Realistic or Modern A Revenge Note | Closed |

[bambi-under-the-sky]

River was currently in a class focused on gender and violence, and if she walked out by herself she would almost certainly get a true lesson.

At her core, River was an optimist to the point where she couldn't understand why anyone would ever choose to be cynical (this world was terrible enough without adding negativity). However, she never fully believed her college counselors when she said college was where you thrived. When she was a senior, she believed the...incident would ruin her life, that would be known as the slut who didn't put out (society was incredible for finding a way to simultaneously call her a whore and a prude). But, now that she was in college, now that she was away from it all she was beginning her fill life with things that caused her real happiness. She had a job she enjoyed and most importantly she had friends.

She and Wally were certainly a pair, she all dark curls and russet skin, him so pretty that it was amazing that he did not become the next Narcissus, but he was her best friend. She never really had a best friend in high school, just a group of people she hung out with, this was different. After all, they lived together, and he was currently waiting to walk her home. Both of them were living the "broke college student life" and River was always scared of walking the streets alone. People tended to not catcall you if they thought you were "claimed" by someone. It was funny, she loved the guy, but if you asked most people they would describe him as a snarky pretentious douchebag and they were wrong...or well, they were only half right.

It might be stupid, but she viewed them as a household, and as someone who grew up in a household that could only be described as dysfunctional, that was important to her. She learned in class about unlearning patterns of abuse, and every day she got to put that into practice. Despite her life, or perhaps to overcompensate for the lack of affection she received in her life, she was an extraordinarily warm person often going out of her way to explicitly tell her roommate whenever he did something that made her happy while also showing him that she cared for him.

When class eventually ended, she tightened her jacket, even she couldn't deny she looked like a stereotypical artsy college student right now, her headband patterned with butterflies and her jacket having been sewn with a multitude of patches championing a variety of political causes. Despite it being dark, her dress, a bright and happy pech shade was noticeable, she was very much a Luna Lovegood who was looking for her Draco Malfoy.

Walking out with her classmates, the cold air hit her like a thrown book and she looked around for her friend. She had a scarf in her patterned backpack, but even she worried that she would look too kitschy in it. Where is he? She thought, he usually stuck out because of his coloring ah! Warm brown eyes met cool grey ones and she waved before walking over, meeting him with a side hug.

"There's my pretty boy," She greeted him with teasing affection, "I couldn't find you and I got scared."

 

[RabbitsWarren]

art by

arithm

Wᴀʀʀᴇɴ Bᴜʀɴs

(he/him)

ʙᴜɢʙᴇᴀʀ ʙᴀʀᴅs ᴡɪᴛʜ
ʙᴀɴᴊᴏs ʏ'ᴀʟʟ

Aʙᴏᴜᴛ Mᴇ

Wᴇʙɴᴏᴠᴇʟ Lɪɴᴋ

Wᴀᴛᴛᴘᴀᴅ Lɪɴᴋ

DᴇᴠɪᴀɴᴛAʀᴛ Lɪɴᴋ

I'ᴍ ᴡᴏʀʀɪᴇᴅ 'ʙᴏᴜᴛ ᴛʜᴇ ғᴜᴛᴜʀᴇ

Tʜʀᴇᴀᴅ Hᴜʙ

Cʜᴀʀᴀᴄᴛᴇʀ Gᴀʟʟᴇʀʏ

RP Pᴀʀᴛɴᴇʀ Sᴇᴀʀᴄʜ

Gᴀᴍᴇ Cᴇɴᴛʀᴀʟ Sᴛᴀᴛɪᴏɴ

Tʜᴇ Fᴜᴛᴜʀᴇ

Mʏsᴛᴇʀʏ Sᴋᴜʟʟs

Wallace sat in his last period class, furiously tapping his pencil on the sketch that he finished only minutes ago. He loved the cheap hobby, as he only invested in sketchbooks and pencils rather than other, more expensive materials that more intricate art required. The professor lectured in the room of twelve students, which he felt thankful for due to the University's policy on small class sizes. He personally did fine in classes of more than 500, as he'd taken a few concurrent basics like that, but he knew it certainly helped a lot of people. When the professor dismissed them, he paused, looking at the sketch of the same woman but instead of walking and talking, she was sitting among a field of poppies. He loved to draw people from life, and some women even asked to be drawn nude occasionally. He did oblige for a few, but he made sure to explicitly state that the drawing would be the only event, and then stuck to it. Usually, though, for this reason, he usually kept the sketchbook near him so people couldn't flip through it.

