Hey everyone. I know what you're thinking. "Pillow, don't you already have three projects or something you still need to finish?"
Heh heh heh... That's not important right now.
What is important is that... Carol Pingrey is back, fam.
Real quick. I should note that this is a continuation of "Carol Likes Luna." So, if you don't understand some of the references, or in other words just find yourself scratching your head, that's why. Also, Lynn dates Paula in the "Pillowverse" as I call it. Just go back and real all of my other stuff, would you?
Also, some references to "Scales of Justice" here. Nothing to ruin that awesome episode for you though, if you haven't seen it. (What are you waiting for? Figure out yo neighbor's WiFi password already!)
Anyway… Enjoy!
"Did you miss me?" Carol asks.
Luna playfully eyes her for a moment, wearing a teasing little grin.
"Yeah. A little bit."
They stand on the front porch of the Loud house, seeing one another for the first time on this sunny summer's day.
The two girls simply smile at one another before breaking into laughter, and wrap each other up in a shared embrace. They gaze into each other's eyes, Luna preens a stray hair behind Carol's ear, Carol blushes, and then…
As they lean in to kiss one another, Lana and Lola barge out the front door and right through the happy couple. The latter twin chases the former twin with a pirate sword, all while yelling Pirate-themed obscenities such as "Yar!" and "Get back here with me booty!"
The teens just gawk at them with dumbfounded expressions before returning their attention to each other, and they share another laugh.
"Wow. What was that about?" Carol says through her dying laughter.
"Beats me dude. I think they were supposed to creep on Lindsey Sweetwater or something, and then just kind of gave up," Luna explains.
"How lame," Carol scoffs.
Disregarding the antics of the twins like everyone else seems to do, Carol and Luna instead focus on what they were about to do before being so rudely interrupted.
Again, they wrap their arms around each other, and smile their pearly whites at each other's faces.
"Now… where were we?" Luna flirts.
Just as she purses her lips for kiss, Carol shoves her away, then slaps her hands against her cheeks.
"Oof! I almost forgot!" she cries before rushing into the house, leaving Luna standing there looking like a duck with her lips all puckered and whatnot.
"Dude? The heck?" she cusses as she fixes her face, and she follows her girlfriend inside the house.
Carol rushes to the couch, and hurriedly grabs the remote off the end table to switch the TV on. Luna dubiously watches as Carol frantically fingers the button on the remote to change the channel, surfing through one after the other.
"Uhm… You gonna tell me what's going on or you just gonna keep me in the dark?" Luna asks.
"No time for references. Just watch!" Carol barks as she points her bony manicured finger to the television monitor.
On the screen, resident Royal Woods news reporter Katherine Mulligan appears to be getting ready to cover her latest story.
Luna simply folds her arms and meets her girlfriend with a distasteful glower. "Yes Carol. She's hot. We've established this," she groans.
"I think about other things besides attractive girls, you know!" Carol argues. "Just watch!" she repeats.
Luna reluctantly takes a seat on the couch by Carol, coercing her into scootching over by nudging her side. Carol just winces with annoyance before focusing again on the TV.
"Good evening everyone. I'm Katherine Mulligan, and I'm here at Ketchum Park where the semi annual Artsy Fartsy Fair is in full swing," the reporter on the TV begins. "There are so many young and passionate artists here today, all sharing the things they love with the community. Music, creative writing, paintings…"
"Carol," Luna snidely starts.
"What?!" Carol practically growls.
"We were there. I know about this," Luna asserts.
"Shush shush, just watch!" Carol insists once more, smiling widely as she rests a halting hand on Luna's lap.
"Joining me now to share some of her amazing sketches is none other than local Royal Woods High valedictorian, Carol Pingrey," Katherine states before the camera pans out to reveal she's standing by the aforementioned starlet.
"That's me!" Carol excitedly tells Luna as she pulls her into a tight side hug, pointing to the TV.
"I see that," Luna utters with discomfort.
Back on the monitor…
"Hello, Ms. Pingrey," Katherine greets.
