TW for brief mentions of violence, minor language/swearing
Bobbi was genuinely surprised at how good her life was starting to feel. There were still parts that didn't feel normal, of course, like sharing a house with four other people who were often boisterous and busy instead of with one surly guy, and pretending that Phil was her uncle instead of an emergency foster father, but there were other parts that felt like pieces that had finally slotted into where they should have been for the last fifteen years.
For the first time in as long as she could remember, she wasn't afraid to be at home. She was keeping up in school, she had friends. Real life, honest-to-God friends. Or at least, proto-friends. She wasn't sure how long you had to hang out with people before it counted as a "friendship" level relationship, or if it counted as being friends if you only hung out at school. Still, even if she hadn't quite hit those milestones yet to be able to call Mack, Hunter, Natasha, and Clint her friends, she felt like she was making progress. They were all nice to her, in their own ways, and after just a couple of weeks of knowing them, she already felt closer to them than she had ever felt with any of the girls from her old school, despite playing soccer with some of them for years.
Maybe it was because she didn't have quite as many things to hide, or the reputation of being the overly-competitive girl with the strict dad and the deadbeat mom. Her dad would say it was because she was a robot who wasn't wired for human connection, or that she was just like her mom and couldn't be bothered to care about anybody but herself. Bobbi hoped that wasn't true. She tried so hard to act like everyone else around her, to talk like them and move like them and find the same things interesting that they did. She tried hard to make sure that she cared about other people, too. She always wished her opponents good luck and helped girls up if she had knocked them over, even if they had deserved it. She took care of her dad once her mom decided she'd had enough.
She would never have told her dad that he was wrong about her to his face, but Bobbi was pretty sure that if you tried hard to be a good person, that made you a good person. She didn't believe people were born bad or good, even though that's what her dad said. If he was in one of his moods, he would shout and stomp around and complain about how her mother was rotten to the core and was a selfish bitch who was never worth the ten years he gave her.
He would remind her that people can't change the way that a fish couldn't decide it wanted to live on land, but Bobbi just couldn't make herself believe it. It took billions of years, but fish eventually crawled out of the water and became lizards. People made choices all the time to do good things or bad things, things that helped people or hurt people. Even a person who had done nothing but bad things their entire life could one day decide that they wanted to do something good for a change.
She had always hoped that would happen to her dad. That one day he'd wake up and realize that the way he treated her was hurting her, and that she needed him to be a dad, a real dad, to her. One who took care of her and listened to her ideas and problems, one who came to her soccer games and took her out for ice cream if she got all As. One who didn't yell and hit and make her feel as worthless as the mud she cleaned off of her soccer cleats every night.
Still, she knew how childish it was to think that, and she worked hard not to get carried away by the fantasy of it all. Up until a few weeks ago, she hadn't ever imagined that her life would look any different than it had, but now here she was, not just with a guy like Phil, who never raised his voice and who smiled so naturally Bobbi was sure he probably smiled in his sleep, too, but with a woman like May, who looked out for her family and was steady as a rock. She wasn't the kind of woman who would just decide she was tired of being a parent one day and run off to who-knows-where to try her hand at a whole new life. The fantasies she had convinced herself were childish stories that would never come true were suddenly swirling around her, taking shape as an actual reality. It felt too good to be true.
Things weren't perfect, of course. She was still hobbling around on crutches, and even though the physical therapist had said she was in a good position to make a full recovery, it was hard to imagine feeling like normal again. She was still getting used to having barely any alone time. Everywhere she went, someone was there, sitting at the kitchen table, watching TV, doing homework, taking too long in the shower. Most of the time she didn't mind, but sometimes she could feel herself shutting down from the almost constant stimulus of human contact. She could tell it was coming, because it felt like her body was slowly filling up with concrete, making everything harder and harder to wade through, and her hands would start to twitch. Luckily, no one seemed to mind when she had to disappear upstairs to her bedroom and be alone.
Her room was nice, with clean, non-broken furniture, walls that didn't have a hole punched in them, paint that wasn't chipped and faded. The bed was soft, and the window let in just the right amount of light in the mornings to help her wake up slowly. It didn't really feel like her, though. When Miss Hand had taken her to her old house to pack her things, she had said "essentials only," which Bobbi understood as clothes, toiletries, and the few things she couldn't live without, like her batons, her soccer gear, and her school stuff. She hadn't packed her World Cup Team posters or her little wind-up R2D2 that she liked to watch shuffle across her desk. She hadn't packed her biology books that she had found in the discard bin of the local library, her dogeared dictionaries for French, Spanish, or Mandarin, or her trophies from years of club and team sports.
