Chapter Text
Cady’s waiting at the bottom of the bleachers after Regina’s lacrosse game. North Shore won, of course. It’s rare that they don’t win when Regina is out on the field.
Regina greets her with a smile and a kiss. “Hey.”
“Hi,” Cady says. “Good job.”
“Thanks.”
Regina gives Cady a once-over, and her smile drops minutely—almost imperceptibly. “You’re not wearing my crewneck.”
Cady looks down and shrugs like it’s not a big deal. “Yeah, I’m washing it.”
“Washing it?” Regina asks. “Why didn’t you just give it back to me? I would’ve washed it and worn it a few times to make it smell like me again.”
“Oh, I just wasn’t thinking, I guess,” Cady replies.
Regina awkwardly smiles. “But I’ve done that every other time.”
“It’s not a big deal; I’ll give it to you next time.”
Regina bites her tongue from saying what she really wants to as she nods and steps past Cady. “You ready to go?”
Cady nods and waits for Regina to hold out her hand, but she never does. She just turns and walks toward the locker room. Cady walks behind her, trying to reach for Regina’s hand, only for Regina to tug it away when their fingers brush.
Regina sits down across from Cady at the lunch table.
Everyone freezes.
Damian trails off on some unintelligible syllables as he looks between the two. Janis stares at Cady like she’s trying to figure out what’s going on between them. Gretchen went from completely calm to being on the verge of a panic attack. Karen and Shane are…unaware of the tension less than a foot in front of them.
Janis is the one to break the silence as she clears her throat awkwardly. “Trouble in paradise?”
“The fuck is that supposed to mean?” Regina says, practically biting Janis’s head off.
Janis barely manages not to flinch. “You aren’t attached to your girlfriend,” she says. “And she hasn’t been talking about you as much to me since…Valentine’s Day.”
Regian scoffs and stands. “Maybe you should ask her why that is.”
She walks away, leaving her food behind. Cady doesn’t even make a move to get up and follow after her. Weeks ago, she would have tripped over herself getting up so quickly. She would’ve left before Regina even managed to get 6 inches away from the table.
“What the fuck is going on?” Janis asks.
Cady shrugs and stands up, too. “Maybe you should just fucking talk to Regina. She seems all too quick to cut me out of the conversation.”
She walks away now, too. That makes both of them gone within the first three minutes of lunch, and both headed in opposite directions so they clearly aren’t going somewhere together.
And clearly, what Cady said isn’t true because Regina practically threw the conversation into her lap when she left. Now Janis has to play detective with two people who seem to be all too comfortable not talking to, or about, each other all of a sudden.
“You messed that up,” Damian comments.
Janis flips him off. “Were we all just gonna sit there and act like Cady not basically sitting in Regina’s lap wasn’t weird? I haven’t seen them like that since Cady kicked Regina out of her own table. Last year.”
“It is weird, but maybe they just need to figure out their own problems,” Damian says. “This is what? The first fight they’ve had where they’ve actually been dating? And who knows if they’re even fighting.”
“They’re not fighting, just having a disagreement about things,” Shane states.
Damian and Janis both look to Shane.
“Please elaborate,” Janis says.
“Uh…”
Damian says, “What do you know?”
“Oh!” Shane exclaims. “Cady asked Gi about college and kind of implied that she and Regina weren’t gonna be together. So Regina tried to ask her about it more, but then Cady turned it back to Regina, and it just didn’t get anywhere.”
Janis slowly nods. Maybe she shouldn’t get involved. Actually…she is going to get involved because no way Regina is going to ruin this relationship because she doesn’t know how to speak.
The rest of the week, Regina doesn't even bother showing up to lunch at all. Cady texts her the first time it happens, and the response she gets is that Regina is practicing.
Cady can only hope she truly means practice and not something else—like a person. That might really just shatter her heart.
She texts her on the second day and gets the same response. By the third, she doesn’t text at all and assumes the worst.
“Okay, I’m sorry,” Janis starts. “But what the actual fuck is going on with you and Regina?”
Cady shrugs and continues to look at the table. She cried last night about it…and the night before. So she’s really not interested in talking about it and crying again. She’s just quietly mourning the end of her relationship without really knowing when it’s going to end.
