Chapter Text
Golden sunlight shone through the sheer curtains that draped in front of the large window of Scaramouche’s dorm room. He had just finished unpacking his belongings; books and plants were nested on the shelves, his clothes were folded and put away into drawers that fit snugly under his bed, his desk held his computer and other trinkets, and his bed was neatly made with a blue and indigo comforter. He placed his hands on his hips as he admired his hard work. He was especially pleased that it seemed he didn’t have a roommate.
He reached into his backpack to find his phone charger and loaded his cozy farming game up. He always loved playing games and analysing the playstyle and the way the art was created. After he spent a good chunk of time gathering materials and decorations for his forest, he felt like taking a shower.
Scaramouche felt that he got insanely lucky with the dorm room he received; there was an attached bathroom, not a communal hall bathroom, and he didn’t have a dumb roommate to annoy him. He grabbed a towel, purple with dark red stripes, and made his way to the bathroom. The faucet for the shower was different from those he’d seen before, so it took a few minutes to get the water running and hot.
He took off his grey t-shirt and a slight smile crept up on his lips when he looked in the mirror and saw his flat chest. He stepped into the warm water, wincing slightly at the dull pain that radiated from the pink scars at the bottom of his chest and around his nipples. The mild physical pain was worth it though; a small price to pay for the much greater mental anguish that had been taken away.
He stood still in the water for a few more minutes, feeling the ways it pattered against his hair and his skin, before pumping his usual orange blossom and vanilla shampoo into his hands and slowly working it through his raven blue hair. Steam billowed around him as he rinsed off the foamy soap suds and eventually turned off the water.
After wrapping himself in his towel, he opened the bathroom door only to be met with the sight of someone, tall with orange hair, in his dorm.
Scaramouche was completely dumbfounded at the sight of the man sitting on the bed opposite his own and yelled accusatorily, “Who the hell are you?”
The ginger gave him a smile, “I’m your roommate of course. Sorry that I’m late.”
“No you’re not. I wasn’t supposed to have a roommate,” he snapped back matter-of-factly.
“Yes I am and I’m here now okay? I’m sorry that we got off on the wrong foot, truly. My name is Ajax,” the new man introduced himself. “I hope we can get along well.”
As he spoke, he was brutally ignored by Scaramouche who instead focused his attention on grabbing a clean pair of clothes and traveling back to the privacy of the bathroom to change.
“Nice to meet you too, prick,” Ajax muttered under his breath. Scaramouche was exactly his type, it was a shame that his personality was awful.
When he padded out of the bathroom, now dressed in shorts and a sweatshirt, Scaramouche made a beeline for his bed, still choosing to not pay attention to the new intruder. He settled on his bed, sitting against the wall, and resumed playing on his Switch.
“I told you my name, what’s yours?” Ajax asked while starting to unpack his belongings. Scaramouche didn’t reply, instead opting to turn on his side away from the annoying pest that was still trying to talk to him.
“I know you heard me, bowl cut,” Ajax decided to tease.
“I don’t have a fucking bowl cut, asshat,” he whirled around in offense to the statement.
Ajax smirked at him, “Okay then, blueberry.”
“Why blueberry?”
He paused for a minute, “You’re right. You might be blue like a blueberry, but you’re much more prickly, like a wolfhook.
Scaramouche was astounded by the thought process of his new roommate. After what felt like minutes of silence, he eventually decided on saying, “Scaramouche.” When he saw that Ajax was visibly confused, he clarified, “My name. It’s Scaramouche.”
“Well, it’s nice to have your name, Scara,” Ajax smiled again at the shorter man in front of him.
“Ew, don’t call me that, meathead.” Scara turned away from the annoyingly handsome man. No, not handsome. Just annoying.
“Blueberry~” Ajax truly was a plague on Scaramouche’s college experience.
After that, neither of them said a word for a while. Scaramouche was busy alternating games from his wide collection whilst Ajax unboxed his personal items. He had a huge array of posters: one of an ice skater who went by Flins; one, slightly smaller, of the famous snowboarder, Varka; and quite a few of the professional boxer, Wriothesley. He also seemed to have a CD collection and had a quite large box of them, some of which he decided to remove and display on his shelves. Some looked to be from some well-known Natlan bands, whilst others seemed to be more obscure Snezhnayan artists. Nothing in particular that was to Scaramouche’s taste.
Scaramouche was much happier listening to his Inazuman pop music, especially the band 5T/AR. He felt so egregiously aggravated by his roommate’s music taste that he felt he had to cleanse himself by playing his own music.
He popped his headphones on and tried to tune out the presence of the obnoxious man that now occupied the other half of his room. Pretty soon, the music lulled him into an in-between awake and asleep state and Scaramouche felt relaxed for the first time since meeting Ajax.
Eventually, the gentle melody lulled him to sleep until he woke up, still listening. He glanced at the clock on his bedside table. It read “5:27”; hours before his alarm was set to wake him.
No matter what he tried, Scaramouche couldn’t get back to sleep, especially now that he could hear his roommate’s slight snoring. Lovely.
After what felt like hours of alternating between pretending to be asleep, staring at the ceiling, and pressing his head between two pillows, he gave up on the idea of more sleep. Instead, he loaded his favourite game on his phone, wincing at the flashbang from the screen brightness.
He spent a while gathering materials and expanding both his farming and his fishing areas before Ajax was a conscious, and therefore annoying, prat again. The moment he saw that Scaramouche was awake too, he excitedly said, “Good morning! I didn’t know you were a morning person too!”
Of course he was a morning person on top of everything. Of course Scaramouche wasn’t going to get to enjoy his leisurely mornings.
“I’m not,” he replied harshly. In another world, his eyebags could be heard begging him to get more rest. In this world, they just emphasized his severe demeanor.
“Ah no worries!” Ajax smiled. Scaramouche’s frown was almost as deep as the upside-down version of Ajax’s wide grin. “You don’t need to worry about being woken by me! I’m as quiet as a mouse.”
Immediately after stating this, Ajax managed to trip over the floor itself and crash onto the floor.
“More like a yelping lab rat,” Scaramouche muttered.
“What was that?”
“Oh, nothing. Don’t worry about it.”
Scaramouche was now heavily debating on somehow putting Ajax up for adoption or selling him online. Sadly, the most he could do would be trying to report Ajax for something and getting a new roommate. If only he could choose the former.