The swoosh of the automatic doors was followed by a blast of heat and from outside that cut through the store's A/C. Lapis sighed as she heard another loud group enter the store, laughing and shouting, and clearly enjoying their summer. She wished that she had her clunky headphones. She could put on music and just drown out the sound of every obnoxious kid and tourist that came into Beach City Petz, which was remarkable for only such an awful name.

Just then she heard her manager, Jasper, shouting at the new kid from across the store.

And its awful boss, she amended.

The job wasn't all bad. Sure the pay was bad, and hauling dog food made her entire body sore, and dealing with customers sucked, but she got to work with animals. And animals was what Lapis loved more than anything else. When she was younger, she would wade out into the ocean just to see what she could find. She didn't really do that anymore.

Her thoughts were interrupted by a persistent tap. She looked down to see a kid somewhere between the ages of eight and fourteen (kids weren't her deal, ok?) with curly brown hair and a pink t-shirt with a star on it.

"Excuse me," he said. "I'm looking for someone that can help us with the fish."

She sighed. "Yeah, I'll be there in just a second."

He smiled up at her like she had just promised him a puppy. "Sounds great!" He stuck out his hand. "I'm Steven."

"I'm Lapis," she said, shaking his hand.

"I know! I saw on your name tag. Lapis is a really pretty name. It sounds like the name of a queen or something."

Whoever this Steven kid was, he was a charmer. She laughed. "Come on, Steven. Let's see how I can help you."

When they walked over to where the fish were, she realized that Steven must have been a part of the group she heard walk in earlier. There was five others, a tall girl that looked more or less like the same age as Steven, and then four women who all looked so different, she couldn't imagine in what situation they had met each other.

"Hey, guys. This is Lapis. She's going to help us get my fish. Lapis, this is Connie, Pearl, Garnet, Amethyst, and- Hey! Where's Peridot?"

"Oh you know her. She's probably having a conversation with a poodle right about now," Amethyst said. "Well, it looks like you've got enough help, Steven, so I'm going to go look around."

Lapis shot her a glance, but decided not to say anything. She had a feeling that she would be reorganizing the back section of the store after Amethyst left. This was Lapis' fourth summer working at Beach City Petz, and she had long ago figured out which customers were going to make her life ten times more difficult.

As Amethyst passed Lapis, she gave her a high five, "Hey, shorty club!"

"Shorty club," Lapis repeated returning the high five. Never hurt to pay respect to a fellow shorty.

"Amethyst, don't eat anything," Pearl called out after her. "It's all food for animals."

"I'm just going to see if there's samples," Amethyst called out, not bothering to turn around.

Peal groaned, but did not seem immediately concerned.

By now, the girl was trying to get Steven's attention. "Steven! Look, these are african cichlids," she said tapping on the name taped below the tank. "Aren't they beautiful?"

"Woah," he breathed, face pressed against the glass. Then his attention latched on to the tank on the top shelf. "What's up there? I can't see anything."

Before Lapis could respond, Garnet picked him up, putting him on her shoulders so that he could see.

Lapis gaped at her. She didn't know much (Ok, anything) about kids, but she knew that there was no way that Steven weighed as little as she had made it seem. Apparently sensing Lapis' incredulous look, Garnet calmly explained, "He wanted to see up here."

"That's fair," Lapis said uncomfortably. What else do you say to a woman holding a ten (fifteen?) year old and wearing sunglasses inside?

Just then, loud breathing caught her attention. When she turned to see what the sound was, she saw someone even shorter than girl that was probably eating dog food right about now. This girl had an odd, triangular haircut, and that was about all she could see because the girl had her face pressed up to the glass, staring at the zebra fish.

"Can I help you?" Lapis asked. Great, now on top of the weird family she was already helping, there was this mouth breather. No, literally a mouth breather. She was fogging up the glass.

"Hey! Lapis, you found Peridot!"

At the sound of their names, both Lapis and Peridot turned around to face Steven, who was now back on the ground, and then when they saw where he was pointing, turned back around to look at each other.

Peridot sized her up and down for a second. "What's wrong with your hair?" She said flatly. Before Lapis could respond, Peridot was turning back to the fish. Lapis touched her blue hair self consciously.

