the flaw in being perfect - rini au

five

Ricky doesn't know how to act around Nini anymore. He just feels... guilty?

He doesn't know what he feels.

All he knows is that he wishes he hadn't essentially accused her of sleeping around before he knew anything about her.

He's been avoiding her since he found out about her parents last week, and he knows she's been avoiding him right back.

Ricky has done more research on Nini since that day, and found out that it's been about a year since the accident. She lives with a family that is fostering three other kids aside from her and has a job performing as characters with a fairytale party company to save up for college. There was a lot more about her on the internet, as she seems to have blown up the media for at least six months straight after her moms died, but those two facts stood out to him the most.

"You good?" Big Red asks as he and Ricky wait for class to start.

Ricky met a guy named Big Red in this class, and they've actually talked quite a bit since then. They even exchanged numbers for a semester-long project.

Contrary to his name, Big Red is not actually very big. He's honestly a pretty scrawny guy.

"Yeah, just thinking."

"About Nini again?" Red guesses.

Ricky groans, burying his head in his arms, laying on the desk. "How'd you know?"

"More often than not, people at this school are thinking about Nini Salazar-Roberts. She's been the talk of the town ever since her parents..." Red trails off, but Ricky knows where he's going.

"Is she okay?" Ricky starts, lifting his head from his the desk. "I mean, obviously she's not okay, but how can she smile like that all the time? It doesn't make any sense."

Red shrugs. "She's just... Nini. She went through a really rough patch after it all happened last year, but she's bounced back an insane amount."

"What kind of rough patch?" Ricky furrows his eyebrows.

"Well, she didn't come to school for a while. I'm not friends with her so I don't really know, but she used to be really close with my friend Ashlyn. They've drifted apart since then."

Ricky nods.

Needless to say, Ricky couldn't focus that class period.

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thank you to everyone that's reading!! pls comment your thoughts!! :)

-jenna