Tenesoir Modern AU

Kyrinna was one of many people stood side-by-side in a line.  They waited there in the airport on that muggy August day, all of them looking for someone different.  She didn't feel the least bit curious to check their signs.  She only wanted to keep hers at the ready.  

“Zeltencia,” she mouthed, letting her tongue roll erratically over the syllables.  Kyrinna hadn't seen Zeltencia in years; sure, they'd kept in touch, but mostly through texts.  After all, the home's rules meant nobody got a smartphone, so she had to be sneaky.  She'd found that without practice, her brain had fallen back on a wrong way to say it—the wrong way she'd used to tease Zel.  It gave her something to think about besides the sweat starting to weigh her down, or the worries she felt about the whole situation.  What if things didn't work out?

“Zeltencia,” Kyrinna mouthed again, putting a little too much emphasis on the “sha” kind of sound at the end.  She heard it whistle out through her teeth.  She'd caught herself soon enough that she was able to anticipate the stare the person to her left was giving her.  It made her much less anxious than it would have otherwise, but it was still uncomfortable.  She stuck a finger into her brown hair and began to twirl it, gripping her sign from below with the other hand.  

All this holding still was starting to get on Kyrinna's nerves.  The last thing Zel had told her was “on my way”.  She'd studied the map online, had the address, looked up directions...the drive should have been five minutes tops, and yet—

“Ky!” she heard someone call out.  It had to be Zel; no one else out here would know Kyrinna's full name, much less be on the short list of people allowed to use her nickname.  Sure enough, she looked up from her reverie to come face-to-face with an athletic young woman.  She flashed Kyrinna a wide smile, her red ponytail still carrying the momentum of her sprint.  Kyrinna opened her mouth to greet her old friend, but the two of them were locked in an embrace before she could.

Kyrinna let out a grunt as their bodies made impact.  “You've gotten faster, sis!” she said, nuzzling into Zel's shoulder a bit.  She had to stand on her tiptoes, but Zel had no problem leaning over the barricade of luggage between them.  Even so, Kyrinna couldn't help but shift, fidgeting to avoid whatever was on Zel's back; its texture and stiffness had surprised her and set her off a bit.  In the end, she decided to wade through her luggage, making it easier to hold on to Zel in a comfortable way.

“Thanks!”  The reply had come a bit late.  Then again, Zel had been a bit short on breath since she'd arrived.  The airport Kyrinna had departed from was so small compared to the waiting area alone of her destination, so that didn't surprise her much.  “Sorry, I just...you've grown so much!  The pics don't do it justice, you know...?”

“Wait...are you crying?”  Ky chuckled, doing her best to keep from following suit.  She hadn't been hugged for awhile now, especially not as tightly and lovingly as Zel was.  “C'mon, nerd, don't embarrass us...”

Zeltencia shook her head, her laugh heavily distorted on its way out.  “Ugh, you're still so worried about being embarrassed?”

Kyrinna could feel Zel's weight shifting.  She moved her left arm to intercept Zel's right.  There was no need to look up; she already knew what was coming.  “Uh-uh, you don't get to noogie me in an airport!”  She shrugged off the rest of the embrace and grabbed her suitcases from around her, a handle gripped in each hand.  “'On my way' my ass...what kept you?”

The two of them began to walk and talk, finding their way closer to the exit.  “It's the road on the way here,” Zeltencia answered, quickly taking the lead.  Zel had always been observant and agile; Kyrinna knew she wouldn't have to bump up against any strangers if she could just keep that brilliant red hair in her sights and follow along.  “There's this kinda dip...it's fun to skate into, but not out of, you know?”

“Skate?” Kyrinna repeated.  “You didn't drive?”

Zel shook her head, guiding the two of them to a bench overlooking the pickup area for cars.  The sun was setting in front of them, casting a warm golden glow over Kyrinna and all the other new arrivals.  “I don't have enough money for a car.  It all went to the apartment.”  She must have heard the air Kyrinna sucked in, because Zel's next move was to gently squeeze her hand.  “I didn't mean it like that, sis...I'd be way better off if the last landlord didn't hold out on returning my security deposit.  I told you about that, right?”

