It was past noon on Saturday, Wally's parents were at home sharing as a family with their children and Kuki who was included in the family activities only for some reason, was very quiet. She would talk when asked questions or when Joey demanded her attention in the boy's favorite card game. Wally's little brother had developed a certain attachment to the girl, something that had not been overlooked by the older brother and clearly the little one had noticed his brother's gaze more fixed than normal on him every time she got too close to the Japanese and that was fun for the boy, bothering his brother was very funny. Activities were interrupted when the Beatles' landline phone rang and Wally's father got up to answer it. After about 10 minutes he returned with the family to give the news.

And so, Kuki was in the car with Wally's father, who was driving towards her house. She looked out the window but she felt discouraged. She hadn't been happy with the situation.

"Your father told me that you have a key to the house, don't worry and take everything you need, if you want to come back for more things I can bring you or ask Wally to accompany you," Sydney Beatles commented while driving.

"Yes, thanks for bringing me" replied the girl in a sad tone.

"Cheer up little one, your parents will return as soon as they can, in the meantime there will be no problem in extending your stay, my wife is very happy to have you at home, it is almost like having a daughter. And I'm sure Wally will be delighted" but Sydney's good humor wasn't enough for the girl.

A couple of minutes later, Kuki opened the door to her house and when she was inside it, she turned on the lights. Everything looked just as it did when she left almost a week ago, the furniture and the floor barely had small particles of dust, they would probably be more noticeable when her parents finally returned.

He went up to his room and took a suitcase from the closet and began to fill it with clean clothes, articles for personal use, shoes, socks, his bathing suit at the request of the Beatles since they would fill the pool with water to be able to use, her favorite blanket and of course, she took another rainbow monkey and put it in the bottom of the suitcase so that it would not be noticed that she was carrying another plushie to Wally's house. Maybe it was something very childish but it needed some moral support.

It took her about 20 minutes to fix her things and she left her room and went into her sister's room. She opened the door and turned on the lights, her sister's room looked like always, full of lilac colors and rainbow monkeys and she gave a long sigh, she missed her little sister, although sometimes it was a nuisance. She took a look around the house again to make sure everything was in order, she turned off the lights and headed for the Beatles' car.

"Do you already have everything you need?" Wally's father asked when the girl closed the car door upon entering and she answered yes "Excellent, let's go back then" and they got ready to drive.

Kuki was still somewhat lost in her thoughts, she felt sad. She missed her parents, her sister, her friends, she had Wally and Hoagie, but she couldn't wait for the five of them to go out again. Her parents weren't coming back soon because of what they told her, she would have to stay at the Beatles' house until further notice and that filled her with a feeling of frustration that she couldn't understand, perhaps it was because she didn't want to continue bothering Wally. He was a grown-up, adolescent, stubborn, energetic boy and he certainly didn't want to spend the whole summer next to a corny and silly girl like her.

"Kuki, we're here, you can get out of the car," Wally's father tells the girl that she hadn't moved despite having been parked back home for about a minute. She was so distracted that she hadn't realized the car had stopped.

She got out of the car and took her suitcase. It was a little heavy but it was nothing that she couldn't control. Despite that, Wally appeared and took her suitcase to help her and she just nodded thanking her for her gesture. They went up the stairs in silence and when Wally left the suitcase in Kuki's room, he noticed that something was not right, he had not heard her utter a word since she arrived and that was not something usual in someone with as much energy as her.

"Hey Kuki, is something wrong?" The blonde asked, scratching the back of his neck, pretending that he wasn't worried.

"It's nothing," she said without looking at him.

"Really? I know you well, you haven't said anything since you walked through that door and you're not that quiet" the boy sat next to her on the bed but taking a prudent distance, the least he wanted now is for them to be very close and let their parents see them alone in the room like this.

"I don't know, maybe I miss them a lot," the girl started to speak. "I like being here but I didn't want to keep bothering you and to your family"

"What do you say? My mom is happy that you are here" and he would have said "me too" but that is something that he would not say out loud and less in the presence of the girl.

