rosavelle | earn the time of your life [april catch-all]

a. oh, things are gonna be alright [rainpetal shower]

[it's not the first rainstorm emerald's been caught in and she's sure it won't be the last. it had caught her by surprise while she was just... wandering, thinking about everything that had happened last week. strolling through residential areas and reminding herself of the way it feels whenever she walks into verso's house and remembers that she can have one of these too, here, if she works hard enough.]

[she's drenched, of course, while she waits out the rainstorm underneath the awning of a nearby house whose owner is a mystery. she glances around, peering inside the window sheepishly to see if anyone inside has noticed her, then looks back out towards the streets.]

[after not very much time at all, the rain of water clears up and is followed by a beautiful rain of petals. she's heard rumors about this, about how walking through it is a good omen for one's love life, and if there's one thing emerald needs right now, it's that. she steps out from under the awning and starts her walk back to the tulip barracks. she still looks a little embarrassed with the petals clinging to her as she walks, but she's trying to be pleasant about it. if anyone approaches her on the way, she's got her default explanation locked and loaded.]

Hey, do you believe in the whole "luck in love" thing?

The Rosavelle superstition?

[ Saint-Germain, en route to a different barrack, attempts to brush a petal out of her own hair. ]

I haven't seen evidence for or against.

[ It is entirely possible she is doing superstitions wrong. ]

[oh great, another watts.]

[well, at least this one is prettier. emerald grins a little bit.]

I didn't think you needed scientific proof for superstitions? I though their whole thing was just enough people believing them.

b. even though they may seem hard at first sight [leaky greenhouse blues]

[she's looking at her own garden when it starts to happen.]

[there's more flowers than she expected, and definitely more since the last time she looked. she notices a forget-me-not turning away from everything else in the garden, positioned in such a way that emerald can't ever really look at its face. a geranium that still has a couple healthy petals on it, but seems to shake and seethe from the corner of emerald's eye. a tulip that might be the healthiest thing there, standing tall and spreading its leaves towards another tulip in the center. at least that one's easy to interpret, she thinks.]

[and then a drop of water hits her square on the head. and a second, and a third, and then there's a gardener rushing to her location with a big empty bucket. they urge her to step away from the soil, which she does, and shove the bucket into her hands, which she takes because she doesn't have a choice. and then they vanish, rushing to attend to more crises as the sound of droplets panging against all the vessels in the greenhouse gets louder.]

Wait, I—[she protests, but she can't exactly leave the bucket on the ground. there's no place to put it without damaging the flowers. so she holds it over her garden while she stands outside of the patch, and she just. she's just doing this now?]

I have practice... [she sounds pathetic.]

First time?

[ speaking of practice. as haruhi had been practicing quite a bit in the greenhouse proper, naturally she's had to deal with the absurd leaks coming through the top of the greenhouse.

which naturally means-- ]

They got me yesterday. Wonder what the hold up is on fixing it.

[ weird how she's saying this, and also offering no solutions to the current issue of emerald holding the bucket. generally, perhaps mimicking one of the flowers below, pretending the garden itself isn't there. ]

[it's still nice to hear a familiar voice, even if her last meeting with haruhi had ended on kind of a strange, somber note. she grins while she remains more or less statue-still, but does turn her head to face the other woman.]

You came here to laugh at me. [that's not true, obviously. probably.] Maybe they want to give everybody fun little meetups where one person is cool and collected and the other is standing like a moron trying not to crush the flowers.

Nope! I came here to see if things were fixed so I could practice. The laughing part's a bonus.

[ it's fun to at least be able to tease like this. and to get to see emerald doing something relatively silly like this. ]

I've got nowhere to be, so if you want, we can switch off for a while. Should be fine as long as the little guys stay dry, right?

But why would I deprive you of the chance to see me looking dumb for once?

[which is to say: she appreciates it, but she's not going to force haruhi to take over quite yet.]

Besides, your practice is more important. Nobody loses their minds over the drummer. [as though she has the slightest idea what she's talking about.] I'm just here to help you look even better.

You kidding? The drummer's accompaniment's important! Not to mention if you ever have to do a solo, it'll be the best chance you have to show off-- it's harder than it looks, so seeing you do that'd make everyone get hyped up.

[ although she definitely appreciates being made to look good by anyone. ]

Either way, I'd get too distracted now. Either I'll keep getting dripped on, or I'll wind up glancing over to see if you're still conscious. If I'm gonna practice, I wanna be able to focus and give it one-hundred and ten percent!

[she just scoffs. of the two of them, haruhi still knows more about what actually goes into music, but that's not going to stop emerald from dismissing her own contributions to the hypothetical band.]

A hundred and ten, huh? Who knew we were both gonna end up taking this so seriously. You know, standing like this is probably pretty good for my calves—maybe this counts as practice, too.

[there's... ugh. it's weird, but it feels a little like pride? in both of them? and like it's been earned, at that. gross.]

So it's just going to be us two up there on stage whenever we're ready for it?