Kyrinna leaned her head on Zel's shoulder, squinting out at the cars shuffling away everyone else.  “Yeah...actually, you showed me the old place when you got it, right?  There's no faking the date you sent me those...you could totally win a court case over that nerd.”

“Eh,” Zel replied.  “I don't have time to fight her.  I've been busy practicing for the Downhill Thunder coming up.  They've already closed off the street being used for the contest, so sometimes I go around to that after work.”

“Exactly!” Kyrinna spat.  “You must be exhausted, Zel!  And I sure as hell don't wanna drag these bags home on foot...didn't think of that, did ya, nerd?”

As if on cue, Kyrinna could hear a smartphone vibrating.  Hers was in one of her bags, and she had no intention of digging for it.  Fortunately, though, it seemed like it had been Zel's phone that went off, and whatever it was, it got a laugh out of her.  

“Actually, I did!” Zeltencia shot back, shoving her screen in Ky's face.  It had a notification from an app she didn't recognize, ChauffeurAll.  “I downloaded this rideshare app earlier this week.  I used to use another one, but some dickhead started trying to get people to boycott ChauffeurAll, so they've been offering discounts all this week if you live in Octarn City.”

“Should we be using it if there's a boycott...?”  Despite her questions, Ky still followed Zel outside, trying to help locate their ride.

Zel shrugged, once again taking the lead through the steady drip of fellow travelers.  “Eh, it's just someone throwing a fit that one of the drivers was living in their van.”  Kyrinna felt another pang of guilt; Zel had texted her before complaining about some of the prices around Octarn City.  Clearly, if someone was living out of their car even with a rideshare job, things hadn't gotten better since those texts.  “Oh, hey, speaking of...!”

Zeltencia pointed through the crowd at a forest green minivan slowly scooting along the access road, its roof bearing the ChauffeurAll logo on a placard.  No other vehicle around was branded like that, so it had to be their ride.  As usual, Zel made it to the van first, but from afar, Ky could see her sis slow down very suddenly, kind of far from the van.  That hesitation gave Ky plenty of time to catch up.  “What's the matter, sis?” she asked.

Before she could ask anything else, the minivan rolled down one of its windows, a distinct scent immediately catching the breeze.  Zeltencia held her ground, but Kyrinna made her way up to the window instead, peering into the vehicle.  The driver responded to this scrutiny with a smile and a shrug of her thick shoulders.  “'ey, you da one what needs a ride?” she asked through an even thicker accent.

Kyrinna nodded.  “Yeah, my sis and I just—“  Before she could finish, she felt a tug on her sleeve, and looked over to see it balled up in Zel's hand.  “What?”

“Don't 'what' me, Ky,” Zel shot back.  “You can't smell that?”

“What?  It's just weed, dude.”  Somehow, that failed to ease Zel's obvious nervousness.  “I told you about the nug the Pinaster twins snuck into the group home, didn't I?  I gotta prepare for these things when someone at med school offers me them.”  Zel stood motionless, stark shadows creeping across the death glare she was giving Ky.  She could already tell that this was a discussion she wouldn't be able to avoid for long.  It's not as if she'd liked smoking with the Pinasters that much anyway.

“You's comin' or not?” the ChauffeurAll driver hollered.

“Yeah, where should we sit?”

The driver held up one hand, jutting a thumb over her shoulder at the rear seats.  It was fine by Kyrinna; she didn't want to move the pillow and blankets out of the front seat anyway.  “You was sayin'?”

Zel continued holding her ground until Ky had loaded her belongings into the van and claimed her seat behind the driver.  Even if Zel didn't like the choice Ky was making, she was still letting it happen, just as she'd always had.  That was part of why Ky was so unfazed by this cabbie; Zel had always been so good at watching over her.  Zel's protective impulses were rarely correct, but when they were, she'd proven herself more than capable of protecting her little sis.  After Ky gave the seat next to her a few pats, Zel finally joined her.

