So, maybe she was meddling in the love lives of her two best friends a little too much. But, really, they were completely hopeless by themselves, and they really were perfect for each other. And all of their avoiding each other was getting the tiniest bit pathetic.
But Skye certainly wasn’t playing favorites. They really were the best two people for the parts. She wasn’t in that deep, that she’d give the parts to them even if there were other people who were far better. It was a well-known fact that Fitz and Simmons were two of the best actors at the school, and even if this didn’t lead to them falling madly and adorably in love with each other, they’d at least be forced to interact.
It was, Skye thought, as she marked their names down in their respective places, the perfect plan.
***
Today was the day.
Today’s the day the cast list was released, and Jemma was impatient for the last bell to roll around so she could check the bulletin board outside the drama wing. She was fairly positive she did better than anyone who tried for her part - she usually did, of course - but there was always the chance that someone else had a really good day.
Unfortunately, there was someone else already standing by the bulletin board when she got there, eyes skimming over the list with a gentle smile that faded as he glanced up at her.
For a moment, she thought about turning around and coming back later.Unfortunately, he’d already noticed her, and there was no way she was going to let him stop her from seeing what part she got. She could stand beside him for thirty seconds. Probably.
“...Hi, Simmons.” Fitz said, shoving his hands into his pockets as she joined him at the bulletin.
“Hello, Fitz.” Jemma greeted, as warmly as she could bear, and searched for her name along the list and tried to ignore him completely.
There it was, nearly at the top, right where she'd hoped it would be:
Jemma Simmons
But then, one above:
Leopold Fitz
No.
The grin that had grown when she had seen her name faded as she saw his, and then came back, fake and forced, as she turned to her peer. “Congratulations.” She said, voice riddled with false cheerfulness.
No one could say she wasn’t a good sport.
“It’ll be fun working with you.” He said, with a smile that seemed much more genuine. Genuine at least for him, which only seemed to be about as genuine as crocodile tears.
“...You, too, I suppose.” She said, and if she sounded surprised, he completely ignored it as he took a step back.
“I have to-- go. Bus to catch.” Fitz explained, before turning quickly on his heel and striding down the hall and out of sight.
It was all his fault. Jemma Simmons was completely sure of it. He hated her; it was exactly the sort of thing he’d try to pull. That insufferable grump knew that she was going to get the part, and was doing everything in his power to make sure she didn’t succeed in possibly the most important role of her life. Leopold Fitz was trying to ruin her.
***
It was all her fault. Leopold Fitz was absolutely, positively sure of it. Rumors were floating around that the most influential critics around were planning to attend opening night (Their director would neither confirm nor deny those rumors, but her grin gave it away. He suspected that she invited them, and started the rumors herself.) This could make or break his career, and Jemma Simmons was doing her best to make sure he did as terribly as possible.
***
Everything went as smoothly as it could until the day after they got their scripts. Skye knew her leads come complaining as soon as they read through the last act, so when Jemma seemed to be more on a warpath than usual to get into class, she knew that a mess was inevitable.
“I’m not kissing him.”
Skye turned in her desk to face her, her pen tapping idly against the surface. Here came the hurricane.“Simmons, you’re being ridiculous.” She replied, nonplussed.
“He hates me.” Jemma replied, sitting down in the desk in front of her.
“No way.”
“Yes way.”
“Nope.
“Yes, Skye.” Simmons replied vehemently, carefully sorting out her pens and paper and pencils onto the desk, perfectly neat.
Skye shook her head, sighing. “I refuse to believe that. And besides, it’s not a real kiss.”
“My lips have to make contact with his. It’s not happening.”
“You’re no fun.”
“I’m not trying to be.
“Ugh, whatever.” Skye sighed, blowing a strand of hair from her face, earning a bit of a glare from her best friend.
“You’re such a child sometimes.” Jemma sighed, but sounded more fond than annoyed, so Skye took that as a good sign. Sometimes, people just needed a bit of peer pressure.
This was definitely one of those times.
“You’re the one who won’t stage-kiss someone who is honestly not unattractive. Not really my type, but...He’s cute.” Skye replied, shrugging slightly.
“He’s a grumpy, bigoted idiot with a superiority complex.”
“But he’s cute.”
There was a moment of hesitation. “Objectively,” Simmons said slowly, as if it physically hurt her to even begin to speak. “I suppose he could fit into the traditional ideas of attractiveness, yes.”
“In other words, you think he’s cute.” Skye concluded, earning a groan from the other girl.
“...yes.” She sighed, as she buried her face in her hands.
She resisted the urge to cheer.
***
“I’m not kissing her.” Comes a voice behind her in the hall after her run in with Simmons. She knows who it is instantly -- she’d been expecting complaints from him as well. Hurricane part two, but she was ready.
“Yes, Leopold Fitz, you are.” Skye replied, slowing to allow him to catch up with her.
