Title: Small Steps (1/1)
Summary: Just a bit o' fluff :) Maria's depressed. Who could possibly cheer her up? Strangely enough, it's Kyle.
Rating: PG13.
Disclaimer: WB and 20thC Fox.
Date: Dec. 24, 1999
Maria looked at Kyle Valenti for a long moment before she finally allowed her laughter to bubble free. "You know, Valenti, you may not be such an asshole after all," she gasped as her laughter faded into the faintest hint of mirth touching her voice.
Kyle popped a french fry into his mouth. "Tell me again whether there's an actual compliment in there," he replied after he had chased down the over-salted fry with a deep sip from his pepsi. He shook his head in mock sorrow. "I really don't know why I bother with you -- you always make me sound like a cross between a stalker, an insensitive bore, and an all around creep."
"You're all that and more... but just not to as great an extent as I'd thought," Maria answered, laughter still colouring her voice. She leaned back into her seat and looked at him thoughtfully. "I do appreciate this, Kyle," she said after a pause. "I don't think that I've had this much fun since Mi... in months."
He shrugged. "Why am I not surprised at that? You've spent the last months walking around looking like a whipped puppy. I don't think that I've _ever_ seen anyone wallow in angst for such a sustained period of time." He spoke over her indignant gasp. "At least I didn't mope when Liz ditched me -- I just went stalker, insensitive and creep-like," Kyle grinned.
Maria spent a long minute struggling between anger and amusement. She finally decided that she had been mired in less than uplifting emotions for long enough and consciously nurtured that spark of amusement that met Kyle's final words. "All of the above is rather difficult to carry off if there's no one to demonstrate it for." Maria pursed her lips thoughtfully. "Although I could have settled for going psycho on the school. When I suffer, everyone suffers!"
"Nah, I don't think my dad would be all that impressed with that. And then no one else but the prison wardens and your fellow inmates would have the pleasure of seeing that pretty face of yours."
"Pretty face? Why Kyle, are you paying me a compliment?" Maria said, wide eyed. A smile tugged at the corner of her lips.
Kyle snagged another french fry before replying. "Don't let it get to your head, DeLuca. You still look like shit." He easily dodged the fry that Maria flung at his head.
"You'll give a girl a complex if you keep on like that!" Maria chided. She knew that he wasn't far off the mark. The first time that Kyle had pulled her aside had been to tell her to pull herself together and get a spine. When he had let her go, Maria had slunk off to the bathroom, his comments still ringing in her ears. She hadn't liked what she had seen in the mirror. She looked pale and sickly with dark shadows under her eyes. She had looked like the heroine in a bad romance novel, ready to wilt away while bereft of her prince. She had looked like shit. It suddenly hadn't been a surprise that the others were tip-toeing around her as if she was about to shatter.
Maria nibbled at her straw, watching Kyle attack his hamburger from beneath lowered lashes. "Kyle?" He looked back towards her, licking off the ketchup that stained his lips. "Why are you doing this again? Ditching the asshole routine for... well, this?"
"I didn't want to get typecast," he joked. Maria mock glared at him. "You looked damned pitiful," he answered seriously. "I know that even before what happened with Liz we weren't exactly the best of friends... but watching you look so beaten down without doing anything just seemed wrong somehow. Maybe because I'd already been jerked around by Liz and Max. It didn't seem fair that you should go over the same thing for his friend."
"That isn't the same thing though. You and Liz were just--" Maria bit off her words mid-sentence.
Kyle crumpled up the hamburger wrapper before him. "To her it was just a summer fling. She may not have gotten attached... nobody said I didn't."
"I'm sorry, Kyle."
He shrugged off her apology. "_You_ don't have anything to be sorry about."
Maria smoothed down her hair, tucking it more securely behind her ear. She sighed. "You know, I never imagined that I'd be swapping stories about miserable love lives with _you_. It's jut a touch unsettling."
"Well let's cut the wallowing short before we get into the really deep stuff, then." Kyle slid out of the booth, quickly dumping the remains of their meal into a nearby trash. He came back, holding his hand out to Maria. "C'mon, let's get out of here."
Maria titled her head. "Where?" she asked even as she accepted his proffered hand.
"Does it matter?" he asked. "Because really, I hadn't planned that far ahead."
Maria grinned. "Then I guess it doesn't."
"Good girl! Now let's go."
~end~