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Gina has always had a personal vendetta on the curly-haired boy, vice-versa. No one knew the reason behind their hatred, and if someone asked they’d simply say “it’s complicated.” There are even times where Gina finds herself second-guessing her bitterness towards him, but then she remembers his stupid grin that captures everyone's eyes as he steps into a room and his stupid big brown eyes that she stares into trying to find a reason why girls swoon over him. Oh, and let's not forget his stupid chestnut curls that are always messy, as if he never has looked in a mirror. She could just vomit thinking about him and his stupid features.
~
Gina was sprawled out on her bed one hand in the bowl of popcorn while the other hovered over her laptop's touch pad, skipping to her favorite parts of spider-man far from home. Of course, she was skipping to all Peter and MJ's scenes. She finally reached the scene where MJ runs into Peter's arms when her laptop is suddenly closed shut.
‘Hey!” “I was watching my daily dose of spideychelle!”
“You can watch that later, I have news.” Ashlyn says with a smile spread across her face and, clearly, excitement bubbling inside her.
“Fine, but hurry. This is my favorite part.” Gina sits up, setting her laptop aside, along with the bowl of popcorn.
“Ok so, you know how you already celebrated Christmas with your mom in new york…”
“Yeah, because she’s working on Christmas,” Gina said, nodding along.
“And how EJ’s and my parents are off somewhere on vacation.”
“Still don’t understand why they would leave three teenagers alone.”
“Mysteries of parenthood. Anyways, EJ and I were thinking that we could spend the rest of break at the cabin-”
“Wait, you guys have a cabin?” Gina questions, after two years of knowing the Caswells you’d think she knows about their cabin.
“Yeah, EJ’s parents bought it a few years ago, we haven’t gone in a bit because last time we went, EJ ate shit on the slopes! Funniest day of my life.” Ashlyn couldn’t contain her laughter at the memory of EJ falling face-first into the snow.
“If I get to see EJ fall into the snow, then I'm all in,” Gina says, as she too giggles from the thought of it all.
“Ahh great! Start packing we leave in two days,” Ashlyn cheers, her smile widening.
“Great, now leave.” She utters, opening up her laptop. Ashlyn’s smile falls as her brows furrow.
“Pretty please,” She adds with pleading eyes and a pout.
Ashlyn makes her way out the door, but before stepping out to the hallway, she says “Oh, and some of our friends are coming.”
Gina didn’t think much of it because Ashlyn specifically said, friends. Ricky Bowen was nothing close to being her friend.
~
“God Ash, how much did you pack?” EJ grunts, lifting both Ginas and Ashlyn suitcases and loading them into the trunk.
“Why are you only blaming me? You are carrying Gina’s bags too.” The two start bickering back and forth. Gina smiles at the two arguing because it’s moments like this she wants to store in the back of her mind. So, one day she could go back and reminisce about the good old days. The Caswells rescued her and she always wanted to remember them even the times they would annoy each other.
“I almost forgot!” She gasps, thinking about the laptop she left stranded on her bed. She runs inside, climbs the stairs to eventually find her laptop in the middle of her bed right next to her polaroid camera. Why not, for the memories she thinks of bringing the polaroid camera with her. She hears a car rumble up the driveway, must be the others. She makes her way downstairs carefully this time, knowing she couldn’t afford to drop either item. The door still left open from when she ran through the house, she looked out and made out an orange buggy. Her heart stops. But then picks back up when she sees Nini get out of the car.
“Neens!” Gina picks up her pace, still cautious of the items in her grip. Nini runs up and squeezes gina into her embrace. “Geenie!” Nini squeals back.
After leaving Nini’s embrace, she places the items at her reserved seat that already contained her blanket and pillow. As she is sorting out her things, she hears his laugh, and once again her heart stops, and her blood begins to boil. Gina looks out to see if the laugh belongs to him, and there he is. Wearing that stupid grin of his, and of course he's wearing that beige sweatshirt. Her eyes roll once she spots the mop of curls on his head that are needless to say messy.
“Why is he here?” Gina says, crossing her arms, trying to bring out hbic Gina, who always seems to appear when Ricky is around.
“Don’t think I’m glad to see you either, buttercup.” Ricky mocks her, causing Gina to roll her eyes. Gina’s rage still rises as she gives him a death stare but then eventually moves her eyes onto Ashlyn.
