AUTHOR'S NOTES: So, this little story was born not simply because I had an idea or anything, but actually because I wanted to practice my writing skills and try something a little bit different, a little bit fun. So due to that, this story isn't going to amazing or anything, and there's probably going to be a ton of mistakes, but I've put it up because I thought someone might like to read it, perhaps give me some critique on my writing. Anyhow, here we are, and I hope you do enjoy!

(don't tell me that i'm wrong)

1.

This it how it starts; with a crowded bus, annoying primary school kids and an empty seat next to a princess-curled girl with a yellow school bag.

"Can I sit here?" he asks shyly. Eight year old Leopold Fitz hasn't quite learned how to feel comfortable in his actions yet.

Princess-Curls smiles and shifts her bag aside. "I like your dog," she says unexpectedly. "She always sneaks into my back garden. Mum says I shouldn't feed other people's pets, but I gave her some of Alice's food the other day. Is that okay?"

He blinks at her, sliding into the empty spot. "Who's Alice?"

2.

Alice is her cat, Fitz finds out approximately one and a half weeks later, when Jemma invites him over to her house with a big smile. Her house is huge (to tiny eight year old Fitz it is, anyway), with pretty furniture and lots of space. Her room is homely and pink, just as expected of a little girl, but her shelves are stocked with books and she nudges a plastic microscope under the bed when she thinks he's not looking.

Her dad keeps quoting books and telling stories at the dinner table, her mum asks him polite questions and offers him food with a smile, and her older brother tries to teach them both soccer after they've finished their homework.

(It's safe to say he fails miserably at it, but Jemma looks incredibly pleased with herself when she manages to outwit Lance and score a goal.)

"Your house is so cool," he tells her earnestly, when they've finished dinner and he's joined everyone for Family Game Night.

"I bet your house is just as cool," Jemma returns brightly, offering him a grin and then sticking her tongue out at Lance as her token passes his on the board.

Fitz isn't so sure.

3.

He's hesitant, but he's already been to Jemma's house six times now and he concludes that he probably doesn't really have a choice in the matter.

Sonja greets them at the front gate with delighted barks and a furiously wagging tail. She's always taken a liking to Jemma, but the dog is just a good judge of character like that.

His house isn't as pretty as Jemma's, and he doesn't have a huge family or a sibling to teach them soccer, but his nan cooks up a storm and tells them all about life in the olden days, and when his mum gets home from work she brings home sweets and a movie rented from the shop, and they all curl up on the couch with popcorn and jelly beans to giggle and point out funny things in the movie.

"I think your house is way cooler," Jemma whispers to him when it's gone dark outside and their mums are chatting in the doorway, with Lance waving from the car and Sonja barking crazily from the safety of her kennel.

4.

It's his birthday, and he could invite Tommy from next door or Alex the mechanic's son or his cousins Elijah and Elise, but when his mum asks him who he wants to invite over, all he can think about is princess curls and a microscope stashed underneath a bed.

Jemma accepts immediately, and on the day in question she turns up at his doorstep with a wide smile and a sparkly wrapped present in her hands. "Happy birthday, Fitz!"

The ride to the zoo is about one hour, but the time seems to pass in no time at all when he's laughing at something Jemma's said and messing around with the box of legos she's gotten him for his birthday.

Fitz soon finds out she's very thorough in her expeditions, wasting no time in dragging him around the enclosures and tugging on his sleeve insistently whenever he lingers for too long at an exhibit.

"Fitz, we can't spend a minute longer here if we want to have equal time looking at every animal in the zoo," she preaches obnoxiously every single time.

"I don't want to spend equal time at every exhibit," he'll retort back just as obnoxiously. "I just want to see the monkeys!"

She'll roll her eyes and sigh at him in the way that only eight year old children can pull off, but she allows him a minute longer and he finds himself tagging after her anyway.

It's only when they actually reach the monkeys' exhibit that he refuses to budge, staring open-mouthed at the creatures and placing his hand up on the glass.

"If I could be like Harry Potter and break the glass," he tells Jemma all too seriously, "I would."

Jemma grins at him, before she grabs a brochure from a smiling caretaker and starts spouting off pointless facts about chimpanzees and orangutans. Eventually it's his nan who finally drags them away with promises of ice cream and lunch.

They sit under one of those sun umbrellas with fizzy drinks and hot chips, squinting against the sun and chatting animatedly about the animals. Nan is lactose intolerant so they don't get a cake, but the waitress is friendly and soon Fitz and Jemma both have an ice cream in their hands, licking the treat from their fingers long after they've left the café to browse the gift shop instead.

His nan buys him a stuffed monkey and then they're on the way home, leaving crumbs in the car as they eat pizza for dinner and play iSpy and stupid travelling games.