“I am not. You can’t make me.”
“You don’t have a choice, unless you want to give up your part.” She replied. “It’s not really a kiss, anyways.”
“I’m not even standing within five feet of her.”
“Do you want this part?”
“Yes, obviously, but wh--”
She doesn’t even let him finish his sentence before she starts talking over him. Really, it’s easiest that way. “Is it in the script?”
Fitz hesitates, for the briefest of moments, before nodding. “Well, yes--”
“Then you’re kissing her.”
“But she’s an infuriating know-it-all who can’t bear to let anyone else be right.”
“But she’s cute.”
“Skye.”
“Oh, come on. She is, and you know it.”
“--yes, fine, she’s attractive.” He relents, rather reluctantly.
“See?” She said happily, as if that solved all of the issues. “It’ll go fine!”
“But she hates me.”
“Oh, no.”
“She does!”
“Nope. She really doesn’t.”
“Skye, you’re being impossible.”
“You know how you were just saying that she’s an infuriating know-it-all who can’t bear to let anyone else be right?”
“Shut up.”
“Love you too, Fitz.” She laughs as she heads into her class, blowing him a kiss that he completely ignores.
Skye considers that argument won.
***
They’re horrors in practice. They can barely go more than thirty seconds before it starts; the bickering over each other, words shoved over one another until the point where no one else really even knows what they’re talking about, because they’re not even talking in proper sentences.
It’s adorable.
***
When they’re both up on stage, however, that’s a completely different story. They’re the first ones off book (not that Skye’s surprised, she’s pretty sure they stayed up all night memorizing their parts just to show each other up), and they’re both rather incredible to watch interact. They aren’t Fitz and Simmons anymore -- they’re Fitzsimmons, a unit that works together perfectly until the moment they’re not reciting lines.
***
They manage to get out of the dreaded kiss until dress rehearsal. Until then, it was awkward staring and pointed coughs as they dropped character, glaring at each other until their director sighed and called them stubborn. They’d quickly smooth over the spot, and Skye would hope that maybe next time they would stop being such children.
But then it got to a few days before the performances, and they hadn’t even practiced it once. So when they started to stare at each other, Jemma’s foot tapping impatiently against the wood stage, Skye spoke up.
“Not this time.”
“Skye--”
“Kiss, or you’re both fired.”
“You won’t do that.”
“Fitz, don’t you dare doubt me.”
“--Fine,” He said, pressing a quick, chaste kiss to his opposite’s cheek before giving Skye a rather pointed glare. “Happy?”
Skye was the opposite of happy, but it was better than nothing. “...Better. But that’s not happening this weekend, right?”
Simmons quickly shook her head, recovering quickly from the unexpected contact, though the faint blush to her cheeks was obvious. “Of course not.”
Knowing that was the best she was going to get, Skye nodded. “Good. Keep going.”
No one would blame her if she killed them both.
In fact, half the cast would probably help her hide the bodies.
***
Seriously contemplating murder for what was at least the hundredth time since rehersals began, Skye tucked her pen behind her ear.
Five minutes before curtain and FitzSimmons weren’t even talking to each other. They were very pointedly not talking to each other, in fact, and were going to the point of sending other cast members with messages to the other, complete with large amounts of passive-aggressive tones like a bad game of telephone.
There would be no time for damage control. They’d have to get over it themselves, and they had a whole...three minutes and forty-six seconds.
This was going to go terribly.
***
It didn’t go terribly.
Skye was still probably going to kill them.
The majority of the play had gone perfectly. Better than it ever had, and that was saying something.
But that was until the last act, which she’d already knew was going to be trouble. Not like this, though. Not like ‘the-two-lead-actors-are-actually-making-out-on-stage-and-no-amount-of-subtle-coughing-is-
getting-them-to-stop.’. Not like ‘the-dam-holding-all-that-crazy-sexual-tension-back-has-finally-broken-and-the-water-is-rushing-too-fast-to-stop’.
And certainly not like someone in the back of the theatre yelling for them to get a room.
They are so dead.
***
They read the papers together, the next week, curled up on a bench, Jemma’s head resting against Fitz’s shoulder. It’s a sharp contrast to where they stood a few days ago, but not an unwelcomed one. Where there was tension before, there was comfort now.
Bright Futures for Students of SHIELD.
It’s there in crisp, dark ink. There’s a picture of the infamous kiss under it. (Later, they’ll find it tacked up on the bulletin board in the drama wing, a sloppy heart drawn around them in hot-pink glitter pen along with the words I told you.)
“I thought this was going to be terrible.” Jemma admitted softly, as she watched Fitz skim the article. It’s nothing but raving reviews, just as they’d hoped.
“Me, too.” He admitted, glancing over at her. “Guess we were wrong.”
“Very wrong,” she agreed softly, settling a bit closer as he wrapped an arm around her shoulders.