(Mal)

Reeling her arm back, Mal let the tennis ball fly from her hand and into the air, watching with a wide smile on her face as Dude let out a single bark before chasing after the ball ecstatically. The sound of her own laugh filled the air as the dog struggled to collect the ball as it bounced wildly over the uneven grass, and she found a deeper laugh joining in soon after.

"He's never been the most coordinated dog," Carlos stated as he stepped up by her side, crossing his arms over his chest as they both watched Dude continue his struggle.

"I can't imagine the state of this field helps much," Mal shrugged, smiling when Dude finally got hold of the ball. "Considering everything else in Auradon seems anally perfect, you'd think the field would be completely even and the grass neatly trimmed."

"I'm surprised there isn't a design cut into the grass," Carlos replied with a shrug of his own, his brown eyes lighting up with amusement when another laugh escaped Mal's lips. "Would you be surprised?"

Mal shook her head after considering it for only a brief second. "Not really, no. I think the only question is: would it be of the school crest, or Beast's face?"

Carlos' head tilted back with his laughter. "That's a great question. Probably Beast's face, though. He's always seemed pretty fond of himself."

"That would be really creepy," Mal laughed, crouching down to scratch Dude's ears when he returned to drop the ball proudly at her feet. "Can you imagine? Beast's face smiling out at you with a ridiculous thumbs up, reminding us to 'do good'."

"Sounds like every day on the Isle," Carlos announced, leaning down to grab the ball.

Dude hopped around delightedly, jumping up Carlos' leg before taking off without the ball needing to be thrown. Mal arched her eyebrow as she looked up at Carlos, and the boy just shrugged, a crooked smile gracing his features as he took off after his dog. Shaking her head in amusement, Mal lowered herself to the ground, stretching her legs out in front of her as she watched Carlos and Dude chase each other, finding the sight comical.

She couldn't help but laugh as she watched the two running around the field, and she found herself wondering why she had waited so long to spend more time with Carlos, the boy easily being her best friend – if she were to use the term she heard often from people in Auradon. However, when the last thing he said fully registered in her mind her laugh fell short as her mind started working more than it probably should. Sounds like every day on the Isle. She had never really thought about how Carlos' life had been on the Isle, and now she found herself wondering how the boy had fared before ending up in Auradon. Recalling everything he had told her about his mother the first time they had truly conversed, she figured it hadn't been the best life as Cruella de Vil's son, and it only took a moment of thinking about it for her to realize that Carlos had been treated like a dog by his mother. We have another thing in common, then, she thought with a dry laugh. That wasn't the thing Mal wanted the boy to have in common with her, and she wished he could have had a better childhood because he deserved more than what his mother had given him; but it didn't matter anymore anyway because the Isle was in his past, he was in Auradon's luxury now. Is it truly luxury, though? She might never know. There were great things about Auradon, but there also seemed to be just as many terrible aspects between the arrogant princes and princesses, the distaste for anything differing from the stories told, and the expectations.

The last one was the most challenging, Mal found, because all the closed minds made her feel as though she wasn't allowed to find and be herself if who she was didn't fit into Auradon's high expectations. Everyone was supposed to be good, supposed to be a hero, she was supposed to be good, but she knew it was something she simply couldn't do, not every moment of every day. She enjoyed doing things that Auradon frowned upon, she couldn't stop her anger from taking over her sometimes, and she certainly couldn't force herself to be interested in things she wasn't. The extent of the rules she broke varied, going anywhere from finding interest in her own gender to killing people, and she couldn't change any of it, yet Auradon would press her until she did.

Everyone was expected to be a perfect mold of their parents, and everyone played so perfectly into that expectation that it made Mal wonder if people could truly differ from those that raised them, or if they were trapped for life. Maybe that's why I can't be good, she thought, the idea that she was exactly like her mother finding its way back into the front of her mind. Even if she did something good, there was always something evil slid into it as well, almost as if she couldn't fully be one or the other, like she was cursed to be hopelessly stuck between the two.

"Man, I swear Dude never tires," Carlos huffed as he dropped to the ground next to her, laying down on the grass as he breathed heavily in attempt to regain steady breathing.

She opened her mouth to respond, but found something else entirely finding its way from her mouth. "Do you think we can be different than our parents?"

Seeming to sense the sincerity to her question, Carlos sat up, bracing his weight on his arms as he crossed his legs in front of both of their bodies. Brown eyes studied her carefully, but she kept her gaze on Dude as he continued running around the field without his owner, not ready to see what emotion ran through his eyes.

"At his coronation, Ben told us that our parents had made their choice to be evil, and that we got to make our own, that our parents' choices didn't affect what was in our hearts unless we let them," Carlos recalled the memory, and Mal could tell that it had been the moment that had changed everything for them. "I believe we get to make our own choices in who we want to be, and I don't think who our parents are changes that. Not even if that parent is the Mistress of All Evil."

Mal's chest tightened in panic at the last piece, the air disappearing from her lungs and her heart leaping into her throat with the knowledge that Carlos knew who her mother was. It can't just be a coincidence that he mentioned Maleficent specifically. There's no way. But everything inside her prayed that it had been nothing more than a coincidence, that Carlos had only mentioned her because she was the worst villain of all. However, she wasn't stupid enough to convince herself it was the truth.

"How long?" Mal choked out, the two words making up the hardest question she had ever had to ask.

Carlos merely shrugged. "A while."

