A/N: Basically, I'm just writing this story because there isn't enough of my favorite femme ship out there. Nyo!PruCan is adorable and everyone should ship it, because Maddie is precious and Gillian is just awesome.

Madeline Williams was, in a word, quite average.

Medium height—just over one hundred and fifty two centimeters. She had a fairly unremarkable hair color—a sort of honey brown, but she had recently been coaxed into adding golden highlights by her overbearing mother. At sixteen, she had finally lost her baby fat and was still rather self-conscious about it. She finally got her awful braces off, and now had quite a nice smile, although she was still painfully shy, and not many people got to see her smile. Her grades were good because she worked hard; she wasn't exceptionally clever or athletic. She was passionate about French and liked reading more than anything, except playing with her cat, Kuma. She attended high school with her stepsister Amelia and occasionally went to soccer games and drank copious amounts of tea and fought with her mom and stepdad and complained about life. So yes, she was fairly average.

Too average.

Maddie had a hard time standing out. Most people simply looked over her. She was quiet, yes, but it was more than that. Sometimes she felt like people looked straight through her. Her teachers' eyes passed over her in class, even when she dared to raise her hand to answer a question when it was obvious that the other students didn't know. She was almost always the last one to be picked for teams in PE, not because she was awful at sports, but because people often forgot she was there. Most of the time, it didn't bother her too much. She liked keeping to herself and her small circle of friends. But sometimes, she wanted to be noticed.

It would be so nice, just for once.

And so, she was rather anxious for the start of her sophomore year of high school. She stood in front of the mirror, fluffing her curly hair expectantly, trying to get some shape into her hair. She tugged her high-waisted denim shorts down a bit and tucked in the cute, lacy blue top that she had picked out last week for this day. It would definitely help that her mom had decided to intervene with her wardrobe choices. All throughout middle school and her freshman year, she had dressed rather badly, mostly out of laziness. Her mother, an editor for a fashion magazine, had finally had it with her daughter's baggy sweatpants and borrowing of her stepdad's old college sweatshirts, and stepped in. "Madeleine, how are people ever going to notice you if you insist on dressing like a slob?" She had said sternly, patting her cheek affectionately. "Now, you're going to start dressing like an adult. See if they don't notice then!" At first, she had been quite opposed to the idea—"Why don't you make Amelia dress more nicely?" "Because she is a lost cause, ma cherie."—but after spending all summer pouring over copies of Vogue, she had finally grown more fond of nicer clothes. The one thing her mother hadn't been able to convince her to get rid of was her glasses. Maddie knew she could just wear contacts like Amelia, but she liked her glasses. They also set her apart from Amelia, who looked rather similar to her despite the fact that they weren't related by blood. She sighed, and applied some light gold eye shadow before turning away from her reflection, nodding at the mousy girl in the mirror in encouragement, before she marched across the hall to knock on her sister's bedroom door.

"Amelia?" She asked, rapping on the door. "Are you up yet?"

"Nnnng," came the drowsy reply.

So, no.

She chuckled a little as she went downstairs to start their coffee. Amelia couldn't function without it. But when she walked into the warm, sunlit kitchen, she saw her stepfather sitting at the breakfast table, sipping his black coffee out of an 'I heart NY' mug. "There's my Maddie!" He said affectionately, looking up from his paper with a smile. "Coffee's ready. Where's my other girl?"

"Still asleep, believe it or not," Maddie quipped as she poured herself some of the hot drink into her own favorite mug, a light pink one decorated with dancing cats. She preferred tea, but both of the Jones were heavily dependent on it, and she decided that it was alright on occasion.

Her stepdad laughed. "She takes after her old man. I'm still not used to getting up at eight a.m. every day, and it's been seven years since I got this job in D.C."

"Mmm," Maddie agreed noncommittally, watching the steam rise off of her drink absently. She mentally ran through a list of things of her classes today: American history, geometry, gym, lunch, then chemistry, English, and French at the very end of the day. She smiled at the thought of school starting again. French was her very best class, and the only one she was looking forward to, besides English.

