It is indeedactually perfect. Thank you, @okaynextcrisis for the fabulous Hallmark prompt, and thank you @cassiopeiasara for the beta reading and great advice.

If Laura could have doneone thing differently in her life, it would have been keeping her seat next tothe weird nose-picker in her freshman English lit class at the University ofWashington. If she’d stuck it out next to him, she might have never met RichardAdar, and she might not be looking over a perfectly pristine 6 acres of landnext to Pine Lake, a large, ambitiously named pond that fed into Lake Chelan,trying to figure out how many trees the state of Washington would let thembulldoze to build the 340 condo units Adar Development so desperately wanted tobuild.

“Lotta trees,” the campmanager said.

No shit, Sherlock, she thought, but she kept her mouth shut. Alot of trees, indeed, trees with rope swings and obstacle courses, somewhatfrayed but still swinging in the late summer breeze. Trees that gave shelter toa small army of campers every summer, until Adar Development found the land andsent her to supervise the acquisition.

It wasn’t hard to findthe site, once she saw the map – it was the same route her parents drove fromBellevue to the lake every summer to drop off Laura and her sisters for a monthof forced childhood fun.

Forced for Laura, funfor Cheryl and Sandra. Somewhere in the attic of her parents’ house, there wasa box of macramé and ceramics, collected over eight years of summer camp atthis very spot. While she stood and surveyed the grounds, mentally making notesof the hills that would need to be graded and the water lines that would needto be laid in place, she saw herself ducking under a tree to read while she wassupposed to be learning to play tennis.

“Shame to bulldoze thetennis courts. Then again, tennis was never my game,” he said.

“Mine either.”

“So I hear.” With that,he turned and strolled down the path that used to lead to the boys’ cabins, butnow led to what would be the development’s fully appointed fitness center.

Treadmills and a yogastudio. That nose-picker in her Lit seminar went on to make probably a cool tenmillion at Amazon, and here she was, bulldozing her childhood so that peoplecould do downward dog where she learned to French braid her hair. Not for thefirst time, she cursed that empty seat next to Richard Adar. She switched seatsand wound up sitting next to him in English Lit, and he cheated off of her forthe next four years. Sixteen years after they graduated from college, she wasstill carrying him.

He was still cheating,and she was still helping him. This time, she was helping him cheat on hiswife. And his tax returns, she was pretty sure, but she couldn’t for the lifeof her figure out which of the two was worse.

Maybe she should havepicked her nose that first day in English Lit and followed the geek to Amazon. JudithRoslin would have been horrified, if she’d remembered who Laura was those lastfew weeks of Laura’s freshman year before she faded away. Her dad, the head ofthe Econ law department at U Dub, would have terrified Richard Adar right outof her life if he hadn’t taken a leave of absence to help care for his wife.

If, if, if. If a bullfrog had wings, he wouldn’t bumphis ass when he hopped.

God, Laura missed herfather.

If she could just getthe camp manager to sign for the latest offer and pass it along to the owner, shecould get the hell out of here and back to her condo in Belltown. She wantedthe offer settled so that she could go home before the dirt road they’d drivendown every summer in an old station wagon was paved to make way for fanciercars with better suspensions.

She followed the managerto the trailer housing the camp’s office, the closest thing to a modernbuilding on the site. The trailer sat between two old cabins, both facing thelake. The last summer she’d spent here, she’d been a counselor in one of them.She didn’t want to think about the counselor in the other, or what had happenedin that little clearing between the two cabins before some idiot had put atrailer there.

Maybe if she’d pickedher nose at that first fireside singalong that summer, she’d never have added BillyAdama to her list of regrets.

***

“I hear you come highlyrecommended by the owner,” she said.

Tigh grunted inresponse. “Hard to find jobs around here, or I’d hang your fancy condo-buildingass out to dry.”

Well, at least he washonest. “I’m not the one buying this land. I’m just here to do my job.”

