★ ꜱʟᴀᴘꜱʜᴏᴛ ᴀɴᴅ ᴛᴀᴄᴋʟᴇ ★
𝗖𝗛𝗔𝗣𝗧𝗘𝗥 𝟭𝟲 - 𝗖𝗔𝗥𝗥𝗬 𝗖𝗨𝗥𝗥𝗬
Family game night was important in the Loud house. With every one always having completely different schedules and things going on in their lives, it was one of the few times every one could put their own plans aside and bond with the family.
But Lynn had other endeavors in her mind.
The second she came home she downed three bottles of water. As in, she filled three of her largest bottles for sports and chugged them within a minute. She was hoping that this was a fluke, that she really was dehydrated again and could go back to being just friends with the Lopez employee slash degenerate that had been plaguing her mind the whole ride home.
But it wasn't a fluke.
She could still feel her guts swirl and her hate rate quicken at the thought of the girl. Her mouth went dry every time she was reminded of her or even thought about anything remotely related to her.
This was new, unusual. Inconvenient, to say the least.
...
What was she going to do???
"Hey Lynn! We're about to start," Leni peeped her head in from the other room. Lynn was hastily refilling her fourth water bottle and was extremely caught off guard by her sister's intrusion. As a result, she dropped it against the counter and sprayed water all over herself.
"Yeah, I'm coming," she hastily dried the kitchen off.
"Why are you covered in water?" Leni inquired as if she didn't witness the entire event. Lynn, who was still very mentally preoccupied, panicked.
"It's a, uh, new sports thing. Yeah! If you pour water on yourself you can... trick your mind into thinking you're sweating and it will stop you from sweating even more!" she exclaimed. It wouldn't have worked on anyone else, but fortunately Leni was a bit of an airhead.
"Oh! Okay! Anyway, Mom's waiting for you!"
Her mind was spinning in circles thinking about everything and anything all at once. Somehow, though, she always managed to come back to just one thought in particular. One question she had been asking herself all day:
How could she like her?
Seriously! She had never,
ever
liked someone like that before. Not only that, but she had always found romance to be a waste of time. So why was she feeling like this now?
She always turned her nose up at any mention of love. Always complained whenever Lori or Leni fawned over some boy or rolled her eyes whenever Luna talked about Sam.
But it was real. It was so real she could hear the evidence beating out of her chest and feel it deep in her stomach. It was undeniable, and she was completely doomed.
Lynn wanted to be more than friends, and that was a problem.
...
"Try hitting it harder!"
"IF I HIT IT ANY HARDER, IT WILL BREAK."
Frankie cursed and threw his beanie on the floor. "I'm so fired!" He ran his hands down his face.
Jolon started climbing down the ladder, flashlight it mouth. "I don't think leaving the grill on for 4 extra minutes caused a blackout all over Royal Woods, dude."
"My boss hates me! He'd kick me to the curb at any chance he got!" The boy was so distraught he almost fell over, needing to get support by holding onto his best-friends arm for dear life. She was not content with this arrangement.
"Francisco get your dirty paws-" she shoved him off, sending him barreling to the concrete. In any usual scenario, she would've regretted being so harsh on the boy. Unfortunately for everyone involved though, Frankie's little mishap with the hot-dog heater at 11-sevens allegedly cut out the entire districts energy supply. The delinquent wouldn't have cared for all that, if it weren't for the fact she was awoken in the middle of the night due to the boys pleas for help.
"Just leave me here to dieee!" he covered his red face with his hands again, mourning the loss of his very sophisticated position as a cashier at a gas-station.
"I'm cool with that," Jolon grunted, not either very pleased with the predicament.
"Sure," the girl huffed, turning on her heel to leave. Jolon nodded and picked up his ladder, following suit.
"Wait!" Frankie stumbled up from his position and chased after the other two. Slipping on the grass, he was right behind them, obviously not done trying to rejuvenate the mess-up again. "What's that?"
"Nice try, man."
"No, seriously! Who's driving out this late?" The two finally stopped and turned around to look at the boy, blended faces of exhaustion, confusion, and anger. Following where the boy was desperately pointing, they saw that he was actually telling the truth. Quickly driving towards them on a nearby empty road was a van, big bright headlights no doubt catching the attention of everybody in sight.
"What kind of dumbasses are they? Are they trying to get robbed?" the leader finally said, taking the flashlight out of Jolon's hand.
"Must be outsiders, let them drive past. Marco'll probably deal with them later."