"Don't take it personally," Steven said. "She's like that with everybody."

Suddenly, a phone was ringing. When Garnet answered, everyone became very quiet, even Steven and his friend. "We'll be there in just a minute," Garnet said, and then she hung up.

"Well?" Pearl said anxiously. Pearl struck Lapis as the kind of person who did everything anxiously.

"We need to go," Garnet said. "Steven, I'm sorry, but we need to get your fish another time."

He nodded. "It's ok. Let's go."

Pearl quickly herded them back towards the front of the store. Amethyst reappeared among the shelves of filters and fish food. "I feel sick," she complained.

"I don't want to know why," Pearl snapped.

"It's not dog food," Amethyst protested. "I think I just had too much catnip."

"Oh for the love of-"

Lapis watched in a daze as the group left as quickly as they had come, bickering loud.

Peridot was on some sort of device that looked like a cross between a cell phone and a calculator, muttering to herself as she followed the group. Lapis gave her a stony look as she passed her.

"Have a good day," Lapis called.

No response.

She sighed and went back to sorting boxes of hamster bedding.

A few days passed before Lapis saw Steven or his entourage again, and she was beginning to think that they might not come back after all. Her disappointment was compounded by the last few hours which had included some teenagers knocking over a display, a ferret getting loose, and a curly blonde guy staring at the reptiles for over an hour. This last event would not have been particularly note worthy, except that when she walked past him, she heard him whispering something about "sneople" to their albino cornsnake.

She heard thumping from the front of the store, followed by a growl. The cash register was now only working half the time, and Jasper was convinced that brute strength was the only solution. Lapis had learned the previous summer to not offer helpful suggestions, such as buy a new cash register.

"LAPIS!" Jasper yelled. The intercom was also out of commission. Lapis rolled her eyes as she headed to the check out counter. She feared and was annoyed by Jasper in equal parts, and she had found that the best way to avoid both emotions was by avoiding Jasper entirely. Especially outside of work, but that was a different story.

There was short line forming at the counter. The new kid looked unabashed, but from the way that Jasper was glaring at him, he had messed up big time. Lapis didn't know his name, but his head was kind of weird white blob, so she just called him Onion in her head.

"Where have you been? I need this register open," Jasper said, punctuating the last word with another smack to the register.

Lapis squinted at the dented register, "What do you want me to do about it?"

Jasper gave a bark like laugh. "I want you to get it open."

Jasper had made fun of Lapis' "puny little arms" the first time Lapis offered to fix the register, but after she had managed to open it in mere seconds, Jasper had shut up. For the moment, anyway. Now anytime that it stuck, she demanded that Lapis stop everything to come fix it.

Lapis sighed, but she slipped her fingers around the edge of the register. Sometimes it caught on something, and Lapis was the only one whose fingers were small enough to fit. Usually this worked, but she couldn't seem to find what was causing the problem.

"What's taking so long?" Jasper growled. "We've got customers waiting."

"It's ok," one customer offered. "I'm in no rush."

Jasper glared at her. "Did I ask you?"

The customer shrank and did not say anything after that.

Lapis was still struggling with the register when she heard, "Hey, Lapis!"

She smiled, turning to see Steven with just one person this time. Ugh, it was Zebra Fish.

Even so, she would rather be with Zebra Fish than Jasper, so she quickly moved over to them. "Hi Steven!" She said. "Ready to pick out your fish today?"

"Yes!" He said, jumping into the air, fist pumped. Lapis smiled again and ruffled his hair. God, why couldn't all kids be like him?

For behind her, Jasper cursed and punched the register again.

"What's wrong with her?" Zebra Fish asked.

"Oh, we can't get the register open," Lapis said, gesturing behind her. "It happens all the time."

"Well maybe Peridot can help," Steven said. "She's really good with machines and stuff."

Peridot preened. "I am quite good, aren't I?" She said. "Let me take a look at it."

Before even Jasper could say anything, Peridot was over at the register. "Hmm," she said. "Well with this ancient machinery, no wonder you're having problems."

