The Blunder Part 1
A/N: Salute. Since I personally didn't like the route The Drama went, this fic will focus on another path I saw a glimpse of. As this fic is ship oriented, there will be undefined amount of cheese. You've been warned.
This story most likely won't be better than the other Carwin fanfics, but I'll try my best to make this enjoyable. Obviously I'm going to alter some stuff from the plot while making my own.
Constructive criticism is always welcome. Hope you enjoy.
I didn't want to be the one to forget
It was a brilliant sunny Sunday morning. Darwin woke up early as he had plans with hanging out with his girlfriend Carrie. Gumball wasn't sleeping soundly since the weight of his doubt got really heavy, so he woke up when he heard Darwin's thuds. Darwin was preparing for the day.
"Oh, you're early today." Darwin said, surprised that his brother was awake, especially on a Sunday morning.
Gumball tried to act normal "So are you," he replied. He didn't want to show his true intentions, that is deciding to spy on his brother. Gumball couldn't take the suspense any longer.
"Well... Got any suggestions?" Darwin said.
"For?" Gumball asked.
"You know, what to wear today. I'm not really sure, we don't get much alone time together, so I want to make the most of it." Darwin explained. He wore some black pants and shoes. "How's this?"
"I dunno. It's alright, but something important is missing." Gumball said.
"What is?" Darwin asked.
"You need a hairstyle." Gumball joked, snickering.
Darwin gave a bitter look. "So I'm bald, what's your problem?" he replied, slightly raising his voice.
"Calm down dude, it's just banter." Gumball said while he pushed himself back a little. The bitter look on Darwin softened and Gumball continued. "Well you should get something for your head with those pants, it looks distracting to be honest. Maybe a little hat?"
Darwin tried on a hat, but he thought it was too formal for a casual hang out. He sighed and took it off. "Maybe I should wear my normal clothes. Nothing's going to be unusual anyways." He put on his regular green shoes and looked in the mirror again with a smile. "Yeah that's better. Simplicity."
"Yeah that's right, just be yourself." Gumball agreed. "So... Where will you go?"
"We're going to the mall first. But we'll probably just walk around the town afterwards. Improvise." Darwin shrugged.
Gumball gave a nod in agreement. Now he knew where to follow Darwin.
"Ok then, I'll leave after breakfast. You need anything?" Darwin asked.
"Thanks, I'm fine." Gumball said.
"Alright." Darwin said and went downstairs. Gumball looked before him, his face a little sour. His worry grew, "Just be yourself," he said in his mind.
After eating his breakfast and greeting everyone, Darwin left the house. At that exact moment, Gumball ran to his room and disguised himself in a coat and fedora. As he ran towards the door, Anais and Nicole were alarmed by his quick steps.
"Gumball, where are you going? And what's with the trenchcoat?" Nicole asked.
"Ah, I-I…" Gumball paused and gave a smile to mask his nervousness. "I have some of my own stuff to do like…" he tried to make something up quick. "Tobias still hasn't given me my cap yet. For the coat, uhh… I just wanted to wear a coat for today." He said.
"In spring?" Anais asked in both an unironical and arrogant way. Gumball however, only sensed the latter and got irritated.
"Yes(!) In spring. I have a self reserved taste of fashion. I don't expect you to understand." He said in a deeper, annoyed voice.
"I don't," Anais said bluntly while zapping the tv.
"Whatever," Gumball replied with the same voice. "Well, love you mom! Have a nice day," he said more calmly, and left the house.
"Eh he probably has his reasons," Nicole said. And was she right.
Gumball saw his brother way far across the street, headed towards the bus stop. Gumball ran towards Darwin until he felt like he was at a safe distance. After that he resorted to walking so as not to alert his target.
Once Darwin reached the stop, Gumball groaned, "Oh man, why do you need to take the bus? Now I have to wait for the next one." After a few minutes, Darwin got on a bus and headed to the mall. Gumball waited for the next bus which luckily came rather quickly.
Inside the bus, Gumball was watching outside and thinking, "Should I really be doing this? They don't seem to have any problems with each other... Am I overreacting again?" He sighed. "I at least need to make sure things are ok... I hope he's doing better than I am with Penny," he thought.
After Gumball arrived at the mall he searched for Darwin for a few minutes. Gumball spotted him waiting at Joyful Burger and took a breath in relief. "Thank god I didn't lose him. Well... I should've made a plan first, I don't want to look like a stalker in public. Ok so... What do secret agents do? Maintaining distance, acting normal and..." He saw a newspaper stand. "Cover! Right." He bought a newspaper and entered the restaurant from the backdoor.
Gumball sat on a table that wasn't too close nor far away from Darwin's table. He opened his newspaper, pushed the edge of his fedora downwards and peeked through the gap. Larry went to Darwin's table.
"Good morning Watterson, what's your order?" Larry asked.
"Good morning. I'm waiting for somebody so I'll take it later, thanks." Darwin said.
"Alright then." Larry said and walked to Gumball's table.
"Hello mister what's your order?" Larry asked.
When Larry glared behind the newspaper, he noticed that it was Gumball under the clothes, both gave each other an awkward look. Larry didn't say anything, but by the way it looked like, Gumball was not acting normally.
"Uh... What are you doing?" Larry asked.
"Shh. I just want a milkshake. And please act like I'm not here ok?" Gumball demanded.
"Well then... What kind of milkshake?"
"Chocolate... With extra bitter..." Gumball said in a melodramatic way.
"Alright, you're already in a weird mood, so I'm not going to ask further." Larry replied as he walked away.
After a few minutes passed, Carrie arrived at the restaurant. She... "sat" in front of Darwin.
"Hey... Sorry I'm late, I wasn't sure if I should've worn anything." Carrie said.
"Haha, it's alright. I had the same thoughts this morning too," Darwin laughed. Then he caught on to Carrie's hair, it was different. She had longer hair than usual, down to her neck. He was bewildered for a moment.
"Your… hair," He said.
"Ah, yes! Glad you noticed, I wanted to have something different for today." Carrie said with smiling eyes.
"Oh… What for?" Darwin asked out of naivety. Carrie sensed this but she stood cool.
"For you. Duh!" she kept a cheerful attitude. She was about to ask if it looked good, but then stopped to wait for the natural response.
"Really? Well, it looks… marvelous." Darwin said, struck dumb for the second.
"Thank you." Carrie said sincerely, smiling again. Darwin slowly recovered from his trance and waved at Larry to order their drinks.
"Larry!" he called.
Larry looked at Darwin's table to see it's Carrie he was waiting for. Larry's morning happiness changed into worry. He walked up to the couple.
"Can I get a strawberry milkshake? And a little joy menu. What do you want?" Darwin asked Carrie.
