Fic: Pinocchio
Title: Pinocchio
Author: interpol_ice
Fandom: Skins - Third Generation
Characters: Mini McGuinness, Franky Fitzgerald
Rating: R
Words: 4,000+
Summary: Lying is the most fun a girl can have without taking her clothes off. / They wanted her. She could see it in every boy’s eye, their truths. Not this boy, though. For this boy, Mini had to dig a little. A Minky one-shot.
Disclaimer: Skins belongs to the lucky lads, Bryan Elsley and Jamie Brittain. I only own my head and maybe even the gutter it's in.
Author’s Note: This follows the canon of 5x01 up to Mini’s party. This is an unapologetic dark fic about how things could have played out during the last scenes of Franky’s episode so you better get your balls ready, okay? Turn away while you still can.
* * *
“You see, Pinocchio, a lie keeps growing and growing until it’s as plain as the nose on your face.”
- The Blue Fairy, Pinocchio (1940)
* * *
This is the biggest party ever.
It might be a bit exaggerated but it's only been three weeks into college and Mini's certain that nobody else in Roundview had the balls to throw such a high-level club party this early in the term. If there were any, she would've known about them. There would have been invitations and Mini not getting any of them is just so out of the fucking question.
So yeah, Mini is pretty cock-sure that this is the biggest party ever.
Anyone who is anyone (to Mini, at least) is in attendance and there are sparks of promises and beginnings in the air. It’s a new chapter in their lives. New chapters mean new people and Mini’s having this party because everyone’s going to be networking and by the end of this night, they’re all going to be friends and-or fuck buddies and will certainly not forget to thank her.
It’s all about street cred. A queen bee has to earn her place so Mini doesn’t mind shelling out for drinks or subtly threatening Anita into making invitations or hunting through Southwest Bristol for a DJ who played decent music, didn’t do drugs on the premises (or if he did, he'd have to be an extra sneaky ninja fucker who'd never get caught), and who didn’t smell bad.
The party's a tall order but again, she doesn’t mind .
People are having a good time because she’s fun and generous. Basically a representation of all things bright and beautiful so logically, everyone’s going to have to love her.
Mini knows that you have to be good to people at first, if you want to be able to push them around someday.
* * *
She feels fabulous. Girls tell her they love her dress, that her make-up really brings out her eyes, and that her party is ‘super’. Mini knows she could get better praises from six year olds but she graciously accepts these generic compliments anyway. Boys hit on her and Nick chases them away before she can even pretend to hit back.
This night’s already too fucking perfect.
* * *
Mini’s glass slips a bit in her hand when she catches a glimpse of that Franky girl sliding through the crowd. She stops listening to Grace and tries to assess the collection of bad decisions that Franky thinks is an outfit.
No make-up on. Hair slicked to the sides. White Oxford shirt, black dinner jacket. She’s wearing those God-awful shoes that Mini wishes didn’t exist.
When 'alternative' became Mini's euphemism of choice, Franky was having her first ever lunch on her first ever day at Roundview College. There was a pile of brown sugar on her table and Franky drew through the grains with her fingers.
It didn't take much to harass Mini. Franky just sat there, like totally fucking hipster, playing with her food oh-so-uniquely. Unsettling. Strange. And Mini wanted so badly to go, “no one gives a fuck, you dyke”. Wanted so badly to say this to Franky's face and witness every second of her eyes watering.
But she never got around to that. Because the sad truth was-Mini did indeed give a fuck.
(And it was a fuck the size of Jupiter.)
* * *
She spends an embarrassing amount of time watching Franky from the corner of her eye. Her night stops being about the party and starts being about getting that fucking freak out of here.
Look at this little shit, trying to be invisible. It's in the way Franky hasn't spoken since she arrived. In the way she won't meet people's eyes.
Well, Franky’s clearly retarded, Mini thinks. If she wanted to blend in, common sense would dictate that she should have dressed the fucking part. Although Mini wouldn’t be having as much fun tonight if she were left with no one to pick out and pull apart, still, Franky should have at least had the decency to try and look like a normal human being.
Put in some proper effort, like everyone else. Like Mini, who remembers every single word on today’s page of her planner.
Don’t eat anything 'til sundown. After college, foot spa. Manicure-Pedicure. Beauty rest, one hour. Nourishment: turkey breast, salad and a glass of wine. Meditation: Sudoku, extra-hard, 15 minutes. Oral Hygiene: Plax antiplaque formula, thirty seconds. Brush teeth thoroughly, five minutes. Floss. Rinse with Listerine. Check nails. Face: deep-pore cleansing lotion, wash off. Lemongrass-mint facial masque, leave on for twenty minutes and wash off with wintergreen facial scrub. Check nails. Shower, thirty-five minutes. Water-activated lilac shower gel, honey-coconut almond body scrub. For face: Exfoliating apricot scrub. For hair: strength-boosting strawberry scented shampoo, strawberry scented conditioner for volume and shine. Rinse. Towel-dry. Check nails. Ring Gracie, ten minutes. Blow-dry hair. Ring Nick, seven minutes. Last minute promo: remind social circle of party via Facebook and Twitter. Ring Liv, five minutes. Braid hair. Make-up prep: Alcohol-free, antibac facial toner, clarifying moisturizer. Light foundation, bronzer. Eye-liner, eye-shadow, mascara. Rouge cheeks and lips with blush and lipstick from Clinique’s pin-up girl collection. Check teeth. Get dressed. Ring for cab. Double check everything. Triple check everything... en route MOGADISHU!!!
