A/N: My first Liv and Maddie fic! I hope you enjoy and thanks so much to Cassie & Carrie for reading ahead of time.
Disclaimer: I do not own Liv & Maddie. Also, I just want to make it known that I DID NOT get the Match O Meter idea from Saved by the Bell. If I did, I would own up to it. Secondly, I cannot take credit for the "WHAT IF I WANT TO BOND WITH YOU?" line. It's from one of the most epic YouTube videos ever titled "Princess Anna and Kristoff Are Breaking Up." If you get the chance you should watch it! Now on with the fic!
"Hey, hey, hey! What are you two doing?" Liv Rooney shouted as she ran down the stairs, brushing a strand of curly blonde hair out of her eyes. "Ruby and I are trying to practice and I can barely hear myself sing it loudeeer!"
Her little brother, Parker, sighed. Motioning to his science partner, he crossed his arms over his chest in defiance. "Arguing over our science project, that's what."
"We are not arguing," Val counteracted, her smug smile turning into a genuine one as she looked toward Liv. "We're merely having a disagreement."
"About what?" Liv asked.
"Who to test our latest invention on."
"Yeah, and it only took us two whole days to decide what we were going to do," Parker snapped, shooting her a tiny glare.
Val shook her head in disbelief. "I suggested not working on our projects together and letting you do whatever you wanted while I decided to invent my own cosmetics applicator, but nooo! You insisted that we work together."
"WHAT IF I WANT TO BOND WITH YOU?" he yelled, throwing his hands up in the air. "I didn't even know you wear makeup!"
"I do sometimes. Besides, who said it was for me? It's an invention. That means other girls' besides me can use it."
"You don't need makeup, anyway," he argued. "You're naturally beaut... I mean, pret... I mean... never mind."
"Huh?"
"Nothing."
"Well, if we don't agree on who to test this thing on in the next five minutes, I'm going to do my own project."
Liv lifted her left eyebrow, the room entirely silent for a moment as she debated on whether or not she should even ask. "Um...what is it we're testing, exactly?"
Parker held up a metal device with two circles at each end connected by a simple chain. "It's called the Match O Meter. You attach it to the wrists of two people, turn on a switch, and through an analysis of each person's DNA, it can tell you how romantically compatible you are. We've already tried it out on Mom and Dad and Maddie and Diggie. The results said they're perfect for each other. When we tested it on Maddie and Josh, it showed that they're better off as friends. These results may not be very surprising, but we'd like to have one more couple, just to be sure the analysis is accurate."
Liv nodded in understanding, deep in thought as she placed her fingers on her chin. Parker and Val jumped slightly in alarm as she let out a sudden gasp of excitement. "What about Joey and Willow?"
They shook their heads simultaneously. "We tried, but they wouldn't go through with it," Val informed her in an exasperated tone.
"I think they were afraid of what it was going to read." Parker continued.
The instant sound of the doorbell caused Liv's heartbeat to skip a pace, but it wasn't due the chime being unexpected; she knew who was at the door. Before, she had been ecstatic about the arrival, but now her stomach was in knots. All she could do was stand frozen in place.
"Coming!" Parker cried out, heading for the door.
Liv held out her arm, holding him back. "It's okay," she muttered. "I've got it." She ran her fingers through her hair, letting it cascade delicately over her shoulders, opening the door with her brightest smile.
An equally eager smile was waiting on the other side. "Liv!"
"Holden!" she screeched, motioning for him to come in. "It's so good to see you!"
Parker's jaw went slack upon seeing Holden Dippeldorf standing in the foyer. His eyes widened as he managed to close his mouth, holding out an accusatory finger. "YOU! What are you doing here?"
Holden gave him a small shrug. "I haven't seen you guys since you moved out here. It's been a few months now, so I thought to myself, 'Why not book a nice flight to California?'
Parker turned to Liv. "You knew he was coming?"
She merely nodded.
"AND YOU DIDN'T SAY ANYTHING?"
Holden creased his forehead in mock confusion. "If this is a problem, I can book a flight back to Wisconsin. A two-thousand mile trip and four hundred dollar ticket is nothing."
"No, no problem. As a matter of fact, there's a solution!" he proclaimed, holding up his index finger. "I'm a little upset because my wonderful sister failed to inform me that you'd be flying in since you two will be the perfect last pair of guinea pigs for our science project, that's all. So what do you say? Would you like to try it out? Huh? Huh? Huh?"
Liv put a defensive hand in front of his face. "First of all, you can't blame me for failing to mention being a couple for your silly little project when I found out about it, like, three minutes ago. Second of all, please chill."
