I Wanna Be Who I Couldn’t Say I’d Ever Been
So this story is completely the result of the awesome Ruby Hale head canons that @ohdangitsang has been blessing me with for the last few weeks and honestly I am just so grateful for these ideas because I need them in my life. Please never stop.
Basically it’s Ruby + being raised by SHIELD moms + plus going to school with “normal” teenagers Peter, Ned and MJ and being a total gay mess. And I definitely want to write more in this because I just love this verse so much.
So yeah, it’s a total guilty pleasure. But that’s the point, right?
“Remember: don’t kill anyone today.”
Daisy had said those words a few short hours ago, a smile on her face, but a hint of fear in her eyes, like she was actually a little bit worried about the joke being more prophetic than humorous. Ruby had only looked at her before getting out of the car without comment and walking up the steps of Midtown School of Science and Technology.
Now Ruby can’t help but repeat Daisy’s words in her mind, thinking about them like a mantra, an important thing to keep in mind.
It’s her first day of high school. She really can’t afford to kill anyone.
Though it is a little bit tempting.
Ruby tightens her hand into a fist, flexing her fingers -empty and useless- as she sits through a biology lecture that covers something she learned years ago. Who would have thought that Hydra had time to actually teach important academic concepts in between teaching their students how to kill the president with a fork?
Ruby tries to focus on the words of the teacher rather than the onslaught of other stimuli around her. There are twenty other students in the class, double the amount of teenagers that she’s used to being around at one time, and each one of them seems determined to make as much noise as possible. The scratching of pencils on paper, the scuff of sneakers on linoleum, the tap of fingers on the surface of a desk, the snuffling, sniffing, coughing, scratching…Ruby doesn’t know how they can stand all of it. It makes her skin crawl, makes her want to jump out of her seat and release some of the tension coiling at the base of her spine.
And the teacher doesn’t seem at all bothered by all the sounds, continuing with his lecture like he isn’t aware of the constant stream of noise coming from his pupils.
Plus there’s the sounds coming from the hallway outside. She’s counted ten people out in the hallway since the start of class twenty-five minutes ago and then there’s the banging of doors, the sighing and rattling pipes, the murmur of voices from the other classrooms.
Ruby can’t even think about the sounds coming from outside the window right now. She’s barely holding onto her sanity as it is.
The person in front of her is a foot-tapper and Ruby stretches her fingers toward the pen on her desk, holding her breath as she curls her fingers around it and pulls it closer and-
Don’t kill anyone today.
Ruby sighs as Daisy’s words repeat through her mind and she forces herself to relax against the back of her seat, loosening her grip on her pen. She can’t afford to make a mistake on her first day and risk getting sent off to the Fridge or some other SHIELD stronghold -a favorite threat of Mack and Coulson. Ruby is pretty sure that Coulson is mostly kidding when he says it, but she’s not completely sure about Mack. Though she’s not sure that he has that kind of pull.
Better to not risk it until at least Friday.
Instead, Ruby just exhales slowly through her teeth, giving the teacher a cursory glance to make sure that she’s still ahead of his current lecture points, before letting her eyes play over the collection of teenagers seated around her.
Real, normal, actual teenagers. Ones who have been living in this normal, real, regular life since they were born. Teenagers who don’t know anything about how to kill someone with their bare hands. Teenagers who haven’t been designed to be the perfect weapon.
Ruby has no idea how they do it.
She looks at the boy sitting to her left, the one intently scribbling in his notebook even though nothing he’s writing has anything to do with the equations that the teacher is writing on the board. Ruby watches him for a second before growing bored with his muses on the abilities of various species of spiders, studying the smattering of other students around her. The blonde in a cheerleading uniform, the kid in glasses who is diligently taking notes on the lecture, the guy staring at his crotch where he’s got his phone hidden like he’s totally being sneaky. The girl diagonal to her that isn’t even bothering to hide the fact that she’s reading a book and not paying even a sliver of attention to the teacher.
Ruby shifts impatiently in her seat, glancing toward the clock. Her body is humming with energy -she’s not used to sitting still for this long and she actually finds herself missing the drills and exercise routines that her instructors used to make her run until she was blinking sweat away from her eyes and gritting her teeth against the burning in her muscles.