Frankie nodded his head. "Yeah, they'll learn their lesson soon enough and then they'll be out of here," he shrugged them off. "Now, since you've finally stopped, let's-"
The boys attempted to convince them to come back and give it another shot. He was met with hard resistance from his taller and more defiant friend, who was half a second away from striking the kid with his ladder. The only one not involved in the argument was the boxer, who held her flashlight out towards the car when it came closer, inspecting it thoroughly.
"Hey, I'm just gonna check this out real quick," she called out passively, jogging towards the familiar van. It started driving slower and slower by the second, steering getting a little sloppy and would've probably warranted a speeding ticket if the cops cared enough to monitor this area.
Conveniently, it fully stopped right around when the girl got close enough to realize what car it was. Muttering a quick "what the fuck" under her breath, she slowed, deciding to approach the car in walking speed as to not startle the people inside.
...
"Honey, why'd you fall asleep?!" Rita scolded her husband, looking both startled and relieved at the same time.
"I'm sorry! It's just, you've got a nice singing voice!" he defended himself.
"Singy!" the cute voice of a baby exclaimed from the back, causing both parents to sigh in despair.
"God, we're never getting peace." Lynn looked close to tears. Her husband wasn't in any better state.
Rubbing his eyes to clear his vision, he took in the wonderful scenery of what looked to be an empty concrete road in some unrecognizable neighborhood. Granted, he could only see about 4 feet in front of the car thanks to the headlights, so really they could've been anywhere.
"Uhm, honey? Do you know where we-"
Rapid knocking on the glass cut him off. The suddenness of the sound added with the fact that a flashlight was from out of nowhere shining into their vehicle was enough to cause both the adults to scream in fear and shock.
Once the light was aimed away and the befuddled face of their favorite teenage degenerate was visible, they relaxed.
"Oh, it's just-" Rita said her name in relief, holding a hand over her heart. Behind her, Lily yelled out the same name, albeit a bit wrong thanks to her lack of teeth and tongue control. Lynn sighed at the fact his daughter was still wide awake as he rolled the window open.
The girl immediately leaned forward and rested her hands against the bottom of the open window, making sure to get a good look at everybody in the car before starting.
"What're you guys doing?" a slight hint of concern was audible under her question.
"Oh," Lynn shrugged with a smile. "You know, just taking the baby out for a little drive. We're hoping to get her to sleep.
The delinquent lowered her head and angled it so she could see Lily. When the toddler made eye-contact, she waved with her toys and had a big smile on her face.
"Drive!"
The juvenile looked back at the driver with a raised brow. "Okay... well, you shouldn't be out here. D'you know what the people around here would do if they saw a shiny van driving around here in the middle of the night? Go home, it's not safe here for you."
"It isn't? What do you mean?"
The thug squinted. "You're in Royal East."
"We are?!" Lynn yelped in surprise. "How far did we drive? Honey?" He turned around to question his wife, but during their conversation she'd managed to fall asleep.
"Is she sleeping?" the delinquent looked at her bewildered, leaning closer to make sure.
"It's been a long night," Lynn had a exhausted tone in his voice.
The vandal simply nodded. She turned around to look at her friends, who were staring back in confusion. Waving them off, she gestured for them to leave.
"Okay, but-" She turned around and was met with the faces of two asleep parents. Snapping her fingers at them, they stirred a bit, but ultimately were still knocked out. "Are you kidding me."
She looked to the back at Lily, who simply waved her toy at her again. The delinquent poked Lynn slightly on his arm, in hopes to wake him up, but failed. Sighing, she turned to her friends again, but they had already left. Running her hands through her hair, she knew of only one thing to do.
...
"So... uh... how is kindergarten?" she made a left turn by the crossing. At least they were out of the main road now, so she could drive without the fear of getting slammed into by another car.
"Apple!" Lily yelled excitedly from beside her. In the back, Lynn and Rita were snoring lightly, both sitting at uncomfortable angles as the thug had just kind of shoved them in there earlier on.
Now, she knew how to drive in theory—you do learn a lot about cars while working as a part-time mechanic—but she had never actually driven a car before. The closest she'd done was ride on one of those huge steerable lawnmowers that her friends found out by a dumpster. And even then, she crashed.
That being said, surprisingly, driving the van was actually easier than controlling that lawn-mower. At least this vehicle could actually steer properly without making cracking sounds. That didn't mean she wasn't fearing for the life of herself and the three other people in the car, one of them being a baby.