She glanced past her step dad's broad shoulders to the little window above the sink, watching the early morning joggers and dog walkers make their way through the brisk autumn day. Autumn was always her favorite season; she loved the way the golden brown leaves cluttered the dove grey sidewalks and the way the sky was almost always slightly overcast, but still warm enough to be outside. It reminded her of living in Quebec, where she lived until she was six with her mother, when the days were so beautiful and crisp and the nights were deliciously cool, before the long winters settled in. She liked to watch the familiar faces swarm their large school building and hear the boisterous laughter of friends finding each other again after a long summer. Suddenly, she was stirred out of her cheerful musings by her sister's loud footsteps crashing down the stairs.

"Aw man, why didn't you wake me, Maddie? Artie's gonna yell if we're late—" Her sister cried, rushing about the kitchen.

"I knocked on your door," Maddie remarked calmly, unfazed. "You made some kind of reply."

Amelia groaned loudly, shoving some bread in the toaster. "Okay, backpack, backpack, where's my backpack—"

"By the stairs," Maddie answered.

"Thanks Maddie! You're the best!" She said over her shoulder. "Okay, it's seven forty-five. Arthur should be here—"

The doorbell buzzed, and the three members of the Jones-Williams family looked up, startled.

"Dammit," Amelia said under her breath, racing upstairs to get something.

"Language, Amelia," her father called after her, chuckling a little.

"Say bye to Mum for me," Maddie said, standing up hurriedly as she went upstairs to grab her school supplies. "Gotta go!"

Five minutes later, the two girls were in their neighbor's archaic grey Ford Anglia, driving down the smooth streets of their Washington D.C. suburb. Maddie sat in the back, listening to Amelia chatter happily in the passenger's seat, much more energetic now that she had had her coffee.

"Where's Peter?" Maddie inquired curiously, noticing that the car ride to school was much quieter without the youngest Kirkland boy.

"Dad was able to take him to school today, thankfully," Arthur said, glaring at a pedestrian that walked out in front of his car without warning. "I don't think I would be able to handle him today." Arthur was the second youngest out of five children, and a year older than Amelia and Maddie. They had been neighbors ever since the Jones-Williams family moved in down the street seven years ago. He and Amelia had quickly become friends, despite Arthur's constant complaining about her boisterous personality and her teasing. He was pretty grouchy, even for a teenager, but he could also be pretty sweet when he felt like it. Maddie was pretty sure he had at least a little bit of a crush on Amelia, and he was always unfailingly polite to her, even when he accidentally called her by the wrong name...which happened more than she would like.

"Aw, I like your brothers," Amelia said, grinning. "And Peter's so cute. He's like a little you!"

"Yeah, well, you don't have to live with him," Arthur muttered, flushing slightly at her comment as they turned into the school parking lot. "He's a little prat, is what he is." He parked and they walked up to the large glass doors in front of the concrete and brick school building, but not before passing a trio of students loitering on the freshly manicured lawn, standing apart from the other students that made their way to class.

"Hey!" Maddie recognized a tanned senior named Antonio, donning his usual attire of a FIFA World Cup jersey and black basketball shorts. He waved at them cheerfully, his white smile standing out against his golden skin. "How were your summers? You ready for the soccer scrimmage this weekend, Amelia?" He asked her sister, who played for the girls' soccer team.

"Ready to kick your asses, yeah," Amelia said cheerfully, pausing to smile back at him. "The guys won't win this year!"

Maddie cringed a little when she noticed that her cousin Francis was with them, along with a short, slender, girl with giant sunglasses and silvery hair. She loved him a lot, he was just…very affectionate. And sometimes annoying. And kind of weird. But he was still family.

"Ma petit Madeleine," Francis said happily, hugging his cousin tightly. She could feel the slight stubble he always had rubbing against her forehead and sighed deeply. "How have you been?"

"Francis, I just saw you last week," she squeaked, fighting his clingy embrace and the rather strong smell of his cologne.

"You know you're not supposed to smoke on school grounds," Arthur said bossily, eyeing the handsome boy's cigarette disapprovingly when he released the Canadian girl.

"I missed you too," Francis said cheekily, blowing a smoke ring into the Brit's face. "I see you haven't grown any less stuffy over the summer. And you somehow managed to become paler."

