Star was, in complete opposition to the situation, having one of the best days of her life. She had learned that she essentially had unlimited time to hang out with her bestie, made some rocking castles at the beach, and was now enjoying one of earth's greatest culinary achievements, ice cream.

Sure, Marco was brooding like a guard that had just been kicked out of a bordello, but Star knew exactly how to cheer him up. Star had been told once that everyone and everything had a weakness, and Marco had two main ones. The first was Jackie Lyn Thomas, obviously. The second however, was that he understood just how much effort went into caring for someone, helping them, and making them feel better. So no matter what you did, so long as you put your whole effort into it, Marco couldn't help but appreciate just how much effort you were putting into it. Meaning that, so long as you kept working on it, he couldn't resist cheering up.

At least, that's how she saw it. It helped that Marco found most of the stuff that she considered commonplace to be ridiculous. So long as she didn't put herself in danger. It was hard to cheer someone up when they were worried about you, after all.

So, when Star saw Jackie skateboarding down to a fries vendor on her lunch break she decided to use
Marco's first and second weakness at the same time. "Oh~ Marco!"

"Hmm?" Was Marco's reply. The boy was spending too much time in his own head, "Could you hold my ice cream for a moment, I need to use the little princesses room."

"Sure," Marco grabbed her cone as she handed it to him and continued staring out into the ocean.

Star gave him a kiss on the cheek, startling him a bit. "Thanks Marco, stay right here." Then she booked it as fast as she could toward the blonde girl. Deciding that legs were for non-magical princesses she quickly rocket propelled herself over the busy street with a surge a pink and purple unicorn octopi.

Slamming down in front of Jackie with enough force to have broken the legs of a normal human she raised her arms and sang, "Ta da!"

Jackie, after a moment of shock, politely clapped her hands, "Seven out of five, would watch again. What's up Star?"

"Oh nothing, what's up with you Jackie?"

"Just getting some lunch." Jackie indicated the box of fries as she grabbed them from the vendor, "Didn't see you in class, you playing hooky?"

Star giggled, "We're not fishing silly, Marco and I are stuck in a time bubble but Marco's grumpy about it because he's had to relive the next couple of days, like, five jillion times. So~, I was thinking that you might help me cheer him up!"

Jackie didn't think much about the insanity spouting from the Star's mouth. It would be an exercise in controlled madness to do so. Being a pretty chill person under most circumstances gave her the ability to roll with most of what came at her, but Star had introduced a level or random, near fatal events into her life that she wasn't sure she liked.

But as star motioned to the brown haired kid across the road Jackie was pretty sure that things wouldn't get too out of hand with the safest kid in school around, and besides, Jackie couldn't just not help someone who was her... friend, acquaintance, long standing classmate? Either way, the only time he had done anything that ticked her off was that one time he broke her skateboard, so she didn't have any beef with him.

So, with that in mind and the overly excited girl in front of her she decided that she had five or ten minutes to help Star and her friend out. "Sure, I guess. What do you want me to do?"

"Just go over there and distract him for a minute. Talk to him or something, just keep his attention on you, Kthxbye!" And with a hop, skip, and a jump Star was around a corning and moving away at the speed of a dumpster fire rolling down a hill toward a baby carriage.

With a shrug and a wince at the explosion in the distance Jackie Thomas crossed the road, kicked her board into her hand, and plopped down next to Marco, noticing that he had on only a pair of swim trunks with a towel wrapped around his shoulders. He surprised her by promptly handing her an ice cream cone.

"Uh, thanks, but my hands are full." Jackie responded.

Marco looked over and, noticing the blonde beauty sitting next to him, nearly jumped out his his shorts. This, of course, would have ended badly for him, so he decided to stay planted to the bench. "O-oh, Jackie, sorry, I, uh, thought you were someone else."

Jackie grinned at the flustered boy, "Sorry I'm not your girlfriend but I'm the next best thing, aren't I?" Marco sputtered and Jackie laughed. She knew that she was attractive, and it was fun when the boys in her school acted this way. She didn't enjoy teasing them as much as Janna did, but watching Marco's face go from tanned brown to tomato red was amusing.

Leaning back and setting her board down against the bench she opened her box of fries. "Didn't expect you to skip school Marco. Seems out of character."

The flushed boy looked away, "I'm, uh, not feeling like myself today."

"Then who do you feel like? Bruce Lee would be my first choice for you." Jackie gestured with a fry. "Y'know, kung fu and all that."

Marco turned indignantly to correct her on her martial arts knowledge when he noticed that she was grinning at him, "It's not smart to tease someone who could kick your butt into next Tuesday."

"Mr. Diaz," Jackie gasped in false shock, "You wouldn't hit a lady now would you?"

Marco looked around like he was searching for someone, "A lady, where?"

Jackie giggled and socked him in the arm, "You're all right Diaz."

Marco smiled at his long time crush, thinking of how the old him would have sputtered and made a fool of himself in the presence of this wonderful girl. What a fool he had been, Jackie wasn't some monster that would hate him if he said something wrong, she was just a kid, like him. Of course that didn't stop his nerves from practically killing him with her being this close.

He didn't feel star pulling his phone from his pocket either. So when she shouted, "Sparkle Surprise Selfie!" And wrapped her arms around Marco and Jackie's necks, pulling their cheeks against hers and snapping a selfie of the three of them, he was quite surprised.

He was more surprised when Star jumped down onto the bench between him and Jackie, wrapping her arms around them, "You two are so cute! Thanks Jackie for helping me out." Star beamed at the other girl.

Jackie smiled at Star, "No prob Star, any time." She looked at her own phone and noticed that she'd have to board hard to get back to school before the bell, "I gotta get going. See you two around, and feel better Marco!" Jackie called and she dropped her board on the sidewalk and started to skate away.

"Bye bye!" Star waved. When Jackie had turned around a corner Star stared at Marco, practically vibrating in her seat at the small smile adorning Marco's face.

It dawned then on Marco that the situation that he had just experienced was most likely the product of Star's ability to set up even the most insane circumstances with little thought or effort. But he wasn't mad. He had forgotten the feeling of experiencing new, unplanned situations. He smiled even more at Star. "Thanks Star."

"What do we do next?" Asked Star. The next three and a half days would be the most fun either of them would ever had, she was certain of it.