"Hi there, Katherine. Thank you for having me," TV Carol sweetly begins. "And might I say; you look so pretty in real life!"
"Why thank you!" Katherine replies.
Luna scowls at real life Carol, who just nervously smiles.
"Carol, why don't you tell us a little bit about what you're doing here today," Katherine asks her.
"Gladly," TV Carol begins before revealing a sketchpad to her. She opens it, and displays a drawing of a certain mud monster Lana created to save the Fishmans.
"I drew this after watching your story the other night. I felt compelled to capture its raw energy on paper. To use its real life struggle to express my own feelings of fear and insecurity," she pretentiously explains.
"Very fascinating!" Katherine happily tells her. "Do you have more?"
"Of course!" Carol answers before flipping through the sketchpad.
"This is one of a mean- I mean adorable Corgi I sadly had to orphan a few months ago," she says while showing a drawing of the aforementioned doggo.
"This is something I drew to work through some art block," she explains as she displays a drawing of a robot shouting with the numbers "16" in a word bubble.
"This is… this is a vent piece," she admits while showing a drawing of a sad man hovering over a toilet.
"And this is-" she begins before looking to make sure she's showing the right drawing. She smiles upon realizing it is. "This is a drawing of my girlfriend Luna. Isn't she lovely?"
Luna smiles and blushes upon seeing this, and Carol just smiles and blushes too.
"She certainly is," Katherine gladly responds. "I must say Carol. Your illustrations draw the perfect picture of what this experience is all about."
"Well, the details aren't sketchy," Carol jokes too, and the two women on TV join in upper class white girl laughter of the snootiest variety.
Real life Carol lets go of Luna to start giddily hopping up and down in her seat, hardly able to contain her vehement enthusiasm.
"Remember when I said I had to pee?!" she blurts out.
"Yeah, I remember when," Luna says with a sickly smile as she wipes some of Carol's spit off her cheek.
"Well, I did pee, but after that, I saw the news people, and Katherine called on me to do the interview! Can you even?!" she spazzes.
Luna just softly chuckles as she rests an encouraging hand on Carol's back.
"That's awesome, babe. It's about time you got your art out there for people to see. I've been telling you this for a while now," Luna tells her.
Carol sets her soft (because of the finest skin moisturizers, duh) hand on top of Luna's as she smiles back at her.
"I know… It's just… After all that stuff at the school variety show-"
"Excuses, excuses," Luna interrupts with a finger wag, slipping into her mock British accent. She returns to form though to console her lover. "For real, C. I'm really happy for you. Who knows? Maybe some real good will come of this?" she tells her.
Carol alluringly lowers her head, and gives Luna an irresistible cutesy eye.
"Who knows? Maybe some real good will come of… this," she says, and she puckers her lips to give Luna a smooch just like the song by Lincoln's favorite eponymous band details.
Luna puckers her lips to return the favor…
Then, Leni and her gal pal Becky make there way in through the front door, interrupting yet another attempt at face sucking on Carol and Luna's part.
"Hey guys!" Leni greets with a smile before donning a concerned expression. "Uhm, are your shellfish allergies acting up, Carol? Your face looks kind of funny," Leni asks her.
The two girls give up on trying to kiss, but don't take it to heart as they meet the other girls with smiles of their own.
"Waddup, Leni Kravitz. Hey Becks," Luna greets them.
"Hi guys. Carol, Dana texted me and told me you were on the news just now," Becky tells her.
"Oh! Yeah… Nothing big. Just hung out with a local celebrity talking about my art and all," Carol humbly replies.
Luna rolls her eyes before returning them to the other girls.
"So what are you guys getting in to today?" she asks.
"Me and Becky are gonna go have lunch down at the pier! You know how much I love seafood!" Leni answers. "Sorry, Carol," she adds, to which Carol simply shrugs.
Then Leni smiles, and Becky smiles, and Luna smiles… There's enough smiling to make a person describing it sick to their stomach.
Especially Carol's smile.
It's all cringey and spaz like, like the cross between reacting to a newborn puppy and having the thought of stealing everyone's Christmas.