She had no idea if she would ever be able to go back and get those things. She had no idea if they were even still there, or if her dad had trashed her room and thrown out all her stuff, like he did when her mom left them. There wasn't a trace of Susan Morse left in the house within 24 hours of her deserting it. Would there be a trace of Bobbi after she had done the same thing? As glad as she was to be away from him and out from under his painful thumb, a shriveled, guilty part of Bobbi felt horrible for what she had done. She had left him, too, just like he always said she would. She knew logically that it was something she'd had to do, for her own safety, but it gave her a weird feeling in the pit of her stomach to know that she had proved him right and turned out just like her good-for-nothing mother.
Fortunately, she was able to force herself not to think too hard about any of that stuff most of the time. When she was at school, or busy doing things with Phil, May, Skye, and Jemma, she could quiet all of the thoughts about her parents and her old room and what made a person good or bad and just focus on whatever the task at hand was, be it irregular French conjugations in class, a spirited game of Clue with her foster family, or the strength exercises her doctor had assigned her. Her head was always clearer when she had something else to do.
"Okay, which two are we missing? Hello? Earth to Bobbi?"
"Huh?" Bobbi snapped her attention back to Mack and Hunter, who were looking at her intently.
"We've got eight of the amendments from the Bill of Rights, but we're missing two. Which ones did we forget?"
Bobbi looked down at the paper sitting in front of them that their small group was supposed to have been working on, trying to give her brain a minute to catch up. She had been watching Phil travel from group to group and thinking about how calmly he had asked Skye to stay behind so that they could talk about whatever it was that she had done wrong. Her own father would never have sat her down for a discussion about something that she was in trouble for. It was kind of mind-blowing just how normal Phil had acted when he asked Skye to stay, with no shouting or breaking anything. She hadn't stuck around to listen to the conversation, but judging by Skye's demeanor when she had joined them in the car, there hadn't been any of that when they were alone, either.
Jemma had been totally freaked out by the whole thing, no matter how much Bobbi had tried to calm her down in the car. She hadn't said much, just that "this was bad, very bad," and she had been all fidgety and out of sorts, shifting back and forth instead of sitting still and doing that thing she did where she tapped her finger over and over again. She hadn't cried, but she looked on the verge of tears for most of the time that they were in the car together. Bobbi had tried to ask what was going on, but once Jemma had refused to answer with a shake of her head, Bobbi let the issue drop. She knew how stressful it was to have people asking you questions you couldn't answer over and over again.
Instead, she had talked to Jemma in as gentle a voice as she could, about how she was sure everything was going to be okay, and that Phil and May were nice people, and that they didn't seem like they were mad that morning, so that was a plus, right? That seemed to have helped a little bit, although not nearly as much as Bobbi's other idea, which was to have Jemma call out strings of nucleotide combinations from a DNA sequence that Bobbi had noticed on Jemma's science homework the day before. The rhythm of pairing off adenines and thymines seemed to sooth the younger girl, and although Bobbi had no idea whether or not the sequence was correct, not having committed Jemma's homework to memory, she figured that wasn't really the important part.
"Seriously, Bobbi, do you have any clue which ones we're forgetting?" Hunter's exasperated tone cut through her thoughts. His expression wasn't angry, so Bobbi assumed he was more fed up with the assignment than with her lack of focus.
"Sorry, um…" She forced herself to concentrate and read over the list the boys had already come up with. They were supposed to be listing out the amendments in the Bill of Rights, and explaining the importance of each of them. "There's one about not letting soldiers stay at your house, right?"
"Why does that sound like a wildly outdated concern?" Hunter smirked. "Probably because it is, and because the Americans haven't updated their government in over 200 years. Good luck trying to write out why that amendment is supposed to matter."
"We've been in this class for over a month," Mack said with a roll of his eyes. "Are you planning on being insufferably British about American history for the entire year, or just until we get past the parts where we totally schooled you?"
"Someone has to carry the torch," Hunter pointed out. "Otherwise you all would get far too big for your britches. I consider it my duty to keep everyone humble."
"Besides yourself," Mack teased. Hunter flicked Mack in the arm with his pencil, but it bounced harmlessly off of Mack's bicep, and both boys laughed.
