ℒ𝒶 𝒩𝓊𝒾𝓉 (AMBW)

𝟗 || 𝐌𝐚𝐫𝐢𝐚

"I hate it here," she mumbled to herself while walking past a group a pale skinned, life-less looking girls who stared at her rather pointedly after the end of the last classes of the day. Fortunate for Analisse, these girls were in a different cohort than her's, but had made her first few days of school quite unpleasant to say the least, among other things Analisse was trying to deal with.

As on the night in which she arrived in the rather sleepy forested town, it had been raining stagnantly throughout the passing days, but when Analisse awoke from her light, rather unrested sleep this morning, she could tell it was going to be raining for most of that Friday.

Normally Analisse very much so enjoyed the rain, and the cloudy grey-like days which came with them, however, knowing she would have be traversing through the campus today to get to various lessons and lectures, she was not at all looking forward to leaving her dorm room.

To make things worse, her dorm-mate, Maria DiMucci was in a peculiarly, seemingly, ecstatic mood today, which she could hardly understand why.

Maria, who was now a friendly acquaintance of sorts to Analisse, was rather cold towards Analisse in the beginning, and fearing that she would be just as ignorant as other's Analisse had encountered in the past, she had avoided her for the first few days.

____

"This is your room dear. I'm not sure if your dorm-mate has arrived yet, but it's normally past curfew now..." With a worried look on her face, Lena, the school attendant that had showed Analisse to her dorm on her first night, looked around the hall-way. "Let's just keep this between us, okay," she said with a smile.

Nodding her head, but before entering, Analisse asked, "I forgot to ask you, what is my dorm-mate's name?"

"Oh silly me, of course you'll want to know the name of the person you'll be staying with," she said with light giggle.

Analisse just looked at her while she desperately tried to find a way to make her laugh. She was tired and was honestly getting annoyed of this woman's constant state of humored delight.

"Her name is Maria DiMucci. She's... well she can be interesting, as you can see, being that it's well past curfew now," Lena said, now with an awkward laughter. But just as she said this, some rushed footsteps were heard coming from the same direction in which Analisse had arrived.

"Ah, Maria!" Said Lena with a great relieved smile.

"Hello Lena," said Maria with an almost monotone-like dullness to her deep, silk-like voice. With a quick glance down at Analisse (the height difference immeasurable, but her confident presence granted her such height in a way), she continued to speak directly to Lena.

"This must be the new girl."

Noting the cool tone to her voice, even Lena felt slightly taken aback by the tension which Maria brought to the conversation. Stammering slightly, Lena continued. "Well... yes, this is your new dorm-mate, Analisse Beaumont."

"French... how chic." Maria said with a clear emphasis on her sarcastic remark.

And like that Maria abruptly left the two other women alone in the hallway, slightly-slamming the door on her way into the room.

–––––

On Tuesday, the second day of her arrival at school, beginning to settle into her new room, whilst becoming acquainted with the layout and amenities on her dorm floor, Maria and Analisse happened to run into each-other that morning in their dorm-room.

With hair slightly disheveled, naturally curled and full, with a dark, almost black chestnut-like coloring, Maria had just returned from the baths, going early before the girls would awake.

Maria, though who did not fit the image of the beauty ideals of the typical western-European standards, with a tan complexion, full lips, dark and wide eyes, with a rather curvaceous figure, was a beautiful woman nonetheless.

While Analisse was preparing and gathering her things to leave the room for the day before breakfast, she felt a slight tap on her shoulder while writing a note to herself in her diary. Slightly startled by her seemingly inaudible footsteps, out of politeness, Analisse greeted her with a slight smile.

"Good-morning."

"Hello Analisse... well, good-morning." Maria seemed lost in thought, though she sported a kind, yet genuine smile.

"Is-is there anything I can help you with?" Analisse asked her, trying her best to sound earnest while hiding the fact that she was in fact anxious by her mere presence. A defense mechanism you could say.

"Listen... Analisse. I should say, I think I gave you the wrong impression of me when we first met. If we may, I would like us to be re-introduced properly. I am... embarrassed by the way I spoke to you–

"Maria, stop!" Analisse said with a reassuring smile. "You mustn't be so serious all the time. I just took it that you were perhaps having a hard day."

Letting out a breathy chuckle, looking away, between a yawn she said, "you could say it was more of a... difficult evening."

"Oh. Do you want to talk about it?" Analisse offered, not really sure what to say in these types of situations.

"Can I be honest Analisse?" Nodding her head, she turned around and went to the window, lighting up a cigarette, while resting her arms on the tall window ledge. Taking in a deep inhale, she let out a puff of smoke, and turned her head now to face Analisse.

"I should like to be your friend... if you can even trust me though, after the way I was towards you when we first met."

Analisse felt as though she were being proposed a deal with some twisted, troubled spirit. "Why wouldn't I be," she asked while shifting the tone of her voice, mimicking Maria's serious tone.

Suddenly, while she faced out the window as she smoked, Analisse caught a glimpse of her exposed upper-back which appeared to have some purple, potentially, dark forming bruising occurring around her neck and between her shoulder blades.

As though noticing Analisse staring at her, she quickly grabbed her robe tying it tightly around her waist.

"You shouldn't trust people so easily Analisse! I'm sure as you've just seen, that is the very reason why," almost yelling, Maria looked to be on the verge of tears, as her eyes began to redden.

"Are-are you okay," Analisse said struggling to get the words out, not believing what she had just seen.

Just as she took a step closer to her, in an attempt to be of some sort of comfort, Maria stepped back quickly, turning around and grabbing a handkerchief from her bedside table, dabbing her eyes while her back was turned away from Analisse.

"Today is Tuesday, right?" She asked, before turning around and seating herself on the edge of her bed, drawing another deep inhale from her cigarette.

"Yes, why?"

Seeming to have regained her composure, she said with an excited look in her eyes "On Friday evening after classes, we'll go into town, and we'll have so much fun. Okay?" She said with a forced-like smile, to hide what appeared to be a distressed, painful look in her eyes.

Everything had happened so fast, yet all Analisse felt she could say along with a simple smile was: "That sounds fun Maria."

A/N: Thank you for reading this new chapter of La Nuit. Apologies for the long wait, but I'm back (or at least I'm going to try to). Hope you have all been well and taking care of yourselves.

Much Love, Yara♡