Chapter Text
Weston College. An academy reserved for boys from Britain’s most influential families. That what the listing for the school was supposed to be, anyway.
“You’ll be attending Weston College.” Your grandmother said boredly as she added to lumps of sugar to her tea. She was a short old woman with long grey hair. Whenever you needed help she was always there. After your parents accident she had stepped up and took you in. You always thought she was the smartest woman you know.
You nearly dropped your teacup on the floor as you sat down. “Isn’t that place an all-boys school?”
Your grandmother simply stirred another lump of sugar into her tea, she'd had always had a sweet tooth. You must have picked up her habit aswell because the tea did seem to bitter for your taste.
“They won’t notice. I already put in your letter, accepted.” She said it with such confidence that you wondered if she’d already lost her mind. She was getting to that age…
When you laughed, she didn’t. Instead, she leaned back in her chair with the faintest smile. “I attended Weston myself, you know?”
“What?” You felt you brow go up at her words, adding another lump of sugar to your own tea.
“For all the six years.” She sipped slowly from her cup.
That night, she told you about her time at Weston. She told you the story of when she was a little girl, her mother cutting her hair and sending her off with her brother to attend the school. Her mother had said to her 'you could use the education.' She’d hidden every part of herself even till graduation. She was rather proud at the fact that no one had ever discovered the truth.
“And now,” she said, reaching for a pair of scissors, “you’ll do the same.”
You hadn’t wanted to, you’d argued, complained, even begged to get a job. But she simply raise her hand as if brushing off your words.
Your grandmother had always been frighteningly persuasive. Before long your hair was lying in uneven piles across the kitchen floor, a binder was wrapped tightly around your ribs.
Your wardrobe was replaced entirely with stuck up boys uniforms. Then, with a kiss on the forehead and a firm push toward the carriage. You were sent to Weston College. You we're suprised how cold she was simply sending you out there. The most she said how to act was to keep a low voice and a even lower profile. She insisted for you to check the trophy rack to find her name in the green house team for winning a cricket game.
—September, 2, 1881
The memory felt strangely distant now.
Back then, everything had still been new.
By the time your carriage rolled through Weston’s gates, the afternoon sun had already begun to sink toward the horizon. Supper couldn’t have been more than an hour away. Students and their families crowded the entrance, servants hauling trunks while boys in neatly pressed uniforms wandered between the buildings. Just beyond the gate sat a small wooden gatehouse where a brunet in a stiff waistcoat lazily managed the arriving students. The back wall was covered from floor to ceiling in neatly hung keys, each one labelled with a brass tag. You dragged your suitcase over the stone path until you reached his desk.
“Name?” he asked flatly, brushing a stray strand of brown hair from his face without looking up.
You answered with your real name. Your grandmother had insisted there was no need to invent another. Plenty of boys have delicate names these days, she’d claimed. No one will question it unless you give them a reason to.
The man scanned a ledger before reaching behind him. His long arm disappeared into the sea of keys and returned with one dangling from his finger.
“Purple House. Room one-thirty-three. Third floor. Meet the fag at the foundation.”
You thanked him quietly before making your way toward the gathering crowd. A senior student wearing a deep purple flower on his jacket stood waiting with a clipboard tucked beneath one arm. Every so often he called a name, marking it off once someone answered.
“Scott Tellingly?”
“Here!” Scratch.
“Gregory Violet?” A hand rose somewhere to your left.
“Here.”
You glanced over without thinking. The boy was pale, with dark hair interrupted by a single white streak framing one side of his face. His eyes were a dark purple beneath heavy lashes, and, oddly enough, his lips looked stained with black lipstick. It should have looked ridiculous. Instead-
“…Cool.”
The word escaped before you could stop it. His head turned almost instantly. Dark lined eyes met yours for only a second before you quickly looking away, you could feel your face warming with embarrassment. Thankfully, the senior called your name at that exact moment, allowing you to answer before you made a bigger fool of yourself.
“Leave your luggage inside the entrance hall,” the senior instructed once everyone had arrived. “It'll be delivered to your rooms after the campus tour.”
