Aces Wild (House of Cards Ser...

Grace knew that she shouldn't feel like laughing at her best friend after breaking his nose, and yet she was laughing so hard she was almost in tears. Of course, since her very sprained- but not actually broken- ankle continued to throb, part of those tears were justified. They weren't all mirth induced, but as Grace wiped them away, she knew no one would notice the painfilled ones amongst the laughter.

Nate had come out of the emergency room groaning and with his face taped up. Her little, harmless twitch; the slight impact of her rather dainty foot had broken his nose. Not just in once place though, hell not even in just two place, but in three different places. And they'd had a hell of a time resetting each one without making the others worse. Since Nathaniel Spade Vega was a heart breakingly good looking man; tape, a nose guard and swelling black eyes were not a look he wore well.

"You're laughing at me?" Nate demanded, his voice muffled and funny sounding. His normally muscial voice was strangely nasal and muffled, it only made Grace laugh harder.

"You shouldn't have made me sprain my ankle then." she finally retorted, still laughing a little but trying to calm down so the other people in the hospital would stop glaring at her. She didn't care what they thought of her but it was also a little strange to be laughing when surrounded by misery.

"Gracless, there isn't a power in this universe that could keep you from tripping over yourself." Nate retorted with a painful looking smirk.

"Nitwit, don't make me give you a concussion to go with your broken nose." Grace warned, glaring at him. She had her father's temper and when she heard both her own father, and Nate's, laughing at them, it killed her laughing mood.

"Are they mocking us?" Nate asked conversationally, their playful animosity abandonded as they prepared to face off against the fathers.

Of course, both Malcom Vega and Westley James Jr had faced down far scarier things than their own children, so neither man was exactly intimidated by the glares of their offspring. They both just grinned, reminding Grace of where her best friend got his damning good looks from. She never realized how much like her own father she looked, and the effect those stunning features had with her mother's colouration.

"Now now, don't be bitter. You two are both barely hurt. So if you promise not to act like brats, we'll even treat you to ice cream." Malcolm stated, his eyes glittering with laughter.

"We're not acting like brats! We're not acting like brats are we?" Nate objected immediately, then turned to look at Grace, the laughter in his eyes almost identical to his father's. It made Grace roll her own eyes, a near perfect imitation of her aunt Opi's usual gesture. "We can show them what acting like brats is actually like." Nate then added on and Grace snapped her eyes back to his, grinning since he couldn't without pain.

"Oh, can we ever do that!" Grace agreed and heard the elder Jamed and Vega both groan. As if they couldn't have anticipated this... Really it made Grace wonder what they had been laughing about earlier because both of their fathers were aware of the dangerous combination that was Nate's twisted sense of humour with Grace's cynical but intellectual nature.

"No! No, it's alright. I'll get you guys freaking sundae's just don't revert to four year olds." West immediately stated, managing to not swear as he spotted a small child near by.

"Yes! Ice cream!" Grace did a litle wiggle, not actually able to dance on the spot with her ankle throbbing. Sadly she'd rather put the ice cream to her leg than her mouth, but the dad's didn't need to know that. And she suspected that Nate would rather have it on his face than in it too. Served him right for starting the food fight in the first place! She shot a glare at her best friend, catching him raising his eyebrows at her and shamelessly staring at her ass and she raised a fist warningly, knowing that both dads had missed that little look. He was such a man-whore!

"Just promise me it'll be soft ice cream and I'm in too." Nate spoke up, hooking an arm around Grace's waist and looping hers over his shoulder. They'd left the crutches in the truck, and her best friend knew her well enough to know that she hated to be carried. And if her dad tried to help her, he would just pick her up like she was still a small child.

"If it's not soft, they can always microwave it for you." Grace replied with an awkward shrug.

"This is why I don't let you cook..." Nate muttered, not saying it quiet enough for her to miss though.

"I can flick your face if you'd like." Grace batted her eyelashes, trying not to grin too evilly as he shook his head quickly no.

