Chapter 7 What happened?

When Carrie saw Gumball's mother pick him up from her window she let out a breath and stretched out, floating in mid-air. She was so confused right now. Gumball had kissed her and she felt like she might have encouraged him to do it. She leaned on his shoulder to get close to him. He might have taken that as a sign that she wanted him to do it. Also, after a while she started kissing him back.

This lead to a bigger question, why did she lean on Gumball's shoulder? At the time she didn't think about it, she just did it. Did she want to get closer to Gumball? More importantly did she like him? She had grown closer to him and Darwin but particularly with Gumball, over the last six weeks. They have done things she had never done with any of her other friends before. Like scaring, watching horror movies and until today, she had never watched A Pony's Tail with anyone. She also felt that they had shared things with her that they had not done with anyone else as far as she knew, like playing that evil game of theirs.

So had she grown an attraction to him and what about Gumball? He had kissed her. Does that means he liked her as well?

'It doesn't matter.' she thought to herself. She had decided a long time ago that she wasn't interested in pursuing a relationship. When you're in a relationship there are certain things you do when you're together, like hug and kiss. She was a ghost, it's not like she can do any of that stuff, so it wouldn't be fair to be in a relationship with someone. Even if she did decide to get into a relationship, what if they wanted to be closer and they did something like her father did to be with her mother? She didn't want to be the reason that happened to anyone.

Suddenly, her door opened again. "Carrie, are you alright?" asked her father as he floated into the room.

"Yeah dad, I am ok." she replied, not taking her eyes of the ceiling.

"That Gumball kid left earlier then I thought he would. I imagined you would have wanted him to stay longer. You have been spending so much time with that boy and his brother lately that you guys seem inseparable."

Carrie shrugged. "He had to go home and do something." she lied.

There was silence in the room for a while before it was broken by Carrie's father's sigh. He stretched out on his back and floated next to Carrie. "What happen between you two?" he asked.

Carrie continued to be silent before saying "Nothing happened dad."

Her father reached his hand over to her cheek and turned her head so she was looking him in the eye. "Tell me what's wrong?" he said gently. "I wasn't a part of your life for so long and now that I am again, I really want to be there for you when you have troubles."

They stared into each other's eyes for a while. Carrie broke the staring contest when she closed her eyes and let out a sigh. "Gumball and I kissed." she said.

Her father paused for a while. Carrie was nervous that her dad would get angry at Gumball. "Who instigated it?" he asked, finally breaking his silence.

"Well he kissed me but….." she stopped to choose her words carefully. "I might have done something that could have given him the idea that I wanted him to?"

He turned himself upright so now he was up looking down at Carrie. "What do you think?"

"I don't know if what I did was really a sign that I wanted to be kissed. All I did was lean my head on his shoulder. I don't know if that is a signal normally bu-"

"That's not what I meant," her father said through a chuckle. "Did you want him to kiss you?"

"No!" Carrie said. A blush appeared on her face. "I mean, I don't know."

Her father smiled. "Do you know if you like him?"

"Well…" Carrie said as a million thoughts ran through her head. "What will happen to us if we go out? I mean, we have just become close friends. I feel that I can trust him more than anyone else. I don't want to ruin that. Not to mention, even if we did get into a relationship we wouldn't really be able to act like a couple. Even if we did try to make it work, I am sure he will eventually want more. What if he does something like you did to be with mum? I don't want that to happen t-" Carrie stopped when her father put a finger on her lips.

"Carrie, you manged to answer my question without directly answering it," he said. He removed his finger from her lips. "It is obvious that you like this boy. You are worrying about things that haven't even happened yet."

Carrie was trying to take in what her father said, particularly the part about her liking Gumball. She did enjoy spending time with him more than other boys. The two of them liked a lot of the same things, like horror movies and music. They also both had a similar mischievous mind when it came to scaring people. She felt like she was having the most fun when she was with him. Does that mean she likes him?

Carrie put the thought out of her head. She turned herself up right and looked up at her father. "It doesn't matter anyway. There isn't going to be a relationship. He is probably annoyed about the kiss."

"Why?" he asked confused. "Didn't you say he was the one to kiss you? Despite the reputation that guys get, I can tell you that a guy won't kiss a girl unless he is interested."

