Chapter Text
Jemma Simmons is eight years old and she really does not want to be where she is. Her mother and father stand on either side of her, forced smiles plastered on their faces as they usher her through the door and into the next room of the building. There’s a painted sign next to the door that reads ‘Friendly Faces Playgroup!’ in bright letters. She starts to make a face but then her mother frowns and pinches her arm, and Jemma sighs and pastes on a smile, letting herself be shoved into the room. There are a couple of other kids there already, standing around awkwardly. Some of their parents are still there, some have already left. Jemma’s parents leave her standing silently by a wall and walk over to talk quietly to the woman Jemma knows is in charge. She remembers her from when her parents first brought her here, explaining what it was and why they wanted her to go.
She thinks the whole thing is a bit silly though, her parents acting as if it’s her fault none of the kids at school like her. It’s certainly not her fault how smart she is scares them or that she has trouble controlling the pitch of her voice or that she’s so shy. They’re all so much older and bigger than her, she doesn’t think it’s a bad thing that maybe they make her a little nervous. Sure, a few friends would be nice, but she does okay on her own. The teachers like her, and she can just spend breaks and lunches reading or working on extra homework. Lost in her thoughts, Jemma doesn’t notice her mother kneeling in front of her, and she starts backwards when she does. Her mother grips her shoulders and looks at her harshly.
“Be good, Jemma Beatrice.” her mother’s voice is stiff and serious. “Remember what I told you. Smile, but not too much, and don’t talk too loud or too much. Be friendly!”
With a stiff nod from her father, her parents are gone.
Leopold Fitz also does not want to be at the Friendly Faces Playgroup, but his mum had asked him nicely and told him it would help him, and also he knew she needed something to do with him once in awhile so she could run errands. So he let her bring him to the group, and he stood slightly behind her as she waited for the hostess to finish talking to a very stern looking couple. He watched the couple as his mum talked to the woman. They had walked over to a very small little girl in a neat skirt and white knee socks. She didn’t look very happy. His mum was done talking to the woman and knelt down in front of him.
“You’ll be alright, love?” she asked softly.
“Yes, mum. I’ll be fine.” he put on a brave face and smiled, trying not to fidget too much. His mother smiled and kissed his forehead, then scrubbed the pink smudge it left off. He made a face and she laughed.
“See you in a few hours, Leo darling.” she said with a smile, and patted his head before heading over to the door.
“Bye mum.” He stared at the floor after she left.
Leo wasn’t overly fond of other people. He liked his mum, and he liked his dog Frodo, and he liked a few of his school teachers, but that was it. The kids at school were older than him and they were mean. He was eight but his classmates were ten, but it didn’t matter because he knew he was smarter than them anyway. Plus, they all knew about his da, and what had happened and why he’d gone back to Scotland, and he hated the way kids sneered at him and the way grown ups looked at him with pity. He didn’t need any of them anyway.
He’s snapped out of his train of thought by the woman, who calls herself Miss Meredith, calling them to the center of the room. He shuffles forward and watches the little girl from earlier fidget with her fingers as she does the same.
Jemma takes a deep breath and walks forward, because if she knows how to do anything, it’s follow instructions. So she does as Miss Meredith says and moves to the middle of the bright room, sitting down. She sits on her knees, they way her mother always tells her to, because it’s more ladylike, even though it hurts her legs a little.
“Okay, kids. What we’re going to do is turn to the person on our left, go off somewhere in the room, and get to know each other! Find out their name, how old they are, what they do for fun, whatever you want to know! Then, we’ll come back to the circle, and tell everyone else what we learned about them, so we can all learn things about each other! Then we’ll go from there with our next activity! Okay? Okay!” she grinned broadly and waved her hands in a ‘go at it’ gesture.
Jemma turned to her left and saw a boy about her age with curly brown hair. She smiled shyly and waved.
“Hello.” she said carefully, trying not to be too loud.
“Hello.” Leo said in response, looking mildly frightened. When he spoke, Jemma beamed.
“You’re Scottish! I’m from the UK too!” her voice echoed in the room and she winced visibly, shrinking in on herself “Sorry. I didn’t mean to shout.”
“I don’t mind. I’m Leo.”
“I’m Jemma.” she smiled shyly, her voice a careful whisper.
“How old are you? I’m eight, but I’m in fifth grade.” he puffs his chest out slightly, smiling brightly.
“Me too! To both!” her voice goes up again but she catches herself halfway, biting her lip and lowering her volume. “I like science and microscopes and reading, and I have a cat named Crookshanks, and I’m very good at climbing trees but mother and father don’t like that and get mad at me, so I don’t do it very much.”