The tall, wiry-bodied man strode out into the large hallway and stuffed his sketchbook into his backpack before continuing down the crowd flow of people starting to file in for night classes and others heading to their night shift jobs. He thought the people working night shift were crazy; he never saw the thrill of it. He preferred to work mornings, have his classes in the afternoon, and be home in the evenings. The need to make money kept the ever-dragging cycle of his college life moving, so he started the day with it so he could force himself to wake up after two hours of sleep.

Someone stopped him by tugging on the sleeve of the back of the button up. He turned to see a beautiful woman, maybe a Sophomore in the college and one year his elder. She leaned her slender body on the wall and prodded him, asking him if he worked nights or if he was free to go out. He responded with only a smile and a polite laugh, as well as the excuse of 'I already have a date' which came off as snarky. Of course, no such date existed, but he hated the meticulous thought of the dating ritual among humans and much preferred to get to know someone closely as a friend first. He simply couldn't bring himself to trust a complete stranger that much to let them into his heart long enough for a date. The harder he played to get, the more women seemed to take it as a competition to get him to go out with him. Some men, too, though he didn't mind the thought, he went with the same principal- friends first.

Men seemed to see him as a challenge, though, and quite often he got into fights for this exact reason, he thought as he left the hallways and out onto the campus lawn where he always met his roommate. He remembered the time Sylvester Wyverne tried to break his jaw because the aforementioned man's girlfriend decided she'd get in on the competition, too. Yeah, most men hated him, and he fought back with a rebellious streak, that was for sure. That's why he was thankful for River, deeply thankful for her. She seemed to understand and treat him kindly, which over the year of knowing her, finally allowed him to trust someone again. It felt nice, too. He got distracted by the vast amount of students in the sea as they flooded out of the building and watched as two squirrels happily chattered to each other and passed a small walnut back and forth. Maybe they were mates, or maybe fondly regarded friends. God knew the rumors that drifted around about the two of them.

"Sorry about that." He apologized when he felt her touch around his back from the side-hug and met her gaze. They really did look like stark differences. The girl that approached, wrapping her arm around him like a friend she knew since birth, donned all of her feelings upon her arms, bags, and jackets with patches for causes and buttons for thoughts. Wallace, however, always found himself picking at and simplifying his appearance to a fault. That day, he wore a white button-up dress shirt covered by a brown, woolen sweater vest and black dress slacks with sharp, polished shoes. What most of the peers around him didn't know about him, he would never say, but he definitely thrifted every article of clothing that he owned. In a way, really, Wallace felt thankful that you could easily look professional by thrifting clothes. It made things a little easier on his end.

"The squirrels distracted me." Wallace admitted and gestured up into the leaves above his head, which spooked the two creatures enough that they retreated into their cavern within the tree. He chuckled at nature's skittishness towards him, or at least wild nature. Cats liked him fairly well.

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♡design by rabbitswarren, coded by uxie♡

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[bambi-under-the-sky]

"It’s okay, you’re forgiven.” River said with an easy laugh.

She was used to being looked at, she had long, wild hair, wore bright colors and dressed like your child’s favorite kindergarten teacher. In fact, River couldn’t deny that she had a bit of an individuality complex, it wasn’t that she felt the desire to be better than everyone else, it was that she had the desire to stand out. Some ids rebelled by drinking, she rebelled by wearing gold eyeliner and rainbow earrings.

