"Lucy, can you hurry it up? I'm not getting any younger out here!"

Lynn waited for Lucy outside the beach locker room with her arms folded and her foot tapping. This wasn't the first time Lucy had kept her waiting; she was notoriously poky when it came to changing clothes. But this time around, she was stalling Lynn on what was shaping up to be her best day of the summer. Ever since late spring, she'd been hitting the gym hard and watching what she ate, in order to build a pitch perfect, photographable beach bod. Not only did her efforts produce some impressive results, but by a stroke of luck, her family and Francisco - the boy of her dreams - picked the exact same day to pay one last visit to Aloha Beach before summer came to a close.

It was as though all the stars aligned in her favor. Fate rewarded her for keeping up her exercise and diet regimen by providing her with an opportunity to win over her crush...

...which made it all the more maddening that it was taking Lucy this long to change into a simple swimsuit.

"You can go," Lucy called from inside. "I'll catch up with you."

Lynn rolled her eyes. "Fine. But if you get lost, I'm not gonna let you pin it on me."

With that, she turned about and jogged onto the beach, decked out in her favorite bikini that revealed all of the results of her hard work. Lean, sculpted and toned, with hardly a trace of body fat... if this didn't get Francisco to swoon, nothing would.

Speaking of swooning, Lynn felt her heart skip a beat as soon as she caught sight of him wading into the water. It didn't take long; his smooth, metallic black hair and bronzed skin were unmistakable. He was clad in nothing but a pair of sky blue swim trunks, putting his own rather impressive musculature on display. Lynn had to resist the urge to faint.

Come on, Lynn, she thought, trying to shake off her feelings of lovesickness. This is the moment you've been preparing for all summer. It's now or never.

"Hey, 'Cisco!" she hollered as soon as he was within range.

Francisco looked over towards Lynn and gave her a wave. A split second later, his eyes burst open with shock and his jaw fell slack, as if he'd just seen a supermodel strutting onto the beach.

"Good gravy!" he cried.

Lynn chuckled, puffing out her chest. "Pretty impressive, huh?" she asked. "I've been hitting the gym hard for the-"

"No, not you," Francisco interrupted, pointing to Lynn's left. "Her."

Lynn's smile disappeared. Her? Her who?

Lynn looked to the side to see Lucy, who had just managed to catch up with her. The first thing she noticed was that Lucy had opted for a two-piece swimsuit, in lieu of her usual one-piece. The second thing - somewhat related to the first - was that she had the most ripped set of abs that Lynn had ever seen on anyone. Eight distinct, striated abdominal blocks, separated with indentations that looked deep enough to trap someone's finger in, and lined with visible obliques on each side.

"L-Lucy!" Lynn yelped. "You...you...your... your a-a-a-a-a..."

While Lynn was stunned into incoherence, Francisco spoke up again. "They're incredible, Lucy! How'd you do it?"

"Eh? What are you talking about?" asked Lucy, before following his gaze down to her marble-chiseled tummy. "Oh, those. I learned some exercises from Haiku's brother. He's a personal trainer."

"Since when?!" cried Lynn. "How come you never told me that you were interested in working out?!"

"I did tell you," said Lucy. "You just didn't listen. You never listen."

Lynn was about to object, until her mind conjured up all of the times in the past she sat in her room and let Lucy ramble on while she just tuned her out. In her defense, she had little interest in Lucy's long-winded monologues about poetry or vampires or the inevitability of death, but it wasn't impossible that some errant line about her hitting the gym slipped through the cracks.

"Well, whatever he's teaching you is working wonders," said Francisco, punctuating his sentence with an impressed whistle. He took cautious steps towards Lucy, hunching over to bring his face closer to her Adonis-caliber stomach. "I know this may sound a little forward, but can I..."

Lynn's throat clenched up in anticipation of what was to come. He wouldn't. He couldn't.

"...can I touch them?"

Lynn's sense of dignity was the only thing preventing her from throwing a fit right there on the sand. She had spent the ride to the beach daydreaming about Francisco posing that request to her, and now she had to stand by and watch while her mousy little sister lived out her fantasy in front of her. The only consolation was that Lucy would probably say no, since she usually disliked being touched, particularly by-

"Sure. Go ahead."

Are you kidding me?!

Lynn's mouth was left agape at that response- and the gap widened further a moment later, when she saw Lucy put her hands behind her head and tense her tummy. All of those striations and ridges looked even more pronounced, and Francisco had to stifle a squeal of glee.

I... I thought she already was flexing!

Francisco rubbed his fingers up and down her abdominals, marveling as they rippled in response to his touch. "God, th-they're like cobblestones..." he babbled.

"Thanks. I'm proud of them. It's nice to know that I can take a punch if I have to."

"A punch?! I bet bullets would bounce off those babies!"

Lynn, whose envy had risen to the point where it was starting to induce a headache, tried to cut in. "Yeah, well, anyway, I was thinking that maybe you and I could-"

"In a minute, Lynn," interrupted Francisco. "Lucy, you've gotta tell me your secret! What's your daily routine like?"

As Francisco and Lucy continued to engage in conversation, Lynn found her eyes lingering on her little sister- for she noticed that, in her quest to tone her stomach, Lucy hadn't neglected the rest of her body. She had plump, powerful-looking thighs and calves, impressively wide lats and shoulders, and thick, toned biceps with pronounced peaks. Even her chest was showing some signs of muscular development. With her pale white complexion, she looked like the ghost of an olympic-level gymnast.

Lynn had managed to tune out most of their conversation - both because she couldn't bear to hear any more of Francisco's fawning and because she was that awestruck by Lucy's startling development. But just when she was convinced that things couldn't get any worse, the following line from Francisco cut through her selective filter:

"Anyway, I was thinking of taking a walk along the beach. Wanna come with me?"

Lucy smiled. "Sure."

That one raspy half-whispered syllable sent a dagger through Lynn's heart. "But- but I thought- you and I-"

"Sorry, Lynn," said Francisco, who continued to keep his eyes on Lucy. "But I think I'd rather we just stay friends. Come on, Lucy, let's get going!"

Lucy wrapped her arms around Francisco and lifted him up into a cradle, as easily as she would a toddler. She then strolled down the shore with the love of Lynn's life in tow, forcing her to watch as her crush was literally stolen away from her. Filled with despair, she dropped to her knees, raised her fists towards the heavens, and howled, "NOOOOOOOOOOO!"

...and then she woke up in her bed, panting, her pajamas damp with sweat.

In a panic, her eyes darted all around her bedroom, until they focused on the subject of her nightmare: her roommate Lucy, sleeping peacefully. At least, she seemed to be sleeping. For all Lynn knew, she could have just been lying there with her eyes open.

Regardless, Lynn wouldn't be able to get back to sleep until she reassured herself that she was back in reality. She crept up to Lucy's bed, grasped her pajama shirt, and drew it back like a curtain, revealing her stomach. To Lynn's immense relief, it was slender, but had virtually no muscular definition. She heaved out an enormous sigh, pulled Lucy's shirt back down and slumped back to her bed.

Lucy, who had been stirred from slumber by Lynn's disturbance, allowed herself a single thought before drifting back to sleep:

I'm not even gonna ask.