For You, I'd Do Anything- Rini One Shots

Roses are Red

It started in first grade.

It was their class's Valentine's Day party, and everyone was supposed to bring in little cards or candies to place in everyone's homemade boxes. Afterwards, they all got to sit with their friends and eat their candy before going out to an early recess.

"Hey, Nini what did Ricky write on your valentine?" her best friend, Kourtney asked, giggling and glancing over at the popular curly haired boy. "He said I'm cool."

Nini had looked through all her valentines, and then frowned. "I don't think he gave me one." She didn't care that much, but Kourtney was not having it.

"He didn't?!" she exclaimed.

"I don't see one..." the brunette replied with a shrug. "It's not a big deal."

Kourtney apparently thought otherwise because she stood up and marched over to the teacher, who had then called Ricky over to her desk. When he trudged over to the arts and crafts table to grab some scissors, paper, and markers before sitting back with his friends, Nini thought that was the end of it. But as they got in line for recess, Ricky had shoved a crudely cut red paper heart in her hands.

"What's it say?!" Kourt squealed when they got outside.

Nini looked down and tried to sound out the words Ricky had misspelled. "Roses are red, violets are blue..." she read slowly. "Your breath smells like pickles, and your hair is dumb."

Kourtney frowned and started to say something, but Nini marched away before she got the chance. She walked right onto the field where Ricky was playing kickball with his friends and shoved the card back in his face.

"This doesn't even rhyme!" she told him.

"That's what you get for being a tattle-tale!" he said, pushing her arm away and trying to get back to his game.

"I didn't tell on you, Kourtney did! I don't care that you didn't give me a valentine. I don't even want a valentine from you."

"Whatever you say, Pickle-Breath."

"Don't call me that!"

And so their rivalry (and the nickname) was born.

*****

He's gotten her a ridiculous Valentine's Day gift every year since that first-grade misunderstanding. The worst has been the few times she's had a boyfriend on Valentine's Day, when she's had to explain the curly sue's dumb grudge. She's also had to endure the confusion and glares whenever he's had a girlfriend on Valentine's Day.

The gifts have gotten worse and worse each year, and they've also gotten more elaborate, but that's a more recent development.

In seventh grade, he gave her another red heart, but instead of a not-rhyming poem inside, it had a drawing of a penis in blue Sharpie. "Real mature." she had told him. "I bet you don't even know what it is." he sassed back, smirking.

Sophomore year, he gave fifty bucks to the girl whose locker was next to Nini's to figure out her locker combination and give it to him so he could leave her gift in her locker. She was surprised to see that he left her flowers- and even signed the card- until the first sneeze. That's when she realized he had left her a bouquet of daisies, which he somehow must've found out she was allergic to. (When she flipped the card over, he had written, 'Valentine's Day just wouldn't be the same with-achoo!')

So on February thirteenth, Nini is extra suspicious. It's their senior year- Ricky Bowen's last chance to pull some dumb Valentine's Day prank- and she wouldn't be surprised if he wanted to start early. When her best friend walks up behind her in the hallway before third period, she jumps so high she almost levitates for a second, causing Kourtney to roll her eyes.