Chapter 5: It's Good To Have Friends

Sophie was just beginning to understand how fun it was to have friends again, and that was just what the Care Bears wanted.

Sophie and April were playing on the swings, having a contest to see who could go higher. They were both swinging up fairly high and having a good time. Both of them were laughing.

"See Sophie, isn't having a friend something that makes you want to cheer?" Cheer Bear said, and did a little cheer, "F-R-I-E-N-D-S!"

Everyone giggled.

"Yeah! Actually, having friends isn't that bad."

"That's the spirit. Say, you know what's better than one friend?"
"What?" Sophie and April asked.

"Two friends!" Cheer answered, holding up two fingers.

"Two friends?" Sophie gulped, and stopped swinging.

"What's the matter?" Wish asked.

"I'm already friends with April now, isn't one friend enough?"

Wish and Cheer looked at each other quizzically, and then back to Sophie.

"You see Sophie, the more friends you have, the stronger you'll be against Emily." Wish said.

Sophie looked up to the sky and admitted to herself that Wish was right.

"Oh. Yeah, she has two friends also." Sophie said, now realizing that two friends would definitely be better.

"If you'd even call those friends." April added in.

Wish said, "Before we find you a new friend, lets spend a little time getting to know April."

"Okay." Sophie nodded.

"What game should we play?" April asked.

"I have an idea! Lava-tag!" Cheer suggested.

"Yeah!" April laughed.

They all had five seconds to run to from the swing set to the slides. The park was filled with toys, like a teeter-totter, another swing set, a few clusters of slides, a merry go round, and a sandbox with rainbow sand.

They played Lava tag for about fifteen minutes, and it was heart racing and exciting.

After a few more games, they went back to the Hall of Hearts and ate lunch together. They all helped Grams make grilled cheese sandwiches and soup for the few Bears who were at the Hall of Hearts. It was just Tenderheart, Baby Hugs, and Tugs who were there. Hugs and Tugs had been taking turns keeping an eye on the Caring Meter, making sure it didn't drop any points. So far it was still the same, at 5 points. Before April came, it was at 3 points, teetering dangerously towards 2.

Everyone enjoyed their lunch together and then they played Apples to Apples JR, which helped Sophie and April get to know each other. Sophie was having a lot of fun with April. Even as she was, she was worried about who her other friend was, and if they would like her as easily as April had.

When the game was over, Tenderheart had to go on a quick mission – to help a boy named Nolan in Akron, Ohio learn about learning about manners. Grams and the cubs stayed behind and watched over the Hall of Hearts.

"That was fun." April said.

Sophie nodded.

Then Cheer and Wish Bear had some more activities planned for them to bond.

"Let's do some teamwork exercises!"

"What?" Sophie asked, confused.

"If you want to be friends, and most importantly, defeat Emily and her sidekicks, then you gotta know how to work together."

"Let's start off with something easy, though. A puzzle!" Cheer said.

They pulled out a beautiful rainbow-colored puzzle of the Care Bears, and started to work on it. It was challenging and Sophie and April almost wanted to give up on it several times. Fortunately, with the help of Wish and Cheer, they got through it within an hour and actually had a fun time.

As they played, Grams and the cubs were tidying up the Hall of Hearts. Once in a while Hugs and Tugs would pop in and put in a piece of the puzzle.

When they were done, Wish said, "See, that wasn't too bad, was it?"

"No!" Sophie smiled, "I think we make a good team, April."

"Yeah, me too!"

They gave each other a high five.

"Okay. How about another fun activity?" Wish said as they took the puzzle apart and put it away.

Sophie and April nodded.

They moved on to drawing, only they had to draw a picture of each other. Since Sophie was an artist, she looked forward to it. Cheer and Wish also did the activity. Sophie and April looked at each other to study each other's features. Sophie noticed that April had amber eyes. She began to draw April's hair, and that was fun since it was curly.

Once their drawings were done, they showed them to each other.

"Now say what you like about the drawing!" Cheer said.

"I like my smile and my eyes." Sophie said, pointing.

"And I love how Sophie drew my hair."

"Very nice. They're both wonderful drawings. And you get to keep them!" Wish said.

In all the times that Sophie had been friends with Emily, she had never gotten a gift.