“I like Legos, and building things, and science too I guess but not the messy kind, and reading too, I have a dog named Frodo and we used to have a cat named Bilbo but he was my da’s so we don’t have him anymore. Climbing trees sounds dangerous. I’m afraid of heights.”
“What’s your favorite book? I’m sorry about your cat. Why did you move to America? And it’s okay to be afraid of heights, I’m afraid of the dark. Father said I was too old for my night light though, so he took it away.” Her voice is louder now, but not a shout, though she is talking awfully fast.
“That’s too hard. I have a lot of favorite books. Harry Potter is good, and so is Lord of the Rings, I also really like His Dark Materials, and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. It’s okay I liked him but he was grumpy and liked da best anyway. We moved to America when I was a baby because of da’s work. I don’t know why we stayed. I think maybe mum couldn’t afford to move.” He isn’t sure why he’s telling her this. Any of it, really. Maybe it’s the accent that’s almost like his own, or maybe it’s how the way her parents talked to her unsettled something in his stomach. He keeps talking either way. “That wasn’t very nice of your father.”
“I love Harry Potter! Hermione is my favorite. Lord of the Rings is good too, I’m reading His Dark Materials right now, actually. I haven’t read 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. I also really like myths and fairy tales, I’ve a big book of myths from all around the world, and one for fairy tales as well.” she adds the last part shyly, afraid that it will make her sound silly, or childish. “We moved here for work too. Father owns some kind of business, I’m not sure what he does really. He isn’t home very much.” she shrugs. “It’s okay. Father says he doesn’t have to be nice because he’s in charge.”
Leo and Jemma spend the rest of the allotted time talking loudly in the corner and finding more and more things they have in common. Miss Meredith makes slow circles around the room and smiles when she sees them speaking animatedly to each other. They fall back into the circle when called, holding hands tightly. Jemma had reached for his to guide him back to the group and he’d let her, and then just hadn’t let go. The rest of the day is spent on a couple of weird group games neither of them cares about very much, but they manage to stay on the same team for each one, so it’s okay.
Jemma frowns when she looks at the clock and sees that it’s almost time to leave. She can see her parents’ car through the window, and she knows they’re sitting inside, waiting for it to be exactly one o’clock before they come in to get her, because that’s the proper thing to do. She may not have wanted to come here, but now she doesn’t want to go home.
“Jemma.” she turns at Leo’s voice and smiles.
“Yes?”
“Do you live in town? I didn’t ask before.”
“Mhm! Well, sort of!”
“Where do you go to school then?”
“Oh. Um.” her face falls and she fidgets with her skirt hem. “Hamilton Preparatory Academy.” she makes a face, clearly embarrassed. She knew her parents insisted the private school was the best possible place for her, but whenever normal kids found out, she could read the sneers of ‘stuffy rich girl’ on their faces. Leo nods sagely, as if this makes sense.
“Your parents did look very upright. I go there too actually.” he blushes. “Scholarship student.”
“Wait, really?” she lights up suddenly. “That’s brilliant! I don’t know how I’ve never met you before!”
“I just started there. See, I lived in America most of my life, but we just moved to this town so.” he shrugged.
“Leo! This means we can hang out all the time!” she’s grinning and bouncing and practically shouting, and when she realizes how loud she’s being she shrinks, lowering her shoulders with her voice. “If you want to, I mean, that is.”
“I definitely do.” he smiles shyly.
“Oh. Well. Good then.” she returns the expression, equally soft and shy.
“Jemma Beatrice Simmons! Was that shouting I heard? What did I tell you?” her mother’s voice admonished, walking slightly behind her father through the door.
“Sorry mother.” she says quietly. “I didn’t mean to.”
“You never mean to, that’s your problem, Jemma. Pay more attention.” her father scolds. Leo frowns at them from behind Jemma, but Jemma just nods solemnly.
“Did you have fun?” her mother asks.
“Yes, mother.”
“Good. Now let’s get you home. Your father and I have a dinner to get ready for.”
She waved sadly to Leo on the way out of the building. He returned it, frowning slightly until his own mother appeared moments later. Jemma watched quietly from the car as they pulled out and Leo’s mum lead him out to her car, smiling broadly and kissing him on the forehead once. She feels a little something like envy, and looks up at her own parents, staring silently at the road ahead as they pull out of the lot and head towards home. In one tightly clenched fist is a piece of paper with messy scrawl on it reading ‘Leopold Fitz’, with a phone number on it. She traces the numbers and letters with her fingers and smiles.