Renee and Phoebe watch as Saskia storms into the room as if literally possessed by a higher spirit.
Without a word she positions herself on top of the frightened Blonde and starts raging about her incompetence.
Renee can’t comprehend any of this and the next thing she seems to be registering is her mouth telling her to spit out whatever Saskia just shoved in there.
“Misinterpret this-“
Saskia suddenly stops, her eyes not being able to focus on one particular spot and utterly bewildered as if she doesn’t recognize the person controlling her movements in that moment.
Before Renee can fully realize what really just happened and Phoebe gets a chance to grab Saskia by her shit perfect not a single strand out of place ponytail the shocked brunette gets up and rushes to leave the room.
Leaving a frightened Renee behind.
“Are you alright?”
“Mmhmm.”
---
Saskia had a plan. Would she be actively apologizing to Renee? Definitely not, fuck that. But she would sit down next to her and pretend everything’s fine. That’s what she was best at after all.
After making sure everyone had acknowledged her presence at dinner, Saskia spots Renee and makes forgettable Laura clear the seat before she finally sits down next to naturally kind spirit.
“Renee-“
Renee however, doesn’t wait another second, gets up and walks to the other side of the table. Demonstratively making noise when putting down her plate.
If the situation were a bit less serious Saskia would allow herself to admit that Renee staring her down was doing something to her. She´d be saving that realisation for the next mop-therapy session, though.
Not seeming to get the message Saskia ate up and decided to try it once more in the evening. At some point Renee had to talk to her, right?
Except, just as Saskia had made it her mission to pretend that they were fine and would end up just taking to each other again, Renee was determined to avoid the self-announced leader at all costs.
Turns out Saskia and her orders were everywhere.
—-
“Hey Renee, do you mind helping me with something later?”
“…”
“Hellooo? You have two ears sitting at the side of your head, I know you’re perfectly capable of hearing me.”
“Yeah, actually I do, sorry.”
“What?”
“I do mind, Sas.”
—-
“Dinner was supposed to be ready an hour ago, move your ass. Oh, and Renee, I thought I told you to set the table today?”
“…”
“Not this again. Fine, don’t then. I don’t care.”
---
While Renee was quite proud of herself for giving Saskia (mostly) the silent treatment she had underestimated that Saskia did not give a shit about other people’s boundaries and ultimately still was a bitch.
The blond nail technician was sitting in her room, waiting for her roommate and therefore didn’t watch when the door opened and someone entered.
“God, Phoebes, can you fricking believe Saskia and her …”
“I know, right? She’s such a cunt.”
A familiar chuckle made Renee look up and immediately send a death stare in her direction.
“It’s you.”
Saskia was used to this particular look by now and continued like she had planned.
“Renee look-“
“No.”
“Please just hear me out.”
Because usually rather forgiving Renee contemplated her options for a moment and finally gave in.
“Fine.”
Both women sighed but for completely different reasons.
“Okay so, I’m sorry for taking it out on you earlier. I really am. I just- I completely lost it.”
“Yeah, you did.”
Renee was trying to be tough, and she really was mad at Saskia but deep down she also was just tired and if she was being honest with herself, it hurt that Saskia had only seemed to notice her as soon as she had made a mistake.
Saskia seemed to struggle with herself. Renee wanted to know her thoughts so badly.
After a minute of just staring at each other Saskia finally gave in and took a step towards Renee before exhaling deeply.
“Alright. For the next 5 minutes I’ll do my best to stop being a bitch and you can say to me whatever you want. I’ll listen.”
Renee gave her a questioning look.
“I promise.”
“You’re a bitch.”
“Yes, good. Keep going.”
“You make people feel worthless.”
“You suck at teamwork.”
“You are so obsessed with power it sometimes makes you more attractive. Wait what?”
Saskia laughed lightly despite the seriousness of the situation but stopped abruptly when Renee spoke again.
“You pretended I didn’t exist for five years.”
The words seemed to suck all of the air out of the room and settled down heavy inside the room.
“That’s not-“
“And don’t say that’s not true. Did you even know my actual name before the reunion?”
For the first time in all these months that they had been stuck together Renee saw genuine hurt in the face that was looking back at her.
