Wow, another high school AU. I'm so original. I apologize. But like? It's roughly 11 pm, I'm on a sugar high, and I frankly have no idea what I'm doing—moreso than usual.

Anyways, wow! Welcome to Momentum! I've been really excited to start writing this. It's going to center around Lapis, a desi girl who is adjusting to her new school, striking up friendships with really odd people, and, most importantly, learning how to love again in the aftermath of her last relationship. I know I can only put so many ships in the description, but just know this is suuuuper polygems. This is basically going to be a glorious Lapamedotbispearlnet trainwreck by the time it's done. Rated T mainly for themes of past abuse and also because Lapis has a pottymouth, haha.

Thank you so much for reading! :')

On the first day, she nearly ended up breaking her lock because she couldn't remember her combo. On the second day, she slept in and wound up hurriedly dressing in the dark; she rushed into class wearing an oversized flannel over a pair of too-tight Camp Pining Hearts pajama pants. Third day? Her breakfast consisted of burnt toast and she flunked her first quiz of the year. Fourth day? She had forgotten to bring her backpack. Her fucking backpack. To school. Who does that?

And by the looks of things, Friday wasn't going to be any better, either. She had left her lunch at home, and both her pockets and stomach were absolutely empty. She sighed as she shuffled into the cafeteria, eyes glued to the tiled floor.

It was official: Lapis hated public school with a burning passion.

It was all her parents' fault. Her mother's voice swam in her head as she took a seat at the corner of the nearest empty table, drumming her fingers on it in desperation for this period to be over. For this day to be over.

"Lakshmi, you're doing it again! Look at these kids your age, going to proms and clubs and the mall while you sit here with your butt glued to the sofa watching that stupid TV serial!"

"It's not stupid, Amma," Lapis had muttered as she idly picked at a scab on her knee, heavily invested in the Camp Pining Hearts holiday special. Paulette and Percy were just about to notice the sprig of mistletoe conveniently placed right over their heads.

"Well, it's making you stupid! Staring at that ridiculous box all day."

Lapis propped her feet up on the coffee table and sank back into the couch. "Huh. That ten-hour marathon of Under the Knife must've docked off a looot of IQ points for you then."

She tensed up as soon as the last word escaped her. Stupid her. Stupid her and her big, snarky mouth. Lapis knew she was in for it now.

She felt a sharp slap on her thigh, and the TV remote was yanked out of her hand right afterwards. She winced not at the pain which was barely noticeable, but at the sight of her mother jabbing the power button. They didn't have DVR. Great. Now she was going to have to stream the rest of the episode in painfully low-quality on one of those virus-infested sites. Or watch it on TubeTube with the voices hideously altered. She huffed in frustration as her mom twirled around on her heels to glare daggers at her.

"You ungrateful girl! Is that how you talk to your mother?!"

"I—" Lapis bit her lip tentatively, her eyes darting from the blank television screen to the musty, washed-out carpet to the raw, slightly burning patch of skin on her knee. Anywhere but her mother's eyes.

"No," she managed finally, getting up to retreat to her room. She knew there was no way she could win this argument. This age old argument about how she was pathetically antisocial. "Sorry, Amma."

"Is this how you're supposed to act, Lakshmi? Is this how your friends talk to their parents?"

Lapis's entire body went rigid. She froze in her tracks.

"I have no friends." The words came out of her mouth clear and simple, leaving an unpleasant sting on her tongue.

Her mother simply snorted. "No wonder you don't, staying cooped up all day! What ever happened to that girl you used to play at the beach with, hmm? That big, muscular one? She had some sort of skin condition, right? Had stripes all over her body." She clucked in dissatisfaction as she shook her head. "It's such a shame you never talk to her anymore, you two got along so well..."

She trailed off as Lapis's fingers began to curl into angry, trembling fists.

"No."

"What?"

"NO!" Lapis screamed. Then, after sucking in a deep breath to compose herself and prevent another outburst, she hissed, "She's. Not. My friend."