Becky and Leni are oblivious to it, but Luna certainly notices.
"Well, we better get going before it gets any hotter out. It was nice seeing you guys!" Becky says to Luna and Carol.
"Alrighty. I'll be ready to leave as soon as I find my sunglasses!" Leni announces before darting up the stairs.
"Leni! They're already on your- Oh, never mind," Becky utters before following her companion upstairs.
Luna just stares at Carol, who still wears her creepy, ungodly smile. She even lets out little amused moans through her teeth, not necessarily laughs, just… moans…
"Carol?" Luna finally asks.
"Huh? Whuh?" Carol cleverly responds as she comes back to.
Luna just folds her arms and raises a judging brow at her.
"What? What did I do?" Carol asks.
Luna narrows her eyes. "You better not be thinking of trying anything with Becky or my sister. It's bad enough you gush all over Katherine what's her face."
"What? No!" Carol guffaws. "It's- it's not like that…" Carol says while nervously rubbing her arm.
Luna raises her brow again. She ain't buying it.
"For real, Luna. It isn't… It's... something else…"
Luna's judging look now seems more confused than anything. "Okay? What is it then?"
Carol looks up to see that Becky and Leni aren't within earshot, and then pulls Luna in to whisper into her ear.
"I ship them."
Luna scrunches her face up as she tries to wrap her head around what that means, "You what them?"
"You know… ship," Carol begins. "Like, I want them to be a couple."
Luna scrunches her face up even more. "What?! Leni and Becky? Just… What?!"
"Oh come on! Look at them!" Carol rebuts. "They are so adorable together! I just wanna wrap them up in a huggy bunch of tin foil and shove it in a microwave so it can explode fluffy lovely goodness all over the place!"
Luna's expression defines cringe.
"Ughhh… Don't look at me like that," Carol scoffs.
"Uhm, first of all, Leni is dating Chaz."
"I know."
"Becky has a boyfriend."
"I know."
"And that's the weirdest thing I've ever heard you say."
"I KNOW!" Carol all but shouts.
She takes a deep yoga breath before continuing. No need to be flustered.
"Okay, so like- I don't actually expect them to be a couple in real life. I just… It's fun to think about," Carol explains.
Luna shakes her head like maybe she's rethinking her existence, but ebbs when she sees Carol dejectedly sigh.
"I shouldn't have even said anything. Now you think I'm weird," she bemoans.
"Well, a little," Luna carelessly whispers, earning her a scowl from Carol.
"Okay, so I guess it's not that weird," Luna backtracks.
"Thank you," Carol says, despite snootily raising her head high and crossing her arms.
"I mean, I guess I shipped Lynn and Clyde for a little bit, honestly," Luna admits.
"What?! Eww!" Carol blurts out.
"Hey!" Luna defensively blurts back.
"That's just gross?!" Carol argues. "He's a nice kid, but he's super unorthodox."
"Carol…" Luna starts again.
"And Lynn and Paula are so cute together!" Carol continues.
"Carol," Luna repeats.
"Come to think of it, I guess I really only think about girl/girl pairings…"
"Carol."
"Is it weird if I ship all your sisters with other girls?"
"CAROL!"
Finally, Carol acknowledges her. "Were you even listening to me?" she stoically responds.
"Were you even listening to yourself?!" Luna retorts.
They take a moment to catch their breath.
"Okay… I'm sorry I called you weird. There's nothing weird about… thinking of all of my sisters getting girlfriends," Luna says. "Even if it is totally ridiculous and unrealistic," she mumbles to herself.
Carol just keeps pouting.
"And you?..." Luna eggs on.
"Ugh, fine," Carol concedes. "I guess I'm sorry for the Clynn thing."
"Clynn?"
"Ship name. You know? Like Clyde plus Lynn? Caroluna? Lobby?... Lecky," she finishes with that same cringey smile as before.
"Lecky?" Luna unenthusiastically repeats.
"Mhm. I thought of Beni first. But something about hearing the name Beni makes me really… mad for some reason."
