Kim Possible Friction

_**Friction**_

**By**: Serendipity

_i did not design this game _

_i did not name the stakes _

_i just happen to like apples _

_and i am not afraid of snakes _

**Ani DiFranco, 'Adam and Eve'**

* * *

**i.**

That first kiss with Ron is warm, and sweet, and like cotton candy at the Middleton fair: nostalgic and pretty and maybe just a little childish. Kim presses deeper and comes up empty- he can't breathe when she grabs for the edges of his shirt and pushes him in closer, and she feels the prickle, the ache of something when she comes away from a kiss feeling like there needs to be something more to this. And she does love him, it's not the lack of feeling.

It's like she's driving down a highway in a race car, but she's only doing twenty. She wants the scenery speeding by, the wind racing its fingers through her hair, wants blood singing in her veins. Adrenaline rush.

She wants more than the play of hands and the smiles, quiet kisses in the halls. It's like this: they're two things with edges that are a mix of rounded and jagged- they won't blend in. They bump against each other, trying to fit. Sometimes it works, but when she wants something (_harder faster stronger_) less careful than what she has, she wishes for that flow. That energy.

* * *

**ii.**

Shego has touched her breast once- butterfly-light with the back of her hand as she tied her up, an accident. Kim felt an electric shock at the contact and her throat closed tightly, but Shego just moved on to Ron with efficient knot-tying fingers. Just a slip of the hand. So why can't she forget it?

Why a girl, she thinks, why Shego?

Why her?

* * *

**iii.**

Sex.

When she thinks about it, she thinks in bright red tones of passion. Nothing concrete, or detailed, not yet. She's still thinking about lips opening in surrender, about grip rough enough to add just an edge to an embrace. About how Ron takes it so slow, so gentle, so nervous, when she wants to push him down and- well, she'll scare him, and she doesn't even know what she wants to do with him.

She thinks about the strength in his boy hands, the curve of muscle in his shoulders…she thinks about battle, and punches, and blows exchanged like a series of staccato notes. Green sparks, green skin-hugging fabric and hips grinding into hers, arms pinning her down, her hair in her mouth and her breath coming harsh and ragged. The weight of a body on hers, and the warmth of skin against skin.

She doesn't realize what she's thinking until her body reacts to it, the strange heat in her stomach and the twist in her throat.

Kim doesn't know what she wants, really.

* * *

**iv.**

They're holding hands and he's talking about- well, she doesn't know, actually- but she's thinking about speed again, and how it relates to this. Kinetic energy and friction, scientific terms for what she wants to feel in a burst of heat like a lightning strike from her heart to her center. It's all so alien to her anyway, how it starts out with sparks and butterflies and explodes into this- this untouchable need.

Need is the word, more than want. Need. _Desire_. It's a word with sibilants and adult meanings she's just beginning to touch.

She wants to ask what he needs, or if he does. Maybe it's just her. Well, they've had different priorities to begin with, haven't they? She's always been the one who _does_ the stuff, the action, the fighting. He's fine with the sidelines, she needs the challenge and the excitement. Is there something wrong with this? Something wrong with her?

By now he's finishing up about his latest struggle with garage-cleaning, and her fingers clench involuntarily around his. Reminds herself there's nothing in the world she wants more than this.

Still, her heart beats faster at the tone of her kimmunicator.

* * *

**v.**

Sometimes she's thought of flying just for the wild, joyful exuberance of flight. Freefall for the heart-leaping pull on her body, and sparring just to feel that tense, razor's edge struggle. With someone she can let go with- no taking it gentle, but running it to the limit and far beyond. Those thoughts follow her everywhere now, an itch just out of reach.

Maybe that's natural. She's seventeen, she's young (_and restless_), the age where she's supposed to be fearless, convinced of invincibility. Yes, she's stood on top of mountains and battled titans and won, and saved and saved and battled more. Invincible.

So why does she feel like she's being disassembled?

* * *

**vi.**

Wait, she thinks. Wait.

The light of Drakken's inventions flicker green, white, red, just beyond the boxes she's hidden herself behind. It's thoughts like these that make her distracted. They creep in and play themselves across her mind like a continuous reel of cinema tape- images, feelings, sensation pulled from her memories. She might think of the plan: concrete, detailed, perfect…but it is the little things that bog her down.

The touch of a hand on her shoulder that brings flesh memories of fingernails, the sight of black hair flying out like a banner in the wind. She thinks of those hands moving further down than shoulder level, relaxed instead of balled into fists, and the sharp tickle of fingernails on the inner thigh. It helps to think of this as an experimental phase- aren't those supposed to happen? It's not right, to think like this, about this girl in particular, but her mind gets caught on the curve of black-glossed lips. ( _she __doesn't know what she wants, really._)

Distracted again. Always with the distractions. When her thoughts travel, she brings them sharply back to reality. Focus, she thinks, the mission, defeating Drakken, going home. Her thoughts refuse to obey this simple logic.

* * *

**vii.**

Happiness is a night without waking up crying out for something she can't name. There is very little light at three AM, and she sits in the puddle of bed sheets, her heart beating to the rhythm of 'no, no, no, yes, no, yes, no."

* * *

**viii.**

It finally gets in the way of the mission when she hesitates (_hesitates!_) before landing a blow. When she gets caught up in the act of wrestling Shego and finds she's having difficulty breathing even though Shego's hands aren't anywhere near her throat.

"What's the matter, Kimmie?" she sneers, "Losing your touch?"

