Chapter Text
Gina released a loaded sigh as she ran her fingers over Nini’s Cottilion dress— it was four in the morning and Nini was fast asleep, after a long day of interviews. Gina’s mind, however, had been endlessly racing. So much so that she couldn’t bring herself to rest. The only thing she could do to keep her mind from being busy was to keep her agile fingers even busier.
She was safe, and she knew that— she was in Auradon now, where her mother could never reach her again, and with her three best friends, Nini, Carlos, and Jet. She was good— they were good! Not because someone had forced them, but because this was the life they had now chosen for themselves and it felt great to be able to choose.
She had a wonderful life here so far— she had a boyfriend who actually cared about who she was underneath the pretty face and bad girl persona for once.
Jack was by no means the son of a prince, (actually quite the opposite) but still, he was as sweet as they came, and he treated her like a princess. All the people at school started to be nicer, and even more than that, the country that had hesitantly opened its gates started to accept her and her friends once they proved their goodness.
Somehow she still felt bothered. By a myriad of things.
She didn’t miss her old life— definitely not— it wasn’t that, even though she did feel terribly for the other innocent villain kids driven to lives of poverty and crime because of their circumstances. She certainly didn’t miss her that her mother was superficial and made her believe her looks were all that mattered— she still was affected by that every time she looked in the mirror and noticed a scar or the formation of acne, pretty much anything that indicated “imperfection”.
Her mother’s words still had so much effect on her. She heard them in her ears every time she looked at Ricky— the way her heart churned in his presence— the way her mouth went dry whenever she looked at him too long— it had her mother inked all over.
It was exactly the same feeling she had gotten the moment she first saw him. Back when her mind had still been power and position driven. She remembered his words as clear as day—
“Pleasure to meet you all, I’m Ricky.”
“Prince Richard! Soon to be king!” The screeching voice of his ex-girlfriend, Lily, chirped and Ricky smiled awkwardly.
“You had me at Prince,” Gina whispered. “My mom’s a queen, so… That makes me a princess.” She smiled at him, hoping to win him over with that— she cringed thinking about it now.
She cringed thinking about how badly she wanted to please her mother. How she thought Ricky of all people would be impressed with titles and how she only saw him as a prize to win, something to satiate Terri (which was the Evil Queen’s real name if anyone was taking notes) long enough that she’d take her eyes off Gina so she could breathe .
Even if it was a polite smile, he smiled back, and that made her heart leap. She had curtseyed at once— her mother had taught her all about royalty and customs that were suitable for exchanges with them. Her head was still tipped as she continued, “It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Prince Ricky.”
“The Evil Queen actually has no royal status here. And neither do you.” Lily replied, still smiling from ear to ear, and Ricky only frowned as Gina did, backing up a little closer to her friends. Anything to feel a small semblance of stability. She had thought the people of Auradon were known for being nice. She guessed there were mean people everywhere. Not just back home.
As Fairy Godmother continued introductions and left, dismissing the band, Gina was taken with Ricky, or rather, taken with the crown he represented. He, however, seemed taken with someone else.
She saw the way they looked at each other. Nini and Ricky. The way she laughed at his joke about his over-the-topness. She was always good at telling when two people liked each other, no matter how much Nini denied her attraction to him when they were alone in their new bedroom without the boys.
She had wished Nini was telling the truth when she said she felt nothing for Ricky but she knew her best friend, and she also knew when she was lying. The last time she had seen her like this was when she had briefly liked the son of Captain Hook back home— a nobody really, just Harry Hook, a flirt from the docks, but Nini worked hard to hide her blush against her cream skin whenever they argued (just a fancy, more villainy word for flirting).
Gina tried to ignore the drop in her mood and pursued another prince— Prince EJ, son of Cinderella— if she couldn’t have Ricky she could at least make her mother happy, right?
And when Nini gave Ricky the love potion that Gina helped make and she felt those dreaded feelings well up in her again she pursued EJ even harder, which ended up not working out at all.
EJ was a raging asshole despite his sweetheart of a mother and Gina was slowly learning that even heroes could produce villains. That was when she saw Jack— or rather, Jack saw her— the sweet son of one of her mother’s sworn enemies.
Jack believed in her, even when no other hero (other than Ricky) seemed to. Focusing on Jack numbed the clench in her heart— more Jack, less Ricky— she liked that the dwarf’s son distracted her. Significantly more Jack, significantly less Ricky— and vis versa if she let it happen, which she never did— her equation had worked wonders. Until recently.
She found herself understanding things about Ricky that Nini just struggled to get— she understood his passion for politics, why he had to be in the limelight, why everyone wanted to know what was going on with Nini as his girlfriend— if all went well she was going to be these people’s queen for crying out loud, she had to make a good impression.