"Urm... Whatever you think is good." Carrie replied.
"Then how about this weird named one: fruity-choffee-mashy. Uh… What exactly is this?" Darwin asked.
"It's a mixture of chocolate and coffee milkshake with fruity bits in it. People trying new tastes likes this." Larry explained.
"Eh, Carrie?" Darwin said.
"Sure. Weirdly named stuff is usually good. I'll take one, but in a paper cup please. I'll also take a little joy menu." Carrie said.
"Rightaway." Larry said and paused.
"But… I have to warn you about this," Larry pointed out Carrie. "If you are going to take someone's body, please do it outside. What you did last time almost got me into trouble, please don't let it happen ever again." he said politely and went back to prepare their orders.
Carrie's cheeks turned slightly crimson. If it was another time, she couldn't care less. But mentioning this in front of his boyfriend, she felt exposed, and embarrassed.
Darwin noticed this and was quick off the mark. "Don't worry, we can box them up for you." he said. Upon this response, Carrie's frown faded, replacing it with a beam.
"So what would you like to do today?" Darwin asked.
"I don't have any specific place to offer. Wherever the road goes?" Carrie asked.
"Sounds good to me!" Darwin agreed cheerfully.
Meanwhile, as Gumball overheard their talk, Larry delivered the cat's milkshake and placed it on the table. Like everything Gumball did for today, he dramatically grabbed the cup and pulled it towards himself, the sound coming from the sliding glass making Gumball's mood deeper. He drank from his milkshake. Larry just rolled his eyes at Gumball's sophisticated acting.
"They are still fresh... They aren't even sure where to go." Gumball said and gulped. "Mmm, the bitter is actually quite tasty." he complimented his drink with a smile on his lips.
Darwin thanked Larry as they got their order right after Gumball's. He talked while taking sips from his milkshake.
"So, how's it going?" Darwin made an attempt to start a convo.
Carrie carried it on. "Good… All better for seeing you." she replied, which put a smile on Darwin's face.
"Hehe. Our feelings are mutual," He said. This became cheesy real quick, Darwin tried to get semi-serious.
"Well… what've you been doing over the… weekend?" he slowly continued.
"Eh, been getting lots of sleep, doing my school work, lots of sleep, helping my dad with chores, lots of sleep, solving crosswords with my grandma and scaring some people in the cemetery." She listed bluntly.
"Ah same!" Darwin said and quickly stopped to correct himself "-except for the scaring people part… and solving crosswords." He cleared his throat. "Isn't that kinda, wrong?" Darwin asked like the innocent kid he was.
"What, solving crosswords?" Carrie said. Darwin was about to say no but he thought that it would be rude, so he gave Carrie her time. She realised her wrong guess after the silence.
"Oh, that. Well… yeah." she dropped her head in a sense of guilt, but quickly reverted it by flipping her hair.
"But, when you're a ghost you can't or don't need to do a lot of things mortals usually do. You don't buy or eat food, you don't take showers or wash hands, you don't work as much as others in a job… So, you fill your time with scaring or haunting, reading stuff… Maybe socializing with people like my father does." She stopped at the last example. "A bit ironic for my case isn't it?" she finished.
"No no! I don't think that way." Darwin disagreed "You're just not as willing as others to make friends, but that's ok too." he said.
"I guess." Carrie replied. "But…" she paused once more, Darwin had shaken something inside her without knowing. But after thinking about it, this was a question for another day.
"Yes?" His boyfriend begged for the rest of her sentence.
"Nevermind, just something I thought." Carrie said.
"You can be open to me." Darwin expressed with a caring, warm voice.
"It's okay. Some other time maybe," Carrie closed the point.
Darwin respected her choice and tried to go through another topic.
"Anything else you have been doing?" Darwin asked.
"You didn't even say what you have been doing," Carrie returned his question. Darwin looked up. He wasn't even thinking about himself. When conversing with his girlfriend, he didn't matter, in his mind. Darwin could listen to Carrie talk all day, but since he was asked Darwin had to find something. Nothing worth mentioning came up. Until something about Gumball formed in his head.
"Oh, I… have been preparing Gumball to run on monday." He said.
"Huh? Is there a running contest I haven't heard about?" Carrie asked.
"Ah, no. Remember Friday how everyone was talking about Gumball accidently hurting Jamie's eye?" He said.
"I do. The ping-pong tourney right? Everyone was mentioning that but I didn't get to see it. How did that happen?" Carrie asked.
Darwin began making gestures to visually re-enact the event.
"Well… Their match got really heated near the end, and when Gumball found his opening, he hit the ball as hard as he could." he said as he swung his fin. "The ball went so fast I couldn't track it at all. In a blink, we saw Jamie holding her eye," then he opened his eyes wide and stretched his arms. "Letting out a furious scream! Gumball gone to earth in an instant while Jamie was still throwing loud insults and threats everywhere." Darwin held his cheeks and dropped his jaw "Everyone watched with mouths agape and I also vanished from the scene in case she would use me as an outlet for her anger. That day at lunch, everyone was asking each other how Jamie's eye got hurt, even the teachers. She was waiting for Gumball there as well. My poor brother had to skip lunch. Anyways, Jamie went to the nurse's office for the afternoon. From what I heard the nurse explained it something like this:
'As much as your friend has impressive behemoth-like durability, her eyes are still as sensitive as others.'
-blah blah blah, it was something like this."
Hearing this, Gumball couldn't help but feel proud over winning against the tyrant that is Jamie, especially in sports. But realizing the possibility of getting mauled to a coma made chills run up his back.
"I offered to help Gumball get warmed up for Monday. He doesn't really have any better things to do, nor did he want a bone grinding machine on his tail, so he took it up. And we ran together crazy long miles over the past few days. Nothing interesting happened afterwards."
"But don't you guys do that every time though? The running away from bullies and stuff?" Carrie asked.
"We do," Darwin said with a low voice at the start and raising to the end. He took a bite from his burger. "But this time it's different. Remember, the reason why someone chases us is because most of the time either we, or Gumball himself, offend someone with our words. This time Jamie got a black eye from a ping-pong ball," Darwin chuckled. "It's actually funny when you think about it. So nobody's sure what Jamie is planning this time. Better to be prepared," Darwin explained while munching his burger.
"I see." Carrie said excitedly and then snickered. "Actually, I'd like to see Gumball's reaction while tearing down the floors."
This comment really bothered Gumball, making him feel humiliated. He waved his hands upside down in opposite directions. "I'd leke te see Gembell's reection whele teering dewn the fleers." he said mockingly "Would it be as funny if you were in my place huh?" he grunted and shook his newspaper to cover himself again.
"Yeah, I guess that was all. There's not much else I did for this weekend," Darwin said.
