Title: Don't Do Sadness
Summary: Grace brushes her hair as Rich watches. Takes place directly after 05x07.
Rating: Heavy T.
Disclaimer: Still don't own Skins. Nor anything else mentioned that's a reference to anything else. Thx guize.
Author's Note: Please tell me how I do, guys; I'm pretty sure this one sucks more than my first story (Good Night, Grace) but I kinda love it. I dunno. But yeah, I really need to improve in everything. Especially summaries /facepalm.
The next morning, Grace brushes her hair as Rich watches.
She does it surely, briskly, making sure to be very careful about the tangles. She's precise about it, knows exactly how strong the strokes have to be or how gentle. Her one hand grips the brush firmly while the other holds her hair in place. Her face is tense and her hair is wet and then the sun shines in her room and sets light to Grace's skin, makes it golden and gleaming.
Rich watches her and through the mirror, Grace can see him gaping a little.
It wasn't meant to be this way, where every single thing she did elicited some sort of emotion from him. When she was sad, he was sad and when she was happy, he was fucking ecstatic.
It freaked him out, to be honest.
Made him feel weak, dependent and so...in love. And love wasn't supposed to happen. Not between them. It was supposed to happen with that Angel of Something, back in the library.
Rich had always thought that if he were ever to settle down with a girlfriend, it would be with someone who was just like him. Someone who loved grunge and metal and generally someone who didn't really give a fuck about society.
Rich had never expected to love Grace Violet Blood, the epitome of class and beauty, the ballerina, the actress. She was perfect.
"Rich?"
Rich looks down as Grace's eyes gaze implore into his. "Yeah?"
"You do love me, right?"
"'Course I do. Proposed to you, didn't I?"
Grace strokes his chest, tiptoes her finger across his torso, lays her palm flat against his heart. "Yes, you did. Thank you."
"You nutter." Rich grins and pulls her closer to him. He presses a kiss on her curls and his other hand sneaks southward.
"Rich," Grace gasps before rolling over him. "Not fair. My turn."
Grace pushed her father for the first time in her life today.
She didn't mean to. Honest. All she wanted to do was see her boyfriend (well, fiancé now) and leave the house for a bit. It wasn't like wanted to go smoke cocaine or something equally NOCD. Why couldn't her father understand that?
Grace, he had said with his nostrils flaring, you are not to leave this house, young lady; you must pack for Mayberry's.
Grace had pushed his hand off her arm and glared at him, her ringlets swaying as the open door's wind blew in.
Just leave me the fuck alone, Dad, she had said. Shouted. Whatever.
It had been rather dramatic what with her mother in the background gasping and covering her mouth and with her father gobsmacked by the foray. Very like the movies.
Grace remembered shrieking incoherently. She remembered grabbing her sensible shoes. She remembered leaving the house. She remembered stumbling into Alo in the pub.
And tomorrow she wouldn't remember laughing and crying hysterically as Alo and Mini pried the empty bottle from her hand.
"Do you think the marriage will go alright?" Grace asks abruptly as they come down from their post-coital high. "Like Sense and Sensibility? The Kate Winslet version? Not that I believe in stories anymore, Rich." She adds hastily. "It's just a film based on a novel by Jane Austen." Who is my fucking hero, Grace wants to add.
Rich takes a while to get back into real life, his senses hazy with Grace, Grace, Grace. He finally splutters. "Of course it'll go fucking alright."
"But Rich—" Grace begins.
"—but nothing. It'll be fucking brilliant, okay? Alo will get pissed with Nick, Liv will pass out with Mini and," Rich mock-glares at her, "—and then we'll fuck all night long."
"So you're marrying me for the fucking?" Grace's tone is cold and so is the room suddenly. Grace's head spins and she tries to remember the feeling of how in love she was when he proposed to her.
"No…although that is an advantage of the wedding…" Rich mutters slyly before he remembers that they haven't discussed the marriage. Not properly.
