his brown eyes ➵ thomgelica

ii.

when she's about to be eleven, he's already fifteen.

she conned him into taking her to see twilight eclipse since when she asked her dad, he regretfully told her teen vampiric romances just weren't for him. he had a reputation to uphold. days of our lives was the extent of his miscellaneous romantic drama addiction.

"pretty sure you could ask one of those boys always following you around," he teased, just like a dad. "tommy has his permit. that lafayette kid has his license, doesn't he?"

it happened when she was helping her mom put groceries away one day. laf was walking past them before oh-so-chivalrously offering his help and a grin too charming for such an already handsome face; all the girls at school talked about how cute he was, and it made her cheeks turn pink when her dad thanked laf for helping his women.

and then he proceeded to tell her that a guy like that is one she'll want to marry when she's forty-three or so.

no, thank you.

except that stuck with her when thomas would always take her bag when he picked her up from school, and oh, god, his eyes were still the most beautiful brown she'd ever seen, and sometime in all the annoying days and movie nights with either of their families and late night study sessions when biology was ruining her life and her gpa, she started to maybe kinda like his gangly, dorky smile and his mood swings  and how he only likes to drink soda at room temperature and knows more lyrics to taylor swift songs than he'll admit.

she has it pretty bad.

thomas and peter were arguing in the backyard when she hangs on her side of the fence and interferes between the words why and difficult.

"hey," she calls lightly, unsure if she should be smiling or not.

mister jefferson smiles, though, and thomas steps back, rocks back on his heels, flexes his fists. "hey."

"i need to borrow him," she tells peter, but as much as he looks like he wants his son out of his hair for a bit, he shakes his head.

"sorry, kid. he's about to be grounded." his hands are tied where thomas's are itching to run and burn, and they both look so done, it's almost funny.

"not even so he can take me to see twilight?" she grins hopeful and helpful and just looking at peter since his son's glowering at her with his brown eyes and his dark oakland shirt radiating righteous indignation beneath all this sun, his head already shaking no, he's not gonna do that.

peter can't stop laughing. he doubles over and chokes and slaps his knee, his eyes shining. "that's better punishment than i can think of," he guffaws, giving her a trademark jefferson smirk.

"you're kidding," thomas huffs, stomping inside and slamming the screen door.

peter gives her an apologetic what can you do? look. "also, angie?"

"yeah?"

"if you could.. talk to him," he blurted, sounding doubtful somehow, "i'd be interested in hearing what he'd say. you two do that talking thing, right?"

"uh, yes," she answers, more question than it should be. "we talk."

"right."