Parker flicked the switch on the Match O Meter, causing the contraption to flash vibrantly. "It sparkles."
She let out shrill squeal. "MY NEW NAME IS GUINEA! Holden, do you want to?"
"What does it do?"
"It will tell you how compatible you and Liv are," Parker explained.
Liv bit her bottom lip as she watched Holden's caramel cheeks turn a light shade of crimson. "I mean, sure. Yeah. If you want to, Liv."
Talk about awkward, she thought, trying to ignore the uncomfortable expression on Holden's face. Her heart sank to her stomach thinking of the good times she and Holden had shared and the hurdles they had jumped in order to be a couple. We had such a good thing going. I had to go and mess it all up.
In that particular moment it occurred to Liv that she wasn't sure what made her sadder: the memories flooding through her mind or the fact that some dumb machine supposedly had the ability to determine the destiny of her relationship with her ex-boyfriend. What if they really weren't compatible? She knew she still had major feelings for the dreamy Dippeldorf, but she wasn't sure if he felt the same way anymore. He was the one who had broken up with her, after all. If he didn't feel the same way and the Match O Meter picked up on it, it might affect the outcome of the result. Liv wasn't sure she could handle knowing they weren't meant to be, even if it were some ridiculous machine doing the telling rather than her heart.
Holden flashed Liv a small smile as Parker clamped the circles around their wrists and pressed the result button. The machine made a whirring noise and beeped loudly while a single green light flashed vibrantly and accelerated through the results. Liv started to ask if the meter were broken until she realized the beeps and light were both getting slower.
The light stopped. The results were in: True Love.
Liv's heart pounded as she attempted to read Holden's expression, but it was difficult to decipher.
Parker looked at Holden with a sly grin, breaking the uncomfortable silence. "Look what we have here! According to these calculations, it looks like you two love birds made quite the mistake when you broke up."
"Yeah, well, I'm not the one who wanted to break up," Liv muttered under her breath.
A pained expression crossed Holden's face. "Everything in your life seemed to be more important than us at the time. Did you want me to lie and pretend like everything was okay when it wasn't? That I wasn't hurting?"
"You hurt me when you broke up with me!"
"And I'm sorry about that, but it was what I had to do. It wasn't any easier for me, believe me. You, of all people, should know that."
Liv let out a defeated sigh. She did know. She knew the breakup hadn't been any easier for him. She knew that it had taken courage for him to try and keep a friendship going amongst the awkwardness after the fact. She knew that he still cared about her, even if it were only as a friend, considering that he had kept in touch and come all the way out to California to visit her. The problem was that she didn't know what he was feeling right now.
"I'm sorry," she finally whispered with a shrug of her shoulders.
His expression turned puzzled. "For what?"
"For not putting up more of a fight for you and making you think that you weren't important to me. Because you were. You still are."
"You're important to me, too. You always have been. That's why I let you go: so you could focus on yourself. I was hoping in the process you'd realize how much I meant to you."
Liv's eyes started filling up with tears of frustration. "Holden, I'm doing my best to tell you how I feel. I don't know what else you want me to say."
"A simple 'I've missed you' would be enough."
"Holden?" she commented, her voice shaky.
"Yeah?"
"I've missed you."
Holden beamed, but Liv felt like a blubbering idiot as he held out his arms to wrap her in a hug, caressing her back soothingly. "I've missed you, too," he murmured once her sobs had died down.
"I thought you would be okay with me denying our relationship as long as it was for Maddie, but I shouldn't have done it. I took you and your feelings for granted and I'm so sorry," she sniffed.
Holden flashed her a crooked grin that made her knees go weak as he gently wiped the last tear from her eye. "That means a lot to me. It's all I've ever wanted to hear, to be honest."
Silence filled the room as he leaned in, his face getting closer to Liv's with each passing second, their lips merely centimeters apart...
"Ahem." Val cleared her throat, reminding the two of them that she and Parker were still present. The pair broke apart quickly.
"Yowza!" Parker exclaimed, rushing over to the coffee table to grab his notebook and pen, scribbling furiously. "This machine works even better than I thought!"
Liv peered up at Holden, the hope evident in her eyes. "Does it? Is it true love?"
"Well, let's see... I waited for months in order to have a chance to be with you, tried to stick it out when I was put on the back burner even though I hated I and broke up with you because I couldn't handle it. Then I realized it was even harder to handle not having you as a friend, so I came groveling back on your front porch. Now here I am in California to see you. I'd say it's true something."