“I just moved out here with my sister here, is what I was saying,” Kyrinna said, leaning around the seat in front of her a bit.

She could see the driver examine the two of them via the rear-view mirror.  “Huh, you's don't look too alike.”

“I mean, we're not related by blood,” Zeltencia piped up.  “But she and I both grew up in the Cross Town Foster Home.”

“'ey, a couple'a orphans, huh?”  Zel's face was less obscured by shadows than it had been outside the car.  Ky could clearly see the scowl this time, again through the rear-view.  “Whoa, didn't mean it like dat.  It's just...I seen da place...kinda messed up, what it used ta be, but it's real pretty now, innit?”

Kyrinna nodded.  “Well, yeah,” she confirmed, “but...how'd you know, nerd?”

“Sorry,” Zeltencia said, reaching over to flick Kyrinna's ear.  She never did it hard enough to hurt, but Kyrinna hated the thumping sensation in her earlobe regardless.  “I think she's calling you names because me being on edge is putting her on edge.”

“Den you's two's got it all wrong,” the driver scolded them.  Kyrinna could see her fiddling with her phone, her fingers sometimes hitting two buttons by mistake.  Eventually, the phone surrendered a map of the nearby streets.  A red line ran along them, doubtlessly to Ky's new home.  “Dis is s'posed ta be a chill place.”

“So we smelled.”  Zeltencia's nose wrinkled.

“Actually, if you get a lot of complaints about this smell,” Ky offered, “you know what you should do?”

Zel's eyes flicked along the rear-view mirror to look into Ky's.  “Stop getting high in your work vehicle?”

“Take a paper towel roll,” Ky continued, ignoring her sister, “and stuff dryer sheets into it.  Breathe out through that, it'll keep you from skunking up the place so much.”  That's what the Pinasters had been doing back at the home to avoid being caught, and last she knew, it was still working for them.

“...well, whaddaya know,” the driver mused.  Kyrinna hadn't been watching Octarn City through the windows, but at about that point, she did feel the van descend.  Looking ahead, she could see they'd hit the dip in the road Zeltencia had ranted about earlier, a natural valley that ran underneath what looked like a highway.  “If dat tip works, I really owe ya one...uh...which one'a you's is Zoltan or whatever dat name on da app was?”

Kyrinna chuckled.  “I'm Kyrinna, and this is my sister Zeltencia!”

“Cydia,” the driver responded, reaching toward the sisters for a moment.  Ky knew Zel would hate Cydia for taking her hand off the steering wheel, but she also got the feeling that it wouldn't get better unless they just shook her hand and got it over with.  Kyrinna volunteered hers, and dragged Zeltencia's hand over afterward.  Cydia's hand disappeared, swallowed up by the waves of dirty blonde hair that must have come down to her waist.  She listened as Cydia scratched her scalp, then put the hand back on the steering wheel, just as she'd expected. 

Zeltencia let out a low chortle from next to her.  “You still do that smirk too?” she asked.

“What smirk?” Kyrinna asked, already turning her face toward the van windows.  Octarn City was starting to turn on all its lights in anticipation of the approaching night, and the result was nothing like sleepy little Cross Town.  So many businesses were crowding Repositrim Street, and all of them were vying for Ky's attention.  The sheer amount of signage hanging off the buildings there seemed to be the city's substitute for streetlights, since she didn't see any.  The colors seemed to swirl around them as Cydia drove through the uniform blocks.

Zel snapped Ky out of her sightseeing with a push, gently jostling her in her seat.  “That's that 'oh, I'm so smart, I was so right' smirk!”  Ky wasn't even allowed one syllable into her own defense.  “You gave me that look all the time, Ky, you can't play dumb with me!”

“I had no intention of playing dumb, Zeltencia.”  Ky was surprised at how good it felt to mispronounce Zel's name.  Text had naturally made it pretty hard to pull that joke, and after Zel had been adopted, she wasn't sure if she'd ever have another chance to do it.  It was just one experience of many that made the day feel so unreal.  These were the most powerful emotions she'd felt in a long time—suspiciously strong, even.  Was she still on the flight, asleep, dreaming of what Octarn City could possibly be like?