It isn’t that fucking hard, Mini thinks.
That dress they all got Franky. If she just wore the over-sparkly clinginess (that really was quite chic) then Mini could have called it a day. Could have called it another conquest. That she got the butch dyke to wear a skin-tight dress. That she got another girl to bend to her whims.
Mini likes to believe that the rest of the world drops at her feet. The world, full of the eager to please. Mini likes to believe that it's reasonable, worshipping her. So when this Franky girl shows up to Mini's party, dressed like a fucking Drag King, Mini is torn. She doesn't know if she should be outraged or amused.
Franky's a challenge, she finally decides.
* * *
Every time a strobe light pulses, Mini feels Franky’s eyes on her. Mini’s sat at the bar, not in the mood to play the perfect hostess. She throws back drinks, broods, and her throat's burning while she waits until she’s thought up of a way to kick the little shitter out without it turning into a riot.
The red lights turn Franky’s hair purple and she's just hovering and being a complete, useless fool. With purple hair.
“She’s here,” Liv says, concerned.
“Who is?” Mini raises, playing it cool. She sweeps her eyes across the room, all for show. Liv doesn’t have to know that she already knows exactly where Franky is.
“Franky.”
Nick's rugby boys stop to look at her and they don't bother being discreet about it. Franky's getting all these odd stares and someone's got to fucking do something about this.
“Fucking lesbo scum’s ruining my party.”
Liv gets a look on her face that makes Mini feel like a very stupid child. She suddenly feels all sorts of shit and this is her soiree for fuck’s sake and she didn’t sign up for any of this patronising bullshit from anyone.
“She’s leaving.” Now that Mini’s said the words aloud she’s even more obliged to carry them out.
Liv lets out a sound, a cross between a snort and a hiss, to amplify her disbelief. “You invite the girl, she comes to the party, and all along you never wanted her here.”
“For fucking laughs, Liv!” Mini’s almost hysterical. She doesn’t get it. Liv, who goes way back with Mini, to the pigtails & cooties don't exist phase, plays Mini's games just as well as she does. “Aren’t we on the same page?”
Mini and Liv. They're the type of best mates that do telepathy and Liv just telepathically told Mini that she's fucking insane.
“You’re going too out of your way for laughs, Mins. What the fuck is up with you?”
Mini doesn’t stay around to answer this because her best mate has apparently decided to become a cunt about everything.
There’s a slight wobble to her step as she moves through the crowd. She doesn’t recognise the song the DJ has put on but she’s certain spaceships make the same sounds. She pauses, kind of surprised with the uncoolness of her thoughts. She swears, if she thinks of Star Trek ever again...
Mini tries to remember how many shots she’s had back at the bar. She doesn’t remember and if she can’t remember, then she’s probably had a shitload more than was necessary. But it’s not like she’s proper pissed. She can still work the crowd.
There’s Maya and her friends, all glitter and glam and Mini knows how easy it is for shiny things to steal her attention. So Mini totters up to them with a big smile and shamelessly asks them if they’re enjoying themselves and then, not letting them answer by cutting in with an “Of course you are, it’s my fucking party. You better be.”
She leaves Maya’s ditzy circle because she couldn’t handle their silence and their identical looks of discomfort. She sees a waiter moving towards her and she feels the need to reload. She quickly finishes off her hundredth (or something) shot of Apple Sourz and switches her empty glass with one full of vodka tonic.
Mini doesn’t regret anything.
* * *
Well, Franky’s finally talking to someone.
Grace is so nice. Grace is so... Grace-cious. Mini actually admires Grace, Saint Grace, for tricking freaks into thinking she actually cared about them. Grace can’t honestly be interested with a wish-I-had-a-cock piece of shit like Franky.
What Mini has to remind herself is that Grace is an actress. It’s what she does. She says something that isn’t true but her eyes can still mean it.
And for a moment, Mini wonders if Grace could be lying to her as well... But then she quickly pushes the thought into the back of her mind because if it were true, it would kill her. A traitorous Saint Grace would kill her.
“Hi, Gracie!” she says, not really tuned in with the rest of her body. Her feet have somehow brought them to the two. Gee, when in God’s sweet earth did that happen?
Grace jumps at Mini’s arrival like she was just caught doing something naughty. Well, if that little moment was proof of Grace’s guilt, it is cancelled out completely by the welcoming aura Grace seems to ooze of just a second later.
“Mini! I was just looking for you,” Grace says, with an honest-to-Christ excitement about her.
Fuck it. Mini adores Grace a wee too much to be dwelling about her two-facedness. So instead, she pointedly ignores Grace to finally focus on the more pressing issue. The fanny-less, party-ruining bitch.
“Mi-”
“What are you doing here?” Mini snaps, unable to hide her impatience.
“I was invited. You, uh... you invited me. You invited me.”
Mini swears, if Franky doesn’t stop eating her words...
Is Mini supposed to feel sorry for her or something?
Because right now, what she really wants is to dunk Franky’s head down a toilet. It’s not exactly her way of doing things, so tasteless and unrefined, but she just can’t deny the appeal of the idea. To get Franky wet and begging.
Mini goes blind for a second. Breathes in deeply to collect herself. When she opens her eyes, she takes great care to keep them from narrowing at Franky. “Right, of course I did.”