Her mom blinked. "Well, not anymore, maybe, but—"

"Never," Lapis shot back. "She never was. I'm going up now. Don't follow me."

Her trip upstairs was stiff and mechanical, the ringing in her ears eerie and sickening. She flopped onto her bed and curled up in fetal position. She wanted to fold her body up like origami, over and over and over again until she had vanished from this plane of existence entirely.

"Breathe," she whispered to herself. "Breathe, breathe, breathe."

But breathing never came all that easy when you were drowning inside of yourself.

And the tears, too. They streamed down her face without warning, hot and just salty enough to give her unpleasant flashbacks. It was the same salt that filled her lungs and endlessly spewed from her mouth in her nightmares. God, she hated the tears.

God, she hated herself.

So Lapis simply laid there, letting her eyes swell up and the snot dry on her face. Maybe if she kept her mind blank, nothing could hurt her anymore.

Blank, blank, like the calm, blue sea.

The same sea that would nibble at her ankles with foamy hands, eventually clawing their way up to her calves, her thighs, her waist; she was drowning, she was drowning. Each wave would become more violent than the last one, nipping at her chest, enveloping her shoulders, making her prisoner, shoving torrents of poisonous saltwater down her throat, choking her with stinging, unbearable pain—

"Lakshmi! You're shaking again."

Lapis shot up with a start, examining her trembling hands. So she was. She quickly subdued them by pressing them to the sides of her thighs, but her rapid-fire heartbeat and shoulders laced with goosebumps still remained.

She was drowning.

Lapis stared straight ahead at the Crying Breakfast Friends poster tacked onto the wall in front of her as she tried to calm down. She had bought it when she was six out of sheer enthusiasm; it still stayed up on the wall ten years later out of sheer laziness.

"Lakshmi," she heard as she gazed blankly at Weeping Egg Cup. She didn't dare look away. The weight on her bed shifted as her mom sat down next to her. "Lakshmi."

Lapis didn't respond.

"Do you remember dance class, Lakshmi?" her mom asked her softly. "Do you remember swim team? You loved those. You loved those so much. And then you just dropped out. What happened?"

Lapis gnawed at the edge of her thumb. Just wasn't interested anymore, she stated flatly.

"We both know that's not true. You've been dancing for over five years. You were captain of your swim division. You can't just stop caring overnight."

Lapis tensed up as she bit back a Watch me.

Her mom, slowly, tentatively, laid a hand on her knee. Lapis bristled slightly at the sudden contact, but allowed it nonetheless. It wasn't like she had much of a choice.

"Lakshmi...I just called Appa before coming upstairs. Your behavior, your isolation...it disturbs him as well. You're sixteen. You'll be a legal adult in two years. You'll move out and head to college right afterwards. And the world won't let you live your life in a bubble. You have to socialize. You have to go out of your way and talk to others, or else they'll go out of their way to make your life miserable. You have to learn how to fend for yourself."

"Fat chance I can learn how to do that after sixteen years of homeschool," Lapis had muttered, eyes still glued to the wall. She could probably draw Weeping Egg Cup from memory by now.

And then she had promptly slapped her forehead and grimaced as her mother gave her a lopsided smirk.

"That's why Appa and I have decided," she said, getting up, "that we're enrolling you in public school."

Lapis shot up, nearly tripping over a set of watercolors sprawled carelessly by her bedside. She yelped as the plastic left a mark on her bare feet, her mind repeating one word a thousand times per second.

No.

No.

No no no no NO.

This was not happening. This most certainly was not happening.

"Rose Egan Quartz Academy." Her mother's voice jolted her to reality, making her realize that yes, this actually was happening. "Fairly new and highly reputable."

Lapis snorted while rubbing her foot. "What kind of name is Rose Egan Quartz?"

"The name," her mother shot back at her, glaring, "of a renowned philanthropist you obviously have no respect for. She passed away four years ago in childbirth. The school was named in her honor."

