Summer for Bonnie usually meant six weeks of free research time. Bubba would always accompany her, and they'd get ahead on the next school year's syllabus, as well as conducting their own personal study sessions on whatever they liked. Because they were the two best students in the school, and their headmistress knew that, they were often allowed to use the science department's facilities over summer to conduct their own experiments.
Despite being one of the best students at her current school and being fairly certain that Marceline's dad would probably allow it – Marceline herself had told Bonnie he liked her – she no longer had that option. She also no longer had Bubba to accompany her. Instead of her standard six weeks of free research, she now had three months to work with, but no facilities and no best friend to join in on the fun.
She supposed she could call Lady, see if her friends were doing anything to kick off the summer. She bet that they were probably at the mall, or maybe the beach. The beach would be okay, because she could take a book and there'd be no pressure to do anything other than sunbathe. She definitely didn't want to end up at the mall, though. Browsing was her least favourite activity, and she hated mindlessly dragging through shops while Elle loudly announced the latest piece of gossip. No, staying home was the best way to go.
Instead of working on her scientific subjects like she usually would, considering she favoured them, Bonnie decided that mathematics would have to do. Mathematics was ingrained in science anyway, so technically she was doing her favourite thing. She dug out an old textbook she'd purchased a year ago, a university maths book, and flipped to a random chapter. The fates decided that today she'd be working on differential equations. She had a folder of notes on those already, so she pulled them out and decided to go over them.
She got to work, doing a few of the exercises for fun, but found her heart wasn't really in it. It wasn't the same, without Bubba to make it just that little bit more exciting. She considered calling him, seeing what he was working on, if he'd managed to charm the staff at the Sixth Form into letting him use the facilities over summer. She didn't doubt it. Bubba was very charming, and if she hadn't been gay all along, she thought she would've been interested in him. Perhaps he still was a soulmate of some sort, just not in a romantic way.
Thoughts of romance made a certain black-haired beauty pop into her mind. No, Bonnie, focus on equations, she chastised herself. It wasn't good for her to maintain whatever fantasy she had in her mind. Especially now that Marceline knew so much. She probably wouldn't want someone with that kind of emotional baggage, anyway.
Rather unceremoniously, Bonnie pushed that train of thought straight off the tracks. No time to be thinking about all of that. Equations were the thing to be thinking about. She wondered if she should put some calming background music on. Nothing with lyrics, but just an instrumental could help. Music was supposed to help people concentrate, right? Music was good. Music was Marceline. Marceline.
"Oh my god, shut up, brain," Bonnie said, exasperated, "concentrate, Bonnie."
She decided to ditch the equations and do something she found a little more challenging. She filed her notes away and flipped through the textbook for something else. When she landed on the topology chapter, she grinned. She'd been meaning to teach herself a little bit of this but hadn't gotten around to it. A challenge made it much easier to concentrate. She got out a fresh pack of sticky notes, her highlighters and a notebook, and got to work.
The time flew by, and she could almost pretend she was back at home, with Bubba working next to her in a comfortable silence. Almost.
Granted, back home, her bedroom door never swung open to a loud, "sup, nerd?" and a pretty musician walking in like she owned the place. "Whoa. Don't you know that school is over? Or are you like, trying to solve all the world's problems over summer? Because that's pretty ambitious, Bon, even for you."
She looked concerned – likely because of the great revision explosion of the last week of school – but she had nothing to worry about. This was Bonnie's entertainment, not her mad panic to get good grades.
Bonnie wondered what she was doing here. By now, she knew that being friends with Marceline meant that she just showed up whenever she felt like it. She hadn't quite grown accustomed to it yet, but she fired back a quick, "Funny, I don't remember getting a phone call asking if you could come and visit."
"That's lame," Marceline pouted, and Bonnie had to resist the urge to launch herself forward and kiss that pout right off her. Marceline flopped down onto Bonnie's bed, making herself comfortable. "Seriously, though. Did you miss the memo? It's summer. That means no schoolwork."
"Mathematics relaxes me," Bonnie merely shrugged, swivelling around in her desk chair to look at her, "besides, it's not like I had anything else to do."