Feeling as though her world was crashing down around her she pulled her knees to her chest and hugged them tightly, resting her chin on top of them as she stared out into the distance without really seeing what was in front of her. Who else knows? She worried that everyone did, that it was the reason they had all watched her with caution as she joined the gathering crowd for the tourney game that afternoon, that it was why nobody had been surprised when she had lashed out on the pink princess. And this time – with no other worry to distract her – she felt her eyes filling with tears as the feeling overwhelmed her, making it impossible for her to believe anything else. I'm just as bad as my mother. She didn't want to feel this way, but there seemed to be nothing she could say to herself to talk herself out of believing it. I'm a monster.

"Hey," Carlos' gentle voice broke through her mind, his touch dragging her further into reality as his hand came to rest on her lower-back. "If your mother being Maleficent changed anything I would have stopped hanging out with you a long time ago. I know what you're going through, okay, and you are not your mother, don't let her choices control your own."

Closing her eyes and letting Carlos' words echo through her mind, Mal inhaled deeply, finding that the tears didn't fall, the comfort of the boy's touch keeping her anchored to the world. Don't let her choices control your own. No, she wouldn't, she would make her own choices without worrying what was good and what was evil because those things didn't matter to her. Good and evil are only ideas that are meant to control people, to make those who don't always make the right choices feel like less than those who strive for the greater good. None of it mattered. She had managed to make incredible friends despite not fitting perfectly into one side of the spectrum, and she didn't regret that she didn't fit. The day she gave into the expectations and stereotypes of Auradon would be the day she had truly lost herself. She knew she wasn't the best person, but she also knew she wasn't the worst, and it was only just now that she realized that she wouldn't change anything about herself to please others; it was only just now that Mal realized that she liked who she was. She wasn't going to pretend she was a hero when she wasn't; she wasn't going to act like a villain when she wasn't; she wasn't going to pretend to be interested in boys when it was Evie she wanted; she wasn't going to pretend she had perfect control over herself when no one truly did. She wasn't going to pretend she was the things she wasn't simply because Auradon didn't understand that not everyone could be crammed into an overlying characterization.

Before she could tell herself that it was a terrible idea, Mal pulled out of the ball she had curled herself into and wrapped her arms around Carlos instead, pulling the boy closer to her when she felt his strong arms find their way around her waist hesitantly. When Carlos laughed awkwardly, Mal couldn't help but smile at the sound, realizing that she was hugging people too often lately; and Carlos seemed to realize the same thing.

"Where did this come from?" Carlos questioned playfully, letting his chin rest on Mal's shoulder. "You weren't this affectionate when we first met. What did Evie do to you, girl?"

With the mention of the blue-haired princess, Mal's body stiffened where it usually relaxed, and she quickly pulled away from the boy, attempting to shut that part of her mind off before it could overwhelm her. "I don't know."

She hadn't thought about Evie since she had knocked on Carlos' door for a distraction, but now that the boy had mentioned her she couldn't stop the beautiful girl from invading her mind, the pain from the realization she had made this afternoon returning as well. The fear and horror mixing in red-brown eyes after Evie had seen that everyone was watching them was stuck in Mal's mind, it didn't matter how hard she tried to forget, it was there to haunt her memory. She didn't reject me because she doesn't feel the same, Mal thought, the realization returning to her; she rejected me because she doesn't want the judgment that will follow us being together. She wished she hadn't figured that out. She hoped she was wrong, hoped that the girl truly did think of her as nothing more than a friend, because the pain that came from feeling as though Evie was ashamed to be seen with her was far worse than what she had felt from believing the girl just didn't share her feelings.

"What happened between you two?"

Mal finally met brown eyes, finding curiosity and confusion pulsing through them, the question one he truly wanted the answer to. She didn't know if she could answer his question, though, didn't know if the way she felt was valid, or if she was overreacting simply because everything involving this topic never seemed to end in her favor. But she trusted Carlos and knew that she could get answers from him as well about everything that was going on, however, she didn't know how to begin.

"It's complicated," Mal stated, her voice quieter than she had meant it to be.

"All relationships are complicated," Carlos replied, pushing for more despite clearly not wanting to pass any boundaries. "The stories are wrong, it's not a smooth slide. It's going to be messy, it's going to require struggle and fighting."

"I would do anything for her, Carlos. She's just so amazing. She's intelligent, she's compassionate, she's beautiful, she's just..." Mal sighed heavily, placing her elbows on her knees and brushing her fingers through her hair in attempt to calm herself down. "But it doesn't matter, she doesn't seem to feel the same."

"What makes you think that?" Carlos asked curiously, expression a cross between worry and delight.

"The way she reacted today when she saw the way everyone was looking at us," Mal explained, red-brown eyes full of fear flashing through her mind again. "She was horrified. She was afraid that everyone would judge her more than they already do." Mal sighed again, preparing to admit more than she ever had to anyone else. "I can't be with her if she's ashamed of being seen with me, it just hurts too much. I've never felt this way before, and I don't want to hide it from anyone, but I don't want to pressure her into doing something she's not ready for. I... I respect her too much to do that to her."

A small smile tugged at the corners of Carlos' lips. "Are you sure respect is the only thing?"

No, there's a lot more to it than just my respect for who she is. Releasing her hair, she straightened her shoulders with confidence and tilted her head back until she was staring at the clear blue sky above. And finally, the words that had been itching at the back of her throat for longer than she could remember found their way from her lips as she confessed everything to Carlos, to the world.

"I'm in love with her, Carlos. I am so helplessly in love with Evie."