"Great. Great. A haunted school. Maybe this philanthropist's spirit will possess me and eat away at my soul and you and Appa will actually like me for once because I won't actually be there at all. You're right. Maybe this is the best way to go."

There was a shocked silence hanging in the air as her mother slowly pursed her lips, tears pricking the corners of her eyes. She shook her head slightly as she stormed to the door. Lapis wanted to call out, to reach out to her and say she didn't mean it; she really did. But she couldn't. Her lungs were filled with saltwater and her lips were bound together. The only thing she could ever spew out was hate, the only thing she could do was drip salt into everyone's wounds, and God, was it frustrating.

"Don't say that," she hissed at Lapis. All Lapis could see of her was her back.

"What? You hate me. I know you do. Just admit it. Everyone does."

"What happened," her mother whispered, her back still facing Lapis, her hands planted firmly on the doorframe, "to the sweet, silly girl I used to love?"

Used to.

Used to.

She was a thing of the past, that's all she ever was.

"She's gone," Lapis replied coldly. "And there's nothing you can do about it."

She had done it again; she could see the tears streaming down her mother's eyes as she turned around to face her daughter. Lapis could feel her own eyes building up a dangerous amount of tension behind them.

"I can still try," she whispered hoarsely. "I'm just scared for you, Lakshmi."

"Everyone's scared of me. No one wants to handle a trainwreck like this," Lapis muttered, then winced on reflex. Self-deprecation only ever made things worse in this household.

"No!" Her mother shook her head, hands on her scalp like she was just about ready to tear her hair out. "Listen to me! This isn't healthy. We're doing everything we can to make you happy. You didn't want the therapists, so we dropped them. You said the medicine made you feel worse, so we talked your doctor out of it. We've done everything for you. We're doing this for you, too. Try to understand, Lakshmi. Just one year. Just try it out for one year, and if you don't like it, we can switch back to homeschooling. You need the interaction. It could do wonders. Please don't hate us for this. Please."

Her voice broke at the last word, and as she closed the door, Lapis felt like she was drowning all over again.

...In retrospect, it probably all was Lapis's fault. Like it always was.

Her fault she always isolated herself; her fault her parents and her mutually lashed out on one another; her fault she couldn't keep her awful, awful mouth shut; her fault they sent her away to this Rose Thorn-in-her-side Prick-up-her-ass Academy or whatever it was called.

And her fault, she thought to herself as her stomach grumbled, that she was stupid enough to leave her goddamn lunch at home and not bother to bring even a spare penny with her just in case.

"Stupid," she hissed as she glared down at the lunch table.

"Don't be so hard on yourself."

Lapis spun around and hit her knee on the table's underside. "Shit." She rubbed her leg and stared up at the intruder.

The first thing she noticed about her was not her towering height, the accented lilt of her voice, or even the massive, vaguely cubic afro severely framing her face; it was her glasses.

Her sunglasses.

"Uh..." Lapis frowned. "Isn't that against dress code?"

"So are pajama pants," she replied swiftly. Lapis's face burned as she recalled walking into pre-calculus half-dressed on Tuesday; luckily for her, the teacher was too preoccupied with a text message of some sort to notice her outfit as she cautiously slid into her desk. Nice ass, baby, some kid behind her had jeered. He was lucky he wasn't within Lapis's range; otherwise, she would have choked the life out of him with his tacky, blue infinity scarf.

"Shut up," she snapped.

The girl did not, in fact, shut up. Instead, she slammed a plastic tray down in front of Lapis.

"Bought you lunch," she informed her, adjusting her sunglasses.

Lapis narrowed her eyes in suspicion. "Well, who am I to turn down food from a total stranger," she deadpanned.

The girl frowned. "'M not a stranger." She jabbed her index finger in Lapis's general direction. "You're Lakshmi. From physics."

Ah. A physics student. That explained it. The moment she had stepped into that class and heard the teacher drone on about relative velocity (don't get her wrong; Mr. Maheswaran was a...nice man, but even the nicest of people could lull you to sleep by talking about vectors), Lapis had realized that it was best for her to just hide in the back and drown everything out with her headphones.

