"Heey, Arooohaa!" Christian called as he jumped up on the porch of his best friend's airy cottage. It was a hot Australian day out, and the screen door was left open. He walked into the house as if he owned the place (which he did not) but it was okay; him and Aroha had this kind of relationship, they were practically closer than family. Christian called her name again, but still received no answer. He then spotted the Kiwi's pet bird rest on the kitchen counter. It appeared as if the bird had been…crying?

"Hey, Ira, where's Aroha?" Christian asked. The kiwi bird shrugged and nodded towards the stair case. The Australian focused on where Ira was gesturing and noticed that the TV could be heard blaring from the basement. He rolled his eyes. "She's still upset over that, huh?"

Christian bounded down the stairs to find Aroha sitting curled up on the couch in the dark. Her face was stained with tears, and her greenish eyes were glued to the TV, which was playing one of the Lord of the Rings movie.

"Nine companions. So be it. You shall be the fellowship of the ring."

"Great! Where are we going ?" said one of the characters on the screen. Christian sighed when he noticed that Aroha was holding a framed picture of a smiling girl and a fluffy sheep. The girl was Aroha. He went up to her and put a hand on her shoulder, squeezing gently.

"Zea, are you still upset about Knox?" he asked cautiously. She nodded softly, a fresh wave of tears coming on. Christian sighed again, knowing that this was going to be difficult.

"Zea, I know that you cared a lot about Knox, but for crying out loud he was a sheep. A freaking sheep. It's not that big of a deal. There are other sheeps out there, okay?"

"'Sheeps'?" Aroha looked up, cocking one eyebrow. Christian rolled his eyes.

"Sure. Sheeps. Sheep. Whatever. There's a lot of sheep out there, okay, Zea? Besides…you're New Zealand, you have like 70 different flocks of sheep. It's not the big of a deal."

"You don't understand, Oz! Knox was my favorite sheep! We did everything together! We even showered together sometimes! I loved Knox! And now he's dead!" Aroha, the embodiment of the nation of New Zealand, cried. Christian, or Australia, facepalmed.

"Okay, yes, I do understand that you really, really loved-"

"Really, really, really loved…"

"Yeah, sure. And you're sad that he's gone, but you can't stay down here in the dark and watch Lord of the Rings all day with a picture of a dead sheep," he argued. Aroha shrugged. "Seriously, Zea, Ira's waiting for you to come upstairs. He feels neglected." Aroha did not respond. Finally, Australia's fuse grew short and he became fed up with his southern neighbor. He grabbed New Zealand's hand and lifted her up off the couch, practically dragging her up the stairs.

"Hey – what're you-? There was a whole marathon of Lord of the Rings on, you can't just take me away from my pride and joy!" she snapped at him. Christian rolled his eyes.

"Yes, yes I can. Come on, I'm taking you somewhere fun," he said.

"Where?"

"I'm not sure where yet. Where's some place fun that you like to go to?"

"I don't know," the Kiwi pouted. The two of them stood on the porch now, facing each other. Aroha looked away and scratched her cheek. A bead of sweat formed on her forehead. It was soooo hot oooooout…

"Take me to get ice cream."

"Okay."

So the Aussie took his friend to George's Great Ice Cream, a small but friendly store full of ice cream down by a little beach. Christian came here often and knew the owner well, so they got a discount price on their frozen treats.

"So, what are you going to get?" he asked Aroha when they entered the shop. She observed the different flavors for a long time before turning to him.

She said, "I think I'll just have original." Christian shrugged.

"Well, that's no fun," he chuckled. Then he turned to George who appeared to be personally running the shop today. "I'll have a large cone with the napoleon ice cream, the chocolate mint, and the strawberry. And sprinkles on top of that." Aroha snorted. Christian turned to her. "Hm?"

"Have you been hanging around Alfred lately by any chance?" she smirked. "Besides, those are like the most common trio of flavors to get if you're gonna get three scoops."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, if you've ever noticed when they have pictures of ice cream with three scoops, it's mainly the three flavors of mint, strawberry and napoleon."

"What? No it's not. It's strawberry, chocolate and vanilla."

"No, they never have strawberry as one of the three main advertised ice cream scoops. It's always napoleon. Always," Aroha argued. Christian still disagreed so they commenced to bicker about the pointless subject, leaving George standing there with their ice cream until it started to melt.

"Uhm…Aroha, Chris, I have your ice cream…" he said. Aroha looked up.

"Oh. Thank you, George!" she said, turning to run out the door. Suddenly, she seemed a lot more cheerful. It must be the ice cream, Christian thought, chasing after her and smiling. They sat on outside on the porch of the shop, eating up their ice cream in silence.

"Mm…mine's melting…" Aroha pouted.

"It was already half melted when you got it," Christian answered, blushing slightly. She was kind of cute was she had that pouty look on her face.

"Why?"

"Because you had to stop and argue with me about ice cream advertisements." Christian sighed. Then he noticed another shop along the beach next to the ice cream one. It was a surf shop. He grinned. "Hey, Zea, you like surfing, right?"