“You said, ‘friends’. He is most definitely not a friend! Not even acquaintances!” Gina tells Ashlyn, who has regret written all over her face.
“Ouch buttercup, you don’t think of me as a friend.” Ricky clutches his chest as if he was wounded, which earns him a nudge from Red.
“I know, I know. I should have told you but, if I did, you wouldn’t come.” Ashlyn admits giving Gina apologetic eyes.
“Your right. I don’t want to go,” she grabs her blanket and marches away until EJ walks in front of her and lifts her off the ground.
“EJ! Put me down!” She declared, but EJ had already made his way to the car, releasing her at her reserved seat. She tries to make an escape by opening the door, but the door won't budge. She looks around and sees that the child lock is on, she huffs blowing a curl out of her face.
“You know Gina, you're way lighter than Ash’s suitcase.” Ashlyn reaches over to the driver's seat and punches him on the arm.
“Sorry we had to do this to you” Ashlyn studies the stern look on Gina’s face.
“Whatever,” Gina scoffs, putting on her airpods and pressing start on far from home.
~
Text messages between everyone in a group chat except Gina and Ricky:
Red: did you guys see the heart eyes
Nini: pretty sure those were death stares but the chemistry is definitely there!!
Ashlyn: yea what nini said^^
Carlos: ok well what are we going to do about the lovebirds??
Kourtney: i was thinking that we should do secret santa and we could rig it so they get each other.
Seb: i like that
Red: alright does everyone agree?
Ashlyn: yep and so does EJ he’s driving so i’ll speak for him.
~
Gina was halfway through the movie when they made a pit stop for gas. Everyone makes their way out of the car like a soccer team. She got out of the car, stretching her limbs and then made her way to the gas station restroom. She can feel his eyes on her as she makes her way through the aisle of chips. She keeps telling herself that she can avoid him the whole trip, but she knows executing that plan will be harder than expected. Gina grabs herself a bag of Hot Cheetos and a cherry slushie, walking down the aisle of chips, counting her money hoping it's enough.
“4 dollars and 35 cents,” the cashier announces. Gina looks frantically to the car where she left the rest of her money.
“Umm, could I possibly go and get-“ She's interrupted by his hand on her shoulder, which sends a shiver down her spine and goosebumps to rise to the surface of her skin.
”Don’t worry I got it.” Ricky hands the cashier a five dollar bill and insists they keep the change. Gina shakes off Ricky’s hand that was still placed on her shoulder, and starts walking off.
“Not even going to say thank you?” Ricky questions, catching up to Gina with a mischievous look in his eyes.
“Thank you,” she mumbles, picks up her pace leaving Ricky behind her.
~
Gina gazed out the window spotting the snowy mountains becoming clear. Eventually they weren’t something that was in the distance now they were up close. Her eyes twinkling from amazement as she stepped out of the car. The sight of the snow was like a blank sheet of paper, it was satisfyingly smooth.
“Have you never seen snow before? We live in Salt Lake, it snows all the time” Ricky interrupts Gina’s thoughts as he shoves past her slightly hitting her shoulder.
“No, I didn't know that Richard. Please enlighten me.” She says, adding one of her infamous eye rolls that Ricky knows so well.
“Can you guys argue inside? It's freezing” Carlos says, standing behind them.
“First come first serve!” EJ screams and in seconds everyone is running into the cabin scramming to find a room.
~
Gina was very pleased with the rooming arrangement seeing as she was rooming with all the girls. Her and Nini in one bed and the two lovebirds, Ashlyn and Kourtney, in one bed. In the room across from them, Ricky and Red slept in separate twin beds. The married couple, Seb and Carlos, had their room. Which left EJ with the master bedroom. Gina wasn’t too thrilled with that but it was his cabin after all.
They were all gathered around the fireplace, warming each other up as the abandoned cabin got used to the company. Gina sat far away from Ricky as possible, she couldn’t handle smelling his minty scent. She scans the room, looking at all her friends, minus Ricky, that she had grown to love, and cherish every moment spent with them. This is a moment I want to remember she thinks to herself. She dashes through the halls and up the wooden stairs, to finally reach her bedroom where she scavenges for her polaroid camera. She makes her way back to her friends and flashes a quick photo. The room is filled with everyone's laughter and is lit up by everyone's smiles. The laughter dies down once EJ calls for attention.