She continued to push buttons, and shimmy the register around. Seemingly out of no where she took out a screw driver.

"Um," Lapis whispered to Steven. "Is she cackling. Steven shrugged, apparently used to this kind of behavior.

Suddenly the register shot open, nailing Peridot, who was eye level with the register, in the face. There wasn't time for anyone to offer her a hand up, or even ask if she was alright, because of a sudden crickets came pouring out of the register, and customers started screaming.

Jasper turned slowly and looked at Onion. A cricket hit her chest before it fell to the floor. She crushed it under her boot without taking her eyes off of him.

"You better run," Jasper said between gritted teeth. Without a word, Onion took off with Jasper only a few steps behind him, shouting at Lapis, "You better have this cleaned up by the time I get back!"

The customers followed suit, running out the automatic doors to their cars. Lapis couldn't blame them. No amount of fish food was worth this, especially when they could just order it online or something.

"Peridot! Are you ok?" Steven asked, helping a woozy Peridot sit up. She squinted at the floor. "Steven, I think I'm seeing things."

"Well if you're seeing crickets, then you're doing just as fine as the rest of us," Steven responded cheerfully.

Lapis felt tears well up in her eyes. How the hell was she supposed to get this store cleaned up? It was teaming with bugs, and the people standing in line had dropped their items everywhere.

She felt arms wrap around her in a hug. "Don't cry, Lapis. We'll help you out."

"You don't have to do that," she sniffled.

"Don't worry about it," Steven said. "I've gotten into worse messes with Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl." He plopped down on the ground began catching crickets.

Lapis knelt beside him and began catching them as well. "Are they all your family or are they family friends?"

"They're both! They're family and they're friends. I just call them the Gems."

"Gems?" Lapis was confused, but she wasn't sure how much to pry. A cricket, apparently sensing that he was next, sprang away from her.

"'cause that's what they are to me," Steven said seriously. He put another handful of crickets into their container, which the onion kid must have dropped on the ground after filling the register. His container was almost full now, and Lapis looked down at her container, which held a grand total of three crickets. And one of those crickets might have been just a ball of lint. She really didn't feel like double checking in that moment.

"You're a strange kid, you know that?"

"Yeah, I've heard that before." He seemed unbothered by this, and somehow that made Lapis feel better.

Peridot watched them for a moment before launching herself on a cricket.

"Careful!" Steven said. "You don't want to squash them."

"Why not?" Peridot said, but she added her cricket to Lapis' container.

All in all, it took over two hours before (hopefully) all of the crickets had been collected. By the time they finished, they were all exhausted.

"Let's go get something to eat," Steven said. "I'll come back and get my fish on another day. I'm too tired to enjoy the experience right now."

Peridot groaned in agreement, and rubbed the knot on her forehead. Lapis was mildly worried that she had a concussion, but decided not to mention it in case Peridot was the suing type.

"Hey, Lapis, want to come with us? I don't think that there's going to be any more customers today," Steven said, glancing outside. The parking lot had been clear since the cricket fiasco. "My dad is coming over for dinner tonight, and Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl with be there.

"I don't know, I should probably stay here until Jasper gets back," she said reluctantly.

"I will be there too," Peridot added. "In case that helps."

Almost on queue Jasper jogged back into the store, each step causing the shelves to tremble slightly.

"Good, you got it cleaned up. I had to chase that kid all the way down to the dock, but I got him."

"Is he ok?" Stephen asked. Lapis didn't blame him for looking worried.

Jasper gave a toothy grin in response. She stretched, first pulling one arm over her head and then the other. "The store looks dead. I'm going to head on home."

"What about me?" Lapis asked.

"You're scheduled to work until midnight," Jasper said.

"I know, but-"

"Don't argue with me, Lapis," Jasper said, pointing a finger in her face. "The schedule says midnight, so you'll stay until midnight." Lapis stood still as Jasper gathered her things, and headed out of the store.

"What a jerk," Stephen muttered.

"Total clod," Peridot agreed.

"Sorry, I can't go," Lapis said. Suddenly she was mad. Not mad. Furious. Furious that she spent the last two hours of her life dealing with crickets, furious that she let a shitty job run her life, and furious at Jasper who had made her life a living hell not just for the summer, but for every single day since she became a manger last year.