However, when people looked at her and Wallace it made her uncomfortable. The best part of college were that rumors held much less strength mainly because most people didn’t care about what anyone else did. But when she was around her friend, she could feel people wondering what was the history between them, how they were so close, and she wanted to tell them it was none of their business. It was especially funny because her dark, scandalous secret was…that she attempted to be a friendly person and build a strong friendship.

She looked at the squirrels curiously, them unfortunately scurrying way from the two. “Little devils, that’s how they get you,” She scoffed, putting her other hand through the loop on her backpack so it was secure. Not being able to see the squirrels in all their cuteness, she began their path to their apartment, keeping close by their side.

“How was your class?” She asked curiously, they were both humanities majors so they had similar courses, but they were different majors. River wasn’t exactly sure what she wanted to do in her life (something that she hoped was normal considering that she’s lived so little of it). But she wanted to help people and she couldn’t do it in one major so she picked two.

First, she picked psychology she knew it was considered a “basic bitch” major so to speak, but she felt like the world needed more people like her in the field. People who cared about those shunned by society and went into the field not because she viewed the people she studied like frogs on a lab table but because she wanted to help. Who knows how much different her life would have been if mental health care was accessible and if the practitioners were empathetic.

For her second major, she picked sociology feeling like it was important to understand society to understand the effects it could have on the psyche of others. It was strange seeing her life be taught in a formal academic situation because that was what it was. River had already lived much of what she learned about, she grew up in an underserved area raised by parents who shouldn’t have had to be parents. She has had interactions with the police, her school system, and of course her neighbors. Sometimes, it made her feel like academia could be easy for her…sometimes it made her feel like an impostor. Everyone in this school just had it, she didn’t know what it was, if it was something you were born with or gained over time but she didn’t think she had it.

She appreciated politics, and sometimes she would ask Wallace to tell her what he learned, but it simply wasn’t for her and she could never go into law. She cried when people argued with her.

If he chose to answer her, she would listen intently, like a puppy. When they were talking, it made the walk easier, she couldn’t stand the cold and while the city was certainly beautiful, she couldn’t help but feel unsafe whenever she walked alone. Was she an idiot? While nobody could deny that women (and men too) had reason to feel unsafe walking home at night, she had been told that she overreacted to “shit like that.”

She frowned, she tried not to think about Micah Parrish, her ex, but he kept invading her thoughts. While Wallace was uncomfortable with the process humans called dating, River romanticized romance, she loved the idea of giving someone her entire heart and them offering hers in return. That meant when a sweet auburn-haired guy called her pretty, she was putty in his hands. However, while she could suffer all types of treatment, even she had a line. She broke up with him, he still didn’t accept it to the point where he was texting her so much that she had to turn off her notifications.

She didn’t want to think about that while she was talking to Wallace though, she hated being the girl with the shitty ex, she felt like a parody of herself at that point.

 

[RabbitsWarren]

art by

arithm

Wᴀʀʀᴇɴ Bᴜʀɴs

(he/him)

ʙᴜɢʙᴇᴀʀ ʙᴀʀᴅs ᴡɪᴛʜ
ʙᴀɴᴊᴏs ʏ'ᴀʟʟ

Aʙᴏᴜᴛ Mᴇ

Wᴇʙɴᴏᴠᴇʟ Lɪɴᴋ

Wᴀᴛᴛᴘᴀᴅ Lɪɴᴋ

DᴇᴠɪᴀɴᴛAʀᴛ Lɪɴᴋ

I'ᴍ ᴡᴏʀʀɪᴇᴅ 'ʙᴏᴜᴛ ᴛʜᴇ ғᴜᴛᴜʀᴇ

Tʜʀᴇᴀᴅ Hᴜʙ

Cʜᴀʀᴀᴄᴛᴇʀ Gᴀʟʟᴇʀʏ

RP Pᴀʀᴛɴᴇʀ Sᴇᴀʀᴄʜ

Gᴀᴍᴇ Cᴇɴᴛʀᴀʟ Sᴛᴀᴛɪᴏɴ

Tʜᴇ Fᴜᴛᴜʀᴇ

Mʏsᴛᴇʀʏ Sᴋᴜʟʟs

“They’re really sweet, yeah,” Wallace smiled upward until he no longer saw any sign of bushy tail or twitching nose. He followed after her at a steady, equal pace as he adjusted his bag. The world looked beautiful that day, he thought, despite the fact that they passed his old neighborhood at a distance. He wanted nothing more than to be away from it, and never think of it again.