“I’ve gathered you here today to fill you in on the cabin rules.”
“We aren’t children EJ” Nini declares, giggling at how serious EJ was.
“Correction, not all of us are children,” Gina replies, glaring over at Ricky as he mouths i-hate-you . She just smiles like her plan to piss him off was a success.
“Anyways, back to the rules. The main cabin is 5 minutes away in a car, if you don’t get stuck in the snow, and I've never walked there so you figure that time out. Don’t break anything unless you want to see me in a casket. Other than that, just have fun.” He sits back down as the others cheer. Ashlyn nudges EJ and mutters “Secret Santa.”
“Oh yeah, and I forgot we're doing secret Santa. If someone can fetch me my hat.” He looks out in the distance, but his eyes fall back on the group when they start teasing him about sounding like an old man. But, eventually red goes to retrieve the hat filled with scraps of paper. Somehow the group pulls off their scheme to rig the game, so Ricky and Gina get each other. Gina’s eyes land on the name on her scrap of paper and groans. On the other hand Ricky seems to enter a new planet once he reads the name. Gina spends the rest of the day begging to swap with everyone but none of them will cave.
“Neens,” Gina whispers.
“Geenie it’s an ungodly hour why are you still awake?” Nini mumbles half asleep.
“Can we switch?” Gina asks, ignoring Nini’s question.
Nini takes her pillow, and slams Gina with it then returns to her slumber.
“Ouch,” Gina rubs her stomach that has just got the air knocked out of it. Gina couldn’t sleep with her mind pondering through ideas of gifts she could give him. She decides to just get out of bed and make everyone chocolate chip muffins for breakfast. After all, baking always cleared her mind. In the room across the hall, there was another nocturnal being struggling to sleep. Ricky rolled around in his bed until he finally thought of the perfect gift for her.
Why am I even doing this? She hates me and I… he stops his train of thought before it can enter uncharted territory. He opens up his phone to order her gift and then eventually falls asleep but wakes up to the sound of an oven timer.
Gina hears footsteps making their way to her, so she wipes her hands on her apron and starts cleaning up the kitchen.
“Hey,” he calls out with a husky voice that sounds just as if he’s rolled out of bed or gotten hit by a bus. Gina stops cleaning up to face him. He looks ruff, like he hasn’t gotten any sleep. His chestnut curls in their prime state, messy as ever.
“Oh, it’s you.”
“Happy to see me, buttercup.”
“It’s too early to have to talk to you, Richard.”
“You're the one who woke me up” he claps back pointing to the oven.
“Whatever dork, just leave me alone.” Gina returns back to cleaning the kitchen.
“Fine, but you should wipe your cheek.” Ricky suggests with that stupid grin of his. He grabs a muffin then starts walking back to his room.
Gina scoffs then wipes her cheek but she can’t let him have this one. “Fine, but you should take a shower .” Her comeback was weak but it was too early in the morning to think of a good one.
~
The next few days consisted of Gina avoiding all encounters with Ricky as best she could. But there were many times when they both would walk out of their rooms and bump into each other as they made their way to the bathroom. Gina would spend a few hours of each day on youtube watching tutorials on how to knit a hat, she picked up pretty quickly, so after that it was just repetition. She knit and knit until the day finally came, Christmas.
Gina decided to wake up early so she can bake everyone some christmas treats. “Merry christmas,” she hears him call out, husky voice and all.
“Merry Christmas, she says, concentrated on not spilling any flour.
“Here let me help,” he offers, seeing as her hands are covered with cookie batter. He takes the bowl from her hands and starts pouring it. His shoulder lightly brushed her as he shook the bowl to get all the flour out.
“Thanks, I guess.” “Alright I got it from here, don’t want you burning the cookies” She takes the cookies and puts them into the oven. Her hands are still covered with batter as she tries to take off her apron.
“Hey could you make yourself useful and help me take this off?” she asks, turning her back to him. He walks over to her and slowly unties her apron, once again sending shivers down her spine.
“Even if I did burn them, they’d still be better than yours,” he says, smiling at her as her demeanor changed like she was hurt by his words.
“Now, you dork, just got your cookie rights provoked.”
