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Imagine You’ve known Will and Grace since 8th grade. You were new to Boston and moved in next door so you’ve known them for 7 years now. You’ve always been a tom boy who loved sports, wore men’s clothes and never did your hair/makeup to look like the girls your age. Now that you’re 18, you are trying to impress the 21 year old Will Smith. Dresses, skirts, shaved legs, hair and makeup done up. All for him.

lanes and lines (will smith x reader)

word count: 1867?+ !ong narrations ahead

a/n: post number eighteen! 🩵 i am so excited to do this as a mini series! my requests are being bombarded once again but fret not, i will be posting slowly but surely to keep the adrenaline pumping. if u simply click the title below it will lead you to the playlists of this series :) enjoy reading!

part 001 <- 002 <- 003 <- 004 -> 005 typing...

001. the north end and the hand me downs

the thing about boston in the winter is that everything smells like salt, car exhaust, and old bricks.

when you moved into the triple-decker next door to the smiths in the middle of eighth grade, you carried two cardboard boxes of baseball cards, three pairs of oversized men’s carhartt carpenters, and a total lack of understanding of what girls your age were supposed to look like. your mother had packed a single small suitcase for herself three months prior—saying something vague about running to the corner store for milk and simply never turning the blinker off—leaving your dad and your older brother, leo, to raise you on a steady diet of box mac-and-cheese and red sox radio broadcasts.

consequently, you looked like a junior varsity lineworker.

your hair was usually shoved into a faded fenway cap to hide the fact that you didn't know how to blow it out, your knuckles were permanently gray from fixing the chain on your old ten-speed bike, and you wore leo’s old high school hockey jerseys like blankets. to the kids down at the end of the block, you were a premier laughing stock. a girl who didn't fit into the narrow, glossy lines of the middle school hallway.

it happened on a freezing tuesday after school, the sky the color of a wet slate shingle. you were walking home alone, your canvas backpack cutting into your shoulders, when three boys from the ninth-grade class cornered you near the neighborhood rink. they were throwing ice-packed snowballs at your boots, laughing at the way your brother’s old winter coat swallowed your frame.

"hey!" one of them yelled, his voice cracking with puberty. "you borrow your dad's clothes today or are you just hiding a bunch of stolen candy in there? where'd your mom go anyway? did she leave because you look like a dude?"

the mention of your mom hit your chest like a lead puck. you stood frozen on the icy sidewalk, your fingers tightening around the straps of your backpack, your throat swelling with a hot, angry lump you refused to let drop.

"hey! back the hell off!"

the voice didn't come from behind you; it came from across the street.

will was fourteen then, a gangly kid with legs that were growing faster than his torso, but he crossed the slushy asphalt with a terrifying, single-minded focus. right behind him was grace, her pink winter coat flying open, her face twisted into absolute fury.

"leave her alone, you losers!" grace screamed, instantly dropping her school bag into the snow and scooping up a chunk of ice, hurling it directly at the lead boy’s chest with surprisingly perfect form.

will didn't even use snow. he ran across and he stepped right into the space between you and the ninth-graders, his chest heaving, his dark eyes fixed on the biggest kid. "you say another word to her and i'm taking your skates off the hook and throwing them into the harbor. you think i'm playing? try me."

"s-she's a freak, smitty," the boy muttered, though he took a noticeable step backward.

"she's our neighbor," will barked, his jaw hardening into a line that looked entirely too mature for his age. "and if you look at her again, you're dealing with me. and you're dealing with her brother, i heard that her brother crushes bones, man you wouldn't want your bones crushed would you?." he whispered taunting the bullies.

as if on cue, the heavy metal doors of the rink swung open, and leo came charging out in his track pants, a hockey stick still clutched in his taped glove. he’d seen the tail end of it from the lobby window.

"who am i killing?" leo roared, his seventeen-year-old voice booming off the brick walls as he sprinted down the concrete steps.

the ninth-graders didn't wait to find out. they scattered down the alleyway like rats, their sneakers slipping on the ice as leo and will actually chased them for half a block, their loud, echoing curses fading into the boston twilight.

when the boys were gone, grace turned to you, her small hands immediately coming up to brush the snow off your oversized shoulders. "you okay? don't listen to them. they're literal trash. their moms buy them generic cereal."

you let out a shaky, wet laugh, nodding as will came trotting back, his face flushed red from the cold run. he didn't say anything soft—he wasn't good at that yet—but his hand dropped onto the top of your fenway cap, giving it a rough, reassuring shake that nearly knocked it over your eyes.