Carrie eye's widened. Did Gumball like her? She quickly shook her head, getting rid of the thought. "Even if he does, there is not going to be a romantic relationship between us."

"Why?" her father asked again. "You like him don't you?" Carrie turned away from her father's eyes. He then wrapped his arms around his daughter. "Don't let what happened to me scare you from ever being in a relationship. This situation is completely different. I had to do that to be with your mother but you are meant for the world of the living. He doesn't have to do something crazy to be with you. I don't know much about Gumball but he seems like a nice boy. Without him we would have never reunited. One day you will want to be in a relationship and you are going to have to put your worries to the side and trust someone. Just find out if he likes you first before you do anything and if you guys decide to be in a relationship I am sure just being there for you would be enough for him."

Carrie felt a little emotional at her father's words. She slowly wrapped her arms around him and deepened the hug. After staying like that for what seemed a lot longer than it was, they pulled apart.

"Why are you so cool about this?" Carrie asked looking up into her father's eyes.

He smiled down at her. "Because I have seen you hang out with that boy. He makes you happy when you two are together and if he makes you happy then I think you are responsible enough to make your own decision. You made it a long time without me."

Carrie smiled up at her dad and gave him another hug. "I love you." she said.

"I love you too." he responded as he rubbed his hand on her back. "Now come on, let's go have some fun."

Carrie looked up and nodded. They both went down stairs and watched some good horror movies together.


When Gumball got home yesterday he went straight to bed. He hadn't left it since then. Darwin would have normally loved the company of his brother while he was recovering, if Gumball wouldn't have groaned every twenty minutes since he had woken up. He didn't know if something happened between him and Carrie or if he started to think about Penny again because every time he asked he would just say "I don't want to talk about it," well Darwin decided that he had, had enough and was going to get it out of him.

"Dude, what's wrong and stop telling me that it is nothing. Clearly something is bothering you so just tell me."

Gumball looked over at Darwin who was standing up in his fish bowl looking serious. Gumball rolled over and turned his back to him. "I don't want to bother you while you are recovering." he said.

"Yeah, because your groaning every so often is really helping me," Darwin said sarcastically. "Come on man, even when I am sick I will still help you and I have a feeling that you want to talk about it." Darwin waited for his brother to respond but he didn't move a muscle. "Is it about Penny again? Did you remember how much you missed her?" he asked.

"No man." Gumball said, he turned around to face Darwin. "I am over Penny. Now can we please not talk about it?"

"So it must be about Carrie." Darwin said, ignoring Gumball's request. "You only started acting like this as soon as you came back from going to the movies with Carrie. What did you do?"

"Why do you assume I did something?" Gumball yelled angrily.

A smirk appeared on Darwin's fish lips. "So it is something to do with Carrie." Gumball looked down, avoiding eye contact with his brother. "Come on man. What ever happened I am sure we can figure out a way to work it out. Carrie has really become a good friend of ours. I am sure we can clear the air somehow."

After a long pause, Gumball mumbled something.

"What?" Darwin said, cupping his hand over his ear.

"I kissed Carrie."

Darwin eyes widened in shock. "What?"

"I SAID THAT I KISSED CARRIE!" he yelled.

"OW.' Darwin said as he rubbed his ear. "I heard what you said. I meant why? What happened?"

So Gumball went through all the events that happened yesterday. From the turning into a ghost to them kissing watching A Pony's Tail.

"Well that was interesting." Darwin said through a sigh.

"What am I going to do Darwin?" Gumball said desperately. "I don't want to lose Carrie as a friend but she probably hates me now. I didn't know what I was doing. I just acted on impulse. I a-"

"You want to know what I think?" Darwin said. Gumball gave a nod. "I think that you like Carrie."

"What?" Gumball said. He couldn't be serious.

"Think about it. You two have gotten particularly close lately. Sure I have been there through some of it but you two are always the one having the most fun. Honestly, I feel like a third wheel some of the time." Darwin said through a chuckle before continuing. "Carrie and I don't have nearly as much fun when it is just the two of us, as what you described." Darwin said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "And I know you. You wouldn't have kissed someone if you didn't like them. You're too much of a romantic. Remember how you reacted when Carmen asked you to kiss her?"

Gumball was a little stunned at how right his brother was about him. Gumball wouldn't kiss a girl he didn't like. So did he like Carrie? Gumball quickly got rid of the thought, deciding that it wasn't even worth thinking about.

