It is Bill who is noticed first. This catches her off-guard.
"Is that work for astrophysics?" says this very pretty girl. The waning Oxford sun catches in her dark hair, spooled up into space buns. "I'm tryin' to get into that class, but the professor keeps blowing off my emails. I swear, I'm about to camp outside his office."
Bill laughs, though it's more of a nasally snort. "Might be a good idea, actually."
There are golden bloody flecks haloing this girl's irises! Her brow is set so determinedly! She needs to forgive herself for the absolute mess being an absolute lesbian is about to get her into, again.
"So it is astrophysics?"
Christ.
"Oh! Sort of." She looks down at the equation she's in the middle of solving. Maxwell's Equation, her nemesis. In her other hand there's a half-eaten ham sandwich from Tesco. There's a spot of mustard on one of her fingerless gloves. So sexy. "I'm auditing. Technically."
"But you know the professor, right? You could introduce me. I've seen you talking to him after class."
Okay, there's something in her eyes besides molten chemical number seventy-nine. It's around her eyes, actually; a tightness and a curling-in. Like she hasn't slept for days and like, Bill sees a lot of that around campus, particularly in the cafeteria. But her hands are on her hips, her shoulders are hiked up to her ears. She looks like she's about to punt God Herself into—
Hold on. "Wait, so you are in the...class already."
There's silence for a moment. The girl blinks a few times. As though Bill just scrambled her neurons with a few stupid words.
"Never mind, no worries. Yeah, I can totally introduce you to Dr. Smith. I really should warn you, though, he's a—"
The girl starts to cry. Oh fuck. Oh no. Oh fuck oh no.
"Sorry." She laughs, a harsh thing. "I haven't slept today."
"That's okay," Bill says, very gently. She takes a deep breath and holds out her sandwich like it's a basket full of warm chips. Then, she realizes that it's still an unsexy ham sandwich and has her teeth marks in it. She scooches on the stone bench and finally dumps the whole thing into the garbage can next to her. "Sitting down can help with all kinds of. Bodily secretion. That's....an astrophysics law?"
The Girl’s beautiful brow furrows deeply, as though she's trying to parse out exactly which astrophysics law it is, and then solve it all in her head. Perhaps she can do that, like the professor in question. In the last six months, this amount of frenetic energy has become very familiar. "No, I have to go. Besides, I've been a weirdo enough today—sorry, didn't catch your name before."
"Bill," she says. She holds out her hand, grins. "And you're really pretty normal, in my book. At least compared to some other books around here."
"Yaz Khan," Yaz Khan says, sticking her hands in her pockets. Her shoulders finally lower into a standard range of relaxed. She looks at the bench like she wants to say yes. Her long stare has too much yearning for Bill's big, gay heart. She wants to ask Yaz what is making her so sad and so devoid of melatonin.
It also piques her interest, she realizes. That Yaz wants to see the Doctor, specifically.
"Hey, can I get you a coffee?"
"What?"
"A coffee." She closes her notebook. Maxwell will just have to wait. "You know, the caffeinated beverage. It's all the rage."
"You just met me. For all you know, I'm a Dalek symbiont."
A what. "A what?"
The corner of Yaz's mouth turns up. "Don't worry about it." She wrings her hands together, once. Looks panicky. "I really do have to go."
Bill feels the gears in her head turning, clicking, sliding into place behind doors she can't quite find the key for yet. It's that hazy moment before a complete realization; when all of the Doctor's bizarre ramblings coalesce into one, unified theory. Einstein has nothing compared to Yaz Khan, however, that much Bill knows for certain. Relativity might as well be a slice of wheat bread.
That's a lie. Relativity is so fucking cool.
"No worries, Yaz. Here!" She rummages through her folders for the Doctor's stupidly formatted syllabus. She's certain his office hours are listed there, although she would not be surprised if they were missing. Bill's never seen a student in his office besides her. "I can give you my—"
She looks up. Yaz is gone.
Like. Literally gone.
No, wait. That's her over there by the Schwarzman Centre, making a grand getaway. Bill drops her folders again, frowning. Her shoulders droop, her heart pounds a million beats per second. That door, it's about to unlock. Yeah. There's something about this girl, alright.
Fire! the! Great! Wizard! Also introduce the concept of consequences to Ethel Hallow. I'll probably follow people's reactions before I watch, but I do hope Julie Hubble's presence means that some of this terrible pedagogy gets called out. But not holding my breath for it!
AND MOST IMPORTANTLY: CONSENT!! CONSENT CONSENT CONSENT, THERE ARE CHILDREN WATCHING.
Yeaaaaah I doubt that’ll happen but man wouldn’t it be great if Julie was just a stand in for the adult audience and is just going WTF?! YOU LET THEM DO WHAT?! NOT ON MY WATCH the entire season? I would love that so much lmao.
AND FUCK YES PLZ BABY JESUS GIVE ME SOME ACTUAL FUCKING CONSENT IN THIS SHOW Like just SOMETHING. ANYTHING?! sigh
fanchonmoreau replied to your post “oh hey it’s a 2kBi!teen not-resolutions list! things I want to do this...”
keep us posted on Liam Neeson and thank you for your service
I mean, to be completely honest and transparent, this is a carryover from every year that Liam Neeson has failed to fight a wolf after promising the world a wolf fight (i.e., starring in The Grey), but I vow to something or other that this* year I will succeed! Or at least come up with a better plan that will position me for success in the future.
🌟(I’m on mobile but happy headcanon) Hecate Hardbroom
weirdly i’m fucking ridiculous and have been sitting on this ask for a week and a half like “what is a more specific happy headcanon than HECATE GETS THE GIRL?????”
weird, huh?
anyway everything i come up with has to do with the kid fic i’m definitely not writing so here, listen, your happy headcanon is cute and everything but does it have anything on:
little miss Hesper Pentangle knowing at least parts of mum’s workout regimen, laying on the floor beside her while she does pushup-to-side plank combos, laughing and rolling underneath her when Hecate does a side plank on that side. Hecate giving her lil cheek kisses when she does her pushup, and Hesper rolling back out from under her when Hecate does another side plank and then BOOKING IT to her other side to do it all over again, laughing the whole time
Flirting is almost entirely Pippa’s job, let’s be honest. At first Hecate doesn’t even catch on to her sly comments and innuendos. Once she does, Pippa starts to do it even more because making Hecate blush is just about her favorite thing in the whole world.Hecate rarely responds in kind, but every once in a great while she’ll drop a perfect flirtatious remark out of nowhere, a tiny, smug smile on her lips. The first time it happens, Pippa is completely floored. They’re walking through the halls of Cackle’s and she literally stops in her tracks and has to race to catch up to Hecate. When she does, however, she quickly convinces Hecate that the work she has in the potions lab can wait and drags her up to her rooms. ;)
