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It was a week into March before Renly cornered her.
Brienne had been helping Margaery on her campaign trail—Margaery, at least, was innocent in her brother’s treachery—and the girl was a drill sergeant when it came to speeches, posters, and other tactics that might win her the title of Prom Queen. She’d sent Brienne on a sacred mission to borrow green and gold paint from the art department.
Renly didn’t have Studio this period, but he practically lived in the Art Wing, so Brienne probably shouldn’t have dropped her supplies in shock when she heard his familiar baritone behind her.
“You’ve spent 3 free periods in dark corners with Jaime Lannister,” Renly greeted her, leaning against a shelf. A bucket of plaster cast dim shadows across his face, deepening his soft frown to nearly a glower. “Whereas I haven’t heard a word from you in weeks.”
His tone was plaintive, demanding; explanation to follow.
Brienne’s throat closed up. There was an eddying panic beneath her ribcage threatening to swallow her, and her hands were less steady than she’d like. She took her time gathering up the scattered materials, clutching the wide brushes and fat tubes of paint tight against her chest as she turned to face him.
Renly looked as handsome as ever: eyebrows arched, coffee-hued hair swept meticulously back, clothes simple and pressed and perfect.
Brienne felt, for half a second, like she was a freshman again, and the hot football player had cornered her behind the cluster of balloons she’d been using for cover. She’d thought he’d meant to mock her, but Renly had been all smiles and charm, and before she’d known it he’d coaxed her onto the dance floor, fighting an uncharacteristic giggle.
“Renly,” she said thickly, swallowed. “Hey.”
“I know I’ve been remiss—what, with prom campaigning and sneaking dates with Loras—but – “ he zeroed in on the paint she was strangling and lost his train of thought. “Acrylic?” he sounded nearly as disdainful as Cersei had when she took in Brienne’s outfit this morning.
“I’m helping Margaery with posters,” Brienne’s throat still felt swollen. She cleared it, tried to move around him. “I’ve got to – “
“Does Margaery know?” his question stopped Brienne’s feet, even as she told her sneakers to get moving.
She knew Mar should have sent Mel on this mission.
“What?” she grimaced, annoyed with herself for asking.
“The sordid details of Jaime’s attempts to woo you,” his eyes teased her, even through the layers of exasperation. “You can’t have neglected to tell all your friends, even if you’ve forgotten who has first dibs.”
Heat crept up her neck, and the tingling hairs standing on their end started to burn uncomfortably.
“Jaime’s not wooing me,” she clutched the paints closer, tightening her fingers around the plastic bottle in her right hand. The paint squished under her grip, gooey green leaking out its half-closed lid to dribble onto her fingers. “We’re friends.”
“We’re friends,” Renly huffed at her, twisting so it was his back and not his shoulder pressed against the metal framework of the shelf.
Brienne thought about darting past him, but for all of the emotions warring inside of her, she couldn’t bring herself to flee. The shelf full of rusty, plaster-specked carving tools was looking pretty tempting, though. She wasn’t exactly sure if she could brandish one as a weapon, but at least she could feel a little in control with something sturdy in her hands.
“I may not be in on your burgeoning relationship with our out-of-commission hockey star, but I was the first one in on your burgeoning crush on him.”
You were the only one in on it, Brienne couldn’t say. The only one I wanted to tell.
“I hope you had a good laugh over it,” her lips felt numb, but the words were out before her brain could catch up.
Renly straightened, his blue eyes widening, throwing up defenses. Brienne found herself torn between the realization that she could hurt him, and the knowledge that she was right.
“Brienne,” he was suddenly serious, shifting uncertainly between the shadows and the fluorescents. She imagined she saw in him a hundred emotions she could never trust. Possessiveness. Concern. Friendship. “What’s – “
She made herself stand firm, feet apart as if she might dump her paints on Renly’s designer shoes and sock him in the mouth.
“I don’t exist for your convenience.” It was quite possibly the first time she’d ever interrupted anyone in her life. She wished she could feel better about it than she did.
