Peridot regrettingly threw herself face first onto her new bed. She kicked the covers down and then masterfully moved it back up with her heels, bringing it to her midsection. And after a few seconds, she turned herself over and grabbed a small stuffed Pokemon doll from her bag and held onto it. Whenever she felt that she couldn't control herself, physically or mentally, she would hold the soft toy to calm herself. It was soothing to her. A bit like a pacifier to a child.

She squeezed the plush toy as she thought back to her afternoon. It had gone from 1 to 100 really quickly, and she really didn't like that. She liked regularity. It was really important to her daily life and structured her day. She had a schedule for most things in her day, like when she would wake up, when she would eat, work or even the time of her bowl movements. She functioned thanks to consistency. But today had been utter nonsense. Not only she was in a place she didn't know, without internet, but she had really strange encounter with a mermaid. Or going crazy. She was probably crazy. She tried going over the facts disproving their existence, but it didn't change the fact that she met one. A real one. She even had gills.

She reached into her pocket and pulled out the seashell that she'd given her. It was a ribbed cantharus shell, running her fingers over the ridges that swirled around it. She hadn't looked into seashells before as she was more interested in Mechanics and Robotics, but it did in a way fascinate her. She turned over onto her side and placed it onto her bedside table. She calmly looked at it and sighed. This Lapis Lazuli was certainly kind, though a bit naive. She'd called her a nice person and wanted to be friends with her. It felt strange that after nineteen years, she had her first voluntary friend.

Because she did have friends, if that is what you want to call them. Her first friend was actually her childhood bully, Jasper. Jasper has always been bigger than the rest in her elementary school. She towered over the others and so, was stronger than the others. And being weaker than the rest, she was Jasper's play toy. But what the bigger girl hadn't realized, was that Peridot was skilled with her selection of words, and leveled the terrain. Ever since it had been a relationship of hate and love between them, each of them trying to out do the other. It had been ten years now.

The other friend that she had was Pearl, an A Grade student, just like her, who shared many classes with her. They weren't exactly friends, but it was more a mutual understanding. They talked, sat together at lunch and studied together. It had just... Happened. The two of them hadn't wanted to be her friend, it had just come to be.

And even though she was glad to have them, it was very different to have someone tell you they want to be your friend. It made her feel... Important. Like she actually had qualities that someone looked for in a person. And based on her aesthetically average friends, she was really surprised that such a stunning being could want to spend time with her. During her whole experience with education, the aesthetically nicer people had just avoided or mocked her. This whole thing felt strange. And she wasn't sure whether she liked it or not.

But she had to admit that having to explain what a mobile phone was and how it worked was quite amusing. It was refreshing to meet someone young who was utterly clueless. She thought it was cute. But it was to be expected from a mermaid. She wondered what they had invented underwater. Humans had created so many things, it was only logical for their underwater counterparts to have done the same. Maybe they had a different system for calling each other? Maybe it was comparable to what comics had imagined? Her face scrunched up as she noticed a detail in her thought process. She'd called her cute.

She turned back onto her back and crossed her arms over her stuffed toy. She never thought things that weren't relevant. So how was finding her cute useful to her thought process? She knew that she was aesthetically pleasing, but it wasn't a reason to call her cute. She'd seen many aesthetically pleasing people that she didn't find cute. What was there to deduce from this? Maybe it was a reaction due to a friendship. Friendship could lead to seeing another differently, such as 'cute'. She then recalled the indirect compliment and how she reached for her hand. Those were things that friends did, wasn't it? Friends compliment each other all the time, or are at least supposed to. And reaching for her hand... If she could recall correctly, she'd reached for her hand to comfort her. That was also something friends did.

