A 'Friendly' Outing

It had been nearly two months since the incident involving Mami's insane ex. The Club had re-opened only two weeks afterwards, and business was booming more than ever. With Shadow in the hospital I had to do double time as the bar were racking about twenty-five customers a time, each of them either asking for drinks that Shadow hadn't even taught me yet, or shots of the same thing; over and over again.

But I wasn't exactly worried about that. It had only been two weeks since Sonic came to town to go to school. And the only time I had heard from him was when he texted saying that his flight had arrive in Station Square, afterwards nothing. Now with the days turning into weeks, I was just wondering if Sonic had been plotting to completely ignore me from the start, in his own childish form of revenge.

But my thoughts proved false when a familiar blue hedgehog sauntered in one Sunday afternoon . . .

I was sitting on the couch reading 'Teen Vogue' when the glass door had slide open and, nearly following within the next second, a pair of hands wrapped around my neck.

My reflexes had reacted before my eyes could dwindled on the face of my old childhood friend, and my hammer only met with a gush of cool air with a blue vapor trail to follow.

"Well it's good to see you too, Ames. I see you haven't broken out of the 'old greetings' you use to give to people." A vibrant voice spoke behind me, between cute laughs.

Sonic the Hedgehog had his arms playfully folded in front of him. His attire: a red and white hoodie, jeans with red-trimmed pockets, and his personally made red and white sneakers, looked as if he lived in the city his whole life. In fact, I was beginning to doubt our childhood living together in farm lands where the average attire was cowboy boots, jeans, and bland T-shirts.

"Well, well looks like you didn't fall off the face of the earth, then." I spoke a bit annoyed that he just show up and greet me like nothing's happened.

"Sorry, Ames, really. I've been meaning to talk to you from since I unpacked in my dorm, but I've been chained down with work."

"As if that's ever stopped you from ditching classes, I've known you long enough to know where you lying." I sat down on the couch as Sonic followed suit besides me, but I scooted away fuming at his immaturity at certain circumstances.

"No, I'm serious, really! In fact today was one of the only days I don't have a group assignment or homework," He stood to add emphasis to his statement. "And I've decided I wanted to spend my whole free day with you."

I looked at him as his face turned from flustered to smiley. "Please?"

Damn his cute ass smile, I silently shouted in my mind.

"Fine . . . What did you have in mind?"

"Alright, how about the Parfait Café? Though I'm not really a sweets guy, I don't mind it if I'm going with you . . . I mean a girl." I caught Sonic's little correction and just sighed to myself. His really trying again with this relationship thing?

"That sounds good, but Sonic this isn't a date, it's just a get together with a friend, right?" I know I came off a bit bitchy but I really didn't want to deal having to decline Sonic's possible bombardments of requisite love, today.

"Yeah . . . Sure."

The Parfait Café was more of a restaurant than a simple bistro that Sonic had implied it was. The one thing that did fit the "café" theme was the fact that the waitresses had dressed up as maids and were serving customers; a majority of them were what Sonic said most people called Otaku: the more crazier fans of anime, manga, and the sorts.

The head waitress had seated us near the farthest window and we waited for our "maid" to come and get our orders.

"So um what do you want to eat?" Sonic was striking up a conversation.

"Oh well the strawberry cake n' sundae looks pretty good, you?"

"Sadly this place doesn't have my favorite chilidogs, but I guess I'll settle for a dessert pizza." I giggled a bit at his cute obsession for chilidogs, something that sort of had grown on him when we were little and his grandfather had made some for us when we got all muddy playing, one Saturday rainy afternoon.

When the waitress showed up I was surprised to find myself facing Mami in a cute purple maid outfit. The maid outfit wasn't exactly what threw me off though, it was the fact that she was even here. Every day, ever since the incident, Mami had been spending most of her time, even from work, in the hospital with Shadow, trying to keep him there so his injuries would heal faster. This was actually the first time I've seen her for two weeks.

"Oh hi Amy." Mami's voice was quiet and innocent as usually. She had made eye contact with Sonic and when he returned it she turned her head, and covered her face with her notepad to hide a deep blush.

"Hey Mami, I thought you were with Shadow, today?"

Mami shook her head and removed the notepad from her mouth to talk.

"No Shadow is in surgery again, the doctors' wanted to check on everything to see how his body's doing. They say that if all goes well then he'll be released in three days." Mami spoke in a more animated, but hushed tone. She then looked at me, then shot Sonic a quick glace hoping that I'll catch the hint.

"Oh Sonic, this one of my coworkers Mami: she's the chef for Club Rouge and a really sweet, but sensitive girl," I took both Mami's and Sonic's hands. "And Mami, this is Sonic. My childhood friend from my old town in the country, his here in the city attending school." I meshed their hands together in a form of a hand shake, but once I did that Sonic had to react fast when Mami suddenly fainted from the sudden body contact.

"Oi, hey! P-pull yourself together!" Sonic shouted as he tried hoisting Mami up and gaining attention from the other people around the café area, while doing so. I looked to notice that Mami's nose was bleeding, too.

Another waitress had run up to us and grabbed a semi-conscious Mami by her elbow. And put rolled up tissue paper in her nose to stop the bleeding.

"I'm sorry, Mami gets like this quite often with the male customers, please don't mind her!" The waitress spoke in a hysterical and creepy tone as she dragged Mami off into the backroom.

Sonic and I were treated for the rest of the afternoon by one of the few waiters that was a dog dressed as a butler. We left when the sun was beginning to set and Sonic decided to take me back to the club due to a sudden text from his teacher.

"I'm sorry about this, but it looks like I'll have to cut our 'friendly' outing short. My teacher was just bugging saying that she assigned a project a couple of days ago that's due tonight at 9. So I have to go and start on it, at the very least."

We stopped in front of Club Rouge as I noticed that Knuckles' car was in the parking lot. I smiled a bit knowing that Knuckles has been coming here more often in order to give Rouge some stress relief.

Sonic and I were standing outside looking up at the now sunset sky. We exchanged looks as I smiled and said my goodbyes, but before I could get to the door he grabbed me and pulled me back.

"Amy, I need to ask you something." Sonic's voice took on a serious tone as my hope of not getting in this conversation had disappeared.

"Y-yeah?"

"Did something bad happen while I was still back at home?" His question threw me off a bit but I recoiled and answered.

"N-not really, why?"

"Well you seemed rather distant this whole evening. I was just wondering if you might've seen something or experienced anything bad."

I looked at him and bite my lower lip. There's no point in getting Sonic's blood sugar going about the near death experience I had.

"No, everything's fine. I'm just exhausted because my partner at the bar is out . . . sick and I've been doing everything alone." I made a faint smile but I didn't think Sonic bought it. Though it seemed like he was ignoring it, for now.

"Alright, Ames. If you say so, I'll try to call you later tonight. See ya." Sonic turned his back and walked away, but for a moment it looked like he hesitated. Maybe he panicked and changed the subject of what he really wanted to talk about; the reason why I didn't return his feelings. But who knows, Sonic has always been the guy who would break his neck to make everyone happy . . . But himself.

Sorry for the long hiatus. School has been kicking my butt lately, as well as writer's block. Hopefully I can start updating more regularly. But besides that I hope everyone enjoyed the chapter. Read & Review! 3