"Fuck off," Arthur said, scowling, waving the smoke out of his face. "Who's this? Your girlfriend?" He gestured to the silver-haired girl, who continued to study them and puff on her own cigarette as she leaned against the brick wall nonchalantly.

Antonio burst out laughing, clapping a hand over his mouth. "Please," he chuckled. "We all know that Francis likes y—"

"Like I would date this guy," the girl interrupted, raising her sunglasses to study each of them in turn. Maddie's eyes widened in surprise when she saw that her irises were a very peculiar shade of red. Oh! So she was an albino. That would explain the sunglasses; direct sunlight probably hurt her eyes. "I'm Gillian Beilschmidt," she added, turning her wide smile on each of them. Her eyes hovered on Maddie, flickering up and down once before she winked at her. "So this is your cousin, huh? You didn't tell me that she was cute."

Maddie's mouth popped open a little in astonishment, and she felt all the blood rush to her face. Was she…was she hitting on her? She finally managed to assemble her thoughts enough to reply, "I'm, um, Madeleine Williams, but you can call me Maddie, everyone else does—"

"And I'm Amelia Jones," her sister added, leaning heavily on Maddie's shoulder and beaming at the albino girl. "And this is Arthur Kirkland, our neighbor!" She gestured to the rather sullen junior at her side.

"Nice to meetcha," Gillian said. "I used to live around here, but my dad travels around a lot for the army. So not awesome. But at least I'm back here for my senior year." She rolled her eyes. "And I'm stuck with these guys."

"You love us," Francis said, unimpressed.

"Ah, Gil, I think we have to go now," Antonio said, glancing at his watch. "Government starts in three minutes—"

"Please, you're going to sleep through it anyway," she said, turning to the Spanish boy and affectionately ruffling his chestnut-colored hair. "But whatever. See you guys later," she said, grinning. She turned on her heel and jogged after her friend, her pale hair fluttering behind her like a banner.

"She's…interesting," Arthur remarked, raising his eyebrows at her odd choice of attire—a skin-tight black Rammstein shirt and denim mini-skirt with bright purple leggings.

"You know, I think I used to play soccer with her when we were little," Amelia mused as they walked inside. "She used to live here?"

"Oui, but she moves around all the time. It's been kind of hard on her and her brother," Francis said with a sigh, running a hand through his blond locks. "Anyway, I'll see you kids in a bit." He winked, shifting his designer bag to his other shoulder as he left them to go to his eight o'clock French class.

"He's so condescending," Arthur said, frowning. His green eyes narrowed in disdain as added, "He thinks because he's eighteen now he can call us kids…"

"Francis has always been kinda condescending, though," Amelia chimed in, her golden brown curls bouncing slightly as she danced ahead of them, turning backwards to face them as she continued to walk. "And anyway, you always treat Maddie and I like we're so much younger than you, when you're only seventeen."

"Not Maddie," he corrected. "She's actually responsible."

Maddie smirked a little at that, but she wasn't really in the mood to listen to the bickering that would invariably follow that comment, so she waved good-bye to them and made her way to her history class, quickly forgetting about her cousin's flirtatious friend as she steeled herself to listen to a boring lecture about the Pilgrims.

Seventh period finally rolled around, and Maddie practically skipped to her French class on the second floor, relieved to be almost done with the day. The first day wasn't really hard, of course; the teachers mostly read the syllabus and explained their expectations for the year. Still, it hadn't gone as well as she had hoped. She only had friends in a few classes; Sakura was in her chemistry class, but she only really knew her through her friendship with Amelia. She was lucky enough to have her friend Carlos in both her history and geometry classes, and she had English with Amelia, but that left two classes without people she was friends with. She sighed as she walked up the linoleum steps, shoving her glasses further up her nose. Maybe she would have someone she knew in French. She quietly slipped into the classroom and found her customary seat in the second row, the same place she sat last year. She smiled politely at the boy to her right, a perpetually unhappy sophomore named Lovino Vargas who played for the boy's soccer team. He didn't seem to notice her, as he was busy trying to subtly eat the remains of his lunch without the teacher noticing.

