The Adventures of Super Jock and Awkward Girl
A/N ~ If anyone else does that thing where you associate songs with ships and characters please message me your ASOIAF/Jaime-and-Brienne playlist, and I'll share mine. My playlists just keep growing and growing and I'd like it to stay that way.
Disclaimer ~ *unzips face* *George steps out* Hello! *unzips face again* *I step out* *whispers* I am not George Martin.
Coming Up… Jaime judges Brienne's taste in music, Selwyn Tarth approves, Brienne however does not, and will their homework ever get completed? Find out in The Adventures of Super Jock and Awkward girl!
20.Just Friends (And That Might Be A Stretch)
The Tarth house was nicer than he'd thought it would be.
In front of the door was a staircase leading to whatever, a side door to the living room and the spacious, green-and-white tiled kitchen. Brienne was trailing in, face red, glaring at her father and at Jaime, and Jaime was just grinning, because he knew he was an idiot. But hell. He'd just gotten his hand back. He wasn't going to deny himself the simpler things in life. (Like humiliating Brienne Tarth.) (Because really, her dad was doing it all for him.) After Selwyn Tarth, who seemed so much friendlier than his daughter, had shown him around to the living room and then disappeared back into the kitchen to reheat the lasagne he'd made, Brienne gave him the most hopeless and furious look he had ever seen on a person. He flopped down on the corduroy corner sofa and stretched his hand out.
"Jaime! What do you think you're doing?!" She hissed, exasperated and slightly panicky.
"I don't think anything, I just know I'm making myself comfortable. Just visiting a – no, we're not friends – ally? Do people still use that word? Science partner. Fellow footballer. Your father seems nice." He corrected pleasantly.
"That's not what I mean! Jaime! You have to leave, I don't…" She faltered.
He wasn't quite sure why this was so amusing to him. (Perhaps somewhere, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep down he just wanted to make sure everything was okay after his outburst.) (Or perhaps he was just a bigger dick than he realized.) (Perhaps he really didn't want to think about it anymore.) His eyes snagged on a picture of Selwyn, clearly decades younger, with his arm around a laughing blonde woman, who wasn't exactly pretty, but was hardly anything like her daughter. "Is that your mother?" Jaime asked, momentarily subdued. Tywin didn't keep any pictures of Joanna out. To see them, he or Cersei or Tyrion would have to go digging around the attic, or the basement. He didn't know why the subject of other poor, sad half-orphans still drew him in.
"Yes – it is." Brienne stared down at her feet on the carpet, absently kicking off one trainer with the toe of the other. Jaime nodded his condolences, and they both sat in silence. Jaime loathed not being able to kick off the settled dust of the dead mother. He was always the icebreaker. He couldn't do serious talk. He did crazy talk and loud faces.
He inwardly kicked himself for bringing it up. Stupid idiot.
"Do you want to have a look at the homework old Tully set us?" He tried half-heartedly.
Brienne nodded. "I think that would be… a good idea."
He then remembered he'd left his bag in the car with Chataya. "Do you have the homework old Tully set us?"
"Yes – just a moment – " She disappeared into the hallway for a second and returned rifling through her bag, sitting down on the sofa. Jaime glanced disinterestedly as she fished out various notebooks and piled them beside her, an empty Tupperware with the remains of a pasta salad. He immediately latched onto the iPod she set aside on her quest for the study book. There had not been enough laughter in this conversation by far – and Cersei always said you could tell a person by the music they listened to.
If that was true, Jaime snorted when he started rifling through her playlists.
Just as she'd found the homework and was refilling her bag, alerted by his sudden amusement, she glanced up and then her gaze turned dark, and so did the faint redness left in her face. "Jaime – Jaime – give it back."
He spluttered laughter. "Why in the name of the seven hells have you got Whitney Houston on here?"
"Because –" Brienne said, grabbing unsuccessfully for the device. "- She's a good singer – give it back to me."
"'Walking Dead soundtrack, interesting, Angels by Robbie fucking Williams, woman, you have appalling taste –"
"Jaime – this isn't funny, give that back to me!"
He squirmed further across the sofa, holding it up in the air. "Coldplay, boring, Sierra Boggess, don't know who that is – Brienne," He laughed. "What in God's name is Viking Skull?"
She snatched again for it, and Jaime leant back so far he toppled over the arm of the couch, and then crawled backward, still laughing, before he relented and tossed it back to her. She glared sullenly at him before shoving the iPod quickly back into the front zip of her bag, though he could have almost sworn she was trying not to smile. "Homework, Lannister."
