Cycle 30-7: Spicing Things Up (Patreon)

"Omigosh, hi!"

Heather greeted her with an overly-enthusiastic hug at the door. Large hoops dangled from each ear, her clear blue eyes alight with unbridled excitement.

"Nice to meetcha!" The blonde girl chuckled. "Finally! It's like, sooooo weird to meet my roommate halfway through the semester, y'know? I like, wasn't sure if you'd come back!"

"Hey, Heather." Kaitlyn smiled. "Nice to finally meet you, too. Sorry about that. Some stuff came up and I had to go off campus for a while."

"Like, don't worry about it!" Heather flapped a hand. "Having the whole room to myself was totally cool. But having a roommate's even better!"

She stepped aside, letting Kaitlyn into the dorm. A faint scent of floral perfume wafted out to meet her. The familiarly furnished space lay inside, now complete with Heather's decorations and furniture. Kaitlyn's own portion of the room remained completely untouched.

Home, sweet home.

"...Thanks for texting, by the way," Heather continued to prattle on as Kaitlyn set her things on the bed and began to unpack. "I got here and was like 'omigosh did she die or something?!' Like, I totally would've thought you got kidnapped!"

Kaitlyn chuckled. "Nope. Nothing that interesting. I was just staying with some friends."

"Oooooh, friends?" The blonde's eyebrows waggled suggestively. "What kinda friends? They gotta be important if they got you to skip sooo many classes! I mean, seriously! Like, how're you gonna catch up?"

"I'll manage." She said simply. "My grades are all a hundred percent exam-based, so it's not like I missed any assignments."

"Omigosh, are you just going to the tests?" Heather put her hands on her hips. "That's like, really ambitious, y'know? This school is pretty dang hard."

A dry chuckle escaped her. "Yeah. I know."

There was no practical reason for Kaitlyn to take the exams anymore. She'd already gotten the achievement, and grades weren't going to close any doors on her this time around. But she'd spent so many loops failing the damn things that she'd rub the results in the game's face every chance she got.

Is this petty? Maybe. She grinned. But I've earned some pettiness. If the game's gonna spite me, you can bet I'm gonna spite it back. Well, as long as it doesn't punish me for it.

After a little more small talk and introductions, Heather headed out for dinner with some friends. Kaitlyn declined to go along, citing a need to rest and settle in. As the door closed behind her, Kaitlyn was left in blissful silence.

She flopped back onto her bed with a soft whumph, staring at the bunk above. Well. I'm back. So… now what?

There was no way she'd be getting back into routine already – that wasn't the point of this. Besides, starting up Kate's Kitchen or even lab this late in the semester felt like far more trouble than it was worth.

I could go back to Chella's. Get the meeting with new Philip over with before it becomes some big psychological block. Her heart clenched. But… no. I promised myself. Not this loop. Next one.

Taking all of that away didn't leave her with too many options. She couldn't even take a new class right now. In fact, if she really didn't want to do anything too ending-related, she was fairly at a loss.

Well, fine. Kaitlyn let out a sigh. I still want to do something a little productive though. What CAN I do?

The "balance" of doing something while also giving herself time to process was an unexpectedly hard one to manage. It felt like she was constantly leaning too far to one side or the other.

Maybe… maybe I'm going about this wrong. She bit her lip. I overcorrected last time by distracting myself from those emotions through work. But am I doing the opposite now? Focusing on them too much?

It was starting to feel like it. She wasn't sure how much more processing she could cram into her daily routine. Not without going in useless circles.

Maybe… I need to go a little easier on myself. Stop thinking about it quite so much. Besides. I am feeling a lot better this time around. I'm functioning pretty darn well, aren't I?

After a moment of thought, she pulled out her phone and started browsing on CappieAppie. She had a little bit of money left over to spend – it wasn't much, but it might be enough.

Yes! The listing's still there! She pumped a fist in triumph. A picture of an old electronic piano keyboard glowed on her screen. It was quite a flattering picture, she knew from experience, but the thing worked. And it was cheap.

With a few brief taps of her fingers, she sent a message to the seller to organize a pickup. Continuing to learn music was something she could easily do on her own. It didn't have the same connotations as going to lab or the restaurant or even Bash Bros tournaments.

Although maybe I can do Bash Bros, too. I've done it before. If it's just for practice, not for doubles…

The idea of limiting herself there did feel a little strange at this point. She'd spent so many loops playing doubles with Ian as a teammate that it just felt natural. Sometimes, she had to remind herself that the guy even was a male lead.