"One more to go," said Mack after a minute, as he finished jotting down the amendment preventing the quartering of troops. "It's seriously bugging me that I can't remember it."
"Right to remain silent, or something like that?" Bobbi suggested halfheartedly. She was still more focused on Phil than on the group work.
Mack put down his pencil and looked at her thoughtfully. "Bobbi, is everything okay? You're even more checked out than Hunter is, which is not something I ever thought I'd say." Okay. Okay.
"I'm sorry," she apologized quickly. She gave her crutches an absentminded squeeze. "I'm just distracted. Weird morning, I guess."
"Do you want to talk about it?" Mack asked. His full attention was on her, and Bobbi felt like she was being x-rayed. "Did something happen at Mr. C's house this morning? Is it your dad? Is he okay?"
"No, no, it's nothing like that," said Bobbi hastily. "Just something with my foster sisters… I mean, cousins. Foster cousins?" She paused for a moment and considered. "Is it bad that I don't know what to call them?"
"If you didn't know their names after all this time, then I would say yes," Hunter quipped. "But seeing as it's a complicated family dynamic, I think we can give you a pass on the actual title." He flashed a sly grin her way that she found it difficult to return. In her head she considered Skye and Jemma her foster sisters, since they all shared the same foster parents, but she had nearly slipped up by calling them that. If Phil was supposed to be her uncle, and Skye and Jemma were his foster daughters, then she probably shouldn't be calling them sisters out loud. Her stomach twisted uncomfortably at the complexities of the lie she was still carrying on with.
"What happened?" Mack wanted to know, rerouting the conversation back to its actual point. "If you want to say, I mean."
"I don't really know for sure," Bobbi admitted. "I wasn't there for part of it. I think Skye got a talking to this morning, and for some reason it really freaked out Jemma. I guess maybe she gets nervous about getting in trouble. But Phil and May were really nice about it, and I guess everything turned out okay. It just made me think about…" She paused, giving herself enough time to properly phrase her next words without giving herself away. "About how some families don't have parents who can talk nicely and constructively with their kids about getting in trouble."
Hunter's face had clouded over, and Bobbi worried she had said something to upset him. "Yeah," he grumbled. "Some parents can be real pieces of... well, anyway, sounds like your sister-cousin-whatever hasn't had good ones before now."
"It's good that they have people like Mr. C and his wife to take care of them now," Mack nodded. "I bet Mr. C is a great dad. I think it's cool that they took in kids like that, ones that hadn't had a good home before. I'm sure it messes you up, to not have people to care about you when you're that young, but it sounds like they do now, which is great." Messes you up. Was she messed up? Probably.
"Yeah, I guess so." Bobbi opted not to elaborate. She was eager to move away from the subject and the possibility that she might accidentally let the whole truth slip out. If talking about hypothetically lousy parents made Hunter upset and made Mack talk about being messed up, then there was no way they would take the truth about her own circumstances well.
"I can't bloody think straight," Hunter blurted loudly, shoving the paper across their desks. "This assignment is—" He was cut short by the arrival of Phil, who had finally made his way over to their group.
"Everything okay over here?" he asked, not without concern.
"We've got most of them, Mr. C," Mack said quickly, retrieving the paper and holding it out for Phil to look over. "We were just taking a break."
"Sounds good," Phil nodded. "Looks good, too," he added once he had read over their work. "You're missing another legal one. Think Gamble v. United States or the trial of Jack McCall."
"Who?" Hunter asked. His cloudy mood seemed to have passed after his outburst, and he had one eyebrow arched in a look of confusion.
"You know, Jack McCall," pressed Phil. "The guy who killed Wild Bill Hickock?"
"I swear you're making these up," Hunter smirked. "Was he friends with Buckaroo Barney and Texas Pete?"
"You just wait until we get to Westward expansion," Phil promised. "Everybody had a cool cowboy name out there. Also some genocidal tendencies, which were considerably less cool, but we'll get to that, too."
"I think you're just going to have to give us the last amendment," Mack admitted. "We're all kind of brain-fried over here."
Phil chuckled, but gave them the answer. "The 5th. Due process, self-incrimination, double jeopardy, things like that. Jack McCall was acquitted in his first trial and convicted in his second, but they were allowed to try him twice because the place where he shot Wild Bill was a town founded illegally on Lakota property. The first trial was ruled invalid because it took place on land that didn't belong to the United States, and Jack McCall was retried by a Dakota territory court."