"I hate it," she said quietly.

"What?" Peridot asked.

"I hate it here!" Lapis cried. "I hate being stuck here!"

"Then let's go," Steven said.

"You're right," Lapis said. "It's not like she can fire me, she can barely keep any employee as it is. Already excited, she ran through the nightly checklist and locked up the store. Stephen and Peridot were waiting for her outside. "Let's get out of here!" She shouted, running by them across the parking lot and towards town. Stephen and Peridot caught up to her, and they each grabbed one of her hands. Stephen was whooping and jumping, Peridot was doing her weird cackle thing, and Lapis joined in with them, laughing just as loudly. At least for today, she was free.

"Hi, Lapis!"

Steven waved as he and Peridot walked over to him.

"Hi, Steven! Can I help you find anything today?" She was about to go on break, but she could wait a few extra minutes for Steven.

"Today is the day," he said. "I can feel it."

"Are you ready to get your fish?"

"Yep," he said, eyes bright with determination as though gearing up for a fight instead of a three dollar fish. They stood in front of the tank full of gold fish silently. "That one," he pronounced finally. Lapis frowned. "You mean the one that is barely moving?" "That's the one," he said, staring intently at it. "I don't know, Steven. He might be sick or something," Lapis said. The fish gave a few flimsy waves with its fins before going still again. She wasn't sure if the fish's lack of movement was due its impending expiration or simply due to its size. It had swollen, puffy look that was kind of disgusting to look at.

"He's just tired. The other fish are constantly bothering him."

"If you're sure," Lapis said doubtfully as she went after the fish with the net. The fish barely bothered to move before the net closed around it.

As they walked to the front of the store with Steven's fish, Lapis said, "Thanks for saving me the other night. It was nice just to have some fun."

"Of course! We had a lot of fun, didn't we, Peridot?"

Lapis had almost forgotten that Peridot was there. She hadn't really said anything, which was certainly a change.

"Yeah, we did," Peridot mumbled.

"Peridot talked about you all week. She kept pestering me to come back to the store."

"I did not!" Peridot shouted, blushing.

"Not that I didn't want to come," he added hurriedly. "I wanted to see you and get Frank, but I've been busy with the Gems." Lapis was still a little confused by his relationship with the Gems. As far she understood it, they were essentially his moms/older sisters? They all seemed to wear a lot of jumpsuits. And she still had no idea how Peridot factored into any of it at all. A distant cousin maybe?

"For the record, Lapis," Peridot said. "Steven had to drag me here. The last place I wanted to be was here."

"We have that in common," Lapis said.

"And I did not talk about you all week. I was just really impressed that you were such a strong swimmer."

After dinner, Amethyst, Steven, Peridot, and Lapis had all gone swimming in the ocean. Lapis had to borrow a swimsuit, although she wasn't exactly sure whose it had been, because it didn't really seem like it would fit the body type of any one that Steven lived with. It was a slim one piece that exposed most of her muscular back that fit her perfectly. Now that she thought about, Peridot had seemed a little ... preoccupied that night.

Just then the new employee walked up.

"Hey, Steven! I can ring him up, Lapis."

"Hi, Sadie!" Steven said cheerfully. Did he know everyone in this town?

"It's ok," Lapis said, taking a few dollars out of her pocket and ringing herself up. "I'm paying for it, so I'll just go ahead and handle it."

"Lapis! You don't have to do that!"

"Consider it me paying you back for helping me last week," Lapis said, shutting the cash register with her hip. He reached out and hugged her tight before looking down at his fish lovingly.

"Thank you so much! Frank is perfect!"

"Is this your new fish?" Sadie said, bending down to get a better look. "Oh, no. I think he's dead, Steven."

"He's not. See? He just isn't a big fan of physical exercise."

Lapis and Sadie exchanged a look.

"I didn't know that you were working here now, Sadie. What is Lars going to do?"

"Don't worry, I'm still working at the donut shop," she said. "You know I can't leave Lars alone at the store for too long. I just wanted to work a few more hours since it was summer and all."

