Chapter Text
Caitlyn had felt strangely nervous for the rest of the class period.
They had a date - or, well. It wasn’t strictly a date date, but it was still making her jittery.
When the final bell rang, Caitlyn made sure to move slowly, unhurried. She didn’t want to appear too eager.
Vi, for her part, ignored Caitlyn completely and just leaned over the side of her chair to snag her backpack and shove her pencil into it, sliding her slightly crumpled homework off her desk as she did so to slouch toward the front of the room.
Caitlyn packed her messenger bag more slowly than she usually did, waiting until Vi had walked out of the classroom to get up.
She truly wasn’t sure what exact speed would give away her eagerness to find out why Vi had wanted to meet, and “cool” had never been a word that described her, under any circumstances, but Vi had left, which meant she could follow her to their bathroom rendezvous at a safe distance.
Caitlyn slipped her own homework into the tray on her way out of the classroom, and kept her steps measured as she made the familiar walk.
She kept her chin high as she did, making sure to nod at teachers and do everything she could to disguise the butterflies flapping away madly in her stomach.
Truly, there was absolutely no reason for her to feel this way. It was true that she was meeting the girl she’d had a crush on for months, but that was entirely irrelevant because Vi didn’t like her.
Caitlyn glanced around as she made the final few steps to the bathroom and, noticing no one seemed to be either looking or heading her way, she opened the door and stepped inside, finding all the stall doors open, and Vi leaning against the opposite wall under the window.
Caitlyn waited until the door closed and flipped the lock.
______
Vi raised her eyebrows, not bothering to keep the bitterness out of her voice. “Trying to keep people from finding out you’re in here with the big, bad trencher, Cupcake?”
She just stared back, raising an eyebrow.
“I don’t use that word. And do you want everyone to know we’re meeting up after class?”
That eyebrow stayed up. Questioning.
It was fucking aggressive, is what it was.
Vi shrugged, a little thrown that the Piltie princess had bothered to notice the words she used. Or to say - with enough fucking conviction that Vi actually believed her - that she didn’t refer to Zaunites that way.
The word was casual among natives, but…pretty fucking hostile from outsiders. Between Zaunites, it was a nod to where they were from - the trenches, where people had worked themselves to death in the mines, where chemicals polluted the water, where, despite the pollution and the crime and the poverty, people stuck together. To an outsider… “trencher” meant “trash.” Or it meant “not worth the fucking air they breathe.” It was meant to be degrading, when Pilties said it.
But apparently…the Piltie princess didn’t use it.
And, she was still staring at Vi, eyebrow raised, not content until Vi fucking responded.
Vi raised her own eyebrow. “Guess not.”
Finally, she nodded, pressing off the door and starting to walk closer, fishing that fucking lip gloss out of her bag and turning toward a mirror.
Vi scoffed, trying to remember that she was here, because of that look in class. And her worried eyes, and her awkward shifting around.
Because, honestly, the bitch looked snooty enough right now that Vi was about to bail through the window, even knowing everything she did now.
That the girl currently inspecting her eyeliner and lip gloss thought Vi was lovely.
That the same girl who was currently fixing her lip gloss, the daughter of the mayor, the popular girl at Piltie Prep…liked girls.
And she was probably absolutely shitting herself that Vi would out her.
Or something.
Vi couldn’t figure out another reason for her to look that worried.
Coming out hadn’t been that big a deal for Vi. It wasn’t a big deal in the Lanes, anyway - people had bigger shit to deal with than who was licking what - and, besides, her haircut of choice since she was, like, nine, had been a fucking mullet.
Point is, nobody had been shocked when her first kiss was with a girl.
Or when she broke Deckard’s nose for trying to kiss her.
But...
Vi looked at the perfect uniform, the silky, straight hair, the lip gloss, the designer bag…
People in Piltover would find it shocking if someone who looked like that liked girls.
Vi had been shocked, and she fucking knew better than to assume. Though she could like both. Probably did, given that she had a boyfriend.
Vi cleared her throat.
She finished fixing the corner of her lip gloss before turning to look over.
“You uh…”
That eyebrow came up again.
“You know I’m not gonna tell anyone…right?”
The other eyebrow came up.
“That uh…you…”
Shit, that eyebrow made her nervous.
Shut up, Vi.
Those eyebrows raised a fraction higher, and then she said, “That I’m a lesbian?”
Vi blinked at her.
Not both, then.
“Yeah. I won’t tell anyone you like pussy.”
She rolled her eyes, shaking her head, and Vi pressed her lips together to keep from smiling at her exasperated laugh.
“So crude. But…thank you.”
Vi watched her fingers tighten on her messenger bag strap, and decided it was really fucking sad that she was being thanked like it was some kind of favor for not outing her. Thought it was really fucking sad that, here, at this goddamn school, in this shit ass excuse for a city, people couldn’t like what they wanted.
That other people gave a shit.
“Don’t mention it, Cupcake.”
She nodded, and Vi pushed off the wall, shoving her hands in her pockets, conversation over.
She walked past her, something floral and girly and nice in her nose, and was almost at the door when…
“Why ‘Cupcake’?”
Vi smiled wryly at the door before turning and grinning at her with a confidence she didn’t feel, shooting her a wink for good measure.
“Because you’re so sweet. Like a cupcake.”