"Thought you'd be off with your little band of dorks," Marceline retorted, casually glancing down at her nails, "you know, celebrating the first day of summer."
"I thought you'd be off with your little band of… well, your band," Bonnie mimicked. She knew that Finn, Jake and everyone would be together, and had also assumed Marceline and Keila would be off with their friends. Bonnie was used to being left behind. Ever since everything with her parents, she'd never truly comprehended it when someone actually wanted her around. "I expected you'd disappear off the moment the last bell rung, for a cross-country journey of self-discovery and rock and roll. Or something."
"Hah, if only," Marceline barked out a laugh, "nah. Anyway, I found a good pizza dough recipe on the internet. Want to help me make it? I'll even let you eat some of the pizza."
Bonnie frowned. "Is Keila busy or something?"
"I don't know. Didn't ask her," Marceline shrugged, "I asked you. And I'm gonna do it again. Want to make pizza with me? And then eat the pizza later? Maybe with a movie? Unless this weird math stuff is actually you trying to solve the world's problems, and there's some kind of equation in there to make my dad less of a square."
"Nice geometry pun, but no. Just simple boredom." Bonnie replied. "I guess I could help you make pizza. And the movie sounds good too."
"Nice," Marceline pushed herself up from the bed and held her hand out to Bonnie. Bonnibel sort of stared at her, reluctant to take her hand because she knew it was only to help her up, knew that Marceline wasn't doing it the way Bonnie wanted her to. "Come on then, grocery run."
Bonnie raised her eyebrows. "You didn't even come prepared?"
Marceline mock gasped, "Yeah, I know that's basically unheard of in princess land, but I wasn't going to walk here with a bag full of ingredients in case you weren't here."
"That's why normal people text or call to ask if someone's home," Bonnie sarcastically replied, "then you'd have known."
"Yeah, well, spontaneity is my thing," Marceline said, waving her hand up and down as if to say come on, take it, "let's go. We gotta make the dough soon to give it time to proof."
Sealing her fate, Bonnie grabbed Marceline's hand and let her pull her up. She didn't know if she was reading into it, but Marceline held her hand by locking her fingers through Bonnie's, and Bonnie was sure that was the way couples did it. Not that she'd ever been part of a couple, but she'd observed.
Bonnie expected Marceline to drop her hand once she'd pulled her up, but the older girl surprised her. It made those stupid butterflies in her stomach flutter hopefully. "Do you need me to bring any money?"
"Nah, I got it covered," Marceline shrugged, using her free hand to pull a fistful of cash from her back pocket. "We need… bread flour, yeast, caster sugar, olive oil and salt. For the dough, anyway. Then tomato sauce, cheese, and whatever other toppings we want."
Bonnie hummed, still slightly preoccupied with the hand in hers as they walked down the stairs. "Jelly beans?"
Marceline paused and looked at her like she just announced she'd killed her whole family. "You better be joking right now, Bon."
"Of course I'm joking," Bonnie rolled her eyes, "I'm not a monster, Marcy."
As they got to the front door, Bonnie realised she'd have to let go of Marceline's hand to put her shoes on. She seriously considered just walking to the shop in her socks, just so she didn't have to.
Reluctantly, she let go of Marceline's hand, already missing the way it felt so warm in hers, missing the gentle touch of the rough callouses on her fingers from all that guitar playing. As she pulled on her pink Converse and watched Marceline lace up her boots, she asked, "Are you and your band doing any shows over summer?"
"Yeah, actually. We play pretty regularly at this one bar in town," Marceline shrugged, "and I think Keila is planning on bugging Principal Citron into letting us play at homecoming. I don't think she'll be all that successful after all the F bombs at prom, and I'm definitely not getting involved. I don't want to be on that dillweed's radar. I already got a stern talking to about my unacceptable use of the English language."
Bonnie laughed. "Dillweed. Do you have a little notebook where you come up with all of these insults, or something?"
"Maybe I do, maybe I don't," Marceline was clearly trying to keep a straight face, but Bonnie could see the grin bleeding through, "you don't know my life."
Bonnie allowed herself a laugh at the mental image she had. "I can just imagine it now. You, sitting at your desk, chewing on your pencil, thinking hm, what can I liken this person to? And probably drawing nasty portraits just to sink your point home."