To be honest, knowing you were taking it so seriously made me want to buckle down and work harder for it. I don't wanna waste your effort.

[ granted, she'd rather not waste her own time either, but that's only coming because em really wanted to join a band that didn't even really exist.

...oh, shoot! ]

Right, I forgot to ask. One of my friends said she was good at playing keyboard, so I offered her a spot. Have you met Tsukasa-chan yet? Blonde, kind of weird?

[emerald's face falls, though mercifully the bucket doesn't. the universe has a sense of humor. she's sure of it.]

...I might have threatened to throw her in the canal during the Faire.

[ uh... huh. that's unexpected, unless tsukasa was doing her intel agent thing again? ]

Uh. Why's that?

She was pretending to be a bandit.

[that should explain it all, but let it never be said that emerald has known when to shut up when she's anxious.]

And I was getting way too into it. You know how it is.

[ there's a brief pause.

and then, like a genius, she speaks. ]

You know, if I wasn't already tired and I didn't already think everyone was taking it too seriously, I probably would have tried the same thing.

[ uh. ]

I mean, if it was you or anyone I knew, I probably would have either made it really easy or really stupid.

[oh. that's a lot nicer than she'd anticipated. not that haruhi isn't nice, but the idea of having caught a break during all of that still feels unreal. she smiles.]

I appreciate it. I think that would've made things a lot less. Intense? I know I would've believed that it was an act if you told me. I trust you more than I trust... gods, our keyboardist.

[and now she has to apologize to tsukasa extra well. perhaps this is hell.]

Edited 2026-04-15 20:33 (UTC)

I get it. I probably should've spoken up more, but by the time I ran into literally anyone else, I was over the whole thing.

[ she's not going to get that deep into it, since she's trying to be done with bringing the mood down. she's gotta force herself to be over it, at least definitely making things even a little worse for her friends. ]

I guess, as long as she didn't do anything to specifically piss you off, it should be okay. If not, I can always ask someone else?

Oh, even if she did, I was the one in the wrong. [like, obviously. she's coming to terms with this in the sharpest of ways. (it's something, she thinks darkly, that clearly sets her apart from golshi.)]

I already have to make it up to the townsperson who was pretending to kidnap Sima. [she looks down and feels the weight of her bucket all of a sudden.] I really made him think that I was going to do something bad to him. So I have to apologize to Tsukasa, too. Good people don't go around threatening to throw actors into canals.

[ ...she feels a little tug from that. granted, she's glad that she's taking accountability, but it seems over something small. then again, a threat is a threat. ]

Good people usually don't react well to being lied to either. Not that it makes it okay...

[ a justification she immediately wipes out. ]

...hey, I know you were okay with it earlier, but really. I can take the bucket for a little bit.

[emerald wants to protest, but she can't really ignore the more urgent plea from her friend. she nods.]

Sure, yeah. [and she's careful with the handoff, sticking close to haruhi, but she does actually go through with it. it gives her a moment to rest her muscles and to think on what to say next.] Thank you, Haruhi.

...Do you remember when I told you that the people I have at home aren't good at anything but hurting people? [back at the unbirthday party. an eternity ago.] I think I'm just trying to be better than them, and it makes me feel weird when I'm not that.

[ haruhi retrieves the bucket, careful with gauging the content inside and making sure not to drop it. the bucket of shame... ]

Yeah, I remember that. [ she nods, taking a few steps to get into position where the leaks'll be. careful with the flowers... ] Did you actually hurt anyone? The guy, or Tsukasa...?

[it takes her a moment to think of the right reply. partially she's making sure that haruhi's okay, but mostly it's just hard to admit to.]

I grabbed Tsukasa's shirt a few times but didn't hurt her. And I... [she touches the empty holster on her lower back.] I have these weapons back at my room. And I don't keep them loaded because I know that it's just a bad idea all around, but I still pushed the empty barrel to his chest.

[she wants to explain herself more, but she knows that that's going to be. a lot. she's looking at her garden instead of anything else and hoping that she doesn't see that forget-me-not start to wilt.]

[ she's doing fairly well, at least so far! her arms aren't sore, at least not yet.

that said... there's something worrying about that admission. it's good that they're not loaded, of course... but, would she be able to load them, she wonders? rather, would she want to for any reason? it wasn't easy to say that nothing would happen anymore.

after all, one of their friends was a danger to herself and others. if she threatened emerald...

...no, she doesn't want to think about that. ]

You really were stressed out about it, huh? You really... [ care that much for simran, huh. she's not going to say that out loud-- it's not her place to speculate on that. ]

I get why you have the weapons, considering where you came from. But... [ one pause. how does she ask this, even? ] If it was real, and it was loaded... what would you have done?

[leave it to haruhi to ask the question that emerald hadn't even dreamed up herself. there's so many threads running at once in her head and this one hadn't even come up briefly—but she hopes desperately that it's because she already knows the answer.]

I wouldn't—I can use them in Remnant because everyone there has Auras. They can shrug off bullets. But nobody here can do that and I don't... want to hurt people anymore, Haruhi. I wouldn't have done it if I knew it would hurt him.