"Boring! I want to see what else you listen to." He grinned, just to spite her further. "Brienne Tarth, you're a ballad girl. Ballads and thrash metal, apparently."
"Be quiet," Brienne shot, witheringly.
It was almost painful to think that just a few days ago he was shouting those things, through the rain, and he never wanted to see her again, she conjured up such a guilt and a hate inside of him. Maybe it was just the sudden return of his hand to him, or maybe it was something else, but he didn't want to bring it up, even in thought. He just wanted to be right now, and… not think of anything else. Just homework.
(You know what?)
(Maybe they were friends.)
Jaime, realizing he was still on the floor, grabbed at a shelf to pull himself up, relishing the feel of wood in his palm and not irritatingly against a cast and-or sling, and felt it slip in his hand. Brienne was on her feet and shoving him aside in seconds. "The second shelf's loose, you just – it's fine," Minimal damage done. He hoped. Oh well.
(This was the discomfiting thing about being around Brienne.) (Around anyone else he didn't have to give a damn about whatever the fuck he did or whatever the fuck he said.) (And not just because I'm Jaime fucking Lannister.) (Because he could trust his looks to carry him through.) (But apparently Brienne didn't really give a shit that he was the hottest guy in Westeros High.) (Well.) (After Rhaegar.) (By a smidge.) (And Rhaegar had Lyanna anyway, and everyone was terrified of Lyanna, as well they should be, so really it all fell down to him.) (He was more talkative and cool and hence more attractive than Rhaegar anyway.)
Turns out he'd just caused the shelf to go a little lopsided, and Brienne fixed that immediately. A few DVD boxes had come down, and so he decided to make himself useful and pick them up. Box sets, actually. Heroes. He replaced them a little sheepishly. "My bad, I guess." He smiled. It was weird and foreign to him, the concept of things being fragile or faulty. Everything around the Lannister house was functional and absurdly expensive.
"It's fine, I don't – it's fine." She stood there, awkwardly focusing on the books and films crammed into the shelving unit.
He sighed, and gave in to his stupid fucking evolved mind. "Look, Brienne, I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I kissed you and then I ignored you and then I shouted at you and then – ignored you, again. We can't be anything more than science partners, I was just very tired, bored, the fresh air was doing weird things to my head. So… What do you say we put aside our false truces and start again, all behind us. Just friends?"
Brienne regained that look she always wore when addressed directly. "You're not joking." She managed, after a long while.
It wasn't a question, but he answered anyway. "I'm not joking. All preconceived ideas behind us… Friends?" She hesitated still. "Oh, come on, nobody in the whole world has ever turned down an opportunity to befriend Jaime fucking Lannister before, don't be the first. I'm doing a nice thing here. I don't actually think I've ever said sorry and meant it in a non-sarcastic way before."
She nodded. "Friends."
Jaime felt a smile settle in amongst his features. "And I mean, that might be a stretch."
Brienne elbowed him and Selwyn Tarth came back into the room. "Right, lasagne'll be done in a sec, Jaime – is it? – if you're staying."
Jaime drew out his phone. No messages. Surprisingly little time had passed. If felt so good to be able to use his proper hand to type now, rather than stabbing crudely away with his left lump. "Well," He grinned, taking care to look Brienne directly in the eye. (He knew that made her uncomfortable.) (This was punishment.) (For what, he didn't know.) "I did tell my folks I'd be home to eat." Brienne's face didn't change, but he still allowed a pause long enough to give her cause for whatever relief she might have felt. "But since we are such good friends, I'm sure they'll understand." Tywin wouldn't be home yet anyway. Cersei would only insult whatever he was wearing and then rant absurdly loud on the phone to her stupid friends. Tyrion wouldn't care either way. He opened messaging and send a quick text to Chataya, letting him know he was eating elsewhere.
He didn't say a friends.
(They might have been friends now. But if word got back to his other friends, he'd never be anyone's friend ever again.)
Selwyn asked if they wanted to eat wherever they were doing homework – supposedly. Jaime doubted that homework would ever get done. – but before Brienne could reply, he'd swooped in all polite and un-Jaime, and said that they'd eat with him. Brienne would probably not be his friend for long at this rate, but it was too priceless an opportunity to miss.
"So, Jaime," Selwyn started, serving him a particularly large portion. "You're on the football team as well, I hear?"
"Yeah, well, I'm on the guy's team. Quarterback." He smiled accommodatingly, shovelling a forkful of lasagne into his mouth. It was actually alright-tasting. "This is amazing, by the way, Mr Tarth."