When the bell finally rings, Ruby jumps in her seat, startled by the sudden, shrill sound. She’s heard it three times already, but she still hasn’t grown used to the sound and she knocks her books onto the floor, earning her a few giggles from her classmates. The kid who had been intently scribbling down things about spiders starts to help her gather her stuff but Ruby snatches it away quickly, hurrying out of the room.
It feels good to be moving at least, even if she’s just going from one room to the next, following the schedule that Jemma put into her hands the night before and instructed her to follow down to the minute. “You always need to be exactly where you’re supposed to be,” she had said, her voice a mixture of stern and understanding. “It’s very important.”
Ruby had taken the schedule with a roll of her eyes. “You think I don’t know how to follow orders?”
She already has the schedule memorized, right down to the room numbers and the names of the teachers and the layout of the school building. Ruby follows the crush of students in the direction of the cafeteria, studying the new terrain with a touch of trepidation. Daisy had briefed her on this part of her day, telling her to make friends, to find someone pleasant to sit with so that she didn’t have to be alone.
Friends. Hmm. Ruby figures it’s probably pretty hard to make friends when you’re attending normal high school for the first time after being raised as an indomitable Hydra weapon. But also the whole not having said a word to anyone all day thing probably doesn’t help either.
Ruby isn’t entirely sure where she stands on the subject of friends anyway. She’s never had them; she’s only ever dealt with people who sought to keep her from her goal, her purpose. She’s had the blood of her classmates on her hands, and even in some cases, their deaths on her shoulders. Which is probably something the people laughing and carrying on around her can’t exactly relate to.
“Hey! Hey, new girl!”
It takes Ruby only a second to ascertain that this summons is directed at her. When she turns her head, she sees the spider-boy waving her over to a table, a grin on his face. Beside him, his pudgy friend is also smiling, though much in the same way that Daisy had smiled at her that morning -hopeful but with a hint of fear.
“Come sit with us.” He points to an empty chair opposite of where he’s currently sitting and Ruby debates her options for a second before moving in his direction.
“We always have empty spaces at our table,” the spider-boy tells her before sitting down in his own seat. “I’m Peter and this is Ned. How’s your first day going?”
Ruby blinks at him, trying to decide if this is a normal thing that normal teenagers do. Do they often talk to one another without pausing? Do they often engage in conversation with strangers without having any type of motive?
Peter and Ned exchange a look at her silence and then Ned shrugs, picking up the slice of pizza on his plate and starting to eat like having strange, silent, blonde girls at the lunch table is completely ordinary.
“You need help navigating the line?” Peter tilts his head in the direction of the massing of students moving through the line, holding trays of food.
Ruby unzips her backpack, pulling out the lunch that Jemma had packed for her that morning in a lunchbox that Daisy had bought for her. “It’s red, see? Like…you know…” Daisy had grinned at her, far too amused in what she perceived as her own cleverness. “Like ruby.”
Ruby isn’t entirely sure if normal teenagers have lunchboxes to coordinate with their names so she makes a mental note to do some recon, just so she knows how to ensure her normalcy tomorrow.
No one really seems to be paying much attention to her at all, aside from Peter and Ned, so Ruby figures that she’s safe for the time being.
Peter just nods. “Ah, good thinking,” he says. “The food here can actually be pretty good, though.”
Ned lifts his pizza slice as proof. “Mondays are always pizza day.”
Ruby studies the triangle in his hand. “I’ve never had pizza.”
This comment earns her incredulous looks from both Ned and Peter and Ruby is pretty sure that Ned only just barely manages not to drop the pizza back onto his tray. She isn’t sure if their surprise is because she’s uttered her first sentence since walking into the school building or because she’s never eaten pizza before.
She’s not sure which is a worse offense in their minds.
Peter and Ned are still fumbling with a response when Ruby senses movement to her right and turns her head just as the girl from her science class drops into the chair beside her. She sets her tray down in front of her and pulls out her book, flipping it open without a glance at the other people at the table.