Luna just stares at her, and Carol just stares back for a bit. Finally, Luna rolls her eyes once more as she allows a little smile to creep up on her face, and she scoots in closer to her girlfriend.
"Oh, what do I care who you ship or don't ship?" she starts. "All that matters is this ship. Caroluna, I think you called it?" she says as she tickles Carol's thigh with her finger while giving her a cutesy eye of her own.
Carol gets all bashful, her shoulders twitching as they hike up around her neck. She lets out a little giggle.
"I think you're onto something," she says.
With that, Luna stands up, grabbing Carol by the wrist to bring her up with her.
"Come on. Let's go get something to eat. Maybe you can draw some fruit or something while I work on that Reelin' in the Years riff I've been practicing," Luna suggests.
"Alright, alright…" Carol playfully whines, allowing Luna to pull her up to her feet. They make their way into the kitchen, all while lovingly jostling and nudging each other, and Luna makes way for the fridge.
"Uhh… We don't have fruit. We do have… uni though?" Luna says while handing a box of her father's delicacies.
"Ehh, don't worry about it," Carol says somewhat despondently. "I can't really draw unless I have a muse, anyway."
"Respect," Luna simply says as she filches a cup of pudding. "I have a hard time getting inspired to play sometimes. Especially with so much other stuff going on."
"Do you need a hug?" Carol says with a mocking pout.
"What I need is more pudding in my belly," Luna answers.
Carol just amusingly shakes her head. "What I need is to find something I can sink my teeth into."
Luna invites Carol to eat a spoonful of her pudding. She simply wags her hand "no" in response.
"I meant like, I need something that really moves me to draw. Something new and exciting."
Luna amusingly huffs. "Shyeah. Why don't you draw Lecky or Beni or whatever you called it," she jokes. She then shivers. "Eww… Beni does sound wrong."
Meanwhile, Carol's eyes widen as she's struck with an epiphany.
"That's… That's it!" she stammers before beaming from ear to ear.
Luna raises yet another confused eyebrow, and Carol begins racing out of the kitchen.
"Hey! Where are you going?" Luna forlornly cries.
Carol stops, and wanders her eyes to their corners as she thinks of what to answer with.
"I... just realized that I left my sketchpad at home. I'd really like to have it. You know!... For when inspiration strikes!"
Luna just meets her with the same confused expression as Carol wears a suspiciously wide smile, but before the resident rocker can follow up, Carol is frantically running out the door.
"Alright gotta go bye love ya text ya in a few~" she babbles as she hurries to her black BMW and into the driver's seat.
"Carol?!" Luna cries as she tries to follow after her, but before she can make any legitimate progress, Carol is burning rubber and speeding out the driveway, leaving her girlfriend to watch in disbelief.
She doesn't even look in the rearview mirror as she slams down on the pedal, practically convulsing as her face forms the same crazed shipping smile that she did before.
"It's literally perfect! Literally! Not only do I have a muse… But I have a release! I can bring my precious Lecky to life… Hauauauaua…." she thinks aloud with a creepy shudder.
The drive isn't very long. She soon enough pulls into the driveway of her lovely 0312 West Sanford Street home. Her neighbor Giggles stops unicycling long enough to notice the purple clad princess neurotically leaving her vehicle, and just watches as she races into her home.
Once inside, she sprints up the stairs, not even checking to see if her parents are home or if they left any memos for her to find. She jets up to her bedroom, and stops in her tracks upon setting eyes on her coveted sketchpad. She imagines a holy aura glowing from it, and lets out another creepy shudder. "Ohhhhh!"
She grabs hold of it, and hugs it tightly while smiling her new favorite cringe smile. She then flashes over to her desk, and grabs a pencil to begin drawing.
"Yes… Yes… Yes!…" she mutters with ecstasy as she draws her latest work of art. She really gets into the groove of it too. The kind of groove that of course would be interrupted by a phone call.
She angrily glowers at the glowing smartphone beside her before realizing it's Luna calling.
She ebbs on the despondence to answer the call.
"Hey Luna," she says, trying to sound casual, but sounding more like a twitchy loon.