"That was on the tip of my tongue," said Hunter dryly, and everyone, including Bobbi, got a laugh out of that one.
"Consider it your fun fact for the day," Phil teased back. "Are you all good to come back together as a class in a couple more minutes?"
They all nodded, and Phil drifted away to another group. Mack finished scribbling out a sentence about the fifth amendment before setting down his pencil and looking over at Bobbi, a question poised on his lips.
"So, Bobbi, there's a girls' soccer game tonight, and Hunter and I will be done with practice before it starts, so we were thinking about going. You want to come?" Bobbi had mentioned to the both of them that she played not long after they'd all met, and this was the third time Mack had invited her to go see the girls here play. So far, she'd said no every time. It felt wrong to go and watch other girls play for a team that both wasn't really hers, even if she went to school here now, especially when she wasn't sure she would ever be able to play again.
"What is it with you and the girls' soccer team?" she asked, trying to deflect attention from her reluctance. "I didn't think those games were big draws for crowd attendance."
"We like to go and support each other's teams," Mack explained. "A lot of the girls come to our games, so we try to return the favor. We don't get crowds like the football games do or anything, but it's nice to have some fans. Plus, I was just thinking it might be good for you to start scouting out the team for when your knee gets better. They'd be lucky to have you, I bet."
"He's casually omitting the fact that Elena is on the team, and he likes to watch her play," Hunter needled. He was smiling, so Bobbi could tell it wasn't mean-spirited, but that didn't stop Mack from blushing.
"Whatever, man. We're just friends. Not even friends. She's an acquaintance. We're in AV together, and she doesn't usually have a lot of people cheering for her."
"I'm just messing with you, mate. You don't have to tie your shorts up in knots about it. It's no skin off my nose if you've got a thing for her."
"I don't have a—whatever, man." Mack shoved Hunter's arm playfully, and Bobbi was glad to see that neither one was actually upset with the other. "How 'bout it, Bobbi? Will you please come?"
"I'll probably have a lot of homework," she shrugged. "Plus, Phil likes it when we're all home for dinner together. I don't think I can make it."
"Come on, Bobbi," Mack pleaded. "It's a big game, they're playing against Mishicot, which is basically our rival school…"
"In football, at least," Hunter added. "In the other sports like basketball and the other, incorrect football it's more about taking down Reedsville High, but we take our Mishicot games very seriously."
"You could ask Mr. C, and he might let you come. He used to come to stuff like that as often as he could, so he might like an excuse to start going again," Mack pointed out.
"Why do you want me to come so badly?" asked Bobbi. "You're going to go either way, aren't you?"
"We want to go with you." Mack looked like he was having trouble understanding why Bobbi was so resistant to the idea. "It'll be fun, and that's what friends do. They hang out at stuff like soccer games and eat junk food from the concession stand and get overly heated when the ref misses on offside call. We are friends, right?" Friends. Friends. Friends. She hadn't known if she could call Mack and Hunter her friends yet or not, but here was Mack basically telling her that they were. He wanted her to go to the game because that was what friends did, and Bobbi wanted very much to be friends with the two boys who made her laugh and made starting at a new school less painful and nerve-wracking than it had any right to be.
"Okay," she relented. "Okay, I'll ask Phil."
"Fantastic," Hunter grinned. "Now I'll have someone to talk to when Mack gets too carried away watching—"
"You better cool it, man," Mack warned. He reached over and rubbed his knuckles onto the top of Hunter's head, and both were cracking up by the time Phil called everyone back together for the last few minutes of class.
The dynamics of their friendship were still somewhat foreign to Bobbi, what with the teasing and all the playful fighting they did, but there was something enticing about it, about their closeness and their comfort with one another. She got the sense that they rarely fought with each other for real, and that they were comfortable both telling each other things and teasing one another about those same things without fear that it would ever go too far. She had never had that with anyone before, but watching the way the pair of them continued to flick and poke at each other surreptitiously as Phil wrapped up the lesson, giggling like little kids, Bobbi felt an overwhelming longing to be a part of it.
When the bell rang and the class began to disperse for lunch, Mack prodded Bobbi in the back to push her towards Phil.
"Go ask him now, while he's not busy," he said eagerly.
Bobbi propelled herself across the room and over to Phil's desk. She was getting decent at swinging herself along in between the crutches, and she could move much faster than she had a few weeks ago. Checking over her shoulder one last time for a bit of encouragement from Mack and Hunter, she drew level with Phil and took a breath.
"Um, Phil?"