"Funny that you think I own a desk," was Marceline's only retort, "hurry up and tie your shoelaces, brainlord. I don't have all day here."
"Clearly you do, since you showed up at my house unannounced when you had no other scheduled plans," Bonnie fired back, but she did as Marceline asked anyway. And, pushing her luck, she said, "Maybe you need to get yourself another boyfriend, if you're so bored that you're slumming it with me."
"Definitely don't have time for that drama. Boys are dumb," Marceline shrugged, watching as Bonnie stood up and grabbed her house keys, trying to play it cool and act like she didn't have that little spark of hope in her chest, "besides, I got loads to do. I could write another song. Actually, I think I'm getting inspiration right now. First line is Bonnie needs to hurry her ass up."
Even though it was barely real singing, just Marceline joking around, it sounded beautiful. Her voice was smooth and melodical and she effortlessly hit every note she intended to, like it was second nature. It probably was; she supposed that Marceline was one of those with innate musical talent, rather than one who really had to work at it to be good.
But instead of gushing over her like a big gay weirdo, Bonnie merely rolled her eyes, "I don't like it. Wouldn't be downloading it off iTunes, that's for sure."
"Nobody uses iTunes anymore," Marceline muttered, rolling her eyes, opening up the front door, "come on, slowpoke."
Bonnie followed her out of the front door, making sure to lock it behind her. She wasn't sure if Uncle Peter was home, but figured she was better to be safe than sorry. Naturally, the minute she locked the front door, she realised she didn't have her sunglasses, "Oh, wait, I forgot my sunglasses."
Marceline let out an annoyed groan that was way too exaggerated to be genuine, "I could've gone to the store and been back by now with everything we need. Twice."
"Maybe next time you'll check to see if I'm actually home first, then you can come prepared," Bonnie retorted, but she really didn't mind Marceline showing up when she pleased. It was quite nice, actually. Made her feel wanted. "We could be making pizza dough right now if you'd sent a text."
"Oh, please. You were so into your math that you wouldn't have noticed," Marceline said, pulling her own sunglasses from her pocket and putting them on. The dark glasses along with the black cropped t-shirt showing off a brown, toned stomach, plus the ripped jeans and the scuffed boots Marceline always wore made Bonnibel's stomach twist. Maybe her friends had been right when they'd said opposites attract, just not in relation to Marshall. Marceline couldn't be more opposite to Bonnie, right down to the colour of her clothes.
Bonnie grabbed her sunglasses from her school bag and put them on, purposely locking the door at the slowest pace she could manage, laughing as Marceline grumbled behind her.
Finally, Marceline sighed dramatically. "Okay, I know you're just doing that to annoy me."
"Only because you make it so easy," Bonnie flashed her a grin, "come on. Let's get the supplies."
Feeling bold, Bonnie grabbed Marceline by the hand and pulled her down the street, and she felt fuzzy inside all the way to the shop.
"Oh, no," Bonnie exclaimed, "I measured 502 grams. That's so annoying."
Marceline noted that Bonnie's accent got significantly thicker when she was bothered about something. It was kind of cute. "I'm sure two extra grams of flour aren't going to make the dough get all donked up. Don't we have to knead it in more flour anyways?"
"I suppose so," Bonnie frowned down at the bowl of flour and began making the well in the middle with the spoon, "I just like to follow the rules. Probably my scientific mind."
"Well, yeah, if you fuck something up in a science experiment, you'll probably explode," Marceline commented, grinning when Bonnie laughed. She poured the yeast mixture into the middle of the well and Marceline added the olive oil, "Sometimes, deviation from a recipe is fun. One time, Keila and I made these amazing cookies, but since we'd just thrown a bunch of stuff in a bowl and hoped for the best, we never figured out how to remake them. So, as long as you write down what you've done, you're golden."
Bonnie mixed everything together in the bowl, "Do you want to knead it? It looks sticky and a little bit disgusting."
Marceline bit back a princess joke. "No thanks, I need my hands to play music. Can't have my fingers burnt off by the lethal extra flour."
