A/N: Surprise! I'm not dead. No, just got some major writer's block, then a sinus infection that was... Well, just don't get a sinus infection during the flu season... or think you're too badass to need a flu shot. It's not good times. Anyway, here's a thing that I hope you all enjoy. Imma try to get back into writing now, so... Yeah. Gonna get to work on How Quaint's next chapter before you all decide to murder me.
SMACK
"Gah!" Timmy Turner sat bolt-upright in his bed, having just been awoken by a harsh slap across his right cheek. The action of sitting up so suddenly had sent his comforter off of him, exposing his bare chest to the cold air in his room. The eighteen year-old was not what one would call muscular, though he wasn't skin and bones, either. No, the still noticeably buck-toothed teenager was somewhere in the middle. Lean, but toned, to some extent, anyway.
He cautiously glanced around his room, searching for his assailant. His dresser, computer desk, bedside table(and the fishbowl it held) all seemed to be in their proper places, and there was enough moonlight streaming in from the windows to illuminate his room, further emphasizing that all was well.
"So who hit me-Ah!" Timmy brought his hand up to his cheek to inspect it, but reflexively pulled away as his fingers grazed the tender area. From what he could tell by how it felt, he likely had a bright red hand print on his cheek, one that burned a little, and stung a whole lot more.
"Hanh..." A sound; a content one somewhere between a moan and a sigh, alerted the brunet to the fact that he wasn't alone after all, there was another person in his bed; a girl to his left, bearing fiery red hair and distinctly pale skin for someone who spent as much time sunning herself as she did. Now, normally just the fact that Timmy was sharing his bed with the bane of his existence would set off some red flags, but there was a certain something about the twenty-four year old that would catch anyone's attention... And likely cause a fair bit of confusion.
This being the fact that she was currently naked as the day she was born, though her body was only visible from the waist up, the rest being hidden underneath the comforter she and Timmy were sharing.
For several seconds, Timmy simply stared at the girl, taking in every detail of her naked body as it almost seemed to glow in the moonlight. Her right arm; mostly out of sight, was pinned up to the elbow beneath the pillow that her head rested on. While her left arm was outstretched in his direction, with the hand attached to it resting on the pillow that had once held the teen's head. Upon her shoulders could be found a barely-there dusting of freckles, gained from her time in the sun, and the closest thing she seemed to be able to manage for a tan. Her back; like the rest of her, was pale and smooth, absolutely free of any blemish or imperfection. And the comforter that delicately laid upon her body stopped just below her waist, showing off the barest hint of her rear-end. Much to the teen's annoyance, her breasts were out of sight, due to her current position of laying on her stomach.
Lightly shaking his head to rouse himself from the mild trance he was in, Timmy blinked once, twice, then a third time, still not quite ready to believe what he was seeing. "Is she...?" Hesitantly, the teen reached out with his left hand, following it with his body as he turned and pivoted toward the red-head. After several agonizingly slow moments, his hand connected with the girl's cool skin, lightly sliding back and forth across it with merely his fingertips, before flattening his palm against her back and mimicking the action performed by his fingers. "Yep, she is." "V-Vicki?" Timmy rubbed his hand back and forth against the small of her back, eliciting a low moan, but nothing else. "Right, always were a heavy sleeper..."
The teen dropped onto his left elbow and pulled his hand away from his babysitter, opting to instead use it to support the weight of his head. The act of leaning over toward her had been enough to make his comforter slide off his own body, revealing that he too was quite naked.
As Timmy pulled the comforter up to his waist to cover himself once more, his mind awoke fully, at last catching up with the situation he found himself in as it shook off the last few shreds of a once comfortable sleep. "Nice to not wake up alone, for once." The brunet smirked as he moved his bedmate's arm and laid himself back down next to her, his head coming to rest on the pillow next to the one that Vicki's was on.
