"I take my grades very seriously and you're the lazy asshole who asks a ton of off-topic questions to distract the professor and I might be a foot shorter than you but I swear to god I'll fight you AU + skimmons please! :)"

WE DESERVE FLUFF AFTER THAT FINALE

disclaimed

...

Jemma's not one for fighting, but she's willing and able to fight the girl that sits in the back row of her lecture and asks ridiculously off topic questions.

Completely willing.

Because unlike some people, Jemma actually cares about her grades, and the off topic wandering that the professor would commence on once the girl asked her asinine questions would take up most of the class period and Jemma had very few relevant notes, though, god help her, she took notes on everything that Professor Coulson said.

So—Fitz has tried to talk her out of this.

But Fitz isn't here right now, and what he doesn't know won't hurt him.

Jemma's settled outside the lecture hall, sitting on the ground, legs stretched out in front of her and crossed neatly. The girl always shows up late for this class, Jemma knows, from the amount of times she's heard the large oak doors creaking open, fifteen minutes after the lecture's begun.

And, like clockwork, the girl walks up slowly, extremely large coffee cup in one hand and phone in the other, her eyes never leaving the screen.

"You," Jemma hisses, scrambling to her feet.

"Me?" the girl raises her eyebrows, looking up finally, and Jemma thinks that she recognizes her, from the way that her lips quirk up around the edge of the cup as she takes a sip.

"Yes, you," Jemma frowns, planting her hands on her hips. "You're the one that always leads the class astray."

The girl takes another unimpressed sip. Jemma glances down and realizes that the reason that she's being forced to look up is because of the girl's actually very cute but very high wedge boots.

"Take those off," she demands, gesturing to the girl's feet. "You're too tall."

The girl looks down. "My shoes?" She looks up again, eyes bright with amusement. Jemma's heart flutters a little and she struggles to remain righteously angry.

Jemma huffs, "You're extremely tall compared to me right now and it's making it rather hard for me to fight you in defense of my grades." The girl breaks out into a grin and Jemma loses her train of thought for a moment.

"Okay," the girl folds. "Hold this for a sec?" She holds out her coffee cup and Jemma takes it carefully, watching in near shock as the girl toes off her shoes, shrinking several inches. She's actually not that much taller than Jemma at all. "Better?"

She's really very attractive. Jemma's not sure how's she managed to never see her around campus before.

"I—," Jemma starts, losing her train of thought when the girl flicks her hair back, catching the light. The girl cocks her head. Jemma remembers that she's supposed to be angry, and in response, she shoves the coffee back into the girl's hands. "It's extremely—it's rude, really! And disrespectful and some of us care about our grades—."

"You're Jemma Simmons, right?" the girl interrupts, unfazed by Jemma's speech. Jemma nods shortly. "You're friends with Bobbi?" She nods again. The girl grins again, wide and bright. "I'm Skye, her roommate," she introduces. "And I'm sorry that I'm throwing off your groove."

Jemma's anger fades quickly. She's heard about Skye before, yes—Bobbi's mentioned her quite a bit, but Jemma'd never had the chance to meet her yet. And now—now she must sound awful. "Ah—," Jemma stutters, crossing her arms nervously. "I'm sorry about my outburst."

"No!" Skye rushes to say. "It's my fault, honestly. I really am kind of disrespectful in class and I'm really sorry about that—."

"Oh, no, I just overreacted—we're still covering all the course material—."

They both stop speaking, looking at one another for a long moment before Jemma starts to giggle. Skye joins her soon after, and Jemma manages to say, "This is ridiculous."

"Yeah," Skye agrees. "This isn't exactly how I planned on meeting you."

That is…not the sentence that Jemma expected.

"Really? Why's that?"

"I—uh." It's kind of adorable to see Skye's cheeks pink. She twists a lock of her hair, nervous, and Jemma's heart pumps out a double beat. "I've—uh—been sort of trying to work up the nerve to ask you out."

Jemma stares. Honestly, she really can't help it. This wasn't at all where she thought this conversation would go when she began it, but she can't help but be pleased with the outcome.

"Well ask," she finds herself saying, arms coming to rest at her sides, hands open. She smiles when Skye looks up, surprised. "You can't very well know the answer if you never even try."

Skye grins again. Jemma thinks she could get used to that.

"Do you—?"

"Yes."

/

(so maybe she didn't get what she was expecting out of the confrontation. weeks later, with skye falling asleep against her, jemma thinks that irrelevant notes are a worthy sacrifice)