Steven thought about it for a moment. "That's fair, I guess. Well, we be go. Connie is getting ready to leave for vacation, and I want to be able to say goodbye to her and show her Frank before she leaves."

"See you around, Steven," Lapis and Sadie said.

"See ya!"

Peridot turned to Lapis. "I would just like to say," she said stiffly, "that you look like a whale." So saying, she ran out of the store.

"What was that about?" Sadie asked as they stared after her.

"I don't know," Lapis said, feeling stung.

"LAPIS!" Jasper roared from the tiny stock room. Lapis sighed.

"I better go see what she wants," she said, trudging towards the back.

"Good luck!" Sadie called after her.

On her fourth visit to Beach City Petz, Peridot came alone.

"Hi, er, Lapis?" Peridot asked timidly.

Lapis sighed. "What, Peridot?"

"I was thinking that I would like to get a fish. For myself."

Lapis looked at her. "Really?"

"Really," Peridot said earnestly, waving her hands. "I mean," she said awkwardly. "It's not like you have sharks or anything cool, so..."

"Yeah, crazy that we don't sell those as pets," Lapis said dryly.

Peridot looked like she was at a loss for what to say, and Lapis' patience was wearing thin. "Where's Steven today?"

Peridot narrowed her eyes. "Why?" She asked suspiciously.

"Because he always comes to the pet store with you?" Lapis said slowly.

"I wanted to come by myself today," Peridot snapped.

"Ok," Lapis said, holding her hands up in surrender. "Chill. I was just asking."

They walked over to the tanks.

"What fish were you looking at?"

Peridot looked around briefly. "Um, that one," she said.

"You sure? You seem a little distracted," Lapis didn't really want to go through the process of getting a fish and bagging it up if Peridot was going to change her mind in a minute.

"Yeah, that green one. I like it," Peridot said. Lapis shrugged. She wasn't the customer, she just had to get the fish. She grabbed everything she needed and walked over to the selected tank. Peridot followed her. As Lapis was lowering her fish net into the water, she glanced over at Peridot who was wearing a purple shirt for a change that had I ❤ CAMP PINING HEARTS on it.

"What's Camp Pining Heart?" Lapis asked, gesturing to Peridot's tshirt.

Peridot gasped so loudly that Lapis nearly dropped the net into the tank. "Youdon'tknowaboutcampPININGHEARTS? It is only the greatest TV show in existence! The only reason I bother to eat, sleep, and breathe? You've never heard of it? What have you been doing with your life?"

Lapis waved her free hand around. "Working," she said flatly.

Peridot seemed to struggle against herself for a moment before saying "Of course. Say, would you be interested in watching it sometime? We could watch it together."

"Why are you talking like that?"

"Like what?"

"All robotic."

Peridot sighed in frustration. "I told Steven it was a stupid thing to say. Stupid, stupid. "

"What's Steven got to do with this?"

"I just want to be your friend!" Peridot exclaimed. "I just wanted to be your friend, but you didn't like me, so Steven has been giving me all sorts of horrible advice to an attempt to 'help me.'" The last part was in air quotes. "And now, you hate me even more, because I blew it by trying to compliment you by calling you a whale and mentioning sharks and-"

"You didn't," Lapis interrupted.

Peridot stopped mid-tirade. "Didn't what?" She said slowly.

"You didn't blow it. And I don't hate you," Lapis said. "Actually, I think it's really sweet that you've put this much thought into it."

Peridot blushed. "Really?"

"Really. But what was the deal with the whale comment?"

"It's blue," Peridot said. "And it reminded me a whale."

"Fair enough. Let's go get your fish."

They talked the entire time. Lapis told Peridot about how she hoped to create a humane animal shelter one day, and Peridot talked a lot about some patents she had that had something to do math and/or engineering, although Lapis didn't understand most of it so she couldn't say for sure.

Ultimately, Peridot did end up changing her mind, but she seemed so pleased when she left the store with her anemone that Lapis didn't care at all.