“Shit job, if you askme.” He dug through the cabinets in the trailer until he found a bottle ofwhiskey and two reasonably clean glasses. He poured a good measure into eachglass – far more than she should be drinking if she had any intention ofdriving home tonight – but it was the closest thing to a friendly gesture she’dgotten from anyone in this pissant town. One thing was for sure, the locals didnot see the need for fancy condos intheir backyard.

She knocked the whiskeyback with more confidence than she felt. “It is a shit job, but it’s a job, andI hear they’re hard to come by these days.”

Glasses lined up, and afew more fingers of whiskey pushed in front of her. “Maybe you’re working for thewrong person. Ever consider that?” Saul’s glass hit the table in front of her,empty again, before she could even wrap her brain around what he said.

Of course she hadconsidered it. She considered it every damn day she showed up in her office,prepared to give Richard her thoughts on smart investments and where they stoodto make money in real estate, only to have him ask her what color underwear shewas wearing.

White cotton, andthreadbare at that, because she wasn’t going to tempt him with silk and lace ifhe wasn’t going to challenge her to do her job better. At this point, she wasfairly certain that her practical underwear would give out at the same time hischarm did; she only hoped she could escape his hold on her with her dignityintact.

Oh, and without going tojail.

Frankly, she wasn’t surejail was worse than her job. She’d just be trading one stifling cage foranother. She nudged her glass toward Saul. Maybe another shot of whiskey wouldhelp her figure it out. If she couldn’t drive home tonight, at least she knewwhere she could pass out; the bunk beds might be old, but the cheap mattresseswere surely holding up better than her underwear.

Saul tipped the bottleinto the empty glasses, a satisfied gleam in his eyes. Men. Drink them underthe table or give them a blow job; they were so damn easy to impress. She’d hadher quota of blow jobs this week, so she’d have to stick with drinking withhim. “Maybe you’re not as bad as I thought,” he said.

“Maybe I’m not,” sheagreed.

“Still don’t like you.”

She slammed the glassdown on the cheap pressboard table and held it up, a challenge, to see if he’draise his own to hers. He did. “Don’t like you either,” she said, beforechasing down the bitter, salty taste of years of regret with a mouthful ofcheap whiskey.

***

She wasn’t a snob, byany stretch of the imagination, but Laura did like to sleep in a comfortablebed. She’d paid a lot of money for her mattress, so waking with rusting coilspoking into her backside was hardly the goodmorning she expected.

Then again, neither wasthe pounding in her head nor the cotton in her mouth. She rolled off the limp,sagging mattress and kicked around at the pile of clothes at her feet. Wherethe hell were her shoes?

Where the hell was herpurse and her car keys, and why was she standing in the middle of a cabin shehadn’t seen for the last 20 years, her toes idly riding up her calf to scratchat bug bites?

Dammit, Saul Tigh! Ifthe contract for purchase of the land hadn’t included retaining existing camp staffuntil demolition began, she’d be at home right now, not kicking through dustbunnies to find her phone.

At least a quick surveyof the cabin assured her she was alone. Score one for Laura Roslin – she wasn’tgoing to add another notch in the cheap pine bunk bed frame to go with herfirst. But she was most definitely going to get fired, because she had apresentation to give about the progress at the construction site at 10 am, and,seriously, where the hell were her shoes?

Her phone rang, echoingthrough the cabin that had been filled with chatter and gossip years ago.Marcie should have been asleep in the bunk underneath her; Cheryl and Sandrashould have been sitting on her bed, waiting for her to wake up.

Instead, she wasstanding in the middle of an empty, musty room that was making her allergiesseize up, sneezing and wiping her nose as she answered the phone. “LauraRoslin.”

“You were supposed to behere ten minutes ago with your report.”

She forced back anapology for her tardiness. Richard had every right to be pissed, but herheadache and his snippy tone told her that Richard had even more right to gofuck himself. He sent her to the development site; he sure as hell didn’t getto choose what happened once she got there.