"Please, call me Selwyn. Thank you. I used to play some myself, in college, before I hurt my ankle. The ankle got better but I'd lost the passion for it." Jaime nodded as if he were interested. Brienne kicked him under the table, but not hard. He ignored her.
"Ah. I broke my hand a few months ago, playing a match." And on the same day I yelled at your daughter because I thought she stole my uniform. "Just got the cast off today." He held up the elastic bandage support around his hand and wrist as proof.
Selwyn made the polite concerned noises. "Brienne said. I'm not sure if you'll remember but I told her to go and visit you while you were in the hospital. She tried to refuse, didn't you, Brienne, try to refuse? But I said to her, you play for the same side, it's only right."
"I'm glad you did, it was a wonderful surprise." I insulted her and then we bonded over failed attempts by our parents – aka you – to set us up on dates. "She said you encourage her to be with people more, and you should. I'm always saying she should."
"Are you?" Selwyn Tarth nodded, seemingly pleased to have found a common topic, if at the expense of his daughter, who was right now staring, scarlet, into her lasagne, very fascinated by her plate. Selwyn raised his fork toward her. "See, she's a great kid, she just doesn't want to socialize, it's always sitting in her room, reading this or on her laptop, or at the gym, where god forbid she interact with anybody. I don't know how she does it."
"Well, we're great friends." Jaime grinned, absurdly proud of what a prat he was, and nudged Brienne. "And I like to think I'm bringing her into the world a little."
Brienne kicked him under the table again, sharper this time. He barely restrained a whiney oww, and he had to shrug it off quickly when her father asked what he'd said. If Brienne had any sense of humour to speak of, she would've laughed. She would've.
"Good, I'm glad. Are you friends with the others, too?" He turned to Brienne. "Hyle and… the little one, with the stutter?"
"Podrick." Brienne told her fork.
"Podrick. Until now, they're the only people I've ever seen! Very private, Brienne is."
"Dad, I have other friends." Brienne protested, still not gracing either Jaime nor Selwyn with, god forbid, eye contact. No you don't. Jaime almost put in. He had to bite his tongue not to, but it was worth it, he was almost certain, making Brienne Tarth's father like him more than Brienne Tarth herself actually did. The funniest part was, that Selwyn looked as amused as Jaime was sure he did.
"Who?" Jaime asked, genuinely intrigued, at the same time Selwyn Tarth inquired the exact same thing.
Brienne looked almost more offended than hurt. She faltered. "I – I – Catelyn – Catelyn Tully!" She finally came up with, triumphant.
Jaime would have laughed, except after a moment he could very nearly see the possibility. Selwyn Tarth frowned. "The redhead you waited at the gates with a couple of times?" Oh. There was an interesting development. Truth be told, Catelyn Tully was not exactly cool at core. She was liked well by most at Westeros High, but not because she was a cheerleader – she was not – and not because she could spread gossip like wildfire – which she couldn't – and not because she had dated Brandon Stark – which she had – but because she was actually a genuinely nice person. It had often perplexed Jaime, that Catelyn was quick to defend but… Nice. And that she had somehow not abandoned her morality or believe system and yet had wormed her way into becoming one of the most prominent populars.
"How do you know Catelyn Tully?" Jaime wanted to know, really quite amusedly gripped by this point.
Brienne blushed furiously at him. "We work together in Medieval Literature."
"You take Medieval Literature?" Jaime snorted incredulously. Helpfully enough, Selwyn didn't really seem to notice anything past medieval literature.
"Oh, yes, Brienne's actually been getting straight As in Med Lit for – how long is it not, Bri?" Brienne made a mumbly sound that appeared to have been some variation of three months. "Three months." He repeated, chasing a scrap of cheese around his plate. "It's one of the few things she doesn't shut up about. She's very excited to go study it at Kings Landing. We're told they have an excellent programme."
Jaime would have made some remark that she ought to be able to speak for herself, but in Brienne's case, she probably actually couldn't. It was weird, that he'd spent so long worrying about Brienne and he never even knew what the fuck she studied. "They do, I've heard, in almost everything. I cannot wait."
He waited for Selwyn's reaction with all the chuffed anticipation Brienne waited with the opposite emotions for. "Oh, Brienne, you didn't tell me any of your friends were going to Kings Landing College!"
"I did, Dad, I said Hyle was studying…" She trailed off when it became evident nobody was listening.
"Jaime, I've heard their student accommodations are wonderful. Would you be staying on campus or renting a place? We were a tad unsure of the student loans, but really, we're sending Bri to Kings Landing, so really we're throwing caution to the wind money-wise anyway."