It was working quite well, actually. She prayed it would stay that way. Her parents would forgive a bad grade or two. At least she didn't ditch class; she had been dangerously close to considering it after cussing out her locker in front of a very horrified group of freshmen on Monday.

Lapis nodded at her. "That's me," she said, picking at the remnants of turquoise nail polish on her fingers. "But I go by Lapis."

"Lapis," the girl echoed before chuckling slightly. "Interesting." She stuck her hand out to Lapis. "Garnet Genevieve Garland," she said. Lapis didn't shake back.

"That's, uh...a mouthful."

Garnet shrugged, still refusing to lower her arm. "Amethyst just calls me G-Squad."

"That's nice," Lapis muttered dismissively. She had no idea who Amethyst was, and she didn't want to know. She just wanted to go home, and maybe she would be equally miserable at home, but at least she could peruse through Camp Pining fanfiction while doing so.

Garnet didn't seem to take the hint, though. She stared down at the lunch tray (or Lapis thought she was staring down at the lunch tray, at least. Her shades were dark and Lapis could only make out the faintest outlines of Garnet's eyes behind them, and only if she stared at her face really hard and squinted—not that she was staring, mind you).

"Eat your food."

Lapis snorted. "Thanks, mom."

"I'm not your mother."

Lapis frowned. Everything that came out of Garnet's mouth was blunt, terse, and straight to the point. No pointless jokes or dancing around in circles to understand what she meant.

...Lapis could appreciate that, honestly.

She sighed and turned to face her plate. She was aware that cafeteria food didn't have the best universal reputation, but it actually didn't smell that bad. And from what she knew things that didn't smell that bad usually didn't taste that bad, either. For the most part.

The green beans looked limp, soggy, and most likely cold. She wrinkled her nose. Pass. Cinnamon apples? Kind of mushy and a muddy shade of beige, but pleasantly aromatic. Maybe. Tater tots? They actually looked kind of crispy and thoroughly fried. She popped one into her mouth and momentarily blissed out. Hell yes.

And then she saw the pizza.

She nearly had another table-induced injury as her whole body stiffened in horror when she first caught sight of it.

The pizza was square.

The pizza. Was square.

This school was fucked up.

She jabbed the slice (could it even be called that?) with her spork.

"Un-fucking-believable," she muttered, picking up the pizza and gaping at it.

"You curse a lot," Garnet noted.

"Well, maybe I wouldn't if this school didn't have square fucking pizza (and maybe she wouldn't if she was allowed to curse at home without getting a mouthful bitter soap if she uttered even so much as a meek "damn"). What's wrong with this place?"

Garnet yanked the spork out of Lapis's hand. "There will come a time in your life when you learn to accept all pizza," she announced sagely before tearing a bite out of the square.

Lapis snorted as she grabbed another tater tot. "Wow. That might've been the longest sentence I've ever heard you say."

Garnet shrugged as she swallowed. "I'm a person of few words."

"Mmm. Yeah. Not one for conversations myself."

Fortunately, Garnet had seemed to finally take the hint and stopped talking. Unfortunately, she still stood there, towering over her with a sporkful of square pizza. Lapis shifted uncomfortably.

After what seemed to be fifteen minutes of horribly awkward silence, she slowly got up and slung a backpack strap over her shoulder and took a step towards the cafeteria doors.

"No."

Lapis turned around and stared at Garnet, who was frowning disapprovingly. "Uh...what?"

Garnet pointed to Lapis's tray. "You didn't eat your food."

Lapis sighed irritably. "The bell's about to ring in five minutes, it's really no use."

"Hmm." Garnet considered this. "What class do you have next?"

"Um...art."

Garnet nodded. "Then take your tray to go. The teacher doesn't care. Peridot eats in there all the time."