"Thank you, April." she said and was about to cry.

"You're welcome, Sophie."

"Hey, what's the matter Sophie?" April then asked, putting a hand on her shoulder.

"I've never gotten a gift from a friend before." she explained.

Wish and Cheer hugged her, and then April decided to join the group hug, too. Eventually Sophie got her feelings under control and wiped her tears away.

"What's next?" April asked, scooting as close as she could to Sophie.

"Oh I got it! Let's make friendship bracelets!" Cheer said.

"What's a friendship bracelet?" asked Sophie.

"It's a bracelet made out of yarn that symbolizes friendship." Cheer told her.

"That's a perfect idea." Sophie nodded.

Wish and Cheer went to Grams and asked for some yarn. She lent them some of her colorful yarn for the bracelets. For Sophie, April made a bracelet out of aqua, yellow, and orange yarn. Sophie made a rainbow and pink one for April – it matched her rainbow necklace.

Wish and Cheer made some for fun too. Then Wish made an extra yellow and orange one.

"Who's that for?" Sophie asked.

"Your next friend!"

"Oh. I wonder who they're going to be." Sophie said.

"You'll find out soon enough." Wish promised.

Now that their friendship bracelets were made, they exchanged them. Sophie's fit her wrist perfectly. Now she had two gifts from her new friend.

"So Sophie, do you think you know April a little better?" asked Cheer.

Sophie nodded.

Then Tenderheart came back with a worried look on his face.

"Care Bears, Sophie, and April, I need your help, quick!" he said nervously. Everyone jumped up and went over to him.

"What is it, Tenderheart?"

"A boy named Nolan on earth is being persuaded by Emily to join her. We have to stop her! Sophie, he could be your next friend, so this is very important. He was my mission to begin with, to teach him manners… but then Emily got in the way."

"A boy?" she blinked.

"Friendship comes in all shapes and colors." Cheer reminded her.

"Okay, if everyone insists…" Sophie said, still slightly uncomfortable with the whole second friend idea.

Even though she felt she had warmed up to April, she had hardly known her for a whole day. And now she had to go help a boy…

The five of them – Sophie, April, Cheer, Wish, and Tenderheart hopped in the cloud car and went down to earth.

They landed on an empty basketball court. Their car magically disappeared. Across the court was a boy struggling to get his basketball back from Emily. But they weren't playing. Emily had been teasing him, and had no intentions of returning the ball.

"Give it back!"

"I'll only give it back if you join me and No Heart to defeat the Care Bears!"

"Forget it!" Nolan shouted, and tried to swipe the ball from her.

"I don't play nice."

Tanya and Vera were there too, and Emily tossed the ball to Tanya. She tossed it to Vera, while Nolan struggled to keep up with it. Sophie could see the sweat on his forehead.

"He needs our help." Sophie said, deciding this teasing had gone on far enough.

For one thing, she hardly knew when someone teased her. And to see someone else being teased, well… something had to be done.

The Care Bears nodded at Sophie. She put her hand around her caring necklace.

"Give it back already!" he pouted, starting to tire out.

"No way." Emily said coldly and passed it to Vera who passed it to Tanya. They switched it up just when Nolan thought there was a pattern.

"That's enough, Emily." Sophie said, moving forward.

Emily groaned.

"Ugh, you again? Come ON!" she was just a breath away from throwing a fit.

"Not Sophie…" Tanya's voice quivered weakly.

"She always ruins our plans!" Vera pointed out.

"Don't encourage her, you dummy!" Emily said, "I'll handle this. And I'm not afraid of a little necklace, either."

"You should be. Because this time there's two of them." Sophie said.

When she looked at Emily and her so called friends and saw they didn't have friendship bracelets, she felt bad for them, because that meant they probably didn't give each other any gifts.

"Don't look at me like that!" Emily slammed the ball down on the ground, and it bounced over to Nolan.

"Then leave Nolan alone."

Nolan grabbed the basketball and sped over to the Care Bears.

"You can't just tell someone to leave someone alone and expect them to."

Sophie looked to the Care Bears for help. They came and stood behind her. So did Nolan. Then Sophie had an idea.

"Why don't we play a game of ball? Whoever wins gets to have Nolan as their friend."