Grace catches Mini’s eye. Be nice, Grace's look says. And it dawns on Mini, that she’s so sick of this reform act her friends are shoving down her throat. They can all fuck off.
Franky’s staring up at her purposefully but before she can speak, Mini stops her, not wanting a scene.
“Not here.”
Franky shuts her mouth.
“We’ll talk somewhere else.”
* * *
Her initial plans with the private lounge consisted of her, Nick, and a lack of clothes. Leading Franky here, Mini feels like she has desecrated the room.
Mini sits with her legs crossed like a proper lady. The couch is too hard for her liking but there’s no where else to place herself in the room. So she sits back, nurses her drink, and dreams up all the ways she could ruin Franky tonight.
The other girl is in front of the aquarium, watching the fish with a serious face. She taps at the glass and the fish dart away in a panic. There’s a trace of amusement in Franky’s stretched lips and Mini surprises herself for noticing this.
They haven’t spoken a word since the door closed.
Franky moves away from the glass tank. The fish must have been boring her.
She stops in front of the couch, eyeing the empty space beside Mini. When Franky doesn’t take the seat, Mini pretends to be offended. (Not like she really cares about what the freak thinks.)
“You really don’t like me, do you?”
Mini takes a sip of her drink, waiting on Franky’s answer. The air conditioning in this room must be broken or something because her palm’s are sweaty and gross.
She’s going to have to write this down on Mogadishu's evaluation sheet tomorrow.
Franky’s crossing the room, to the wall on the opposite side. There’s a stupid painting there and Mini finds herself hating all the extra stimuli in the private lounge. That Franky can busy herself with, denying Mini that honour of Franky's full attention. “You make it so hard,” she says, her back to Mini.
Mini smiles. A slight admission that Franky bested her there.
“Let’s start over,” Mini suggests.
“Fancy apologising first?” Franky suggests right back, whipping around to face her.
Against her intentions, her glass slams onto the table. A momentary loss of cool. A show of instability. She recovers. Conjures up a fabulous giggle. Oh, Franky. You humour me so. And Mini goes on and says to Franky, in the sweetest way she could fake, “Don’t be like this.”
“Apologise.”
The limit’s hit and Mini gets up from the sofa, exasperated. She marches up to where Franky is and the other girl shuffles away until her back hits the wall. Mini’s got her cornered and all Franky can do right now is frown her eternal, pathetic frown at Mini.
She wants to spit in Franky’s face just so the other girl could stop looking at her with so much disapproval. Mini doesn’t want to hand it to Franky but the little shit’s standing her ground and being such a fucking problem.
“I said we’re starting over. We haven’t met.”
The bass levels outside filter through the lounge door, making the walls shake. Franky’s face is commendably resolute, dangerous even, in the murky mix of the lounge’s red and orange lights.
“I don’t play pretend like that, Mini.”
It’s like a gun has gone off. Mini hears it in her head. An explosion. She hears it so loud, that she mistakes this hot, painful feeling in her chest as a bullet ripping through. She bites down on her cheek, to see if it could feel worse and the only thing that could be worse than that is if it doesn’t.
Mini bites harder and even then, it still doesn’t.
With Franky standing before her, eyebrows raised and so indicative of her smugness, Mini thinks, I am untouchable. She thinks, no one fucks me over. She thinks of pulling at Franky’s hair. Of punching her in the mouth so that her braces would cut the insides of her lips. Of fires and of Mean Girls, of strangulation and of burying dead bodies. Of beating Franky silly with her very own red-soled Louboutin (nobody needs to know they’re knockoff) pumps.
By now Mini has fifty ways to cut this fanny-eating dyke right back down to size. She weighs out her options and can’t figure out which of them is the heaviest.
So it might be the indecision that gets her to lean in. She doesn’t have a plan, really. She just thinks it would be better if she goes in closer.
“I won’t bite,” Mini says with a smile that’s a little too dirty to be any sort of comforting.
So Franky straightens. Puts up this sad, little front that she’s ready for whatever Mini has to dish her. A punch, a slap, a kick. Franky is just going to have to take it.
* * *
(Franky takes it like a champ.)
Mini's kissing her. And yeah, she’s clumsy but it’s only because she’s being it on purpose and not because this means anything enough to make her knees shake.
When they break for air, Mini realises how hard it is to breathe again. Franky’s eyes are so big and so fucking pretty-girly-beautiful that Mini has to... maybe not see this for five seconds.
A game. This is only a game.
She shuts her eyes tight. Tries to remember how to be a bitch again because wasn’t that the whole point of all this?
So Mini pulls away a bit to say, “Would you play along now?”
Franky's lips are coated with their spit. She looks up at Mini, frenzied. “Aren’t you with Nick?”
“I’m with a lot of boys,” Mini says coolly, sliding her arms around Franky’s neck.
“I’m not a boy,” Franky reminds her.
“Is that the problem here, Franky?”
Then Franky relaxes. Stops looking crazy. “I… I dunno,” Franky says and she hesitates when she puts her hands on Mini’s waist.
The smaller girl holds her and Mini feels this power entering and leaving her in big tides. The smaller girl grips at her and Mini is dizzy.
She is overcome with a desire to touch Franky's face so she does, with the most careful of fingers. Mini is overcome with a desire to see into Franky's eyes but the other girl has them trained somewhere else. On Mini's lips.
This is perfect.
