I don't really ship Markle (but I also kind of do because they are opposites and me likey), but this idea was floating around in my head so I wrote it. This is an AU with one specific canon reference if you squint.
Inspired by Seddie and a conversation with RedLippedAngel about Markle kind of being cute!
Rated K+ for (Accidentally) Kissing Best Friends
Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I don't own GMW, which is good because I'm absolutely positively sure I'm nuts.
"Okay, so how do we construct this gumdrop bridge in the least weight possible so that it holds the most weight possible?" Farkle pondered aloud, sifting through his scattered physics notes on weight. "There's got to be some way that we can create it that will prevent it from getting a hole in the middle so quickly once we put the weights on it. Maybe thickening the number of toothpicks in the center? No... we tried that already."
He'd been brainstorming for hours, poring over information to try to come up with a solution to their project. Maya was his assigned partner, but she'd done nothing to help yet, lounging around eating snacks and watching videos on her phone instead. Farkle was okay with doing the project on his own (he believed it meant a much better grade without her input), but they'd run a thousand trials in class and none of them had worked and now he was getting frustrated because he couldn't think of anything else. He'd exhausted all options and ideas and still couldn't come up with anything that hadn't failed while they'd been in class.
Maya frowned, setting her phone back in her pocket and sitting up. "Well, you keep assuming that it has to be flat."
"What?" he muttered absentmindedly, still looking through his notes for anything that would help.
"I'm saying, the reason the toothpicks keep caving in and breaking is because you're making it a flat surface and there's not enough support on the sides. In the experiment, the weight gets concentrated in the middle because of placement so our sides need to help offset that. What if we use some 3D hexagon cube or something that takes more weight off the center? The interior can reinforce the outer edges by connecting to them." She shrugged when he lifted his head and met her gaze in surprise. "There's a loophole here. Mrs. Langley never said it had to be an actual bridge shape. All she said was it had to be able to hold weight between two tables. Instead of using an elaborate bridge design, let's make a brick thing and use the remaining toothpicks to double up and strengthen the edges. We put the weights on it, and they'll be more evenly distributed throughout."
Farkle stared at her for a second, blinking in shock as a slow smile grew on his face.
"Maya... You're a genius!"
Before he could rethink it, Farkle grabbed her shoulders, yanked her forward, and planted a kiss full on her lips. Maya inhaled sharply as she went completely still.
And that was when Farkle realised what he had just done.
There was a moment of shock where Maya and Farkle both stared at each other wide eyed in total silence, their lips still pressed together. Then Maya made a disgusted sound from the back of her throat and pushed Farkle away from her, vehemently wiping her lips with her sleeve. Farkle looked mortified, his heart beating wildly in his chest. He really messed up. She looked like she was about to blow.
"Maya...?"
"What the heck was that?!" she exploded, shooting up to her feet and putting more space between them.
"I-I don't know!"
"You kissed me!" Maya hissed, as if the very word itself was a taboo that should never be said.
"Why did you let me?!" Farkle said, panicked and looking like he was about to start hyperventilating. "You didn't push me away immediately!"
"Because I was in shock!"
"I swear I wasn't trying to kiss you! I swear!" He cowered slightly when Maya took a slight dangerous step forward. "Please don't hurt me!"
"So why did you?!"
"I don't know! I got excited about the project, and then I turned to you and I saw your face and your lips were right there like some seductive temptress and I think I blacked out after that!"
"What the hell, Farkle?!" Maya yelled, running a hand through her hair and taking a few deep breaths to calm down. "You don't just go around kissing friends when you're excited."
He looked utterly terrified and confused. "Well... Maybe I wanted to...?"
She snapped her gaze to him and shot him a glare so dirty, Farkle yelped. "What?"
"Subconsciously." He licked his lips nervously. "I mean, why else would I do it unless I wanted to? Right?"
"...Did you feel something?" she asked quietly, swallowing thickly.
"Huh?"
"Like emotion wise. Did you feel something just now when we kissed?" Maya asked cautiously.
"I-I don't know... I can't remember." Farkle's brows furrowed, and he looked up at her. "Did you?"
Maya stared at the ground, chewing on her lower lip as she recounted the experience.
"I... don't know. Maybe?" She looked back up at him, panic in her expression. "I think I might have liked it. Oh God. I'm not supposed to like it! What is this?!"
"Well, what do we do?"
"This cannot be happening. This is all wrong! I'm not supposed to like kissing you. We're not supposed to ever kiss first of all!" She started pacing frantically, gripping her roots as she spoke. "Now I'm always going to be plagued with the thought that my first kiss was with you of all people! No offence."
"That was your first kiss?" he squeaked, looking appalled.
"Yes Farkle! You just took my lip virginity! Do you realize what this means?!"
"No?"
"It means that you've officially broken whatever tension may or may not have laid dormant between us. It means that our platonic affiliation has just gotten punted into outer space and now we're in limbo because we don't know how we felt about the kiss! It means that if we felt anything at all, there is something romantic between us and that cannot happen because I'm Maya and you're you're Farkle and any kind of romance between us is completely inappropriate and it's illegal, Farkle! It's illegal!"
"Oh man. This is bad." He ran a hand through his hair. "So now what?"
"Now?" She rounded on him, a crazed look in her eyes. "Now, I get a shovel and bury you alive because you were the idiot who kissed me in the first place!"
"Let's not be rash here, Maya." Farkle jumped to his feet, quickly moving to the opposite side of his bed when she started stalking towards him. "Maybe there's a simple solution to this."