"Fine."

"What?!" Nolan gawked, "Oh come on…"

"Can we use your basketball, Nolan?"

"Okay, fine…" he gave in once Tenderheart looked at him.

It would be Sophie, April, and Nolan against Emily, Tanya, and Vera. They'd play to 10 points. The two teams huddled separately to discuss a game plan. The Care Bears would be the referees, and Cheer would be cheering everyone on, of course.

"Okay. I have a plan." Sophie said, and told her friends what she had in mind.

Nolan helped her improve it, too. Once she knew what they were going to do, their team was ready to play.

Tenderheart flipped a coin to see who would go first. Sophie and Emily were in the center court.

"Okay. Emily, you get the ball first. No cheating." Tenderheart said.

"Heh. Whatever." Emily said, flipping her hair over her shoulder and took the ball.

"Is everyone ready?" Tenderheart asked once Emily had the ball, "3… 2… 1… play!"

Emily dribbled and then ran towards Sophie's team's hoop. Tanya and Vera rushed down to that end of the court and Emily threw the ball to Tanya. It was clear though they weren't very coordinated or use communication.

"Um do I throw it in the hoop now?" Tanya asked.

"Yes, you dummy!" Emily growled.

Nolan went and blocked Tanya's throw, but she tossed it just above his fingers and the ball slammed into the backboard, and missed the hoop. Sophie and her team on the other hand, were planning to work together.

"I got it!" April said, and got the ball, and with a wave of her hand she told Sophie to go to the other end of the court.

Sophie did and caught the ball when April threw it. Sophie scored a point as Emily was running after her in attempts to block her.

"Sophie's team gets 1 point!" Tenderheart announced.

"Yeah!" Nolan cheered.

Then they went to the middle again, and Sophie had the ball. But as she was dribbling, Vera swiped it and tossed it to Emily. Then Emily's team got a point.

It went back and forth like this until both of their teams were tied up 5-5. Sophie felt her team was doing better.

Until Emily's team got another point. And another. Sophie and her team called a time out and huddled.

"What's going on? Why are they getting more points than us all the sudden?" Sophie asked.

"I don't know." April answered.

"Because they must really want me to join them." Nolan reminded her.

"Well we can't let that happen. I have another idea." she smiled.

They held their hands together and lifted them up into the air. "Say this with me, please." Sophie said.

Together they all said, "I care! I care! I care!"

This boosted April and Sophie's caring necklaces. She hoped that would help. If Nolan had his caring necklace, surely his would've been boosted too. But even just saying those words almost made him seem to glow.

"Now let's win!" April cheered.

Sophie nodded, and the game resumed.

The next rounds were different. Sophie and her team scored even again, and then were in the lead one extra point. Then Emily and her team moved their score up to 9-6. It almost seemed impossible for Sophie and her team to win. They only needed three more points. Sophie wiped the sweat off her forehead.

"You can do it, Sophie!" Wish cheered from the sidelines.

"Go April!" Cheer whistled.

"Keep it up, Nolan!" Tenderheart encouraged.

Even though Sophie was starting to get tired, she had to try her hardest. On the next round Nolan scored them a point. Then April scored another. Now the score was 9-8.

Sophie's heart was hammering in her chest. Nolan scored them another point. As he shot the ball, it teeter tottered on the rim and looked like it was about to fall out, but then it actually went in! Sophie was relieved, but also anxious as to whom would win the final point. She looked to her friends. They had to win. If they lost, Emily would only hurt Nolan even more.

This was Sophie's chance.

Just like in the beginning, it was Sophie versus Emily in the center. Emily got it first, and Sophie somehow caught the ball when it was in mid-air. A little moment of victory quickly vanished as when she threw it to Nolan, Vera swiped it away from them again.

Tanya tried to make it in their team's hoop, but missed. Then April caught the ball and threw it to Sophie. Sophie made sure to have a firm grip, and ran as fast as she could to the other hoop and threw it in. Just as she threw it in, Emily purposely rammed in to her, thinking that she still had the ball.

Sophie fell on the pavement and scraped her knees and wrists.

"Ouch, hey!" she said, and Tanya and Vera pulled Emily away from Sophie. She winced with pain. Her rainbow leggings were torn to pieces at the knees.