As unusual as it may seem for the brunet to be in bed with the girl that had been his nemesis for so long, the fact of the matter was that this situation... Was not unusual. Not in the slightest. The red-head had been in the same position innumerable times before this one; the very first having taken place at about the midway point of Timmy's fourteenth year. That day had started like any other, and progressed like any other... Until the teen had reached his front lawn, at which point he was set upon by everyone's favorite gray mutant, Francis, who had apparently followed him home, not unlike a lost puppy. Though lost puppies generally didn't beat the living Hell out of the person they followed home... Or try to, anyway.
Unfortunately for Francis, the older, grayer teen was only able to rail off a single, teeth-clattering punch before he was set upon by a far more dangerous kind of bully...
And Vicki didn't take kindly to someone moving in on what she considered to be her 'territory'. Long story short, by the time the twenty year old was done with the bully, he was far more black and blue than gray, and to no one's surprise, the red-head with striking pink eyes was none the worse for wear, more than could be said for the boy whose care was her responsibility.
Though much to Timmy's relief, the worst Francis had done was give him a black eye. Far less than he would have received, were it not for his babysitter's speedy intervention.
After she'd asked him if he was okay, Vicki had insisted on bringing him into the house and giving his eye a quick once-over, just to ensure that he didn't need to go to the hospital. He had to admit, it was odd for her to be so concerned about his welfare, but he assumed it was simply because him getting really hurt might put a damper on her getting paid. Yes, it was definitely odd... But strangely pleasant.
That had not been the end of her strange behavior, either. Once she'd made sure his eye was clean and at no risk of infection(could a black eye even get infected?), Vicki requested-yes, that's right, not a demand, but a request-that he stay downstairs in the living room with her, even inviting him to sit next to her on the couch.
And as wary as the teen was to sit next to this girl who he'd always assumed was irredeemably evil, he was far too tired from school and getting his eye punched in to argue with the red-head. Again, her behavior was most certainly odd, but Timmy figured at the time that if Vicki had gone through the trouble of cleaning his eye and making sure he wasn't hurt... Then she probably wasn't going to hurt him herself... Not physically, anyway.
The next several hours after that were little more than a collective blur of TV shows and bad movies in the teen's memories, but he did know that he must've fallen asleep at some point, because he woke up to find that the sun had set, the TV was still on, and himself lying on the couch, gently embraced in Vicki's arms, his babysitter apparently having fallen asleep as well, if her closed eyes and the soft, steady breathing coming from her slightly parted lips was anything to go by.
Under more normal circumstances, Timmy would've quietly slipped out of her grasp, tiptoed up to his room, and kissed the floor of his bedroom while whispering a thousand praises to whatever god was listening, thanking them profusely at his still being alive.
However; the teen instead found himself in... What his mind could only fathom as some sort of trance, as he merely stared at the girl laying next to him. While he'd had the presence of mind when he first awoke to look over his shoulder at the still-on TV, as soon as he turned in the direction his body was facing, his eyes fell upon Vicki, and he couldn't look away.
For the first time in his fourteen years on Earth, he looked at the girl-like really looked at her-and realized that, when she wasn't thinking about some horrible way to torture him, or yelling at him, or just plain being her normally oh so unpleasant self... She was really quite pretty. Her face was entirely free of any sort of blemish, her skin was creamy white, with just a light dusting of freckles sprinkled across her upper cheeks and nose, and her pink lips looked soft and delicate... For the first time, Timmy saw the girl as... Well, a girl.
And then he did something stupid. Why he did it, he still wasn't sure, even with four long years to think on it, but there was just... Something about how serene and peaceful Vicki looked as she slept that drew him in, both figuratively and very much literally, as he closed his eyes and unconsciously leaned forward to lightly press his lips to hers. To his surprise, the red-head's lips felt even softer than they looked, and had a faint, sweet taste to them.
His intention had been... Well, he wasn't really sure. But he certainly hadn't planned on letting the kiss go on for as long as it did, as when he opened his blue eyes again, he found pink staring back, almost seeming to glow from the television's reflection in them.