"What's up, kiddo?" He winced and corrected himself. "Sorry, I probably shouldn't call you that at school, even if it's only Mack and Hunter with us." He waved to the boys, who were lurking in the back of the room, letting them know that he wasn't oblivious to their presence.
"It's okay," Bobbi said, twisting the corner of her mouth up into a half smile. "I don't mind. Can I… Can I ask you something?"
"Of course." Phil set down his pen and turned to give her his full attention. It was supposed to be a nice gesture, Bobbi supposed, but the intensity of his gaze set her on edge a little. She took another breath and squeezed the handles of her crutches.
"Well, Mack and Hunter are going to the soccer game tonight, and they asked me if I wanted to come, and…" She trailed off. She didn't have a lot of practice asking fathers for permission to go to things. Her dad always said no, so she stopped asking a long time ago. Sometimes she went anyways, like if the team was getting food after practice, but she usually paid the price for that later.
"Would you like to go?" Phil asked. He was smiling in the soft way that he had that made Bobbi feel like the air around her had just let out a gentle sigh.
"I… I would, yeah," she told him. She felt her own face arranging itself into smile that matched his. This wasn't so bad after all. "If it's okay."
"Bobbi," said Phil earnestly, "I think it's a great idea. I'm really glad you're spending time with friends outside of school. The soccer games here are lots of fun, and I bet you'll have a great time."
"They're playing Mishicot, apparently," Bobbi threw in. Phil's face lit up.
"Mishicot, really? How did I not know tonight was the Mishicot game? Oh, you are in for a treat, Bobbi." He paused for a second, his face scrunched up and his eyebrows knit. Confused face? Maybe more of a thinking face, Bobbi decided.
"I have an idea," Phil began slowly, "and you can say no if you want to, it won't hurt my feelings at all. But how would feel about the rest of us coming to the game, too? Me and Melinda and Skye and Jemma? You wouldn't have to sit with us or anything, you could hang out with your friends, but the Mishicot game is so much fun, and Melinda and I haven't been to any games yet this year. I think the girls would really like it, too. Like I said, feel free to say no. I don't want to encroach on your night out with your friends."
"That sounds good," Bobbi said, nodding. Somewhat to her surprise, the idea of having her foster family close by actually made her feel less nervous about going to the game. If anything went wrong, they'd be right there if she needed them. "I'd like that, actually."
Phil's face cracked open into a sunbeam smile. "Fantastic! This is going to be great, Bobbi, just you wait."
"Thanks, Phil," she smiled. She turned around slightly and flashed a thumbs-up to Mack and Hunter, who high-fived behind her when they got the signal.
"Mr. C, you rock," Mack said excitedly as he came over to the corner where Bobbi and Phil were chatting.
"I can pick her up before, if you want," Hunter offered. "I have to go and get my cousin after practice anyway, so it'd be on the way."
"Turbo's coming?" Mack asked.
"Yeah, both our mums are working late tonight, and my aunt Linda doesn't like it when he's home alone in the evenings. After school is okay, but she gets twitchy about it after dark, so I'm making him tag along. Don't worry, though," Hunter said quickly, misreading Bobbi's concerned face. "He won't bother us. Usually he just sits there with a book, or he'll just watch the game. He likes football, so he's fine to come."
"Oh no, that's not…" Bobbi wasn't sure how to explain that she had been more worried at the idea of Hunter's little cousin staying home by himself than at the idea of him coming along. She had spent many an afternoon in an empty house all alone as a kid, and she didn't have many fond memories of the experience.
"You're going to love this kid," Mack promised her. "He's a total riot, and he knows all the nitpicky rules better than anyone, so he's good for some color commentary, too."
"It's a plan, then," Hunter announced with finality. "Can I pick you up around 6, Bob?"
Bobbi nodded, and was suddenly overcome with the sensation that another one of those missing life pieces had slotted itself into place.
Because Natasha and Clint were seniors, they were able to leave school at lunchtime if they wanted to, which meant that they often didn't join Mack, Hunter, and Bobbi for lunch until about halfway through the period. When they did join them, they usually came bearing half-empty cartons of French fries or big to-go cups from the various fast-food restaurants they frequented with the power of the senior privileges, and today was no different.
Bobbi had made it most of the way through the lunch that Phil had packed for her that morning, with only a few nibbled bits of PB&J and a handful of carrot sticks left, and Mack and Hunter had finished their lunches as well when Natasha and Clint plunked themselves down at the table, still sipping on sodas from the Taco Bell down the street.