The teacher, a delicate-looking woman in her early thirties with glasses and a long brown braid that trailed down her back, got their attention by rapping on the old blackboard with a ruler and clearing her throat. "Bonjour, and welcome to another year of French," she said in her calm, serious voice. "I am Madame Dubois, as many of you know. Here is this year's syllabus. Feliciana, if you will pass it out, please, and then we will read it over together." Lovino's eager-to-please twin sister jumped out of her seat from the back and handed out the syllabuses, smiling extra wide at Maddie, who smiled back. Feliciana was one of the nicest girls in their year. She couldn't fathom how she was related to Lovino.

"Alright, does everyone have a copy? Bonne! First thing is first. This year, we will be having—"

The door slammed open then, and the class looked towards the direction of the noise, startled.

"Sorry, my stupid friend told me the wrong room number," the intruder said in a rather unapologetic tone, beaming at the teacher, who looked very unamused.

"Please take a seat, Miss…"

"Beilschmidt," Gillian replied, looking around the room for a seat. "Ah!" She grinned at Maddie and slid into the empty seat next to her, ignoring the glare of Madame Dubois. "Hey, awesome," she whispered to Maddie, who felt her face starting to turn red again. Why was she talking to her? She didn't want to get in trouble. "What'd I miss?"

"Nothing yet," she whispered back, fidgeting with her glasses so she wouldn't have to look at her. Something about her was just...off-putting.

"Cool," Gillian replied, leaning over Maddie's desk to read off of her syllabus. "I don't really like French. I took German the first two years of high school, but of course they don't offer it here, so—"

"Miss Beilschmidt, Miss Williams, if you could save your conversation for later," Madam Dubois said, her eyes flashing dangerously behind her glasses.

Maddie felt herself slide down further into her seat, her entire face the same color as her cherry red backpack. "Je suis desole, Madame," she mumbled. She was one of Madame Dubois' favorite students, which made it even more embarrassing.

"Maddie, would you like to read the first part of the syllabus, then? In French?"

"S-sure," Maddie answered. She hated reading out loud, but it was just as well. Most of the people in their class had atrocious accents. In very clear French, she began to read, "This semester, we will be covering the preterit and future tenses. In order to fully comprehend the material, students will have weekly reading assignments as well as a French movie night once a month…" When she finished, Madame Dubois nodded in approval, smiling slightly.

"Very good. For the rest of class, you will introduce yourself to your partner and learn a few basic facts for next class. You will be partners for the rest of the year for oral exercises, so your best friend is probably not a good idea. You can choose your own partners, I don't care—" After that, the loud buzzing of the class cut her off as everyone frantically searched for a partner.

Maddie looked around with a resigned expression. She didn't really know anyone besides the Vargas twins, and Gillian of course, but she had only met her this morning. The only other sophomore she knew was a guy named Vash Zwingli, but he was pretty intimidating, and she didn't want to ask him. She looked back at Gillian, to see if she had found a partner yet.

"Sounds like you already know French pretty well," Gillian said, smiling. "Okay! You'll be my partner!"

"Um, alright," Maddie said reluctantly. She hoped that this new girl wouldn't try to get her to do all of the work, like her partner last year. She hated when people took advantage of her. She took a deep breath and added, "But, uh, I'm not gonna do everything, okay. I mean, I don't want to be rude, but—" Oh God, why did she say that? She probably thought she was a total bitch now.

Gillian stared at her for a second with her strangely colored eyes, and then burst out laughing, so loudly that Maddie felt self-conscious again because she could feel everyone in the classroom looking at her. "I like you," Gillian said, grinning. "You're more feisty than you let on."

"Uh, thanks?" Maddie said, confused. Well, at least she wasn't offended. But then, if she was friends with Francis and Antonio, it seemed unlikely that she was easily offended. "I guess we better start with introductions, then…" She glanced towards the prompt on the paper. "Names…"

"Je suis the awesome Gillian, as you know," Gillian said grandly, pretending to bow.

"I'm pretty sure you're supposed to say all of that in French," Maddie corrected, grinning a tiny bit.