It's settled, then. Kaitlyn sat up and stretched. I obliterate my exams, play piano, play Bash Bros, and that's it. I'll make sure to go on plenty of walks so that I have time to think, too. Hopefully that'll help. Then next loop…

She turned toward the corkboard by her desk. The inexpertly-made sock bunny grinned back at her with a crooked smile.

…Next loop, I get back to business. I'll go see him first thing.

***

The lecture hall rustled softly with the sound of flipping pages and scratching pens. Kaitlyn scribbled down one last line of work for the final Genetics question, circling the answer with a flourish. Without even checking over the test, she stood and strode to the front of the room.

Her eye caught the clock hanging in the corner. Twenty minutes? Not bad.

Lately, she'd turned the exams into a bit of a time trial. She raced herself to see how quickly she could put the answers down on paper. The multiple choice questions went by much more quickly – despite specifically not memorizing the answers, a few too many loops of repeated test taking pretty much burned the things into her mind. At this point, she was pretty sure she'd remember them on her deathbed.

The same was even true for free response questions. Although they took longer to write out, she knew them all by heart at this point.

Maybe I should optimize for answer length. See how short I can make it and still get full credit.

Was there a particular point to it? No. But it was a little fun.

Her steps sounded too loud on the stairs leading to the front. She tried to walk more quietly, but her passage still drew looks from her fellow students. Most of their expressions were impassive, too absorbed in their own exam stress to particularly care about someone else's situation. A few looked absolutely crestfallen. A few more eyed her with contempt, as though her finishing early was a bluff or show of confidence.

Well, I've got reason to be confident at least.

A slightly surprised aide checked her ID as she dropped the exam on the table. With a nod and a thumbs up, she was released back into the fresh air and sunlight.

Alright. Three down, one more to go. Just gotta finish off Chemistry tomorrow.

She'd already turned in her essay for Writing – which was a masterpiece, if she did say so herself. That one took the most time to work up by far. Still, she'd gotten bored of simply writing the same essay over and over.

Maybe I can start changing that up, too. Adding a bit more pizazz and character. Actually, I wonder how hard it would be to make the whole thing a poem?

As she idly thought about the impracticality of writing an entire essay in iambic pentameter, Kaitlyn approached the familiar U-shaped structure of Cappy's Cafeteria. Late afternoon sunlight glinted off of the glass walls as a loose crowd of students milled about. Among the outdoor tables, a conspicuous amount of textbooks and laptops could be seen as other students got in some last-minute studying with their meals.

Kaitlyn stepped inside and glanced around. Usually, Genetics didn't let out until dinnertime. However, with how quickly she'd finished her exam, she found herself at a nice sweet spot – too early for dinner crowds, but too late for lunch.

I mean, I could wait until later, but I'm a little bit hungry. Might as well get a snack while I'm here and take advantage of the emptiness.

A quick scan of the available options showed exactly what she'd expected for a Thursday – that is to say, nothing that sounded particularly tempting. Her experimentation had taken her pretty far with stretching the options around here, but there were only so many ways to doctor a sandwich or a slice of pizza before you got into frankly silly territory.

And I don't even have all my cooking equipment this time, she grumbled internally. So I have even less options than before. It's just the toaster oven and my personal collection of seasonings…

Shifting her backpack resulted in the telltale clink of her collected condiments. Restocking was one of the first things she'd done upon getting back to campus. How else was she supposed to survive off of the food here?

A lightbulb went off in her head. Actually… maybe I should experiment a bit more with that. I've been making this food better for ages now. Even if it's not new to me, it might be to others. What if I help them do the same?

It wasn't a completely unreasonable idea. Based on feedback from Heather, Alex, and so many others, she knew that her fellow students liked her "adjusted" versions of the dining hall meals a lot better than what came standard. Some of them took a lot of effort and creativity on her part, but not all of them. Many were as simple

Her eyes roved around the area, keeping an eye out for potential candidates to target. The soup here was middling at best, but with a little bit of extra salt, rosemary, hot sauce, and a few other things, it was actually quite good. Same with the pizza – a little bit of oregano and garlic went a long way. Not to mention the fixes she'd made to their atrocious marinara and alfredo sauces…

A slow grin spread across her face. She couldn't exactly assemble and resell trays of bagel sandwiches or french toasted pizza. Well, maybe she could, but not without raising some eyebrows. But spice mixes and premade seasoning blends, specifically tailored to dining hall food? Now that was an idea worth trying.

Oh yeah. That's DEFINITELY something productive I can play with. Next loop, it's time to branch out the business. Heather's gonna love this.