“Thereare…complications,” she said.

Richard hung up. Henever liked complications.

She didn’t either, butshe did like knowing where she could find her shoes. Finally, she dug them outfrom under a well-worn blanket. If she could just manage to button her blouse,she’d be out of here and on her way.

Just as soon as shetracked down Saul Tigh and got him to sign off on the damn offer.

***

Based on the yellingcoming from the construction trailer, Laura wasn’t the only one having a roughstart to the day. Tigh’s bellowing was loud enough to wake the dead, andwhoever he was arguing with didn’t seem to be holding back either. She halfexpected to see one of them to come crashing through the windows as she pickedher way through the weeds choking the path.

The last thing shewanted was to get in the middle of whatever battle was being fought, but sheneeded coffee and she needed to brush her teeth, and neither of those thingswere going to happen until she got a signature and got on the road back tocivilization. Squaring her shoulders, she reached up and pounded on the door tothe trailer.

Saul threw open thedoor, and Laura was annoyed to see that he didn’t even have the courtesy tolook hung over. “Oh. You’re still here.”

“Sorry to interrupt,”she said through clenched teeth, “but I still need someone to sign this.” Shethrust the folder at him. Rather than take it, he stepped back from the doorwayand waved her in to the trailer.

“Might as well get your signaturefrom the boss,” he said. She was tempted to remind him that, once the sale wentthrough, she was going to be theboss, but the smarter play seemed to be to keep her mouth shut and get a penready.

“Signature for what?”came a deep, gravelly voice from somewhere inside the trailer. She followedTigh inside, squinting against the dark of the trailer.

“Revised offer,” shesaid. She cupped her hands around her eyes to block the light from the doorway,barely able to make out the shape of a man at the far end of the room. “I needa signatory from the camp to receive the offer, or else it’ll have to go backto the lawyers.”

He let out a derisivegrunt. “Never had much use for lawyers.”

Laura bristled. Herfather had been a lawyer, a damn good one, and she wasn’t going to let thischump hiding out in the middle of nowhere crap all over his memory. “Lawyerscome in handy when you need to get things done, and I’d very much like to getthis offer done and accepted so that I can get out of here and get moving onthe development plans.”

“And a lawyer is gonnahelp you with that?” he asked. He moved forward, just enough into the lightthat she could see the glint of silver threaded through his black hair. Hereached out and snatched the folder from her hand, then leafed through thepapers. “It’s a good offer,” he grunted.

“It is,” she agreed, surprisingeven herself with the ice in her tone. “Better than any other this camp isgoing to get.”

He scribbled his name onthe first form, acknowledging receipt of the offer, and handed the paper backto her. “Maybe so,” he agreed, “but that doesn’t mean I’m going to sell.”

He’s going to sell? After all these months, the elusive owner of CampBlackbird had finally shown his face? It’sabout damn time, she thought. Richard was already pissed enough at her;maybe if she took a little extra time to work her feminine wiles on him, suchas they may be, she could get him to agree to the sale and she could get herboss off her back. In more ways than one.

“It’s a beautifulproperty,” she said, turning on her brightest smile. “People would love to buy acondo here and take advantage of the peace and quiet. I spent some time here asa child myself, and I have to tell you, I’ve thought of buying my own place hereonce the development goes up.”

“Really? I thought therewas a rule around these parts about you not being allowed back.” He finallystepped fully into the light of the doorway, and his blue eyes met hers. Blueeyes that she hadn’t seen since she was seventeen years old and flat on herback on the ground under this very spot. Suddenly, complicated wasn’t the wordfor this sale anymore. Impossibleseemed a little bit more accurate, and some other words with just four letterscrossed her mind as well. And then one more word – breathe. “Of course, since that’s half my fault, it’s probably onlyfair that I lift the ban on Laura Roslin.”

Jesus Christ, Billy Adama. Laura’s knees went a little weak underneathher.