Janis scoots closer to Cady and pulls her into her side. “Cady, what’s going on? You can talk to me. Even if it’s something disgusting, like Regina without clothes on.”
Cady snorts and even cracks a smile. She turns to Janis, her face a little red. “That wouldn’t be disgusting, and you know it.”
Janis swallows her disgust, but knows she did a bad job when Cady starts laughing to herself. Janis will take that. She’ll take giving Cady a little joy over her comfort.
“Seriously,” Janis says, squeezing her shoulder. “I’m here for you. Talk to me.”
“Can we talk later? Like, at your house?” Cady asks.
Janis smiles. “Course, I’ll drive. As always.”
Cady manages to get through the rest of the school day without tears. She waits by Janis’s car, imagining a world where everything is perfect, and Regina is back to being sweet and caring.
“Am I taking you home?” Regina asks.
Cady shakes her head and looks up. “What?”
“I’ve been taking you home all week. Am I not taking you home today?” Regina clarifies.
Her tone is all icy and cold. It doesn’t feel like the Regina Cady knows.
“I’m gonna hang out with Janis,” Cady says.
Regina rolls her eyes. “You could’ve told me.”
Cady scoffs. “And when was I supposed to do that? When you’ve been avoiding me at lunch with practice? Or in the silence of our car rides home?”
Regina grumbles something under her breath that Cady misses. “What-fucking-ever, text me next time.”
Cady watches her walk away, and all she feels is anger. She repeatedly taps her foot on the ground until Janis breaks her concentration.
“You ready?”
Cady forces a smile and nods. The drive to Janis’s house is silent. Not like the drives with Regina, though. This one isn’t filled with tension and discomfort. It’s just quiet.
They head into Janis’s garage and sit down on the couch. Cady is very blase about explaining what’s going on. She summarizes it as Regina not wanting to be with her in the future. Which isn’t exactly how their conversation went, but Cady doesn’t want to relive it line by line.
Janis says she’ll talk to Regina, but Cady is sure that’s going to go nowhere. If anything, it’ll probably just make Regina finally do the final break and cut Cady out of her life. And at this point, that’s better than how she’s being treated right now.
Regina walks through the halls, her head a little higher, her attitude a little sharper. She’s starting to fall into old habits.
Old habits die hard.
At least that’s what Regina is telling herself to make it seem okay that she’s pushed four freshmen into lockers, verbally assaulted a teacher who then quit the same day, and snapped at Cady.
Her precious Cady.
She promised herself she wouldn’t, and she did. Regina knows she’s taken away her spark again; she can see it. Everyone can see it. Janis asked about it, and that was really the last person she wanted to know because she knows revenge plot part two is about to come her way.
It wasn’t her fault, though!
Cady said she was planning a future without Regina, so Regina was going to build a future without her. And it’s not like Cady tried to take it back or explain further.
Just after Valentine’s Day, everything seemed fine. At least that’s what she thought.
“Reggie!” Cady exclaims.
Regina smiles, leaning down to kiss her and then leaning back against her Jeep. “Hey, lover girl.”
Cady giggles and blushes. “Why am I lover girl? Shouldn’t that be you?”
Regina’s nose scrunches up. “How about we just stick to Reggie?”
“Okay,” Cady says with a shrug. Reggie is just as good as anything else.
She finally gets a good look at what Regina’s wearing, and her brain comes to a screeching halt. Muscle tee. In the cold. After lacrosse practice.
“I like what you’re wearing,” Cady comments.
“This thing?” Regina says, smirking and acting like she’s stretching her arms by her head, but really just flexing her biceps.
Cady bites her lip and nods. She reaches her hands out and squeezes her flexed muscles. She tries to take a step closer, but trips over a rock in the parking lot and stumbles straight into Regina’s arms. Those very muscled arms that she wants pressing her against a wall and–
“Careful, baby,” Regina says, holding her tightly around the waist.
Cady smiles. “I knew you’d be there to catch me.”
“What about when we’re apart at college?” Regina jokes.