"Psh, of course! I am New Zealand after all; surfing is just one of my things. And I know that you really like surfing to, Aussie. Why?"

"Because I think we should go surfing today," he told her. Aroha beamed. So, after finishing their ice cream they raced each other back home to put on their swimsuits and get their boards.

"Wooohooo!" Aroha shouted as she rode atop one of the waves. Christian looked over at her and grinned. There were some really good waves up for riding today, and both of them took full advantage of that fact. But the only thing with having good waves meant that it was windy, and when it was windy out that could mean a storm. And a storm it meant indeed.

"Hey, Chris, I think we should probably head back now!" Aroha called to him. He shrugged.

"Yeah, I guess. But wait – look! I have to ride some of the waves coming up before we go, they're really big," he answered. The Kiwi rolled her eyes. Whatever. But while there were still waves good for riding, you might as well ride them.

But before either of them knew it, there was a full out storm. Lightning flashed in menacing chains across the sky and thunder cried violently as it started to rain. Aroha shook her head. "Aussie, we should've gone to shore when I said so! Then we wouldn't be stuck in the rain!" she snapped as they paddled to shore on their boards. Christian just grinned at her. He had seen the look on her face while riding those last couple waves, and he knew that she enjoyed the hell out of it, and didn't regret a thing. He could just tell. Aroha couldn't help but smirk back a little bit.

"It's really cold out," she said, rubbing at her arms as if she could rub away the goose bumps on her arms. "We should stay at the surf shop over there so we don't have to run home in the rain." Christian nodded in agreement. The only thing though, was that the surf shop was now closed.

"Well, shit." So, it did turn out that Aroha and Christian had to run home in the freezing rain. Since Aroha's house was closer to the beach, it was silently decided that they would both stay there until the storm let up. Aroha would always be ready to take Christian in, and she knew that he wouldn't hesitate to do the same for her. They held the surf boards over their heads as makeshift umbrellas as the duo sprinted through the storm. After setting the boards on the Kiwi's porch, they quickly made their way into the cottage and retrieved a butt load of towels from the bathroom. The two of them sat on her couch, soaking, wrapped up in several towels each, both of them with chattering teeth. Christian was able to recover from the cold more quickly than Aroha, so he offered to prepare some hot chocolate for both of them. Because Christian was just nice like that.

"Ah-ah-ah-ahCHOO!" Aroha sneezed. She sniffled and soon started couching. Her friend chuckled and walked into the living room where she sat.

"It sounds like you're getting sick. Maybe I should make some chicken noodle soup instead?" Aroha nodded when Christian said this. She laid her head down on the arm of the couch and closed her eyes as he went back into the kitchen to start the soup. After about a minute, sneezing could be heard from the kitchen as well. Aroha laughed to herself a little and lumbered into the room, pushing Christian out of the way and taking over the process of making soup.

"I can't have you sneezing in my soup and making me all sick, Chris," she said. Ironically, after she said this a big sneeze escaped from her nose. The Australian giggled, before sneezing himself.

"You're a little hypocrite, you know that, right?" he said, putting his hand on his friend's forehead. It was warm – warmer than it should be. "You're the one with the fever." Aroha shrugged and then held her wrist up to Christian's forehead.

"You're forehead it hot, too! I guess we're both sick." She turned away and folded her arms. "This is your entire fault, Aussie, if you hadn't insisted we stay out there longer then neither of us would be sick!"

" Haha, but you can't deny you had fun!" he bickered cheerfully. The Kiwi put on her famous pouty face. Christian smiled to himself contentedly. "If you want, you can go lay down and I'll finish making the soup. Then we can both have some." Aroha shook her head.

"No way! I can't have you getting all your germs in my soup! I'll stand here and make sure you don't ruin it," she said irritably. But they both knew that she didn't really mean it – Aroha got grumpy sometimes, but most of the time it was all in good humor and everything was fine. Christian chuckled to himself, amused at his friend's antics. When the soup was done, they sat at the table and ate it in silence. After they were done with their warm meal, Aroha's eyes could barely stay open; her eyelids weighed over sea green orbs like bricks.

"Come on," Christian said, picking up Aroha bridal style. "You're going to bed." She frown.

"Stupid…I'm not a little baby, you know…you're being really immature…" she grumbled all the way to her room. Christian gently set her down on the bed.

"Anything else you need, Aroha?"

"No," she replied bitterly. Christian smiled and climbed in bed with her. He wrapped her in his arms and held her gently.

"What are you doing, stupid?" Aroha was always this grumpy when she got tired.

"You said you don't need anything else, and I was already here so it's nice to know that you need me, Zea." He dared to kiss her forehead. The Kiwi's face turned bright red.

"Y-yeah, well! Uhm…" She couldn't think of anything to say, so she just curled up into Christian's side, hiding her head beneath his chin. "Well then, uh…thank you for a great day today, Australia," she muttered softly.

"Don't mention it, mate. I had lots of fun, too."

"Po Marie…"

"Good night."