“Saul,” Bill barked,“take a hike. Miss Roslin and I have business to discuss.”

Business? After allthese years, she had a lot of questions to ask him, but none of them had a damnthing to do with the offer he was still holding in his hands. Hands sheremembered far too well.

Saul raised an eyebrowat his boss, then looked back at Laura. “You gonna be ok?” he asked her, hisvoice a little gruff, but his expression softer than it had been last night.

“Fine,” she saidfaintly. “Thank you.”

“You know where thewhiskey is, if you need it,” he said, then ducked out of the trailer. It wasbarely 9am, her head was still pounding, but God help her, she’d never wanted adrink more in her life.

She had the receipt ofoffer in her hands; she should collect her dignity and get the hell out of herewhile she still could. Instead, she sank down into one of the beat-up vinylchairs in front of the reception desk. “So I get a lifetime ban, but you get tocome in and take over? Seems a little unfair to me.”

“I bought the camp usingan LLC. Mr. Cottle wouldn’t have sold it to me if he knew who was buying,” hesaid with a little chuckle.

Privately, Laura had herdoubts. As she recalled, Mr. Cottle wasn’t nearly as pissed at poor BillyAdama, led astray by Laura Roslin’s bookish charms, as he was at her fordefiling the sanctity of his precious camp. After all, it hadn’t been his entire family dragged down for avery detailed description of how he’d found the two of them bare-ass nakedunder a blanket, and then escorted to their station wagon with a very colorfulreminder that they were not invited back for the next summer.

Then again, she hadabsolutely no idea what happened after they’d left Camp Blackbird. Maybe Bill’sparents had been on their way when they’d headed down the dirt road, Cheryl andSandra whining on either side of her in the back seat and her parents refusingto speak to their oldest daughter.

It wasn’t like shehadn’t done the math; their anniversary was seven months before her birthday.Laura might not know much about children, but she knew that a preemie didn’tweigh 8 pounds at birth. It seemed more than a little unfair to her that theywere so pissed about her night under the stars.

She hadn’t regretted itat the time. He was handsome, and smart, and had a wicked sense of humor. He’dliked to make her laugh. She’d liked to laugh with him. They’d gone fromsneaking kisses behind her cabin to groping under swimsuits while they weresupposed to be teaching swim classes, to having sex under the stars. If onlythey’d snuck out half an hour earlier…

If only he’d called herafter she’d been sent home. He had her number; she waited to hear from him, butthe rest of the summer stretched out with no contact, and in the fall, she wasin her dorm at U Dub and sitting next to Richard Adar.

And 20 years later, shewas sitting in a cheap plastic chair, staring him down as he flipped throughthe pages of her company’s offer, every flip of a page catching the sunlightagainst the wedding ring on his finger. Ofcourse.

She was done withmarried men. Done with this one in particular, just as much of a pain in theass as the other married man who was expecting her to deliver a signed offerletter.

“I wasn’t kidding. Youand I both know this camp hasn’t been profitable for years. Just accept theoffer and call it a day.”

He held out the folderto her, waving it a little bit when she refused to take it. “It’s a greatoffer. But you’re wasting your time.”

“I quit wasting my timeabout 20 years ago,” she snapped.

He looked her over,those damn blue eyes drilling into her. “And yet here you are.”

“And so are you. Really,Billy? So many happy memories here for you?”

“Bill,” he snapped, “andyes, as a matter of fact.”

She let out a sharp snort.Lord only knew what he got up to after she was booted out of the camp. She hadabsolutely no interest in how many happymemories he had at this camp.

“I remember you, and me,and a night under the stars, and that’s enough to make me turn down youroffer.”

“Well,” she said primly,“Not all of us have such fond memories of losing our virginity.”

He blinked at that andtook a quick step back. For a second, she felt like a complete ass. It wasn’this fault the night ended badly. Well, not entirely– he was the one who suggested they meet halfway, and he was the one with theblanket. He was also the one who made enough noise to wake the dead…and Mr.Cottle.

