Till all the stars go blue [Chaennie]

Chapter 7

The cloying smile fell immediately from Jennie's face and Rosie could have sworn she heard it land in the dirt with a soft thud.

"What?" Jennie asked, deflated.

"I quit," Rosie repeated again, firmly. She started futzing around and gathering things together like she was packing.

Jennie cast her eyes about anxiously and then seemed to find her wits and motor skills again about the same time.

"Why?" She said urgently, moving toward Rosie in a frantic rush.

"Because clearly you're not happy about things. And, quite frankly," Rosie raised her eyes and sought out Jennie's. They were wide and panicked. "I don't want to work for you."

The fragile look on Jennie's face nearly tore Rosie's heart in half and she had to look away. She was expecting rage, insolence, but certainly not this.

"But you can't quit." Jennie said quietly.

Rosie chuckled. "Sure I can," she said brightly. "I just did."

"But... how will I get back?" she wondered aloud.

"Jennie, " Rosie said, rolling her eyes. "I'll take you back. I'm not going to leave you out here like bear bait."

"Bear bait?" Jennie said with a whimper.

Rosie winced and grunted in frustration. God damn it, Rosie. Learn to keep your stupid snarky comments to yourself. Please, please, please don't fixate on that, Jennie.

"You can't quit," Jennie started again finally.

Rosie breathed a huge sigh of relief. "Um, I think we just went over this," she said patiently.

"But that means I didn't finish... or whatever." Jennie sputtered, trying a new tactic.

"It's kind of a pass/fail thing, Jennie." Rosie explained. "I think we can safely say the grading curve is pretty liberal. Completion is highly overrated anyway."

That last remark was mean because Rosie was pretty sure in Jennie Kim's world, completion was everything and she would never say something like that. That certainly wasn't Rosie talking and it rattled her. It was just another thing she was now going to have keep in check, if it was even possible.

"Jennie, everything will be fine." Rosie said honestly.

"But I don't want it to be fine. I don't want to be graded on a curve. I don't want..." Jennie said in a rush. "I don't want you to quit."

"But you want your cell phone back, right? You're ready to get back to cell phones and email and noise? Your great life awaits you. By comparison, this stuff really doesn't matter. It's just another meaningful experience to apply whenever called upon."

Oh my God, shut up, Rosie. Stop talking right now.

"But I don't want it to be over... today," Jennie said, her voice quivering.

"Why not, Jennie?" Rosie sniped. "This is just a bad vacation for you and, as you so happily pointed out, I'm just the hired help. I'm here to carry your bags and prop up your..."

Not. Another. Word. They were all lined up right there ready to tumble forth: To carry your bags, to flirt with you shamelessly and prop up your fragile, needy, inflated ego.

Rosie bit down on her lip, hard. So hard, in fact, that she tasted copper: blood. She toyed with the fresh split in her lip with her tongue, using the pain to her advantage and the flow increased. She spit it out. Pain was good. Another foil to use against things she thought she had mastered. Her nails dug viciously into her palm and she was sure she was drawing blood there as well.