Liv wrapped him in a hug, taking in the scent of the cologne that she hadn't realized she'd missed until that moment. "Good, because I do love you. I love you so much and I'm never letting you go again."
Parker crinkled his nose in distaste. "Yeah, yeah. Enough is enough. You two get out of here and go enjoy each others company or whatever it is that people who are in love do," he commented, putting air quotes around 'in love' and easing them toward the door. "You've done your job. The machine works fine."
Liv turned around, a mischievous smile playing across her lips. "You sure about that? Seems to me there's one more couple you could test it on."
Parker and Val shot each other bewildered looks. "Who?"
Liv darted her index finger back and forth between the two of them. Their eyes widened.
"Nuh-uh," Parker declared. "No way. We don't need to. The machine has been tested plenty, thanks."
"Okay," Liv said in sing-song, putting on her jacket, "but remember, one way or another, you'll find out who you're compatible with and it is someone. It's not up to the Match O Meter. It's up to fate."
The happy couple smiled and waved goodbye to the two scientists, gently closing the door behind them.
"Pft, what does she know?" Parker scoffed. "It's a machine."
"Yeah," Val agreed, letting out a forced laugh. "They're ridiculous." The room settled into a several second quiet as the brunette girl pondered his statement. "Wait, you're not scared, are you?"
"No. Why? Are you?"
"No."
"Cool," he replied, rubbing the back of his neck in apprehension.
"Then why don't we try it out?"
Parker swallowed hard to clear the lump in his throat. On the one hand, he was curious as to what the results would be. On the other, he was terrified. Of course, he wasn't going to let Val know that. "Fine."
He connected the machine to their wrists and let it whirr. Incompatible. Better Off Friends. True Love. Soulmates. BEEP. BEEP. BEEP. Finally, the tone slowed down and the green light came to a halt: Meant to Be.
Parker licked his lips as Val's cheeks burned a bright pink.
Great. Just great. Now I guess we have to talk about our feelings. Well, guess what? I don't have any feelings.
Yes, you do.
No, I don't.
Yes, you do.
No, I don't.
YES, YOU DO.
Okay, fine. Maybe I do. But I refuse to talk about it. REFUSE! HOW ABOUT THAT?
"So..." Val stated slowly, breaking up the internal fight that was currently being held in his head, "I guess in order to determine if the machine works we need to talk about how we feel about the results."
"That... that would be the proper way to go about it scientifically, yes." Parker said with a grin, avoiding looking into Val's aquamarine eyes while holding up his index finger. "However, I think in this particular case our data doesn't necessarily depend on it."
"But what if I want to talk about it?" Val questioned, her tone determined.
"Oh, for Lovey Dovey Lizard, do we have to?!"
Val's tone dropped several octaves and she looked down at the ground. "No. I'm sorry I asked."
Parker's stomach knotted with guilt. He closed his eyes, thinking carefully about what he was going to say next. "Sorry. I shouldn't have snapped. I'm just... not exactly good about talking about my feelings. And maybe I lied a little. Maybe I'm a little scared."
"Why?"
He shrugged. "I don't know." Strike two for the liar.
"I'm scared, too," she whispered.
Parker turned his head abruptly, peering at her in concern. This was news to him. "Why?" She was silent for so long that he began to wonder if she'd even heard him. "Val?"
"Because I like you, okay?! There. I said it."
Parker's face lit up. "You do?"
She gave him a timid nod. "I've wanted to tell you since the dance but I was afraid you wouldn't feel the same way."
"I was afraid you wouldn't," he stated with a broad grin, forcing his gaze to meet hers. "I like you, too. A lot. Wow. The machine really does work."
Val giggled. "Well, it's like I've already said, I think we make a pretty good team. So I guess this makes us boyfriend and girlfriend?"
"Do you want to be?" Now he was nervous again. Why did she feel the need to ask?
She shrugged, a playful expression crossing her face. "I think you should know what you're getting into. It's a lot of work," she warned. "You'll have to buy me Christmas presents. We have to kiss at midnight on New Years Eve, no exceptions, unless maybe you're sick or something. Then there's Valentines Day and my birthday. Oh, and I expect a goodnight text before bed every single night."
He leaned in, connecting his lips to her cheek, causing both to turn an even darker shade of pink. Taking her hand in his, he gently intertwined their fingers together as she peered into his deep brown eyes. "Challenge accepted."
I hope you enjoyed this as much as I enjoyed writing it! Reviews and favorites of any kind are always appreciated if you did or even if you didn't. -Krys