When Bonnie rolled her eyes, Marceline caved and poured some flour onto the counter, took her mom's ring off, rubbed some flour on the palms of her hands, and then grabbed the sticky dough and dumped it down. "Jokes, dork. I've got this. Do me a favour and put some music on."
She nodded to her phone, which she'd left safely out of the way of the ingredients. Bonnie walked over and grabbed it, holding it up with a frown. "You have to put your passcode in."
"It's 052703," Marceline told her, more focused on kneading the dough than anything else. She didn't care if Bonnie knew her passcode; it wasn't like there was anything scandalous on her phone anyway. "Go to Spotify and put my jams playlist on shuffle."
Bonnie did as she asked and put her phone back down, and Marceline hummed along to the opening notes of the first song. She sung without thinking about it; when music played, Marceline sang. That was just how it was.
"I don't know what to do without you, I don't know where to put my hands, I've been trying to lay my head down, but I'm writing this at 3am," She paused, feeling Bonnie's eyes on her. She didn't know how she was so in tune to that, she just always had been. Bonnie looked at her, and Marceline could feel it. She glanced up, still kneading the dough, "What?"
"I just…" Bonnie trailed off, playing with the sleeve of her sweater awkwardly, "you have a really amazing voice. And I know you know that, but still. I didn't really tell you that at prom, so. Have you ever had lessons? Or were you just… born that good?"
Marceline felt herself blushing and feigned interest in the dough she was kneading. "You really think my dad would pay for any kind of music class? Have you met the guy?"
"Well, okay, you raise a fair point," Bonnie said, "so you were just born with the talent. That's pretty amazing. How'd you learn bass, then? Since your dad is a music-hater."
"My mom wasn't. She taught me how to play piano – even got me a teacher – and a little bit of acoustic guitar. Once you know the basics of string instruments it's not hard to transfer to another instrument so once I had guitar down, I moved to bass and then ukulele." Marceline dumped the kneaded dough back into the bowl and Bonnie rushed to cover it with a kitchen towel. "Still working on getting the hang of percussion. Drums are hard."
"Still, that's four instruments. Five if you include singing," Bonnie replied, "Five and a half with your drum knowledge. That's really impressive, Marcy."
Blushing again, Marceline busied herself with walking to the fridge for a drink. "Actually, uh, it's ten."
Bonnibel looked at her incredulously. "No way."
"I told you, didn't I? Over text…" Marceline trailed off, but Bonnie looked at her expectantly, so she started the list as she opened a can of coke, "Bass, guitar, piano, ukulele, violin, cello, mandolin, harp, banjo and flute."
"Wow," Bonnie said, "that's… wow."
Marceline shrugged but really the compliment gave her a warm fuzzy feeling. "It's no more impressive than all the science junk you keep up in your big dork brain. Everyone's got their own thing, you know."
"That's true, but wow. You're like, a whole musical prodigy," Bonnie said, and Marceline occupied herself with putting her ring back on as an excuse to look away from her. She knew she was blushing. Again. "I like your ring. You always wear that one."
"It was my mom's," Marceline told her, twisting the ring around her finger like she sometimes did when she was nervous. "I wear it every day. Because it was hers, it sort of feels like she's with me, you know?"
She wanted to change the subject. She always did when it came to her mom. Even though she lost her eight years ago, nearly nine, the pain still felt fresh. Especially when she had to go home every day to her stoic father.
But Bonnie asked, "if you don't mind me asking, what happened?" and Marceline couldn't bring herself to ignore the question. She trusted Bonnie.
"Car accident. She was on her way to pick me up from piano class when a drunk driver hit her." Marceline realised that said a lot more than she wanted it to, and Bonnie was smart. There was no doubt she'd pick up on it anyway, so she thought she might as well say it. "Dad blames me. I kinda blame me too."
Bonnie hugged her so tightly that Marceline struggled to breathe a little bit. She didn't mind. "Oh, Marcy. I'm so sorry. And it wasn't anyone's fault other than that stupid drunk driver."
Rationally, she knew that. It was just the other part that was louder, the part in her dad's voice, telling her that my Elise would've been alive if it wasn't for you.
She hugged Bonnie back and then mumbled, "Okay, kinda need oxygen now, Bon."
