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To live the absolute life of luxury while the world had ended and Carol was the last to survive seemed like a prompt she would have been given in college while in her storytelling workshop. Followed by adding a character of your choice, just having to write them being so stupidly in love it was embarrassing to everyone else around them that wasn't them.
And it would've included a laugh and a good chuckle. An original character that was taller than herself, brunette hair and blue eyes – or maybe brown she wasn't sure – like the woman that sat three rows in front of her in a different class. Something about public relations.
Somehow that is what has happened, living her life to the fullest like sixty days earlier she wasn't debating on killing anyone she could get her hands on. Carol’s a woman of many sides, sharp still poke but soft prudes through.
The city sparkles outside the glass window of their hotel room, and the robes are so fluffy enough to drown in. Carol is almost giddy at the feeling, smiling wide as she lets the feeling of it rub against her skin. Zosia stands behind her, looking down at herself in the expensive bleach smelling robe. It was not made for people of her height, model-esque like a gorgeous giraffe. It doesn't move lower below her kneecap, and sticks at the third quarter of her arm.
Carol chuckles, and Zosia gives her a knowing look.
The bath is slowly filling with water, and the kettle is slowly boiling in the next room. Music floods through the rooms through her phone. Stuff she and Helen used to listen to but Carol tries not to dwell on it. All instrumental, no words to break the silence of hollow wood and steel strings.
Zosia removed her robe first, dropping it onto the counter top beside the sink. She quickly steps into the water, settling in the warmth. The heat lights up her skin with goosebumps and burns them to a light shade of red. Carol dips her fingers in before pulling them out quickly, hissing.
“Too hot?” Zosia asks, head titled.
Carol shakes her head, trying to get the feeling of her burnt hand to go away. “Just a little,” She sucks onto her fingers, an attempt to soothe. “Are you okay in there?”
Zosia nods palatably, slowly kneeling down into the soapy water until it swallows her thighs. Carol watches her slip under, eyes following the skin that beads with steam and disappears. It covers her stomach, and the lower part of her hands bubbles the more she settles.
Brown eyes attempt to catch her own, and Zosia gives her a small smirk before looking away and focusing on tying up her hair in a bun. Hair that is definitely not real, and deeply confuses her on why she has it attached. Unsure if it was the hive that made her wear it, or she was already wearing it. Carol had worked enough in the press as a younger adult, and it was always something you could catch. A nagging thing that once you saw it, there was no way from not seeing it.
As the bun sits tight, Zosia slips further under the bubble until it covers her shoulders. She lets out a gentle moan, her head laying on the end of the black porcelain. Carol feels herself smile at the sound and attempts to hold it back from spreading it all over face. Forcing her lips into a flatline and holding them between her teeth. She turns her head, and moves to grab the wailing tea from the plastic boiler in the corner of their bathroom.
Zosia had recommended it while they read old magazines — a pastime of Helen’s because she felt it was more stimulating than looking at Yahoo's front page — where a section was marked about woman’s health, and how to recharge your low mental battery. Carol nodded along to Zosia’s thought, smiling and agreeing.
Now, it seems almost performative but she wouldn’t deny Zosia a pleasure of her own, especially with how excited she seemed at making her favorite flavour. She sets the teapot on the wood table set that Zosia attached to the tub.
Zosia smiles as she sets down the cups, eyes shimmering. “Are you going to get in?”
Carol looks up at her, slowly untying her robe. “I’m waiting for the water to cool.”
Zosia hums, amused and unbelieved of her statement. “Didn’t know if you were avoiding it or not.”
Carol chuckles humorously. Eyes still hesitant, and checking to see if Zosia is watching as she pulls off her robe. Zosia has seen her naked an extensive amount of times, but she still feels self conscious and her stomach churns when brown eyes do appear on her.
“I don’t know how you people like it, but I rather not boil myself alive in a bubble bath.” Carol adds, eyes on the water as she sinks herself into it. The warmth covers over her bones, and she hums satisfyingly, eyes closed.
“I happen to like hot bubble baths,” Zosia says, playfully serious and Carol chuckles, low into her throat. Zosia pushes herself upwards to pour the tea, and the water rises against Carol's legs, skirting over the edge of the tub. She eyes the edge of the tub, watching the water trickle to the ground.
“I’ll clean that up later.” Zosia smiles, pouring the cups of tea and setting one near Carol.
Carol nods, moving herself to settle and get more comfortable against the tub. Head tipped towards the ceiling as she sighs. The music continued to play dimly, and the silence that settles through the air is calming. Her pleasure blindsides her from the feet that slowly settle around both sides of her hips. Toes wiggling and poking against her thighs. Carol peaks an eye open to questionally look at the brunette. A slight grin on her face.
“Is that your foot?” She asks, hands moving down to hold into them.
Zosia has her lip bitten between her teeth, taking her left foot and dragging it around Carol’s thigh. “Perhaps.”
Carol squirms under the touch, trying to shove the feet away but it only makes them more persistent. “I am going to get out of this bath.”
Zosia pouts, pulling her feet back and Carol pulls legs into her chest. “You’re no fun.”
“You almost created a realistic version of the word pussyfooting.”
Zosia laughs, “As a writer and an English major, you should know the meaning of that word by now.”
Carol scoffs. “I do, but you’re creating another meaning that I don’t want to be what of.” Soapy fingers reaching to hold onto the cup of tea. It was a basic herbal tea that Zosia had found in the cupboards. No hotel she has ever been in had this type of fancy tea.
Zosia just smiles. Attention off her and now on the bubbles surrounding her. Her hands are covered in them as she attempts to make basic shapes that pop and crackle and fall apart on her skin. Carol smiles at the sight, sinking under the water to fully soak herself. She is only under for a few seconds but when she sits back up, blowing the water out of her nose Zosia is beaming, and in her hand is a decent sized bubble.
“Is that yours?”
Zosia nods excitedly. “And look, I can move it over,” Slowly her left hand moves out of the water, scooping a handful of bubbles. With her right hand she gently taps the bubble onto the new set and it sinks into them before settling as an even bigger bubble.
Carol chuckles, raising her hands out of the water to give her a round of applause.
“Now watch.” Zosia holds out her hand, pointing the tips of her fingers towards Carol as she stacks a good bit of bubbles on top of it and blows. They fly every which way and attach to the bubble onto Carol's. Carol squeals like she's a kid on the playground, turning her head to not get any in her face. They float and connect to her hair and shoulders. Zosia's loud cackling overshadows her own laughs, and in that moment Carol is the happiest she's ever been in a long time.
“I cannot believe you just did that.” Carol jibs, pushing the bubbles through her hair.
Zosia just doesn't stop smiling and Carol wonders if her cheeks will ever begin to hurt. “I love bubbles.”
“I see that.”
Zosia doesn't reply to the jab at her, continuing to contort with the foam. “Im going to make more.”
Carol bites her lip to hold herself back from smiling, her cheek muscles beginning to burn at the over use. She pokes her toe at Zosia’s leg and Zosia squeaks, throwing more bubbles at her before kicking back.
Water laps against them both and all Carol can do is laugh. Laugh at her time with Zosia and how it’s healed her in ways that shouldn’t be possible, laugh at what they are doing and how silly it is for them especially Carol, and laugh at how they got there.
How Zosia will move next to her in bed in the next few hours, opening her up and holding her as she closes herself back up. Recovering and resting on her chest that hours earlier was stuttering with the inability to breathe over her own laughs.