She watches Cady’s face fall and mentally slaps herself. She thought they were past whatever miscommunication they had over college, but that clearly isn’t the case. Cady tries to pull away from Regina, but Regina stops her from getting too far.
“Reggie,” Cady whispers. “Let me go.”
Regina loosens her arms so Cady can step away just far enough that the tips of Regina’s fingers barely brush her sides.
“It was just a joke, lover,” Regina tries. “It was stupid of me.”
Cady shakes her head. “Let’s just go.”
“Cads…” Regina pleads.
“Regina, please.”
And then even early last week it was fine! Until they had that fight. That Regina may have caused (definitely).
“Cady, do we have to fucking talk about college again?” Regina asks.
She’s on the verge of snapping completely. This feels like the twentieth time Cady has brought up college in the past week and a half. It’s like the only thing she wants to talk about, and it’s driving Regina up a wall.
Can’t she just focus on right now?
“When else are we going to talk about it?” Cady demands. “Graduation is in a couple of months, and you won’t tell me what you’re planning.”
Regina scoffs. “Oh, I’m sorry. Do you know the exact plan of what you’re doing when you graduate?”
Cady rolls her eyes. “No, but I want to at least talk to my girlfriend about it! But clearly she doesn’t wanna talk to me.”
“Cady, that is not what I said, and you know it,” Regina snaps.
That’s the turning point for Cady. Attitudes are in full force. Apex Predator and Apex Predator Jr.
“Oh, okay. So you just wanna make the decisions and not involve each other,” Cady says. “Well fuck me then!”
Regina slams her textbook shut and stands up from her desk. “Cady! Will you fucking listen to me?! I’m just trying to think about right now, not 6 fucking months from now, where I can’t be around you every minute of every day!”
Cady rolls her eyes. “That’s what I’m trying to talk about! We could fucking figure it out.”
Regina taps her foot on the ground and huffs. “I thought you said you didn’t want me to ruin my future by choosing you. But now you do?!”
Cady shuts her textbook and stands up a few feet away from Regina. “I want you to do what’s best for you, not us.”
“And yet you’re still standing here saying we could figure out how to stay together!” Regina exclaims. “Making up your fucking mind. Do you want us to be together or not?”
Cady freezes and steps forward. “Reggie–”
“No, don’t…I don’t wanna–just drop it,” Regina finally says. “I’ll drive you home.”
“But–”
“Get your stuff,” Regina says, not sparing a second glance at Cady.
And then Cady wasn’t really talking to her after that, but Regina wasn’t really making an effort to talk to her either.
“Regina!”
Regina shakes her head out of the previous memories and looks around. She spots Janis and gives her a tight smile. She gestures to the chair opposite hers and even pushes it out a little with her foot.
Janis drops her bag on the table with a slam and sits down. She just stares at Regina, so Regina tries to recede into her head.
“I heard you’ve been terrorizing people again,” Janis comments.
Regina feels a rush course through her at the thought that people might be scared again. She lets herself be smug for a second, then shakes it away.
“Maybe,” she says.
Janis kicks her shin—lightly.
“Ow! Dick,” Regina says, kicking her back.
Janis snickers, feeling particularly tickled by Regina’s reaction. “You’re supposed to be cuddly Regina now. Not Apex Predator. That Regina does not have Cady.”
Cady.
“Cuddly Regina doesn’t have Cady either,” Regina snaps. “And don’t fucking call me that.”
“What does that mean?” Janis asks.
Regina’s eyes widen slightly, just enough for Janis to catch. “Nothing,” she mumbles. “It doesn’t mean anything.”
Janis sighs. “Regina, what does any of this fucking mean? I don’t wanna play games, and the two of you are just fucking sad. Did you fuck and realize you’re a pillow princess?”
Regina scoffs. “Get real, I love Cady, but I’m nobody's pillow princess.”
Janis’s eyes widen, and she slams her mouth shut. She can hear Damian in her head right now: ‘Tread lightly, Janis. Regina just admitted she loves Cady. Don’t mess it up.’ Maybe that’s why they’re both in a shitty mood, because one of them said I love you and not the other.
She takes a deep breath and carefully asks, “When did you guys say the L word?”
