"Let's see," Lillian began saying to herself, "I got the item for Cheryl, delivered the message to Phillip. I guess I'm done here, or at least that's what I'd like to say. I broke Georgia's trust by reading her letter, upset Phillip, had Sheng give me strange glares as I walked out of the inn, received a mysterious message in a bottle, and not to mention gained mysterious gifts from Cam. Ohhhh, how did all this happen to me in one day? No, no time for that, it's ok Lillian, you'll be fine, you're always great, you can do it!" Lillian's pep talk would seem strange to anyone who passed by, but to her it always got her through and kept her optimistic. "None of that even matters right now, just get the onion back and fix everything later."
The self reflecting thoughts of hers were interrupted by the sound of hooves trampling the ground. Lillian looked to see where the noise was coming from and saw Kana riding atop Hayate as he flashed right by her towards his home.
"Woah Hayate," was the only murmur she could make out from the rider, before she knew it the horse began slowing down to a stop, but before stopping Kana leaped off the horse and took a fall on his hands and knees, thankfully on the grass. The dangerous stunt left Lillian worried and before running to him, she whispered with her hands clasped together and eyes closed, "Sorry Cheryl."
As Kana stood back up, the increasing noise of scuffling feet approached and from it came the voice of Lillian frantically asking, "Kana, Kana, are you alright?!"
Kana looked to Lillian, signaling to her panicked face to give him a moment. He took that time to do some stretching and when he finished he responded, "Hey, Lillian, what's up? What are doing here this time of night? Oh, I know, here to see Hayate?"
"Kana, now's not the time for jokes, we need to take you to see Ayame, you could have seriously injured yourself."
"Me, nah, me and Hayate used to do this kind of stuff all the time. Just wanted to check and see if we still got it."
"Well if you're sure."
"Ahh lighten up Lillian, you do pretty dangerous stuff yourself. Dirk told me about you running out in the middle of a storm to check up on Hayate."
"Well that was different, you asked me to watch her while you visited your dad and I couldn't just ignore a request from a friend."
"You should have heard him, 'It was amazing, it was awesome, you should have seen her. All I wanted to do was close the curtains by the window, but out that window I saw Lillian having a standoff in the middle of the rain with a horse, trying to hold her place in the harsh winds, as the rain beat down on her, and before I knew it she took the horse by the reigns and carried it inside the barn, all with a smile on her face.'"
Lillian sweat dropped at such an absurd, over exaggerated story. The way she recalled it Hayate was waiting for her and kept trying to nudge her inside out of concern for her safety, or so she thought, but in reality Hayate was just trying to get someone to find her food. Lillian hadn't remembered that checking up on her also meant feeding her, even though Bluebell farmers typically didn't forget such things when it came to animals. Of course when she realized her vital mistake she tried her best to make up for it by pampering Hayate in her free time, despite Hayate and Kana forgiving her.
Though absurd a story as it may have been Lillian couldn't help but chuckle out loud about it. She wasn't quite sure at what point Dirk saw her smiling after having torn her clothes in the tunnel, falling into a mud puddle, or having a chewed wad of gum flying in the wind only to eventually get stuck in her hair, but his story of exaggerated heroic deeds made for a nice reward for that day.
"See, dangerous stuff is fun," he remarked as he saw Lillian chuckling.
"Well, maybe in moderation. Just be sure not to do that too often or your customers won't have anyone to handle their animal needs."
"Nah, my main customer is Phillip and he does fine even without my advice." At the utterance of the name came a coincidental appearance of said person while he was in the middle of a search for the deliveryman aka Dirk. "Speak of the devil," Kana stated as he caught the figure of Phillip in the corner of his eye.
Lillian turned to see what he was looking, hoping that it wasn't really what he saw. She wasn't in the mood for confronting Phillip yet. "Please don't look over here, please don't look over here," was all she could think. Phillip's glance though, of course, had to turn towards Lillian. "Please don't come over here, please don't come over here." Phillip walked towards Lillian.
"Hey, Phillip, what's up? What are you doing here this time of night?"
"Kana," he stopped next to Lillian, "where's Dirk?"
"Dunno, haven't seen him lately,"
"He's out delivering letters," Lillian interrupted, trying to remain calm.
"...Just can't remain still," he muttered under his breath, but aloud said, "fine, if you see him, tell him I need to see him."
"Will do," Kana casually replied.
"And head home Lillian, staying out when it's dark is dangerous. No one's going to save you if you get hurt."
Lillian didn't take too kindly to thar comment, but felt it would be better to walk away from the trap he was setting her up for and pretending to ignore it said, "well since I'm about to leave, would you like me to deliver any messages to anyone, maybe Georgia?"
"Tell her, I can't accept her feelings."
"Woah," Kana intervened, "feelings, what's going on here?"
"Nothing you need to know," Phillip rebutted.
"Easy there," Kana said sensing the hostility from Phillip's tone, and with that Phillip retreated to his farm. "What's his problem today?"
"Don't mind him, it's my fault, we got into an argument that you just happened to be caught in the middle of."
"Lllliiiilllliiiaaaannnn," the whining sound passing through the wind disrupted the peaceful atmosphere. It was the sound of a little girl by the name of Cheryl. "Lillian, Lillian, Lillian,"