"Cool. I miss learning about apples," she nodded, keeping her eyes wide open as she stared at the road. It didn't help that every single streetlight was shut off. Goddamn it, Frankie. How the hell did you cause this?!
"Home! Home!" Lily clapped excitedly.
"This it?" the thug exhaled, turning into the driveway. She gave herself a mental clap on the back. Lo and behold, they were actually at the Loud's house. Thank god she hadn't crashed.
"Alright," she said to herself, looking at the rearview mirror. Mr. and Mrs. Loud were still sleeping soundly. Now how was she going to do this?
Exiting the vehicle, she started by carrying Lily out of the van. Fortunately, their door was unlocked. Must be nice, the delinquent thought. In Royal East, an unlocked door was practically like begging to get robbed.
Leaving the toddler on the couch with the promise of getting her a cookie if she stayed put, the boxer stepped back out and examined the two parents asleep in the back seat.
Ambitiously, she shook Rita lightly with a glimmer of hope that she would awake. Just as the thug expected, she didn't.
With a grunt, she hoisted the woman into her arms and carefully carried her into the house.
Once she got a better grip, she could move around a little faster. Walking past Lily on the couch, she uncomfortably shuffled into the parents room and carefully layed the woman on their bed. To both her surprise and relief, the woman didn't awake.
Then, she carefully stepped outside again and repeated the step with Lynn Sr. Admittedly, carrying him around was a tad bit more difficult, but in the end she succeeded. After setting him down as gently as she could, she tiptoed out of the room.
"Great," she brushed her hands off. "Now there's only one left."
"Lily!" the baby exclaimed, knwing exactly who the other girl was reffering to.
"Precisely," she approached the girl and picked her up. "Are you going to be difficult?"
"Hihi!"
"...great."
She ran up the stairs, ready to put the baby to sleep and leave, when someone yelped her name in shock and confusion.
"-What are you doing here?!!" Lynn Jr called out from the end of the hallway, presumably after stepping out of the bathroom. She walked up to the thug, who hoisted Lily further up in her arms.
"Your parents stranded themselves out by Royal East, so I had to get them home," she examined the jock, who was standing stiffly. "...is that guacamole..?"
Lynn looked down at herself before looking back up with wide eyes. "And curry chicken."
She shut her eyes and internally kicked herself. Of course she just had to be covered in food the one night her... friend decides to show up unannounced.
The thug blinked. "Okay." No one said anything. Luckily, Lily knew just what to do to rescue her sister.
"Let's go," she pulled on the juveniles sleeve, leaning in the direction of her bedroom.
"Alright, alright..." she nodded a goodbye to a still Lynn before walking over to where she assumed Lily's room was.
...
Shitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshit
Lynn was pacing around in her room, hair still sticky from the chicken and her old clothes bunched together on the floor.
Jesus, get your shit together, Lynn! She slapped herself on the face a few times. This was not the time to freak out over a... a crush. No time was the right time for that! Not for Lynn.
This was fine. Everything was fine. There was absolutely no reason for Lynn to be acting this way. Sure, she may have just recently discovered that she had the teeniest, meaningless, slight attraction for the other girl, but before all else she was her friend.
Who she just happened to like. Who just so happened to be in the room next door with her sister.
Shit, could she hear her??
Lynn immediately stopped pacing and stood deathly still.
...
Fuck! Lynn hit herself on the forehead with her wrist. Why was she acting so weird? Yeah, she was a little unsure about how to act—this was after all her first crush ever—but this was definitely not the way to do it.
It was cool. She could be cool. As far as anyone else was aware, nothing was different. No one had any idea of what was happening, so as long as Lynn pretended everything was fine, things could go back to normal and she could pretend this never happened.
Stopping herself from checking her clothes—the normal Lynn would've never cared about how she presented herself to the girl—she stepped out of her room and headed towards Lily and Lisa's room.
Okay, maybe being around the other girl when she was behaving this way wasn't the smartest move, but it would've been more unusual if Lynn ignored her own friend like the plague when she was in her home. Lynn wanted to seem normal, and joining the thug in coaxing her sister to sleep was the perfect way to present things as okay.
...and maybe Lynn wanted to hang out with the girl as well, but that was irrelevant.
Carefully opening the door to the room, she saw Lily in her bed whispering to the vandal, who was crouched down beside her. Upon her entrance, they both turned to look at her, who waved at them sheepishly. She looked over to her crush, and tried to ignore the thumping in her chest.
"What're you guys talking about?" she whispered, slinking in and joining the guest on the floor. She put her arm out to caress Lily, who was giggling slightly at the attention.