"come on," will mumbled, his fingers lingering on the brim of your hat for a second too long. "let's go get some hot chocolate before leo actually tracks them down and gets arrested."

seven years bled together in a blur of seasons after that afternoon. the smiths’ house became your actual sanctuary, the third chair at their kitchen table permanently reserved for you.

but being the only girl raised by two mechanics meant the teasing was a daily currency.

"if you wear that jersey any more, it's going to grow limbs and walk out of the house itself," leo grumbled one night, throwing a balled-up sock at your head across the living room.

you were fifteen then, sitting cross-legged on the floor, sorting through a pile of used hockey tape. "it's comfortable, leo. mind your business."

"it has a grease stain from your pop's truck on the sleeve," will pointed out from the armchair, his long legs dangling over the side as he played with a mini-stick. he looked over at you, a tiny, teasing smirk tugging at the corner of his lips. "seriously. you look like you're about to go do a shift at the shipyard. you want me to buy you a hard hat for your birthday?"

"shut up, smitty," you threw a roll of tape right at his chest. he caught it easily with one hand, his eyes crinkling with lazy, familiar warmth that always made your stomach do a weird, uncoordinated flip.

"i'm just saying," will laughed, tossing the tape back into your lap. "you're the only girl in Boston who knows how to change a spark plug but doesn't know how to use a hairbrush."

"she knows how to use a hairbrush!" grace yelled from the kitchen, walking in with a bag of potato chips. she dropped onto the couch and pulled your cap off your head, letting your messy, tangled hair fall around your shoulders. "she just needs... a vision. we're working on it."

you didn't have a vision. you had a crush that was starting to feel like a bruise. will smith isn't that hard to love— wait was it love, or was it infatuation. maybe you and grace watch too much romance shows or a growing realization that while will was starting to look like an actual adult—his shoulders filling out, his name appearing in local sports columns—you were still just the neighborhood tomboy who could catch his eighty-mile-per-hour slapshots in the driveway without blinking.

------------------

the first time you and grace tried to change your style, you were sixteen.

it was a sweltering july afternoon, and will was away at a development camp in toronto, giving you and grace a clear three-day window of absolute secrecy. grace’s bedroom smelled like vanilla, expensive moisturizer, and clean laundry—a total contrast to your room, which mostly smelled like old leather and chain grease.

"okay, don't move," grace instructed, her tongue poking out of the corner of her mouth as she held a tube of bright pink lip gloss. "this is called 'bubblegum pop.' it's supposed to make your lips look like a movie star."

"grace, it smells like a chemical factory," you mumbled, your eyes watering as she smeared the sticky, glossy substance across your mouth.

"beauty is pain, shut up," she muttered, grabbing a heavy blue eye shadow palette next. "now let me do the lids. will says he likes girls who look like they put effort in. i heard him talking to his buddies about that girl on the varsity field hockey team."

the mention of will’s preferences made you sit perfectly still, even when the scratchy bristles of the makeup brush poked you right in the corner of your eye muttering curses as grace kept glamming you up.

ten minutes later, grace stepped back, clanking her brushes into a glass jar. "okay. turn around. look at the vanity."

you turned slowly, your heart hammering against your ribs.

the reflection staring back at you was an absolute horror show. the bright pink lip gloss made your mouth look like you had just eaten a sloppy cherry popsicle, and the heavy blue shadow on your lids made your eyes look like you had been in a minor bicycle accident. your hair had been brushed out into an aggressive, frizzy triangle that didn't suit the sharp, lines of your jaw at all.

you looked like a toddler had defaced a museum statue.

you stared at the glass for three seconds before a small, helpless snort escaped your nose. grace looked at your reflection, then at her own horrified face in the mirror, and the two of you completely collapsed.

"oh my god," grace shrieked, burying her face in her pillows as she shook with laughter. "i'm so sorry! it looks like you got punched by a blueberry!"

"i look like a clown who got caught in the rain!" you yelled, wiping the sticky gloss off with the back of your hand, your ears burning with a mix of hilarity and deep embarrassment. "see? i told you! it doesn't fit my texture, grace! i'm just... i'm built for carhartts and grease and chains an—."

