Tumblr's FicWeek | LUTTEO

let's take it back to where it first began

DAY FIVE: "You punched me in the face while gesticulating wildly to a friend."

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There were many normal; ways you could meet someone new, someone who'd stay with you for a period of time, or someone permanent in your life; at school, at the mall, at work... But Luna Valente? She wasn't blessed with such luck.

At the age of five, when she still lived in sunny, Mexican paradise Cancún, while running around with one of her little fists full of mud, she bumped into a lady visiting her orphanage. The lady had smiled sweetly at her, ignoring the big splash of mud on her white dress, and asked for her name; they talked for what had to be hours (or at least that's what felt to her little five year old self) until one of the nuns taking care of her let the nice lady know her husband was looking for her. Six months later, she was officially the new member of the Valente family.

When she was ten, still in Cancún, she met her best friend.

Simón was two years older, and the nicest six grader in her primary school, and everyone knew him; teachers, students, the janitors, even the lunch lady! And one day, of what he liked to call as fate, she had a soccer ball on her feet, kicked it, and landed on his head. She'd been horrified, thinking she'd giving him a death sentence, when he started laughing maniacally at her paranoia. After a few days they were inseparable.

Fast-forward six years later, Luna moved to Buenos Aires and met her other best friend; Nina. Their meeting wasn't as violent as hers with Simón, but it was soap opera's worthy. At her first day on South Blake, Nina had tripped in front of Luna's locker, gaining the laughs of the students gathered in the hallway; so Luna stepped in, shushing them up while helping Nina stand up, automatically gaining her respect and friendship. They, too, were inseparable after that.

You'd think that she'd realize the pattern of odd meetings for the most important people in her life, and recognize the signs in front of her.

Nothing, however, could prepare her to meet Matteo Balsano.

She couldn't remember the exact day, or date of this, but she remembers she had been living in Buenos Aired for a few months already; Nina and she had decided to go to a Cinema, and watch the new Captain America movie. She was a big superheroes' nerd (like half the world, apparently, because the movie theater was full), and got excited easily when the topic was touched; so, while animatedly explaining to Nina the cameos of other superheroes in this particular movie, she unconsciously extended her arm behind her, accidentally hitting someone on their face.

The sound of her hand slapping against the stranger's face made her turn around so fast, so suddenly, she got dizzy for a second. Her victim had his right hand over his nose, covering it from her. His companion, another guy, was laughing uncontrollably at his friend's dismay, and only made her feeling worse.

Nina hurried her to get him out of the movie theater, to get his nose checked ("it could be broken, Luna" was what she said, making her freak out even more). She gave the boy no warning, pulled him out of his seat, and dragged him outside where one of the workers kindly offered to call the mall's emergency doctor (she didn't even knew malls had one). Nina and the boy's friend ("I'm Gastón" he'd say two hours later, after noticing he hadn't introduced himself earlier) arrived two minutes later with their hands full of the snacks they'd bought for the movie.

Gastón joked over and over again about Luna "kicking Matteo's ass" (that's when she realized her victim's name was Matteo), thanking her for dropping his friend's superiority complex a few levels, saying everyone would thank her for it.

Twenty minutes after the incident, she was still profusely apologizing and Matteo was silent. If it weren't for the fact he'd told Gastón to fuck of multiple times, she'd think the boy couldn't talk. It was obvious the only person he didn't want to talk to was her.

After the doctor assured them Matteo's nose wasn't broken, gave him a pill for the pain, and cleaned the blood on his nose, not before suggesting he headed home. Luna offered to take him home, but Matteo declined quicker than a flash. The first time he spoke to her were to tell her he had a driver waiting for him outside the mall. He left soon after. That was the first and only time she spoke to him in three years.

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Their second meeting was something similar. They weren't at the cinema, but someone got a bloody nose this time too.

She'd convinced Nina to let her teach her how to rollerskate. A new place had opened up close to their college, a place with a rollerskating rink and apparently good enough food; a place Nina refused to go because "she couldn't skate." So she got her to wear a pair of skates on, and strolled around a park near their houses.

It wasn't until she let Nina go on her own when she realized she hadn't taught her how to stop. And when she did, she fell down onto a guy napping under a tree.

She didn't recognize Gastón at first, but she definitely did recognize Matteo; who had woken up from his sleep thanks to his friend's shrieking of pain. Disheveled hair, puffy eyes from sleeping, and a cute confused look was all it took for her brain to remember him.

"What's up with you and your weird ways to hurt people's noses?" He'd asked her. She could only shrug, because she didn't know how to answer him. "Well, nose breaker, I'm Matteo."

"I'm Luna, nice to uh, meet you?"

He smiled and she was sold.

After that things just felt naturally. Turns out, they all attended the same university, but had never crossed each-other because of their different majors. They had a couple of friends in common (Nico, Simón's bandmate, was dating the best friend of one of Matteo's guy friends), they adopted the Jam & Roller (the rollerskating place) as their own, and just clicked.

Matteo admitted he'd been so embarrassed the night they met, he just couldn't get words to get out of his mouth when she spoke to him. "There you were, the prettiest girl I've ever met, worried sick about my bleeding nose, with Gastón's continuous commentary and jokes as the perfect chaperone. I just didn't stand a chance." He'd told her.

Like she'd said, her encounters with the most important people to her were anything but normal; but for it she'd gained a wonderful pair of parents, the best friends ever, and a pretty perfect guy.

And she was perfectly fine with that.