Oh, man. You guys totally surprised me. I didn't think anyone even still looked for She's the Man stuff, (other than me, of course), but I'm glad.
Thanks for all your reviews! XD Like, millions and millions of kudos. As long as you keep pushing me forward, I'll keep writing, so don't be stingy!
"Are you okay, Liv?"
Olivia sighed. No, she was not okay. As much as she wished she could say that she was, she wasn't. Falling in love with someone was supposed to be easy, damn it! Falling in love was supposed to make you smile so much your face hurt and give you a heart attack every time you saw your significant other! The pretty blonde princess met her handsome, charming prince and they rode off into the sunset to live happily ever after--wasn't that how it worked?
Apparently, Disney had been lying to her all those years, because that's not how falling in love was at all.
In fact, it was so different that the pretty blonde princess closed her eyes and allowed her head to fall to the wooden floor beneath her, connecting with a solid, satisfactory thunk. Parts of it were true, she supposed, because she did smile very often in Viola's presence and it did feel like her heart was going to beat out of her chest every time the other girl smiled--but it was sadly noted that Disney must have left a few things out. Like how there was this gnawing sense of guilt deep within her every time she caught her breath. Like how falling in love sometimes entailed throwing yourself head over heels for girls who dress like their brothers so they can play soccer, and how sometimes it included believing that you could just transfer all of those feelings over to their brothers when, in reality, they were nothing like the girls you fell in love with in the first place.
Considering that, she was fairly certain she was in need of a Fairy Godmother. "Where's Paul when you need him?"
Taking a breath, she attempted to rewind her brain into vacuuming the thoughtless comment back in. It wasn't like it was Paul's fault that she was in love with his best friend. It was Viola's fault, but Olivia's mind had already made it very clear that she couldn't blame her for it. As much as she had wanted to yell and scream at her after she had taken off that wig and came clean, nothing could be done. Maybe it was the sincerity in her words--or maybe in her eyes--or maybe it was just because she was so far in love with her, but she couldn't blame her for it. And, truthfully, sometimes that hurt more than anything.
But she couldn't just lay there forever. Viola would come back sometime and notice her there, her forehead pressed to the ground, knees drawn up like she was about to lose what little lunch she'd eaten, and she desperately did not want the other girl to see her that way. It would only make her ask more questions, and more questions meant more answers, and more answers meant more feelings, and she knew all too well that more feelings were bad to think about whenever Viola was around.
So, with that in mind, the blonde reluctantly picked herself up. "She wasn't down there anyway."
Though, did it really take three and a half minutes to decipher that a kitten wasn't under a bed? Viola had run off to check the stairs and the hallway after they realized that Skye had gone missing, but Olivia simply dropped to her knees and checked for her in the first place she knew she wanted to go: a nice, dark, quiet place to hide away from the world. Although, taking a personal moment, laying there for an extra three minutes and fifteen seconds, was not a part of looking for Viola's kitten; it was a part of trying to keep herself from crawling down there herself and never coming out--which was a really tough thing to do.
Standing, Olivia glanced around the room. There were no obvious hiding spots as far as she could see. Where else would she have gone if she was a kitten? In the hallway, of course. Out the door and far, far away from all the tension. Why not?
As she took the first step, a crash from downstairs launched her into a sprint, and she all but threw herself out of Viola's bedroom and at the second-story railing. Before she could make a sound, the brunette below, whom Olivia could only assume was the cause of the crash, cursed loudly to herself. Hands tight around the polished wood, she leaned out as far as she could in an attempt to see her.
"Vi?" she called, worried. "Are you okay?"
A tight, "For the moment," served as the only response she got. Though, she was certain she also heard, "Until mom kills me, that is…" as well. After a moment, Olivia realized that the crash must have involved one of the plants Viola had rushed to save, as it had sounded an awful lot like some sort of pottery breaking. It seemed as if Ms. Hastings' begonias were simply doomed for destruction, though the blonde wasn't sure it was really the kitten they had to worry about.
And speaking of the kitten--slinking out of one of the many hall closets, Skye peered up at Olivia curiously.
The Illyrian had to smile to herself. Even though she'd been contemplating digging a hole in the ground to hide in for the rest of her life only moments ago, Viola's little mishap and the kitten's easy appearance had managed to completely change her demeanor. Not for the first time, as she leaned back, away from the rail, she envisioned herself at the local clinic picking up an assortment of prescription drugs for her bipolarity. After all, she did literally just launch herself onto a wooden railing that had absolutely no guarantee of supporting one hundred and sixteen pounds, and she had also just began to chuckle. If the combination of those two things didn't secure her instability, well, then, the world just did not know 'crazy' when it saw it.
Taking a step away from the banister, as, even though it might have sounded like a good escape for a second or so, falling to her death probably wouldn't be too much fun, she turned her eyes down to the kitten, who was now winding its way around her ankles. Olivia grinned. She picked up the kitten and playfully mussed its fur. "You're a little trouble-maker," she teased.