“I was joking,” he chuckles at how offended she got.
“Still not getting a cookie”
“Oh really,” he’s smirking as his eyes fall on the flour bag then move back to her.
“Richard Bowen! Don’t you dare!” she warns him, but he already has his hand in the bag of flour.
“Come here, buttercup!” He shouts, chasing her around as flour is dropping all on the floor. He finally has her close enough, so he extends his hand and throws a handful of flour her way.
“I’m going to kill you!” Gina screams as she starts chasing him with a full face of flour. Ricky drops the bag of flour and starts running around the living room. He makes his way back to the kitchen, where the floor is filled with flour. Gina is still chasing him at full speed, but in moments she feels her sock slide on a pile of flour, her body lunging forward, falling on Ricky. Ricky catches her, wrapping his arms around her waist as she grabs onto his arms. She starts standing up only to be greeted with his big brown eyes and his minty scent filling the air along with the smell of cookies. They are face to face, their noses close to touching. Her breath hitches when his eyes flicker down to her lips. It might just be the heat coming from the oven that was hazing her vision, or she was actually seeing Ricky lean in. He was inches away, this time their noses actually touching as flour from her nose rubs onto his. He could smell the strawberry lip gloss projecting from her lips, filling the space between them. The oven timer goes off, and he releases her as she lets go of his arms.
She lets out the breath she had been holding ever since his arms were wrapped around her waist. She cleared her throat and went over to take out the cookies.
“You are still definitely not getting a cookie,” she says, trying to fill the silence. Ricky stunned by everything just stands there confused with the events.
~
It was secret santa time! They were all scattered around the living room forming a circle. Everyone exchanged their gifts, except Gina and Ricky who were last. All her friends were beaming with excitement as they received their gifts. Gina kept fiddling with the gift bag that contained the knitted hat inside. She wasn’t quite sure why she felt so nervous about giving him the gift. If she had given him the gift before today's morning events, she would just want to get it over with. But now she just wants the world to stop, so she can figure out why she’s having this weird feeling in her stomach. Must have been the cookies, she supposes.
“Alright Ricky, your up.” Red says, the group's excitement now turning into anticipation.
Ricky stands up with everyone's eyes on him, except Gina, who is still stuck in her trance. “So, my secret santa gift is for Gina…” Gina’s head immediately whips up, her eyes meeting a nervous Ricky.
He continues, "So I know how obsessed you are with spider-man far from home. You talk about it ALL the time, seriously it's annoying!” Kourtney shoves him in an attempt to get him to stop being rude.
“Anyways, I got you this and now maybe you’ll shut up.” Ricky places the black dahlia necklace in her palms, his fingers lightly grazing her hand.
Gina is frozen, admiring the necklace in all of its glory. The room went silent making heat rise to Ricky's cheeks
“Thank you,” Gina whispers loudly enough for him to hear. Her face conveying pure shock and amazement, that Ricky had put thought into the gift. Gina takes a moment to regain her composer and then finally stands up, still fidgeting with the gift bag.
“My secret santa gift is for Ricky. Umm, I made you this hat.” Gina hands Ricky the bag. “So you don’t get hypothermia, dork,” Gina felt as if she had to add that dork in there. You know to keep everything balanced.
“Thanks,” he says, taking the hat and running his fingers through the tight knitted yarn.
Everyone vanishes throughout the cabin leaving the two in the living room. The space is filled by their silence until Gina finally speaks.
“Can you put the necklace on me?” She asks.
“Yeah, sure,” He walks over to her, grabbing the necklace. His palms sweating and his hands shaking. Gina clutches all her curls and holds them up. Her heart pounds against her rib cage as he puts the necklace around her neck. Her cheeks heating up when she feels his breath on her neck. The weird feeling in her stomach is going insane. He steps away with big splats of blush on both cheeks.
He goes and gets the knitted hat and slips it on over his chestnut curls. “How do I look?”
“Oh, that’s too big. And all those youtube videos I watched to make that were useless” “Maybe you just have a small head, it makes sense. There isn’t much brain cells in that head anyways”
“One, I’ll grow into it. Second, youtube videos, really? Third, RUDE!”