"Oh, sorry," Bonnie pulled back, but her arms were still around Marceline's waist. She looked slightly sheepish, and Marceline had nowhere to hide that stupid telltale blush when Bonnie pressed a kiss to her cheek, "thank you for telling me. And your dad is no longer my favourite teacher. No. Not even in the top ten."
Despite herself, Marceline laughed, "Wow, that's a pretty sick burn coming from you."
"Mhm," Bonnibel hummed, grabbing her by the hand and pulling her towards the lounge, "come on, let's watch a bit of telly while we wait for the dough."
Despite the previously heavy conversation, Marceline snorted with laughter, though she tried to hold it in for Bonnie's sake. Obviously, she knew why she was laughing, because she turned around with a raised eyebrow, her expression giving off a flat, sarcastic really?
"You're laughing because I said telly, aren't you?"
Marceline snickered again, "No."
Bonnie rolled her eyes, "Grow up."
"I wasn't laughing at it!" Marceline tried and failed to make the lie believable, and when Bonnie turned away in disbelief, snickered to herself. "Telly."
Bonnie whirled around and pointed at her accusingly. "I heard that!"
Marceline smiled innocently. "Heard what?"
Bonnie just shook her head in disbelief. "Oh my god."
"This is surprisingly good."
"Wow, thanks, Uncle Peter," Bonnie said as he finished off a slice of their homemade pizza, "I'll be sure to go to the papers with your rave review."
"Damn, I really am rubbing off on you," Marceline commented, "a sarcastic comment from the princess. Who'd have thought it?"
Bonnie rolled her eyes, "Shut up and eat your pizza."
She saw Marceline smile as she pushed herself up from the couch. "Actually, I'm going to go to the bathroom, if that's alright with your majesty."
Bonnie laughed. The princess and royalty jokes bothered her when they were said with malice, but now it had merely become a running gag between the two of them. "Yes, but hurry back, servant. I will need you to lift my slice of pizza for me upon your return."
Marceline bowed jokingly as she backed out of the living room, calling after, "It would be my honour, your highness!"
Bonnie looked at the doorway she'd disappeared through, aware that her smile was probably betraying the way she felt. Sure enough, Uncle Peter commented, "You two seem to be very good friends," and Bonnie picked up on the implication.
"Yeah," Bonnie murmured, and then admitted quietly, "I like her."
Even though she'd never confirmed her sexuality to him, and actively denied it at one point in time, she thought he probably already knew. His answer just made that obvious.
"I thought you might," Peter said, and added, "I think she likes you, too."
Bonnie snorted with laughter. "No way."
Peter raised his eyebrows, "What makes you so sure?"
"She's just… a lot cooler than me," Bonnie admitted lamely, "she's in a band and she's got piercings and a tattoo and she's pretty and smart and… perfect. I know that nobody's perfect, not really, but… she's as close as you can get. And I'm just me. A science nerd with a lot of baggage."
"You see yourself that way," Peter said, "but she might see you differently. Try asking her out. She seems like a lovely girl, Bonnibel. The worst she could do is say no."
Bonnie heard the bathroom door open again, so she mimed an end of discussion to Peter and grabbed another slice of pizza, biting into it. Marceline walked back into the room and flopped back down on the couch. "Hey, dork."
"Hey," Bonnie replied, paranoid that Marceline had somehow heard their conversation, "how was the bathroom?"
"It was a bathroom," Marceline said, shrugging, "wanna watch a movie?"
Bonnie hummed in thought, finishing off her pizza. "Depends. What do you have in mind?"
Marceline shrugged, "Nothing in particular, we could always just go through Netflix until we find something we can agree on."
"That would be an excellent plan. One hitch, though," Bonnie paused, "I don't have Netflix."
"I do," Marceline said, "I can sign in on your laptop and you can use it whenever you want."
"Okay. Thanks," Bonnie pushed herself up from the sofa and picked up one of the half empty plates, "Help me take the empty plates through?"
She didn't need to ask, because when she turned around, Marceline was already up and helping. She flashed her a smile, and Marceline returned it; not one of her usual electric grins, but a softer, reserved version. It made Bonnie's heart ache.
And when Marceline pressed up close to her once their movie started, Bonnie wondered if Peter could be right.