“That’s Michelle,” Peter says, pointing to the girl with her curly hair piled on top of her head and her deep brown eyes scanning the pages of her book.
“Sup,” Michelle says without looking out from her book. “MJ.”
Peter lifts his eyebrows. “I thought you said only your friends could call you that.”
The girl just looks at him over the top of her book and turns the page without comment.
Ruby looks at the three of them and tries to decipher the conversation going on around her. She’s starting to feel even less equipped for normal high school than she’d previously thought.
There seems to be an air of expectation at the table and Ruby sighs, breathing out slowly. “My name is Ruby.”
It’s been a while since she’s been around people who didn’t know who she was.
Who didn’t know to be afraid of her.
Ruby isn’t sure what to make of the sudden tightness in her chest, the way her stomach feels like it’s twisting around inside her body.
“So,” Ned says, unaware of the sudden fluttery panic that Ruby feels running through her body, “you’ve really never had pizza?”
~ ~ ~
After lunch, Ruby is almost relieved to head to the gym, though her relief is quickly tempered by disappointment when she sees that it’s nothing like the gym from the safe house. There are just bleachers and freshly waxed floors and a few basketball hoops and everything smells like sweat and desperation and rubber and Ruby isn’t sure what she’s supposed to do with this.
How is she supposed to keep herself in shape with…this? How is she supposed to work off the energy threatening to tear her apart from the inside out?
The coach blows the whistle around his neck and Ruby jumps once again, cursing herself under her breath. She makes a mental note to ask May to work whistle drills into their regular training sessions in the hopes that it’ll help her look more normal around her classmates, more like she belongs there.
“Okay, go ahead and start your stretches and then we’ll move on to push-ups,” the coach says, his tone matching the bored expressions that Ruby sees around her. “We’ll finish with laps. Let’s go people.”
Of course he punctuates his instructions with another bleat on the whistle and Ruby grits her teeth, rolling her shoulders. She’s really tempted to grab that whistle and shove it down his throat…if she doesn’t shove it too far down then she should still be able to adhere to Daisy’s command to not kill anyone.
As Ruby effortlessly moves through the stretches that she’s been doing since she could walk, she notices Peter and Ned a few feet to her left and, beside them, MJ. Who happens to be sitting cross-legged on the floor, book in her lap. Ruby stretches her arm across her chest, holding the posture until she feels her muscles start to tingle, coming alive, keeping her focus on MJ.
MJ lifts her head as if sensing Ruby’s eyes on hers, meeting Ruby’s gaze before Ruby can look away. She holds up the book so that Ruby can see the title: The Handmaid’s Tale, raising her eyebrows in a question that Ruby can’t entirely decipher.
Quickly, Ruby looks away, feeling a strange heat rush to her cheeks, the unsettling feeling returning to her stomach. She pushes it away, focusing on loosening her body in preparation for the push-ups.
And, of course, the command to begin comes with a whistle.
Ruby really wants to snatch that thing away from the coach and wrap the lanyard around his neck and just-
Thankfully the physical activity helps take her mind off the impulse that she feels to strangle the man. Ruby doesn’t bother to keep track of push-ups, focusing instead on her breathing, on the movement of her muscles, the curve of her spine as she moves effortlessly.
It takes her a few minutes to realize that the coach is staring at her with interest, whistle hanging loosely from his teeth. “Where did you say you transferred from?” He asks when he sees that he has Ruby’s attention. “Was it some kind of military academy?”
Ruby doesn’t bother to answer, moving fluidly from the push-up position to standing once more. She wipes at her forehead with the back of her hand even though she’s not close to sweating. It’s a bit of a disappointment. Clearly she’s going to have to hold back here, as it seems like physical prowess is not normal.
And Ruby so badly just wants to be normal.
The coach moves off to supervise some of the other students and Ruby sees that he’s not the only one who has been watching her. Peter is studying her closely too, brow furrowed with interest. He looks like he wants to say something, which Ruby figures is the perfect excuse to turn her back to him and act like she needs to go through the stretching process once more, even though her body is itching, aching to move.
