Chapter 3
“She’s just been working so hard lately, and I have been getting rather worried. She has barely played with her instrument. All her free time is going into her work, and do not get me wrong, it is great that she can finally focus on her work. But all work and having no time to take a break or relax is not healthy.” Cocolia continues to ramble on to her speaking partner. She takes a breath and sips on her tea waiting for her partner to respond or give her the answer to her predicament.
“Miss Cocolia, I’m still only 13 years old. Why are you talking to me about this; surely there must be others to converse with.” Replied Pela, completely confused why she’s even here in the first place. She was just here visiting with her mom, only to be dragged off, kidnapped really, by the future Supreme Guardian. Now here she was having teatime with a frustrated, soon to be, Supreme Guardian.
“Well… it pains me to admit, however I am in fact lacking in associates that I am able confide in. Most of my companions are rather close to Serval, two of them being her siblings, and your mother is very much insufferable if I were to bring her up as the topic of our conversation.” Cocolia responds with a light blush on her face. It was rather sad that her circle of companions was rather small, however, it was not of particular concern as she would always have Serval by her side to confide in. Which she only recently realised is very problematic when the problem she has is with her one confidant.
“Have you tried to take her out on a date?” Pela replies, causing Cocolia to choke on some of her tea. “Are you okay? Its just, in some of the books my mom owns, there’s lots of stories about using breaks as an excuse to go on a date, or vice versa.”
“I can’t do that!” Cocolia clears her throat and is able to reign in her reactions reassuming the calm mask that she puts on around other people. “Besides, we are not even dating yet.”
“Didn’t you tell her that you love her?” Pela answers innocently, causing Cocolia to sputter and try to shush her, turning bright red at the same time. “She said it back too, right? Doesn’t that make you girlfriends?”
Cocolia starts to cough, Pela was only 13 years old, and she was already this knowledgeable about relationships??? What a frightening child. As her coughing starts to subside another voice rings out from behind her. “Pela there you are! Your mom’s been looking for you!” Of course, it had to be the subject of the conversation of all people. Cocolia was on the verge of recovering, but the shock of Serval showing up made it a lot worse. “Lia are you okay?” She rushes towards Cocolia and starts to pat and rub her on the back so she could catch a breath.
“I was just talking with Miss Cocolia about relationships!” Cocolia started to choke and cough even harder, Serval patting her back even more. She could not blame Pela for speaking so directly, after all it was on her for not requesting their conversation to be kept private. But to completely come clean was wildly out of her expectations.
Serval raised her eyebrow, “Relationships?” She questioned. It was fine Cocolia was experienced with politics she was used to diverting the subject when it was inconvenient to her, the adults were horrible but at least she could use her experience to help herself out from a sticky situation. She’s salvaged worse disasters than this recently.
“Yeah! Miss Cocolia here wanted to ask you on a date!” Oh, Qlipoth save her soul, a literal child has condemned her to death row, is this how she will go down in belobogs history books. Death by embarrassment. “She was really worried about you!”
“Well, that’s a surprise.” Cocolia stiffened at the response. “How about I go drop Pela off with her mom and I’ll take you on that date that you wanted then?” Wait what? Serval grabs Pela’s hand and begins to walk back to where she came from. “I need to pack up a few things, so let’s meet back here in lets say 10 minutes?” Serval didn’t get a reply, so she looked back, gazing deeply into her eyes. Cocolia couldn’t get any words out, breathless, and only nodded to reply.
Was this actually happening? She wasn’t dreaming right? She looked back to Serval only to meet eyes with Pela. A wide grin on her face with her thumbs up behind Serval’s back. Scary. That was the only thing she could think of was that a cunning girl like her was destined for great things.
Wait there was no time to waste, she had 10 minutes, no 9 now after her mini spiral, to come up with the perfect date plan for Serval. She had a rather simple idea in mind, but simple was not good enough for someone like Serval. It had to be perfect and relieve Serval of all her stress. More importantly, she just wants her Serval back, the loud, overbearing and carefree Serval. The one who broke through the walls she built up to protect the image of the Supreme Guardian. She would do anything for Serval, her best friend, or rather who she hoped would be her future girlfriend.