"Dude, is everything alright?" Luna asks from the other end of the phone as Lincoln helps Lynn fill up her swimming pool in the background.
"What? Yeah- yeah! Everything's great! Perfect, fine, copasetic!... Why do you ask?" Carol sputters.
"Because you just got here! And then you just up and left!" Luna rebuts. "Is everything cool?"
"What? Yeah, everything's cool. I just… uh… I got here and I realized I really need to do some cleaning! Yeah! It's a total mess here. Can't have mom and dad coming home to this hogwash."
"Hogwash?"
"Gotta go babe love you kiss!" Carol says with diarrhea of the mouth before hanging up. She takes a deep breath and wipes some sweat from her brow.
"Okay. Now back to work… Lecky," she says to her drawing of her favorite imaginary real life girl pairing.
Three Days Later…
A sweatpants and sweatshirt clad Carol is in the same spot at her desk, using a new pencil on the same sketch pad for a new drawing.
And yes, it's of Leni and Becky.
She butts the eraser against her chin as she sticks her tongue out, accidentally brushing her hand against an open bag of honey barbeque corn ships on her desk. She disgustedly flicks them to the side because they deter her focus, but she soon enough has her "aha!" moment as she thinks of the finishing touch for her newest work of art.
She applies it; heart eyes for Becky, who is on the receiving end of being gifted some red chrysanthemums.
"Ye-eah-ha-ha," she proudly enunciates as she finishes, and she lifts the drawing up to admire it. Satisfied with it, she gives it a big hug before ripping the sheet out and adding it to her wall of drawings… all depicting several other romantic scenarios involving Leni and Becky.
She smiles her same signature cringey smile at the pairing, all while creepily rubbing her hands together like the bad guy out of a B-level horror movie.
Suddenly, she senses what would appear to be someone coming up to her house. "Who dares?!" she thinks as she goes to sneakily peer out of the blinds of her closed window.
Outside, Luna and Luan park their bicycle-built-for-two against the curb, and step off to remove their safety helmets.
"Thanks for helping me ride here, funny girl," Luna begins. "I haven't heard from Carol all morning. I'm actually pretty worried."
"Oh, she's fine. I don't think it's anything you can't handle! Ha ha ha ha!" Luan jokes as she squeezes onto the bicycle handlebar.
"So weak," Luna comments as she prepares to walk up to Carol's porch.
"Aw, I'm just yankin' your chain," Luan jokes again, this time fingering the bike chain. "I'm gonna go see what Giggles is up to. Don't worry about Carol not texting. It's your calling to be together!"
Luna can't help but smirk at her last pun as they go their separate ways, and she makes her way to the front door of her girlfriend's home. She gives it a knock.
"Carol?"
She doesn't wait much longer before inviting herself inside, and looking around to see if anyone's on the first floor. "Carol? Mr. P? Mrs. P?"
"Are there any aminals in here?" she quips before deciding to head upstairs to Carol's room. She carefully treads her way along until seeing the bedroom door cracked just barely open.
"Carol?" she calls out once more, this time with a little trepidation.
She paces towards the door…
She places her hand on the door…
She gently pushes against it…
The door…
And discovers Carol inside, already working on a new drawing. This one featuring Leni and Becky cosplaying as Starblast and Buzzard from Preteen Protectors.
She makes all sorts of strange and probably unhealthy noises as her eye twitches with every press of her pencil, and Luna can only watch with a blend of concern and peevishness as she folds her arms and steps over to her desk.
She simply clears her throat. "Ahem."
"Yeah," Carol barely utters, her eyes glued to her paper.
"Uhm, hello?!" Luna blurts out, flailing her hands forward.
"Yeah," Carol simply repeats.
Luna melodramatically facepalms, and she decides to bring on the tough love as she snags the sketchpad from Carol.
"Hey!" she petulantly whines. "Give that back! I'm not finished!"
Luna studies the picture for a moment, and her face transitions from confused, to conflicted, to confounded as she notices all of the other drawings hung on the walls.
Carol becomes nervous. "It's- I can explain!"
