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Fareeha never cried.
When she was sent to her room without dessert for refusing to eat her turnips, she sucked in her bottom lip and bit down until she did not want to cry anymore. When the boys down the road told her she was no longer allowed to play with them because she was a girl and that was gross, she slashed their bike tires and refused to cry. When she asked her mother about her father and saw her stare into the middle distance, tears in her eyes that would not fall, she followed her lead and would not cry. When she woke up in the night after a particularly bad dream, when she got back a failing grade on a test, when she sucked in too much pool water up her nose, she put on a brave face and did not cry.
She would let her lip quiver. She would let the tears sit under her eyelids. She would ball her hands into fists. She would not cry.
Or, that had been the case.
She had not cried until she saw the Ashe girl bawling her eyes out, a scrape on her knee and a smirk twisting her lips as a bandage was pressed over the barely bleeding wound. She had not cried until she heard how Cassidy mumbled something about a bigger kid and a scrap, tears in his big eyes and getting a bag of ice pressed to his shoulder until he could hold it himself. She had not cried until she saw even the reclusive girl, scowling and frowning with a spider bite on her hand, orange hair mussed and eyes red with tears, as her wrist was held and the bite inspected.
When she had learned of the lofty goals Angela held and that she wanted to one day be a doctor, she had begun to take into consideration what could be gained by not being quite so stone faced and stoic as her mother in the face of pain.
When she had seen her with her little first-aid kit, hair pulled back messily and little face scrunched up in contemplation over Lena’s twisted ankle, she had decided to try for herself.
It was nothing she could not have simply shaken off. She could have walked until it stopped hurting, brushed the gravel out of the cuts and moved on, letting her mother put alcohol on it later and chide her for being so reckless. She had suffered worse injuries playing sports and had kept on playing. Just a rock under her bike wheel, hand scraped up and knee bleeding from where she braced herself.
It was only a little cut, until she saw Angela standing up from where she was reading, worry in her eyes.
The tears came easily.
She refused to wail like Elizabeth, loud and attention seeking. Instead, she let her lip tremble and her hands form fists and the tears build behind her eyelids, letting one fall down her cheek. She wiped it away with her arm, but it had already had its intended effect.
“Fareeha,” came Angela’s worried call.
When she looked, she saw her all but flying from her spot under the tree, first-aid kit in hand and unzipped jacket billowing behind her. Her pretty face was marred with concern, brows furrowed and blue eyes watery with worry.
A shy smile, playing tough as she sniffled and tried to brush it off as nothing, managing a casual, “‘s nothing.”
“Nothing?” Angela repeated, sounding aghast.
“Just a scrape,” Fareeha said. She made sure she sounded a little bit scared, more tears falling.
There was a knowing in Angela’s eyes, one well beyond her years. She looked her over with a frown, squaring her shoulders and seeming to weigh the situation, before saying, “Let me take a look.”
Not a question. Never a question, not with Angela, too firm and too certain to waste time on them.
Fareeha knew better than to waste her time - and her own opportunity - by arguing. “Okay.”
She was led by the hand, off the road and under the tree, dragging her bike behind and letting it fall into the grass. Part of her expected Angela to wait for her to sit, or to ask her to, but she was pushed down by the shoulders. The pressure was careful, on the side of her uninjured leg, and she bent and sat with her back to the tree.
Angela stood over her, giving her a discerning once over. Her hands were on her hips, her brow was furrowed in thought, and she tilted her head so slightly to the side, ponytail bouncing.
Fareeha knew she was blushing, the sensation so hot in her cheeks it felt like she had cried much harder than she had.
Finally, Angela bent down, reached for her first-aid kit, and began rifling through it. She took it much more seriously than Fareeha had realised, and she winced when she saw her pulling out an antiseptic wipe. It was ripped open, the smell not unfamiliar, and Fareeha closed her eyes as it was pressed and rubbed gingerly over the cuts.
A breath out was met by a more gentle wipe and the soothing voice of Angela as she said, “You must be more careful.”
“I was trying to be,” Fareeha argued, but it was weak. She squinted her eyes as a fresh wipe made direct contact with the cut, gravel wiped out.
She must have made a noise, because Angela asked, “How badly does it hurt?”
The part of her that wanted to be strong like her mother told her to say it didn’t. The part that had watched Angela kiss Elizabeth’s scraped palm said, “Very bad.”
A noise of sympathy, and the antiseptic wipe was placed aside. The box of bandages was pulled out, multicolour and half empty. Angela said, as if to distract her with conversation, “It must be bad, for you to cry.”
“I wasn’t crying,” Fareeha lied.
“You were.”
The unspoken was that she had noticed the times before that Fareeha had fallen off her bike or got into a fight or tumbled over a fence, bruised and scraped. She had watched, waiting every time to see if she needed help, but, it seemed, never wanting to embarrass her by going when she did not need it.
Knowing her blush must have overtaken her whole face by then, dark red and telling, Fareeha forced her eyes off of Angela.
The wrapped bandages were dumped out into the grass, their colours faint but visible.Little fingers sifted through them, until they stopped over one. Of the larger variety, and through the wrapping Fareeha could see its colour.
Picking it up, Angela flicked her thumb over the wrapping and pulled, opening it as she said, “Your favourite colour is blue.”
Never a question, and Fareeha knew her hairline to her neck must have been scarlet.
The bandage was placed with a delicate and well practiced push, careful not to press on the cuts, but smoothing it and making sure it was secure. It was a sky blue, contrasting against Fareeha’s skin, sticking out a mile. There would be no hiding it.
Knowing there was no use in looking cool or strong, she said, half a question, “You kissed Ashe’s hand better.”
Angela looked up from where she was putting the bandages back in their box. She looked her over again, a smile sliding easily along her mouth, and Angela asked, “Would you like that?”
“I would.” Her mouth felt dry, and her cheeks pulled, dried tears feeling strange on her skin as she smiled back at her.
She was given a look, maybe of exasperation, maybe of fondness, possibly both, but all the same Angela leaned down and pressed a kiss to the blue bandage. Fareeha couldn’t even feel it on her skin, yet still she grinned, lopsided and goofy, even as Angela’s head lifted and their eyes met.
Sitting up, Angela asked, “You’ll be more careful?”
“For today,” Fareeha promised with a nod.
“Only today?” Definitely exasperated.
Leaning back against the tree, confidence regained, Fareeha said, “I can sit with you, where I can’t be reckless.”
The smile changed to fondness, undoubtedly, as Angela asked, tone altered, “Only today?”
“Maybe tomorrow, too.”
Angela sat on the grass in front of her, hands folded in her lap and a smile on her lips as she said, simply, “I would like that.”