"Great," Lapis said flatly, picking up the tray. She didn't know who Peridot was, either. She sighed in defeat as she made her way to the exit—which, of course, just had to remain stubbornly locked no matter how many times she tugged at the handle. She grit her teeth, her patience wearing thin.

"Come—on—just—fucking—work—!"

"Lapis."

Lapis spun around and glared at Garnet. "What?"

Garnet strolled up and stared right back at her, unfazed. She gave the door a gentle shove and opened it.

"Push, not pull," she said, and Lapis swore she could faintly make out a wink underneath those dusky glasses.

She felt her cheeks burn as she cleared her throat. "Right. I knew that. Um..." Her eyes flitted from her milk carton to her tater tots to Garnet.

"So, uh..."

"You're welcome."

Lapis huffed. "You didn't know what I was gonna say!"

Garnet adjusted her sunglasses and grinned. "Future vision," she said smugly (whatever that was supposed to mean).

Lapis rolled her eyes and strode out of the cafeteria as the bell rang, muttering "cocky" under her breath.

Art. Finally. Art. The only thing Lapis looked forward to in this school.

Her mother said she may as well have come out of the womb with a box of paints and a pencil in her hands. Priyanka Auntie said the same thing. Her first-ever work of art still hung proudly on her fridge at home; an anatomically incorrect angel with wings made of a miserably shaded excuse for water, floating in space with a mirror held stiffly in her hand.

She had titled it Meep-Morp.

God, she was a weird kid.

As the years went on, her room eventually became littered with sketchbooks and amorphous wads of clay she had referred to as "works in progress." She hadn't drawn, painted, or sculpted anything in roughly two years, though.

"Loss of interest in activities which were once pleasurable is one of the many side effects of depression," her psychiatrist had told her (God, he acted like he knew everything. Eight visits later, and Lapis decided she had had enough of it).

But Lapis knew the answer wasn't simply "the Depression™." It wasn't like she had lost interest in art; she had simply lost her inspiration. And those were two different things entirely.

That's why she was reasonably irked when her mother looked up at her in shock when she had stated that she wanted art to be one of her electives at Quartz Academy. She had wrapped her arms around her and muttered something about how some of her "old baby" was still in Lapis after all.

That comment had...hurt, honestly. But she couldn't let her mother know that.

Lapis hurt everyone else just as equally, after all.

She trudged into the classroom, her stomach growling at her irritably. It certainly didn't help her mood. She was ready to slump into her chair, have some lunch (sans soggy green beans), listen to the teacher idly mutter something about atmospheric perspective or pointillism or some other technique that had nothing to do with what their current assignment, and begin working on her still life study.

Only problem: there was no chair to slump into.

"Uh..." she stared in confusion at the tiny girl occupying her assigned seat at her assigned table; she caught sight of Lapis a mere seconds later and clucked her tongue sympathetically.

"School lunch," she said in the most nasally voice Lapis had ever heard in her life. "Pathetic. Who was the clod that told you eating that junk was a good idea, anyways?"

Lapis set the tray at the edge of her (assigned!) table and popped another tater tot into her mouth. "Garnet Genevieve Garland," she announced, her mouth still full.

"Oh!" The girl stiffened up immediately. "Garnet." She gave a nervous chuckle, her cheeks slightly red. "Uh—don't tell her I called her that."

"I just might if you don't get out of my seat."

She snorted at Lapis. "Um, excuse me, but you're wrong. All my classes got rescheduled, and since I am now sharing a class with you and have deduced that the seating arrangement here is based on alphabetical order of surnames, this is my seat now. Not yours." She pointed to her right. "You get the one right next to me. It's vacant, anyhow, so it shouldn't be a problem. You are..." she craned her neck, peering at the ID dangling from Lapis's neck. "Lake-shoo-mee Sag-aur?"

Lapis cringed at her horrid pronunciation. "Just call me Lapis," she said, sliding into the seat right next to her.

"Lapis...like the gemstone? Lapis lazuli?"

"Yep."

The girl frowned. "I fail to see how that has any connection with the name 'Lake-shoo-mee.'"