He would have contributed something more than an awkward nod, but he could hardly make his whole Lannisters are reared for perfection, Jaime fucking Lannister speech without insulting somebody. He didn't need any student loans, thanks to Daddy's business. And that was with two of them going. (Sometimes Jaime wondered if Tywin cursed Joanna for giving him twins.) (Gods knew Jaime did.) He also noticed how Selwyn referred to himself as we. He wondered if the we was Selwyn and Brienne, Selwyn and whatever possible girlfriend he might have, or, the more heartbreaking and pathetic, Selwyn and his dead wife.
"Dad." Brienne muttered, and he sort of got the point.
"Jaime… Lannister, did you say it was? Your father wouldn't be Tywin Lannister, of West Rock Industries?"
Jaime wasn't so certain if that was a good thing or a bad thing, so it was neutrally and slightly concerned that he replied, "…Yes."
"Oh, I know him. Knew him, briefly enough. Good man." He paused. "Business man. I was an intern at the company headquarters when he was just beginning to rise there. Deputy of the whole corporation now, isn't he?"
"He is," Jaime confirmed. "I didn't know you came from Casterly Rock."
"Oh, we don't." Selwyn shook his head, dabbing at his face with a tissue. "I'm originally from Evenfall – little town, on a little island – but I moved to the mainland and to Casterly when I was younger. Big head, big dreams. All of which were deflated when I realized I was stuck getting coffee for Tywin and Joanna and Kevan for two years for a reason. Eventually I went back to Evenfall, settled down, and had Brienne."
Jaime nodded. He'd cut out the dead wife. He wondered what you were meant to say when a sort-of friends' father told you his life story. "Nice… When did you move here, then?"
"We were going to move a while ago, when Bri was little, but I kept putting off. But then I realized, did I really want Bri stuck on the island all her life? She'd never gotten along with the locals' kids. And I wanted her to go to a good school. So we made the move… Nine, ten years ago?"
Brienne nodded. Jaime restrained laughter, and made a mental note to remind her that her father called her Bri. He should definitely start calling her Bri. (If any Brienne was less a Bri than Brienne Tarth, he really didn't know.) "Oh, so sorry, Jaime, Bri, you probably don't want to be hearing about dull old me. But honestly," Selwyn lowered his voice and leant minutely across the table to Jaime, as if that would make Brienne oblivious. "With a kid as quiet as this around, you find yourself going to to compensate, fill in the gaps."
Jaime smirked into his plate, scraping the remainder of sauce absently onto his knife. "Are you done? I'll wash up, you two go… Do what you do."
"Jaime probably has to go now, Dad." Brienne protested quickly.
"No I don't,"
"No he doesn't."
Jaime beamed falsely. "Come on, Bri. Let's go do what we do."
Back in the living room, they appeared to be no less close to actually completing that homework than they were before. Brienne looked just about ready to slaughter him, so Jaime went about flicking about his hand and just generally appreciating the fact that it actually served him as it was supposed to now.
"I didn't know my father knew yours." Jaime went on smugly. See, it's only you that can't stand the sigh of me. Truth be told, Jaime had never known his mother and Tywin worked at the West Rock offices together when they were younger. Truth be told, Jaime had never known much about Tywin. He wondered if most parents and children talked like Selwyn Tarth talked to Brienne.
"Jaime, what was that?"
"That was me proving to you that I am a nice person."
"You are not a nice person."
"But you're still my friend."
"Jaime, I –"
"You agreed."
"That's –"
"You can't go back on it now." He paused, and then relented. "It's all light banter, Brienne. I'm still being nice." But I'm so glad you need me to make the distinction for you, though. She didn't seem very convinced, so he went on proving it. "So, little island, apparently?"
"We moved when Galladon left." She confirmed quietly, and then, when her face had not returned to her ordinary skin colour rather than a tomato's skin colour, swallowed and started to say something, before thinking of better of it and staring back down at the carpet. Wow. Don't get between the fun and the Tarth house.
After a long silence, Jaime stood up, stretched. "I'm going to go." Brienne nodded awkwardly and motioned to walk him to the door.
It was leaning in the doorway, questioning himself in Brienne Tarth's astonishing eyes that he realized this was a good note to leave it on. Friends. They could be friends, however uneasily. He nodded. "Tell your dad thanks for the dinner." He paused. "And whatever you do, please, by all the seven fucking hells, do not tell Lyanna Stark we had a meal together."
Brienne looked confused, but Jaime was smiling as he walked away.
A/N ~ If you're lucky and I get extra library time, you may or may not get another update today.