“Cydia,” Zeltencia called out, bringing Kyrinna out of her head once again.  “What's up with this music?”

“Not into da vaporwave stuff, Z?” Cydia replied.  Kyrinna hadn't even noticed the music; Cydia had kept it turned down real low.  Now that Zel had pointed it out, though, Ky focused on the tune, its tranquil beats ambling out of the van's speakers.  If this wasn't a dream, then Cydia's van sure seemed designed to make it feel like one.  Besides the somambulant song Cydia played, she'd resurfaced the walls and floors of the van's interior with what seemed to be black carpeting.  The seats were covered, too, in plush protectors that came in such a dark blue that they nearly blended in with the carpet.

“It's like a sensory deprivation tank back here,” Kyrinna mused, not meaning to say it aloud.

She didn't even notice she had until Cydia glanced at her in the rear-view mirror again.  “Sensa-wha...?” the driver asked.

“Uh...sensory deprivation.”  Kyrinna tried to stifle a laugh, but that too ended up more audible than she'd intended.  “Hey Cydia, guess what I came to Octarn City's med school to study...!”

“Aw, jeez, I wouldn't know...tell me, what're ya here for?”

“Pharmacokinetics!”

Something about the word seemed to make Cydia lose a little control of the vehicle.  She slammed on the brakes at the next stop sign, not at all the gentle stop she'd apparently been doing this whole time.  “Okay, dat's just mean, innit?  You're big-wordin' at me on purpose!”

“Busted,” Ky admitted.  “But I'm not lying!  It's, uh...well, it's about stuff like medicine and chemicals, and how they travel through your body.”

Cydia let out a long, low whistle.  “Jeez Louise,” she gasped, “dat what you's eggheads are gonna be talkin' about at dat med school party tomorrow night?”

“Party?” Zel parroted.  “Ky, you never told me about a party...”

Kyrinna clicked her tongue.  “Excuse me, nerd?” she replied, reeling away from Zel a bit.  “I didn't even know about it!”

“Huh,” Cydia said, easing the van into a parking spot.  “All da different parts of Octarn City University throw dese big parties right at da end of break.  I make bank offa dem kids...an' da med school one's tomorrow.”  Cydia craned herself around her seat to look back at Kyrinna.  “Ya want a lift to da party, right from me, for cheaper than on da app?”

“...honestly, Cydia, I'm not even sure I'll go.”

“Well, if ya do...”  Cydia rummaged through her car for a bit, finding a receipt in the cup holder and a pen in her bra.  “...I'll give ya my number, how's dat?”

“I'll keep it in mind, thanks,” Kyrinna chirped, accepting the phone number with a smile.

“Thank you for the ride, Cydia,” Zeltencia said.  She'd been speaking so quietly up until that moment, it jumped Kyrinna a little.  “Besides that one stop, you're a very gentle driver.  It almost put me to sleep...”

Cydia responded with a short bark of a laugh.  “Well, now dat's a review I'd love ta have!” she noted.  “See you's two around!”

“Bye Cydia!” Kyrinna answered.  “Nice meeting you!”  Zel had already taken one of her bags; Ky took the other on her way out of the van.  Stepping out onto the sidewalk, she was immediately overcome by the same cloying air that had plagued her in the airport.  Whatever Cydia had done to keep the inside of her van so cool and comfy, Ky didn't miss it until it was gone.  When the van turned a corner and left her sight, she instead turned to Zel, hands on her hips.  “Well, that was fun...!”

Zel said something back, but under her breath, too low for Ky to hear.  Instead, the two of them made their way through the apartment complex, the wheels of Ky's baggage scraping along too loudly to say much else.  The noise continued up a few flights of stairs, until they finally hit the fourth story.

