Peridot curled herself around her laptop, legs tucked underneath her and a couch arm against her back. The college dorm s public lounge was more than quiet enough for her to catch up on final s work; so much so that it was unnerving this late at night and she plugged in her headphones. The small girl was a protege when it came to churning out excellent work overflowing with researched and cited information but surprisingly had an awful sense of time management. Finals week involved spending days without sleep and not a moment without a bottle of mountain dew and a thermos of black coffee. Peridot s green eyes scanned the pixels from behind clear framed glasses. Paragraphs seemed to write themselves as the hours ticked by, and before she realized it, midnight became 3 A.M. Sleeping before her 8 A.M. class seemed like a lost cause at this point. The half-Korean student removed her glasses and pinched the bridge of her nose, fighting off the feeling of exhaustion with another gulp of her soda. She glanced around the room but couldn t focus on anything that was visible in the dark; practically blind without her glasses. Peridot could have sworn that something moved on the other side of the room, but she figured it was just her still being psyched out by that movie her and Lapis watched the night before.
Jasper fought the urge to get out of her warm bed to go to the restroom but after fifteen minutes of trying to fall back asleep, she sighed and swung her muscular legs over the bedside. Amber eyes blinked into focus on the digital clock on the wall - 3:23 A.M. The athlete mumbled under her breath something about regretting taking a dare to drink four slurpees at once as she shuffled across the room, feeling around for the door handle that lead into the hallway. On the way she ran into the loveseat her roommate, Garnet, dozed off on and gave herself a few seconds of reassurance that the other hadn t woken up before slipping out into the hall. All of the lights were out but it was a straight shot to the lounge from here; the bathrooms out there were actually working compared to the one in her dorm block that s been S.O.L. for a couple of weeks. The soft moonlight streaming through the skylights in the lounge made the room visible through the glass doors.
The temperature difference that hit her when she opened the door was refreshing. It was stuffy in the dorms but out here they actually used the air conditioning. The entrance clicked closed behind her and Jasper headed towards the bathrooms, but stopped when something caught her eye. The illuminated face of another student a good fifteen feet away wasn t something she expected to see at this time, even during finals. Normally seeing some scrawny geek in the open would be like a present under the Christmas tree for Jasper but having just woken up she didn t care so much for introducing any faces to the floor. She lazily pushed her platinum hair behind her shoulders and squinted at the other, wondering if the familiarity she felt was a reality or just because she left half of her senses back in the room. Jasper sneered in disapproval as the other took a drink from a mountain dew bottle; shit was so bad for you. She continued her march to the bathrooms, sneaking past the small frame curled up on the couch. Just as she pushed the doors open, Peridot put her glasses back on.
The mechanics major caught a glimpse of something moving again and this time she wasn t seeing things. The light to the bathroom to her right went on and off, meaning that the door opened. She figured it unlikely that someone would be awake at this time but didn t let it bother her. Peridot just wriggled down farther onto the couch, laptop resting on her stomach. Her green hoodie crumpled and swallowed her up, the hood cradling her head. The warmth from her device was starting to make her sleepy and she closed her eyes, telling herself that she d just rest for a second. That was a lie.
Soon after she fell into a much needed sleep, Jasper left the restroom. The lack of light coming from the couch pinned her curiosity and a closer look revealed that the girl fell asleep along with her laptop. She did her best to quietly approach the couch, looking down on her from the back of it. So she did recognize her. It was that one girl from her AP physics class that everyone threw a big ruckus about one day. Jasper at the time didn t pay attention and instead talked with her friend Amethyst in the back of the room. That and she sees her around campus sometimes with the school s bratty swim team captain. She studied her; the way the girl s unruly short black hair cupped her face and how relaxed she seemed to be despite the bags under her eyes. Almost cute. she thought to herself. Jasper paused for a second and shook her head. Right, like I d find some weak little prick cute - besides, she s, well, a she. Those words ran through her head as she made her way back to the door; after snatching the half finished bottle from under the other s arm. It might give her a reason to figure out who that overachiever was. Or at least lengthen her life a bit. Jasper felt unhealthy just holding the damn thing.
Peridot woke with a start thanks to her iTunes account finishing off her playlist titled Study and starting up the one titled EDM/Chiptunes . Needless to say, music that belongs in raves isn t easy to sleep to. She sat up and adjusted her glasses, trying to ignore the sick feeling in her stomach from napping. With an irritated groan she tapped the spacebar on her laptop until it sprung to life, thankfully still set to dim, and closed the program. The clock read 5:49. Peridot shut it and placed in on the coffee table next to her and took a deep breath. Her hand went to the crook of the couch where she last remembered leaving her soda. After a few moments her thin eyebrows furrowed and she looked around, finding nary a trace of her beloved drink. Had someone taken it from her? She reeled her mind for any memory of someone coming in and it hit her. The figure from earlier. She grit her teeth and let out a small tch as she lifted herself from the cushions. Seriously, there were as many vending machines as there were students littered around campus. What cheap asshole had she the disfortune of crossing paths with? She grabbed her laptop and rubbed near the base of her left arm, mumbling incoherent nothings. It was always a pain falling asleep with her prosthetic on. Peridot slowly made her way back to her dorm, doing her best not to wake her roommate. An hour of sleep might do her some good.