It’s a relief when they move to the laps portion of the class and Ruby doesn’t even bother to remember to keep herself in check as they start their laps around the all too small space of the gym. She thinks if she bothers to hold back, even for a moment longer, that she’ll go completely crazy.
And then someone really might die.
And then where would she be?
Ruby laps everyone easily, focusing on the sound of her feet against the floor. It makes it easier to move, to think, when that’s all she has to concentrate on.
And then…she hears another pair of footsteps join the rhythm that she’s gotten used to, matching her pace.
Ruby frowns, lifting her head, glancing over to her left. She’s only somewhat surprised to see Peter running there beside her, grinning, not seeming the least bit winded. “Finally, someone else who can keep up,” he says, companionably.
Ruby purses her lips, adding a little bit more speed to her laps, hardly in the mood for conversation.
Not that it matters. For every burst of speed Ruby gives to her strides, Peter is there to match her perfectly, keeping pace with her effortlessly. Ruby stops bothering to count laps, stops keeping track of the number of times that she laps her classmates, instead focusing on Peter and shaking him.
It doesn’t do much good. He keeps perfect pace with her until the coach blows his whistle and Ruby breaks her stride, nearly stumbling in her surprise. Peter reaches for her, keeping her upright with a hand on her shoulder, which Ruby quickly shakes away.
“Okay, I think that’s enough of that,” the coach calls from the opposite side of the gym. “Everybody dress out.”
Peter grins at her, not seeming at all winded. Which is something Ruby can relate to. He steps closer to her, invading her personal space. “So, are you like…” He glances around to make sure there’s no one else around. “A superhero too or something?”
Ruby steps back quickly, trying to force down the sudden surge of panic that she feels at Peter’s words.
She heads toward the girls’ locker room without bothering to answer, without even trying to protest that she’s normal, totally normal, that she’s here because she’s normal. Normal, normal, normal.
That’s all she wants to be.
Ruby figures it’ll do no good to point out to Peter that she’s hardly a superhero.
More like a supervillain.
~ ~ ~
As Ruby heads down the steps toward the line of cars waiting at the front of the building, she spots MJ sitting cross-legged beside one of the stone statues at the front of the school. MJ lifts her hand in a brief wave, lifting her chin in a parting gesture.
Ruby swallows and looks away quickly.
It’s a definite relief to be sitting in the back seat of the car, closed into the small space with just Daisy and Jemma.
Even though Ruby can tell right away they’re both trying to hide their anxiety, trying to look casual as they both turn around in their seats to look at her.
“So…” Daisy prompts, a hopeful smile on her face.
“How was it?” Jemma finishes the sentence for her and Ruby wants to tell them that they both suck at this whole casual persona they’re trying to master.
Ruby just shrugs, looking out the window at the stream of students. She briefly thinks about telling them about the bells, about all the sounds and movement and things that threaten to distract her. She thinks about telling them about the schedule and how she almost can’t stand the forced rigidity of it. She thinks about mentioning Peter’s strange comment to her, or even mentioning Peter and Ned to them and suggesting timidly that she might have friends.
But then she sees MJ and Ruby purses her lips, frowning slightly.
Ruby looks back toward Daisy and Jemma, who are still staring at her and Ruby can practically feel them holding their collective breath. “Can you take me to the library?” She asks, rather than answer their impatient, unspoken questions. “I need to get a book.”
Daisy and Jemma exchange a look, nearly indecipherable given the years that Ruby assumes they’ve had to perfect their special form of silent communication.
Finally Jemma nods. “Of course. Do you need it for school?”
Ruby shrugs, settling back in her seat. “No,” she says. “Someone recommended it to me.”
At least, she thinks that’s what happened anyway.
Teenagers are hard to figure out.
Daisy lifts an eyebrow. “You made a friend?”
A few months ago, Ruby would have sneered at the hopeful lilt in Daisy’s voice. She would have seen it as weakness, exploited it to gain the upper hand, to do whatever she had to do to take out her enemy.
Hope, much like friends, was completely unnecessary to her even a month ago.
Now Ruby just shrugs, turning the word over in her mind.
A month ago, she wouldn’t have cared about having friends.
She wouldn’t have cared about being normal.
But Ruby knows how fast circumstances can change.