Mini takes this as her cue to drop the bomb. The big plan. The game-changer. This is her ticket to winning back the upper hand. Franky's clearly interested now and all Mini has to do is to feed that fire. To start sounding like all those sex education videos she's seen to figure out what you do with boyfriends.
She has to start sounding like a proper porn star.
See you on the field, stud.
Mini kisses her again. Deeper this time. And she tries to get some words out when Franky’s tongue isn’t in her mouth.
“Would you like to-do things to me?”
And then Franky learns to do the same. Learns to talk when there aren’t two tongues in her mouth. “What-things?”
Mini works on Franky’s neck. Yeah, she promised not to bite but being honest was never one of her strong suits. Her dental records are going to be bruises on Franky’s neck tomorrow. To Mini, this is some sort of accomplishment.
“Bad things,” she says and she feels ridiculous and hot. She crushes her mouth into Franky’s again and Mini doesn’t remember it this loud or this sloppy, kissing someone.
She pushes her hips into Franky and when she can’t push them in any further, she starts grinding against the smaller girl. And surprise, surprise. Franky gets with the program and arches her back off the wall behind her to grind back and it’s friction in all the right places and it’s making Mini insane.
Franky moans into her mouth and Mini feels it coming down her throat, bubbling hot until it reaches the pit of her stomach. She's got a hand curling into Franky's hair and it's stiff with gel but she can't mind that right now as she's pulling Franky in even more closer. Her heart’s beating crazy hard and she can’t stop herself from saying things. “If you had a cock, would you fuck me nice and good? Tell me, what would you do right now if you were a real boy?”
She knows she’s never been the best actress, but right now she’s hitting it out of fifty parks.
Mini leans back a little, so she can see Franky better. “Be honest,” she pushes, putting on a perverse smile.
Franky’s face darkens. She grabs at Mini’s arms and for a moment there, they’re both still. Mini’s pretty sure Franky wants to kill her right now. It’s something Mini doesn't know how to process. Doesn't know what to do about. A second later, Franky's shoving her away roughly.
“Fuck you, you fucking slut,” she says, pushing Mini again until she’s a safe distance away.
Mini would have fought back but something, fucking disbelief perhaps, has weakened her. (What Franky said, it isn't supposed to hurt.)
Franky pulls at her own clothes quickly, to flatten them out. She runs her fingers through her hair, hair that Mini recalls she was frantically grabbing at a minute before. Mini's getting all the reactions from Franky that she wanted but she misses the feel of Franky's new lips so much that she gets an urge to take it all back.
Franky slams her fist into that dumb painting on her way out. The glass cracks and if you look closer, you'd see flecks of blood.
“Fine, I never wanted you here anyway!” she shouts when Franky's hand is at the doorhandle. There's a slight pause that tells Mini that Franky caught that (like, really listened) and Mini thinks it's why the door bangs shut harder than it should have.
She knows she’s never been the best actress. And maybe, whatever this is she’s doing. Maybe this isn’t even acting.
“Fucking dyke,” she murmurs to herself. She licks at her lips. They’re sore.
Her knickers are sticky. She feels wretched.
She takes her phone out. Her hands are shaking and her thumbs are clumsy messes on her touch-screen.
Bbz? M n lounge. Lets fuckkk. X X X
She doesn’t send the text. She doesn’t know why. Maybe because her exhaustion has finally caught up to her. Maybe because the couch is too fucking stiff to have sex on and she doesn't want to wake up tomorrow with back pain. Maybe because, when she reads the text again, she thinks about Lady D and how she would never approve of such lack of finesse and propriety.
She squirms in her seat. Her knickers are sticky.
Maybe because Nick is never going to fix her.
Fuck it.
She bunches her skirt up. Her hand crawls in between her legs and unceremoniously pushes her knickers to the side. Starts prodding and rubbing. She closes her eyes and pretends picking up from where they left off, Franky playing along and turning them both around so that she fucks Mini nice and good against the wall. The fish, in their glowing electric blue aquarium, watch the show they put on and Franky loves it especially. Franky going in-out, in-out and in-out of Mini and she's there, her skirts pooled at her hips, an absolute slut. Loud and desperate. And Mini sees herself, slumped over the shorter girl, just bouncing down repeatedly on Franky’s fuck-hand. And her enthusiasm (or her thighs pressed together around the freak’s wrist, she better imagines) undoes one of Franky’s cufflinks.
It’s really scary how it becomes so real in her head. So the waves come and they come hard and Mini tries not to think of her.
She fails spectacularly. Her body twitching pleasurably for a few stolen moments and all she sees are those big, brown eyes and lashes that can never ever belong to a boy.
“Fucking dyke.” This time she says it, it's not just Franky she means.
She pulls her hand out from her knickers, lazily wiping her fingers clean on the lining of her dress. The door isn’t locked. So there’s a passing horror when Mini realises this, that (the whole time) anyone could have walked in on her.
But they didn't now, did they?
So she relaxes. Saves the two fucks she was supposed to give for something else. It's Franky she worries about. Franky and her bleeding honesty. She'd rat Mini out and it'll all go to shit once people know she bumped crotches with a fucking lesbo.
But why would Franky ever tell anyone? Why would she admit to being humiliated and toyed? If Franky really is clever, she'll shut the fuck up and this will all stay a secret.
Her breathing slows down. She smiles, counting on Franky's silence.
Why do people do what they do?
Mini doesn’t regret anything.