"Right. Well." Grace gets up and quickly shoves on her underwear. "So fucking is an advantage of marrying me? Well, fuck you, Rich. I am not like Pris from Blade Runner, I—"
"—hey, hey." Rich interjects angrily. "When the fuck were we talking about fucking Blade Runner? And where the fuck do you think you're going? Grace?"
Grace shoves on her dress and grabs her shawl. "Goodbye, Richard…you twat." She ignores his shock and leaves the room in a way only an actress can—by the applause of a resounding door slam.
Rich chucks something heavy at the door and listens to Grace bidding his parents goodbye.
Well, shit.
Grace ignored the loud angry knocks on her door and she ignored the piles of English homework and she ignored her phone's insisting vibrations.
She simply fell onto her bed face first, curled up her body tight and sobbed into her knees. Liv's voice echoed in her mind: You said everything was going to be okay.
Rich couldn't sleep that night.
Grace wouldn't answer his calls or his texts, her parents wouldn't answer the door properly (Mrs. Blood gave him an apple crumble which he promptly threw at the dog slobbering at his feet) and Alo didn't answer his phone either.
All he wanted to do was say sorry. He never meant to fuck up the best thing in his life.
Napalm's Death poster stared at him reproachfully from the wall.
Rich turned the light off and closed his eyes. Sorry Barney but there were more important things in life.
"Grace, I have to talk to you."
"Can't it wait, Richard? Excuse me, I have to get to class."
She tries to step around him but Rich grabs her arm and brings her body to his. It's a desperate move—one he has only learnt from movie nights with Grace—and kisses her. They're small, close-mouthed kisses because Grace isn't responding until her mouth finally opens and her hands go round his neck and his to her waist and they're snogging on the college yard for everyone to see and catcall at (which Rider is having loads of fun doing).
Grace is the first to pull away as she shoves him off. "You were the one who called me a slag."
Rich gapes at her. "No, I fucking didn't! All I said was that we'd fuck all night after the marriage because isn't that what people do on their fucking wedding night?"
Grace punches his arm. "Shut up, Richard. It's called 'making love'."
"Well, that's a shit name."
"And you're a shit fiancé."
Rich's face falls and Grace tries not to comfort him. Stay strong, Grace Blood. Violet. Grace Violet Blood.
"Look, Grace, I'm…I'm really sorry alright. I never wanted to make you feel like a…slag or something. I love you, okay? I'm sorry."
Grace bursts into tears and Rich looks around alarmingly. For the entire course of their relationship, it has always been Rich to cry first (something he has never admitted to anyone for obvious reasons). And now that Grace is the one…
"Grace? I'm really sorry, Grace. Don't cry. Please. Please don't cry." Rich pulls her to him again and wraps his arms around her tightly. "Sorry, Grace."
Grace grasps his jacket and buries her face into his shirt. Love you, too, Rich. Heaps and heaps and heaps.
"So the wedding's still on?" Rich asks.
Grace glares at him. "I thought you were going to make love to me?"
"Fucking." Rich mutters.
"What?"
"Nothing! I didn't say nothing!"
"Good." Grace smiles, satisfied. "And yes, of course the wedding's still on, silly. You love me and I love you, right? And I am not a slag, okay? And there's nothing wrong with being one if those are your life choices." She adds primly.
"Yes. I love you and you love me. You're not anything like a slag and even if you were, I wouldn't insult you at all. Nor anyone else who chooses to shag a busload of people." Rich rolls his eyes. "Now can I fu—make love to you?"
"Yes." Grace pulls off her camisole and Rich pushes her down on the bed.
*NOCD – "Not our class, dear." Took this from my most favourite book ever 'Freshman' by Michael Gerber. It is GLORIOUS.
**I know the ending is blah. I feel pretty blah. Stupid male population.
***Song taken from Spring Awakening, a Broadway musical. One of my most favourite songs ever.
****Thank you for reading! :)