“You know how Dr. Arota is.” Wallace answered the question with a sly smile working its way up into his face. He pulled the sketchbook out of his bag from earlier and flipped to the newly finished page before handing it to her. “She’s prettier than she is interesting sometimes. All she did was drone on and on about her personal bias for a candidate that’s running for office right now. Talking about how great he is when there’s so much slimy stuff out there about him. It’s repulsive.”

Wallace only wanted the money to get rid of the debt and help his family, so he went into the Political Science field in order to pursue Law school after he graduates. He couldn’t help but despise his father, killed by a serial murderer in their city. He never could forgive the man that did it, but he got off by pleading insanity as soon as he got to court. So, his father’s killer sat up in a mental rehabilitation center instead, mostly fine.

“And yours? How are you feeling?” Wallace took no other majors, as he felt they weren’t needed, but he supported her decision to take on all of the ones she did. He admired her, really, and her absolute drive to get anything and everything done. With the winter coming on as the semester passed, he started to feel the chill on his soul. He always got colder and more withdrawn through the Winter, as well as a little gripey.

His father died in the middle of November, leaving Wallace as the only income at 14. So, naturally, he didn’t really have time to grieve. Instead, all future Winters now dedicated to grieving himself, and what he could’ve been had he not had to take on everything for his family. Though he told River about all of this on one occasion or another, he didn’t tell her about his marijuana addiction to get over it.

“Evelyn Winters tried to ask me on a date again today.” All of the political science majors and STEM majors alike had a dealer, almost, using sativa strains to keep them up long past hours. He used both sativa and indica, anything he could get his hands on, and in large amounts when the winter would hit, spraying his room with all different kinds of incense and fragrant spray to cover it up as best he could. Though, it wasn’t exactly a secret when he would sometimes go too far and sleep for more than a day.

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♡design by rabbitswarren, coded by uxie♡

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[bambi-under-the-sky]

River eagerly took the chance to look at Wallace’s sacred sketchbook, she was always curious about what he was drawing but she was too respectful to ask. She knew enough artists to know that looking at someone’s sketchbook was a very personal thing. However, if Wallace has ever done the honor of drawing her, River, the eager person that she was probably kept the drawing somewhere that was very close to her heart.

“Isn’t there slimy stuff about every politician?” She offered, although she still did not think that she would want to in Dr. Arota’s class unless it was because she wanted fashion tips. She could relate, although she wasn’t a politics major, sociology was a very political major so she was also very knowledgeable about her professor’s political leanings. Most of the time, if a person was interested enough in society’s problems that they taught classes like “Gender & Politics” or “Philanthropy & Civil Society” they had politics that aligned with hers, but sometimes she wanted to remind them that this was a sociology course, not a politics one.

At the chance to talk about her class, she gave him an exasperated look, it took a lot for River to talk bad about someone so you knew that something good was coming up, “I swear, if I hear one more person say they want to play devil’s advocate I’m going to snap, they’ll be the reason for my psychological break.” She threw her hands up in the air, clearly annoyed by something in the class, “The devil isn’t here, and even if he was; don’t do his work for him, let him advocate for himself!” There was a good chance Wallace could relate to that, or maybe, horribly, he was the devil’s advocate.

“Has it ever happened when you’re talking to someone and you can tell that they’re not taking you seriously? They’re not actively rude but you can tell they’re just listening to humor you?” Sometimes, River thought it was ridiculous to complain about it. A long time ago River decided that she wanted love, she wanted be the person felt safe around, the person you could come to with anything and unfortunately that meant people didn’t take her academic thoughts as seriously as she thought they should.

