friends (rick riley and scott holland)(INDEFINITE HIATUS)

chapter four

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chapter four: cheer season

a/n:

i cut this chapter in half because it was getting long and i really wanted to update. whatever. sue me.

this is mostly gwen being a mom to like everyone.

tw(s) -- some mentions of past bullying and bad parenting

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Gwen, as she does most things in her life, takes cheerleading very seriously.

It was one of those things that her father knew in his bones she'd be good at —— the perfect niche for his loud, headstrong daughter who always seemed to thrive on pushing herself just a little too far. She's always liked to teeter on the edge of total combustion, tiredness pulling behind her eyes as she performs for a crowd. It's what makes her the life of the party. It's what makes her such a good (mother.)

In her early childhood, she was a gymnast, but she was forced to stop when a coach in her division turned out to be a pedophile. (Phillip has always gone pale at the thought of his precious, baby girl being in danger, only to turn around and put her in more just the same.) When she reached middle school, the boredom from the lack of an extracurricular activity caught up to her. She dug her heels in the dirt one day and demanded that Phillip pay for violin lessons, a claim that it would look good on her eventual college resume chipped through her braced teeth and across his town car. He paused before he, like he always did when it came to her, caved. She'd actually only wanted to play it because a mean violinist girl on the school's ensemble told her she couldn't, and then ended up dropping the talent just two years in because the kids on the chess club were so much kinder.

Then, in high school, there was cheerleading.

Cheerleading, with its intensive practices, cut-throat environment, and pleated skirts, quickly became her thing.

And nothing —— no amount of balance beam routines, or hours spent pouring over playing Eine Kleine Nachtmusik —— could beat the pure, physical exhaustion that came with it.

Years of Gwen's blood, sweat, and tears have gone into Eden Hall Varsity Cheer. She survived unmitigated humiliation, allowed the older girls to abuse her into submission and thanked them for it, just to get and maintain a place on the squad. She's suffered countless injuries, taken flailing limbs to the face from girls who never should've been on top and fallen from the hands of girls who never should've been at the bottom, as the years dragged on. Her body has become more glitter and bruises than it ever was flesh or bone, and the fear that she was going to turn the corner into degradation itched at the back of her throat for longer than she'd care to admit, but she did make it.

The seniors who used to crush raw eggs on her head in front of the whole cafeteria and the healed crack in her left cheekbone are just obstacles on a course.

Irrelevant, truly, in the grand scheme of things.

Why should she give a damn about such petty things when she's finally reached the top of both the food chain and the cheer pyramid?

When she puts on her skirt and smiles at an arena's worth of people with her glittery face, she's more than herself. She's more than the daughter of some drunk lawyer, or the big sister of some kid who's good at hockey. They're all footnotes in her story.