~
Gina’s weird feeling in the pit of her stomach terrified her. She would only feel it when she thought about him, looked at him, or smelled mint (reminding her of him). So she tried to keep her distance, but when she tried to all her friends would always run off, leaving them alone. But on this particular day, their friend's actions were very suspicious. First off, they made Gina snowboard, which everyone knows she never wanted to. Then, they make her get on a ski lift with red and Ricky. Of course, she made red sit in the middle because in her words “she’d rather climb up the mountain than sit next to icky ” But as they started to move red slips away, leaving the two in the ski lift.
“Red you better come back right now!” Gina shouts.
“I’m so getting him back.” Ricky scoffs, “Oh, cheer up buttercup. I’m not that bad.”
“Yes you are,” she whines, seeing red becoming a blob in the distance.
They sat in the silence for a few moments, the icy air hitting the parts of their faces that were exposed.
“Why have you been avoiding me, Porter?” "I know you usually do, but lately, you’ve been extra distant. We used to have combos, or at least we said two words to each other.” “I kind of miss our morning encounters,” Ricky confesses.
Panic rises inside gina, taking over her face. I can’t like him, I can’t like him, I can’t like him, she repeats to herself.
“You have just been extra obnoxious,” Gina says, staring out at the wilderness, making sure she doesn’t make eye contact.
He scoffs “Right.”
Ricky’s thoughts of him and Gina are thrown out the window. Whatever, he felt it must have been fake, because clearly gina didn’t feel the same way. right?
The ski lift stops signaling for them to get off and separate ways. Gina stares out into the blank white scenery, terrified of moving. She finally gains the courage to make her move, and in the blink of an eye, she’s moving rapidly down the mountain. She’s screaming for help, but everyone is in their own world, not paying attention to the girl crying for help.
“Watch out!” she hears someone call from behind her, but she has no control. She then suddenly feels a weight pushing her down into the satisfyingly smooth snow, face first. She rolls on her back, not being able to breathe as the wind just got knocked out of her. She lays there until she sees his big brown eyes making their way to her.
“Oh my god, Gina!” he yells, making sure she’s alive. Once he’s positive she’s alive, a smile spreads across his face. His laugh fills gina's ear after the ringing stops.
“That was the highlight of my day!” He’s still laughing as Gina is still having a hard time breathing. She starts coughing nonstop, and that's when Ricky's smile is replaced with a concerned expression. His instincts start to kick in, he scoops Gina up, carrying her down the mountain. He sets her down on this wooden bench at the bottom of the mountain. She starts shivering, and her lip starts to tremble. Ricky’s concerns grow seeing her start to lose color and the life leaving her eyes.
“Stay here,” he warns her, making his way to the main cabin. Gina does as he said not because she wants to but because she physically can’t move. A few minutes later, she sees him in the distance holding something in his hands.
“Here, drink this.” He offers. He hands her a cup of hot chocolate in an attempt to warm her up.
The steam from the hot chocolate evaporating in the brisk cold air. Gina was stunned that he would even help her up. She’s been a bitch to him, why would he make a ten-minute trip to get her a hot chocolate?
Gina wouldn’t stop trembling, so Ricky took off his jacket and wrapped it around her freezing body. Gina brings her head up to come face to face with the curly-haired boy. Her eyes displaying sincerity and admiration.
“Thank you,” she says just barely a whisper. He nods.
“And I'm sorry,” Gina moved her focus down to the cup of hot chocolate.
“For what?” he asks, confused on what she had to apologize for.
“For everything. For always being a bitch to you, avoiding you…” She says now fidgeting with the lid of the hot chocolate.
“It’s fine,” he shrugs. “I’m sorry too. I’ve been a dick before.”
“Yeah, I know.” Gina jokingly says as Ricky lightly shoves her.
“Why don’t we make a treaty?” “We both agree that war is over, and we can be civil.”
“Yeah, I’d like that.” Gina smiles sheepishly.
Ricky offers her his hand to shake, she shakes it, accidentally holding onto his hand for a little too long. In her defense, she was staring into his stupid big brown eyes, finally understanding why girls would swoon for him.
~
As the days went on, Gina stopped avoiding Ricky and started to really get to know him. Their morning encounters started to become a daily routine for the two. The weird feeling in Gina’s stomach grew every day. The trip was coming to an end as the day was New year's eve. The girl's room was in complete disaster as all the girls got ready for the night.
