One - girl you caught my eye & now i can't stop looking
The first time Rosa Diaz laid eyes on Gina Linetti she thought what is up with that woman's face. Gina had makeup smeared all over her face and was pulling off an extreme duck pout. "Gina Linetti." She introduced herself. "Art made human."
Rosa should have known that it would be a long, slippery slope into infatuation.
A very long slope. Gina Linetti manages to reach before unknown levels of hilarity and annoyance in Rosa's eyes.
Rosa had known Gina for years. But she never really noticed her, not really, not until Captain Holt came to the precinct and made Gina his personal assistant. Rosa had been too busy before that. Too busy trying to become accustomed to the life of a police officer, too busy clawing her way up the totem pole in a mostly male environment.
She was also very busy trying to keep her private life private from the gossip mill that was the precinct. Particularly the gossip mill known as Jake Peralta.
It's surprisingly time consuming to move house and change habits every six months, but at this point Rosa has it down to a fine art. Maybe that's why she finally had time to notice that, yeah, Gina Linetti really is a work of art.
It's not that she hadn't noticed Gina at all before Holt. Because who couldn't? The girl was an exploding firework: beautiful, vibrant, and she drew the eyes of everyone around her. Gina Linetti was a proper little weirdo. You couldn't escape her.
She was constantly around. Gina was filming ridiculous Youtube videos in the break room when Rosa wanted five minutes to chill out. Gina was setting things on fire and barking orders at Hitchcock and Scully when Rosa was trying to take a nap at her desk. Gina was constantly making noise. It was infuriating. It made Rosa want to punch things.
But all those years and Rosa never really noticed Gina, never really saw past the glamour and the glitter and the terrible dance moves to see a glimpse of the real person beneath. Not until Rosa agreed to help Amy convince a bunch of at-risk (read: loser) kids to be "student snitches".
"Fiiiine." Gina sighs dramatically from over in the corner. The most notable thing about her eavesdropping their conversation is that she puts down her phone on the desk. Rosa, arms folded, turns around to look at her, eyebrows raised. "I guess I can help you with those at-risk kids."
"I don't need your help." Amy retorts. Damn, Rosa thinks as Gina's eyebrows shoot up and her posture somehow becomes sassier but yet she doesn't seem to move. This is gonna be good.
"It's nothing personal." Amy catches the look on Gina's face and instantly becomes flustered. "It's just that you're not a cop. So I'm not really sure how you could help."
Gina looks like she could happily blowtorch off Amy's hair. It's a sexy sort of look.
"M'kay." Gina picks at the skin beneath her nails. "No hard feelings. But I hate you. Not joking. Bye."
Rosa forgets about this little interaction until Amy's perfectly prepared speech about the value of police work and how everyone can contribute positively to society somehow ends up being taken over by a bunch of fifteen year olds chanting "BLACK PEOPLE CAN SELL DRUGS". They are, of course, led by none other than Gina Linetti.
Rosa has to admire her balls.
Or, you know, her more feminine parts. Not that Rosa is thinking about Gina's feminine assets. Or Gina at all, really. Her mind is totally fixed on taking the piss out of Amy. Yeah.
"I did not think getting these kids to sign up would be this hard." Amy admits to Rosa as they stand outside the conference room, staring in at the kids.
Rosa scoffs. It's obvious to her what the problem is. Amy is uptight, serious, and dresses like a sixty year old lawyer. She doesn't speak the language of the streets, of the wild child. Not like Rosa does.
"They don't identify with you because you aren't from the streets. I am." Rosa fixes her battle glare on her face. That glare has made countless grown men freeze up, prevented hundreds of awful, awkward social interactions on the streets, and famously once made a criminal run head first into a mailbox. He knocked himself out.
"Follow. Watch. Learn." Rosa marched back into the room.
Her theory is quickly blown right out of the water and nuked in orbit when Rosa's words end up being remixed right back at her. That takes her by surprise. There's even a surprisingly little tear pooling at the corner of her eye. She isn't used to being made fun of. It's made even more embarrassing by the sight of Gina bopping along to the terrible music.
So they have to suck it up and go crawling to Gina. Well, Rosa lets Amy do the crawling. And the begging. Rosa is sure this is a waste of time. Why would Gina help them when she could sit around blogging or playing Candy Crush or doing whatever else it is that she does all day?
Rosa would like to say that this is one of the few times that she was proven wrong. But it isn't. Being wrong over and over, doubting yourself, it's all part of being a detective.
But it is odd how that smirk seems to light a small fire inside her chest.
"Sure I'll help you out honeybun. Cops are the worst." Gina swans into the conference room like she owns it, speaker in hand. Rosa has no idea what she plans on saying.
That brief spark of attraction is promptly doused to ashes by Gina's terrible dance moves. To the sound of Christina Aguilera's Beautiful comes some sort of weird gymnastics routine, butterfly impressions, and moves that can only be of Gina's own creation. It's awful. All Rosa can do is stare.
It was the first time Rosa had really seen Gina Linetti. And now that she'd started, she couldn't seem to stop.
Thanks for reading! This is my first Brooklyn Nine Nine fic, hope you enjoy.