“Has Jaime been – “
“This isn’t about Jaime,” his attempt to dodge only made her angrier. As if Jaime were at fault for this mess. “If you didn’t want to be my friend, you could have said so.”
His mouth was working, but for once he didn’t have all the right words. Brienne’s throat ached, her pulse lurched sluggishly, and she felt the familiar mistiness of impending tears. She stomped past him, not even caring when her sticky green fingers bumped the sleeve of his impractical silk shirt.
Renly never found the words to complain.
Brienne strode down the hall and back to the main corridor without once looking back. She found Margaery and the girls, dumped the paints in a pile on the floor, and collapsed her limbs down beside them.
Margaery’s eyes were on her, but she didn’t mention Brienne’s stony silence, just explained the concept for the next poster. Brienne painted painstaking block letters, ignoring the girls drawing crowns and roses and other pretty things Brienne’s thick fingers would only botch.
“I’ll take one to cotillion,” Margaery chattered as she worked, penning lines of calligraphy below a rough portrait Mel had sketched. “If Brienne could take one to hockey?”
“Sure,” she mumbled, training her eyes on words under her hand: Every rose has its thorn.
What Brienne tried to ignore was the picture above it, a snapshot of Cersei glowering at a sweetly smiling Margaery. It felt uncomfortably like a smear campaign, even if Cersei had started it by digging up old pictures from Margaery’s Catholic school days.
“Has Jaime been good to us?” Margaery’s eyes twinkled, and Brienne’s stomach swooped uncomfortably.
Jaime, for all Margaery’s insistence that he knew just how to play it, had absolutely zero interest in prom court. The cheerleader’s curiosity echoed Renly’s willful misreading of Jaime’s feelings for Brienne, and it was throwing Brienne out of sorts. She’d done nothing more than start a fledgling friendship with a teammate she respected; if he happened to be the guy she was currently crushing on, that was her problem and no one else’s.
Brienne shrugged, dropping the paintbrush back on the cardboard they’d been using as a drop cloth and wiping her hands on a ripped paper towel.
Margaery sighed.
“I have snacks in my car,” she phrased it as a request, dangling her keys toward Brienne, but her smile was supportive. “The office gave us a pass.”
Brienne snatched them gratefully, clambering up and out of the confining walls of West Eros High. The March air was still brisk, but the sun was warm; it seeped so deeply into Brienne’s pale skin that she could almost feel her freckles spreading.
She took longer than was strictly necessary fishing water and veggies from the trunk of Margaery’s little green Bug, enjoying the blueness of the usually cloudy sky. But when she saw Loras hauling boxes of streamers around toward the art wing, she darted from the Junior’s lot and around the corner so fast she nearly dropped the baby carrots.
Staff milled about the football field with a smattering of students setting up for yet another PEP rally. This one was after school, and Brienne was oddly grateful for her obligation to attend cotillion. Not only did she have an excuse to miss the rally, but Cersei’s place on prom court guaranteed she’d be missing today’s lecture on female empowerment.
Brienne counted a few beats, making sure Loras had time to disappear before she hauled herself up from her awkward crouch. The scraggly, budding shrub was barely worth hiding behind, and she felt kind of silly for trying.
“Shh,” an insistent rebuke echoed across the concrete, and Brienne instinctively folded herself back behind the bush. The sound had come from around the corner, but Brienne didn’t need a visual to recognize the controlling tones of Cersei Lannister.
She’s just skipping class, Brienne told herself, feeling the plastic bag stretch taut under her unrelenting hand. She’s just practicing her court speech.
It wasn’t convincing, even in her head.
A voice responded, low and male, and even though Brienne couldn’t pin its owner, she felt suddenly queasy. She inched closer to the wall, peeked around, sure she wouldn’t like what she found.
It was Cersei, all right. Brienne could make out the back of her head, shining golden curls spilling down a red sundress sexy enough to make Brienne want to crawl beneath the shrubbery and never come out. She almost leaned forward to identify Cersei’s partner-in-crime, but caution wouldn’t let her. Knowing who did Cersei’s dirty work would get Brienne nowhere if she exposed herself in the process.
She bit her lip, wondering what to do.