"What about you? Doesn't it bother you that I'm here all day? Surely you want to go out and do your things" she began to play with her hair in a reflex to calm her nervousness. "Go out with other friends, girls, I don't know …"

"Why would I want to date dumb girls? Nor is it that I have many friends apart from you and the others that we already know, why are you so strange" the blonde asked something annoyed, usually he was not good with words to comfort her, he tried hard but always said something that made it worse things, even so he tried not to see her sad.

"Excuse me, I don't know what ... forget it. Can you leave me alone for a while? I'll come down at dinner time" the girl asked him.

"You don't want to go out?" The boy asked him suddenly, "Maybe those sugary milkshakes you like will make you feel better."

-Do you believe it? I'm not in the mood" she excused herself.

"Being locked up here I don't think your spirits will rise much, let's go before I regret it, I'll pay" he got up from the bed and waited for the girl to follow him to leave the room together. Kuki smiled without the blonde noticing, maybe Wally was very silly but what he said in the language of the girls is almost like a date, and he didn't know it.

After a while they arrived at the milkshake place which was full of teenagers in groups, and of course in pairs. Kuki chose a table and sat down while Wally ordered the drinks and brought them with him. It definitely looked like a date, suddenly a guy sat down with her and it all happened so fast that she didn't have time to react.

"Hi pretty, why are you so lonely? I could accompany you, for me it would be a pleasure" says the boy who sat at the table without her being able to protest. He was tall, had a leather jacket and dark hair slicked back with a protruding lock on his forehead, she felt somewhat awkward from the way the boy was looking at her.

"My name is Kuki," she said after a few seconds. "But I'm not alone." She laughed nervously when she saw Wally approaching with the milkshakes.

"And this what?" Wally asks with a frown when he arrives and sees Kuki with another boy other than him.

"Oh sure, a girl as pretty as you of course would have a boyfriend."

"Um ... I ..." she began to stammer.

"Of course she does," Wally replied, almost shouting. "Do you want to go? You're taking my place" she glared at him at which the unknown boy just nodded, got up and left.

"Hey that was rude," Kuki scolded him when the boy left the establishment.

"Are you going to let any guy approach you like that on the street?" he scolds her, handing her a milkshake.

"Well, I didn't know I had to ask your permission." She crossed her arms angrily. "And since when do you say I'm your girlfriend? I don't remember you asking me"

"Sorry, okay? It's that otherwise he wasn't going to leave" he took a sip of her milkshake, looking away.

"You could have told him anything else"

"I asked you out to get distracted, can we do that?" Wally spoke in a bad way, he was clearly jealous but he was not going to admit it, and less with the girl he liked in front of her nose.

"Well, but just because you brought my favorite shake," Kuki replied and began to enjoy her drink. "Are you going to invite Hoagie to come to the pool tomorrow?"

"I wasn't going to do it, but surely my dad already called his mother and I'm sure his brother Tommy will also invade my house," he said without thinking well about the last thing he had said.

"So I'm trespassing on your house?"

"Of course not," he hurried to answer, looked at the girl in her eyes and then lowered her gaze.

"I see, so you're mad at Hoagie, can we talk about that?" Kuki asked. The blonde just sighed tiredly.

"I'm annoyed with him," he admitted, "But I can't talk about it, it's supposed to be a private matter between him and me, we're best friends and it's just that ... sometimes he drives me crazy, he insists on things that ..." He stopped. thinking about how to proceed, then continued, "Hoagie insisted on a private matter, so to speak, but then he did the opposite, he didn't care about anyone, he didn't even tell me and even Abby left because of it, somehow I feel like he divided the group"

"So you're upset because Abby isn't here?" The girl asked somewhat discouraged, hearing him speak like that made her think for a moment that perhaps Wally was interested in Abby as something more than a friend.

"Abby is my friend, as are you and the boys," he took a sip of her shake that was already running out. "If someone did something to hurt them, I would always defend them, but it's complicated when it was Hoagie who ruined things, because they, I'm sure they had something" he crossed his arms "I'm not going to get into that, I just want him to follow the advice that he wants to force me to follow"

"What kind of advice?" The girl asks, staring at him. "Wait, do you like someone?"