[her throat feels tight. she can't even explain the reason she brought all that up without getting caught up in things like this.]

But... oh, this is a shitty way to say it. Fuck. [she shakes her head with her palm up against half her face.] I'm scared of how easy it was.

[ it didn't take any time at all really, for her to regret asking that question. honestly, who gives a shit about hypotheticals? the fact of the matter was, it was a threat as empty as it was. a scare tactic, it sounded like.

she shifts her body a little, shuffling slightly to keep a good grip on the bucket. she doesn't want to hold the bucket. problem being, what she wanted to hold onto was too far away, despite how close she was at the moment. ]

...That question wasn't fair. Sorry.

[ but, she answered. and haruhi has to reckon with that. she really doesn't know much about emerald, outside of the bits and pieces she's heard. scared of how easy it was, meant that it used to be something that fit her like a glove before, didn't it? ]

Like I said... I believe you. I do. It's just, a little scary to hear that. They'd definitely throw you out, or worse, if you hurt anyone like that.

[ why even say that? does she think emerald doesn't know? ] When we're done here... can we talk about it? I want to know more about you, what happened before you got here. Who you used to be, right? Not... not who you are now. That way, I can help you move forward.

[gods, she wishes she were that bucket right now.]

[she swallows and feels the grip of terror loosen, but its bony fingers are still there. if haruhi wants to learn about this—ha. ha, that's funny, okay. if (when) she tells haruhi all this stuff, she'll know more about her past than simran does. hilarious.]

Okay. Yeah. This is such a shitty place for... [she has to laugh, and she gets closer to haruhi and tries helping her with the bucket. if it means their arms and hands are touching a little, so be it.] I'm still figuring a lot of stuff out about myself. But you have to promise me you'll be ready to hear it.

[ they're touching again. she's not a fan of how comfortable it is, at least at this moment. she had to force herself to step away from emerald before things got worse--

worse? was that even the way to put it? why was this bad?

then again. there's a chance that what emerald has to say will shine light on that. she won't however, turn away right now. not when emerald was so open with her.

so, she stays. and speaks. ]

I promise. I want to know as much about you as I can.

[ she's so confident in that, even if she can't decide on what she should be doing. if she shouldn't go ahead and let herself get swept up.

don't force it. ]

Maybe... you wanna meet up later? If you don't have anything else going on, I mean.

Edited 2026-04-16 03:07 (UTC)

Yeah, um.

[is it too late for her to back out of this? and how soon does she want to say something? well, fuck it. she knows it's going to be on her mind all day and that she's not going to get any sleep tonight if she's still spinning a hypothetical conversation around in her head. so there's only one option.]

After practice I usually go out for dinner with Yayoi, but I think she has... other stuff going on right now. So maybe later tonight? If—that's okay. You can come to my room in the barracks or... or I can come visit you?

[ ...if she thinks about that for even more than half a second, her brain will scramble even more, so she's just going to ignore it. especially when she has to figure out what she's supposed to give as a response. her room, right? she'd have time to prepare herself, to brace for whatever's going to come.

except. she's being irrational and stupid again.

the idea of going to emerald's room and thinking...

... ]

I'll... no, can you visit me? [ ....... ] I can make dinner, if you want.

Edited 2026-04-16 03:15 (UTC)

Yeah. Sounds good.

[she notices that the pinging of water that's been plaguing the background noise of the greenhouse has slowed to a stop for now, and the bucket that they've both been tending to doesn't seem to be getting any heavier. she looks as relieved as she can be given what they've both just... decided they're going to do later tonight! haha!]

Looks like it's stopped for now. [she takes the bucket in her own hands, glad to remove the burden from her friend, and sets it down just outside her garden.] Have fun with practice, okay? I—[and she wants to say something else, but the words don't get all the way there. so she just waves meekly and starts walking away, out of the greenhouse, towards verso's place.]

[surely nothing bad will happen tonight.]

[ ah. haruhi just lets the bucket go, watching emerald go with her own awkward wave. well, she's in it now. might as well head to her own flowerbed to start practicing. she kept the guitar over there just in case everything stopped and she could get going. back to her forget-me-not, and the flowers surrounding it. as much as she liked playing her guitar there, she couldn't help but feel a bit down when she looked at what was growing. or rather, what wasn't. like a couple of the flowers were trying, but they couldn't reach past a certain limit.

she pushes that out of her head, as she picks up her guitar and starts playing. ]

==

[ later on that night, haruhi just kinda paces in her room a bit. she'd cut any thoughts of running or exploring out of her head and generally hung around the forget-me-not barracks. flitting about restlessly, making sure once, twice, that her room was tidied up, her desk was cleared of any papers and her notebook stashed away. nothing out of place.

finally, at a certain point, she decides to go sit outside to wait for emerald, unsure of what to even do with herself. trying to brave herself for what's next. ]

What the hell. [ she mumbles to herself. when did she get to be so skittish? ]

earn the time of your life [april catch-all]

april 5th [open]

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