Purple House looked nothing like the rest of Weston. The building loomed over the grounds with weathered stone walls and narrow windows. A tall tower stretched into the grey sky while bare trees surrounded the courtyard, their twisted branches rattling softly in the wind. Somehow, despite only being a short walk from the main campus, the air felt colder here.
As the group followed their guide, you couldn’t shake the feeling someone was watching you. Glancing over your shoulder, you came to see the same boy as before. He wasn’t exactly staring, but every time you looked back, his gaze drifted away a few seconds too late.
The tour passed in a blur of classrooms, gardens, music rooms and lecture halls before ending in the grand dining hall. Supper was surprisingly lively despite everyone having only just arrived, conversations bouncing from table to table as strangers quickly became acquaintances.
After the meal, the House students returned to their dormitory. Their luggage had already been carried upstairs, leaving the entrance hall completely empty. As everyone climbed the staircases, groups slowly split apart until only a handful of students remained on the third floor.
You counted the room numbers as you walked. One hundred and twenty seven, one hundred and twenty nine, one hundred and thirty one. Finally, One hundred and thirty three.
You reached for your key, only to hear footsteps stop behind you. Turning around, you found Gregory standing there with the matching key resting loosely between his fingers.
“…Is this your room too?” you asked, hoping you hadn’t somehow wandered to the wrong door.
“Yes.” His voice was so quiet that you almost missed it.He stepped past you without another word, unlocked the door, and pushed it open.
Inside, two neatly made beds stood opposite one another. A two desks sat beneath the window, and both of your suitcases had already been placed beside their respective beds.
—October, 10, 1884
Three years passed quicker than you ever expected. Your grandmother had been right. As long as you kept your head down, minded your own business, and gave no one a reason to question you, life at Weston was surprisingly manageable.
Your roommate had turned out to be Gregory Violet. The two of you had met on your very first day at Weston and, by sheer coincidence, or perhaps bad luck, had remained roommates ever since. Gregory came from a distinguished, wealthy family, but it wasn’t his name that had placed him in Purple House. It was his talent. His sketches looked almost lifelike, each one painstakingly detailed, as though he noticed things everyone else overlooked.
Living with him was… unusual. Gregory rarely left the dormitory outside of classes or meals. Thick blackout curtains permanently covered the windows, leaving the room lit almost entirely by flickering candles, even in the middle of the afternoon. When you had once asked why he disliked opening the curtains, he’d simply replied, “The sun hurts,” before returning to his drawing.
He wasn’t unfriendly—just quiet. Some days the two of you exchanged only a handful of words, while on others you’d find yourselves talking absentmindedly over homework or while getting ready for bed. It wasn’t the sort of friendship people would notice from the outside, but after three years of sharing the same room, you had come to understand each other’s habits well enough. In your second year you went through a phase of believing that he was a vampire. It fit for a while till you came to your senses over the summer break.
You knew Gregory preferred silence while he drew, sharpened every pencil to the exact same point, and always fell asleep with a sketchbook resting on his chest. Liked to mix his tea with different flavours and always put in two lumps of sugar in his tea, And Gregory knew never to ask why you were always the first to wake up and the last to change into your nightclothes.
It was during your that's same year that tragedy struck Weston. A student from Red House had been murdered.
His body had been discovered in the kitchens that morning with a knife buried in his chest. No one knew who had done it, or why, but the news spread through the college faster than any rumour ever had.
Lessons were cancelled immediately. Every student was ordered to remain inside their dormitory until further notice, with meals to be delivered throughout the day. Police officers came and went from the grounds, questioning masters, prefects, and students alike. Every footstep echoing through the corridors made people wonder if someone else had been called in for questioning, or if another body had been found.
The silence settled heavily Weston College.
Your bed sat beneath the curtained window on the left side of the room, while Gregory’s occupied the opposite wall. Laying flat on your back, staring at the cracked ceiling above as candlelight danced across the plaster. Across from you, Gregory sat with his sketchbook balanced on his knees, the only sound in the room the steady scratching of graphite against parchment.