"South of the border, today, I see," Hunter remarked. Natasha snorted.
"More like south of Green Street, but sure," she said with a roll of her eyes.
"What can I say, I had a hankering for a taco with a shell made out of a giant Dorito," Clint shrugged. "When you crave Cool Ranch, you don't say no."
"You do if you're a sophomore," Mack griped. "They should let younger grades go out, too. Hunter has a car."
"You paying for my gas, mate?" Hunter teased. "I can't just chauffeur you around all day just because you want a taco."
"I'm just saying…"
"Remember when we were so young and full of longing, Nat?" Clint simpered, a mischievous gleam in his eye. "Now we're wizened and gray and full of knowledge… and tacos."
"You're hilarious," Mack deadpanned. Sarcasm.
Bobbi enjoyed spending time with the four of them more than she had ever enjoyed the company of anyone else her age, but they all talked and joked back and forth so quickly that it was hard to keep up, sometimes. Still, it was worth the extra effort, because Bobbi had never met other kids as nice and as funny as them.
"So what's new?" Natasha asked, changing the subject pointedly.
"Bobbi's coming to the game with us tonight," Mack announced. Clint and Natasha both smiled.
"Oh, awesome," said Natasha. "I'm glad Mack finally convinced you to come. He's been trying since you first got here. The games are fun, you'll have a good time."
"For sure," Clint agreed. "And once we get you hooked on those, you can start coming to our games, too. We could use all the fans we can get."
"Phil said he was coming, too," Bobbi said, looking for a way to add herself into the conversation at last. "And he's bringing May and my foster sis… cousins. He got really excited when I told him about it."
"Excellent, Mr. C's in!" Clint whooped. "He used to come to games all the time. He's cool like that, coming to see all the sports, and he comes to other stuff like band concerts and musicals and stuff. It's always hilarious to see how into everything he gets."
"But nice, too," Natasha added quickly. "It's always cool to see teachers supporting students like that."
The warning bell rang before Bobbi could formulate a response, and they all rose to toss out their trash before heading to their next class.
"Don't forget, Bob, 6 o'clock. Text me your address, okay?" Hunter called as he started to drift towards the cafeteria door. Okay. Okay? No. Not okay. Bobbi didn't have a phone. She had lost hers sometime between getting hurt by her dad and waking up in the hospital, and it hadn't really occurred to her before now that she would need a replacement one.
She was sure it sounded crazy to go weeks without missing your phone, but part of that time she had been in the hospital and on a considerable amount of pain medication, and the rest of the time she had been more focused on acclimating to the abundance of newness than keeping up with a phone. Her dad didn't let her have any social media accounts, so she didn't use her phone for that, and the only people she ever really texted were the girls in the soccer team group chat, but that was mostly about scheduling practice times and arranging carpools home from games.
Hunter was already gone before Bobbi had a chance to string together the words to tell him that she had no way of texting him, as was Mack and Clint. The only person still standing there with her was Natasha, who was looking at her expectantly.
"Ready to head to French?"
"Êtes-vous excité pour le match de ce soir?" Natasha's question cut through the fog in Bobbi's head and drug back into reality.
"Huh? Oh, um, Je veux l'aubergine," Bobbi managed to spit out. They were sitting French class, and Mrs. Duvall had asked them to partner up for conversation practice while she went to go pick up some copies she had forgotten in the teachers' lounge.
"What? Who said anything about eggplants?" Natasha tilted her head and gave Bobbi an x-ray gaze. "Did I lose you, there, petit savant?"
"I'm taller than you," Bobbi pointed out. "It doesn't make much sense to call me that."
"I'm older," Natasha countered, "so you'll always be littler than me no matter how Amazonian you become." Bobbi blushed and looked down at her notebook, where she had been doodling spirals. Twirling her batons was always the best way to help her think, but she had figured out a few other temporary replacements for when it wasn't socially appropriate to pull out two big wooden sticks and start swinging them around. Drawing spirals, swirling her pen round and round down the margin of her notebook page, wasn't as effective, but it helped to take the edge off and kept her hands busy while she thought.
She needed a way to let Hunter know about her phone situation, which wasn't an insurmountable problem by any means, but she knew that there would be follow up questions if she was honest about not having one. Lying to Hunter and the rest of her new friends about her living situation made her stomach feel tight every time she thought about it, and she wasn't interested in cooking up another story to explain why she, a fifteen year old girl from a middle class Midwestern family, didn't have a cell phone.