But she was the one whomet him there, under the stars, and she was only too happy to let him tease herout of her shorts and her camp t-shirt, and she was the one who told him thatshe was ready, that she wanted it to be him.

Billy – no, Bill – sighed. “Ifthis is really what you want, I’ll sign,” he said.            

Thank God. “It’s what I want.” She nodded at the pen on the table.“Sign it, and we can be out of each other’s hair.”

“On one condition,” he said. He picked up the pen and hovered it overthe paperwork. “I’ll sign, but you have to go on a date with me.”

“Have you lost your fucking mind?” The words were out of her mouthbefore she could stop them, but he didn’t seem the least put off by her crass words.

“Yep. Long time ago,” he said.

“Sign the papers and take your wife on a date,” she snapped.

His brows furrowed, a bit confused before he saw her pointed gazedirected at the ring on his finger.

“Divorced,” he said. “I wear the ring so Saul doesn’t hit on me.”

“He’d probably be an easier target than me,” she said.

“Easy never interested me.”

Well, he’d be the first. “Fine,” she said. “Sign the papers and I’ll goout with you.”

He signed the offer with a flourish, then held his hand out to her. “Isbreakfast too early for a date?”

Laura shrugged. “Whatever.” She’d eat some pancakes, tell him he wascharming, and then be on her way by noon. “Lead the way.”

***

Her phone rang once again, and one again, she was determined to ignoreit.

“You have to answer eventually,” he muttered, his voice thick withsleep, even as he pulled her closer to him.

He was probably right. Richard wasn’t going to stop calling, not untilhe got the answer he expected. She tucked her hair behind her ears, trying tocall up some sense of professionalism. Hard to do when she was stark naked andBill Adama was wrapping his arms against her waist.

“Roslin,” she barked, choking back a laugh as his fingers trailed upagainst her sides.

“It’s been four days and you haven’t shown up once. What the hell areyou doing?”

That was a very good question, but not one she was going to answer forRichard Adar when Bill Adama was pressing kisses to her shoulder. “I��mquitting,” she said. “Deal’s dead.”

“Goddammit, Laura, I didn’t send you down there to kill the deal!”

She was half tempted to argue, but Bill pulled the phone out of herhand. “I’ll talk to you about my severance tomorrow,” she called out before hemanaged to hit the disconnect button and throw the phone down on the flooramidst their discarded clothes.

“I’m going to get fired,” she said with a giggle. He hummed in response.“Do you care?”

“Nope.” He rolled onto his back, then tugged her on her side so that shewas draped against his chest. “Do you?”

“Mmm-mmm,” she hummed.

“Good,” he whispered.

“I’m out of a job, and you’ve got a camp that’s not making money,” shesaid. “How is that good?”

“Never wanted the camp. Just wanted you. Do you think Adar’s the onlyoffer I have?”

She snuggled a little bit closer to him. “I’m very good at real estate.I could probably get you a great price for the land.”

He laughed as he dug his fingers into the skin of her hip. “Whatever youwant. Don’t want the camp anymore, since my girl isn’t allowed on the grounds.”

“Well, Washington is a big state,” she chuckled. “I’m sure we can findother places to get kicked out of.”

“God, I hope so,” he laughed into the sensitive skin of her neck.  “Can’t think of anything I want more than tobe kicked out of every campground we find.”

She shrieked with laughter as he moved down from her neck, teasing theticklish spots he’d discovered over the last few days. Neither could she.

[missenden]

1.7.12 8:05pm

Half the year has gone already ??? What ??? How ???

This has probably been the best few months I’ve had in a long while. Granted, they weren’t without their difficulty, but I think there were less meltdowns and bad periods than usual? It can be hard to tell in hindsight, but I’m happy anyway. It’s been a good time and I’m sad to see the semester end…

There are so many things to cover – gonna list them out here so I don’t forget to write about anything. Uni (academics and new friends), piano, fic, boxing, quitting SYO, what else? I think that’s it for now.

