I think that some connections don't take time. Sometimes, just being around someone can pull you closer. You know each other without even trying; you trust each other without having to test it. That's how me and Kat were: we just connected. During school we didn't really talk, though. I was with Cordelia and Kara, she was with some of the more "punk" girls who were here as a last resort before military school. But when we got back to the room at night, we were together. Kat's parents were very well off, and had purchased her a large TV for the dorm. They'd also thrown in a Playstation. Most nights we'd end up playing Tekken or some skateboarding game. Kat loved the more competition games: button-mashers, she called them. Fighting, sports, sometimes racing. I'd never been much in favor of video games, but slowly I got into them. She showed me how everything worked, which buttons did what and what happened when they mixed, before we played any game. I liked that. I wanted to know those things. When we played a new game, Kat wouldn't even glance at the directions. She liked to just put the game in, press play, push buttons and see what happened. I would watch her for an hour or two, just watching her fingers click at rapid speeds and her eyes glaze over as she watched cars explode on the screen.
"3 K.O.! I win again!" She yelled, throwing the controller towards Paulie's bed.
"I can never get the hang of this." I shook my head and set the controller down on the bed gingerly.
"Its because you insist on being the Panda. I taught you the moves for the other dude."
"But I like the Panda!" She laughed and I smiled.
"Crazy." She clicked her tongue. "But a cute kinda crazy."
Her wink made me blush furiously. I ducked my head, then felt her fingers brushing against my hair. They were twitching slightly.
"You'd look really cool with highlights, Mouse." her voice was quiet and her eyes insistent.
"Really?"
"Yeah. I could get my parents to send me some bleach, I was thinking of doing my hair again." She shook out her brown locks.
"Your hair was blonde?"
"For forever. I liked it better blonde, but it looked a little too 'rocker chick' for my parent's liking, so I dyed it back to boring brown."
"I…I like it that color. It's not boring."
"What is it then?"
"It's…it's the color of soil, right after a freeze when its getting sun."
For a moment she just stared into my eyes, a smile spreading across her face like the sun rising on the horizon. Then she burst out laughing.
"You just compared my hair to dirt! That's not a good color!" She giggled.
"No, no, I'm a gardener: dirt is good!"
"Dirt is good…" She repeated, her laughing subdued. "Dirt is good."