* * * fin
Author: interpol_ice
Fandom: Skins - Third Generation
Characters: Mini McGuinness, Franky Fitzgerald
Rating: R
Words: 4,000+
Summary: Lying is the most fun a girl can have without taking her clothes off. / They wanted her. She could see it in every boy’s eye, their truths. Not this boy, though. For this boy, Mini had to dig a little. A Minky one-shot.
Disclaimer: Skins belongs to the lucky lads, Bryan Elsley and Jamie Brittain. I only own my head and maybe even the gutter it's in.
Author’s Note: This follows the canon of 5x01 up to Mini’s party. This is an unapologetic dark fic about how things could have played out during the last scenes of Franky’s episode so you better get your balls ready, okay? Turn away while you still can.
* * *
“You see, Pinocchio, a lie keeps growing and growing until it’s as plain as the nose on your face.”
- The Blue Fairy, Pinocchio (1940)
* * *
This is the biggest party ever.
It might be a bit exaggerated but it's only been three weeks into college and Mini's certain that nobody else in Roundview had the balls to throw such a high-level club party this early in the term. If there were any, she would've known about them. There would have been invitations and Mini not getting any of them is just so out of the fucking question.
So yeah, Mini is pretty cock-sure that this is the biggest party ever.
Anyone who is anyone (to Mini, at least) is in attendance and there are sparks of promises and beginnings in the air. It’s a new chapter in their lives. New chapters mean new people and Mini’s having this party because everyone’s going to be networking and by the end of this night, they’re all going to be friends and-or fuck buddies and will certainly not forget to thank her.
It’s all about street cred. A queen bee has to earn her place so Mini doesn’t mind shelling out for drinks or subtly threatening Anita into making invitations or hunting through Southwest Bristol for a DJ who played decent music, didn’t do drugs on the premises (or if he did, he'd have to be an extra sneaky ninja fucker who'd never get caught), and who didn’t smell bad.
The party's a tall order but again, she doesn’t mind .
People are having a good time because she’s fun and generous. Basically a representation of all things bright and beautiful so logically, everyone’s going to have to love her.
Mini knows that you have to be good to people at first, if you want to be able to push them around someday.
* * *
She feels fabulous. Girls tell her they love her dress, that her make-up really brings out her eyes, and that her party is ‘super’. Mini knows she could get better praises from six year olds but she graciously accepts these generic compliments anyway. Boys hit on her and Nick chases them away before she can even pretend to hit back.
This night’s already too fucking perfect.
* * *
Mini’s glass slips a bit in her hand when she catches a glimpse of that Franky girl sliding through the crowd. She stops listening to Grace and tries to assess the collection of bad decisions that Franky thinks is an outfit.
No make-up on. Hair slicked to the sides. White Oxford shirt, black dinner jacket. She’s wearing those God-awful shoes that Mini wishes didn’t exist.
When 'alternative' became Mini's euphemism of choice, Franky was having her first ever lunch on her first ever day at Roundview College. There was a pile of brown sugar on her table and Franky drew through the grains with her fingers.
It didn't take much to harass Mini. Franky just sat there, like totally fucking hipster, playing with her food oh-so-uniquely. Unsettling. Strange. And Mini wanted so badly to go, “no one gives a fuck, you dyke”. Wanted so badly to say this to Franky's face and witness every second of her eyes watering.
But she never got around to that. Because the sad truth was-Mini did indeed give a fuck.
(And it was a fuck the size of Jupiter.)
* * *
She spends an embarrassing amount of time watching Franky from the corner of her eye. Her night stops being about the party and starts being about getting that fucking freak out of here.
Look at this little shit, trying to be invisible. It's in the way Franky hasn't spoken since she arrived. In the way she won't meet people's eyes.
Well, Franky’s clearly retarded, Mini thinks. If she wanted to blend in, common sense would dictate that she should have dressed the fucking part. Although Mini wouldn’t be having as much fun tonight if she were left with no one to pick out and pull apart, still, Franky should have at least had the decency to try and look like a normal human being.
Put in some proper effort, like everyone else. Like Mini, who remembers every single word on today’s page of her planner.
Don’t eat anything 'til sundown. After college, foot spa. Manicure-Pedicure. Beauty rest, one hour. Nourishment: turkey breast, salad and a glass of wine. Meditation: Sudoku, extra-hard, 15 minutes. Oral Hygiene: Plax antiplaque formula, thirty seconds. Brush teeth thoroughly, five minutes. Floss. Rinse with Listerine. Check nails. Face: deep-pore cleansing lotion, wash off. Lemongrass-mint facial masque, leave on for twenty minutes and wash off with wintergreen facial scrub. Check nails. Shower, thirty-five minutes. Water-activated lilac shower gel, honey-coconut almond body scrub. For face: Exfoliating apricot scrub. For hair: strength-boosting strawberry scented shampoo, strawberry scented conditioner for volume and shine. Rinse. Towel-dry. Check nails. Ring Gracie, ten minutes. Blow-dry hair. Ring Nick, seven minutes. Last minute promo: remind social circle of party via Facebook and Twitter. Ring Liv, five minutes. Braid hair. Make-up prep: Alcohol-free, antibac facial toner, clarifying moisturizer. Light foundation, bronzer. Eye-liner, eye-shadow, mascara. Rouge cheeks and lips with blush and lipstick from Clinique’s pin-up girl collection. Check teeth. Get dressed. Ring for cab. Double check everything. Triple check everything... en route MOGADISHU!!!