It's only when they're dropping Jemma off at her house that she throws her arms around him in a hug. "Happy birthday, Fitz. Today was loads of fun."

His eyes droop on the way home, and his mum has to carry a sleeping Leopold Fitz to bed. "Happy ninth, birthday boy," she whispers. She turns off the light.

5.

By the time Jemma's birthday rolls around, he already knows everything about it. When exactly she'll be ticking over from eight to nine whole years of age, Fitz! and what her parents are getting her for her birthday and what horrible prank Lance is going to play in the morning to wake up the birthday girl, as is apparently customary every year.

So, he's kind of surprised at how shy she is when she approaches him before class one morning with a smile. "You're my friend, right Fitz?" she asks earnestly. At his confused confirmation, she beams and reveals a pale robin-egg blue card from behind her back, handing it to him with an expectant look.

The bell rings before he can open it, but when he gets home he's immediately excited by the scrawling slope of Jemma Simmons' hand writing.

He turns up at her house at ten o'clock one morning, only to find Jemma already waiting for him with a squeak. "I'm officially nine now!" she announces, much to his bewilderment.

They don't go anywhere special for Jemma's birthday, but there's a present or two in the corner of the living room and Lance is home with his own friends - a laid back guy who Fitz soon learns is Idaho, and a determined looking girl by the name of Izzy.

"Happy birthday," he tells her, glancing warily at the older kids who lounge in the living room, snacking on chips and messing around with a gaming console.

"Don't worry about them," Jemma says easily, offering him a grin as she races off. "I'll see what my mum's making in the kitchen!"

By the time she comes back with a platter of cookies, Fitz is thrashing Izzy and Idaho in their best game, much to the excited shouts from her old brother. Lance leans back to steal a cookie from his sister with a sly smirk.

"He's pretty cool, princess."

"I know," she declares smugly. "Didn't I tell you?"

Fitz smothers a crooked smile with the success of another game.

They play silly party games like pass the parcel and pin the tail on the donkey and musical chairs - all of which nobody really wins due to Lance insisting each game is rigged by his mischievous little sister. They snack on chips and after lunch Fitz and Jemma both try their hand at baking actual cookies (spoiler alert; neither of them are cut out to be bakers).

Later, when the day is drawing to a close, they all settle down to watch Jemma's favourite movie, Alice In Wonderland, with burnt cookies and full hearts.

"Happy birthday?" he whispers to her when the movie is paused for a dessert break.

"The happiest," she confirms with a wide grin.

6.

This is how it is at twelve years old, all awkward limbs and slowly fading innocence. There's whispers of crushes and 'dating', which basically consists of holding hands and hugging and hanging out together at interval.

He doesn't quite get it when Grant Ward waves at Jemma and her new friend Skye from across the room and they both burst into girlish giggles, or when they both stop talking immediately when Fitz enters a room, or the fact that Skye seems to be replacing him by the way that she's always at Jemma's house for sleepovers instead of him.

Even though he never voices anything to her, Jemma seems to pick up on it anyway, dropping herself next to him one sunny lunch time and offering him a bright grin. It takes him a while, but eventually he looks at her from over his lunch with a hesitant smile.

"You're my best friend, you know that, yeah?" he asks her, trying to act casual.

To his surprise, Jemma laughs and shoves his arm gently. "And you're my best friend too, silly!"

"It's just, you've been spending loads of time with Skye," he confesses, his ear-tips turning pink with the embarrassment of admitting his concerns to her.

"That's because she's a girl," Jemma says like it's the most obvious thing in the world. "You're my best friend, you know that, but you're a boy."

"Hey! What's that supposed to mean?" He frowns obstinately at her. "You can tell me anything you want!"

Jemma leans over to him with a grin to nudge him in the shoulder. "Did you hear that apparently Luke has a crush on Raina?"

He wrinkles his nose. "On second thought..."

She grins triumphantly.

"Don't you dare s-"

"I told you so."

7.

Twelve years old is also the year when Jemma's brother gets a girlfriend. She turns up at school one morning with shining eyes and admiration in her voice.

"Lance has a girlfriend," she sing-songs, and immediately Skye's pestering her with questions. Fitz sidles out of the conversation to join Grant Ward and Antoine Triplett, who it turns out are actually pretty cool, even if Jemma and Skye can't hold a conversation with them without blushing.

"Girl stuff?" Trip questions knowingly, cracking a grin as Fitz approaches.

"Girl stuff," he confirms.

Jemma gushes about Lance's new girlfriend the entire walk home, and he pretends to be annoyed with her but secretly her enthusiasm is contagious and he has to keep reminding himself not to laugh at her excitement.