Gillian rolled her eyes. "Ugh. I hate French. Francis always talks in French when he wants to annoy me."

"How do you know him, anyway?" Maddie asked curiously, jotting down Gillian's name on the worksheet.

"Our parents are friends, so they figured we should be, too," Gillian replied, shrugging her slender shoulders. "I couldn't stand him at first. I thought he was a little pansy. He cried when I destroyed his sand castle in their backyard sandbox. But it was in the way of my awesome kingdom."

Maddie snorted, trying not to laugh too hard. "You made him cry?"

Gillian nodded, smirking. "He cried a lot when we were little. My dad made me apologize, and I offered to let him in my tree house even though he was lame, and we became friends after that. He's not as much of a wimp as he used to be, thank God, or I wouldn't be able to deal with it."

"I see," Maddie noted, smiling to herself. "Um…okay. Say one interesting thing about yourself in French."

"Everything about me is interesting," Gillian said matter of factly. "Hmm…where to begin…" She rested her chin on her folded fingers on the desk, staring out into space. "Oh, okay. One time when I was little, I kissed my best friend because we both thought she was a guy. Turns out she wasn't," she added with a laugh. "Not like it mattered to me, though."

"What do you mean?" Maddie asked curiously, not bothering to correct her for using English. Everyone else around them had reverted to English, anyway. There were only a few minutes of class.
"Oh, it didn't matter cause I had a crush on her anyway," Gillian said, smiling fondly at the memory. "Too bad she's straight. But what can you do, right?"

"Uh, right," Maddie said, fumbling for an articulate response. She hadn't met anyone so upfront about their sexual orientation except Francis, but then, he hit on just about anybody he found attractive, so she tended to ignore it. So then, was Gillian flirting with her earlier? The thought made her flush a little, but she wasn't sure why. She definitely liked guys. Definitely. She had even had a boyfriend for a few months last year, a senior named Lars who smoked a lot.

"Dude, you okay? You're spacing out," Gillian said, waving a hand in her face. "I think it's your turn to say something interesting."

"Um, okay. I'm from Quebec, originally," she said proudly.

"Canadian, eh?" Gillian joked.

"Haven't heard that one before," Maddie deadpanned, making the older girl laughed.

"Ha! But it's better when I make the joke. Okay, what's next...these are so lame, man. What's your favorite color?"

Maddie scribbled down something on her syllabus. "Um...red, probably. But I like all colors, really."

"Mine's black! Specifically, black with white. The most awesome colors."

"Okay, so that would be noir et blanc," Maddie supplied, adding it to her list of Gillian traits. "Uh, are you writing any of this down, Gillian?"

"You can call me Gil if ya want," the albino girl said, yawning a little. "And no. I have it all memorized. I'm just that good." She winked, and went back to her sketching on the back of her paper.

Maddie sighed. "Alright then. Let's see what we have left…" Places you would like to visit, favorite books, favorite bands. By the time class was over, she learned that Gillian's favorite place in the world was Berlin, Germany—"Berlin has such a badass history!"-, her favorite book was War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy, although she really liked Ernest Hemingway novels, and her favorite band was some strange German disco group that Maddie had never heard of. And she insisted on telling her all of that in English.

"You know, you're going to have to use French in this class eventually," Maddie pointed out knowingly, as they began to pack up. "Madame Dubois will make you."

"French is so lame though," Gillian sulked, shoving all of her books at once into a rather tattered black knapsack. "Especially compared to German. But then, everything is pretty lame compared to German."

"Why do you like German so much?" Maddie asked, ignoring the slight against her favorite language. She smiled apologetically at Madame Dubois as they walked out of class together, heading down the stairs.

"'Cause I was born in Germany," Gillian answered, skipping down the stairs two at a time. She spun around at the bottom of the stairs and turned to beam up at the Canadian girl, hands planted on her hips in a ridiculous pose. She kind of reminded her of Amelia, always striking weird poses to make her friends laugh. "I lived there until I was ten, and then we moved here for sixth and seventh grade, and then Seoul, and then Copenhagen, and now here again! I can teach ya some time, if you want!" She added helpfully.