Vi got way too much satisfaction out of watching blue eyes go wide before she turned and flipped the lock, yanking open the door and stepping into the hall, keeping her head down so the fucking assholes in the hallway couldn’t see her smiling.
______
After Vi had left her in the bathroom, blush creeping over her face and toes wiggling in her loafers, Caitlyn had re applied her lip gloss to try to grasp for some form of normalcy, and then left the bathroom, heading toward the parking lot.
She didn’t have any after-school meetings today, and her parents were away, which meant that she had a blessed few hours at home to bake some cookies in her pajamas before getting a head start on her homework.
The race for valedictorian was tight, and it would be absolutely unacceptable - a family disgrace, in fact - if she didn’t graduate with the title.
Nevermind that she would still be in the top few percent without it.
Close meant nothing to the Kirammans.
Caitlyn shook her head, tilting her chin up another fraction of an inch.
Her feelings were no excuse for poor posture.
As she’d been reminded.
Often.
Caitlyn nodded her thanks to the student who held the door for her, and stepped outside into the cold January air.
_______
“That I’m a lesbian?”
Vi couldn’t get the words out of her head.
She’d been…well, Vi’d been thinking maybe it was a fluke. Or that maybe she liked both - which meant she could have her fancy fuck boyfriend and, for some reason, think Vi was lovely, but never have to or want to do anything about it.
But…
Being a lesbian…
That meant…
Vi groaned, leaning back against a couch that was more patches than original fabric at this point.
Caitlyn Kiramman was a lesbian, and she thought Vi was lovely, which meant that…she wasn’t the unattainable, bitchy rich girl Vi had thought she was.
She was still a bitchy rich girl, but now…
Now she was an option.
Vi could, if she was stupid or brave enough, ask her out.
On a date.
Because.
They were lesbians.
They could go on a gay ass date.
Vi pressed the heels of her palms into her eyes and groaned again.
It didn’t make any fucking sense. Still didn’t. Sure, people could be into whatever they were into, but Caitlyn Kiramman liking her? A fucking trencher?
“I don’t use that word.”
Vi groaned a third time and got up suddenly, needing to move to work out all the feelings buzzing through her.
The passed notes, the feelings she could see in those blue eyes - blue eyes she’d thought before were just… ice, looking at her with complete disdain - the words spoken not with anger or disgust, but with…interest.
It. Didn’t. Make. Any. Sense.
Vi grabbed some water from the kitchen and headed toward the heavy bag, not bothering with changing out of her school uniform except to start unbuttoning her shirt.
A sports bra and her uniform pants would do fine.
She just needed to hit something.
______
After three batches of cookies - chocolate chip, snickerdoodles, and oatmeal raisin - and a loaf of bread, which she’d made mainly so she had an excuse to work out some of the day’s frustration, Caitlyn was feeling a little better.
It was a relief to know Vi wasn’t going to say anything, but it still…
Even a confession that she was, in fact, a lesbian - only interested in women, and, notably, interested in Vi - hadn’t changed anything.
Vi still didn’t like her - though, really, they didn’t know enough about one another to make a judgement of that sort - and Caitlyn still had a stupid crush.
Every time she’d kneaded her loaf of bread, she’d imagined that wink that had made her blush and her mouth dry out and her toes curl in her loafers.
The bread was, possibly, slightly over kneaded.
Caitlyn would just have to, as she had reminded herself since Vi had said I don’t like you, get over it.
It was a simple (debilitating, months-long) crush.
She could get over it.
She would get over it, even though she now knew that Vi’s eyes, up close, were more blue than grey, knew that she smelled like cigarettes and muscle rub and something else that was spicy and filled her with the absolutely absurd urge to bury her nose in the corner of Vi’s slightly uneven jaw and just…inhale.
Caitlyn shook her head, throwing down her pencil.
Her attempts to do her math homework - which Vi would complete in twenty minutes during class - were utterly fruitless while she was stuck in this line of thinking.
She grabbed her phone, sending off a quick text to Jayce.
Her parents had informed her they’d be staying overnight at the conference where her father had presented a paper - the roads were slick, and they’d gotten done later than expected - so it was the perfect night for movie night, since Jayce lived close enough to walk over and avoid any danger on the roads.
He also lived close enough for Caitlyn to ply him with cookies and the promise of his pick of movies, so that he might give her some actual advice on how to handle having a crush on someone who now had information that could destroy her, on top of not liking her to begin with.
Caitlyn stood up out of her desk chair and padded across the plush carpet on her bedroom floor to flop face down on her bed.
Oh, this was a royal mess.
A second later, her phone buzzed with Jayce’s ETA.
Caitlyn looked at the message and sent him a thumbs up before tossing her phone to the side and pressing her face into her duvet.
Maybe, just maybe, if she just stayed like this, the whole problem would go away. Pink hair and tattoos and gorgeous, gorgeous blue-gray eyes, and a mischievous smirk filled the blackness of her vision and Caitlyn groaned pathetically, rolling over to snag a pillow and press it over her face.
Her phone buzzed again, and she didn’t bother to check it.
Jayce could ring the doorbell.
______
Vi lay on the mats below the heavy bag, breathing hard and sweating harder, her elbows up over her head to get more air into her lungs.
She’d worked until her already-abused forearms screamed at her, and her abs felt like she could barely hold herself up.
And she’d come to a really fucking annoying conclusion.
She was right.
She’d been right.
Vi shut her eyes, and started to make a plan.