on thin ice [karen/frank - marvel]

forty: millennial love

PELTERSFIELD HIGH SCHOOL, SEPTEMBER 28, 2000

"I heard Lorenzo got spaghetti and fuckin' raw fish in his skates when he made Defenseman"

"Wait really?"

He stared across at Damien opposite him in the locker room as he untied the pads from his shins. He shoved them into his bag, the musty smell leaking out as he opened it. The plastic coating the outside had begun to peel away and flakes of it crumpled in his hands. It was disgusting and he was desperately in need of a new one but he knew that money was tight and it wasn't a priority. Nothing of his ever was.

"Yeah, really" Damien replied. "So you better watch your back, Frankie V. Lorenzo will be out to get you when he hears you just got made a Winger. I hope you like fish"

He scoffed, laughing loudly as he shook his head. The two others in the locker room, Ark and Dre, just laughed along with him as he was shoved by Damien as he walked out. The three continued changing in silence as he pondered what antics the rest of his team mates might get up to now he'd been promoted to a better position. He knew that someone from the school paper would get ahold of it, maybe catching the congratulatory prank also, it was just a matter of when.

"You coming to Millie's, V? Whole team is gonna be there celebrating promotions and shit" Dre asked, throwing a shirt over his shoulder. Dre was the tallest member of the team and  it scared him a little. He knew that if Dre was coming toward him on the ice, the impact would last until about two weeks after the game.

He shook his head. "Can't. Gotta stick around to get my sister from Calculus club. She still hasn't passed her fucking driving test so I have to wait for her every damn week after practise"

The two of them laughed and he could feel his cheeks growing red. She always found a way to embarrass him, even when she was nowhere to be seen. Somehow just the mention of her got him into shit. "Man I don't get how she's related to you" Ark said, pulling the drawstrings on his bag before throwing it on his back. Dre may have been the tallest on the team but Ark was officially the smallest and their friendship was the oddest combination of any he had seen.

"You're not the only one" He replied, the three of them laughing once again. He was alone once they had finished changing and he went as slowly as he could. His phone was buzzing constantly, texts coming through, congratulations on making Winger. He ignored them all. He knew that his mother had called to tell him to find out where Marco was, but he had pretended to "forget" been as he wasn't bothered. He usually made his own way home anyway, so there was no point.

Shutting the door to the locker room, he threw his bag on his back before beginning to jog to the track. The bleachers were empty, the odd few cheerleaders sitting there after practise to try and catch some of the hockey players. They were there every week without fail, the exact same ones and he had learned to just roll with it. Even though he didn't feel comfortable with them watching him and shouting things at him, he had tried to repress it into a compliment - purely because that's what Coach said every time he bought it up.

"Looking good today, V"

He looked up to the bleachers briefly and saw Tara Lerner wave toward him with a wink. Her hair was short and dark just like her eyes as she eyed him from across homeroom practically everyday. She'd made a move or two on him but he never really felt something click. He finally realised it was popularity that threw them together but something else he couldn't name that separated them. They kept their distance, acting as though nothing happened and denying the odd rumour here and there. According to literally everyone else, they made an intensely brilliant and talented pair. He didn't see it. The few others girls around her just laughed as he saluted back, continuing to run along the fields.

He didn't make it onto the track before he spotted a redhead on the bottom level of the bleachers, clearly keeping her distance from the others. "Damn it," she cursed as he approached, papers lay in her lap with red coating the corners. He frowned instantly, shoving his hands in his pockets as he slowed to a walk in front of her. When he got closer, he realised that the red on the corners of what looked like assignments, was blood.

"You alright down there?" He asked, coming to a stand still in front of her. Her shoulders were hunched over the papers and her bag was sat on the floor next to her feet. He leaned forward and peered inside at four chunky textbooks with coloured note cards sticking out from multiple pages.

She looked up quickly and he noticed she held a hand behind her ear. The blood was coating her palm also, trickling down her forearm. Her face dropped as he approached and she pulled the hand away from her ear and began to pile her papers away. She only stuttered as she spoke, as expected. "Hi,"

He smiled back at her, adjusting his bag over his shoulder as the load inside was starting to fuse his muscles together. It was painful. "What's with the bloody papers?"

She shoved them into her arms, tucking her hair behind the ear she wasn't messing with. You couldn't notice the blood on her crimson hair and he could tell she was grateful for that. He found himself glued to the spot with his hands hanging by his side as she looked in terrible discomfort. "It's embarrassing"

He shook his head, "Can't be that bad"

Her cheeks had turned almost the colour of her hair as she grabbed her bag and shoved the papers inside. It was messy, the blood coating the edges of her bag and disrupting the order in which her textbooks sat inside. He could tell it bothered her as she sighed agitated before throwing it over her shoulder and beginning to leave. "It's nothing, look I have to go-"

"Let me take a look" He said, quickly breaking into a small jog to catch up to her. He didn't realise how fast she was walking until he caught up to her and yanked on the strap of her bag before she could walk any further. She turned as he halted her on the field, looking at him with a frown on her face. "Maybe I can help"

She stopped in front of him, placing her bag back on the bleachers before sitting next to it. He joined her, sitting at an angle as she tucked her hair to one side. He placed his bag on the ground, shuffling closer to her as she turned away from him. She moved it away from her ear and he grimaced as there was a huge red gash behind it, bleeding. "Whoa" He said, going to touch it but being stopped abruptly as she hit his hand away. Laughing a little, he held his hands up in response. "Hey, I was only trying to help"

"Sorry," she replied, her body relaxing a little as he hadn't even noticed how tense she was before. "It's just painful, that's all. Warn me next time"

He kept his eyes on her as she looked at him, hand clutching behind her ear once again, the blood spilling profusely. He grimaced a little as he eyed it, "Look, we need to do something to stop the bleeding, it's not helping anything"

She shook her head, pulling a tissue from her pocket and beginning to press it against her head once again. "There's no use, I've tried to stop the bleeding for the past hour" He just watched her once again, feeling completely helpless to her situation. He finally noticed, now being so close-up to her, that she was wearing a scarf. In summer. He almost laughed but it had gaped open a little and he realised why she was wearing it – to cover the blood on her white shirt.

"At least let me give you a change of clothes?" He asked, looking back toward the locker room. He could see the cheerleaders heading down from the bleachers and head toward it, most likely to leave the school grounds completely. "I have a jersey in my locker, or a shirt, whatever you want. And there's got to be something in the med kit in Jansen's office to help you"

Standing from the bleachers, he picked his bag from the ground and then grabbed hold of her wrist, pulling her to a stand. She quickly grabbed her bag before he began walking down the fields once again, her half following-half attempting to leave. Pulling away from his grip, she shook her head, letting her hair fall back into place. "This was a bad idea, excuse me"

"It won't take long, I promise" He said, turning toward her.

An uncertain frown appeared on her face. "I have to get back"

"Ten minutes," he said, "Tops"