Is this AU? Is this just Canonverse? (caught in a landslide, no escape from reality)(sorry) I have no idea. I couldn't decide, and it didn't matter much in the story, so it's up to you and your interpretation. Honestly, I just really really wanted to write this, and that's all I know. I finished BLLB last week and I can't get over it.
A few things you should know if you don't want to be confused:
-Ronan and Blue have already seen each other, but they've never hung out or anything, they don't know each other
-Monmouth Manufacturing turned into an apartment building, because I needed it to
Disclaimer: (is this really necessary?) I'm not Maggie Stiefvater, and I don't own the characters.
Also, title's from Novocaine, by Fall Out Boy, because I spent two hours searching for a title and couldn't find one that fit Blue/Ronan for the life of me.
Summary: Ronan's a shithead, and Blue never backs down from a challenge—OR, Ronan hit the "door close" button of the elevator on Blue, and she'll be damned if she lets him get away with it.
Don't take too long, please. We have to be there in an hour. And, with this text, Blue turned off her phone, shoved it angrily in her bag, and slowed considerably her pace. Okay, so maybe it wasn't fair of her to be mad at Gansey, as he wasn't the only cause of her bad mood. But it was only eleven AM, and she'd already had the shittiest day. Between Orla getting in her hair since the moment she woke up, her mother saying that "she wasn't telling Blue not to go out, she just asked if she was sure it was a good idea," and Gansey asking her if she could go to pick up some snacks before meeting him because he wasn't sure he'd have the time; between all that, Blue hadn't had a minute to breathe and that was not how she wanted to spend the rest of her vacation.
Even walking slower, Blue arrived at Monmouth only a few minutes later. Part of her wished it had taken her longer, she would've delighted in annoying Gansey, but she was also kind of glad, because her bag felt heavier and heavier, and she was getting tired of walking between all of these daddy's boys and their stupid new cars acting like they owned the world. Gansey's apartment was about two streets away from Aglionby Academy, the school Blue dreamed of attending, what with all of its crazily handsome, crazily rich boys in their perfect white sweaters and pleated pants. And by dreamed, she meant she'd rather die eaten by wild animals while she was still alive than hang out with one of them for more than a second. She was still baffled when she remembered that she did, in fact, hang out with three of them, for hours and hours every day. But Adam, Noah and Gansey didn't really feel like Aglionby students to Blue. As cliché as it was, she thought they were different. She couldn't bear any of the others, though. Just talking to them at Nino's, the restaurant she worked at, made her want to puke.
Blue let out a breath when she entered Montmouth. She'd left home in a hurry, only to realize a few minutes later she had on the least comfortable shoes ever. And of course she'd had to make a detour to buy snacks. Her feet were killing her.
Thankfully, the elevator was on the ground floor, and there was only one person in it, still plenty of place and—no, he didn't. The bastard didn't just hit the "door close" button when he saw her. Oh no, trust her, he didn't.
A thing you need to know about Blue Sargent is that she never backs down from a challenge. And this looked a lot like a challenge.
Immediately regaining her energy, Blue started to run, and launched herself between the elevator doors just before they closed. She'd managed to get in.
All the pride she felt quickly turned into anger when she remembered why she'd practically had to risk her life in the first place.
She looked up at the boy, only to find him shaking his head, annoyed. Blue wasn't sure why, but somehow she felt like she knew him. Dark skin, blue eyes, buzz-cut hair and a haughty expression that clearly showed he thought he was better than everyone else... It took her a few seconds to recognize him, but when she did, her anger rose to a thirteen on a scale from one to ten, she'd say. Ronan Lynch. Of course she had to end up in the elevator with an Aglionby boy. And on top of it, out of all the students that went to this school, it had to be Ronan. If she'd had to pick one Aglionby boy she hated more than the others, and that was saying something, it would've been Ronan. She saw him almost every week when she worked at Nino's after school, and he always managed to make her ponder if going to prison for murder was really that bad.
Ignoring the part of her brain telling her it was probably a very bad idea, Blue proceeded to punch every floor button as fast as possible, some of them twice.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Ronan snarled. Objectively, Blue knew it was a bad idea. But in the heat of the moment, she couldn't have cared less. "Are you stupid?"
It was only when Blue heard the elevator stop moving that she started to realize what was happening.
"Oh shit," she breathed. She was going to be trapped in the elevator for who knows how long. With Ronan.
Said boy laughed dryly. "Yeah, shit. Maybe you should've thought of that before punching every button like a two-year-old."
No. There was no way he was pinning it on her. Her day had already been terrible, but this, this was the last straw. "Are you joking? You're the kid, out of the two of us!" He huffed, but Blue didn't let him interrupt. "You're the one who hit the door close button when you saw me! You started it!"
"Yeah, well I didn't feel like sharing the elevator, especially with you," he replied. The back of his neck had turned red from anger, and Blue could feel hers heating, too.
"And yet, look where that lead us."
"I can't believe you're going to pin it on me," he shook his head. "You could have taken the stairs, for fuck's sake! Nothing forced you to take the elevator."
"Well, if I'd known I'd be stuck in an elevator with you, trust me, I would've," Blue said, clenching her fits.
She turned from Ronan and pushed the emergency button. The boy came next to her, to be able to hear what was going on, too. At first, they didn't hear anything. And didn't hear anything. Until, suddenly, the white noise stopped. Ronan and Blue both reflexively straightened up—only to hear the start of some classical music you'd hear in the waiting room for the dentist. The boy, frustrated, punched the wall, which, of course, didn't change anything, except angering Blue more than she already was.
"Can't you call someone?" She asked him, rummaging through her groceries bag to find her own phone.
"Don't have my phone," he answered.
"Wait, I found mine," Blue exclaimed, brandishing her cell. "I just need to turn it on," she said, but something was wrong. She looked up at Ronan, wordlessly beckoning him to come and take a look at it. Her phone only served in emergency (or when Gansey needed to reach her and it couldn't wait). Blue didn't care much for cellphones, more than anything else they irritated her. Hers was probably something that they had stopped making ten years ago, and she'd never cared—until that moment, when she needed it, and of course it had to stop cooperating. Of course.
"Well, we're screwed," Ronan stated, sinking slowly so as to sit on the elevator floor.
"That we are," agreed Blue, joining him. Truth was, she didn't feel as angry towards Ronan as she had before that. Sure, she still resented him, but right then they were both stuck in an elevator with nothing to do about it but wait. "It's still your fault, though," she said, because honestly, you can't expect any less from her. Rummaging through the grocery bags, she added, "Want some chips?"
(They get out three hours later, elevator music still playing, because someone had apparently wanted to take the elevator, and contacted someone to fix it when they saw it didn't work. Blue and Ronan get out and take the stairs, refusing to spend one more minute in this elevator; only to realize they're both going to Gansey's, who's taking them somewhere, though none of them really understood where. Of course, they argue during the whole ride, but they both smile with the corner of their mouth when Gansey asks what happened to the snacks.)
So, what do you think? I wrote this in the middle of the night because I couldn't sleep, but I think it's okay? I don't know, I'll probably hate it in two days, but still. I'd love to know what you think of it! (Also, you /have/ to admit they're the best friendship)
I also posted this on AO3, under the same username, and I'm colcstewart on tumblr if you want to talk to me about it!