I haven’t updated for legit like 3 months so this is probably going to take fkn forever. But here goes. So uni has been a bit of a rollercoaster – my first midsems for econ (maths and micro) were god awful. I didn’t think it was possible to do as badly as I did in maths, a solid 4/25 and barely a pass in micro with 15/25. It hit me hard – I wasn’t super confident going into them, but no-one expects to do quite that badly, and to be honest I’m used to working hard and getting the results. I probably should’ve seen it coming. The practice tests weren’t going great and I was probably too confident going in. But yeah. It was a real reality check. Are you as smart as you think, Alyssa? Never. So after about a week of just crying and being real upset at Don (the shittiest lecturer I think I’ve ever had; he wouldn’t give me marks because he was ‘too annoyed’ that I’d gotten so many things wrong previously’, laughs at people in class, tells people to quit their jobs to study for maths…yeah. I know I’ll probably look back on this and laugh at how trivial it is, but man during semester it was annoying.) life had to move on and I had to move on with it. Julia came to Sydney in the midsemester break which was pretty great (it was real nice to hang out with her again and relax!) and then I began to work my ass off for my law assignments before starting to prep for the next econ midsems.

To be honest, I pretty much gave up 2-3 weeks of my life working for law and econ…but it’s not like I didn’t really enjoy it. I really enjoyed working with Tom and then eventually with Soo as well on the contracts assignment, even with the long hours cooped up in my room, poring over casebooks and PDF judgments online (control F has never been more useful I think). There was something about being so absorbed into the knowledge and being so dedicated to something that was just so great – most people would hate it, but I’m glad I don’t. Even working on CCP wasn’t terrible ! Those assignments worked out great; 25/30 for contracts (the top mark was 26), and 16.5/20 for CCP (I think I might have been close to topping!). I never thought I’d see the day where I did that well in law, and that those marks would ever be better than econ lol. But I was mostly glad that everything worked out the way it did – I think it would’ve killed me if I hadn’t done well after so much work. Anyway, hopefully those results can save me from the horror of exams…I’m glad I have at least something of a buffer.

And econ…econ was something special. I have never worked on anything as hard as I did for that maths exam, and to an extent the micro paper as well. All I did was eat, sleep, mandi and study for a two week period – I’m very lucky that I was living in college and that my friends were always around me, because otherwise I probably could’ve become a real hermit. I think it was about then that I really started to fall in love with the maths a little bit lol. There’s this satisfaction that I got out of it that I’d never gotten before. But yeah. After two crazy weeks, I did the papers and scored damn well – went from 16% in maths to 84%, and 60 in micro to 75. By some insane coincidence I’m now exactly on a pass for maths – hopefully it’s enough to carry me into honours next year. I was just so desperate to prove to myself and everyone around me that I could do this, and that I wasn’t an idiot. And I’m glad I did – it’s one hell of a story to tell at job interviews at any rate. But that feeling of success when I first got the maths mark back was absolutely phenomenal. I remember it really vividly – I was waiting out on the street waiting for uber eats when Connor texted the group chat saying that maths marks were up. My nerves were astronomical, but when I saw that number…man. That feeling was something else. All the hard work had been well worth it just for that moment. The feeling is absolutely amazing; I just hope that I’ll be able to experience it again when the exam marks come back.

So yeah – that’s the academics. It’s been a bit of a rollercoaster. Hopefully I can deliver in exams too, and get through with decent looking grades.

There was another great outcome of the second set of midsems – I met this amazing group of friends who do economics at uni. They’re all so welcoming and wonderful and genuine !! I just wish I could’ve met them sooner. For most of the semester since then, I’ve been seeing them every now and again which has been really great – hopefully I can get closer to them next sem. I even got invited to their end of semester stuff – Wednesday night was really great <3 They are all so great. Fingers crossed I can keep hanging out with them.