"So what exactly prompted this round of best friend bashing?" Malcolm asked as he climbed into the passenger seat of West's truck, looking over his shoulder at Grace and Nate in the back seat.

"She started it." "He started it." Grace and Nate both said at the exact same time, in fact sounding as if they really were small children still instead of college students.

"Forget I asked. If you two don't kill each other, the war stories will certainly keep me entertained into my dotage." Malcolm said sarcastically. At 44 years old, he was a long way from being considered elderly, but he still cracked the old age jokes as often as anyone else in their strangely mixed families. Malcolm was five years older than West, and almost seven years older than Nate's mom, Alice. It prompted a lot of cradle robber jokes.

"Ha-ha dad, ha-ha." Nate said dryly, rubbing at his temple as the inevitable headache must have raged in his skull.

Now Grace did feel a little bad, not only for laughing at him, but for breaking his nose in the first place. It had been an accident, and she knew Nate didn't hold it against her, but it had to have sucked even more than her ankle. Grace rested her head on his shoulder, letting him use her head as a pillow in return while her dad drove them to the ice cream parlour. Sadly enough, this was not the first time this quartet had gone in to the Baskin 'N Robbins after a trip to the emergency room. It had all but become tradition itself with how frequently Grace ended up hurt, and the moment they hobbled in, the ice cream lady started to scoop out their go to favourites. It's a rather bad sign that they were in there that frequently that they didn't even have to order anymore....

Nate maneuvered Grace over to the table and got her seated before he walked over to the counter to grab the sundaes. Inevitably his bruised face made the girl behind the scoops act all sympathetic but for a chance Grace's best friend, the ultimate Cassanova, ignored the subtle-as-a-flamethrower flirtations and brought her the sundae without flirting back. She gave him a surprised look but Nate didn't seem to notice the shange in his own behaviour as he sat down next to her. Maybe his face hurt worse than he was letting on? The guilt suddenly swirling in her gut only added to the vaguely nauseated feeling the sprained ankle and the pain medication gave her, but Grace ate her ice cream, knowing that there wasn't a whole lot she could do about any of it now. She didn't mean to be so clumsy, and it was embarassing considering how graceful both of her parents were. But it definitely looked like that particular talent skipped a generation, because Grace earned her nickname of Graceless almost daily.

"So did you finish that photography assignment that's worth a million and a half percent of your mark?" Grace asked Nate, remembering him working on a weird ass portfolio for class. She never told him that he was a genuis behind the camera, but he knew it and she loved to look at the photos he took. More often than not he could sell them to a company like Hallmark and make a quick buck, although it wasn't something he really told anyone else about. Most girls never got to know the man behind the charming smile.

Nate looked down and away from her, something he almost never did and shrugged without answering. She knew the spoonful of ice cream he crammed into his mouth was just an excuse to delay his repsonse, which told her that he wasn't happy with his own work. That was about as surprising as seeing the sun rise everyday, Nate was able to compliment Grace's sketches and everyone elses work but never thought his own was any good. "Nitwit, do not make me steal your project and show it around to get a REAL opinion on it." Grace warned and he flashed her a startled, alarmed look. It made her blink, taking her back a second because he never looked like that. It was as if there was something in that project he didn't want her seeing, which of course only made her want to find the damn thing even more.

"It's going alright but I don't know if it's what the prof wants, you know?" Nate finally said, but Grace had the feeling that wasn't why he was hesitant about it. Still, she wasn't going to press him on the matter with their dads right there watching. It would be awkward as hell if he was reacting this way because he was taking pictures of all his lovers or something and didn't want to discuss the fact that he was a man whore in front of thier dads. Not that they didn't already know but still... weird. "So how goes your own winter finals project?" Nate switched the topic and Grace was more than fine with boring the hell out of him with an in depth discussion on the issues with her specific drawing technique and the project she had to complete.

It was actually a little embarassing when the ice cream clerk came over to flirt with Nate some more, all but interrupting Grace's conversation with her best friend. "I was just wondering if there was anything else I could do for you?" the girl asked, leaning over the table so that her already short skirt rode up more in the back. Grace felt her eyebrows jump up her face as both her father and Nate's started to try and not laugh at the young woman's blatant invitation.

