The first time he sees her, she's in fourth grade and he's in sixth, and she's a spitfire if he ever saw one. She catches his attention because, well, she's pretty much best friends with TJ Detweiler, and anyone who tags along with that kid is guaranteed to catch everyone's eye. He glances around the playground and his eyes settle on the little girl with the scuffed up boots and striped tights that was beating up a sniveling Randall Weems.
"Who's that girl?" he asks one of his attendants.
"Which one?"
"The one who Detweiler hangs out with that wears the jacket."
"She goes by Spinelli," Jerome says in a quiet, clipped tone. "Fourth grade. Picks a fight with anyone who gets in her way."
He keeps looking at the small, short-tempered girl and decides that she is trouble.
She was trouble, and that did not bode too well with him, because as King of the playground, he was supposed to keep everything in order, and she seemed hellbent on doing everything to avoid that. She pulled nasty pranks on the Ashleys and picked fights and scowled at everyone but her friends, though Bob couldn't call her a bad person; she had her morals sorted out well enough.
He watches and frowns slightly at some of her actions, sees her go along with some of Detweiler's crazy schemes, and intercedes when he has to, but mostly he just tries to figure her out.
She was a rebel. Rebelling against him.
That...that didn't bother him nearly as much as it should have.
"What is your deal?!" Spinelli grinds out furiously, eyes flashing as she screamed at him.
"What's yours?" Bob asks, in a bored voice.
"You," she spits venomously, and stormed away.
He smiles.
Each King is supposed to have one thing that decides their entire legacy, that defines who they are when they rule and how future generations will see them forever.
Bob thinks that his greatest achievement will probably be keeping Ashley Spinelli in line.
"You're graduating," Spinelli says flatly. Her lips are pressed in a thin line.
Bob nods. "Yeah."
They stay quiet for a moment, because really, what can they say? Sorry for something that never quite happened? They just sit next to each other and watch the kids screaming below them; they're sitting on the roof of the school, legs dangling exhilaratingly over the side. He decides this is how she is, thrilling and frightening-with the dark, twisted knowledge you could just leap over the side without a second thought and never come back. She's adrenaline and breathlessness and just wide-eyed feeling.
"I'll miss you," he says, and she moves closer to the edge of the roof, looking up at the sky idly and swinging her feet back and forth, avoiding his gaze.
"Yeah, well...I'llprobablymissyoutoo," she mumbles, and he doesn't miss the blush that spreads across her cheeks.
The meet again in high school. Gone are the little red dresses and striped tights, replaced with fishnets and torn jeans and dark shirts. She keeps the leather jacket and of course, her boots are ever present. She ditches the hat and pigtails and lets her dark hair tumble down her back, wavy and thick.
He goes up to her and wraps his hands around her and whispers something half degrading and half affectionate into her ear. She spins around and slugs him in the stomach before politely telling him to fuck off, even after she realizes it's him.
"Nice to see you too," she says, after he catches his breath, because damn that girl can pack a punch. She doesn't apologize, and he wouldn't have it any other way.
They're at someone's party; he doesn't know who, maybe a friend of a friend of a friend. Something like that. He can see her, eyeliner circling her dark brown eyes, wearing some black leather dress that's a little too tight and that's attracting a little too much attention from the sleazy guys that lurk in corners, red cups clutched in their hands. She's wearing her boots. Of course.
After a while, she sees him and pulls him and they go to the roof, climbing up walls like they've done it their entire life, which of course, they have. They laugh and laugh until they're dizzy and they hurt, and they cry and scream and live before they falling back, breathless, and drinking in the stars.
They face each other, and Spinelli smirks like she always does when he leans forwards and kisses her, winding his fingers through her hair and tasting the alcohol on her red, red lips.
"This is not supposed to be how it goes," he mumbles against her lips.
"No," she agrees. "It's not."
Bob smiles. "Then let's break some rules."
She smiles back.
"Let's."
I loved recess when I was younger. I like TJ/Spinelli the most, but I decided to try this, haha.
Reviews would be amazing.
~lmf