"Miss Simian was mentioning about the year project this week. If you want to… Maybe we can do it together?" Carrie asked.
"Sure thing. I'd love to," Darwin said.
"Great!"
"Is there a topic you prefer?"
"You know me. I'm best at history, but from what I've heard and seen in your notes, your history is…" She said while gesturing at her neck as if slitting it. "Your biology is good, but why would a ghost bother with bio?"
"I see. Yeah that's basically the case," Darwin said. He thought for a moment. "What if we could find some topic in between? Both including biology and history. We could also teach each other some stuff while doing so."
"Ok. But we don't know the options yet. Did Ms. Simian explain anything about it?" Carrie asked.
"To be honest, I wasn't listening to her carefully at that moment. I don't really know, sorry." Darwin said as he looked to the ground.
"Well, we can ask about it tomorrow." Carrie said.
Darwin finished his drink and his meal. Now they had to leave for Carrie to eat.
"Larry, can you wrap these up?" Carrie asked, to which Larry responded with a sigh of relief. Maybe today would be a troubleless day.
Gumball thought to himself, "Gosh, they can't even eat or drink something together properly. This could be a problem."
Darwin loosened himself "What do we do now?" he asked.
"Erm..." Carrie covered her chin with her hand. She looked around for a while, the first thing her eye caught was a books and records shop.
"How about buying some albums?" She offered. It was fine for Darwin, as always.
"Not a bad idea," He accepted.
Carrie took her meal and Darwin asked for the bill. After paying, they left the restaurant. Gumball was about to leave as well but he wanted to buy one more drink. He asked Larry to quickly make another milkshake. Larry started preparing his order, he couldn't resist but inquire.
"You know you shouldn't be doing that, right Gumball?"
Gumball sweated a little. "What? Watching them? Come on Larry, like I'm not supposed to see my brother happy."
Larry glared at him and Gumball surrendered. "Ok I'm spying on them, but it's for a good cause. Also, this is between me and them."
"I'm only talking by etiquette but whatever. You're free to ignore me as always." Larry said as he slowly passed Gumball's milkshake. They both have exchanged unamused glares. Obviously, Gumball ignored him after a few seconds and left the restaurant with his second milkshake. He followed the couple into the store, then spotted a bookshelf for cover. When he felt safe he took a sip from his milkshake, audible to both Darwin and Carrie, causing them to look behind. Gumball quickly hid himself again behind the shelves with slight panic.
"Hooh that was a close call. Maybe I shouldn't be drinking this so carelessly," Then he suddenly saw something in front of him, smirking. It was The Doubt again, but smaller this time, implying that its weight has been lifted since Gumball decided to take action.
"You know this is all your fault!" Gumball said to the Doubt.
"Are you sure?" The Doubt repeated his line again like a broken record.
"I'm bordering on privacy violation, get out of my head already you stubborn thing!" Gumball closed his eyes and hit his head several times. When he reopened his eyes he saw the lightbulb guy awkwardly looking at him. Gumball facepalmed "Not you again..."
"Oh oh, it's ok, it's ok. I'll just walk away. Please just don't mind." the guy said and returned to his business.
Gumball peeked at Darwin and Carrie once more, they were looking at albums to buy.
"Would you like to listen to some at home?" Carrie asked.
"Yep," Darwin replied.
Both of them split for a minute to choose what they wanted.
"How about this?" Both asked each other. Carrie was holding an ABCD album, and Darwin was holding Editones.
"Country?" Carrie asked.
"Rock?" Darwin asked. Both looked away. The agony, the torment, the horror could be read from their faces, it was like their tongues were getting pulled from their mouth, and eyes were crushed at the same time. Darwin looked like he was poisoned, while Carrie looked like she was choking on air…
Or they were simply cringing.
They turned back to each other, impressively synchronized. "Well sure, it's not like I don't like rock." Darwin said.
"Yeah, it would be good to listen to some casual stuff too. Let's buy both of 'em." Carrie said.
"No way." Both of them in their minds were saying.
"Oh god, they don't have common tastes. This might be a problem." Gumball was saying. "Well, actually that was kinda given from the start wasn't it? Yeah…" He added like it wasn't something to be surprised about.
Carrie took the records but... something was wrong, she couldn't move them. It was like there was an invisible wall in between her and the cashier. She pushed hard but to no avail.
"How about I try?" Darwin said.
"They won't admit it, but clearly one hates the other's choice *siiip*. It's like that time in Ripley 2000." Gumball said.
Darwin took the albums and tried to push with all his strength, but the invisible force didn't let him through. Carrie came up with an idea.
"Maybe try it separately?" She said and took the ABCD album, Darwin was left with Editones. They didn't feel the force this time. They bought both of them and looked at each other, then started giggling.
"We're going to regret this, aren't we?" Darwin snickered.
"Well it's alright, perhaps we'll gain a new perspective," She shrugged. "Ok, we bought our music. Got any recommendations on where to go next?"
"The park? I love having some peaceful time there." Darwin said.
"Park it is. Let's go." She said, holding Darwin's hand as they left the store.
"Aww... It's still cute though." Gumball said after them.
"Are you sure?" The doubt appeared again.
"Could you stop?" Gumball was getting frustrated.
"It's my job. I tell you, this was their best so far. Their road doesn't look good," The Doubt started to put its weight on Gumball again. Gumball tried to ignore it as he knew this talk would not be going anywhere. "I tell you..." The doubt said again and disappeared once more. As the imaginary weight lifted, Gumball headed to the park to continue watching over Darwin and Carrie.
At the park Darwin and Carrie wandered around, Gumball following behind them. But since it was an open place, Gumball struggled to stay out of sight, and he was falling behind. He could see them talking, but it was impossible to understand what they were saying.
"Come on! Sit or stop somewhere! You really have to look all around the park, don't ya? Everything works against me today."
After a while the couple finally decided to stop at a hill. Darwin laid down in the grass and so did Carrie. To Gumball's luck, this time he found a perfect tree to hide in. "Ok, I take it back. Maybe not everything."
"The sky is beautiful right?" Darwin said.
"It is," Carrie replied.
"You know what else is beautiful?" Darwin said with a smug. Carrie blushed and laughed over the little compliment.
"Haha, stop being cliche," She said.
"But it works right?" Darwin said while giggling.
Behind them, Gumball was making vomiting expressions.
"Blaugh, eugh. Is this how it looks from outside? It's so sour I can taste it," He said.
"If you are keen on that route then let's tell each other: if you had to describe me in one sentence, how would you do it?" Carrie asked.
"Oh... Do you think one sentence is enough?" Darwin said, raising an eyebrow but still smiling.
"As long as you get the words right." Carrie replied.