Were he not being held by her, Timmy would've chosen that moment to leap backward with all his might and sprint upstairs to his room, likely leaving a trail of fire in his wake as he shut the door behind him in a last ditch effort to postpone his almost certain demise.
Yet; again, the brunet was surprised by his babysitter's reaction. He'd never been very good at reading people, or their facial expressions(barring the obvious ones like happiness, anger, or sadness), but Vicki's eyes seemed to darken in consideration for a split second, followed by her mouth opening, obviously intending to say something, yet all that came out was a small groan before she closed it again.
At the time, he was suitably shocked. How often could it be said that the evil babysitter known as Victoria Valentine had been struck speechless? Nevermind that it had been him, the 'Twerp' who caused it?
And if the saying 'actions speak louder than words' had any merit... Then things became very loud very quickly after that, as Vicki returned the kiss with a rough and hungry one of her own. Thinking back... He probably should've responded with shock, or surprise... Maybe even disgust!
But instead, the brunet-haired teen simply followed her lead... First with kissing and touching... Then up to his room, wherein both of their clothes were quick to be stripped off and tossed to the floor. What happened next... Really didn't need to be spelled out. To this day, Timmy still didn't know what exactly it was that had provoked Vicki into offering him something like... That; whether it was simply the kiss, the both of them needing some kind of release, or some unknown tension boiling over at last, but, while it was his first sexual experience(both with Vicki and in general), it would not be the last, as evidenced by his current situation.
Vicki shifted in her sleep a little, releasing another content-sounding sigh that blew some of her messy hair out of her face, though a significant portion was still obscured by her fiery locks.
Timmy, still smirking in appreciation of the beauty sleeping next to him, reached up and brushed the excess hair away from her face, tucking it behind her left ear. Content as the two appeared, this thing they were in... Some might call it a 'relationship', could best be described as... Difficult.
The difficulty arose because... Well, the teen simply cared about the girl too much. The night after their first... 'Encounter', Vicki had made sure to clearly spell out the rules of what they were doing. No talking about it as long as he was a minor, even after he hit eighteen she still wasn't keen on talking about it, and they weren't, no matter how much he wished it, dating. In short, the red-head insisted that the relationship was a purely sexual one. They both wanted to screw, so why not screw each other?
Which was fine with Timmy... At first. But as anyone who's ever been in a relationship based solely on sex knows, something had to give eventually. That 'something' ended up being a someone, namely the brunet. At some point, 'just sex' became far more, though he wasn't sure when. The teen began finding clever ways to get his parents to go on more vacations, honeymoons, and the like. And because they thought he still needed a babysitter, they were quick to call the red-head over to keep an eye on their 'little angel'.
"If they only knew..." With her hair now out of her face, Timmy took the opportunity to give Vicki's cheek a gentle caress, one her subconscious mind caused her to ever so slightly lean into.
Unfortunately, his best attempts to spark something akin to a more normal relationship with Vicki were usually met with defiance. While it was true that she was far less abrasive towards him than she'd been in the past, she still remained fairly cold most of the time, answering questions with the bare minimum amount of words, never wanting to hang out(outside of his house, anyway), and she rarely ate at the same time that he did. To Timmy, it almost seemed like she was purposefully being distant for both of their sakes. She didn't want him to get too close and start to really like her, and more than likely didn't want the reverse to happen either.
"Little late for that..." The brunet rolled over onto his back and stared at the ceiling, then released a huff of air through his nose as he clasped his hands together and laid them on his chest.
While he had trouble figuring out how she could be so dead-set on not entering into real relationship status with him, Timmy also found it odd how she could almost just... Flip a switch with her mood. She'd act cold and uncaring for most of the time they were together, but as soon as the topic of sex was brought up; be it a question that was outright asked, or just a gentle caress on her upper thigh, her icy and indifferent mood would become a hot, nearly feverish passion, further indicating to the teen that the red-head was being distant on purpose, and sex allowed her to release everything she was keeping pent up.
Timmy threw his right arm over his eyes wearily. "Agh... Not like I can say anything. She's just gonna avoid the issue if I do... Maybe even avoid me!" Subtle movement to his left drew the teen's gaze to the girl sleeping next to him, now clearly beginning to wake up.
