That One Time We Kissed // Bishova College AU

The Past is a Dead Body, The Future is a Loaded Gun

Kate Bishop had a shadow.

The following week on campus, whenever she was on the quad or traveling from class to class, she would constantly spot a flash of blonde and a hulking man clad in a sweater, waving and calling her name. She could hardly step foot outside of Pym Hall, struggling to shove her crumpled notes in her bag, without hearing his thunderous voice.

Unwisely, she had been putting off her follow up meeting with her advisor, the cheerful Mr. Blake, since the winter musical. So, if Kate saw him coming, boisterous greetings and pure cashmere and all, she would unceremoniously hop onto her longboard and coast away.

Though a small part of her felt bad for shrugging him off, Kate had practice with this sort of thing. She was rather good at completely ignoring problems— like how her mother still hadn't called, how she still flinched at the sound of car horns or screeching tires, and how, only months from graduation, she had no fucking idea what she was doing.

Desperately, Kate tried to convince herself that everyone felt this way, listless in the sea of young adulthood, but there was no way the whole student body was drowning as quickly as she was.

Counterintuitively, this confusion, this utter lack of ambition or ideas on what to do with the rest of her life, did not drive her toward Mr. Blake's lavender-scented office. She stayed away because she knew what he would say, knew what disappointment she would find behind his brown rimmed glasses. She'd seen that look countless times before in her life.

So, instead of seeking out help, she bet on herself. Improvisation and her wit had gotten her this far, within a breath of graduating from college, so why couldn't it carry her now? She would figure it out as she always did, like when she literally rolled a six sided die to choose her college, or applied for a student job without knowing what it entailed.

What was it about her that left her incapable of taking life by the horns? Sometimes she felt like a spectator in her own life, watching as her peers made big decisions and she haplessly followed behind. She was just a little leaf floating down a big river, hoping to drift ashore on the right bank.

Sometimes Kate wished she was as decisive and bold as her girlfriend, who seemingly always knew what she wanted and how to get it. She was so... sure, so steady, that when Yelena called Kate 'her rock', it made Kate laugh. If Kate was a rock, Yelena was a mountain.

This and more weighed on Kate's mind the rest of the week, as midterms and deadlines and decisions loomed. Some of her peers were already admitted into graduate programs, internships, jobs. Some of them had actual plans. Some of them had it all figured out.

Despite her best efforts, Kate could not hide the consternation from creeping onto her features, as even a Tri Delta barbecue did not fully ease her mind.

"What's the matter, Katie?" Someone asked. Kate turned, expecting Yelena, but found green rather than hazel.

"Hi, Wanda," Kate said, admittedly not quite hearing the question. She stared down into the fire pit, poking at it with a charred stick in hopes that the brunette was just saying hello in passing.

Wanda raised an eyebrow, nudging Kate's elbow. "Why are you staring at the fire like that?"

Kate met her gaze, head tilting. "Like what?"

"So... forlornly."

"Forlornly? Are you an English major?"

"Yes, actually, I am." Wanda lifted her solo cup to her mouth, downing its contents. Her engagement ring caught glimmers of the fire, making Kate smile.

"Can I ask you something?" Kate continued, still idly poking around the pit.

"Of course."

"What do you plan on doing with a degree like that?"