"no, no, we just went too hard," grace gasped for air, sitting up and grabbing a makeup wipe. "we tried to make you look like a girl from a magazine. we gotta find your lane. a classy lane. not... whatever this is."

you let her wipe the blue smudge off your face, but as you looked at your raw, clean skin in the mirror, the laughter died down into a quiet, heavy ache. you didn't want to look like a magazine girl. you just wanted to look like someone will could see as a woman.

---------------------------

by the time you and will were attending boston college high school together, the blueberry clown disaster was a distant memory, a brand-new, entirely more confusing problem took its place.

there was a literal two-year age gap between you—will was older, already moving with the heavier strides of a young man—but due to your late enrollment when you first moved to boston, you were in the same grade. you weren't on the same path; will was a blue-chip athlete bound for the highest tier of hockey sports, while you were a mechanic’s daughter just trying to pass pre-calculus. but because of your identical schedules, you were together constantly. you shared the same history lectures, the same english periods, and you ate lunch together out of brown paper bags at the exact same stained perimeter table in the cafeteria every single day.

and for the longest time, it was entirely, utterly platonic.

what you had with will wasn't a standard friendship. it wasn't something that could be bartered or traded for any prized possession on earth. it was a functional necessity. you needed him, and he needed you. for years in the driveway and the local rec rinks, you had been his goalie—the only person stubborn enough to stop his bone-crushing slapshots—and he had been your center. it was like yin and yang. a perfect, unpolished balance of two neighborhood kids who could read each other’s movements without ever having to look.

but your body had decided to stop cooperating with the disguise.

almost overnight during junior year, you had filled out. you hadn't stopped wearing your boyish style—you still wore men’s thick cotton hoodies and heavyweight champion sweatpants—but you weren't the worst-dressed girl in the school; you were just a girl whose curves were outgrowing her armor. your chest got noticeably bigger, your hips rounded out, and your ass became a distinct, soft shape that your brother’s old hand-me-down clothes could no longer completely flatten.

you felt like an imposter. you would haul a massive, oversized bc hockey hoodie over your head, tugging it down past your waist, but the soft, feminine weight of your breasts still pushed against the thick fabric, making you look entirely more done up than you ever intended to be.

walking down the high school hallways next to him became a specialized form of torture.

will was growing into his full six-foot-two frame, all broad shoulders, sharp jawline, and casual athletic grace. the hockey guys would yell his name from down the hall, and will would just give them that easy, confident chin-flick. but whenever you walked beside him, his eyes would occasionally dip—just for a fraction of a second—tracking the way a pair of standard gray sweatpants hung differently on your hips than they did on his.

"you're pulling at your shirt again," will murmured one afternoon as you both walked to his truck after school. the spring breeze was warm, and you were aggressively twisting the hem of your oversized black t-shirt around your fingers to keep it from sticking to your waist.

"i'm not," you lied, looking at the gravel.

"you are," he said, his voice dropping into a quiet steady register he only used when it was just the two of you. he stopped by the driver's side door, leaning his forearms against the roof of the truck, looking across at you. his eyes were thoughtful, completely unreadable. "you look fine, you don't gotta hide under four layers of fleece every day. it’s eighty degrees out."

"i'm comfortable like this, smitty," you muttered, throwing your backpack into the truck bed.

will didn't say anything else, but his gaze lingered on your face, on the flushed heat in your cheeks, before he climbed into the cab. he didn't understand the sheer panic of a body turning into a woman's when all you wanted was to remain the safe, faceless neighbor boy who could track his pucks in the dark.

---------------------

and then, the universe pulled the rug out from under the four of you.

the four-way friendship that had anchored your entire teenage life—the countless night drives, the burnt rye toast in your kitchen, the shared parking lot secrets—abruptly met its expiration date in the summer before you turned eighteen.

everything happened at once, a sudden, violent scattering of the high school bubble.

will got drafted to the nhl. his name was printed on every major sports column in the country, a first-round lock, his bag already packed for training camps and media tours that would take him thousands of miles away from the triple-decker. at the exact same time, leo got an assistant coaching and scouting job with a minor league program out in vancouver—a massive break for him, but one that required him to pack his entire life into his beaten-up civic and drive across the continent.

you and grace were being left behind. you were both enrolled at boston college for the fall, staying right there in the city, but the house next door was suddenly going to be empty. the kitchen chairs would be vacant.

the afternoon before will’s official draft day was a chaotic, heartbreaking mess of cardboard and packing tape.

over at your house, the screen door kept banging shut as leo hauled heavy plastic bins down the stairs, his face sweaty and his mood a weird mix of hyperactive excitement and sudden, quiet panic. you and grace were sitting on your front steps, knees pulled up to chests, watching him strap a set of old tires to the roof of his car.