But the pain was stopped for a moment when Tenderheart declared Sophie's team the winner.

"Whew! I can't believe we won!" Sophie laughed and hugged April quickly.

"This isn't fair!" Emily complained, "They cheated!"

"No they didn't, they won fair and square!" Tenderheart told Emily, but she refused to believe them.

"Yay Sophie!" Cheer said.

"Oh, are you okay? Your knees and wrists!" Wish pointed out.

They were scrapped and starting to bleed.

"Hurry, let's go to Care-a-lot." Tenderheart suggested.

They got in the cloud car and zoomed off to Care-a-lot with Nolan.

Instead of starting off with a tour, they helped clean up Sophie's wounds. Cheer went and got a fresh pair of rainbow shorts for Sophie from her backpack that she had brought. She came back down and Nolan and Wish Bear were helping clean her up and put Band-Aids on her wounds.

"Ouch!" Sophie said when Nolan put a Band-Aid on her knees.

"Sorry." he replied.

"You're doing great, Sophie." April encouraged her.

By now most of the Care Bears had returned from their missions. It was getting late in the afternoon and dinner was approaching. When they were all done, Sophie felt a lot better. All the Care Bears greeted her and asked if she was okay. When they finished the meet and greet, she noticed that Nolan was still by her side.

"Thanks for helping me, Nolan."

Nolan smiled and said, "Sure. No problem."

"Nolan, remember your manners." Tenderheart said.

"What? Oh. I meant… you're welcome, Sophie."

She blushed and quickly looked away in hopes that no one would see it. Wish brought Sophie over to the couch while dinner was getting prepped. Then Tenderheart took Nolan to get his caring test and necklace. Funshine joined in. Cheer came and sat down on the couch next to Sophie and Wish Bear. Sophie closed her eyes for a moment and tried to relax. Thankfully her blush had gone away now.

"I hope Nolan does good on his caring test." Sophie said.

"I think he will." Wish smiled, "By the way, you did stellar in basketball today."

"Really?"

"You bet!" Cheer giggled.

"Yeah! I loved how you made that last shot." April added.

Then Tenderheart came out with Nolan and Funshine, who apparently had a bond of friendship already.

"I passed!" Nolan said, and showed them his caring necklace. It was a sun with clouds, and looked very similar to Funshine's symbol. He was wearing it proudly around his neck.

"Nolan's score was a 96%." Funshine said proudly.

"And of course, his caring potential matches both of yours, Sophie and April."

The dinner bell rang and everyone went to the kitchen. Sophie got her dinner – ravioli, green beans, and steak. At the heart-shaped table she sat next to Nolan and April.

At dinner Tenderheart took the opportunity to remind Sophie of the things she needed to find to become the Queen of Care-a-lot.

"Now that you have two friends, you can search for the staff, crown, and shield." he said.

Sophie glanced nervously to her new friends. Would they help her?

"So, when does that start?"

"First thing tomorrow. I suggest you get to know Nolan a little better, just like you did with April."

"Okay." she nodded.

"No one is really sure where the objects are, so there'll be a little bit of searching. Think of it as a treasure hunt!" he said.

"Maybe there are hints in the book." Wish Bear pointed out.

Tenderheart thought for a moment.

"Perhaps." he smiled.

Sophie and her friends finished dinner and helped clean it up. For the rest of the night, they poured over the Legend of the Queen of Care-a-lot book for clues.

"Where do you think they are, Wish Bear?" Sophie asked.

They were sitting at the heart-shaped table together with their noses in the book. It was blue and had gold trim, and elegant writing inside. For some reason, it reminded Sophie of her mom's handwriting… only there were hearts for every dot, which wasn't something she really did unless she signed her name.

"They'd be somewhere secret and hard to find. I'm not sure." she shook her head.

They flipped more pages. Near the end of the book, they found a few words that stuck out to them. Castle, forest, and library were all obviously spelled wrong.

"Well isn't that odd." Cheer said.

"It must be where they are!" April beamed.

"Yeah!" Nolan agreed, "There were no other typos in the entire book."

"There's the Care-a-lot Castle, which even though it is used… and Cheer and I visited it the other day, it does seem like a protective place for one of the quest items." Wish said.