"Urgh... What-" Vicki pushed herself up tiredly with both arms and slowly glanced around the room, making her hair fall back into her face. "Who're you... Talking to?"
"I stand corrected about the heavy sleeper part." "Eheh... Sorry, must've been thinking out loud." Though her pink eyes were almost entirely obscured by her messy and disheveled red hair, Timmy could still feel them staring back at him. "I'll try to be a little more quiet, go back to sleep, alright?"
Vicki considered the teen's words for a few seconds before dropping back down onto the bed with a muffled thump. "Just keep it down, Twerp." The red-head let out a small, cute-sounding yawn as she closed her eyes... Then cracked just her right one open again. "Time is it?"
"Um..." Timmy turned over a little and reached for his phone on the end table next to his bed, the one that held the fishbowl. "Just about twelve forty-five. Plenty of time to sleep-"
"I gotta get up." Vicki interrupted in a much more awake-sounding tone as she began to climb out of bed, intending to take the comforter with her to cover herself.
"Oh yeah?" Timmy turned over onto his side, once again using his left elbow to support his weight as he faced his babysitter, whose bare back was now to him as she sat on the edge of the bed. "And just where is it that you have to be at a quarter to one in the morning?"
"Does it matter?" Vicki spoke in an evasive tone as she pulled the comforter she and the teen shared up a little. "It's always cold in here..." "I'm pretty much always gone before you wake up-"
"I know. You're always gone before I wake up. So now I want to know why. Why are you always in such a hurry to disappear on me?" Though he knew she couldn't see it, Timmy bore a look of hurt on his face. Four years they'd been doing this, and not once did she stay the night. Oh sure, she stayed in his house, and he'd usually find her sleeping on the couch by the time morning came, but she never stayed in bed with him. He drummed the fingers of his right hand on the mattress, awaiting the response he assumed she'd try to avoid giving.
"I don't... Disappear. I'm just going downstairs to sleep on the couch..." The red-head's tone continued to be evasive as she shivered, goosebumps breaking out on her skin from Timmy's room's low temperature. Likely brought on by the fact that he kept at least one window open, even in winter.
"But you're already here. So why not stay?" Timmy slid forward, just enough to reach out and graze his fingertips against the small protrusions of her backbone.
"Don't. Timmy... We're both fine right now, we hang out, we make out, and we screw. That should be enough for both of us..." Vicki turned her head and looked over her shoulder, barely catching sight of the brunet's icy blue eyes staring back at her.
"Well... It isn't." Timmy looped his arm around Vicki's midsection, eliciting a flinch from the girl before she relaxed in his slight embrace.
However; the flinch was enough to make her refocus her attention on the teen's bedroom door, mere feet away... Yet she knew it was hard to resist Timmy's offers. She honestly would love to agree with him, settle back into bed with him, let the boy affectionately nuzzle his cheek against hers... But she couldn't. She was the older party here, the instigator of the... It wasn't a relationship, more... An agreement. She started it, so she had to maintain a certain measure of control over it. Vicki scoffed and shook her head as her gaze dropped to her lap. "It never is... Did you forget what I told you, Timmy?" "Timmy? He's the TWERP. Not... You aren't supposed to-"
"I didn't forget. I remember. We aren't dating, we're just..." Timmy sighed as his grip on her tightened unconsciously. "Messing around."
"Actually, I said we were fuck-"
"I know what you said." The teen interrupted in an annoyed tone. "But we've been doing this for four years, Vicki. I'm eighteen now, so there's no danger of-"
"There's always the danger of me getting in trouble. How would it look to your friends if you suddenly told them you were dating me? Your evil babysitter? Either Blondie or that hairless wonder you call a friend would go straight to the police and report me, say that I got my claws in you while you were young, forced you to do whatever I wanted, raped you-"
"Shut up." Timmy whispered out harshly as he pushed himself up off the bed, wrapping his other arm around her, giving her a back-hug as he pressed his forehead into her hair, against the back of her head. "You're just making up stupid excuses now, and I know it. You and I both know that I wanted this just as much as you did..."