Lily said some gibberish, and followed it with a "-is trying to tell me a story, but she's bad at thinking one," she added the last part as a whisper.
"That's not how you pronounce that. And gee thanks, Lily. Not like I'm sitting right here," the thug rolled her eyes, looking tired. Lily only giggled more.
"What is "fhmkdjol"?" Lynn asked, smiling at the two.
"She's trying to say my name," the thug answered, shocking Lynn as the toddler's mumble didn't even sound remotely close to her name. "She's not getting it."
Lynn laughed as quietly as she could, but when the girl slowly turned her head to give her the biggest look of disappointment she'd seen, she couldn't hold it in. Both her and her sister started laughing loudly, to the annoyance of the degenerate.
"Yeah, yeah. Keep laughing you two. Maybe while I'm here I'll steal your toys as revenge. Then you'll see who's laughing," she muttered a threat, causing both of them to laugh harder at the bizarre scenario.
Lynn tried to ignore the warmth swirling in her chest as she laughed. The boxer kept coming up with more and more absurd threats to keep Lily giggling. After a while, Lynn couldn't hear the words anymore. She could only see her friend adorning a scowl while speaking with her joyful sister, making her break into more and more laughs. Lynn stopped her snickering, she only kept watchful eyes on the guest as she spoke, smiling at the softness of the moment.
This was a bad idea. How was Lynn supposed to suppress her crush when she was doing things like this?
Eventually, Lily's laughter slowed as she drifted off. Lynn shook her head and observed the toddler, seeing if she was asleep yet or not. When the sounds of her light snoring filled the room, Lynn and the thug practically moved in slow-motion as they carefully exited the room, hoping the baby doesn't wake from their movement.
...
With a soft click, the baby was safe and asleep in her room, unable to be disturbed from the outside world.
The thug let out a huge sigh of relief, standing up straight now as she didn't have to tip-toe around anymore. She turned to look at Lynn, who herself was staring straight ahead at the door.
"Will she stay asleep or...?" she whispered, still wary about making too much noise.
The jock's head snapped to look the the guest. Clearing her throat, she said "Uh, yeah, should be." She straightened up as well, but her nerves were killing her at the moment.
The delinquent yawned into her fist. "Well, now that that's over, I'm gonna walk home now." She nodded a goodbye to Lynn and turned to leave before getting a response.
"Wait!" Lynn yelled before she could stop herself. When the girl turned her head and raised her brow at her, the jock continued. "It's already late, you know. Maybe you can just crash here for the night?" she suggested hopefully. "It's too far to walk," she added quickly to justify her request.
"I don't know, Lynn," she hesitated. "I don't wanna come here in the middle of the night and sleepover twice, you know?"
"Don't worry, my parents like you. And after getting Lily to sleep, they owe you that much," the athlete reassured quickly. "And, uhm, I was kinda hoping we could hang out too. It's been a while."
It had been a while. Ever since Lynn had her little epiphany, she had avoided the other girl in school as much as possible. Not that it was very different, of course, considering the thug's habit of disappearing.
"I wasn't worried," the juvenile said blankly before smirking. "If I'm not imposing or anything, then-"
"You're not," Lynn cut her off, leading her to the bedroom.
...
"So why exactly were you covered in guacamole and curry?" the thug said stepping over the pile of dirty clothes. Lynn saw this and kicked the pile as hard as possible so it was out of the way.
"We kinda had a food war," Lynn answered. She sat down on the bed, where the vandal quickly followed.
"A food war?"
"Yeah. Lincoln and Clyde had this club that we weren't allowed in, so Luna and Leni made their own club, but we weren't allowed in there either. Then Lucy and Lisa did the same, so me and Lana hosted a party in the shed," Lynn explained casually.
"That... doesn't answer anything..."
"Oh, right," she rasped, chuckling to herself. "Well, when Lisa's science experiment shut off the power everywhere, me and Lana still had electricity, and when Lincoln tried to enter our club without a pass Lana threw chicken on him which kinda snowballed after that."
The delinquent's jaw fell open and she slapped Lynn on the arm. "So you were the motherfuckers who..." she wiped her face with her palms and sighed loudly. "Well, at least Frankie'll still have a job."
"What's that?" Lynn questioned while rubbing the sore spot on her arm.
"Frankie was working the night-shift at 11-Sevens and he thought he accidentally caused the power outage by messing with the hot-dog heater or something," she explained, collapsing backwards onto the bed. "He woke me up like an hour ago so I could help him restore it with Jolon."