Wally looked around him and felt uncomfortable seeing that all the tables around him were occupied by honeyed couples, even a couple were kissing giving quite a show. What was he supposed to answer? He couldn't talk about it with her, not now.

"I think… but it doesn't matter"

"Like it doesn't matter?" Kuki exhaled without taking his eyes off her. "Is she someone I know? Is she cute?"

"Why do you want to know?" You're just like Hoagie, always insisting that" he put the glass of her milkshake aside and saw that Kuki was barely halfway through." It doesn't matter because she ... well ... I don't know, I don't think she will notice someone like me. Do you want to change the subject? I don't want to talk about it with you"

"I thought I was your best friend," she said in a sad tone. Wally noticed and looked into her eyes trying to find the right words to continue the conversation, he couldn't tell her that he thought he was in love with her, not like that. He wasn't sure, and he was afraid of messing things up.

"You are, it's just… when I have a clear answer I'll tell you about it, okay?" He hoped that was enough for the conversation to change course.

"Yes," the girl just said.

Both teenagers were talking about other topics after that, the tension between them had softened, talking about their feelings with each other had always been somewhat uncomfortable, especially when neither of them were not sure what they felt and had no idea that maybe their affection was mutual.

That night Kuki had a hard time falling asleep. Who is the girl Wally was talking about? If it were her, he probably would have said something different, because he would talk about a girl and comment on it? Could it be that it was a different girl from her? Wasn't it her? And of course, why did he want so much for Wally to tell him that the girl he wanted was only her and not someone else? With so many unanswered questions, she managed to fall asleep after midnight.

Just as Wally had predicted, Tommy walked through his front door when the doorbell rang the next morning, then further back was Hoagie saying goodbye to her mom who had dropped them off at Wally's house to enjoy the warm water of the famous swimming pool of the Beatles.

"Great, what was missing," the blonde commented aloud.

"Sorry, you know how my brother is with the pools, they excite him too much"

"Anyway, I'll tell mom they've already arrived, although with all the fuss your brother made, I don't think it's necessary."

"And Kuki? She'll surely wear a nice swimsuit," he laughed when he saw that the blonde had blushed at the comment.

"Don't start, don't you dare look at her like that pervert"

The boy, along with his friend, reached the back of the house where Tommy and Joey were already in the pool with their respective floats. Hoagie didn't need one as he knew how to swim perfectly, Wally had recently learned to swim, he told himself that if he wanted to get on sports teams he couldn't waver at something as basic as swimming. The blonde took off his shirt showing a more formed adolescent body with certain marked muscles due to the exercise he had been doing lately.

"You definitely have to tell me what diet you're on," says Hoagie, looking at him shirtless.

Hoagie had always had a few extra pounds, but due to adolescence, hormones and now being one of the tallest of the group, he sported a slim body but felt a bit self-conscious when he saw that his friend already had what it took to do. Any girl would melt for him.

"I always tell you to come to the gym with me but you don't want to because you're the busiest man in the world" he said, making the quotation mark with his fingers in the last sentence.

"What can I tell you, even so the girls will love me"

Their conversation was interrupted when Kuki finally made his appearance, looking down sadly, although it was true that since they were children they met at Wally's pool and went together on the beach, the truth is that it was the first time that Kuki used a two-piece swimsuit, it was pink and even had the clearest neckline that her friend Abby used to wear. Hoagie looked at Kuki impressed but the one who really was was her friend who was staring at her with her mouth open and that caused him a lot of laughter. She approached him to say something only he would hear.

"Who is the pervert now?" Well Kuki had his attributes" he told him in a whisper.

"Oh shut up," Wally yelled at him and pushed Hoagie into the pool causing him to fall backwards, everyone was just laughing at the scene.

"Thanks Abby, I managed to impress him" thought the girl smiling, entering the pool as if she had not seen anything at all. Then she would talk to her friend to thank her for buying her that bathing suit as a Christmas present.