"Ok... Let me think for a second." Darwin said and tried to find something meaningful. "Well... To me: there are a lot of galaxies in the universe, waiting to be discovered, some get ignored because maybe it's dim to the eye at first and..." He tried not to end the sentence. "... I think you are one of those galaxies where there are thousands of beautiful stars that need to be uncovered beyond that cold exterior,"
Carrie was surprised, she didn't know Darwin was going to say this all in one sentence. Her surprise reflected in her tone. "Oh... That's (real cute)... That was really clever, you're really poetic aren't you?"
"Hehe, I try. So... How about you?" Darwin asked.
"Erm... I don't think I can pull this off..." Carrie said.
Darwin tried to encourage her. "It's fine, whatever comes out, I'm grateful for it."
Carrie thought upon it for a little while. "Hehe... I- I dunno... I should've known before I asked, I really fell for my own trap didn't I?" she said, covering her eyes and forehead.
Darwin smiled and shrugged. Carrie calmed down a little "Ok... I need to have a moment." she said, looking at the sky. Words started shaping after gazing upon it. "You know that people's days go like any day on Earth, sometimes light, sometimes dark, sometimes happy, sometimes blue. During your sunny days everything feels good as everything is bright in the light, but on your sad, dark nights it's easy to get lost. You try to find your way back in the dark, but even on those bad days there are the ones, you couldn't notice existed back then. They were behind the warm sky and always watched over in case your world went dark, they continued to be your guide, your hope, your happiness until dawn. But once you know it, you don't forget them, they are still there, even if you can't see them. And you are like the moon, the north star of my dark night." She paused. "Well... That definitely wasn't one sentence," she said with a downer tone.
Darwin didn't mind that at all though. "...wow. It was clearly better than what I said." he said with smiling eyes. "And you thought was poetic."
"It was good?" Carrie asked. "Whew, that's great news... But I won't be doing that again." she switched right back at her monotone voice.
"Heh, as you wish." Darwin replied.
Darwin felt real happy over hearing that from Carrie. It was rare to hear such heartful things, especially since it wasn't easy for her to bring them up. Even Gumball was affected by it no matter how cheesy it came to him as a third party.
"Wow... That's not something you hear all the time. Maybe I can use this quote sometime with Penny," he said.
Carrie's mood suddenly changed into a displeasured one. "Aargh!" she let out a grunt and rolled herself face down on the grass. Her voice was muffled "I just remembered I have school theatre practise tomorrow," she said.
"You don't want to go?" Darwin asked.
"No, I can go. I'm just…" She lifted her head from the ground "Really bad at acting and it feels bothersome."
"I don't think so. I've seen you play, it's decent at least," Darwin said, not letting her emotions get her down.
Carrie guffawed over this comment "You bet? I sometimes watch myself for laughs. I don't even know how I got selected," she said, opening her phone -which appeared out of thin air- and its gallery to scroll through her media. After a few seconds of searching she found the recordings of her previous practises.
"Here is an example," she said. But before she played it Darwin quickly snuck in a question.
"You record your practises?"
"My father does. He says there aren't many memoirs of me so he wants to make some. It feels a bit awkward but, I can understand why. Now see this one," She pressed play.
Tobias is seen in a cavalryman costume "Well well. We arrived at the Groundmount mountain pass. Yet another obstacle to overcome. How do you feel about this my beloved pal?" He said in his classic boastful voice.
"Ok, your turn Carrie," Mr. Small directed from off-screen.
"We must be surely careful. I heard about the wandering-" She said tediously, but got cut by Mr. Small.
"Wait, wait wait. Carrie, you and your friend are about to enter into danger. That sounded too careless, give it a bit more feeling." he said.
"Ok." Carrie acknowledged, tried with a more emotional take.
"We need to be caref-"
"Louder." Mr. Small cut her word once again.
Carrie sighed and continued with a higher volume.
"We need to be careful. I heard there were dangerous beasts wandering around. Deadly as lions, nimble as donkeys. Not even mentioning the great pit of love."
Darwin snorted as he heard this. But he took a grip of himself, didn't want to look rude.
"CUUUT! Nimble as 'monkeys' not donkeys, and it's pit of lava, not love! How can you confuse these?" Mr. Small nearly freaked out, so did Carrie.
"I can't remember the lines properly when all I get is non stop orders!" She waved her hands around vigorously.
"Ok! Let's just, stop and take a little break shall we?" Mr. Small calmed himself down. The recording ended.
"See, you found it funny as well." Carrie remarked.
"Just a bit, but it really isn't the case. You dropped a small clanger, who doesn't? If you act bad so, how would you get selected? I think you're belittling yourself there." Darwin said.
Carrie sighed "It's because of the witch role I took long ago-"
"Exactly! I watched that, you were awesome there!" Darwin cut her word.
While the sweet words Darwin exclaimed put a smile on Carrie's face, she still rested her case "Yes but it's because I know a few things about how witches behave. Like, I can play those; sorcerer, monster, zombie, haunter, goblin and stuff. They want me to play a hero's companion, and worse, that hero is Tobias." Carrie puffed at her hair. "The amount of machismo coming from him will be unbearable." she scowled.
"I can talk with him about it if you want me to." Darwin said.
"Nah he wouldn't listen." Carrie said as she waved her hand in disagreement.
"Why don't you just say to the organizers you quit?" Darwin asked.
"They don't allow that. If I persist, they threaten me with lowering my marks. I know I'm not the brightest student but I do care about my grades too. I guess I'll just hope it won't be boring." Carrie answered, then her last line echoed in her mind.
"Boring… Won't be boring? That's it, I just need to play it my way!" She said with an excited voice.
"Your way?" Darwin asked, curious to hear what exactly she meant.
"Yeah. Make it a bit more action-packed, more thrilled. If they want adventure, they'll get it. I can use some illusion potions, or maybe even summon some spectres." Carrie's eyes and smile widened, disfigured even. She rubbed her hands together. "Oh it will be golly fun. The horror and screams of the audience, my reverbing cackle... The begging, terrified eyes of Tobias to make it stop!" She remorselessly plotted. She took a gander at Darwin to see this face,
(ºДº )3
"Oh come on Darwin, where is the fun with playing theatre without some tension?" Carrie smirked. Darwin couldn't agree, but he tried to have empathy.
"I see. I think… I would be bored as well if all I had done was exchanging made up lines." Darwin said. "But it still sounds somewhat dangerous. Say, if you promise me it will not harm anyone, I won't object." Darwin asked for Carrie's word.
She continued to smirk, but gave her word. "I promise I won't hurt anyone." Carrie held her hand on her chest. Darwin simply nodded in acceptance.
"Can I show you something too?" Darwin asked.
"Go ahead."
