Chapter Text
CHAPTER SIX.
NEW CHANGES.
"ricky? ricky?"
he snapped out of his thoughts, apologetically glancing at nini in front of him, who was holding a pen in her hand and pointing it towards him. she probably used it to poke him out of his deep state, too focused on what happened yesterday to really pay attention to their conversation.
“sorry, sorry,” he muttered, placing hands in his hair and lightly slamming his head against the wooden table, feeling his body slump over because of lack of energy. he was just so tired after having no sleep and couldn’t bring himself to be actively engaged in their talk. “what’s got your mind so messed up?” nini asked him, dropping her pen onto the table.
“nothing,” he muttered, glancing around at the decorations being put up around the cafeteria, things like homecoming propaganda, special lights and tinsel? “just... all of this homecoming stuff. it’s just a lot of pressure to have to see all this stuff around. i don’t really feel like going.”
nini looked surprised. “you don’t?” she asked quietly, like she was afraid he’d get mad at her if she thought otherwise. he let out a sigh, shrugging his shoulders. “oh, i don’t know! sure, it would be nice to have a date to go with... but it’s also a fun time with friends too, you know? and me and one of my closest friends had a bit of an argument.”
nini raised an eyebrow. “you and big red had an argument? but you guys haven’t argued in years, and that argument was over something as silly as a kindergartner crying over spilt milk. literally, you had an argument over who made the kid cry because of the spilt milk-”
“me and gina, neens. i told her what you told me, and we argued. i said some things... she said some things. now we aren’t talking anymore.” nini leaned back in her chair and ricky glanced at her to gauge her reaction. she didn’t seem happy about it, but she also didn’t seem unhappy. “what did she say?” she asked curiously.
ricky didn’t want to talk about it. the words rang in his ears when he was laying in bed last night, they rang while he was eating breakfast- they even rang during this very conversation. “in the universe where i like you ricky.”
gina liked him. she had a crush on him, and he was struggling to come to terms with it. what was he supposed to do? how was he supposed to talk to her, knowing she liked him in that way?
not that she wanted to talk to him now anyway.
“a lot,” ricky answered vaguely, fiddling with his untouched fries. he could hear nini huff, unsatisfied with his answer. “ricky, c’mon, you can tell me anything-” “can we just go back to writing this song? the team’s depending on troy and gabriella here, not nini and ricky.” she sighed loudly, disappointment etched onto her face before nodding.
as they went over lyrics during lunch, ricky spotted gina laughing with big red, ashlyn, ej and kourtney, all talking animatedly about something, probably rehearsals because he wasn’t sure what any of them had in common besides it. his eyes searched for any fake emotion behind gina’s expression but she actually looked happy.
and then their eyes met.
immediately her smile dropped and her voice died down, eyes darting to look at her food like it was a piece of art she was studying. her mouth seemed to stammer an excuse to go before getting up quickly and heading out of the cafeteria, leaving them all confused at her sudden change of mood. all except big red, who had turned his head in ricky’s direction.
it took all of his power not to run off after her.
in classes it was clear gina wanted nothing to do with him. she didn’t sit in her usual seat, the one next to ricky and big red in their social studies class, she dodged being his partner in gym and completely ignored his existence when they were paired up as biology lab partners. they had only exchanged one word all day.
“move.”
the exchange occurred in biology class, when he was blocking her path to the hydrochloric acid. he moved out of her way without saying a word, and watched her walk past and back to her table. despite it only being one word, and despite it being a word fueled with malice, it only made ricky’s heart ache more. he just wanted to talk to her. he just didn’t know what to say.
before he entered rehearsals at the end of the day, big red pulled him to the side by the arm. “i know what you’re going to say,” ricky admitted, before he could even open his mouth. “listen to me ricky. you and gina, i don’t know what happened to you guys after i left, i can admit that. but what i do know is that she has shown you so much support so far, and you guys are two of my bestest friends. what she did was bad, but you can’t bring it in your heart to forgive her? everyone does shifty things sometimes, even-”
“she likes me big red. she like likes me, she told me yesterday and then she ran off and since then we haven’t spoken to each other and she just ignores me in class- one word big red. she told me to move in biology, and that’s it.”
red looked surprised, like he hadn’t expected him to say that. “oh. ohhh, yeah, that changes things. i’ve spoken to her and she told me she’s perfectly fine being civil with me, but she doesn’t want to talk to you at all. she told you that?”