And then Nate did something that made Grace nearly choke to death on her own ice cream, all while she tried to smother her laughter. "Don't you know it's rude to interrupt me while I'm on a date with my future wife?" he demanded cooly, clearly irritated with the girl's incessant flirting.

"F-future wife?" the girl squeaked, looking alarmed and surprised because he used to flirt with her before.

"Of course, why do you think our fathers are chaperoning. She's to be my wife as they arranged when we were just children. Thank you, now please go away." Nate said, turned back to Grace with a wink. She was slowly dying in the booth, trying very hard not to start laughing and give it all away as a big fat lie.

The girl looked nearly in tears and fled to the back room, making Nate look a little guilty at hurting her but by the Malcolm and West were already laughing and trying to keep it quiet, which only made the younger James and Vega start to laugh too. "We should go." West said, grinning as he ushered them all out before the girl could come back out and see them all in hysterics.

"You are a cruel, cruel man." Grace chided her best friend, laughing as she was helped into the back seat again.

"I'm sorry, but it was just getting annoying. I mean, how rude was that, her coming over to throw herself at me and interrupting you. I mean come on, take a look at me right now. Do I look like I want a tussle under covers? No I look like I need frozen peas in a bag on my face for the next day or so. I just..." Nate shook his head. It surprised Grace a bit, because in all honesty she had never seen him turn someone down like that before. Normally he was nicer but maybe even Nathaniel Spade Vega could get sick of the easy lay route?

"You do realize this means we can never go back in there again though right?" Grace pointed out, not even wanting to endure whatever angst filled sighing the girl would aim at him now.

"Unless you'd go in as my wife..." Nate wiggled his eyebrows jokingly and Grace snorted a very undelicate sound.

"You don't even date girls, let alone marry them Nitwit. You're the kind of guy who has a harem, not a wife." she replied, rolling her eyes at his ceaselessly joking nature. Thankfully their conversation was mostly disguised from the fathers' ears thanks to the radio being on. It was just too weird for any of the adults to get without making the assumption that the best friends were seriously flirting. It was just how they'd always been and Grace was sick of people trying to push them together like that.

"Yeah well right now I am seriosuly considering taking a sexual hiatus. Being around pretty girls seems to be bad for my health latetly." Nate groused, rasing his hand to his broken nose again. It made Grace almost blush, he complimented her often enough but it always caught her off guard. She wasn't what most people considered a normal, pretty girl. Nerdy and slender and constantly awkward, Grace knew that she was 'unique' not beautiful. But it was still nice to hear once in a while.

"You give up sex? Isn't that one of the signs of the coming apocalypse?" She teased, wondering what was making Nate act so, well mature suddenly.

"Probably. But hell, I could do with a little change of pace. And the extra sleep will certainly be appreciated." Nate admitted with a shrug.

"Huh.... I did not see that coming. Whatever will your date to the Fall Ball think?" Grace asked, wondering where the hell the Nate she was used to had gone. She wasn't complaining, it was nice to think that maybe he was growing up, he was supposed to be older than her after all, but it was a little out of left field.

"Actually I think I might not go this year. Just not... I don't know. I've already dropped the girl I was going to take and she's found another to take her." Nate shook his head with a slight scowl. Grace knew better than to press while their dads were within ear shot. He'd tell her the whole 온라인카지노게임 eventually, just not yet.

She grabbed her cell phone and texted him a message instead, even though he was sitting next to her. Best friend pow ow tonight. Something's eating at you and you won't be happy until you talk it out with the all wise and knowing guru Grace.

When Nate's cell phone rumbled the message, he shot her an amused look, probably already knowing what it is she was sending him. He still looked down at the message and grinned at her sarcastic name for herself. It was nice to see his good humour restored so easily, and it was the least Grace could do for her best friend after breaking his nose, again. This time in three places.