"So here it is..." Darwin said "-this is when we were doing our random weekly challenges and it was Gumball's turn to dare me that week. He bet that I couldn't swim for a minute in Elmore Park's lake when it was frozen during winter. To my fishy pride I accepted it and, here is what happened." Darwin played his video.
Gumball slowly walked into the camera's perspective. "You have to dive headfirst or it doesn't count."
"You're challenging a fish to swim," Darwin replied. "It's a piece of cake. Now stand aside," he passed the camera to Gumball.
Darwin got closer to the water and started warming up a bit. Winded himself up, then jumped into the lake, doing a mid-air flip as well to look stylish. He cracked through the layer of ice and dived in with a loud splash.
Gumball whistled "Fweeuut! He went in. Now let's see if he can hold on."
Darwin disappeared in the water for several seconds and then surfaced, shouting from the freezing cold.
"It's cold! So cold!" he yelled. It can be seen from his struggle that he's begging to get out of the lake.
"Get me ouutt!" Darwin cried out to his brother.
Gumball felt his sides splitting, laughing hysterically. He then held Darwin's fin and pulled him out from the water. The recording ended with continuing laughter and screaming coming from the brothers.
"And I got sick right after, obviously." Darwin said.
Carrie snickered. "So that's why you were absent for a week this winter."
"I thought I could take cold water but... Guess not," Darwin shrugged.
Meanwhile Carrie browsed her gallery a bit more. "I found a good photo." She opened an old image. "This is from an autumn party I was in. The dead, immortals and such, celebrate autumn like the others celebrate the spring."
Darwin looked at the photo. After checking over it for few seconds he felt like something didn't belong here. The surroundings in the photo were oddly ancient. "Everything here is old looking; the buildings, clothes, even the tables. Why is that?" Darwin asked.
"That's because it was taken a long time ago." Carrie said.
"How long?.." Darwin asked.
"Aa-round three centuries," Carrie gave an estimated number. But Darwin was confused even more.
"Huh? How did you even find a camera back then? And hold on, if you were there, how old are you now?"
Carrie got a little nervous. "I~'m 327 years old," She said, lowering her voice at the end.
"What?!" Darwin was surprised. "H-How?"
"Well, long story short, that's how immortal stuff works," Carrie shrugged.
"O-k. I guess it does." Darwin tried to cover his puzzlement. "So who are these people?"
Carrie started introducing the people in the photo. "This is Eliza. She usually likes big places, like castles and abandoned mansions. She arranged the party. This is an old friend, Claudio. He likes to travel around the world. I haven't seen him for a long time. There is Cath, great artist. Stefan, complete nerd… Brandy, Scott, Penelope, Lander, Nancy..."
Darwin checked everyone in the photo. "What about this? You skipped one."
"Ah..." Carrie said, in a faking tone as if she was confused. "That is Azrael. He's like this 'adventurer' kind. You know what I mean? He likes… probably lots of things."
"Yeah, I get it," Darwin shook his head.
"Coo-" Carrie cut her word. She looked around the park. Astonishment could be read from her face.
"Is there something wrong?" Darwin asked. She made a "one second" gesture and didn't respond.
The park was getting windy, Darwin felt this breeze and smiled. His wonder flew away with the wind. "Mm, the peaceful good old wind." He said.
But it wasn't as peaceful as he thought. Carrie noticed it was actually a demon that was making the gust, and if it got close its growl was strong enough to hurl people away. The demon, noticing Carrie's eyes on itself, instinctively came closer to the couple, slowly and threatful.
Carrie tried to get Darwin up, concern in her voice. "Uuh… Darwin can we go somewhere else?" The demon came near enough and let out a sort of deep but weak growl. Carrie was backing off while Darwin still thought it was a breeze.
Gumball sensed Carrie's odd movement.
"Huh? What's she doing?" He asked himself. Darwin noticed Carrie was covering herself with her arm.
"What's the matter? You don't like the wind?" He asked.
Carrie was trying to shoo off the demon "No it was just, sudden. We should visit some other place," She said.
Darwin couldn't really understand why, but he didn't reject. They were sitting in the park for a while too. "Alright then. Let's roll out. What'd you offer next?"
"I'll come up with something, let's just get moving." Carrie hurried Darwin. She checked for the demon, it was stretching itself to swoop on them. While Darwin was looking away she took the opportunity and screeched at the demon to not let it attack, the demon jumped back for a moment, but so did Darwin in horror.
"AAAHH!" He screamed, got caught off-guard. Darwin put his fins on his heart, gawked at his girlfriend. "C-carrie?" he could just say with a scaredy voice. In this moment the demon growled back more furious, making Darwin roll backwards from the coming wind force.
"What- what is happening?" he stood up to his feet and stepped back from the direction the force came from.
Gumball's eyes widened. "What is happening indeed. Where is Carrie looking at?"
Carrie floated back to Darwin's side, seeing the terror on his face. She tried to calm Darwin down."It's alright, it's alright! Can we just move a little bit faster?"
Darwin didn't know what it was but there was something off and making Carrie hostile. He couldn't think about the reasons and at this rate he just did as he was told.
"Sure, sure! Maybe run even?" Darwin held Carrie's hand and started to accelerate towards the exit.
Seeing the kids leave, the demon stopped harassing them. It was simply territorial behaviour. Some people around the park walked away as well.
The idea finally hit Gumball's head. He gasped from the realization. "Oh my god! That was a ghost. She's seeing other ghosts of course! It was probably some monster from the immortal world. His world is happy and cozy, her world is dangerous and terrifying. This might be a problem."
When the couple got far enough, Gumball slowly left his cover and continued to keep his track.
During their walk, Darwin and Carrie were thinking. "What just happened?" for the fish, "How did that happen?" for the ghost.
"I wonder why she screamed at the park. Does she hate it there? Or was it something else… Was it me? Am I being too annoying with this nature talk? Maybe my commentary on wind was unnecessary. She likes more bleak stuff anyways," Darwin made some self criticism. He did not want to be irritating to his girlfriend, who would? But then, he remembered Carrie's first response about the park. "…but she also said she's fine with it? She didn't sound like she was lying, either. Ugh, I'm so confused. Maybe I just need to talk a bit less and give her a chance. She hasn't said a word since."
But Carrie was in thoughts as well."Finally that demon stopped chasing us. What do they do in a park anyway?" she said with sort of an angry inner voice. "They have to ruin some peace and quiet. Darwin hasn't said anything since we left the park. He still looks scared from my growl too…" She looked down to Darwin. "Why did I do it right next to him anyway? Stupid Carrie, you had one job. I didn't want it to end up awkward and cold like this. Should I have told him about the demon? ...nah that would just scare him more." She refused her own idea. "I hope I haven't left a negative impression on him."
So was Gumball in thoughts. Trying to connect things.