It was all too overwhelming for Nini who just wanted to withdraw, write songs, and hang out with her friends that reminded her of simpler times back at home— she didn’t want to be in the limelight or be interviewed by Aladdin and Jasmine about stocks and trading negotiations, peace treaties and plans for the future. Nini was still using her damn evil spellbook to please Ricky for God’s sake.
Gina often found herself uniquely frustrated with her best friend because she always felt like she had the perfect answers to the questions that Nini stumbled over. Sometimes Nini couldn’t even answer properly what she liked most about Ricky. Gina had that answer perfectly—
She liked how kind his eyes were. Even since the day they met. He didn’t know her at all, she could’ve been a murderer back in The Isle for all he knew, but he smiled at her. His eyes smiled. It was like her past didn’t even matter to him because she never had a real chance to be good until now, and she liked being good. She liked Ricky.
But now that Gina knew that the feelings could be quelled, she knew for certain she only felt these feelings about Ricky as sickly residue from her mother’s constant idolization of royalty. It was a part of her now. A part of her that she’d have to deny, and continue to deny until it went away completely.
Deny, deny, deny. She repeated in her head as she threaded the needle— Ricky’s stupid smile. Deny. Ricky’s curly hair that looked so soft to the touch and fluffy. Deny. Ricky’s sweet singing voice and warm welcoming brown eyes. Deny, deny, deny, deny, deny, de—
“Ow!” She yelped as her finger was pricked red, fresh with blood from the needle that she accidentally stabbed into herself, immediately she stuck her finger into her mouth to calm the pain and stop the bleeding, and when she took it out she mumbled, “Maybe now I’ll finally be able to fall asleep like Lily’s mom.” She stretched in her seat, and then a deep yawn overtook her.
“What about Lily’s mom?” Nini murmured, stretching and then turning in Gina’s direction rubbing her eyes.
“I pricked my finger on a needle, so I was saying that maybe I’ll finally be able to get to sleep like Lily’s mom did.” Gina turned around in her chair to face Nini, scooping up her layers of dark blue curls and tucking them into a bun on the top of her head.
Nini chuckled. “Don’t let Fairy Godmother hear that joke, or worse yet,” Nini gasped, and then leaned forward, sitting up slightly in her bed, “Princess Lily— Oh no!” She groaned and threw herself backward with a hand on her forehead, which caused Gina to giggle.
“Yeah, like Lily can hear me from her lofty palace.” She mumbled, turning back to her work, casting her little light down directly on it again.
“Do you think she’s ever gonna come back?”
“To Auradon Prep?”
“Mhm.”
Nini sounded worried. As much as she didn’t like Lily, she didn’t want to be the reason someone left the school— they were already literally seen as the bad guys, and they didn’t need that added to. As her best friend, it was Gina’s job to calm her nerves.
“Of course. Lily has a sick need to be a Queen bee. She can’t do that at homeschooling. There's no peasants to have power over.”
Nini let out a burst of laughter. “You’re probably right.”
“I’m definitely right.” She looked back briefly at Nini to say with a smirk.
There was a beat of silence as Gina got back to her work before Nini asked, “How’s the dress coming along?”
“It’s coming along well, thanks for asking.” Gina smiled.
“Great… Just great… ” Maleficent's daughter sighed, running her fingers restlessly through her purple hair, hair that only had small peekaboo pieces of lingering brown in the back.
Gina knew she wanted to say something else— something was prodding at her, but Gina also wouldn’t force it out of her— she’d let her say it in her own time. She just turned back to look at her with one eyebrow quirked upward as if to ask, “What’s up?” as a small nudge.
“Just… hate blue and gold. That’s all.” Gina gave her a hurt look— blue was her signature color. “On me.” Nini rushed to defend herself when she realized her mistake. “Blue looks much better on you than me.”
Gina smiled content with her friend’s save. “I don’t know. I think blue looks good on you.” She shrugged and returned to her work.
Eventually, Nini drifted off back to sleep, and thoughts of Ricky bombarded Gina again— she wondered if he was up too… Even if he was, he was all the way in the palace. There was no chance of her being able to see him now, and even if she did it might look weird.
It wasn’t like she was his girlfriend or anything. She was only a friend.
A friend of the King who needed an early morning sweet snack— maybe she could bake something!
She had been getting pretty good at that— she had always seen all the treats growing up but could never really attempt making them without all the proper ingredients back on the Isle. Here they had everything in the kitchen, and there was access for all Auradon Prep students.
Before she knew it she was up on her feet and down to the kitchen about to make herself a batch of maybe brownies, or some cookies… Maybe a small cake? That could be too much, but she knew Jet and Carlos would eat anything she had left over for sure.