Regina shakes her head and taps her nails on the desk. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. We haven’t even come close to that. And just for the record, we haven’t had sex either. Since you’re nosy like that.”
“Regina,” Janis says with a smile. “You just said that you love Cady.”
“No, I didn’t–”
Regina drops into silence. A million thoughts are running through her head, and all of them are telling her to run. She’s never even come remotely close to feeling this way about anyone she’s dated. Let alone the one person she actually truly cares about in her life.
Janis slowly nods. “Is that why you guys have been…fighting recently?”
“We’re not fighting,” Regina says. “If we were, though, it has nothing to do with that.”
“Does Cady know that you’re not fighting?” Janis asks, stifling a laugh. “Do you know that?”
Regina flips her off. “Mind your business, bitch.”
“I can’t want you to be happy?”
“Lies. You don’t even like me.”
Janis scoffs and shakes her head. After all this time, Regina still thinks the same way. They used to be two peas in a pod. They knew what the other was thinking without even having to say it, and now Regina is sitting in front of Janis, thinking she doesn’t even like her.
“I like you, Regina,” Janis says. “I like you with Cady. You get this look in your eye that I’ve never seen before, and I think it’s actually an emotion other than rage.”
Regina shifts uncomfortably in her seat. Janis, noticing that—saying that—makes her feel a little raw. “I don’t…” she tries.
It’s like her brain can’t process the idea that she is Janis’s friend. Again. It feels weird; it feels like a little piece of herself that was missing is back in place. Regina feels kind of soft and mushy inside, and it’s kind of gross.
Janis abruptly stands and drags her chair around to the other side of the table and sits next to Regina. “Know what to say, I know,” she finishes. “Just…talk to me like I’m twelve again and we’re floating around in your pool, looking at the stars late at night.”
“I, um,” Regina mumbles, clearing her throat. “I do love Cady. That has nothing to do with why we’re all mad at each other or whatever the fuck we are.”
She looks over at Janis briefly, just to see if she’s paying attention, and Janis is already looking back at her. So she continues, “Cady brought up the future.”
It comes out all stiff, and she even feels uncomfortable saying it. And the look Janis gives her? That cocky grin and her amused eyes. Regina is going to murder her.
“And because you are naturally avoidant, you cut the conversation?” Janis asks, already knowing the answer.
Regina sighs and slowly nods. “Yes.”
Janis nods because, of course. That is Regina George at the end of the day. She is avoidant and gets angry in the process. And in her case, getting angry means yelling. “Did you yell at Cady?”
“I didn’t exactly yell,” Regina clarifies as she looks at the table.
Janis snorts. “Okay, so you got all Apex Predator with your girlfriend, and she wasn’t turned on by it for once.”
Regina shoves at Janis’s shoulder and laughs in disbelief. “That’s my girlfriend you’re talking about! And not to mention your friend.”
“I can make comments about my friends and the fact that one of them very much likes it when the other one is a little mean,” Janis states.
Regina rolls her eyes. “You don’t even know that she does.”
“Oh, please,” Janis says. “That girl would do absurd things for you to be a little mean to her, but we’re getting off topic. Future talk, and you yelled?”
“Something like that,” Regina replies, clearly withholding information.
“Were you guys talking about the summer?” Janis asks.
Regina briefly chews on the inside of her cheek. “Not really.”
“College, then?”
Regina makes this grumbling noise in the back of her throat and digs her nails into the palms of her hands.
College.
Nightmare conversation topic.
“Cady talked about college,” Regina says. “I found out that Cady isn’t super interested in being with me, but she’s saying it under the guise of, ‘I want you to do what’s best for you’ or ‘you’re ruining your dreams cause of me’. As if I would ruin my future for that pretty little redhead.”
Janis shakes her head mockingly. “Oh no, certainly not at all.”
Regina gives her a single look to shut her up, and she simply laughs. “You literally declined NYU as soon as you got your acceptance letter. I watched you do it.”
“How do you know I did that?” Regina asks.
“I saw it from over your shoulder,” Janis says with a smile. “I was gonna congratulate you, but then I watched you take a screenshot of your acceptance letter and then promptly hit ‘I’m not going’. Which I thought was crazy.”