Cersei might be plotting new ways to make Brienne look ridiculous at cotillion. She might be hunting down incriminating pictures of Margaery. She might even be scheming crueler ways to lord her dad’s power over Jaime.
Whatever she was doing, Brienne couldn’t do a thing about it. But she knew a few people who could probably help her out.
She was right in guessing Cersei’s brothers would take pep prep as an excuse to slip off to the student lounge. Jaime was playing on his phone, looking awkward for once with his cast crammed into a cushion, giving his right hand access to the controls. Tyrion was pursing his lips at a huge book clinging perilously to his lap. Brienne wondered why he bothered missing class if he was only going to study anyway.
She took a deep breath and strode over, hoping they wouldn’t laugh. She felt enormous and exposed, looming over them after hunkering down behind those bushes.
“Cersei – “ she began, wincing at how paranoid she probably sounded.
“Is up to something,” Tyrion finished, eyes still trained on his text.
She blinked at him, then over at Jaime, whose fingers were manipulating his touch screen, even as he looked up to grin at her.
“What else is new?” he shrugged, making a spot for her on the couch.
Brienne sat, feeling aimless, thunder stolen.
“There’s some guy involved,” she added lamely.
She felt rather than saw Jaime stiffen. His hands weren’t moving anymore, and his phone trilled angrily at him while he lost whatever game he’d been playing.
She toyed with her hands, tracing the creases of her fingers. Green paint clung in stubborn lines on the middle two, and she touched each fleck lightly with the flat of her nail.
Tyrion marked his book deliberately, closed it firmly, and looked her full in the face.
The combination of Jaime’s tension and Tyrion’s calm made Brienne clench her jaw and steel her spine.
It felt like Renly was about to happen all over again.
“She’s spreading rumors,” Tyrion said levelly, as if that would keep her from panicking, “About your involvement with Kyle.”
The words were almost a relief. The rumors about her and Kyle hadn’t died down—until they stopped dancing together, it was probably too much to hope for—but Brienne had gotten pretty good at ignoring them.
“Oh,” she sunk back into the cushions, breathing deeply. “Okay.”
Tyrion’s eyes reproved her, and Brienne found herself braced against Jaime’s shoulder. He was somehow pressed against her, but Brienne didn’t remember moving.
“What?” she asked, digging stubby fingernails into her palm.
“I’ve heard,” Tyrion’s eyes flickered to his brother for half a heartbeat. “From several sources,” he looked square at Brienne, didn’t flinch as her eyes beseeched him to just make something up, “Exaggerated tales of your . . . physical relationship.”
“What do you mean?” she asked numbly, but she knew the answer.
Tyrion didn’t bother with confirmation, just twisted his mouth sympathetically and shrugged as if to say, There are worse things.
“I can punch him for you,” Jaime offered, close enough to her ear that Brienne shivered.
“She can punch him herself,” his brother snorted.
Brienne forced a laugh that sounded like a weak bark.
Jaime grumbled, “But she won’t.” The back of his hand fell against her thigh so casually she couldn’t tell if it had happened by mistake.
“No,” Brienne agreed. She shoved away thoughts of Kyle last year in favor of Kyle last week, because she could handle that. “But if he thinks he can escape our next dance without some broken toes, he’s sorely mistaken.”
Jaime laughed aloud, and Brienne felt oddly proud when Tyrion murmured, “You know, Jaime, I think we’re rubbing off on her.”
Jaime twisted his hand on her jeans in a way that could only be deliberate.
“Good dog,” he said, patting her leg like she’d just done a trick.
She swatted him away, glaring.
“I wish I could rub off on you,” she grumbled, eyes flitting around the room that most definitely did not belong to their 4th periods.
Tyrion snorted, and Jaime’s eyes twinkled in a way that made her feel warm and slow.
“Believe me, so do I.”
It took half of cotillion for Brienne to realize what he’d meant, and when she did, she turned redder than Jaime’s cast. She hunched down in her fold-up chair, staring straight up the dais at Joanna Lannister’s practical black heels. She couldn’t bear to look at her face for fear that the woman would know just what she was thinking, and who she was thinking it about.