"Well… It's not a great date is it? And this is like their, what? Third? It's been the longest so far. They… do match, but also don't. I don't know how. They are just too fine with each other, like one completes the other. But they must have some interests in common too, are they going to spend all their time together with something one of them doesn't like? And what about their styles, Carrie is cool and edgy meanwhile my brother is too warm and bubbly. Maybe that's why they like each other but… can they also dislike each other for this?" He questioned himself.
And with these thoughts in their minds they stopped by the arcade, not saying anything. But from the body language of each other, it was clear they wanted to play some games. To break the silence Carrie acted first this time. She flipped her hair to attract Darwin's attention, and surely it did. He still thought it looked gorgeous.
"So… What would you like to play? Something that doesn't require legs actually," Carrie asked.
That brought a little laughter from Darwin. "How about the new Kebab Fighters? I heard they changed a lot of things. I think you'd like to stay sharp?" Darwin said.
"If you want to get your tail stomped," Carrie said with a confident manner.
"Oh you're on!" Darwin replied with the same attitude. They got in the arcade and searched around to find the newly placed game. After looking around for a moment they found it in a corner. Gumball was lucky again to have a spot for hiding behind. He fixed himself in the suit, leaned against a machine and covered himself with the newspaper again.
Darwin and Carrie had already selected their fighters.
"You didn't pick the hot dog guy again," Carrie said.
"I'm getting used to noodle ninja since the tournament. I like its playstyle. And you are still with luchar... Lurco... Ludcopod?"
"Lucharthropod. Lucha plus arthropod basically," Carrie corrected Darwin.
"Whatever that is. You're still with him," Darwin said.
"I liked him most all these years, can't drop it anymore. So, do you know what's new?" She asked.
"No. I don't know anything either. We're going to find out ourselves."
The match started. "Round one... Fight!"
Gumball heard the sounds of buttons and controls from afar. A sign the radar is off.
Several minutes later...
"Ugh, stoop!" Darwin was getting frustrated while Carrie laughed. "You know lows are my weakness," He said.
"Block them!" Carrie casually said.
"I can't block them. Do you know how hard it is to react to them?" Darwin said.
"C'mon. Is this how you'll get good, by whining? Look, I'm coming. I'm going to sweep again. You better block!" Carrie warned.
"Noo!"
Carrie's character just ran up close and made a sweep. Unable to block, Darwin got K.O.'d.
"Ok! Now you have it, I'm going to use my ultimate technique." Darwin said and next round, he started spamming gimmicky moves. Carrie couldn't keep up and counter.
"What? Hey! Stop the spam."
"Come on Carrie. What were you saying about getting good? Just block them."
"Grr. If you want to play this way..." Carrie said and started spamming as well. People passing by were giving an awkward look to the brutal mashing. A stranger came up behind.
"Is it spare after your game folks?" He asked.
"Few more games and we are spare." Carrie responded. A few seconds later, her face got frozen at the moment she was K.O.'d. Darwin fist pumping to his victory.
"Noodle Ninja wins," The announcer said.
"Yeeaah! Another win to my ninja. The ultimate technique never falters," He said and made a little dance leaning left and right. But losing was not the reason Carrie's face was frozen, this voice was familiar… Deadly familiar. She slowly turned back. After finishing his pop off, Darwin noticed the pale look… Uh, the paler look in her face.
"Huh. Carrie? What's the matter?" He asked and turned his face to see what Carrie was looking at.
First it looked huge to Darwin, maybe it was the suddenness of the moment, or the fact the stranger was too close. It took another second for Darwin's eyes to completely focus, what he was seeing could be described as a smug with legs. "Wait! Y-you are the guy in- what was his name?"
"Azrael?!" Carrie shouted to this out-of-nowhere encounter, in a voice of surprise, shock and anger. Azrael showed himself up from his hoodie, smirking, and with a bit of a menacing look.
"Yeah I remembered, Azrael," Darwin said. He thought of grinning to look friendly, but that grin came out nervous. Azrael was larger than he imagined, at least he didn't look like a sack of muscle. Darwin had never seen Azrael in Elmore, neither anywhere else, aside from the photo, so he had no idea what's to come. Questions are in his head.
"Oh you know about me? What's up?" Azrael responded while doing finger guns and keeping the smirk on his face.
"Great!" Darwin said, doing finger guns as well. Actually he was not sure what to say or do. He thought it'd be better to let Azrael talk with Carrie since he was her friend. Darwin stood silent.
"How about you Carrie? You don't seem happy to see an old friend. Forgive my rudeness for coming out of nowhere and butting in your business," Azrael apologized.
Carrie didn't say anything but humphed. Hearing this humph made Darwin start to sweat. "Is there something wrong Carrie has with this guy?" He thought in his mind. For now, he preferred to stay reactive rather than proactive.
"Eh... So... Is this the guy you told me about?" Azrael asked but Carrie didn't respond again. "What's your name buddy?"
"I'm Darwin. Nice to meet you." Darwin said, he was a bit more comfortable that Azrael asked a friendly question.
"Darwin... Good name. Nice to meet you too. I'm Azrael" He said and then added "But I guess you know that already."
"Are you a close friend of Carrie?" Darwin asked.
"Uh, well I was her ex so does that count?" Azrael said nonchalantly.
Hearing this made Carrie's and Gumball's jaw drop. Carrie was stunned because Azrael dropped the bombshell so easily, and Gumball for learning Carrie even had an ex.
"What? What? An ex? Carrie had an ex? And she never talked about him? H-How?" Gumball thought in his mind.
"Ex? Like ex boyfriend?" Darwin asked.
Carrie almost foamed at the mouth. How could Azrael be all so comfortable with saying this?
"Yeah I was-" Azrael started but got interrupted by Carrie. She held shut his long beak-like mouth to prevent him from saying anything worse. She forced a smile.
"HAHAHA Azrael you jokester!" She said, her eyes and imaginary muscles twitching from furor. "Can I talk about something a little bit with you?" She said and pulled Azrael into a corner where Darwin couldn't hear them.
Carrie made sure she was far enough from Darwin. Then turned to Azrael. Her eyes grew wide with a pitcher black. It was not transparent anymore, resembling a black hole that couldn't be stared at. Her mouth started to morph. Her teeth sharpened, her jaw twisted, her hands shaped into claws. A monstrosity had formed.
"What do you THINK YOU'RE DOING!?" She snapped.
Azrael got defensive, waving his arms in a sorry manner.
"Ok ok don't get mad now, it escaped my lips!"
"Escaped? You call this escaped? You let out the cat like it's ALL NOTHING! " Carrie said while carelessly swinging those claws, Azrael had to take a step back to not get struck. Hate could be read from every bit of her body. "I especially stressed for you not to tell ANYONE!"