"Even if that is true, which I am not saying it is, I only recently broke up with Penny." Gumball said.

"Didn't you just say that you had gotten over her?" Darwin said, using Gumball's own words he used earlier against him.

This cause Gumball to think about it. It's true that he wasn't completely over Penny, even when Carrie and Darwin were starting to hang out and for a while he was still holding out hope that she would come back or contact him and they could work it out. But now, he hadn't even thought about Penny in the last couple of weeks and that really was thanks to Carrie and Darwin. Especially Carrie.

He certainly enjoyed hanging out with her in the last month and a half. She was a cool girl that enjoyed living life to the fullest. He had also found that he had a lot more in common with her then he originally thought. He found he enjoyed watching a lot of the same horror movies as her, he really enjoyed scaring people with her and he liked listening to her music with her. Thinking about it, Gumball realised the key phase in those statements. With her.

She was also a very understanding person even when Gumball did something stupid that got them in trouble. Most of the time she saw the funny side to it. Not to mention when she smiled at him in that certain way, he feels like he is the only person in the world.

"I like Carrie." Gumball said, as he came to a realisation. "How did that happen?"

"It doesn't matter how it happened dude. It just happens." Darwin said happily.

Somehow hearing that didn't make him feel better. He was thinking about how this might affect his relationship with Carrie. There was no way she liked him back. She told him to leave after he did it so it was clear that she didn't like it. He didn't know what to do now he had feelings for her and he was certain that he lose her as a friend.

"What's wrong now dude?" Darwin asked.

"What am I going to do about Carrie? She is probably still mad about it."

Darwin paused, really thinking about what to say. "Explain to me about how the kiss happened again?" he asked.

Gumball sighed as he rested his head on his pillow. "We were watching A pony's tail and at a certain point she rested her head on my shoulder. When I got her attention she looked at me and… I don't know," he trailed off. "I just kissed her. I ran my hand through her hair while I was kissing her. She then put her hand on my shoulder and leaned in. After that her father made a noise outside the room and we stopped. She then asked me to leave."

Darwin took a minute to take this all in before he responded. "It sounded to me like she liked it."

Gumball snorted. "Ok Darwin what theory do you have this time?"

"Well think about it, she only asked you to leave after her father came to the door. Not to mention you said she leaned into it" Darwin said. "All I am saying is maybe she subconsciously wasn't oppose to the idea of you kissing her. That's why she didn't stop you when you were kissing before, she had only realised what she was doing when her dad got her back to reality."

"So what you're saying is that when she wasn't thinking she was ok with kissing me but when she is aware of what she is doing she wouldn't be interested?" Gumball said. Darwin was not making him feel better at all.

Darwin pinched his brow. "No. What I am saying is she was probably caught up in the moment as well but that doesn't mean she didn't like it. We both know that Carrie would have done something right away, if she didn't like it. She stopped when her dad came in and when she came back to reality she was really embarrassed and confused. Maybe she didn't even realise that she had started to develop feelings for you like you didn't realise you had developed feelings for her until just now."

"You think dude?" Gumball said hopeful.

"I don't know. You should talk to her about this." Darwin said tiredly.

"You seem a lot calmer about this then you were when I started going out with Penny." Gumball said.

Darwin snorted. "I am not as insecure as I use to be." he put his head back into his fish bowl and got comfortable.

Gumball stood on his bed looking determined. "Your right buddy. I should go over to Carrie's right now and talk to her about this." He then jumped off his bed and headed for the door.

"Wait!" Darwin yelled, pulling his head out of his bowl.

Gumball froze on the spot. "What?"

"Have you even thought about what you are going to say to her or what you want to get out of this conversation?" Darwin asked.

"What do you mean?" Gumball said, confused by what Darwin was asking.

Darwin shook his head in irritation at how oblivious Gumball was being. "Do you want to just be friends again and clear the air or do you want to have a relationship start from this? If I am right about Carrie being confused at the moment, you need to think about how you are going to approach her."

Gumball thought about what his brother said for a while before a smile appeared on his face.

"Thanks, man. That was some good advice." Gumball then headed out the door.

Darwin stood there looking perplexed. He couldn't have figured out what he was going to say already, had he?