"This is why you haven't been answering my calls?!" Luna questions with the most discombobulated tone in her voice.
Carol casts smooth recovery. It's ineffective.
While she'd like to just rewind time and make it to where Luna never saw this, she knows that won't happen. She decides it's best to just try and explain herself with the confidence and poise she's been known to display in even the most stressful of circumstances.
"Okay, hear me out Luna. Before you get too weirded out, let me walk you through this," she says as she stands up from her desk. A corn chip falls from her hoodie of course, and she just watches it fall to the ground, a little shame coming over her, but not enough to deter her from proceeding.
"Okay, so like, you remember how I said I needed something to sink my teeth into?" she starts. "You said I should try drawing Leni and Becky!"
"I was being sarcastic!" Luna retorts.
"Maybe, but look at this!" Carol continues. "I've drawn more in the last three days since I don't know when! And if you ask me, these pics are totes adorbs. Maybe even my best work."
Luna just shakes her head as she pinches the bridge of her nose. "C…"
"Now before you start getting all preachy, look at these!" she says as she gestures Luna to look into the sketchbook in her Loud hands.
She flips past the Protectors drawing, showing Luna one of Lecky in a tunnel of love. Luna looks to her with a piteous wince, but Carol smiles an encouraging smile. "Just look at them! Isn't it cute? Admit it's cute!"
"Carol," Luna says again.
"Look at this one!" Carol says as she flips to a drawing of Leni being Rapunzel for Becky, throwing down her hair to her. "I was feeling princessy."
Luna indecisively nods her head back and forth a bit. "Ehh…"
Carol says nothing as she flips the page again, getting confident that she may be swaying Luna finally.
"Now this… This one should be obvious," Carol says as she points out how Becky and Leni are throwing wads of paper at their old English teacher, Ms. Clifford.
Luna cheekily smiles as her cheeks burn pink. "Awww…"
"I've got her now," Carol thinks to herself. She confidently turns to the next page in her sketchbook…
And with wide eyes and a sudden jolt to her pulse, she closes it again.
"What the heck?" Luna asks.
"It's nothing!" Carol insists before trying and failing to snag the sketchpad back from Luna.
"Come on, it can't be that bad," Luna coolly says as she reopens the book to the prior page. She too gets wide eyed upon seeing its contents.
A picture of Luan… With Maggie.
The former has her arm around her apparent "girlfriend's" shoulder as she laughs, and Maggie blushes as she tries to conceal a creeping grin.
Carol thought it was super cute. Luna…
"What… the…?"
"I can explain," Carol says once more, nearly paralyzed with fear.
"Carol… This… Luan? Maggie?" Luna dumbfoundedly musters out.
"Luaggie…" Carol weakly mumbles, feeling very, very small.
"Wh- what?" Luna responds.
"Luaggie…" Carol almost shamefully says again, loudly enough to actually be heard now.
Luna just gawks at her with profound disbelief.
"Luaggie?" she finally repeats.
"Luan… Maggie…" Carol elaborates with the same pitiful tone.
"Yeah, yeah; I get that," Luna begins, trying to stay calm. "Just… Why?"
Carol takes a deep breath before answering.
"I… I love the whole… opposites attract dynamic. They'd be cute together."
Luna gawks again before shaking her head.
"You were serious when you said you shipped all of my sisters with girls, weren't you?"
Sad face.
"Just pretend…" Carol says, almost in the same manner that a small child does when they've been busted for stealing dessert before dinner.
Luna sighs. "I'm gonna see more of these if I flip through here. Aren't I?"
Carol says nothing. The way she guiltily rubs her arm and looks to the floor says it all.
Even so, Luna can't help but let her curiosity get the better of her, and she proceeds to go through the pages.
The next drawing features Lynn and Paula. Innocent enough, considering they're dating in real life.
"Well… I guess this isn't so-" Luna begins, but she stops herself from saying anything that could hurt her girlfriend's feelings as they meet eyes and share a sorrowful gaze.
Carol disregards the obvious stall though, and takes the opportunity to share some details.