And if she was partially honest and told him that she had lost it in the "car crash" that had sent her to Manitowoc in the first place, she felt like she was getting to know Hunter well enough to know that he wouldn't just let the matter go. Hunter seemed incapable of keeping his thoughts and questions to himself, which normally resulted in a slew of witty and sarcastic comments that he muttered under his breath almost constantly, but also meant that he was more likely to keep pressing for information when Bobbi didn't have any to give. She needed to tell someone who would accept her story at face value. Someone like Mack, who wouldn't push, or like –
"Hey, is everything okay?" Natasha interrupted her thoughts once again. This time, she spoke in English and in a concerned undertone. "You keep spacing out on me, Bobbi."
Bobbi blinked. She could tell Natasha. It was harder to lie to Natasha, that Bobbi knew for sure, but Natasha hadn't shown herself to be much of an information fisher so far. There were times where Bobbi felt like Natasha saw right through her and knew that most everything out her mouth was untrue, but if Natasha didn't believe her, she hadn't said a word to Bobbi about it. Maybe that was a sign that she was the one to talk to. It was so complicated, having friends she was supposed to talk to about things other than soccer practice or the buy-one-get-one special at the drive-thru, while also having so many secrets to keep.
"Sorry," Bobbi apologized. She clenched and unclenched her fingers around the barrel of her pen. The doodling wasn't cutting it. She wanted to twirl, badly. "Just thinking about a lot. We're supposed to be doing conversations, right? Uh, le temps est beau aujourd'hui, no?"
"Forget the weather. Mrs. Duvall isn't coming back for a while. She always has trouble with the copier. Talk to me. What's on your mind?"
"En français ou en anglaise?" Bobbi asked. She tried to make it sound light and jovial, like a joke, but really, she was stalling for time. Why was the subject of her phone making her so jumpy? And why were the lights so bright in the classroom? Her fingers twitched again and she folded them into a fist to keep herself still.
"In English is fine," Natasha rolled her eyes, smiling. The smile didn't make it all the way up her face. She knew that Bobbi was putting up a shield. "Did something happen this morning? You were quiet in Spanish and at lunch, too."
Bobbi shook her head, then paused and considered. "Well," she admitted, "there was a thing with my… with Skye and Jemma, but that wasn't a big deal, I don't think."
"Skye and Jemma?"
"My foster sisters, or foster… cousins." Bobbi grimaced. She had stumbled over it once again.
"Oh right," Natasha nodded. "I forgot. The two girls Mr. Coulson and his wife are fostering."
"I don't really know what to call them… since Phil is my uncle, I mean," shrugged Bobbi. She stared at Natasha's left ear when she lied so that she wouldn't have to look her in the eye. Too risky.
"I'm sure that's confusing," Natasha said gently. "Foster relationships can get a little complicated." Complicated. Everything was so complicated. "What was the thing?"
"Huh?"
"You said a thing happened with them. What was the thing?"
"Oh." Bobbi took a brief second to weigh the benefits and drawbacks of sharing this story with Natasha, then decided it was safe to tell. She had already told Mack and Hunter anyways. "Well, I think Skye got in trouble for something. I'm not sure what, but Phil and May had a talk with her, I guess. Nothing bad happened, but it made Jemma all worried, and she was about two steps away from totally freaking out in the car. I did my best to help her out, but she seemed really upset. I guess I had just never seen her like that. I'd never seen Phil give someone a talking to before, either. It was just kind of weird."
Natasha pursed her lips thoughtfully. It was a minute before she spoke.
"I'm sure you did a great job with her. She probably appreciated having someone nice be there with her while she was scared. She's in middle school, right?" Bobbi confirmed with a nod. Natasha rolled her pencil back and forth across her desk with a single, slender finger and took breath before continuing.
"I don't want to speculate or anything, but it's possible that the two of them have had some bad experiences with getting in trouble before. Being foster kids, and all. Some parents don't really understand the line between discipline and straight-up abuse." Abuse. Abuse. Abuse. Was what he did abuse? That was such a harsh sounding word for someone who was supposed to be her father.
Bobbi swallowed hard. Her fingers twitched again, hard, and she let herself start to twirl her pen between her fingers. Something in her chest started to feel tight, like a spiderweb was building up over her lungs. A swarm of bees was filling up her veins. The lights were too bright, and she wanted something better to twirl than a ballpoint pen. She wanted her batons. She wanted to run. The conversation was veering dangerously close to a place where Bobbi did not want it to go.
