Inspired Prompt: "Hey i didnt have time to get a partner for a locker and now i got a randomized partner and we've never met but i know they skateboard and- holy shit that's a picture of me taped to the inside of the door" au
A/N: If you've never heard of slalom skating, its super incredible. I almost want this to be a love letter to the sport; it brings a smile to my face. Mari's style is inspired by the female skater Feng Hui.
Alright, goal of this story is Flirting, Fun, and Flow. Mostly, flow because I need to work on pacing.
I always write to improve, so comments and critiques are welcome! Please rip this to bits! Thank you!
Edit: Fixed tense issues.
"Look at it," Alya intoned, shaking her head then inhaling deeply. "It even smells like printed money in here."
"Alya, please." Marinette shook her head before rolling through the rather grand double doors of their new high school. The sun is bright and there was a certain crispness to the air on this side of town, she admitted, but she wouldn't say it was monetary. Alya had complained since she caught her on her route, which shouldn't have been a surprise considering her particular enthusiasm insulting their alleged 'rival school'.
Marinette's pinafore blew in the wind, blue ruffles waving to passerby's, and her hair was wrapped in double buns, because she habitually hit people at its current length. She didn't mind the school change— though Alya argued she had the most reason to mind— so long as she could skate on the grounds to start off her mornings.
"I bet they have a pool just to hoard that extra coin."
"Stop it," Marinette chuckled.
"Or even a room of exotic zoo animals."
"Maybe, we're the exotic zoo animals. It's all one big conspiracy," Marinette wiggled her fingers towards Alya.
Alya snapped her fingers, it traveled through the halls in a wonderful echo. "Excellent point. We won't even have classes. Just a glass room with blocks, crayons, and Jigsaw sitting in the corner for suspense."
"You're really being too dramatic about this." Marinette was craning her head around the building, having only visit once, looking for the lockers. She found the sign next to a set of stairs and glided over. She took quick practiced hops up the steps on her blades, not waiting for Alya because she should know to keep her pace. "Did you forget we went to middle school on this side of the city? We know over half the students in our grade."
"But we're like different people, gurl. We've seen the other side," she elaborated.
"What other side? We have the same curriculum, both schools are public, and we've skated with them for six years. What's honestly different about us?"
"Their snobbish personalities thinking they're better than us, that's what."
Marinette denied responding to the obvious hypocritical statement and to prevent encouraging her friend to recite more exciting differences between the two schools.
It was without question, Zag Lycée was grander than their last high school, Astruc Lycée, just on the other side of the city. Here the floors gleamed ivory, clearly waxed weekly, and the halls were supported by elegant pillars rather than hollow plaster columns housing colonies of bees. The streets leading up to the school are also better managed, with less littering and cracks in the ground. Her wheels might last longer this year because of the decreased in wear. But Alya was being ridiculous, just because of a silly rivalry between a small portion of the schools' populations.
She made a mental countdown of when she would go off again.
They reached the lockers, lined in four adjacent rows and standing tall—as opposed to those short stack lockers at the last school which only accommodated for two textbooks and a PB&J. However, this new luxury had a small condition.
"Ready to be buddies with the enemy?" Alya added.
"Fifteen-seconds," Marinette muttered. Alya shoved her, catching on, and Marinette drifted to the left a bit and laughed.
"What do you think your partner is like?"
"As long as they don't steal my skates, there's no problems."
Marinette glanced the inside of her wrist for her locker number and combination. Alya caught it. "You couldn't remember eight digits?" Alya teased, her brows raised .
Marinette jerked her arm back. "I didn't want to risk getting it wrong," she defended. Bringing the piece of paper that had the information guaranteed it was lost forever, and she almost forgot she would need a combination being on autopilot to go to her old school.
Alya tapped her back amicably, her eyes saying she always forgot the sort of klutz she is. Marinette found her locker in the back of the third row and input the combination. The metal ushered a soft click—ah, young lockers— when she pulled it open and glimpsed inside. It was empty, which she suspected meant her partner didn't need to use it yet or had not entered school grounds.
Marinette crouched to undo her skates. The left unbuckled in a crisp snap and she shimmied out when Alya exclaimed, "Oh my god, Mari, how many boys are in love with you?"
Marinette's head snapped up, brows merged together and looked in the direction of Alya's shout. Her eyes expand and blink wildly, like an owl attacked by a mouse and trying to decipher the situation.
"W-What is that?" Marinette stuttered.
"You don't remember what you look like? I think you look hot."
"You know wha—" Marinette cut herself off to grumble in her throat.
It was her, no doubt. Jumping, dancing, smiling at the skatepark in her blades and plastered in five to ten photos inside of the pictures were professional and well lit, many of them catching her in a trick without blurring. Secretly, she was impressed, but outwardly she was losing brain function.
"You know, I thought Luka had it bad, but this is a sickness. Or, shall I say, the 'love bug'," Alya waggled her brows.
An old pang hit her chest from mentioning her ex, but luckily the terrible pun overshadowed it. "I really hate that one."
Alya just laughed. "It's my favorite one, considering every male in the skate park is in love with our queen skater, Ladybug. I wonder how many other lockers have your pictures in them?"
"Not funny," Marinette sighed. She knew she was great at skating, she worked hard for it. Besides designing clothes, it was her only other good quality. She was also aware some skaters admired her skills at a distance, but to come face to face as a locker partner was disorientating.
"You should ask them out," Alya said.
"It could be a girl," Marinette fired back.
"You've never tried girls." Alya looked on like it was the brightest idea she ever considered.
"Are you volunteering?" She raised her brow. Alya's brow twitched upwards at the challenge and she leaned forward until she was a hair's breadth away, her lips parted and larger chest bumping against hers. Marinette maintained a stoic expression then blew raspberries into her face.
Alya sputtered, jumping back and swiping her face, and laughed. "Okay, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. You're gorgeous but clearly too mulish for me."
Marinate gave a smarmy smile and finished unbuckling her skates. She couldn't stop shifting her eyes back to the photos like a cobra in its nest while digging out her shoes and lunchbox from her bag. She wished there were other hints in the locker to the owner and perhaps she could have a piece of mind. She tossed her skates and lunchbox inside, determined to push it back for later.