"That's the third one in the series! I'll make a fourth one to finish it!... Eventually…"
"Right…" Luna simply says as she flips to the next page.
Next in the armada of Carol's ships, Lucy and her friend Haiku. They appear to be cosplaying as a vampire and a vampire hunter respectively in the drawing.
Luna just sort of winces and nods, almost like she wants to be impressed despite the subjects.
Another page flip, another strange ship. This time, Lola and Lindsey Sweetwater sitting on a bench and smiling at each other.
"Oh, Carol," Luna disappointedly blurts out.
"What?!" she defensively says with her arms crossed.
"They're six?" Luna says in the same tone.
"It's tasteful!" Carol refutes, but she goes back to hanging her head lowly as Luna continues on.
"I guess…" Luna concedes. "It reminds me of something you didn't finish, but we'll talk about that later."
Next page…
Lisa and Darcy… Should have seen that one coming…" Luna says upon discovering the next illustration. She flips past it to move on to the next pairing.
It's Lori, and she's dancing with…
"Is that… Is that who I think it is?" Luna says with obvious bewilderment in her eyes.
"Yeah… Genderbent Bobby…" Carol sadly tells her. "I call her Bebe."
Luna says nothing. For once in her life, she is speechless.
Reluctantly, because she loves Carol, she flips to the next page.
She finds a picture of Girl Jordan, a swell gal she's gotten to know a little because of her only brother. AKA… the male version of her partner in the caricature.
"This… It's… Jordan and Girl Lincoln?"
"Linka," Carol corrects. "Girl Lincoln is Linka."
Luna rubs her forehead with the tips of her fingers, heavily sighing because of the new stimuli she's been introduced to.
"I don't- Carol…"
"Hey! I'm expressing myself creatively! I could've shipped them with people besides their true loves!"
"Since when is Jordan Lincoln's true love?! Never mind… Just... never mind…" Luna says before flipping to the next sheet.
As expected, Lola's twin sister has been paired with a girl too. However, it's a girl Luna isn't able to recognize.
"Okay… Uhm… Who is this?" she asks, trying not to sound patronizing.
Carol doesn't answer. She just looks out the corner of her eye to the carpet, hoping to turn invisible.
"Babe… I know you heard me," Luna states. "Will you tell me who it is? I promise not to be mad."
"You'll think I'm even weirder than you already do," Carol asserts.
"Carol… Just please tell me," she says with a soft, almost somber voice.
Carol looks into her eyes, and silently takes a breath.
"It's Hops."
…
Luna's jaw drops.
"It's Hops," Carol repeats as she deflates, clearly unable to hide her true feelings of humiliation anymore. "I couldn't think of who else to pair her with, and I know she really likes her frog…"
Luna's expression becomes sickly.
"Not like that!" Carol is sure to reiterate. "Just- The whole point of these drawings is to convey love, and I figured… I already made Bobby and Lincoln into chicks… Why not her pet frog?"
Luna sighs and shakes her head for the umpteenth time. "Okay… I guess now's the part where I react to all of this…"
"Wait," Carol calmly intervenes. "There's one more…"
"Carol, I don't know if I can-"
"Just… just look at it…" Carol says. "You've already seen the rest…"
Luna just looks into her crestfallen blue eyes for a moment before viewing the final sheet in the sketchbook.
It depicts baby Lily, hugging her favoritest teddy bear with hearts floating above them.
Luna smiles a very small smile before closing the sketchpad and handing it over to Carol. Carol takes it with some apprehension, and there is a tense, prolonged silence that follows.
"Okay…" Luna says to finally break the silence, but before she can go any further, Carol is cutting her off.
"Listen, before you say anything-"
"Before either of us says anything," Luna interrupts in return, "I tell you this because I love you; but you really need to change your clothes, and there's nothing healthy about sitting in a dark empty room for this long doing… Well… Anything."
Carol smells herself, and realizes what Luna means. "Okay… I'll give you that," she agrees. "But I feel like I'm going to have to give a really long, somewhat well thought out explanation for all of this," she says while looking all around at her many cringeworthy yuri drawings.