It isn’t that fucking hard, Mini thinks.
That dress they all got Franky. If she just wore the over-sparkly clinginess (that really was quite chic) then Mini could have called it a day. Could have called it another conquest. That she got the butch dyke to wear a skin-tight dress. That she got another girl to bend to her whims.
Mini likes to believe that the rest of the world drops at her feet. The world, full of the eager to please. Mini likes to believe that it's reasonable, worshipping her. So when this Franky girl shows up to Mini's party, dressed like a fucking Drag King, Mini is torn. She doesn't know if she should be outraged or amused.
Franky's a challenge, she finally decides.
* * *
Every time a strobe light pulses, Mini feels Franky’s eyes on her. Mini’s sat at the bar, not in the mood to play the perfect hostess. She throws back drinks, broods, and her throat's burning while she waits until she’s thought up of a way to kick the little shitter out without it turning into a riot.
The red lights turn Franky’s hair purple and she's just hovering and being a complete, useless fool. With purple hair.
“She’s here,” Liv says, concerned.
“Who is?” Mini raises, playing it cool. She sweeps her eyes across the room, all for show. Liv doesn’t have to know that she already knows exactly where Franky is.
“Franky.”
Nick's rugby boys stop to look at her and they don't bother being discreet about it. Franky's getting all these odd stares and someone's got to fucking do something about this.
“Fucking lesbo scum’s ruining my party.”
Liv gets a look on her face that makes Mini feel like a very stupid child. She suddenly feels all sorts of shit and this is her soiree for fuck’s sake and she didn’t sign up for any of this patronising bullshit from anyone.
“She’s leaving.” Now that Mini’s said the words aloud she’s even more obliged to carry them out.
Liv lets out a sound, a cross between a snort and a hiss, to amplify her disbelief. “You invite the girl, she comes to the party, and all along you never wanted her here.”
“For fucking laughs, Liv!” Mini’s almost hysterical. She doesn’t get it. Liv, who goes way back with Mini, to the pigtails & cooties don't exist phase, plays Mini's games just as well as she does. “Aren’t we on the same page?”
Mini and Liv. They're the type of best mates that do telepathy and Liv just telepathically told Mini that she's fucking insane.
“You’re going too out of your way for laughs, Mins. What the fuck is up with you?”
Mini doesn’t stay around to answer this because her best mate has apparently decided to become a cunt about everything.
There’s a slight wobble to her step as she moves through the crowd. She doesn’t recognise the song the DJ has put on but she’s certain spaceships make the same sounds. She pauses, kind of surprised with the uncoolness of her thoughts. She swears, if she thinks of Star Trek ever again...
Mini tries to remember how many shots she’s had back at the bar. She doesn’t remember and if she can’t remember, then she’s probably had a shitload more than was necessary. But it’s not like she’s proper pissed. She can still work the crowd.
There’s Maya and her friends, all glitter and glam and Mini knows how easy it is for shiny things to steal her attention. So Mini totters up to them with a big smile and shamelessly asks them if they’re enjoying themselves and then, not letting them answer by cutting in with an “Of course you are, it’s my fucking party. You better be.”
She leaves Maya’s ditzy circle because she couldn’t handle their silence and their identical looks of discomfort. She sees a waiter moving towards her and she feels the need to reload. She quickly finishes off her hundredth (or something) shot of Apple Sourz and switches her empty glass with one full of vodka tonic.
Mini doesn’t regret anything.
* * *
Well, Franky’s finally talking to someone.
Grace is so nice. Grace is so... Grace-cious. Mini actually admires Grace, Saint Grace, for tricking freaks into thinking she actually cared about them. Grace can’t honestly be interested with a wish-I-had-a-cock piece of shit like Franky.
What Mini has to remind herself is that Grace is an actress. It’s what she does. She says something that isn’t true but her eyes can still mean it.
And for a moment, Mini wonders if Grace could be lying to her as well... But then she quickly pushes the thought into the back of her mind because if it were true, it would kill her. A traitorous Saint Grace would kill her.
“Hi, Gracie!” she says, not really tuned in with the rest of her body. Her feet have somehow brought them to the two. Gee, when in God’s sweet earth did that happen?
Grace jumps at Mini’s arrival like she was just caught doing something naughty. Well, if that little moment was proof of Grace’s guilt, it is cancelled out completely by the welcoming aura Grace seems to ooze of just a second later.
“Mini! I was just looking for you,” Grace says, with an honest-to-Christ excitement about her.
Fuck it. Mini adores Grace a wee too much to be dwelling about her two-facedness. So instead, she pointedly ignores Grace to finally focus on the more pressing issue. The fanny-less, party-ruining bitch.
“Mi-”
“What are you doing here?” Mini snaps, unable to hide her impatience.
“I was invited. You, uh... you invited me. You invited me.”
Mini swears, if Franky doesn’t stop eating her words...
Is Mini supposed to feel sorry for her or something?
Because right now, what she really wants is to dunk Franky’s head down a toilet. It’s not exactly her way of doing things, so tasteless and unrefined, but she just can’t deny the appeal of the idea. To get Franky wet and begging.
Mini goes blind for a second. Breathes in deeply to collect herself. When she opens her eyes, she takes great care to keep them from narrowing at Franky. “Right, of course I did.”
