A story set on the campus of the fictional university of Ardenthill Bioscience and Design University.
8 Monserrat opened the creaky back door to her house, motioning Clarissa inside. She could hear her girlfriends and her fiancé eagerly greeting Lyssa as soon as her friend had cleared the mud room. It wasn’t a surprise that the polycule was fired up for their little meeting, but it was a surprise to be …
The store’s exterior had been almost as embarrassing as its contents. Ginger was sure Chun had picked the least discreet store in town. The building was painted purple, and its sign featured a pair of lips as well as a pair of handcuffs. It wasn’t the kind of place a girl like Ginger went to, …
The morning dawned on an entirely new earth. Jenna woke with the aggressively chirping digital birds of Monserrat’s alarm. Where she would have pulled a pillow over her ears before, Jenna forced herself awake to hold her fiancé before Monchi rose. The creaky old house was cold, almost as cold as the snowy yard outside. …
The longer they lingered in front of the steam tunnels, the more Camila’s nerves frayed. At any minute, hordes of campus security guards could descend on them and get them all in trouble. That her long wait was her fault, for arriving so early, did nothing to abate her nervousness. Lamara, at least, was on …
Monserrat watched the volleyball rise and leapt to meet it. The motion of her arm started in her hips and belly, rippled up her back, and finished with an explosive downward smash. Distorted by the force of the strike, the ball cratered into Clarissa’s chest. Clarissa went down on her back hard enough to bounce. …
Camila grunted, fighting with her diaper’s tapes. Putting a diaper on herself was difficult enough. Doing it under the covers was proving impossible. She couldn’t see the stupid tapes and kept catching them on the blanket. “You don’t have to do that under the covers. I don’t care if you put on a diaper in …
The house was quiet dark, except for three lights. Two of the lights were always on at night, bright guardians standing at the front and back doors. The bedroom hallway was lit only by snow-reflected moonlight streaming through the window. The third light was coming from under Jenna’s bedroom door. Monserrat hesitated at the door. …
Ginger’s room always seemed smaller when Chun was in it. It was a small room to begin with, there was hardly space for Ginger and her roommate to turn around at the same time. They’d have more space if they stacked the beds into bunks, but Alice didn’t want to be on the bottom bunk. …
The Mathematics faculty lounge had been an intimidating place the first time Jenna had set foot inside. In looks it wasn’t much, shabby furniture and ill-maintained appliances like any department lounge. Only business and other industry-pipeline departments had nice lounges. Nor were the people particularly impressive to look at. Math people tended to be withdrawn …
The pile of presents grew until even the huge tree couldn’t contain them. Stockings appeared above the fireplace. Packages were arriving every day as the post office struggled to keep up with the holiday volume. The house had transformed into the movie version of Christmas, decorated from top to bottom. Briana was certain that she …