“she did.”
“and what did you say back?”
“she didn’t let me say anything. she ran off before i could even process what she had just said to me.” red crossed his arms, seemingly deep in thought. it was clear he didn’t know what to say. surely, after a moment’s silence, red asked him a difficult question.
a question he was avoiding asking himself.
“well do you like her?”
he should’ve expected this question really, but when he heard big red say it he coughed loudly, winded by some hidden truth. “what?” he asked, clearing his throat and rubbing the back of his neck. big red leaned back, staring straight through him. “you do like her, don’t you? you’re blushing.”
“i don’t- i’m not-”
“do you like her or not?”
“yes! maybe? i don’t know,” he sighed, running a hand down his face in exasperation. “i’ve always felt things towards gina, like i’d look into her eyes and just see wonder and something real staring back at me. she’d smile at me and i’d feel fuzzy and warm, and all these other complicated feelings that make me smile back at her... but, i also like nini. i still want to be with nini, and when i’m with her everything feels right. is it even possible-”
“to have two crushes?” big red interrupted. “yes. a lot of people like two people at the same time, have you never watched a teen drama on netflix before? or like, a sequel to a netflix romcom?” red asked, a bit bewildered and off topic.
he shrugged his shoulders. “you know i’m not into stuff like that,” ricky said, feeling like things were rapidly changing, and he didn’t like it. “but they’re so good though? okay, we definitely have to watch them later, i have a bunch of recommendations-” he paused, presumably after catching the look ricky was giving him. “but that’ll be later. we’ll focus on now.”
“i just want the three of us back again. she did a bad thing, like a really bad thing, but ej approached her. it’s not like it was her idea, right? plus, what if she said no at first but he kept on insisting?” all of ricky’s issues would’ve been better if ej just stopped doing what he was doing.
“ricky, i can’t lie to you, this situation is complicated. it seems very... very delicate and should probably be handled with care. i’ll talk to gina myself later today, and maybe see where her head is at. i don’t know if she trusts me enough to tell me, but i’m hoping she does!” ricky thought he didn’t sound so sure but he nodded in agreement anyway.
“sure. thanks for letting me talk to you about this by the way. nini was asking and just... the one person i trust to tell i can’t tell- just thanks for being there man,” he praised, and he could tell big red was pleased their conversation didn’t end up turning into a fight.
ricky walked into rehearsals, hands in pockets and was immediately facing gina who was inside the storage room. considering nobody else was in the room except her, ricky said his prayers before heading to the entryway, awkwardly leaning against the door frame. “gina, can we please just talk about yesterday?”
he saw her body freeze its movements.
after a long pause of silence, where the only sound being heard where the noises of students in the hallways, gina said, “i don’t want to speak to you ricky, and i think i made that very clear.” he scoffed at her, blocking the one entrance and her one exit. “gina, i don’t want us to fight, i really don’t. i want us to be friends, can’t we just talk about this? i know it wasn’t your idea to steal nini’s phone.”
gina turned around to glare at him, her nose flaring up every now and then like a raging bull. he tried to keep his face unaffected, but he was terrified. “i don’t care. it’s so embarrassing ricky, and i just don’t want to talk about it with you. please, can you just move?”
“what if i said...” he trailed off, not expecting that to come out of his mouth. she raised an eyebrow. “what if you said what?” despite her not wanting to talk, it was clear she was curious about what he had to say. thing was, what he wanted to say, he hadn’t really said to himself yet.
anytime gina was in a room with him alone, and they were talking, he’d feel how close they were, like a sixth sense. every hand touch, every shoulder grab, every punch felt like it was being enhanced by multiple different senses. anytime she looked at him with that bright eyed smile of hers, he always felt winded. that time in the skatepark, when he couldn’t keep his eyes off of her? he had had the urge to do something, something he had never thought of with her before.
he had wanted to kiss her.