It was nearing the end of summer, and Lapis was more ready than anyone for it to be over. Jasper had apparently broken up with her on-again/off-again girlfriend, and her mood was more abysmal, even for her. She stomped around, shoulder-checking customers and cages alike. Apparently deciding that her unhappiness would mean everyone's unhappiness, she switched around everyone's schedule constantly, and changed everyone's hours last minute. Since the onion kid had been fired, it was only Lapis, Ronaldo (aka sneople guy), and some girl named Sadie. Sally? She was nice, and kind of quiet, and she got her work done, which was all Lapis cared about. She should probably know her coworkers names, considering she just had three of them. It wasn't like this was a big shop.

In her defense, she was tired and stressed from Jasper's constant rescheduling. Yesterday, Lapis had only worked for two hours. Today, she was seven hours into a fourteen hour shift. She heard a loud van pull up outside the store. She smiled, sure that it was Mr. Universe's van. Steven dropped by often, and he usually brought someone with him, which was always a nice change of pace from dealing with the moody hamsters/coworkers.

Looking out the store window, she expected to see Steven hop out of the front seat of the van like he usually did, but instead Peridot popped out. The door to the van quickly shut behind her, as if whoever pushed her out didn't want her to climb back in. Even from this distance, Lapis could see that Peridot was grumbling as she brushed herself off, and headed inside.

Hiding her smile, Lapis returned to her work. What was going on? She wasn't sure if she wanted find out.

"Eh-hm," Peridot cleared her throat behind her. Lapis turned around.

"Oh, hey, Peridot."

"Hi," Peridot gulped.

"Just you today?"

"Yes. Is that agreeable?" Peridot fidgeted with her bow tie.

Lapis laughed. "Of course it's agreeable. You look really nice today."

Peridot mumbled something and ran a hand through her hair, which was particularly pointy today.

"You're also suspiciously tall," Lapis said, glancing down. "Wow, those are some tall platforms."

"I prefer limb enhancements," Peridot said primly. "As a fellow shorty, I'm sure you can understand."

"Of course," Lapis said graciously. "So, what's the occasion?"

Peridot fidgeted some more. "I have a date."

Oh. Lapis hadn't known that Peridot was dating anyone, or that she was even interested in dating anyone. "Well, I hope it goes well," she said, trying to keep her voice light.

"No, erm, I hope i have a date. I don't know if she likes me. I still have to ask her. You. If you would like to go on a date with me." Peridot had squeezed her eyes shut half way through her ramble. Now she opened them again. "Would you?" She asked tentatively. "Like to go on a date with me?"

Lapis looked down at her own outfit, which consisted of her work uniform. "Um, right now?"

"Of course," Peridot said. It was the middle of the day.

"Do you never have to work?" Lapis blurted out, wanting to smack herself even as she said it.

"No," Peridot said. "I have a few patents, remember?" Maybe Lapis should have payed closer attention. She didn't say anything.

"Lapis?"

Peridot said hesitantly. Lapis should really say no. She would have to blow off work. She was not at all dressed for a date. She had no idea whether Peridot would even like her at all after got to know her better.

Fuck it.

"Let's go," Lapis said, smiling.

"Really?" Peridot seemed surprised. "Well I constructed a list of reasons to date me just in case you were hesitant for some reason," Peridot triumphantly pulled out the device she always carried with her. Lapis still wasn't sure exactly what it was.

"Which of course you wouldn't be, but I wanted to be prepared. 1) I am clearly a superior dating partner/companion/girlfriend, which ever term you prefer. 2) I can't swim, so I might need you to save me someday. 3) You are very kind, and you need someone like me who will make sure you won't get taken advantage of. 4) You've never flown before, but luckily you know one of the best pilots- thats me," she added. And 5) you watched every episode of CPH and loved it almost as much as I did, which means we're practically soulmates."

Lapis laughed and leaned forward, kissing Peridot on the cheek. Before Peridot could react, Lapis grabbed her hand and pulled her out of the store. She had no idea what they were going to do, but everything in her wanted to find out. As they walked out, she could hear Jasper yelling "LAPIS!" from somewhere in the store, but for once she didn't turn around. She just kept going forward.

Thanks for reading! I'm thinking about writing a sequel, so let me know!