"And the Forest could only mean the Forest of Feelings." Cheer added.

"So what's the library?"

"There's a lot of libraries downtown, but I'm not certain it's any of those. Though don't you remember Wish Bear that Grumpy found an old abandoned library a while ago? But he was too scared to go inside it."

"Hmm… that could be the place. We'll have to ask him about where it is." Wish nodded.

Sophie then wrote down all of the locations on a note card with rainbow pen so they wouldn't forget.

Even though it was fairly late, they went to find Tenderheart Bear in his office. He was on a phone call with Brave Heart Lion about something. He looked up and saw them, and told Brave Heart to please hold on a moment. The he put down the phone.

"Rainbow news, Tenderheart!" Cheer said, with a thumbs up and a big smile.

"Yeah, we found out where the items could be!" Sophie replied.

"Ah that's wonderful. Great job. I had a feeling you could do it. Now, why don't you stop by the Care-a-lot Castle tomorrow?"

"Sure!"

Everyone embraced in a warm group hug.

"Okay. Now let's go get ready for bed." Wish said, yawning.

"I have an idea. Let's have a mini sleepover in the living room!" Cheer said. Everyone nodded.

"Good night. Don't stay up too late." Tenderheart said, and went back to his phone call with Brave Heart.

The kids had went up to change into their PJ's and brush their teeth, and then came back down.

When they all met back in the living room, Funshine came down from his room for a glass of water. He had a Wii remote in his hand. It looked like he was in the middle of playing something.

"What are you all doing?" he asked, once he saw Wish and Cheer pulling the couch out for the built-in bed.

"We're having a mini sleepover!" Cheer said.

"Can I join?" Funshine gawked.

"You bet!" Sophie personally invited him.

"Yeah Funshine!" Nolan was very excited to have his Care Bear buddy join the sleepover.

Sophie and April then helped put the blankets on the bed-couch. Just as Nolan and Funshine put the pillows down, they both looked at each other mischievously.

"Uh-oh…" Wish Bear said with a warning tone.

"What's the matter?" Sophie asked.

Wish Bear then whispered into Sophie's ear, "That's Funshine's look when he wants a pillow fight!"

Just as she said that, Nolan and Funshine started hitting each other playfully with the pillows. Then April and Cheer joined in.

"Pillow fight! Haha!" Funshine giggled, bouncing all over the place. He lightly swung his pillow at Wish.

She couldn't help herself and picked up a pillow. Then she tossed one to Sophie. Everyone bounced around and swatted each other with the soft pillows. No one got hurt, even when Nolan whacked Sophie in the knees.

"Hey, watch it!" Sophie said. She tackled Nolan playfully and they rolled on the couch and attacked each other with pillows. After a moment Nolan escaped and scrambled up on the back of the couch. He lightly batted her on the head.

Even though they were being playful and kind to each other, soon they were all having too much fun and getting a bit too loud. Their laughter bounced through the Hall of Hearts. Tenderheart came out of the office. He wasn't mad, but he had a hard look in his eye. At first no one noticed him. He crossed his arms and cleared his throat loudly.

"Excuse me, would you mind toning it down a little?" He said.

Everyone stopped.

"Oh, sorry Tenderheart. But we were having so much fun!" Funshine giggled as Nolan batted Funshine Bear with a pillow.

"Okay everyone, let's try to settle down and go to sleep." Wish suggested.

"I'm not really tired." Nolan complained.

"But we have a big day ahead of us tomorrow." Cheer told him with a pout.

Sophie was getting tired, and decided to stop the pillow fight.

"Come on. We can have another pillow fight tomorrow!" Sophie said.

"Yeah!" Funshine whooped.

"Funshine, keep it down." Tenderheart warned, and then went back into his office and turned off the lights. He went upstairs to bed.

"Okay, Mr. Bossy pants." he grumbled.

"I heard that!" he said, just before he closed his door.

"Sorry!" he yelped. Everyone giggled.

Wish cuddled next to Sophie. April was next to Cheer, and Nolan was next to Funshine.

"Good night everyone. And sweet dreams." Wish said.

Sophie closed her eyes with a smile on her face. Now she had two very special friends.