When she got downstairs and turned on the lights the first thing she did was start flipping through the cookbook to look for something that seemed good enough to bake. “Maybe some brownies… I think I’m in the mood for chocolate…” She bit her lip as she flipped through the wide catalog.
“Honestly I could go for something chocolatey too.” As she heard the voice behind her she jumped, almost knocking over the flour she had taken out and sending the whole room into a powdery mess as she yelped.
“Shit, Ricky!” She quickly covered her mouth. “Sorry…” She grimaced, closing her eyes tight. “I know you’re not allowed to use that sort of language in Auradon—”
“Don’t worry Gina. I… I slip up a considerable amount too. Probably more than you do.” He laughed, as he walked around the table in front of her.
Then she laughed. “I didn’t even know you knew words like that.”
“Why? Because I’m a royal?”
“No, because they censor anything remotely close to a swear word here. I’m pretty sure I heard Fairy Godmother reprimand someone for using the word heck the other day.”
“Well, Jenn has always been so uptight, that no one can help—”
“... Fairy Godmother’s real name is Jenn?!”
“...Yeah… Well technically Jennifer, but don’t tell anyone I told you.”
“I’m sure Nini has already told the boys—”
“Nope, not even Nini knows that one.” He chuckled, and their eyes met from across the table.
She didn’t shy away from it— “Well then I guess it’s our little secret then, hm?” She whispered.
He gulped. “Yeah… Our little secret.” He chuckled nervously, and Gina immediately felt guilty, as if the secret was that she had kissed Nini’s boyfriend when really all that occurred was that he told her someone’s real name.
So why did it feel like they had committed high treason?
“So um… No offense, I know this like, your kingdom and everything but like… Why are you here? In the school kitchen? Don’t you have like six back at the palace?”
He laughed. “Yeah, but this is the original one. I just like to come down here sometimes. To feel connected to my parents' story. That’s probably stupid…”
She quirked her brow. “What do you mean original one?”
“I mean like… This is the kitchen… Like with all the talking silverware?”
“This is the kitchen that Mrs. Potts ran?! Like… Lumiere and Cogsworth and Chip?! That kitchen?!”
Ricky snickered. “Yes, that kitchen. My father’s old palace was transformed into the school— There were a lot of… bad memories there for him so he wanted to make good memories. They added more floors, renovated, added more buildings, a sports field, and viola! Auradon Prep!”
“... I never knew that… That’s really cool…” She mumbled. “And it’s not stupid for the record. Wanting to be connected to your parents somehow even though you weren’t there. I get it.”
He looked up. “You do?”
“Yeah. I feel the same way about my Mom..." And my Dad... She thought but didn't say. "I didn’t really… understand her hatred for Snow White? At least not the way she did, so I used to ask her to tell me their story so I could hate her the same way... Then when I came here I watched it a bunch on her mini magic mirror... Before I turned it in, of course.”
When she looked up she realized she said too much, Ricky had this look on his face, but then he just said, “I get that.”
“No way,” she chuckled, “There’s no way you get hatred, Ricky.”
“Maybe not hatred.” He shrugged, “But I never quite understood my Dad’s beastly ways either. The way he treated my mom at first— I didn’t get it, and I was all self-righteous about it, but then… I saw some of those same qualities myself… Sometimes it’s just… hard to do the right thing. To want the right thing, you know?”
When they locked eyes she gulped. “Yeah. I get that. A lot. Especially as a villain kid.”
“It’s hard for ‘heroes’ to do the right thing too.” He whispered, and there were invisible air quotes around the word heroes that she saw all too clearly, and they were making eye contact for a length of time that honestly felt illegal, but she couldn’t tear her eyes away. Then he followed it up with, “But yes… This is that kitchen… You’ll probably learn more about the architecture in Auradon this semester. Now that you’re out of Goodness 101.”
“Oh really? That’s cool. I thought maybe they’d just put it into like… Goodness 2 now or something…” She joked.
“No. Those days are over. You guys proved yourself. No more goodness class.” He said sternly, and she knew he meant it.
“Thanks, Ricky.” She didn’t know what exactly she was thanking him for but she knew it was for good reason.
It seemed like he understood. “You’re welcome.” He replied. “So… What are we baking? Brownies, right?” He peered his eyes over into the book.
“We?” She laughed, looking at his head of curls that she had been thinking about earlier.
“Sorry, did you want me to leave? I can totally leave if—”
“No, I just didn’t think you’d want to stay. That’s all.”
“I do.”
“Well okay, help me get some ingredients then!”
“I do have to warn you, I’m not the best at baking.”
“Eh, we’ll figure it out together, right? I’ve been getting pretty good at it.”
“Well, then you take the lead. I’m at your will, chef!” He stood at mock attention, which made her laugh.
“Okay, let’s get started then!”