"She's going to start teaching me how to swim," she tells him with a grin, running her fingers along the panels of someone's bench as they walk past.

"You don't know how to swim?" Fitz asks, jerking his head up in surprise, his hands loosening slightly from his bag straps.

"Well.. not properly," she admits. "I spend most of my time reading and doing homework, remember?" She nudges him. He remembers all too well - he's normally right there with her. "Anyway, Bobbi is going to teach me how to swim properly. Me and Skye are going to meet her down at the pools on Saturday. You can come too, if you want?"

Fitz pictures himself, standing awkwardly by the pool in his swimming shorts while Jemma, Skye and Lance's mystery girlfriend all giggle about 'girl stuff'. "Nah," he says finally, giving his shoulders a shrug. "You should just go."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah," he says a little bit too casually, offering her a crooked smile. "Mum wants me to help out around the house anyway."

Jemma looks reluctant, but she slings an arm around his shoulder anyway. "Okay, if you say so. You can always come down if you want, right? I - oh look, there's Bobbi!"

8.

Thirteen years old is full of worry for Leopold Fitz. What college should he pick? What if Jemma goes to a different school? What if he doesn't make any friends at college? He's never been good at interacting with others before.

Still, he rejoices in the feeling of being a year older and throwing it in Jemma's face with a smug grin until it strikes upon her birthday and he finds a robin-egg blue envelope in his school bag when he gets home, exactly the same as it is every year, with her neat hand writing and an invitation inside.

He turns up at her house like normal, but this year it's different, because instead of him and Jemma and her family curling up to watch Alice In Wonderland, there's unfamiliar shoes at the front door and a purple bag in the hallway.

"Hey Fitz." Skye waves from around the corner, and he tries not to feel too disappointed as Jemma approaches him with a huge smile. It's always just been him and Jemma really, but as it turns out it's not so bad. They team up against Lance and win a game of soccer, and Jemma opens her presents and throws her arms around him when she sees it's the book she's been wanting for ages, and Fitz and Skye even team up to rig the game of Monopoly for Jemma when she gets up to go to the bathroom.

"I swear I have more money now then before," Jemma frowns when she returns, flipping through the paper with a confused expression.

"That's because your friends rigged the game for you!" Lance complains, his feet kicked up on the couch and an arm around Bobbi's shoulders. "C'mon Bobs, back me up. We're not losing to my baby sister."

"I'm not your baby sister," Jemma says with a laugh, plucking up her little metal thimble with a delighted flourish. "And Fitz and Skye wouldn't rig the game." She pauses, eyes flickering between them suspiciously. "Right?"

Fitz and Skye plaster innocent expressions onto their features and hide their laughs behind their hands.

"Wouldn't dream of it," Skye smiles sweetly.

"Don't be ridiculous," Fitz responds immediately.

Jemma gives them both a confused look. "You two are being really odd today."

9.

She turns up at his house one dreary Saturday morning, when his hair is still unruly and he's just halfway through the homework he'd forgotten to hand in several weeks ago. She's smiling, but it's watery and her eyes are red-rimmed and Fitz doesn't really remember the last time he saw her properly cry.

"Jemma? What's wrong?"

"Alice got hit by a car," Jemma says, and then she does something which he can only describe as a strange mix between laughing and crying.

"Jemma.." He doesn't really know what to say, but he lets the door swing behind her and he rifles the cupboards for something that might possibly help her while she sits at the table, her fingers tracing the scratches and indents in their old wooden dinner table. The surface is full of marks, even a few burns and pen scribbles from when Leopold Fitz was but a tiny baby, curious to test out his abilities.

"It's silly, I know," she says, her lips curving up into a teary smile. "She was just a cat, you know?"

Fitz glances outside at Sonja, who's bounding around and digging through a pile of leaves with a wagging tail and a gleam in her eyes. "It's not silly. Is she really gone?"

She nods lightly, and he doesn't hesitate in giving her one of his best hugs, the kind he reserves for moments when it matters, moments like these, when his best friend is crying and upset and he has no idea what to do. His nan walks in at that precise moment, but she takes one look at the scene and mouths 'cookies are in the pantry', before disappearing quickly.

"Should I be sad?" Jemma asks, her voice muffled over his shoulder.

"Only if you want to be," he tells her honestly. "You can cry if you want. I won't tell anyone, promise. Or do you want me to call Skye? I can call her if you wan-"

"Fitz," she interrupts, and even though he can't see her expression he knows she's smiling, because her tone changes and she releases her hold on him. "Thanks."

He doesn't say no problem or your welcome, but it's probably an unspoken thing anyway. "You still like chocolate chip, yeah?"