[center][img]https://img.roleplayerguild.com/prod/users/019ed55e-8f34-709e-bf2f-d7a5d6358958.webp[/img][/CENTER][indent][sub][COLOR=ad4b8f][I]Zoe[/I][/color][/sub][sup][right][COLOR=ad4b8f] [i]Sugar Water[/i][/COLOR][/right][/sup][/indent][center][COLOR=dimgray][SUP][sub]_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________[/sub][/SUP][/COLOR][/center]

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[i]30 Years Ago[/i]

The sun was cresting the Calder State University lawns, but beneath them something different hummed. Machinery and chaos were stacked up in equal measure around in a soundproof booth and vinyls lined every shelf. A filing cabinet was littered with bumper stickers and skateboard decals and everything imaginable to hide the dull, flat grey of it. Droll and deadpan lyrics played out in the space and the waft of smoke from a Vogue Slim held between two fingers framed a woman who was sat right in the centre, lip syncing along to it with a bored expression. [i]I know what boys like. Boys like, boys like me. Nya, nya, nya, nya, nya. Nya, nya, nya, nya, nya[/i]. She continued the nya nyas while the song finished up and as it faded out with a comfortable ease she moved the microphone closer to her lips. [color=ad4b8f]"That was [i]I Know What Boys Like[/i] by The Waitresses. Now isn't that one a classic over here or what? This is WKNT and whether you've been listening or you're just tuning in you already know who it is, it's Zoe, and I'm here for Sundowners."[/color] Her voice was crisp and practiced, and the ease at which she sat in the chair was effortless. She took a drag from the cigarette close enough to the mic that anyone listening to it loud enough would have heard the smoulder of it. [color=ad4b8f]"Next up I've got Cibo Matto's new single, and maybe I'll see you at their gig tomorrow, remember it's at The Insignia."[/color]

It was just after 7pm when Zoe Seeley locked up and left, walked across the campus lawn with a bag over her shoulder, and the latest hit read in her hand, fingers idly thumbing the pages even as she moved. 

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Book club went as book club did. It was never about the books, not really. Sure, the women all read the book and they discussed it. This month it was The Secret History and as they each shared their thoughts, Zoe sat and listened to the ramblings of Rachel Sinclair. A vicious gossip and a terrible reader. A fine arts student who also happened to be a terrible artist, Zoe thought. Book club, to Rachel, was a space to belong in, and to read the energy of the room, and store up their secrets. When Rachel was at the book club, people only shared less until there was enough wine down their throats so that they all, Zoe included, became vicious gossips too. Discussion had turned quickly from the book, to boys and Zoe rolled her eyes, although of course she too was invested in learning who was fucking who, and who wasn't fucking, and who was thinking about fucking who. For her part, Zoe was sitting firmly in camp [i]"thinking about it"[/i] after a terrible breakup months ago that she still thought about.

Zoe was studying biomedical sciences and the boy that she was thinking about was of course an arts major. Too cool for the school and all full of activism for every cause. He was classically, and annoyingly handsome to the degree where as much as Zoe wanted to be better than feelings of fancy and by being taken by the whims of a crush, she hadn't quite been able to escape them.

She seethed to hear his name fall from Rachel's lips as her [i]"currently fucking."[/i] She internally swore off men and relationships and fucking then and there.

It didn't last.

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[i]2 Years Later[/i]

Life post university wasn't the one she had imagined it would be. She no longer had WKNT, no doubt someone else was becoming the voice of their class and the campus cool girl. Their book club still existed, only Zoe had stopped going quite as often once the talk of boys switched to talk of careers and post university success; Zoe was still living at home. She wasn't living in a fancy apartment with roommates, spending her days working at the office getting hit on by the older men, or into passive aggressive work place spats with the older women like her girlfriends were. Even in its mundane hideousness, it all sounded so glamourous. Rushing from the office to after-work drinks, to the apartment for a change of clothes, and then out into the nightlife, it was so cosmopolitan and beautiful, and would never be hers. Not yet. Zoe's mother had gotten sick just shy of her graduation, and now Zoe lived at home as her mother's caregiver.

Some days she would be kind and lucid and easy, but there were other days that were incredibly difficult. 

Zoe had never been close to her mother and it was not something by her mother's doing, but more the pull of a rebellious streak that lived in Zoe that always kept her from really wanting to connect. Their values were different and a life spent living in her home was tough. There were times when Zoe's mother was distant, and she often seemed to disappear away into herself, and sometimes Zoe found those times kind; like a gift of space to breath. She'd gone to Calder State in the hopes of getting her ticket out of Calder City and moving away somewhere else, but now she was back in the four walls she grew up in, only with the taste of having lived free still lingering in her mouth.

One afternoon, Zoe's mother's eyes softened and she spoke with a great and earnest gentleness and Zoe could see that her eyes had teared up just a little. “I should have told you sooner... I should have given you more time. But I can... I can do it now, we can start now Zoe. We can start now.” 

[color=ad4b8f]"Told me what? What do you mean?"[/color] Zoe frowned, reached a hand to place on hers and felt it trembling, there was a look to her that she'd never seen before. [color=ad4b8f]"Mom?"[/color]

“What's gonna happen to you when I die." Regret. "What's gonna change in you. What's gonna wake up.”

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