As another muffled curse filtered through the floorboards, the blonde shook her head. "Just like someone else I know."
Only a second later, she decided she might as well go see if the troubled brunette downstairs needed any help. "Lets go find her, huh?" she muttered absently to the kitten, and she began to descend the stairs. Aptly dividing attention between her feet and her hands, she ensured a safe passage downward and also a happy kitty. She reached the bottom a moment later, turning towards the little bit of hallway leading to the first of the Hastings' family rooms, where she had assumed the crash had come from. She stopped short when she caught sight of the predicament the love of her life had managed to get herself into.
Standing in the wreckage that was the remaining dirt and pottery of what was once a meticulously groomed plant, one of her hands effectively buried in a second, surprisingly intact, sconce of begonias, the other hand liberally dirtied as well, Viola appeared rather flustered.
Olivia could only chuckle. How in the world had she managed to do such damage?
At the blonde's laughter, Viola finally glanced up. Flushing, she rose to her feet, quicker than she should have, apparently, as she knocked her head on an overhanging ledge, nearly dislodging another vase, and upsetting a few candles. Of course, she just had to make things worse when Olivia was there to see them, didn't she? After taking a moment to calm herself, she let out a heavy exhale as she fixed the candles. Her mind relentlessly ordered her to play it off as no big deal, and, turning to the other girl, she shrugged, trying to make the situation seem less chaotic. "The plant ate my ring," she offered sheepishly.
The Illyrian in the hallway only shook her head, and her grin never faltered. She truly had fallen for the cutest girl on the planet. She began to walk towards the soccer star slowly, giggling. "It ate your ring?" she asked, dubious, raising a single golden brow.
Viola shrugged. Of course the plant had eaten her ring; it didn't just fall in there by itself. "Yeah," she replied. "Bougainvilleas are hungry things, you know."
Olivia grinned at her misconception. "Begonias, Vi," she corrected her, and the brunette appeared a bit confused. With the confusion easy to pick out, as the two were probably very close to the same thing in the other girl's mind, the blonde continued to clear it up for her. "They're begonias, not bougainvilleas."
Of course they were begonias. If they weren't, then Viola might have been right about something for once in her life, and that just couldn't happen, could it? Again, the twin shrugged, though her uneasiness had grown increasingly apparent. "Yeah, well, you know me," she said wryly. "I was never much for the whole horticulture part of the Junior League."
The blonde frowned. She could hear the agitation lingering below the other girl's words clearly, and she fought a sigh. Why couldn't things just be simple between them? Because she was in love with her, that's why. So, of course, everything just had to be difficult, or it wouldn't be her life. Oh, yes, her life had been simple once, and she was popular, and smart, and pretty, and there was no need to worry about trying to find a boyfriend, because they all literally threw themselves at her feet anyway--and then she just happened to bump into this incredibly charming boy, who asked about her shoes, and who could tell Anthropology from Aeropostale, who she couldn't help but fall for because he was so different than all the other boys, but, for some reason, he wanted nothing to do with her, and then, come to find out only a week later that, really, he wasn't one of the other boys at all; he was a girl dressed like a boy so she could play soccer, and she was very, very straight.
And so came about the not-so-simple-anymore life of Olivia Lennox.
Taking a breath, the Illyrian tried to figure out a way to fix the situation, and, as she set Skye down on one of the cushioned kitchen chairs, where she sprawled out to nap, Olivia attempted a smile. "Well, even so, I think you might have one up on them," she said. "As far as I know, they weren't aware begonias liked to eat rings." And then Viola was grinning at her and all was right in the world. Olivia cheered silently at her success. Now, if she could only keep it running. "How exactly did it manage to get your ring in the first place?" she asked. She crossed her arms and stared pointedly at her (though biting her lip and raising a brow while awaiting her answer was completely unintentional, and she blamed it on her inner girl's incorrigibly flirty nature).
The brunette noticed the subtle cheekiness, but tried her best to ignore it, focusing on the other girl's question. "Well, I was trying to make sure that she"--Viola pointed accusingly at the kitten--"wasn't getting into it, and when I went to move the leaves, it snatched it right off me!" She imitated the swift grabbing motion the plant must have made, grinning. Then, she decided it was only fair for her to have some fun as well, and brandished her dirtiest arm, exaggerating, "I nearly lost my hand!"
Olivia chuckled. "It couldn't have been that bad," she said for the second time that day. She reached to touch the plant's leaves tenderly. "You probably just frightened it." Shaking her head, she lowered herself to her knees, carefully minding the dirt on the floor, and gently separating the lower level stems that burrowed into the soil. Talking about a plant like it was a real person wasn't exactly the weirdest thing she and Viola had been involved in--considering their entire history together--but it was definitely somewhere near the top of the list. However, it didn't bother the blonde. It was only one more thing she got to share with the brunette, and the weirder the better, because that meant that it was really Viola.