“Of course I did, Renee.”
“Yeah, that’s easy to say now.”
Renee had meant to make her words sound hard, but she hated hurting people even if they had done her wrong first.
There was this look in Saskia’s eyes again. The one where a thousand thoughts seemed to race in her mind and Saskia herself wasn’t sure which ones to believe and which not.
“You don’t want to believe me? That’s fine. But trust me, you existed. In fact, you were so fucking present in school and in my life and generally fucking everywhere that I started to pretend you didn’t. And then I tried to distract myself and how could I’ve known that he’d be so fucking manipulative. He was so… manipulative.”
Saskia had started to get angry but as soon as her mind started to remember, her voice grew quiet, and Renee barely caught it when Saskia repeated herself painfully.
Renee felt for the broken girl in front of her and wanted to say something but Saskia caught herself and continued.
“Doesn’t matter, at that point it was too fucking late anyway. You seemed to be perfectly fine with me ignoring you and either way you were always so sure of yourself, and you knew what kind of person you wanted to be and how could I´ve lived up to that?”
“Oh, Sas.”
Renee was now the one to close the distance between them and reached out to take the hand of the beautiful brunette in front of her.
“Just because I knew what I wanted to be doesn´t mean I wasn´t overflowing with insecurities.”
After a quick glance at their now joint hands and making sure Saskia wasn´t pushing her away, Renee decided to be open up.
“You know, I had this stupid crush on you and then you go on ignoring me and everyone was a part of some stupid friend group and I felt so lonely and unwanted.”
“I´m sorry, Renee. I never wanted you to feel like that. No, honestly, I probably did at that time, I was a fucking cunt. Wait- you had a crush on me?”
“That´s your takeaway?”
“No, I really am sorry. Really. But you had a crush on me.”
There was a sly smirk starting to form on Saskia’s face and Renee didn´t know if she wanted to slap or kiss the hot brunette that confused the hell out of her.
“Yeah, so I fricking did. Will you get over yourself?”
“I won´t, but I hope you will tell me if this is okay.”
Every ounce of Renee´s body was responding naturally to the way Saskia pulled her closer and gently rested her right hand on her cheek and her eyes on her lips.
“Renee you´ll have to give me a verbal response honey.”
“God yes, this is okay. It´s more than-“
Before Renee could verbally express how much she wanted this her lips chased eagerly after the ones Saskia had softly put on her own. And if anyone would have told the blonde nail technician that she would be shamelessly making out with her unbelievably hot school crush in an apocalyptic situation where everyone had lost their mind, she would have laughed the hardest she´d ever did in her life.
As if solely the kissing and body contact wasn´t already making her mind spin in the best way possible, Saskia was now pushing her gently down onto the bed and Renee was only half registering how the determinant brunette straddled her.
“Are you alright?”
Her face must have given her away.
“Yes! Yeah! I’m fine!”
The look on her face was saying otherwise and Saskia started backing up as she stared in frightened eyes. Renee was definitely re-experiencing the toe-encounter and a familiar feeling of guilt made itself at home in the pit of Saskia´s stomach.
“Shit, sorry I shouldn’t have.”
Distance. She needed to get some space between them, now.
As Saskia was starting to get up from the bed Renee seemed to catch up and her hand caught a familiar one at the last second.
“No stop, don’t move.”
Dark eyes filled with uncertainty.
“Please.”
“You tell me if it’s too much.”
“I will, boss.”
“Not funny.”
“It is a little bit.”
For the first time that night and maybe in all of the weeks they had been stuck together both girls were allowing themselves to smile genuinely at the other.
“You know, if it wasn’t for your rage and a fucking toe in my mouth, I would’ve thought it looked hot- you sitting on top of me like that.”
“I can´t believe you just said that.”
“What? It´s not like I was lying. It is extremely attractive, which I can confidently admit from this position.”
“Good. Because I like being on top of you.”
Saskia would never admit it aloud, but she adored the light blush that made her enjoy looking at the lighthearted blonde girl even more.
“Stop looking at me like that and kiss me.”
“Please.”
“Honey, save the begging for later.”
Saskia felt the heat against her cheeks and for the first time since being stranded she felt at home.