Lynn snickered. "Wait, don't tell him it was us!" she convinced.
"Why not?"
"Because it's funnier if he thinks it was him."
The boxer looked at the girl appalled. "You're evil," she laughed along. "And you call me a degenerate?"
Now it was Lynn's turn to look scandalized. "Hey, I've never called you that!"
"Yes you have!"
"Not to your face!"
"Well," the thug looked torn. "You've definitely thought it. And you called me a gangster before!"
"Well, that's different!" Lynn threw her hands up. "And, in my defense, you totally are!"
"You suck, I'm leaving."
Lynn cackled at the girl's upset expression. She lied down as well so the two were next to each other. For a second, Lynn thought about how strange it was that the two commonly found themselves in that exact position.
"So what happened," Lynn asked after a moment.
"Huh?"
"With Frankie. Did you manage to restore the power?"
"Does it look like we managed to restore the power?"
Lynn looked out the window and remembered that it was pitch dark outside. "No, actually."
"There you go," the vandal said smugly, eyes closed. Lynn saw this and freaked.
"Hey, are you gonna fall asleep now?" she shook the girl, causing her to whine.
"Yes?" she pushed Lynn's hands off. "I told you I was woken up. I was on my way home for a reason."
"What happened to hanging out?" Lynn shook her with more ferociousness. "You can't fall asleep on me now!"
The juvenile sighed and sat up again, the athlete following quickly behind. "Come up with something then."
Lynn scrunched her eyebrows while thinking. They could join Lincoln and the rest of her sisters who were dancing in the attic, but Lynn didn't wanna drag her friend into that. Luna would probably just tease her anyway and ruin everything.
"Wanna... go for a walk or something?" she suggested. The thug frowned.
"It's dark and the middle of the night, Lynn."
"And you were planning on walking home anyway so what's the matter?"
The thug shrugged. "I know my way around Royal East, and I wouldn't be bothered by anyone there. Here? I can't be sure about that."
Lynn sighed. "Fine. We coulddddd... play a sport?"
"Indoors?" the delinquent questioned.
"No, outside."
"Okay, it's still pitch black outside," she raised a good point.
They grew silent again, thinking of things they could do. The vandal perked up. "We could watch a movie."
Lynn thought about it for a moment before nodding slowly, until she started frantically shaking her head instead. "You'll just fall asleep," she deadpanned.
"No I won't!" the girl defended herself, offended.
Lynn was a bit reluctant, but finally she agreed. The thug settled on the bed properly this time, and Lynn went to fetch her computer. Luckily for the two of them, it was already charged beforehand, so Lynn didn't have to worry about the whole power outage thing.
Briefly, Lynn considered if she should go to the basement to get the spare mattress up first, but she honestly couldn't be bothered to do that right now. Fuck it, she'll just do it after the movie.
"What do you wanna watch?" Lynn said, moving over to lie next to the vandal. She tried to ignore how her heartbeat quickened whenever they accidentally made contact with each other.
"I dunno. You got Webflix?"
"I don't think so," Lynn furled her eyebrows. "What's that?"
"Pirating software."
Lynn rolled her eyes. "No, we don't." She laughed a bit. "I think we have JBO though."
"Okay, put something on then."
Eventually they settled on some 80's slasher horror film. Or, it was more so Lynn who was interested and the other girl just agreed without even checking what it was.
Regardless, Lynn really enjoyed the opening scene. She was surprised at the girl's silence, but she couldn't be bothered to care. She expected her to be that person who always talked throughout movies, but if she wasn't then who cared?
After a particularly gory scene, Lynn flinched. "Whoa, that was sick. How did they even do that stuff without CGI?" she turned to the other girl, only to see that she was, in fact, asleep.
Lynn stared at her in denial for a few seconds before chuckling. Fine, she'd let her off the hook just this once.
The next morning, Lynn quietly slipped her goth sister a 5 dollar bill for staying quiet about a certain thug being in their room. And if the girl had anything to say about the vandal sneaking out of the window early at dawn too, she didn't make that clear.
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AUTHOR'S NOTE:
These short meaningless chapters give me life. Go complain somewhere else this fic would be NOTHING without a quick 4000 word break where basically nothing in the story develops every so often 🤩
also sorry about the long unexpected leave of absense lmao. I took a vacation to portugal and had no opportunity to write, so I kinda had to throw this together oops. But the next chapter should be coming shortly, and that's a long one!