Grace catches Mini’s eye. Be nice, Grace's look says. And it dawns on Mini, that she’s so sick of this reform act her friends are shoving down her throat. They can all fuck off.
Franky’s staring up at her purposefully but before she can speak, Mini stops her, not wanting a scene.
“Not here.”
Franky shuts her mouth.
“We’ll talk somewhere else.”
* * *
Her initial plans with the private lounge consisted of her, Nick, and a lack of clothes. Leading Franky here, Mini feels like she has desecrated the room.
Mini sits with her legs crossed like a proper lady. The couch is too hard for her liking but there’s no where else to place herself in the room. So she sits back, nurses her drink, and dreams up all the ways she could ruin Franky tonight.
The other girl is in front of the aquarium, watching the fish with a serious face. She taps at the glass and the fish dart away in a panic. There’s a trace of amusement in Franky’s stretched lips and Mini surprises herself for noticing this.
They haven’t spoken a word since the door closed.
Franky moves away from the glass tank. The fish must have been boring her.
She stops in front of the couch, eyeing the empty space beside Mini. When Franky doesn’t take the seat, Mini pretends to be offended. (Not like she really cares about what the freak thinks.)
“You really don’t like me, do you?”
Mini takes a sip of her drink, waiting on Franky’s answer. The air conditioning in this room must be broken or something because her palm’s are sweaty and gross.
She’s going to have to write this down on Mogadishu's evaluation sheet tomorrow.
Franky’s crossing the room, to the wall on the opposite side. There’s a stupid painting there and Mini finds herself hating all the extra stimuli in the private lounge. That Franky can busy herself with, denying Mini that honour of Franky's full attention. “You make it so hard,” she says, her back to Mini.
Mini smiles. A slight admission that Franky bested her there.
“Let’s start over,” Mini suggests.
“Fancy apologising first?” Franky suggests right back, whipping around to face her.
Against her intentions, her glass slams onto the table. A momentary loss of cool. A show of instability. She recovers. Conjures up a fabulous giggle. Oh, Franky. You humour me so. And Mini goes on and says to Franky, in the sweetest way she could fake, “Don’t be like this.”
“Apologise.”
The limit’s hit and Mini gets up from the sofa, exasperated. She marches up to where Franky is and the other girl shuffles away until her back hits the wall. Mini’s got her cornered and all Franky can do right now is frown her eternal, pathetic frown at Mini.
She wants to spit in Franky’s face just so the other girl could stop looking at her with so much disapproval. Mini doesn’t want to hand it to Franky but the little shit’s standing her ground and being such a fucking problem.
“I said we’re starting over. We haven’t met.”
The bass levels outside filter through the lounge door, making the walls shake. Franky’s face is commendably resolute, dangerous even, in the murky mix of the lounge’s red and orange lights.
“I don’t play pretend like that, Mini.”
It’s like a gun has gone off. Mini hears it in her head. An explosion. She hears it so loud, that she mistakes this hot, painful feeling in her chest as a bullet ripping through. She bites down on her cheek, to see if it could feel worse and the only thing that could be worse than that is if it doesn’t.
Mini bites harder and even then, it still doesn’t.
With Franky standing before her, eyebrows raised and so indicative of her smugness, Mini thinks, I am untouchable. She thinks, no one fucks me over. She thinks of pulling at Franky’s hair. Of punching her in the mouth so that her braces would cut the insides of her lips. Of fires and of Mean Girls, of strangulation and of burying dead bodies. Of beating Franky silly with her very own red-soled Louboutin (nobody needs to know they’re knockoff) pumps.
By now Mini has fifty ways to cut this fanny-eating dyke right back down to size. She weighs out her options and can’t figure out which of them is the heaviest.
So it might be the indecision that gets her to lean in. She doesn’t have a plan, really. She just thinks it would be better if she goes in closer.
“I won’t bite,” Mini says with a smile that’s a little too dirty to be any sort of comforting.
So Franky straightens. Puts up this sad, little front that she’s ready for whatever Mini has to dish her. A punch, a slap, a kick. Franky is just going to have to take it.
* * *
(Franky takes it like a champ.)
Mini's kissing her. And yeah, she’s clumsy but it’s only because she’s being it on purpose and not because this means anything enough to make her knees shake.
When they break for air, Mini realises how hard it is to breathe again. Franky’s eyes are so big and so fucking pretty-girly-beautiful that Mini has to... maybe not see this for five seconds.
A game. This is only a game.
She shuts her eyes tight. Tries to remember how to be a bitch again because wasn’t that the whole point of all this?
So Mini pulls away a bit to say, “Would you play along now?”
Franky's lips are coated with their spit. She looks up at Mini, frenzied. “Aren’t you with Nick?”
“I’m with a lot of boys,” Mini says coolly, sliding her arms around Franky’s neck.
“I’m not a boy,” Franky reminds her.
“Is that the problem here, Franky?”
Then Franky relaxes. Stops looking crazy. “I… I dunno,” Franky says and she hesitates when she puts her hands on Mini’s waist.
The smaller girl holds her and Mini feels this power entering and leaving her in big tides. The smaller girl grips at her and Mini is dizzy.
She is overcome with a desire to touch Franky's face so she does, with the most careful of fingers. Mini is overcome with a desire to see into Franky's eyes but the other girl has them trained somewhere else. On Mini's lips.
This is perfect.