"Lakshmi," Lapis corrected her.

"Lak-uhs-mee."

"Lakshmi."

She glared at Lapis. "That's what I said!"

Lapis rolled her eyes. "Just say Lapis."

She sighed. "Fiiine. Oh, oh! Wait, can I call you Lazuli?"

"Knock yourself out," Lapis muttered, reaching for her milk carton.

"Lazuli!" She knocked Lapis's hand away from the tray, earning herself a nasty glare. She seemed unfazed, however. "That stuff is disgusting," she said, unzipping her backpack and pulling out a plastic bag. She tossed it over to Lapis. "Eat these. They're infinitely superior."

"Infinitely superior," Lapis echoed, incredulous. She examined the bag. "Uh...Cheezy Chaaaps?"

"They're incredible," the girl whispered in awe, picking at the bright green bandaid on her forehead. "The sheer amount of cheddar they've managed to condense into a single slice of processed potato is astounding."

"That sounds disgusting."

She scowled. "Would you rather eat that cold, soggy excuse for a vegetable?" she asked, indicating Lapis's green beans.

Lapis shrugged as she opened the bag with a pop. "Fair enough." She tossed a chip into her mouth. Incredibly cheesy and a bit on the salty side, but not too bad. "So," she said, swallowing, "how do I know these aren't laced with poison?"

The girl looked thoroughly offended as she pulled out a dark green bag and opened it (the sour cream and onion variant of chaaaps, Lapis supposed). "Do I look like an assassin to you, Lazuli? Do I look intimidating in any shape or form?"

"Uh..."

She shook her head. "Never mind. Don't answer that. Also, I can't believe you haven't even asked me for my name yet. It's only proper manners! I'm Peridot Rabara." She huffed. "It's like I have to do all the talking around here."

"And I have to do all the reluctant listening," Lapis said under her breath.

Or at least she thought it was under her breath. "I heard that," Peridot informed her with a glare. "If you don't want to talk, then fine. You could have simply told me earlier."

Lapis bit back a that big mouth of yours didn't give me the chance to, fished a 2B pencil out of her backpack, and gazed at the fruits set in the middle of the table, trying to capture them accurately as more students trickled in and filled up her table. She occasionally rewarded her efforts with a cheezy chaaap.

As she glanced up at the clock now and then, she caught a few glimpses of the strange girl sitting next to her, scribbling away on her paper.

Everything about Peridot seemed...too big. Her annoying-ass, pompous voice was too big for her mouth. Her glasses were too big to be supported by her small, pointy nose. Her shock of blonde hair (which wasn't her actual hair color, Lapis noted as she saw jet black roots poking out of her scalp) was too big for her head, making up for her height by sticking straight up and defying all known laws of gravity. The fact that her favorite color seemed to be a loud, obnoxious neon green didn't seem to help, either. The band-aid on her forehead was that color, along with her (ridiculously oversized) backpack adorned with a mismatched array of crudely sewn-on patches: an alien head, a crying waffle (presumably from Crying Breakfast Friends), a diamond...

...the Camp Pining Hearts logo.

Lapis stared at it, her curiosity piqued. "Have you watched the winter special?" she asked, before snapping her mouth shut and immediately regretting it.

Peridot turned around to look at her, confused. "I thought you didn't want to talk to—oh." Her frown slowly gave way to a goofy grin as Lapis mentally kicked herself. She flashed her neon green (what else?) braces at Lapis. "No way, Lazuli. You watch Camp Pining Hearts?"

Lapis nodded as she outlined her peach, hoping to end the conversation right there.

Of course she should have known that wouldn't be the case with someone like Peridot.

"Well, of course I've watched the winter special! And the fifth anniversary special. And the Valentine's special—although every day seems to be Valentine's Day in that show, if you know what I mean." She cackled. Just when Lapis thought her voice was the most annoying thing she'd ever heard.

"Mmm."

"I'd have to say seasons two and three are my favorite, though. The dynamics between Percy and Pierre are spectacular! Between you and I, though, season 5?" Peridot shook her head. "A complete and utter mistake."