"Ok ok! Really sorry! It wasn't on purpose, I swear."
Carrie clenched all parts of her body out of fury. Her fists, her teeth, her eyes. She felt like throwing a clean paw for Azrael's ignorant behaviour, but thinking on it for a second, she decided not to. After making a grunt that lasted for longer than a few seconds, she slowly reformed back to her normal state.
"I'm not going to let myself get fed up by you. Now, what are you doing here?" She said with her classic cold emo tone.
"Uh hello? I texted like yesterday I'm coming to Elmore? As well as last week." Azrael said.
Carrie facepalmed. "No, not that. You said you will be visiting my house tonight remember? What are you doing here? Stalking me? To suddenly appear and drop an 'I'm her ex!' bomb?" She mildly yelled.
Azrael figured out where she's getting at. "What? Absolutely not! It was pure coincidence I found you here, and I wanted to say hi. I didn't come to Elmore to ruin things, I said this over and over," he paused, to give weight on his statement. "I came here because I wanted to kill some time until night and you just happened to be here."
Carrie sighed. "Why can't I trust you?"
Meanwhile, Darwin was looking away from Carrie and Azrael to respect their privacy. While he was looking around an odd blueness caught his eye. He looked at it again and the blue "thing" disappeared behind the arcade stand. Darwin got suspicious and decided to take a look.
Gumball who was the blue "thing" noticed he alerted Darwin, and his footsteps were getting louder. "What should I do? What should I do?" Gumball thought in panic. He needed to act fast.
Darwin looked behind the corner to see nothing. Scanned the surroundings around once more and shrugged. Walked away from the area.
The perspective rolled to show a blue cat squished in a really narrow space between two machines. It hurt him a lot but it was better than getting caught. Gumball carefully got out and had a deep breath of relief.
"Hahhh. Close call."
"Not really." Darwin appeared right behind.
"GGAAHH!" Gumball yelled. Jumping a meter back from his brother, left in quick breaths to calm down.
"Dude! You almost gave me a heart attack there!" Gumball rarked up.
Darwin didn't give a response. He stood with his arms crossed and eyes half-narrowed, Gumball fathomed it as 'Now, explain.'.
"Ok I'll explain. But first, what gave it away?"
"I checked the other way around. You've made too much noise. I can recognize your color from a mile away."
Gumball stood up and dusted himself off. "I need to work more on that." He said. "But, seriously?! You're gonna do nothing about that?" Gumball continued with a deeper voice.
"About what?" Darwin asked.
"About a guy suddenly popping out and claiming to be your girlfriend's ex, and you talk like he's your pal." Gumball said.
"What is wrong with that? He's just being friendly. Why does it bother you?" Darwin said.
"Ah you can't be serious. You don't be friends with your girlfriend's ex, it's against the golden rules of relationship," Gumball said.
"Golden rules? How do you even claim to know this when Penny doesn't even have an ex?" Darwin asked, somewhat confused.
"Believe me Darwin, after you come to a certain point in relationships you get to know everything," Gumball said with confidence.
Darwin sighed. "Just tell me, what are you doing here spying on us?"
"Oh come on it's the 21st century. Everyone is spying on everyone." Gumball said.
"Can't you give this person another chance to settle things?"
"I said I'm still considering it, and you better drop your 'cool guy' attitude if you don't want to lower your chances."
Azrael got a more serious tone "You know this is basically what I am right?" He said.
"Just don't be a jerk. If Darwin misunderstands anything from this, you will be the responsible. Alright?"
"Gee okay, I haven't even done anything." Azrael said. Carrie gave a 'Really?' look. "Ok, apart from that," He accepted. "I'll be nice, I promise." Azrael said, they exchanged looks for a few seconds. "I... Uh, like your new haircut."
"You don't get to like my haircut." Carrie said coldly and floated back to the Kebab Fighters arcade, Azrael followed behind her.
"Who gives you the right to?" Darwin said while holding his hands on his sides.
"My... uh. Concerns?" Gumball said.
"Concerns of what?" Darwin continued to ask.
"Look I just wanted to make sure that your..."
...
"What?"
"I mean both of your..."
...
"Yes?"
"...relationship is stable." Gumball finished.
"What are you on about? Of course we are stable. Where did you get that idea from? Are you still heeding others at school?"
Darwin checked Carrie and Azrael. Looks like their talk was finished.
"We're going to talk about this later ok? I need to get back now." He said. Darwin quickly took his place without making them notice and tried to talk like nothing happened.
"Hey so, everything is alright?" Darwin asked.
"Yeah, no worries." Carrie replied.
"Want to play another match? This time I'll play properly." Darwin offered.
"Doesn't matter, no more miss nice ghost. I'm ready when you are." Carrie said.
"I'm off for a walk until you finish, have fun." Azrael said and walked off. He wanted to give them space.
"I didn't know you had a boyfriend." Darwin said when Azrael was out of sight. Carrie kept her chill.
"Well, only one. But it wasn't serious." She said.
"Really? How long did you hang out?" Darwin asked.
"One… maybe two decades." She nervously said.
"Two decades? That's- one moment… what a decade equals… 20 years? That sounds pretty serious to me!"
"Well it may seem like it but 20 years are nothing in an immortal's life."
She looked at Darwin to see an unconvinced, sour face.
Carrie picked up a more convincing voice. "Look, I know. It's still long, but it was more of a friend-friend vibe. It never got to the point where we are now." She held Darwin from his "shoulders" to shake away his thoughts.
"So that doesn't matter, what matters is we're together. Picture it this way, he was more like a roaring sport car, and you're more like a shopping cart. Sure, the convertible looks cool, sounds cool, and everyone wants one, but… the shopping cart is filled with all the stuff you love."
Darwin was a bit confused, but he took it as a compliment. "...thanks" He could just say silently.
"Come on, let's not dwell on this silly topic. I still owe you a defeat," She said.
"Challenging still? You're asking for it," Darwin said, he checked around for Gumball again, but he was gone. Darwin thought he could relax for real now. The couple continued their game…
Some time later, Azrael returned. Carrie seeing this defeated Darwin in a flash. Adding another count to his lose streak. Darwin was getting annoyed by this, he let go of the controller.
"Lucharthropod wins." The announcer said.
"Ok ok ok, you are still better than me. I submit." He sighed.
Carrie folded her arms and gave Darwin a smug. "You've still got a lot to learn."
Azrael saw Darwin and Carrie finished their match. "If you guys have time would you like to play together or..?" he said.
"Sorry but we have been playing for enough. Next time." Carrie quickly rejected. Darwin could accept it for kindness, but he also thought it was enough for today as Carrie said. Neither he was really in the mood to do so after getting trampled by Carrie.
