"Just pretend I'm not here, you're good at that." She says as he approaches her, except clearly she doesn't mean it. She's drooped over her knees, looking sadly at the white wall in front of her.
"I am not, even when I'm ignoring you I think about you every five seconds." She tries not to smile at his cheesy comment, but she can feel the edges of her mouth move up. "I mean, who else am I going to argue with?"
She rolls her eyes at the ceiling, "There's always Miley."
He rolls his now, "You're right, I want to loose my rights to my Mike disguise until the next time she fights with you."
"Oh, I'm sure it won't take that long, she's a pretty bad friend a lot of the time," She knows she shouldn't be badmouthing her to him when they're fighting but she's too mad to think straight. "That's not the point anyways."
"You're right," He nods, sitting down next to her and leaning his chin on his knee in mirror to her. "The point is, I'm an idiot, but I'm your idiot. Where else am I going to find a smart, funny, pretty blonde girl who's willing to fall in love with me?"
"You can't just point out the obvious and expect me to forgive you," She mumbles, not looking at him. She probably has already forgiven him somewhere deep down, her brain just needs to catch up.
"So it's obvious you're in love with me?" She can feel him grinning. It's annoying, it makes her want to slap him and storm out but that would require her to act like it meant anything.
"I was talking about you being an idiot and me being pretty," She remarks quickly in self defense, playing with the string on her hoodie.
"So are you?" He asks quietly. She feels her heart jump up in her throat. That is not safe question to answer, her brain seems to say, but something is disagreeing with it. Something is telling her it's the best question that's ever been asked.
"Pretty? Why yes, I am." She stalls. She knows in about five seconds he'll ask her a straighter question, one it will be ten times more difficult to weasel her way out of.
"Lilly, are you in love with me?" Damn it. Why do they always have to be on the same page? Why can't they ever read each other wrong? Maybe because she wouldn't care about him if it wasn't like this, if being with him was a haunting experience. She liked that they just were.
"You aren't allowed to ask that question right now," She muttered at him, biting her lip to hold back an urge somewhere between crying and screaming.
"When we're sitting on the floor of the gym?" He says stupidly, and she fights the urge to call him a doughnut and scoff.
"When you were just flirting with you ex-girlfriend," She accuses. She knows it sounds petty, because she was the one who started it but still, he'd just tried to corner her into answering the most serious of questions in the middle of the argument.
"You were the one who told me to try and find another girl willing to ride the Ollie Trolley now that I'd gone and gotten this haircut," He pointed to his new short, black 'do.
"First of all, those were not my words. I said you should try to find another girl who finds you attractive with it. And second, I did not mean for you to go chat up Joannie! I thought you'd do something stupid like go up to Amber and Ashley and get insulted. I was going to fluff you ego when it happened to!" And he knew it too. He was just being a moron because she'd hurt his pride, twice.
"I don't care about Joannie, okay Lils?" He grumbled, kicking the floor. "I don't really frickin' care about any of the other stupid, shallow girls around here."
"Yeah right," She scoffed. "I'm not stupid, do you think I don't remember the time you gave out your number at cheerleading practice?" And she'd beaten him within an inch of his life for it after practice, but she didn't need to mention that part.
"You were a cheerleader," He mumbled into his sleeve.
"What's that?" She asked, looking at him.
"You…and that stupid uniform. You cheered. You were pretty good too, flexible," She felt a smile form on her face. "You actually looked like a girl for once," Her smile faltered and she smacked him as hard as she could. "OW!"
"You don't think I look like a girl?" She gaped at him, crossing her arms over her chest.
"Of course you do! Geeze, it's just…back then…I mean…all the skateboarding," He stuttered aimlessly. "And you were pretty flat-chested."
"Now you care about the size of my bra?" She yelped, glad she was covering her chest.
"No!" He responded automatically. "I wasn't saying that, you know I wouldn't…I like you…I just meant…it was the first time I noticed how pretty you were, okay?"
She couldn't help it, there were butterflies erupting all over her stomach. "Okay," She mumbled, trying to hide her blush. Definitely okay.
They sat there for a few more minutes on the gym floor, acting awkward in a way they hadn't since they'd started dating. It was nice to soak in. It was a stolen moment again, not one they had in front of Miley's irritated face or a kiss that would be blocked by their best friend. They didn't even need to try.
"I love you, Lillypop," He whispered, taking her hand in his and squeezing it.
"Okay," She paused, looking at the astonished look on his face and giggling. "I love you too." And she leaned back, careful not to break his grasp on her.
Sometimes it was enough just to be together. Sometimes what you felt was more important then what actually happened.
AN: Wow, it's been a while since I posted. I hope this fluff makes up for it. I don't usually write fluff, but it just kind of came out.
This is prompt 165: + "Just pretend I'm not here."