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"I swear there's always something with you." Sevika groaned, running her hand down her face in a gesture that she hoped would convey just how exasperated she was with this kid and his constant sulking. "Can't you like... punch your feelings out? Why do you always have to be so emotional?!"
He'd gotten pretty good at ignoring her natural rude nature by now and chose not to respond, continuing to sulk behind one of the tables they'd set up in their hangout.
With a rather loud and dramatic sigh, Sevika dragged herself over and sat herself down beside him, flicking him on the forehead as she did. This earned her a quick scowl before Viktor turned away from her.
"What's got you in a mood this time?" She asked, making sure she sounded as miserable as possible to be talking about feelings and emotions.
His reply was to simply shake his head and she had absolutely no fucking clue what that was supposed to mean.
"Don't you shake your head at me!" She scolded, sounding an awful lot like her mother which made her want to shrivel up and die, "Give me a proper answer or I'll throw you in the sewage and the chemicals will turn you into a big, ugly, mutated monster. But I guess you wouldn't need all that to make you ugly, you've already got that bit covered."
He shot her a look that very clearly told her to shut the fuck up and okay, maybe she could benefit from doing that every now and again.
"Off-topic. Tell me what's wrong." She rephrased.
Sevika often forgot how fucking cringe it was to be a kid with so many pointless emotions. Like ew, she used to make a big deal out of Mateo splashing her when they went down to the river because she didn't like getting the water in her eyes. Kids were strange and emotional like that. And unfortunately for her, she was currently being forced to remember that fact now that she was having to deal with a kid who for some fucking reason seemed to look up to her. Lucky her.
Viktor huffed like an annoying little brat before folding his arms over his chest. "Nobody likes me..." He finally said. Oooo how angsty.
"Of course they don't. You're weird and annoying. Boom, next question." She stated, dusting her hands off. A job well done, she'd say.
"Sevika!" He whined.
"Viktor!" She mimicked.
He sighed as dramatically as he could and gave her an eye roll for good measure. "I shouldn't have come to you about this."
"Exactly. I don't do feelings. Go talk to the doctor or your mom or something, I don't know." She grumbled.
"My mother is busy and the doctor doesn't 'do feelings' either." He shot back.
"So you came to bother me about it instead?"
"Yep!"
"Fabulous."
They both turned away, now in the huff with each other. While the silence droned on Sevika wondered why he always seemed to come to her with these sorts of things, always looking for her thoughts and her solutions and her ideas. She knew he looked up to her, that much was evident from the way he always seemed to tag along with her when she ran errands or just felt like intimidating people for a bit of fun, the way he'd started wrapping bandages around his hands like she did despite getting into very minimal fights, and the way he always seemed to be grasping for her approval specifically. Was that what this was? Something similar? Was he doing this because he wanted her advice specifically?
Ugh, why did kids have to be so damn difficult?!
She turned to look at him over her shoulder and found him sneaking glances to check if she still knew he was miserable. She nearly laughed but stifled it and turned back around instead. "Fine. Tell me your problems." She relented.
He eyed her suspiciously for a moment before giving in. "I just feel like nobody really likes me..." Viktor sighed. "People my own age are mean to me or just ignore me, my father can't even say that he loves me, and I have no friends."
"I don't have friends either." Sevika pointed out, "And I turned out just fine!"
Viktor glanced at her sideways before looking away again. "But you had Mateo..."
The mood dropped a little.
"Yeah. I did." Sevika replied quietly. She dwelled on that for a moment before dropping her head to look at the floor with a sigh. "I guess I get what you're saying. People don't really like me either. I've only really been able to call Mateo my friend, and even still we were... different. I don't know."
"Was he..." He gave her a look.
"Spit it out." She sighed, knowing what was coming.
"Your boyfriend!" He whispered very loudly.
"No."
"Are you sure?" He teased with a hint of a smile.
"Yep."
"Would you have liked him to have been your boyfriend?"
"Dunno. Never really considered it. We just sort of... existed. Never bothered with all that nonsense. Even now, I'm not sure if I would have wanted that or not, if he was still... around. I'd rather just keep us the way we are rather than putting a label on it and fucking everything up with expectations. We just did what we wanted and that was cool." She explained as best she could. "Anyway, you know nobody can stand to be around me anyway."
"I can stand you." Viktor chimed in. "Most of the time."
She huffed out a small laugh. "I refuse to call you a friend. I am not friends with eleven-year-olds. I am, however, arch nemesis with eleven-year-olds because they're really fucking annoying."
"You just can't admit that the only person willing to tolerate you is an eleven-year-old loser with no friends," Viktor said, seemingly having cheered up a bit.
"Better you than some thumb-sucking, brain-dead idiot at least." She joked along.
"Can I call you my friend then?" Viktor tried.
"No. Enemies can't be friends." She stated, "Unless it's one of those sappy novels from topside that are really fucking good for some reason."
"Then maybe I'm fine with having no friends, actually." He said, picking splinters off the wood grain beneath them. "If I can have an arch nemesis like you instead, then I think that's much cooler."
"Exactly. Now you're getting it." She grinned, giving him an overly rough pat on the back that earned her a sharp glare in return. "So are you done sulking?"
"You always make my feelings sound silly!" He complained. Sevika felt less bad annoying him now that he sounded less wounded about the whole thing.
"Cause they are."
"Well, Singed says it's important to talk about your feelings, to get them out of your system!" He shot back.
"Well Singed says—" She mocked, "Shut up. Didn't ask."
"Well, what do you do about your feelings then? Apart from snapping at people."
"I punch them out. Duh. That's what the boxing machine is for. Wanna try it?"
"Okay. Can you stand behind me and help me do it again?"
"Sure."
"Thank you, my arch nemesis."
"Whatever. Arch nemesis."