"Maybe," Maddie said uncertainly, following her out the doors into the bright September afternoon. She spotted Arthur waiting in his old Ford Anglia at the very edge of the parking lot and waved. "My ride's here. It was nice talking with you, Gillian."

"You too," Gillian said, giving her a little salute. "I gotta go pick up my baby bro, anyway. He's gotta be around here somewhere. Oh—HEY, LUDWIG!" She hollered at a tall, broad-shouldered sophomore that Maddie vaguely recognized. "There's my cute little bro! Bye, Maddie!" She waved enthusiastically and raced across the lawn to hug him, startling the quiet Japanese girl at his side.

Maddie chuckled a little as she weaved through the student parking lot to where Arthur was waiting.

"Where's Amelia?" She asked, climbing into the back. She never sat in the passenger seat, even though she knew Arthur wouldn't mind. Somehow it was an unspoken agreement that that was reserved for Amelia. "She doesn't have practice today, does she?"

"I don't think so, not on the first day, anyway," Arthur said with a sigh. "That girl's always late. How were your classes?"

"Alright. And yours?"

"Not too bad. English will be good this year, I think," he said happily. "We're studying British literature this year."

"Your favorite," she teased, smiling even though he wasn't facing her.

He turned around in his seat, his eyes lighting up with excitement. "It's the best!" He said proudly. "We're starting with the Romantic era! You're the only one who understands, Maddie. I swear, half of our school is illiterate."

"Heh, I believe that," Maddie said softly, pulling out a paperback from her school bag to read while they waited for Amelia. Barely a minute later, there was a loud rapping on the window, startling both of its occupants.

Arthur sighed heavily and reached over to unlock the passenger door.

"Sorry I'm late," she apologized, crashing into the seat. "I got into an argument with this guy in my physics class about—well, it doesn't matter now. He was wrong. Hey, Artie, can we swing by McDonald's? All that work made me really thirsty for a Coke!"

Arthur started the car and rolled out of the parking lot in his rickety old car, flipping off Antonio and Francis, who pretended to run in front of his car before vanishing out of sight. "Idiots," he growled as they turned out onto the highway. "And no. I thought you said you were trying to lay off the sodas, Amelia."

"When did I say that?" She said indignantly. "How was your day, Maddie?" She asked, swiveling around to face her sister.

"Put your seat belt on."

"Ughhhhh—"

"It was good," Maddie said quietly. "I think I made a new friend."

"Aw, I'm proud," Amelia teased, grinning. "Oh, and I asked Antonio at lunch, and that Gillian girl was on my soccer team a few years ago! I'm gonna try to convince her to join the girl's soccer team here, and then we'll totally beat the guys! You'll come to our scrimmage this weekend, right?"

"Sure," Maddie said. "Why not?" She tried to imagine Gillian playing soccer. She had a pretty small frame, so she was probably pretty fast. Maddie didn't really care about soccer, but she liked to go to Amelia's games. She knew that it meant a lot to her. And Francis usually dragged her to the guy's soccer games to watch Antonio play, so she knew most of the team, even if they didn't know her. And maybe she'd see Gillian there. She smiled a little at the thought, and folded down the corner of her page for later reading. "I'll be there."

Please R&R if you like it uwu

Also, I want a cute French title for the story, but I can't think of any English phrases I really like enough to make them French. So if you have any suggestions, let me know! Nothing too strong though, like je t'aime. That's more serious than I'm going for. Oh, and in case the human names are confusing:

Maddie Williams: fem!Canada

Amelia Jones: fem!America

Arthur Kirkland: England

Francis Bonnefoy: France

Antonio Carriedo: Spain

Gillian Beilschmidt: fem!Prussia

Sakura Honda: fem!Japan

Carlos Suarez: Cuba

Madame Dubois: Monaco

Lovino Vargas: South Italy

Feliciana Vargas: fem!North Italy

Vash Zwingli: Switzerland

Ludwig Beilschmidt: Germany

I'm not sure how often everyone is going to be appearing, but these are just for reference, I do like to have minor characters lying around. There will probably (definitely) be some UK/fem!US, and some minor Spamano and Ger/fem!Ita too uwu And some one-sided FrUK, it seems...