"i can't believe he's actually going," grace whispered, her chin resting on her knees. her eyes were slightly glassy. "it’s just going to be us. in that massive lecture hall. no leo to yell at us about the toast. no will to pick us up from the library."

"i know," you said, your throat so tight it felt like you had swallowed a handful of sand.

you looked across the narrow gravel driveway to the smiths' house. will’s truck was parked there, completely clean, a garment bag containing his official draft suit hanging in the back window.

the truth was, you loved everyone on this block. you loved your dad with his oil-stained shirts; you loved leo, even when he was putting you in headlocks and calling you a caveman; you loved grace like a vital organ. but you loved will in a way that didn't have a name. it wasn't just a teenage crush anymore; it was an architectural foundation. you had spent seven years admiring the quiet, immovable steel of his character, the way he had stepped in front of those ninth-graders when you were just a scared kid who lost her mom. you loved him so much it felt like a physical weight behind your ribs, a constant, low-voltage ache that you had never been allowed to speak out loud because you were his goalie. his balance.

"hey."

the heavy, warm shadow fell over both of you before you even heard him cross the gravel.

will was standing at the bottom of your steps. he was wearing a gray sleeveless training shirt, his broad shoulders gleaming with a faint sweat from his own packing, his hair messy. he didn't look like an nhl star right then; he just looked like smitty from next door.

before either of you could speak, will stepped up the stairs, his massive arms moving on pure instinct. he hoisted his left arm over grace’s shoulder and his right arm over yours, his heavy, solid weight instantly sandwiching you both against his sides. his skin smelled like deodorant, old ice, and the familiar laundry detergent his mom used.

"come on," will muttered, his grip tightening around your shoulder, pulling you so close your ribs pressed against his ribs. "leave leo to look like a lunatic with his roof rack. we're going over to the spot."

he didn't give you a choice, literally steering you both down your steps, through the narrow gravel gap, and up onto the front porch of the smiths' house.

the front porch spot.

it was a specific corner behind the green wooden railing where the floorboards were slightly warped from twenty years of new england winters. for seven years, it had been the designated headquarters. it was where you had hidden when you were crying about your mother; it was where will had sat for five hours after his first major knee injury; it was where the four of you had shared a single sleeve of saltines after a high school game.

leo must have seen the three of you moving, because a second later, he dropped a roll of packing tape and came tramping across the yard, his heavy boots loud against the wood as he joined you.

the four of you crowded onto the old wicker bench that lined the railing. the seating arrangement happened seamlessly, a physical habit honed over a thousand summer nights. grace sat on the far left, her shoulder tucked securely under will’s broad wing. will sat solid in the center-left, his long legs stretched straight out over the warped wood. you were tucked right against his right side, your shoulder flush against his chest, completely bracketed by his warmth. and on the far right, closing the line, was leo, his massive frame anchoring you from the other side.

the silence that settled over the porch was heavy, thick with the gray boston humidity and the terrifying knowledge that tomorrow, the clock would start ticking.

"vancouver is far, man," leo said quietly, leaning his head back against the green siding of the house, his usual loud-mouthed swagger completely gone. he looked down at his boots. "it’s like... a thirty-hour drive. i don't even know if my civic's alternator is gonna make it past buffalo."

"it'll make it," will said, his voice firm, steady. he looked past you to leo, his eyes fierce that absolute loyalty that made him who he was. "and if it doesn't, you call me. i don't care what time it is or what city i'm in. you call me, and i'll get a truck out to you."

leo let out a small, rough laugh, reaching behind your neck to cuff the back of will’s head. "look at you. first-round pick. already talking like you got a corporate card."