Regina shrugs. “It’s just NYU.”
Janis scoffs and shoves at her shoulder. “It’s not just NYU, it's NYU. What you’ve dreamed of!”
“That was before I got hit by a bus,” Regina comments. “And before I realized that there are other things I want in life than just saying I went to NYU.”
“Like Cady.”
“Like Cady,” Regina repeats. “It’s not about Cady, though! I mean–it is, but it isn’t.”
She groans and digs her nails into the palm of her hands. NYU was a fantasy that 13-year-old Regina made, thinking it would help her perfect her life. That fantasy also had her marrying some man, so clearly not in the cards anymore.
Janis nudges Regina gently and asks, “Where does the great Regina George want to go to school now?”
“Harvard.”
“You seem pretty certain.”
Regina tries to stifle her smile as she says, “I’ve never been more certain of something.”
“And it being extremely close to MIT?” Janis asks.
“Cosmic luck,” Regina replies. “Cady has nothing to do with it.”
“Tell me why then.”
“Harvard has a D-1 women’s lacrosse program, their law school is insane, it’s far away from anything here and all the energy that follows this place, and…and Cady will be close by.”
Janis smirks. “I thought you said Cady didn’t have anything to do with it.”
Regina rolls her eyes. “She doesn’t. The idea of her does.”
“Same shit,” Janis mumbles.
Regina pushes her out of her chair and laughs as she hits the floor. Janis remains offended for all of two seconds before she bursts out laughing, too. It feels like times when Regina and Janis were attached at the hip—inseparable, when it was so easy for both of them to be themselves.
“Thanks for making me feel better,” Regina says, offering a hand to help Janis up.
Janis takes Regina’s hand and stands up. “Now, what are you going to say to Cady?”
Regina shrugs. “I don’t know.”
“Regina.”
“What! I don’t fucking know! It seems like she doesn’t want anything to do with me after we graduate high school.”
“Maybe that’s because you keep projecting that feeling, so she’s just giving you the same feeling back,” Janis says.
“I’m not projecting shit.”
Janis gives Regina a look that says she’s full of shit. And they both fucking know it.
Janis sighs. “Regina, apologize to Cady. Actually say the words, ‘I’m sorry’. And then you’re going to explain what your college plans are.”
Regina makes a grumbling noise in the back of her throat, but it doesn’t deter Janis from continuing to talk.
“And then, you’re going to listen to her talk about college. And then, you’re going to make a plan together.”
“You’re an ass,” Regina says.
“No, I’m just right,” Janis replies, walking away.
“Cady, can I talk to you?”
Cady shuts her locker to find Regina standing next to her. She looks rather awkward, well…maybe uncomfortable is a better word. Cady fights back her emotions and the eventual tears that will come with them.
“If you’re gonna break up with me, can you at least do it in a less public place?” She mumbles, looking at the ground.
“Break up with–what? I’m not breaking up with you; I’d rather gouge my eye out with a fork,” Regina says.
Cady looks up, and against her will, a few tears do spring to her eyes, but they never fall. Regina immediately notices and pulls her against her chest.
“Oh, baby…I would rather get hit by another bus than lose you.”
Cady lets out a laugh riddled with tears. “That’s really dark, Gina. And dramatic.”
Regina laughs and squeezes Cady tightly before gently pulling her head away from her chest. She gently wipes the tears off her cheeks and presses a kiss to her nose.
“My pretty girl,” she hums.
Cady blushes and whispers, “I missed you.”
“I did, too,” Regina replies. “We gotta talk, though.”
“Okay.”
Regina laces her fingers with Cady’s and gently tugs her out of the school doors. She opens the passenger door for Cady and gently helps her into the Jeep. Regina wipes one final tear off her cheek and kisses her softly. Cady hums and sits back in her seat with a little smile.
Regina will not admit this, but she does walk slightly faster than normal to the driver's seat. She wants to talk to Cady and fix all the shit that she apparently caused. According to Janis, who could be full of shit, but Regina is being the bigger person or whatever.
Only for Cady, though.