"But... Now you want more. How can you? You know me, what I've done, how I can be sometimes... And you know I might do it again... I know I'll do it again..." "Please, just let me go. We're fine now. Fine keeping things the way they are... I don't want-" Vicki shook again, but not from the cold. This time, her shiver was brought on by the situation itself. Timmy was far too determined, even at ten years old, to just give up on anything, let alone a person he was close to.
And she'd become such a constant in his life, even more so with what they did behind closed doors... She was cornered. Trapped in a most unusual web, one born of affection and sex and... And just needing an outlet for everything. She hated how little her attempts to be distant mattered. Her best efforts to keep the teen from getting close seemed to have the opposite effect.
"So... What if Blondie or... Or Baldy... What if they don't understand, want to lie and tell people-"
"I'll make them understand." Timmy gently tugged with both arms, guiding his babysitter back onto the bed, and away from its edge. "And we both know it won't matter to my parents..." "Not so sure how Cosmo and Wanda will feel..." He blinked the thought of his godparents to the back of his mind, opting to focus on the here and now as he placed a feather-light kiss on his bed mate's right shoulder.
With a frown, Vicki ceased her resistance, allowing Timmy to pull her back onto the bed as she laid back down next to him. "Damnit, Timmy. You know I shouldn't-" The red-head's train of thought was interrupted by more movement from her right as Timmy pulled the comforter up over the both of them, tightly wrapping it around them. "...You're making it really hard for me to leave..."
"That's kind of the idea, Vicki." The brunet responded in a matter-of-fact tone as he looped his right arm back around the girl's waist.
She sighed again as she at last allowed herself to relax a little. "I don't get you. You've got this pretty girl who's willing to make out with you and let you screw her brains out pretty much whenever you ask, with none of that relationshippy bullshit to get in the way... And you have to be the one guy who wants emotional baggage. You realize how ass-backwards that is, right?" Vicki turned her head toward Timmy, intending to glare at him, but faltered and simply rolled her eyes when she was met with a dumb grin, big buck-teeth and all. "Why though? We're fine. Why potentially ruin a good thing?" She grimaced as her voice cracked, very nearly making her question come out in a whining tone.
"That's just it, though. We're fine." Timmy mimicked the tone she used for the word that he was quickly beginning to find distasteful. "Being fine is just... Fine. Maybe you're right-" The brunet laid his head next to Vicki's, his chin coming to rest on her shoulder. "Things are gonna change, maybe even get worse."
"I feel so reassured." Vicki deadpanned at the teen.
"Hey, I'm not done." Timmy pressed his lips to her shoulder again, smirking as a light pink blush bloomed across Vicki's cheeks. "But things could get even better too. Maybe you should stop worrying about all the things that could go wrong, and try to focus on what could go right? Vicki, I know we're fine-"
"But the next step up from fine is serious!" Her somewhat raised voice echoed through the teen's room, aided by the few items of furniture within. She tried to pull away, put some distance between herself and Timmy, get even a few feet away so she could have a measure of control over the situation...
But she couldn't. Not simply because the brunet was holding her, nor because they were both wrapped up in a large comforter. No, the real reason was... She just didn't want to. The part of her that wanted to keep things simple; keep them 'fine', was losing out against... Her feelings. The ones she had for the boy whom she was sharing a bed with. Those annoying little things she thought were buried deep, locked away to remain unknown.
"You want to tell me, that after four years of... Of this, just screwing around... What?" The red-head felt wetness at the corners of her eyes and cursed the fact that her arms were bound somewhat tightly at her sides, thanks again to the comforter.