A moment later, she realized that said girl had plopped down on the floor next to her and turned to look at her, greeted by a bright smile. Viola was practically beaming. Olivia offered the other girl her own grin, continuing to play in the dirt. Sure, digging into a pot of begonias with her bare hands wasn't very Junior League of her, but as long as her mother didn't know, she decided she was safe. She could only imagine her trying to pin the blame on Viola, and fought rolling her eyes.
Instead, she returned to the task at hand. "See?" she asked the other girl, nodding towards the plant. "It's perfectly fine if you're nice to it." And, after she'd deciphered that the ring was nowhere in the topsoil, she rolled up her sleeve and began to fish around in the lower bits, leaning forward to reach deeper, and sharing a quiet chuckle with the brunette next to her.
And she was just starting to get lost in those mesmerizing eyes, drifting off into those endless pools, thoughts of rings and dirt far from her mind, an involuntary smile just starting to begin--when something pulled her violently from her daydream.
Quickly retracting her arm, she shook it spastically. "Oh, my God, I think I just felt something move in there!"
Dirt had been flung out of the jar at her reaction, but it had missed her for the most part. It did, however still linger on her hand, and the urge to wipe away the lingering slimy sensation that had caused her reaction was powerful, but a moment of thinking and the realization that she'd ruin her favorite pair of anchorblues was stronger. As such, she settled on continuing to shake her hand free of the grossness, an unsettled squirming in her stomach, even as Viola began to chuckle.
The brunette shook her head. "Nah, I'm sure it was just a root or something," she assured the other girl. Though it did, for the most part, look very convincing, the soccer star was sure the blonde was only adding a bit more to their game. Beginning to fish around for herself, as she was already dirty anyway and there was no use in trying to deny it, she made a show of being very gentle as she felt for her ring. She sent the blonde a haughty grin. "Maybe you were too rough--" and the biggest lizard Viola had ever seen in her life crawled its way out of the soil and up her wrist. "AHHH!!"
Olivia screamed as well, if not because of the lizard then because it just felt like the right thing to do at the time.
Freaking out quite a bit more than the Illyrian had, Viola literally flung the slimy creature off of her hand. It sailed out of the potted begonias and into the unknown. She and the blonde beside her backed away from it quickly as it gained its bearings on the floor, both appearing quite horrified. Then, Viola realized that another problem was arising; Skye had woken, and was eyeing the lizard hungrily. Barely able to mutter an "Oh, no," Viola scrambled across the floor in an attempt to catch the kitten, but the feline and the reptile were already skittering off down the hall. "Get her!" she yelled, to no one in particular.
Years of soccer allowed her to catch footing amidst the dirt and she sprinted after the animals, Olivia hot on her tail.
The blonde was slower, but not by much, and she was just closing in on the kitten, quite awkwardly, when Viola, somehow suddenly with an empty jar in her hand--which Olivia expected had lost its innards somewhere along the way--raced past her. They hit a snag between the two of them and the blonde felt herself falling. However, it didn't seem to matter much, as she caught the kitten anyway, wrestling her into her arms, and Viola slammed the jar down on top of the lizard, trapping it.
The Illyrian was just beginning to breathe again when the brunette jumped quickly to her feet.
"Oh, my God!" she cried. "Oh, my God! Ew! I just cut off its tail! Oh, my God! Ew! Ew, ew, ew! It's still moving!"
Olivia laughed breathlessly, watching the brunette dance on the spot with disgust. Such a thing might have seemed out of character for Viola, but the Illyrian had figured out by now that 'the whole dissecting thing' wasn't the only part of biology that freaked her out, and so the entire scene was rather comical. Viola was supposed to be a tomboy, and yet, there she was, cowering away from a lizard--though Olivia would agree that it was a really big lizard. But it was funny. What else she found rather comical was the fact that, sprawled on the ground like she was, she was certain she felt a tear in the knee of her jeans. And so much for not ruining them with dirt either, it seemed, because it was all around them, sooty against her stomach.
The Illyrian pushed herself into a sitting position, still holding tightly to the struggling kitten while Viola tortured herself, hesitantly nudging the jar towards the front door with her foot. It took her nearly a full minute to get it over there, and once she did, she pushed it outside as quickly as she could, whining as she did so, then turning, slamming door, and sliding down in a tired ooze to sit at its base. Olivia chuckled quietly as the kitten in her arms finally managed to get free, racing up the stairs. When Viola finally peeked an eye open, surveying the damage, the Illyrian followed her gaze into the hallway.
She could only agree when Viola muttered, "Mom's gonna kill me."
And I know there wasn't much Viola/Olivia tension going on right there, but I was writing it out without a plan and the lizard part just seemed funny, so I threw it in. But trust me, the tension is coming, along with lots and lots of close calls. Hopefully. If my brain works it right. As always, thanks for reading, and clicky the button!
(In the next chapter, look forward to: uhm… I'm not really sure. Heh. I guess it's a surprise then!)