"That's a good point," she croaked. Her voice had stopped working for some reason.
"I mean, I don't know that for sure or anything," Natasha said quickly. "It's just possible that it was like, a trigger for Jemma or something. But it sounds like you did a good job helping her out." Bobbi just shrugged. She wasn't sure how she felt about being praised for getting Jemma to recite DNA sequences to keep her from hyperventilating.
"What did you do?" Natasha asked. "To help calm her down, I mean." Bobbi told her about the DNA thing, and the corners of Natasha's mouth twitched up into the kind of smile that was holding back a laugh.
"She just really like biology and lists and stuff like that," Bobbi tried to explain. She didn't want Natasha thinking that Jemma was an oddball. "I just tried to distract her with stuff she likes."
"I think it sounds genius." Natasha smiled for real and reached out a hand like she was going to rest it on Bobbi's arm reassuringly. Bobbi shifted her arm quickly, but casually enough to not draw attention to the fact that she was avoiding Natasha's touch. If she noticed, Natasha didn't comment on the behavior, which Bobbi was grateful for. It wasn't anything personal, but Bobbi still felt like she was buzzing inside and she was afraid that if someone touched her, even someone she mostly trusted, like Natasha, she might actually burst into flames.
"Hey, you know what?" Natasha said suddenly, diving down into her backpack and rummaging around. "I think I have something your sister-cousin-whatever you want to call her might like." She emerged with an assortment of colored beads and a string clutched in her fist. Bobbi raised an eyebrow in curiosity.
"We had an exam in AP Bio today, and Mrs. Diaz always gives us goofy little crafts and puzzles and stuff to do if we finish early. This was supposed to be DNA double helix bracelet, but I'm not exactly the crafty type." She tipped the beads and string onto Bobbi's desk, the plastic making a sound like hail as it cascaded down in front of her. She cupped her hands around the beads to keep them from rolling off of the desktop.
"I think you're supposed to string the different colors on in the right order, and then loop and twist the strong so it looks like a double helix or something." Natasha shrugged sheepishly and Bobbi felt herself smile. The buzzy feeling was starting to subside, and her breaths didn't feel quite so sharp in her ribs. Whatever had come over her was passing, thankfully.
"They've got the little letters on them," Bobbi noticed, turning the beads over and inspecting them. "A's, T's, G's, and C's. Jemma's going to love this. Thank you."
"No problem," Natasha grinned. "I was honestly just going to string it together however and give it to Clint. Maybe make him wear it in his hair like a padawan braid. But this is way better." Bobbi laughed at the idea of Clint wearing a string of beads in his hair like a Star Wars character. Some people could pull that look off, but she didn't think Clint was one of them.
"I guess it might make him look a little like Anakin in Attack of the Clones," Bobbi mused. "They have kind of similar hairstyles."
"I don't know if I'd call 'short and blonde' a true hairstyle," Natasha laughed. "Although Clint would probably tell me that I'm wrong. He's very sensitive about his hair."
Mrs. Duvall returned then, weighed down with a hefty stack of freshly copied worksheets, so the girls' conversation was brought to an end until the bell signaled the end of class. Natasha waited patiently for Bobbi to get to her feet and navigate the desks and chairs on her crutches, and as they stepped out into the hall, Bobbi felt a surge of confidence.
"Hey, Natasha?"
"Yeah?"
"Hunter asked me to text him my address for the game tonight, but I don't exactly have a phone right now, or his number. Do you think you could let him know?"
"Definitely." Natasha pulled out her own phone and sent her fingers flying across the screen. "I'll just text Clint. They'll see each other at practice, and he can tell Hunter. What's the address?"
Bobbi told her, and was amazed at how easy the conversation had been. She had gotten herself worked up for nothing. That was another one of her dad's favorite criticisms of her – if she wasn't acting like a robot, she was being too emotional. It was basically impossible to please him, which is why Bobbi had resorted to expressing as little of her thoughts and feelings around him as she could. She was starting to see that wasn't the case with the new people in her life, however, and she found herself almost exhilarated at the success she'd had by opening up to people. No, not people. Her friends.
"We'll see you later on tonight," Natasha said as she started to part ways with Bobbi in the hall. "I'm glad you're coming. It's going to be fun!"
Thank you all so much for continuing to read and review! I'm so grateful for you all :)