Luna sighs. "Just… Let's settle for a slowdown," Luna debunks before forming a new statement. "The thing is, I can't lie and tell you I'm not a little freaked out by all of this."
Carol sadly frowns at that.
"But I will say, I am glad to see you have something to be passionate about. I haven't seen you this motivated to work on your art in, well…"
"The first time in forever?" Carol cheekily quips.
Luna sighs an almost annoyed sigh. "Okay…"
She disregards her stupid joke to get back to her point.
"These are really good drawings, even if they are of my sisters and their genderbent, animal people girlfriends…"
"Please don't tell any of them about this," Carol sheepishly asks.
"Uh, trust me, I'll avoid that conversation," Luna assures her.
Surprisingly, a smile then comes to her face, and she goes to wrap her arm around her inamorata.
"But you know what? The way I see it, this doesn't hurt anybody. If anything, it's just a way for you to express yourself," she tells Carol.
"Do you really mean that?" Carol asks with a little smile of her own.
"I kind of have to tell myself that so I can look at you the same way," Luna stoically says, but she breaks into another grin that makes it obvious she's just ribbing.
"You're awful," Carol jokes back. "But you're awesome…" she adds as she leans her head on Luna's shoulder, looking at her with puppy eyes.
"I am pretty lame," Luna jokes once more. "Come on. You need to get some fresh air! Maybe we'll go over to Giggles' and see what her and Luan are getting up to? Get a soda… my favorite flavor-"
"Cherry red," Carol finishes for her, and then they share another endearing smile.
And the way they look at one another in this moment, with the corn chip dust on Carol's lips and the drops of sweat rolling down Luna's forehead…
They remember just what they love so much about one another.
And finally, finally… They lean in to share a kiss.
…
They break away, and look into each other's eyes again for a little while. Then, Carol dons a thoughtful expression.
"Hmmm… Giggles and Luan, huh?" she teasingly thinks aloud.
"Don't push it," Luna teases back with a playful pinch of her bicep. "Come on. But uhm… Change into something clean first," she adds with a little cringe.
"Oh. Right," Carol says with a little embarrassment. "Wanna give me a minute alone?"
"Can do, love," Luna says with a slip into her English accent, and then she steps out into the hall to give Carol some privacy.
Carol waits about four seconds before hurrying over to her desk to recover a sheet of paper buried underneath some of her other rubbish.
She holds it up to admire it, and then wipes her brow with a sigh of relief.
"Phew… At least she didn't see you. Then I would have had to of given a long winded explanation," she says about the drawing of Katherine Mulligan and genderbent Mr. Sunderland in her possession.
"Carol?" Luna asks from out in the hallway.
"Coming!" Ms. Pingrey hollers back, and she begins to hurry out the door after hiding the picture.
She gets about halfway to the door before realizing she's still a mess.
"Oh… Right," she says before going over to her closet to pick out something… her to wear.
Meanwhile, Luna stands in the hallway with her phone in her hand, opening up a new tab in her web browser.
She does a double take to make sure no one else is around, and when she's sure she's safe, she opens up the web page she wants to see with a wickedly cringey smile on her face.
"Oh yeah… Vampires of Melancholia fiction, here I come!"
She realizes she said that out loud, then covers her mouth while fretfully making sure Carol didn't hear. Thankfully, she didn't.
So, she sighs with relief.
"Man… We are a strange couple."
"Smile" count: 31.
Now that that horrific incident of terror is over, how 'bout some breakfast?
It felt really good to write about these two again. And hopefully it won't be the last time. But, as always, I don't make promises I can't keep. So who knows? But I'll keep them in mind despite my super busy workload and existential dread XD
Also, I could go on and dissect the meta humor (soooo much meta) in this chapter, but that's just not as fun as wondering how many people collectively facepalmed over the girl Hops thing. You people really should be checking out the other authors on this site. My stuff's pretty drek, fam.
Just kidding I'm the best and you know it. dab
As always, thanks so much for reading, and hopefully we'll all hear from each other again in the near future.
Until next time, true believers.