Regina taps her nails against the steering wheel, debating driving while talking, but maybe her full attention should be on this conversation since it hasn't been in the past. She turns to face Cady and feels that uncomfortable feeling that comes along with her trying to be open.
Regina clears her throat and blurts out before she can think about it anymore, “I declined NYU because it’s not what I want anymore, and I’d rather play lacrosse or field hockey at a D1 school than be miles away from you in New York.”
Cady doesn’t say anything for a long time. Long enough that Regina is planning Cady’s death and her own, so no one will know this conversation ever happened, and that Regina has gone soft.
“Can I say something?” Cady asks.
Regina chokes on her words and jerkily nods her head.
Cady looks down at her hands and says, “I wouldn’t care if you went to NYU. It might suck, but we don’t have to be permanent. I–”
“I want us to be permanent!” Regina exclaims. “You kept putting words in my mouth, and I didn’t know what to say. And all it really sounded like was that you were over us already, which hurt.”
Cady is silent for a long time again and then looks at Regina properly. “I only acted like that cause you were acting like that.”
Regina shakes her head and starts laughing. Cady’s looking at her like she’s experiencing a mental break and debating on how difficult it would be to get Regina institutionalized.
“Fuck Janis for being right,” Regina mumbles.
“Janis?” Cady asks.
Regina hums and nods. “We talked earlier, and she said you were acting like that because I was projecting my own avoidance.”
“Janis can be good like that,” Cady says.
“Never tell her she was right,” Regina jokes.
Cady giggles a little at that and holds her hand out for Regina. Regina takes it and rubs her thumb over the back of Cady’s knuckles.
“I’m sorry,” Regina says.
“I am, too.”
“You have nothing to apologize for. You were just asking a basic question, and I blew you off, I yelled at you, I was rude—the worst girlfriend on the planet,” Regina rambles.
“You were not the worst girlfriend on the planet,” Cady says. “Those other things though…”
Regina lets out an incredulous laugh. “Oh, wow. I see how it is.”
Cady shrugs and lets this cheeky smile grace her face. “I’m just agreeing with what you said.”
Regina shakes her head and sighs. She mentally goes through everything she talked to Janis about and makes sure she said everything she wanted to. One thing comes to mind, but that can go unsaid for a bit longer.
“I, um,” Regina starts, clearing her throat. “I think I’m gonna go to Harvard for college. It has a good lacrosse program and law school…and it’s close to MIT. Not that you’re going there for sure!”
“MIT is at the top,” Cady says. “I’m not just gonna go there cause you’re close, though.”
Regina nods and finds herself surprised that actual tears spring to her eyes. Regina knows what she wants, and it would be really nice to have Cady there, too, especially because she wants Cady, but she won’t fuck up her future.
Cady leans forward and presses a kiss to Regina’s cheek. “It’s not a no, Gina. And besides, I gotta make sure no one tries to take you from me.”
Regina chokes on her laugh and wipes away the lone tear that falls down her cheek. “It won’t happen.”
“We will figure it out,” Cady says. “Everything will be okay. No more tears, from either of us.”
“You’ve been crying?”
“Every day for several days now.”
“I’m sorry, baby,” Regina says. “I was being so stupid and rude.”
Cady smiles. “It’s okay. It’s in the past. We’ll figure out everything else, okay?”
Regina nods and closes her eyes, taking a few deep breaths. She really hopes that the answer to this next thing isn’t going to break her heart.
“I know I said I want us to be permanent, but if you don’t want that, I can live with being friends.”
Cady’s face scrunches together in confusion. “Why would I want that?”
Regina shrugs and says, “I just don’t want you to feel obligated because I want us to be together.”
“Who said I didn’t want us to be together?”
“The implication was there when you first brought up college,” Regina mumbles.
Cady laughs and rolls her eyes. “Regina, you are such an idiot.”
Regina whips her head to face Cady with a disgruntled look. “Hey!”
“I want you to be the most permanent thing about my life; when everything else is gonna change, you’ll still be here.”
Regina lets out a sigh of relief and nods. “Okay, I can be permanent. I can be here for you.”
“We will be permanent,” Cady corrects.
Regina smiles and lays her head against the headrest of her seat, “we” ringing in her head.