"That I want you to stay." Timmy shifted a bit, loosening the grip of the warm blanket on both of them as he pushed himself up over Vicki, an arm to support his body on either side of the girl. "I know that... Us becoming serious... I know it's kinda scary, but... I can't do anything if you don't tell me what you're so afraid of." He dropped down onto his elbows, then gently laid himself down on Vicki, being careful since, though he knew he wasn't all that heavy to begin with, it didn't feel right to just... Drop down on her and lie on top of her.
"Afraid? Since when was I afraid? What on Earth could be so scary that it'd terrify me? The 'most evil babysitter in Dimmsdale'?" Again, Vicki's gaze drifted over to Timmy's bedroom door, still shut, and seemingly a million miles away; a goal she could no longer reach. "How- How do I know you're serious? Not just... Just telling me what I want to hear?" Her eyes focused on his again. "You can say all this sweet crap, but do you actually mean it?"
At this, Timmy grinned once more, then leaned in and lightly butted his forehead against Vicki's, before gently nuzzling it back and forth. "Haven't I always been genuine with you?"
At this, Vicki felt her cheeks heat up, coloring her face a wonderful shade of scarlet, and making her close her eyes in a poor attempt to not have to acknowledge it. "I don't know if I should be more surprised at how much of a sappy romantic you are, or the fact that your sappy romance-talk is actually working..."
The brunet chuckled at his small victory. "So... Can I ask you something?"
"I have a choice?" The red-head peeked her left eye open, a sparkle of playful intent visible in it.
"Not really."
"Ask..." She sighed out in a mockingly weary manner. Yes, she'd had her concerns about Timmy, if she meant as much to him as he seemed to indicate, if he truly did like her, whether he'd grow tired of her after a time and move on to someone... More like him... But he was right in what he'd said. Not once had he been cruel, mean, or malicious to her in any way. He was always truthful with her, and almost made it a point not to lie, even when lying was easier...
"What would it take... To get you to stay? For tonight, and... As long as we want?"
"So I do have a choice!" Vicki's right eye shot open, joining her left in a mischievous and gleeful look.
"Long as you know that leaving may very well break my heart, forever wounding me, and possibly preventing me from ever having a meaningful relationship with someone." Timmy remarked rather nonchalantly.
"...That's a Hell of a clause." Vicki deadpanned. "Uhm... Oh! How 'bout this?" An evil grin danced across her lips, but quickly disappeared, making Timmy wonder if it was ever there in the first place. "Tell me... I'm pretty!"
"...You-You're serious?" The teen looked at the girl pinned beneath him quizzically. "That's it? Out of all the things you could make me say, you want me to tell you you're pretty? ...You already know you're gorgeous, why have me-"
"Ah! Good point." The red-head interrupted, a thoughtful look coming over her features once more. "Mmm... Then how about..." Vicki felt that familiar tingling warmth on her cheeks return. "Tell me you... You love me."
"Wha-" An audible gulp; almost as if he'd choked, escaped Timmy's now agape mouth. "Kn-Knowing you won't-"
"All I can say- Is... I think... I love you." She averted her eyes once more, this time to the right, not at the door, but simply away from Timmy. "If... If you say that... Then I'll stay, I promise."
It was Timmy's turn to blush as he stared at Vicki, the girl that he once knew as simply his 'babysitter'. It was true that she certainly meant... A great deal to him, and he absolutely adored being around her, and the time he spent with her...
But love? Did he love her? Was he even old enough to grasp such an abstract concept as love? ...Was she? She said she thought she loved him... And... Maybe he thought he loved her too. The thought of just being with the red-head; not even the sex, or making out, just being around her, enjoying the company she provided... Was just that enough? Well... Maybe not for everyone, but it felt like enough to him...
"Eheh... That's... A Hell of a clause..." The teen nervously mirrored the older girl's words.
"'Suppose we ought to know a thing or two about them, considering what we've been through over the years..." Feeling her own nervousness beginning to creep up on her, Vicki somehow managed to look Timmy in his eyes again.
"Yeah... Um... I don't... I mean, I can't really say for certain, either... But..." The brunet leaned down, pressing a kiss to Vicki's lips, and lingering for a few moments, before pulling away. "I... Think I love you too."