"Hey. I like Season 5," Lapis shot back defensively.

Peridot scoffed as she crunched on a sour cream and onion chaaap. "Pfft! Of course. Everyone likes Season 5. All the characters were at the beach half-naked. Who wouldn't like that? Two words, Lazuli: fan. Service."

And that was pretty much how that conversation went—if it could even be called a conversation, that was. Peridot droned on and on about the Yellow Team and how she hated Paulette (which Lapis didn't take too kindly to), and how she practically worshiped Percierre (which Lapis could kind of see happening, but wasn't the biggest fan of). Needless to say, she was immensely relieved when Peridot decided to turn her attention to her artwork (apparently her conversation was distracting Peridot from being productive. That self-conceited ass).

Lapis was halfway through sketching her banana when she grimaced at the incessant squeaking emanating from underneath the table. God. Even when when Peridot wasn't talking, she still managed to be obnoxious.

"Stop doing whatever that is," Lapis snapped. "It's fucking annoying."

Peridot stared at her for a good minute before the squeaking stopped. "Oh. Uh...sorry." Her voice sounded unusually small as she scooted her chair back and stretched out her legs. "I...can't really help it."

Lapis shot her a glare. "What do you mean you can't really help—" And then she saw them.

Prosthetics. Two of them, one for each leg. Peridot's body stopped around her kneecaps, where two metallic, dark green machines connected to the nubs of flesh.

...Well, shit.

Lapis's face burned as she stared at Peridot's legs. Stupid her and her big, fucking mouth. "I, uh...sorry." She cleared her throat. "I didn't know."

To her surprise, Peridot just snorted. "Really? That's refreshing to hear," she said, scooting back to the table and balling up her now-empty bag of chaaaps. "It's usually the first thing people notice about me."

"Your prosthetics?"

"Pssh! Prosthetics? That just sounds dreary. I prefer calling them...limb enhancers."

"And that just sounds ridiculous."

"You're just jealous your gravity connectors aren't green. Or shiny." She huffed.

"What the—gravity connectors? You mean legs? God, you're such a nerd."

"And I take pride in it, Lazuli. I take pride."

"Yeah. Whatever." Lapis turned back to her fruit.

"So...what class do you have next?" Lapis groaned. Where was the off switch on this kid?

"Physics," she mumbled, hoping the drab subject matter would repel her. Even Peridot couldn't carry on a conversation about relative velocity.

"Oh! Well, what do you know, Laz?" She pulled out a bright orange sheet of paper from her backpack and thrust it at her, beaming. "That's what I have!" Sure enough, the last row on the schedule of RABARA, PERIDOT read PHYS 1 HON in bold, black letters.

In the words of Garnet: No.

"You've gotta be kidding me," Lapis said.

"Nope! I most certainly am not joking you," she verified. "We're art buddies and physics buddies! Isn't this great? I think it's great, so it must be. Right?"

Lapis merely chewed the edge of her eraser in response and tried not to scream as Peridot flashed her a mouthful of neon green brackets again.

...This was going to be one hell of a year, wasn't it?

Lapis is desi (of Indian descent)! "Amma" means mother in various south Indian languages, including Tamil (my first language!), Telegu, and Malayalam. Similarly, "Appa" means father (yes, I am also aware it's the name of a particularly famous sky bison. I am well aware).

Both "Egan" and "Rabara" are names I picked up from Rose Quartz and Peridot's voice actresses, mainly because I just think they have a really nice ring to them (also, I wanted to make Peridot Filipino, so there we go).

I hope the flashback scene fit in well because trust me, this story is going to be flashback-heavy. Flashbacks will be put in italics to prevent any confusion.

Updates are going to be reallyyyy slow because my main goals are updating my other fic and focusing on school. That being said, though, any feedback/comments/etc. are greatly appreciated! I am just so, so excited to begin writing this, probably more than I should be, lol! Thanks for reading! :)