Along with this group has come some boy stuff lol. Which I’m just so bad at dealing with it’s almost funny. So basically, I think this guy is probably/maybe/I think keen, and I thought I was too, but honestly now I don’t know. Part of it is remnants of all the Lynden stuff – I can’t shake this feeling that getting into a relationship means giving up my independence and losing a part of myself. And then I think the other part is I don’t know if he’s quite the right guy – it sounds shallow, but appearance is definitely a factor, and then also idk I’m worried that if things go pear shaped I won’t be able to be friends with everyone anymore. Idk, I’m just not sure. Tom keeps laughing at my indecision but honestly it’s so bad lol. And I don’t know why I keep pushing people away – is it a self defence mechanism or something? It’s very unhelpful lol and only serves to make things difficult. I haven’t quite worked this one out, but hopefully I will at some point?

On to the next thing – piano. So I’ve been playing casually all semester and really enjoying it! I think not having the pressure to play super well all the time and to just have fun is really great, but is also a little restrictive in terms of progress. At the moment I’m playing a lot of music from the movie Amelie and also Goodbye Lenin, as well as some Studio Ghibli stuff. For some reason it feels a lot better than playing violin, which I haven’t been doing too much of lately – I think a break is probably a good thing, but it also feels sad to let it go. I haven’t even applied for AYO this year, which just feels so strange. Also, I quit SYO – weirdly they never emailed me back or anything, and that doesn’t feel great, but yeah. Idk. It feels like I’m just letting go of so many things in my life which is strange – I’m so used to being committed to a million and one things, and it’s weird to just enjoy doing stuff for the sake of it how most people do, in the way of hobbies. It’ll definitely take some time to adjust to it, but hopefully I’ll get there at some point.

But actually, one thing I have picked up this semester is boxing, and it’s been bloody great. I struggled so much last year to let go of karate and try something new, but somehow I’ve managed to do it this year and I honestly feel as if I’m learning so much. Learning boxing has been a radically different experience to karate – the environment is much more full on, fast paced and intense, which to be honest is a good thing for me I think. My fitness has improved markedly, I’m more toned and feel good. The only thing I wished was a bit better is that individuals don’t get all that much attention, but you can’t win everything I suppose. But hell, I’m really enjoying it – might even be doing a fight in October, though the prospect is a little nerve-wracking. Will probably be doing a kata competition in August as well for karate, so that’ll be interesting !

This semester has really been great. I feel so much more settled in Sydney, my friendships feel much more secure and I finally feel like things are falling into place. I know I take a long time to settle in to places, but I really didn’t anticipate it taking this long lol, but I’m glad that it’s happening at all. It’s nice to feel like some kind of equilibrium has been hit, and that it’s a bit different but a bit the same as what it is at home. Also, it’s great to not be constantly missing home all the time – of course I miss family, friends and Perth itself, but it’s no longer at the front of my mind constantly and stressing me out. Not really looking forward to all the changes that next semester will bring though; everyone is going on exchange and Hintze 3 is going to be weirdly different after the break. And man the bloody room drama – at least Jesse is moving up, but I wish Charlotte was too, but also there was the whole beef with Will and blergh it’s just been annoying.

Speaking of that drama – one of the changes this sem is that I’m not as close to Will as I was before. We kinda grew apart, in part from me getting tired of having him hover all the time wanting to talk about Perth and music, and I don’t think he’s all too happy about it – he apparently things ‘I’ve changed’. But like what else is to be expected? People change and grow up, and normally friendships change to reflect that…I’m not really sure what to do about it. I’m just glad that he won’t be moving to Hintze. The whole room drama just felt very childish…

I think that’s it from me for the moment – Jesse’s just wandered in asking me to chill. Kathryn’s leaving tomorrow so should probably go hang out – things are going to be so weird next sem without her and everyone else ! But yeah. Will try and update soon.