some of these feelings felt new, like they were just manifesting themselves into his life. but he knew some of the things had been there for a while, and he just didn’t want to acknowledge them before. he then cleared his throat before glancing away. “i just want you back gina,” he said, thought that hadn’t been what he had wanted to say.
she stared at him, her face unmovable in its frown. just as she opened her mouth to speak, the sounds of the other performers in the musical arrived and they could both hear miss jenn screaming about how they had to be quick because homecoming was going to start taking up all of her time.
gina closed her mouth and he moved out of her way so she could leave the room, following after her, not happy with how the conversation went. as rehearsals went on, miss jenn out of nowhere declared that nini and ricky should practice their kissing scene as troy and gabriella.
“but they don’t kiss in the first movie miss jenn...” carlos questioned, but miss jenn shushed him. “i know, i know that troy and gabriella only kiss at the end of high school musical two, however! we need drama and we need romance to capture audience’s attention, and what better way than a kiss?”
he wasn’t sure what complied him to do so, but he glanced at gina to see her reaction. she didn’t seem to care, but ricky had a feeling she was doing that thing where she walled up her emotions so nobody could see through them. “nini, ricky? how about we give you guys some privacy? maybe go to a storage closet somewhere in the school?”
ricky shrugged his shoulders before following nini down the hallways, heading towards the janitors closet. they didn’t say a word to each other until they entered, and ricky took a seat on an upturned empty bucket. “so...” nini began, wringing her hands almost unnoticeably. “a kissing scene huh?”
“actors do it all the time right? i’m sure we can... we can just-” he muttered, shaking hands grabbing onto nini’s hips. her hands rested on his shoulders, one hand coming up to brush some more uncontrollable hair out of his eyes. “relax ricky, you’re shaking,” she observed, running her hand through his hair soothingly.
“sorry. just... a lot of my mind. i’m nervous.”
“it’s for the show, right? don’t overthink it.”
but even when she said it, he knew she didn’t believe her own words just as much as he didn’t. his mind wandered to gina, but she didn’t want anything to do with him. he liked her... but he also liked nini, and he had liked her first. was it wrong to do this? he didn’t know the moral implications behind all of this, but he did know the kiss was just for the play.
it wasn’t like it was nini’s idea.
she bit her lip and his eyes were drawn to the movement, feeling a plunge in his stomach like he had just gone down a steep rollercoaster. she leaned forward and he closed his eyes. her lips captured his own with a lot more passion than he had expected, her hand clenching around his locks of hair as she pulled him towards her. he kissed her back just as hard, pulling her by the waist until he didn’t know where his body started and where hers ended.
heat radiated off the both of them before nini pulled away from the kiss briefly, before ricky pulled her back in for more. she pulled away once again, adjusting her sweater and breathing heavily. “your lips are swollen,” ricky noted, and she blushed profusely. “you don’t just say that!” she complained.
there was silence before nini said, “listen ricky, i would love it if me and you went to the homecoming dance together as friends do, but i can’t go. my moms, they have this bingo night planned out, and i have to help out with the music. i would’ve.. i mean, i would’ve asked..” he held her hands. “you’re good. it would’ve been fun. i decided i will go, big red will still be there and it could be a fun bonding thing with the cast and stuff.”
nini smiled. “you’re just as good of a kisser as i remember,” she praised and even he felt himself go red. “pfff no... do you think someone’s going to come in here and look at us and think we did more than just-” “don’t finish that sentence,” she threatened.
as they left the room, ricky suddenly felt a lot of anxiety around how he looked. his hair was probably really messy, and his lips were glossy and his shirt was a bit wonky. all he could think about then was what if gina saw him like this?
god, what was wrong with him?
what was going on?
he made a quick detour to the bathroom to fix himself. however, as he got back to rehearsals, he found out from ashlyn that gina had left early, because she didn’t feel well. suddenly neither did ricky.
as rehearsals came to a close, and ricky found himself skateboarding home, he briefly wondered if he should go check up on gina. he didn’t think she would appreciate him showing up at her door, and would most likely slam it in his face, but he cared about her and he wanted to make sure she was okay. just as he made his decision, he got a phone call.
from his mom.