"shut up," will muttered, but a faint, bittersweet smile touched his lips.

grace shifted on will's other side, her chin resting on her knees as she looked up. "are you scared? about tomorrow? the cameras? everything?"

will paused, his gaze drifting out toward the harbor line visible between the triple-deckers. his jaw worked for a second. "not about the hockey," he admitted honestly. "i know how to play hockey. it's just... everything else. the hotels. the flights. waking up in a room where i can't hear leo burning the rye next door."

leo let out a soft snort, his arm moving along the back of the wicker bench until his heavy hand dropped onto your shoulder, giving you a gentle, loving squeeze. he looked down at your small face poked out from the giant hood of your champion sweatshirt.

"hey, kid," leo murmured, his voice dropping that annoying older-brother edge, replaced by a rare, quiet tenderness. he bumped his shoulder against yours, a soft nudge. "you gotta promise me you won't lose your mind when there's no one here to eat half your breakfast. and don't go changing into some fancy college girl just because i'm not around to tell you that you look like a JV lineman, alright? i like my little brother-sister just the way she is."

a tear spiked your eye, hot and sudden, and you shoved leo’s knee with your elbow. "i'm not gonna change, leo. i'm staying right here."

"good," leo whispered, his fingers briefly catching the hair at the back of your head, shaking you gently. "because smitty's gonna get famous, and i'm gonna get a tan in canada, but you're the anchor. you keep the porch running."

will turned his head then, his eyes cutting through the small space between you to land directly on your face. you were trapped between the two most important men in your life, trying so hard to look small, trying to hide the fact that your heart was breaking in half.

will reached down. his large, rough hand—the one with the calluses from his hockey stick—dropped onto the crown of your fenway cap. he didn't shake it this time. he just let his palm rest there, the warm, solid weight of it filtering through the canvas brim down into your scalp.

"you gotta look after grace," will said to you, his voice dropping into a low, private tond that completely ignored the other two people on the bench. "she's gonna get lost on that bc campus on day one. you have the better sense of direction."

"i'll look after her," you whispered, your voice trembling slightly. you reached up, your fingers lightly touching the edge of his wrist, right where his team-issued watch sat against his skin. "you just... don't forget how to skate, smitty. those western conference defensemen are bigger than the ones in high school."

"they're not bigger than me," will murmured.

the porch went quiet again, the distant hum of the commercial avenue traffic filling the gap. leo and grace began to murmur to each other on the flanks, leaving you and will trapped in the small, heavy pocket of space in the center of the bench.

will slowly leaned down, his massive frame shifting until his shoulder was completely flush against yours, his face just inches from your cap.

"hey," he said, his voice so quiet it was almost a secret. "look at me."

you turned your head slowly, your chin resting against the thick cotton of your hoodie, your eyes meeting his intense gaze.

"i'm leaving my car keys on the kitchen counter," will murmured, his eyes scanning your face with a strange, heavy gravity. "they’re for you. don't let my dad touch the truck. it’s yours while i'm gone."

"will, i can't take your truck," you whispered, your heart thumping violently against your ribs. "that's... that's your prize possession. you spent three summers working the docks for that engine."

will let out a low, rough breath that hit your cheek like warm air. his fingers reached out, his thumb catching the edge of your jaw, his rough skin grounding you instantly.

"i don't care about the engine," he said, his voice completely steady completely devoid of the usual teasing. "there's nothing in that garage that matters more than what's sitting right here on these boards. we've been in the same room since we were fourteen. i don't know how to go into a locker room where you aren't sitting at the perimeter table afterward."

he paused, his gaze tightening as he looked at the soft, rounded shape of your shoulders under the massive hoodie—the woman you were becoming while he was looking the other way.

"you're my goalie," will whispered, his thumb moving just a fraction of an inch to trace the small freckle near your lip. "you always have been. the center doesn't work if the net is empty. you remember that while i'm out west. we're the balance."

"i won't let anyone else in the net, smitty," you promised, your voice cracking just a little bit as you reached up to press your hand over his wrist, holding him there against your skin for as long as the twilight would allow.

"good," he murmured, his fingers lingering on your jaw for one more agonizing, beautiful second before leo’s heavy arm pulled you back into a side-hug, sealing the memory into the warped green wood of the porch before the morning sun could take them away.

(anon you are the elixir of my writing life i would kiss and kiss and make out with you so bad. THANK U SO MUCH for this request ily anon. credits to the rightful owners of the dividers :p)

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