Her mind decided to recall the conversation with the mysterious girl over and over in her head for her. All that she could remember just reinforced her friendship theory. 'Everything that I'm hearing about you is good Peridot'. She paused. 'Peridot'. Her body shivered as she remembered how the girl had pronounced her name. Was this a friendship thing? She'd never experienced it before with Jasper, nor Pearl. She'd never heard of it happening to others. If it wasn't a Friendship thing, then what was it? Was is less than Friendship? No, she'd never, ever reacted like this to someone she qualified as lower than friendship. Maybe it was a more than Friend thing ? Was it romantic interest? She laughed and stared at her toy. There was no way she was romantically interested in Lapis. Was there?

*-*-*-*

It was 3pm and Peridot sat on the same rock that she had sat on the previous day, with her feet in the water. She was on time and waiting for her new friend to arrive. She had two hours of free time before her parents would drag her out into town. And she sincerely hoped that these two hours would be the longest of her life, because she was in no way interested in spending two and a half hours visiting before eating and heading home. It meant social interaction with her family, with people she didn't know. She shuddered just imagining the possibilities of conversation topics. A light splashing sound broke her from her thoughts, revealing Lapis Lazuli.

"Hello," She greeted her with a smile and a comical wave. Peridot returned the smile.

"Hi" She replied, but then realized that she hadn't thought of conversation topics. She usually had at least ten prepared for any situation she may need them for. But she had forgotten this time. She didn't know what there was to talk about. What does one talk to a friend about? What does one talk to a mermaid about? She panicked, looked down and bit her bottom lip nervously. Lapis just observed her, and she found it stressful, yet calming, which was contradictory, but it was how she felt. "Uhm.." She inadvertently mumbled.

Lapis noticed how nervous Peridot seemed and swam to the rock side and hoisted herself up next to Peridot, her tail touching the water. It wasn't exactly the most comfortable place for her to be sat, but she figured it may be easier for them to interact if they were on the same level.

" How was your day ?" Lapis asked, understanding that the other girl was having trouble initiating conversation with her. It wasn't exactly if they knew each other enough to know what to talk about, so she figured small talk would be the best way to get to know each other. And Peridot was thankful for her doing so.

"Hasn't been very interesting so far." She sighed "I woke up at 8am, but I didn't have anything that I needed to stick to my schedule, so I kept my little brother entertained all morning. Lunch wasn't terrible, then I just waited to come here." She looked to the girl who was almost too close for comfort. She didn't really like people being in her bubble, but so far, things were going ok, she was dealing with it. She couldn't ruin her only distraction for the week.

"Sounds like you're having quite the boring day, what do you think about having a swim?"

Peridot stayed silent. Was she offering to swim because she was uncomfortable on the rock? She probably was, it wasn't exactly the best seat, even for her. And she could really do with a swim. She shrugged. "Fine, but I need to go change into my swimming costume."

"You swim dressed ?" Lapis slid herself back into the water, then looked up to her, confused. "Just swim with me undressed?"

"N-no." Peridot looked at her house, blushing furiously. There was no way that she was skinny dipping. The house wasn't too far, and she had enough time left to go change. The other girl waited patiently for her to make up her mind, though it felt more like passive aggressive persuasion to her. She could maybe just swim in her underwear? What was she wearing today? She tried to remember what she put on that morning. She'd picked out her American flag boxer shorts and dark blue sports bra. She sighed. That'd have to do.

She pulled her T-shirt off over her head and folded it, placing it next to her shoes, then stood up to remove her shorts, doing the same with them, then removed the hair clip that was holding back the top part of her hair. Lapis watched amazed. "You wear clothes under your clothes?" It almost comforted Peridot to know that what was more important to her was her layering of fabrics and not her small structure.

She sat back down and slowly slid into the water. But she wasn't prepared for her body to sink so far in the water as her head went underwater. She burst back up, her hair covering her eyes, provoking Lapis to laugh. She quickly moved them out of the way and timidly smiled. "It's quite deep here." she said, not wanted to admit that she found the spot scarily deep.

"Here, hold on to me." She swam closer to Peridot and reached out to her. Peridot looked at her hands for a second, hesitating on holding them. She then frowned at her hesitation and held onto her hands, ensuring her safety.

"Thanks."