Wallace didn’t tell her about his marijuana addiction, but if there was one thing she knew, it was drugs. Her mother was an addict, her father was an addict, her brother, thank God was trying to get help. However, Yaena was not his mother nor his therapist, she wanted to say something about it but she decided that if Wallace wanted to talk about it, he would talk to her about.

“Tried, huh?” River asked scoffing a little bit, she could already see how that conversation must have gone, “Rina wanted me to ask what you thought of her.” Rina was her classmate, occasionally she would be over the apartment when she and River were working on a project. Overall, she wasn’t that bad but…sometimes you could tell when someone was so privileged that they didn’t know how life fully worked.

________​

When River was stressed, she baked. Growing up, she regularly had to cook for her family and so she learned to love it and not resent the fact that she, the youngest member of the family had to take a maternal role. However, baking was calming she knew exactly how it was going to come out because she knew how the ingredients intermingled with each other.

River happened to win a raffle at her work where she got to have one free takeout order so she gave Wallace the promo code and let him pick what they had for dinner. River worked two jobs, the first was an internship she needed if she wanted to graduate (all sociology students needed to work in some form of aid or research group) but that job didn’t pay much so she also worked as a waitress. She was good enough at faking happiness that she was able to get her share of tips.

Humming to the kitchen, listening to the twee indie girl music that you would expect from her, she danced while stirring the batter. Sometimes she tried to bake complex foods, other times she wanted to do a reliable classic. This was one of the latter nights and she decided that she wanted to make chocolate chip cookies.

Ring.

“Can you get that please?” River called out, “I’m almost done!”

If Wallace opened the door he wouldn’t be facing a delivery guy, the man he was facing was about five foot ten, with curly auburn hair and blue eyes that were so bright that it was unnatural. While he did not dress as poshly as the blonde in front of him, the oversized t-shirt he was wearing probably cost at least one hundred dollars.

“You didn’t answer my texts, I got wor-“ Micah began, clearly expecting to talk to River before he realized that she wasn’t there…and then he grinned like an idiot, a playful glint in his ocean eyes. “Holy fucking shit, Wally is that you?” He asked, “What the fuck are you doing here?” He sounded like they were friends.


River told Wallace about her ex, about how she was so naively in love with him, and all the ways he mistreated her. It started subtly, sometimes he would be extra flirty with a waitress, or forget when they had a date. Then she noticed that he was a drinker and that he was mean when he was drunk, he was part of the reason why she asked Wallace to walk with her at night. She didn't want to run into guys like him. Sometimes she wished that she was able to be as guarded with her heart as Wallace was, but sometimes she felt she didn’t learn anything, if you offered her some kindness she would bloom like a flower.

 

[RabbitsWarren]

art by

arithm

Wᴀʀʀᴇɴ Bᴜʀɴs

(he/him)

ʙᴜɢʙᴇᴀʀ ʙᴀʀᴅs ᴡɪᴛʜ
ʙᴀɴᴊᴏs ʏ'ᴀʟʟ

Aʙᴏᴜᴛ Mᴇ

Wᴇʙɴᴏᴠᴇʟ Lɪɴᴋ

Wᴀᴛᴛᴘᴀᴅ Lɪɴᴋ

DᴇᴠɪᴀɴᴛAʀᴛ Lɪɴᴋ

I'ᴍ ᴡᴏʀʀɪᴇᴅ 'ʙᴏᴜᴛ ᴛʜᴇ ғᴜᴛᴜʀᴇ

Tʜʀᴇᴀᴅ Hᴜʙ

Cʜᴀʀᴀᴄᴛᴇʀ Gᴀʟʟᴇʀʏ

RP Pᴀʀᴛɴᴇʀ Sᴇᴀʀᴄʜ

Gᴀᴍᴇ Cᴇɴᴛʀᴀʟ Sᴛᴀᴛɪᴏɴ

Tʜᴇ Fᴜᴛᴜʀᴇ

Mʏsᴛᴇʀʏ Sᴋᴜʟʟs

Wallace on occasion had drawn River, usually from photos he took when he could tell she felt honestly and truly happy. He loved doing that, really, taking pictures of people in raw, genuine moments. It went along with his sketching, recreating expressions, but almost always he photographed raw happiness of some kind. The first one he took of River displayed her at one of the college booth fairs earlier in the fall, lips covered with crumbs of pumpkin pie and the biggest, most genuine smile stretched across her face.