“Wanna play tic-tac-toe?” you asked, breaking the silence.
Expected a quiet refusal, you looked back at the cieling.
The steady scratching of his pencil stopped. Gregory flipped two pages of his sketchbook, retrieved two school pencils from his desk, and crossed the room. Sitting opposite you on the bed, he opened to a blank page and carefully drew a neat grid before sliding the book between you.
You smiled faintly and drew an X in the centre square. “Who do you think did it?”
Gregory placed an O in the top corner without looking up. “I don’t know.” His voice was as calm as ever. “I just hope they catch them before they do something again.”
You nodded absentmindedly, placing another X. For the next several minutes, the two of you talked quietly about the murder, repeating rumours neither of you believed while taking turns marking the page. Gregory all the first game without much effort.
“I wasn’t paying attention,” you muttered.
He simply turned the full page and drew another grid. Three games later, you had yet to win a single round. You tossed your pencil onto the bed and flopped backwards with an exaggerated groan. “You’re impossible.”
Gregory had already returned to absentmindedly sketching in the corner of the page. After a long moment of staring at the ceiling, another idea came to mind.
“…We could do each other’s makeup?”
The words slipped out before you had much time to think about them. It wasn’t exactly a normal suggestion, but being trapped inside all day was slowly driving you mad.
Gregory finally looked up. His dark eyes lingered on your face just long enough to make you oddly self-conscious.
“…Sure,” he said quietly. “Sit in the chair.”
You blinked. “Really?”
He simply gave you a small nod. You carried your desk chair into the middle of the room while Gregory pulled his own over until they were facing one another. From the drawer of his bedside table, he produced a small collection of cosmetics you already knew well. After three years together, seeing Gregory apply black lipstick and dark eye makeup every morning had become as ordinary as watching someone button their waistcoat.
Pinning your bangs back to better see what he was doing, he worked with surprising gentleness. A brush swept lightly across your eyelids before soft, dark colours framed your eyes.
"Come more forward." He said pushing himself forward in his seat. Pushing his legs wider apart to move closer, you could feel the tips of your ears warming. He blended each shade with careful precision, pausing every so often to study your face before continuing. When he leaned away, he tilted his head thoughtfully.
“You’re quite androgynous,” he murmured. “If your hair were longer… I might have mistaken you for—”
“You're funny.” you interrupted with a grin.
Gregory blinked once. "What?"
You laughed, taking the makeup brush from his hand before he could finish.
“My turn to be the artist.” He didn’t object.
Instead, he lowered the hood of his cloak while you pinned back the white streak of hair that kept falling over his face. His makeup had already been done that morning, so there wasn’t much to add. You simply touched up the edges, darkened the shadow around his eyes with a different shade of purple, and finished by carefully brushing a deep plum colour over his lips. Adding a what you called 'loopy circle thing' to his eyeliner, you were rather proud of.
“There,” you said happily. “Perfect.”
Gregory reached for the small hand mirror resting on his desk.
Before he could pick it up— Knock. Knock.
The sharp sound against the door made both of you jump. Gregory’s fingers tightened around the arms of his chair while you instinctively clutched your hands together pulling them to your chest, trying to will your heartbeat to slow. Another knock followed. Then a familiar voice called through the wood. “I’ll leave your lunch on the floor if no one answers.”
You let out a relieved breath. “It’s just the lunch steward.”
Gregory relaxed almost immediately. You crossed the room and unlocked the door.
The steward stood outside balancing a tray with two neatly arranged meals. His eyes flicked from you…to Gregory…then back again.
His brows lifted slightly as he took in the matching dark makeup covering both of your faces, but he wisely chose not to comment.
“I’ll collect the trays at supper,” he said, handing them over. “Just leave them outside your door.”
You thanked him before closing the door once more. As the latch clicked shut, you glanced sideways at Gregory. He looked down at the tray in his hands. A soft huff of breath came from Gregory. It was close to a laugh, in a way. Looking over to him he had a hand covering his face, but you could see a faint smile trying to escape.