Azrael froze for a second, then looked at sideways with a silent grunt. He knew Carrie was doing this deliberately, to avoid intimacy at all cost. She was still angry. Ok, but how long does it take to cool?
"Alright then. See you 'round I guess…" He replied and inserted a token to machine. The couple simply left the place.
"Where else you would like to go next?" Darwin asked
"Eh, I'd love to but I have some business for tonight, and it's getting a bit late for it. I have to go home early and arrange stuff." She explained.
"Oh, alright then. It was still... nice to tag along with you today." Darwin said sheepishly.
Carrie smiled "Yeah… It's… Nice" she said. Even after solidifying their relationship, they still felt embarrassed with speaking at moments like this. As if they were opening up for the first time.
"See you in school tomorrow," Carrie said, as she floated away.
Darwin waved at her, and she responded by waving back. Darwin stood still for a few seconds. After checking around, as a habit now, he also hit the road to home.
Just as Darwin entered home Nicole welcomed her son.
"Welcome home lovebird," Nicole greeted Darwin jokingly.
"Hi Mrs. Mom," Darwin greeted back, he was about to go upstairs but got interrupted.
"Dinner is ready. Wash your hands and join us," Nicole said.
"Thanks mom, but I won't eat tonight. I don't feel hungry," Darwin said. His mother thought otherwise though.
"No way. You were outside all day, you need to eat," She replied.
"I'll be fine! I need some rest. Besides, I ate with Carrie, which is double on my side." Darwin said.
Upon hearing this, Nicole didn't persist, since she knew how the eating matter goes when Carrie is involved.
"Ok then, you are off for tonight." She said.
"Thanks… Uh, where is Gumball?" Darwin asked.
"Ah, he ate early. He's in his room," Nicole replied.
Hearing this, Darwin discerned Gumball was waiting for him. He let out a sigh and went upstairs to not keep Gumball waiting.
He opened the door to see Gumball doing a dramatic turn on feet and pointing at Darwin.
"You finally came…" Gumball said with squinted eyes. Getting no response from Darwin, he cleared his throat and continued. "So, really? You're going to do nothing about it?" Gumball said angrily.
"About what?" Darwin asked frustrated. Same questions, same answers.
"About the guy in the hoodie that just came up and took his first step in stealing your girlfriend!" Gumball replied.
"What? Steal? What are you talking about? And wait a minute, I'm the one who needs to have the first word. What were you even doing there? Why are you jumping into sudden conclusions?" Darwin said.
"I was there because I needed to make sure Carrie and you don't have some kind of trouble between each other. And these are not assumptions, these are the signs of a slippery slope that leads to disaster." Gumball explained.
"Why are you trying to involve yourself in what's private between us? Everything is fine between me and Carrie." Darwin said.
Gumball pinched his eyes. "Argh, they always say that. Let's put the guy aside for now. You are polar opposites, didn't you ever notice something out of line? She can't even eat without getting in you. Ok maybe that's a price you are willing to pay but what about others? You don't have a similar taste of music or movie or even literature, sense of humor, hobby, style… She lives in a different world. Literally."
"These are just gossip of the class and they are egging you on to intervene. Stop lending an ear to everything," Darwin said.
"These aren't from gossip, I saw them myself today." Gumball said and Darwin gazed on him. "Yes from the beginning, don't give me that look," Gumball added.
"So what? Yes, we have differing styles and tastes. As long as we respect each other's perspective isn't that what matters for a couple?" Darwin said.
"Ok then what about the 'sport car' line? She says the guy is cool and everyone wants one. But when it comes to describing you it's a shopping cart." Gumball asserted.
"'Filled with all the stuff you love'" Darwin completed the quote.
"Let me revise you Darwin, shopping carts are used for carrying stuff you want until you pay the cashier and then dump them out."
Gumball started hearing unpleasant sounds coming from Darwin. "Don't cross me out yet I'm not trying to tell you that was exactly what she meant but honestly it wasn't a great illustration either. Let me open up the possible scenario a bit. This guy is cool, just like Carrie, happens to appear from nowhere right after she has shown a picture of him. I have NO trust in that stork looking, hoodie headed, fiendish smirking jerk's eyes and…" He stopped.
"And what?" Darwin asked.
"I shouldn't go on." Gumball hesitated. Going beyond may end up breaking his brother's heart.
"Say it. Spill all the beans you have before it starts to grow within you once more." Darwin insisted.
Gumball sighed. "Ok… I was going to say, the more this guy is around, which looks like for a decent time, the more likely Carrie will find common things with Azrael. She will start reconsidering things and begin to think you are an unfitting boyfriend, and in her most vulnerable moment… BAM! The guy will make his move to get his ex back." He finished. Silence took over the room for a little. Then Darwin continued.
"Are you done?" he asked uncaringly. Gumball nodded to confirm.
"Good. Honestly, I don't want to hear more of your conspiracy theories for tonight. I'm sure that everything is just fine. You are overthinking things, just like you did with Penny dozens of times. You're trying to get me to adopt your mindset. But that won't work today. So don't speculate too much about it, in the end we'll see there was nothing to worry about. Now, if you don't mind, I have school tomorrow, so I'm going to sleep early tonight," Darwin got into his bowl and closed his eyes to sleep. Ignoring any further statement or sentence coming from Gumball.
Gumball wasn't sure what to say, or how to react in any way. Perhaps he should drop this topic for now. He simply sighed and replied "Alright. Goodnight," calmly, and turned off the light. Then he left the room to join others downstairs.
Nicole saw Gumball coming down from stairs.
"Your brother isn't coming?" She asked.
"No. He said he will sleep early tonight." Gumball explained.
"This early?" Nicole was surprised.
Gumball simply shrugged and looked away. Nicole glared more closely on Gumball, she noticed some bitterness on his face. She wondered if something happened.
"Did you two argue?" Nicole made a spot on guess. Gumball dazed upon this, but he quickly got to himself and gave a made up reason.
"Ah? No. I- was just thinking about school stuff." Gumball said.
"What kind of stuff?" Nicole asked for more.
"You know… I won the last match of tourney, I was thinking of that." He said.
Nicole took the bait. "Are you feeling nervous for your next match?" she said.
"Kind of yeah, but I'll manage. No problem," he cut it short.
"I believe you can do it. Don't stop believing in yourself," Nicole replied with a warming smile. She still had a slight suspicion that Gumball was lying, but ignored it in a second and returned to her business
A/N: So that settles it for now. Before anything, I want to clarify that I don't want to drop this story, not at all, but if I'd be honest with you; don't expect much. At least for a long while because it might take even years to finish this decently, considering this chapter alone took several months. 'Wow, so much lack of self-confidence yet it's just the beginning.' Yeah... But it's what it is.
Hope you enjoyed.