LIKE A FIST IN THE EYE | Ch. 1
[rotbtd // soulmate AU]
“Are you done for the day?” Rapunzel repeats. “Or do you still have that midterm essay you said Rafiki asked you?”
“...Hell’s bells. I completely forgot about that!” Merida shoots up to a sitting position and immediately falls back to her elbows, head spinning as colors flooded her vision. “Ugh.”
“You need to sleep,” Rapunzel says sternly as she sits up as well, one hand on Merida’s shoulder. “It’s submitted through email tonight, right? Have some rest first.”
“Punz, I haven’t even started it yet.”
“You’ll get it done, I know you can! You always do. I’ve seen how you work. But first, you need to rest.” Rapunzel grabs her hand to steady her when the world wobbles underneath Merida’s feet and checks her wristwatch. “Oops, it’s almost time already. I’ll meet you back at the apartment?”
“Yeah, sure,” she almost forgot Rapunzel has an afternoon exam today, at three thirty PM. After putting back her things into her backpack, Merida yawns and waves her away. “Go now. Be brilliant.”
Rapunzel finally leaves, but not before telling her, “Take a break, Merida! Sleep!”
Which, heartbreakingly, is something that Merida can’t do. The deadline for Rafiki’s essay is nine PM. What she needs to do right now, instead of sleeping, is set up a nice cramming corner in their apartment with a good coffee on her side. A potent one.
Turns out, finding an establishment that could fulfill her request is harder than it sounds.
After being (politely) denied in every mainstream coffee chain around Walt, Merida finds herself defeatedly stepping inside that blasted café down the main street, consciousness hanging by a thread. She’s heard about the place many times before, one of the newer student haunts in town that Rapunzel has mentioned as her cousins’ favorite. But the distance from campus and her initial skepticism with its flowery name has kept Merida away from the establishment—until now.