Mini takes this as her cue to drop the bomb. The big plan. The game-changer. This is her ticket to winning back the upper hand. Franky's clearly interested now and all Mini has to do is to feed that fire. To start sounding like all those sex education videos she's seen to figure out what you do with boyfriends.
She has to start sounding like a proper porn star.
See you on the field, stud.
Mini kisses her again. Deeper this time. And she tries to get some words out when Franky’s tongue isn’t in her mouth.
“Would you like to-do things to me?”
And then Franky learns to do the same. Learns to talk when there aren’t two tongues in her mouth. “What-things?”
Mini works on Franky’s neck. Yeah, she promised not to bite but being honest was never one of her strong suits. Her dental records are going to be bruises on Franky’s neck tomorrow. To Mini, this is some sort of accomplishment.
“Bad things,” she says and she feels ridiculous and hot. She crushes her mouth into Franky’s again and Mini doesn’t remember it this loud or this sloppy, kissing someone.
She pushes her hips into Franky and when she can’t push them in any further, she starts grinding against the smaller girl. And surprise, surprise. Franky gets with the program and arches her back off the wall behind her to grind back and it’s friction in all the right places and it’s making Mini insane.
Franky moans into her mouth and Mini feels it coming down her throat, bubbling hot until it reaches the pit of her stomach. She's got a hand curling into Franky's hair and it's stiff with gel but she can't mind that right now as she's pulling Franky in even more closer. Her heart’s beating crazy hard and she can’t stop herself from saying things. “If you had a cock, would you fuck me nice and good? Tell me, what would you do right now if you were a real boy?”
She knows she’s never been the best actress, but right now she’s hitting it out of fifty parks.
Mini leans back a little, so she can see Franky better. “Be honest,” she pushes, putting on a perverse smile.
Franky’s face darkens. She grabs at Mini’s arms and for a moment there, they’re both still. Mini’s pretty sure Franky wants to kill her right now. It’s something Mini doesn't know how to process. Doesn't know what to do about. A second later, Franky's shoving her away roughly.
“Fuck you, you fucking slut,” she says, pushing Mini again until she’s a safe distance away.
Mini would have fought back but something, fucking disbelief perhaps, has weakened her. (What Franky said, it isn't supposed to hurt.)
Franky pulls at her own clothes quickly, to flatten them out. She runs her fingers through her hair, hair that Mini recalls she was frantically grabbing at a minute before. Mini's getting all the reactions from Franky that she wanted but she misses the feel of Franky's new lips so much that she gets an urge to take it all back.
Franky slams her fist into that dumb painting on her way out. The glass cracks and if you look closer, you'd see flecks of blood.
“Fine, I never wanted you here anyway!” she shouts when Franky's hand is at the doorhandle. There's a slight pause that tells Mini that Franky caught that (like, really listened) and Mini thinks it's why the door bangs shut harder than it should have.
She knows she’s never been the best actress. And maybe, whatever this is she’s doing. Maybe this isn’t even acting.
“Fucking dyke,” she murmurs to herself. She licks at her lips. They’re sore.
Her knickers are sticky. She feels wretched.
She takes her phone out. Her hands are shaking and her thumbs are clumsy messes on her touch-screen.
Bbz? M n lounge. Lets fuckkk. X X X
She doesn’t send the text. She doesn’t know why. Maybe because her exhaustion has finally caught up to her. Maybe because the couch is too fucking stiff to have sex on and she doesn't want to wake up tomorrow with back pain. Maybe because, when she reads the text again, she thinks about Lady D and how she would never approve of such lack of finesse and propriety.
She squirms in her seat. Her knickers are sticky.
Maybe because Nick is never going to fix her.
Fuck it.
She bunches her skirt up. Her hand crawls in between her legs and unceremoniously pushes her knickers to the side. Starts prodding and rubbing. She closes her eyes and pretends picking up from where they left off, Franky playing along and turning them both around so that she fucks Mini nice and good against the wall. The fish, in their glowing electric blue aquarium, watch the show they put on and Franky loves it especially. Franky going in-out, in-out and in-out of Mini and she's there, her skirts pooled at her hips, an absolute slut. Loud and desperate. And Mini sees herself, slumped over the shorter girl, just bouncing down repeatedly on Franky’s fuck-hand. And her enthusiasm (or her thighs pressed together around the freak’s wrist, she better imagines) undoes one of Franky’s cufflinks.
It’s really scary how it becomes so real in her head. So the waves come and they come hard and Mini tries not to think of her.
She fails spectacularly. Her body twitching pleasurably for a few stolen moments and all she sees are those big, brown eyes and lashes that can never ever belong to a boy.
“Fucking dyke.” This time she says it, it's not just Franky she means.
She pulls her hand out from her knickers, lazily wiping her fingers clean on the lining of her dress. The door isn’t locked. So there’s a passing horror when Mini realises this, that (the whole time) anyone could have walked in on her.
But they didn't now, did they?
So she relaxes. Saves the two fucks she was supposed to give for something else. It's Franky she worries about. Franky and her bleeding honesty. She'd rat Mini out and it'll all go to shit once people know she bumped crotches with a fucking lesbo.
But why would Franky ever tell anyone? Why would she admit to being humiliated and toyed? If Franky really is clever, she'll shut the fuck up and this will all stay a secret.
Her breathing slows down. She smiles, counting on Franky's silence.
Why do people do what they do?
Mini doesn’t regret anything.
* * * fin