"Yeah, burying you alive!" She stormed around the bed to get to him. Farkle hurried to the other side to get away from her. Every time she started moving to the opposite side, Farkle ran away to where she had been before. "Get back here!"
"Wait, Maya! We don't really know how we felt when we kissed, right?" he rushed to explain. "So why don't we figure out how we felt?"
She stopped moving, her eyes narrowing in suspicion. "Where are you going with this?"
"I'm saying, maybe we need to kiss again to decide officially whether or not we liked kissing each other."
She was quiet for a little bit, contemplating him seriously, a pensive expression on her face. Farkle thought he was off the hook, but Maya's glare returned on her face and she snarled at him.
"Nope, still like the shovel idea."
She hopped up on his bed, resuming the chase to grab him, and Farkle screamed, tripping as he stumbled backwards in an effort to escape her clutches. He landed on his bum and quickly put up his hands in front of him to protect himself.
"Wait! Hear me out! This is the only way we can fix things! If we don't figure out if we felt something or not, we'll keep thinking about this kiss until it drives us insane. We won't be able to talk or look at each other or spend time together the way we used to because of unresolved and unexplored possible feelings. And then it'll mess with our friend group's dynamic and everything will get weird. So we need to figure out the what if, otherwise we'll never be able to move past it. And the only way to figure it out once and for all, is to kiss each other again."
Maya sighed in annoyance, running a hand through her hair and closing her eyes briefly.
"Why does this crap keep happening to me?" she muttered.
"This has happened to you before?" he asked in confusion.
"Not this particular... Nevermind. It's not important." She plopped down on the edge of his bed like her whole body was completely drained of energy. "You're sure this is the smart thing to do?"
"Positive," Farkle said, trying his luck and carefully sitting next to her.
"And what happens if we do feel something," Maya asked hesitantly, glancing at him a little nervously. "What if one of us likes it? Or what if we both like it?"
"Then... we date?"
"Get real, Farks. I'm not dating you."
"...We could make out a lot," he said hopefully.
"Strike two," she growled through grit teeth.
He inhaled sharply. "Or we could just cross that bridge if we get there?"
"Agreed. One kiss. Ten seconds. Nothing more. Deal?"
Farkle nodded resolutely. "Deal."
They turned to face each other, and Maya put her hands on his shoulders though she was looking at his chin rather than directly in his eyes. Farkle wasn't looking at her directly either, choosing to focus his attention on the freckles on her nose.
"Uhh... Where do I put my hands?"
"On my waist, you nincompoop."
"Right."
They leaned in, staring at each other's lips.
"Okay. On your mark..."
Maya bristled when she felt Farkle's breath on her lips.
"Get set..."
Farkle could feel himself sweating as Maya closed her eyes.
"Go."
Their lips pressed together, slow and hesitant, their mouths slightly parted as they kissed. It was strange for Farkle, who had never imagined in his life that Maya Penelope Hart would ever kiss him. Over the years, she'd made it pointedly clear that she was uninterested in any romantic relationship between them, but here she was kissing him, no matter what the circumstances. And Maya herself could never have imagined kissing her geeky best friend. It was like the universe had inverted itself or something.
They pulled away from each other once the ten seconds were up, their eyes fluttering open slowly. Maya's nose wrinkled in bewilderment while Farkle held his breath. Her hands slid from his shoulders and when she gave him a pointed look, he hastily removed his from her waist. His palms felt clammy and his hands were shaking the slightest bit.
"O-okay," Farkle said, searching her eyes anxiously,"so what did you feel?"
"It was..." Her brows furrowed as she touched her lips absentmindedly. "I..."
"Yeah...?"
"It was... kind of gross actually."
Farkle let out the long breath he'd been holding, smiling in relief. "Yeah. And really weird."
Maya snorted. "I did not enjoy that at all. Like, at all."
"Yeah, me neither." He nodded emphatically.
"Yupp."
"Right."
They fell silent, Maya picking at the polish on her fingernails while Farkle started gathering his notes into one pile, his eyes staying determinedly off of the blonde beside him.
"So that's that," she finally declared once the silence grew uncomfortable, slapping her hands together as if brushing away the situation. "We are not physically or romantically attracted to each other at all."
"Well, that's not totally true," he rambled. "I mean, you are pretty hot, Maya—"
"Farkle! What did I just say?"
"We're not attracted to each other at all," he said quickly, nodding.
"Damn straight. Don't ever let me hear you say that again."
"Sorry. So w-we're good?"
"I think so."
They glanced each other, staring at the other for a few seconds, their lips tugging up into small smiles. Farkle's efforts to keep a straight face broke first and he broke down in chuckles and a moment later, Maya joined in, shaking her head in amusement.
"What is wrong with us?" he muttered.
Maya smiled, nudging his side playfully with her elbow. "I honestly don't know."
"I'm glad we got this out of the way. We can still be best friends even though we kissed, right?"
"Yeah. We're still best friends." She gave his shoulder a soft squeeze to reassure him.
"Great." He picked up the box of toothpicks behind him, shaking it a bit. "We should probably finish up the rest of this project then."
"Good idea. Oh and Farkie poo?"
He smiled adoringly. "Yes, Maya dear?"
She grabbed the front of his shirt, pulling him close and glaring at him, her eyes glinting menacingly and the frosty blue gaze setting chills of fear down Farkle's back. He swallowed hard, eyes widening in fright as she held his gaze.
"If you ever tell anyone that we kissed," she said evenly, her tone low and dangerous, "that dream where you wake up naked in the middle of the school hallway? I'll make it a reality."
"N-noted."