Wallace sketched it later that night from the photo on his phone, only delaying the photo’s deletion with the promise that he wouldn’t send it to anyone and that the picture ‘had a purpose that she would understand in the morning’. He awoke to her waiting outside his room with cooked breakfast and tapping her foot. Of course, he showed her then, appreciating the hard work that went into it himself.

“Every single one of the bastards. They need to sift them out better. You would think they’d prescreen them before letting them in.” Wallace snickered under his breath and adjusted his scarf while he listened. He personally didn’t pay much attention to personal bias in politics, and perhaps that’s why he never understood where the bleed over occurred.

“Ew, sounds like you’ve had a day of assholes.” If Wallace was a ‘devil’s advocate’, it wouldn’t be in the traditional sense. He certainly didn’t intrude on spaces not meant for him, nor did he try to insert vicious, hurtful opinions in place of a ‘rough argument’. However, he did find himself in the position where he had to make a choice out of a barrel of difficult, bad options quite often, if that qualified. “Exactly. He’s certainly powerful enough to not need an advocate.”

“Yes, it’s infuriating. It’s usually triggered upon hearing my last name. Hence, my introduction to you as, ‘Wallace. Just Wallace.’ I didn’t know that in your rebellion you wouldn’t dig for my name, but rather just went with ‘Wally’ because it wasn’t ‘Just Wallace’.” The man smiled, indicating the good humor in his words. He remembered being a little annoyed at first, but now he looked back on it fondly. And, if anything, she definitely accomplished her goal of him feeling safe around her. Wallace just had the bonus icing on top with the fact that he took her seriously and trusted her, too. The only reason he hadn’t told her yet about the marijuana was because he didn’t feel like it was a problem yet. If he ever got worried about it, he undoubtedly would reach out.

“Rina? The girl you brought over a couple of times? Is that the one that put on my cologne?” Wallace’s shoulders shook from his laughter, and a sly, goofy smile slid across his face. He stuffed his hand in his pockets, looking over to River with a mischievous look in his eyes. “She had pretty red hair. Would you like me to write her a sonnet about her beauty? I feel like if I don’t say anything, they’ll try to solidify the rumor that I’m gay.”

-

Wallace heard the ring over the quiet, rumbling grunge music in his own room. He immediately rose and set his laptop aside, where he’d been working on school papers. He knew River already began baking something by the smell of the apartment, and because of this, he knew she’d be unable to answer the door. Thankful that the smell of baked goods masked the own smell of the previously lit plant considering his lack of time to rid himself and the room of the stench, he strode off into the hallway and opened the door.

“You are not our Chinese takeout.” Wallace blurted out with narrowed, vicious eyes before he actually filtered his thoughts. The man’s eyes scrutinized the other, gaze flickering up and down and searching for any sign of a bag containing food or otherwise. When he found nothing and the other began to open up his mouth, Wallace recognized him by his voice. Oh. [i}Oh.[/i]

“Micah, what a surprise. I haven’t seen you since high school.” Wallace’s voice started as a low rumble before he could conjure it up any louder. The college student carefully made sure that he filled the doorway so Micah couldn’t see inside, not yet clicking that Micah had been said ex that River had told him about before. No, it more resembled Wallace not wanting Micah to have any more ammo than he already had, and letting him see into his life gave him ammo, so Wallace tried to seal that away from the possible foe.

“What are you. . . Can I help you with something?” Wallace couldn’t help the edge in his voice as he tried to figure out what might be happening. His heart throbbed just behind his eyes and his whole head screamed. He didn’t want Micah to know anything.

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♡design by rabbitswarren, coded by uxie♡

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