She snarls and hits her. Hard. Harder than she's hit anyone before, and it sends Shego flying into the wall, arm curled over her stomach protectively. She slides to the floor, rolls to a crouch- but Kim gets there before she can spring to her feet and come up with blazing fists. The second punch lands harder, like she wants to feel a bone crack under her knuckles, or flesh bruise beneath her fingertips. Shego's smile is like oil on flames- it sinks into the cracks in her self control and bursts outward.

For a while, she loses everything in the rush of anger and the flurry of blows- striking to the shoulder, gripping legs and arms and scrabbling to get free. Her heartbeat starts the rhythm again, faster, louder, a war dance of pounding drums and blood rushing through her. It's almost savage.

Shego manages to tackle her, pins an arm behind her back and laughs. "Did I hit a nerve?"

"Don't touch me," she says, and knocks her back. Kicks her away, desperate this time, and stands there with her stomach a burning hollow and her fists raised in self-protection. Because she _wants_, yes, she wants so badly it's freaking her out. This is a weakness, and she knows better than to expose any underbelly to a predator like Shego. Her eardrums are pounding (_that rhythm, no, no, no, yes, no, yes, touch, don't touch_…) and she waits for the next move.

* * *

**ix.**

In the end, they capture her alone and tie her to one of Drakken's villain-y pieces of lair architecture. It's a minor setback, really, if it wasn't for Shego leaning against the pipe and getting in her face. Ron is late, too damn late getting here and damn homework and after school activities, and damn her decision to take this one simple mission alone. What was she thinking? Why can't she _think _lately? And does Shego really have to lean that close when she's taunting her? She's almost close enough that if she tilts her head forward, moves her shoulders just enough- but she doesn't think about it. Very pointedly she does not _think_ about that.

Shego doesn't seem to notice her discomfort at all- or if she does, she's decided it's only natural for having been caught so early, so easily, and so thoroughly. "A little quiet tonight, aren't you?" she says, an inch away from her face, and she can catch every movement of her lips as she talks, the delicate curl of her tongue, "What's the matter? Missing your little boyfriend? Isn't this the part where you break free and thwart our evil schemes?"

Kim stays motionless, not trusting her body to move, and Shego laughs. "Right. I thought not." Her hand is right by her face, and she is so close, too close, and Kim squeezes her eyes shut because she doesn't want to think- doesn't want her to see…

"Eyes on the prize, Kimmie," Shego says, and yanks her chin up.

"But I don't want to look at you," she says stupidly, like that's any kind of comeback at all, and her damn body is leaning _into _Shego trying to push itself against her, and this close she swears she can hear her heartbeat. She can _taste_ her on her breath, her fingers on her chin and her hair so close to her face it's like a curtain. Kim's breath is coming quickly, harshly, and she's definitely not thinking at all when she shoves her face against Shego's and finds her lips and presses hers against them hard as she can. Opens her mouth and pants and tastes bitter and salt and licks it all out, her mind empty and racing because she can't be thinking. Can't be thinking at all.

One kiss and Shego pulls herself away like she's touched poison, her expression unreadable as she scrubs her mouth with the back of her hand and whirls away without a word. Kim squeezes her eyes shut.

Then she gets out her laser-beam lipstick and slices through the ropes.

* * *

**x.**

Kim doesn't say 'forget this', or 'this never happened'. She doesn't say anything.

After a while, she tries washing Shego out of her skin, her lips, her mouth. It's impossible, she's seeped into her skin, into her veins, somewhere deep enough that no amount of exfoliation can rub her out. One stupid mistake, and she keeps replaying it in her mind at night or classes, anywhere she has free time to think. She remembers with such vivid clarity that sometimes it's like she can feel the breath on her face. Don't think, she tells herself, don't _think_.

What a dumb idea. Not thinking is how she got into this mess.

She thinks: the worst part of this is the consequences of it all. How can she be expected to fight her with this hanging over her head? With the burn of her lips still on her mouth? What if she told Ron? Ron, who was her best friend before she'd ever accepted him as her boyfriend? Ron, who was easy enough to crush if you picked the right pressure points? She's not a fool. She knows she is a sensitive spot for him- a pressure point right on his heart. But that's not even the first thing she thought of, and that makes her chest constrict and her throat burn with guilt.

She thinks: Oh, god, what if she tells Drakken? What if they're both just laughing about it now? About Kimmie and her teenage, closeted crush? They would, too. They would shove it in her face just to watch her squirm and laugh and laugh at poor, conflicted Kim Possible. And the humiliation, the expectation of it so tangibly in the future, makes her bury her head in the covers. It still isn't her first thought- not the heartbreak, the ridicule, the pain. Not the awkwardness of fighting someone she kissed.

She thinks: what if it happens again?

She thinks: what if I _want_ it to happen again?

It feels like something planted seeds in her stomach and they sprouted into vines, curling through her body and wrapping around her brain. Like she's only reached the edge of something and her body is just waiting for her to topple into the canyon. She feels too young, too new, too stretched out, and every nerve in her body is lit up in neon. Kim doesn't even know what she is anymore, and it all starts with a touch, a flush of heat, a kiss.

Shego, she thinks, Shego, Shego.

"Shego," she says. The name curls around her tongue, making it hard to swallow_._

_

* * *

_

**fin.**

Author's Note: I have no idea what possessed me to write this. I blame far too many rewatchings of old Kim Possible episodes. I kind of liked the idea of adrenaline junkie Kim with all this sexual confusion, and Shego- well, we don't see Shego's side in this fic, really, but I had her reactions planned out, too. Might have to do another.


End file.

Kim Possible, Drama, Romance