“This is stupid.” Sugarcoat intoned darkly, her glasses reflecting the colorful antics going on on her smartphone. She flicked her thumb across the screen and crushed another row of candies.
“I thought you liked that game?” Fleur smoothed the hemline of her skirt, eyeballing the absolute territory between it and the top of her long socks. It looked right to her and she turned back to smile at the flashing and clicking phones held by a half dozen other classmates. The impromptu photo session triggered, once again, by her need to recline on the teacher’s desk between classes.
“‘Like’ is a strong word.” Sugarcoat executed a four way combo, setting a new personal best as more candies disintegrated on her screen. “I was referring to this.”
“‘This’?” Fleur ran her fingers through her hair and twisted to look at the clock above her. The flashes got faster, her photographers ‘oohing’ and ‘awing.’
“Yeah. This. All of this.” Sugarcoat looked up, brushing white hair our of her magenta eyes and straightening her glasses. “Here we are, waiting again for the Games to start, and everyone is getting needlessly hyped up. Crystal Prep wins every year, it’s pointless and dumb.”
“You, my friend, have all the school spirit of a dead horse.” Fleur stuck out her tongue playfully and took the opportunity to stand and stretch. “This is free period! We can do as we please for the next ten minutes. I agree with you the hype is unnecessary, but aren’t you moved in the slightest about ensuring our school’s superiority? You were picked for the team! You will look so darling in the outfits!”
Sugarcoat rolled her eyes and started up the next level of her game. She cast a glance at the other students, Fleur’s photo team, as they fanned out around them, snapping images of Fleur and herself. She frowned at the thought of how clogged her MyStable feed was going to be this evening. Sugarcoat looked up at Fleur and stuck out her tongue. “You just wish you got to wear them. Add more followers to your social media net.”
“Admittedly, I have run out of students at Crystal Prep to gain new followers from.” Fleur shrugged and tossed her long hair back over her shoulder. “If I’d been picked, I would be able to start gathering from Canterlot High’s student body faster. But then I’d have to worry about doing math or racing a motorbike. I love Dean Cadance and all, but let’s be realistic, I’d be a poor choice if we want to stomp our rivals into the ground.”
“Because you hate physical activity?”
“No, because I’m too nice to leave them in my dust.” Fleur smirked, leaned down on her palms against Sugarcoat’s desk. “You, on the other hand, are a tough cookie. A sweet as can be one, but a tough cookie that’ll show those Canterlot High students just how amazing we are.”
Sugarcoat stared at Fleur, one edge of her mouth rising enough to not be a frown. “Are you still upset Cinch shot down the beauty contest idea?”
“Yes!”
“It’s a good thing we didn’t go with a beauty contest.” Sugarcoat sighed tiredly, focusing back on her mobile game. She hunched her shoulder, blocking out Fleur when the taller girl leaned forward to look at the action on her phone.
“What do you mean, it’s a good thing?” Fleur leaned down, her elbows on Sugarcoat’s desk, and pushed with her toes to try and worm in where she could see Sugarcoat’s play through. “It would have been a sure win.”
“Right, you’d just lose it to Sunset Shimmer, or that Rarity girl.”
“Rarity?” Fleur sniffed, practically climbing up onto the desk, her backside in the air while a half-dozen phones snapped pictures. “Never heard of her. Sunset, on the other hand, would have at least been a worthy opponent, Sugarcoat. You’re competitive, you understand.”
“I hate completing.”
“I’m sorry,” Fleur sighed, turning her hand around vaguely in circles, “I meant you like winning.”
“Which is why I said this was dumb. Team sports are stupid.” Sugarcoat flicked her thumb in several quick moves, matching like with like on her phone. She paused after a moment and looked up, her frown deeper than ever. “Does anyone else hear singing?”
Fleur lifted her head and turned back and forth. “Hmmm...maybe? Does someone have their radio on?”
Sugarcoat ‘hmphed’, turning back to her game. “Singing is dumb too.”
Fleur stood up, slipping off Sungarcoat’s desk and making her way toward the classroom door. The door was closed, but though the window, Fleur could see a girl in thick rimmed glasses coming down the hall, singing a heartfelt song about moving on with her life. The girl reached their class and her song was approaching a high note, so Fleur grabbed the blinds and pulled it closed. “How rude, singing in the hallway like that! Who does she think she is?”
“That’s Twilight Sparkle.”
Fleur turned back around to Sugarcoat. “Oh now you’re just making up names! First ‘Rarity’, now ‘Twilight.’ Really, Sugarcoat, you shouldn’t tease me so.”
The girl with the white hair ignored the fawning model and swiped her thumb back and forth again and again, crushing more brightly colored candies. “Don’t you ever drop the drama act?”
“Fleur deLis never does anything halfway.”
“We’ll see about that.” Sugarcoat swiped once more and her phone made a series of happy beeps and tones, signifying clearing the level of the game. For once, she smiled, showing an uncharacteristic amount of positive emotion. It was enough to weird out Fleur’s team of photographers, but Fleur herself was unfazed. Sugarcoat held up her phone, turning it the pink haired girl’s way. At the top, it displayed scores from other players of the app that were friends—at least on social media—and flashed her’s at the very top, right above Fleur’s.
“Oh...oh my.”
The silence in the room was deafening as Sugarcoat and Fleur faced off. Finally, Fleur broke the stalemate and nodded to acknowledge the score. “Congratulations are in order I see.”
“And you have to do whatever I say. The bet was whoever could topple your score got to give you one command, and I just took it down.” Sugarcoat smirked.
“Within reason!” Fleur pointed out. “That was a dumb bet. I should have never made it.”
“Now what’s something demeaning I can get you to do?” Sugarcoat tilted her head, thinking for a moment. Whatever it was, it needed to be something Fleur wouldn’t be too happy about it getting captured on digital film. “I want you…” Sugarcoat’s uncharacteristic smile stretched to near seussian proportions, “to kiss me.”
“What?” Fleur blinked, looking back at Sugarcoat as if the girl had sprouted a second, snarkier head.
Sugarcoat wasn’t sure where the thought had come from, a kiss from Fleur didn’t sound like much of a reward. Sure, Fleur might suffer some social fallout from it, and she might be the target of most of Crystal Prep’s jealousy for a while, but now that they were at this point, she wasn’t going to let her just reward escape. She sat back in her chair, smirking up at Fleur’s flawless face. She expected that Fleur would baulk at the request entirely, or just give her a peck on the forehead, or on the cheek.
She wasn’t expecting to get rushed. She wasn’t expecting to feel Fleur’s lips on her own. She wasn’t expecting Fleur to hold her head in one hand while pushing them to the floor. She wasn’t expecting tongue.
But then again, Fleur deLis never did anything halfway.