“Does this look fine?” Gina asks them, looking at herself in the mirror, still not sure it was the perfect fit.
“You look amazing!” Kourtney reassures her. “Now come here and let me finish your makeup.”
She made her way down the stairs, the strange feeling growing once she heard his laugh bouncing off the walls.
She takes her last step to reach the bottom. She lifts her head to see an astonished Ricky Bowen with his eyes twinkling. His jaw-dropping from the beauty standing in front of him. Everyone in the room dispersed, leaving the two alone.
He clears his throat. “Gina, you look beautiful”
“Thanks, you don’t look so bad yourself.” She says, smiling sheepishly, her blush peeking through her makeup.
They stand there in the comfortable silence as if their eyes are speaking for them. Throughout the night, they both would steal glances of each other, sometimes the other catching them.
A few minutes before the ball dropped, Gina decided to get fresh air, so she walked out to the cabin's balcony. Her hands resting on the wooden railing, the cold breeze moving her curls away from her face.
“All alone buttercup?” she hears him ask, a smile creeping onto her lips.
“Can we add to the treaty?”
“Depends, what would you like to add?”
“You can’t call me that stupid nickname.” She declares, moving her focus from the stars to him, who was now standing next to her. His body emitting heat, keeping Gina from freezing.
“No can do porter,” he says, then adding “sorry I meant buttercup.” And of course, he winks, making gina’s blush reappear.
“I like Porter better. Just call me porter.”
“Hmm ok but only if you stop calling me a dork.”
She ponders for a moment glaring back at the stars but eventually she moves her focus back to him.
“Tempting, but the deal is off. I will call you a dork for as long as I live.”
“So, what I’m hearing is you want me in my life for as long as you live,” he states, his stupid grin spreading across his face.
“When did I say ‘want’?”
“Ouch.” he clutches his chest making her giggle.
“You just have a way of staying in my life Bowen, even when I don't want you to.”
“Well do you want me to?” he asks, her genuinely wondering if she wanted him in her life.
“Now, yes.” “Couldn’t imagine my life without you.” she nudges him.
“Good, I’m glad to hear that,” he smiles at her. “Couldn't imagine my life without you either.” Silence falls between them as they both get lost, gazing into each other's brown eyes.
“So, any new year's resolutions?” he breaks the silence but still keeps his eyes on hers.
“Uhh new year new me baby!” she says jokingly, making him laugh, throwing his head back. “Ok seriously, probably just leave it up to fate.”
“Fate…”
“What about you?”
“I want to experience new things.” His hand itching for hers, his eyes only wishing to see her, and his lips only wanting to kiss her. “You know I’ve never had a new years kiss.”
He leans in closing the space between them until their noses touch. Placing a hand on her warm cheek.
“Wow, that was not smooth at all, dork.” She says, biting her lip to stop a giggle from escaping.
“Hey cut me some slack here. Remember there aren't many brain cells up here.” He moves his hand from her cheek to point to his head. Gina misses his touch and having him inches away from her.
Ricky goes on rambling about other scenarios he was thinking of but Gina wasn’t registering anything he was saying. She was to caught up gazing at his stupid grin, his stupid big brown eyes, and his stupid chestnut curls. As she is snapping out of her trance, she hears her friends start to count down from ten.
Ten…
Nine…
Eight…
Seven…
Six…
Five...
“Ricky bowen, just kiss me already!” She blurts out, ending his ramble.
Four..
Three...
“Wh- wha-,” he’s taken aback from the words she just said, wondering if they were real or just a dream.
Two…
Gina places her hand around his neck and moves her lips onto his. Ricky is once again taken aback but quickly recovers, placing his hand on her cheek.
One…
“Happy new years.” he whispers, filling the small space between them
“Happy new years.”
He captures her lips with his once more, missing how they felt. After a few more kisses, Gina takes a step back breathless but feeling more alive than ever. She stays there for a moment admiring his stupid grin that gives her butterflies, his stupid big brown eyes that she finds herself getting lost in. Oh, and let's not forget his stupid messy, chestnut curls that she wants to run her hands through every chance she gets
As she stood there admiring all his stupid features she realizes that they aren’t what she hates about him they are what she loves about him…
gina porter loves ricky bowen, vice-versa.