“Home sweet home,” Zel muttered as she fumbled with her keys, leaning on a door probably marked 44.  The paint had been worn away too much to know for sure.  The dark blue of the paint gave way to the brown of the wooden door in random spots, creating random patterns that would have looked much nicer in different colors.

Eventually, Zel got the door open and stepped aside, letting Ky into the apartment first.  Zel had sent her pictures of the place, so she knew the basic layout—a small entry hallway, formed by a nook on each side.  To her right was the kitchen area, and she could see an open door into the bathroom on the left.  The rest of the apartment was one contiguous open space, carved up into sections by the furniture there.

“It was the only thing close to the university we could afford, you know?” Zel said.  She seemed to be responding to a slight Ky hadn't even made.

In fact, the situation was quite the opposite.  “This is so cool!” Kyrinna gasped, leaving her suitcase at the door to run into the open section.  What she saw there, especially the couch and the bunk bed, spurred a new thought in her head.  “And you worked so hard to set all this up!”  Zeltencia took a few steps her way, but she ran the rest of the distance.  It was her turn to catch Zel in a sudden hug.  “Thanks, sis.”

Zeltencia was more than happy to hug, but not for long.  “Yeah, yeah, no problem...but we've gotta have a talk about this, you know?”  Zel guided the two of them over to the couch, a dark gray thing clearly showing its age.  Zel had draped a purple throw blanket over it, but that wasn't enough to cover all the frayed strands hanging off it.  “We, uh, might need another roommate.”

Kyrinna looked up at her big sister.  “If money's that bad, maybe I can work—“

“No, Ky...you'll be working hard enough.  It's not at all like those community college classes you were taking—I did my research, you know?”  To prove her point, Zel started tapping on her phone, eventually calling up a list of reviews for Ky to see.  “There's a website where you rank your professors and courses, so I went rooting through the big pharma ones.  Lots of course work, lots of studying...”

“Okay, okay, nerd, I gotcha.”  Kyrinna waved the phone away from her.  “Yeesh, you make it sound like OCU's gonna overwork me on its own.”  She didn't want to hear any more about it, lest it dissuade her from this whole setup.  Then again, Zel had already signed the lease, so it was much too late for that.  “Have you found any roommates?”

Zel shook her head.  “I'm out of the house a lot, so I wanted to get you more involved in the search.  We both have to be comfortable with whoever we pick.”

Ky could tell what Zel was holding back.  The only reason she'd spoken to Cydia so much was because Zel didn't.  Most of the time, it was Zel that spoke for the two of them, since Ky was usually too shy to speak for herself.  Then again, perhaps the fact that Cydia felt so approachable was a sign all its own.  “What about Cydia?” she asked.

“Our ChauffeurAll driver?” Zel asked.  “You're joking, right?”

Ky shook her head.  “She wasn't your typical driver, sure, but...I dunno, she seemed really nice.  I just wanted to see if saying 'pharmacokinetics' around her would make her head explode, but...she was really interested in hearing what I was studying, didn't you notice?”

Zel brought her hand to her forehead.  “Ky, she was setting up a sales pitch.”

“That's not fair, Zel.  You can't ask me my opinion and then fight me so hard on it.”

“You're right.”  Zel shook her head, taking the hand she'd left there and putting on Ky's shoulder instead.  “I'm sorry.  I just...I was thinking more...maybe you'll meet someone at that med school party.  You'll have someone around that understands that stuff better than Cydia or I ever could.”

Ky let out a low sigh.  Parties were absolutely not her strong suit, but Zel had a good point.  “...okay,” she relented.  “But either we have time to be picky, or we don't, Zel.  And if we don't...well, I'm asking Cydia if I don't find anyone at the party.”  Ky shrugged and added, “See?  If your idea's so good, we don't even have to try my dumb idea.”

“That's not what I meant either.”  Zel cradled Ky against her on the couch, and reached for the TV remote with the other hand.  “Sometimes you just latch on to the first person you find, you know?  And that's not always the right thing to do.”

“That's how I found you, though...innit?”  Kyrinna got through her Cydia impersonation without laughing, but just barely.