Chapter Text
Lapis’ consciousness jerked into awareness. It felt like she was suspended in a bowl of gelatin, weightless yet impossibly heavy. She was buzzing as she blindly attempted to cling to the last remnants of whatever dream she’d been having. She tried to move her arms but found them heavy as lead pipes, as if trapped under something massive. Her whole body felt that way, she realized, her brain giving up the ghost of her dream and focusing on the real world. Something taut and cold surged in her chest; she was pinned down, immobilized, helpless. It felt like-
-like she was underwater.
She shot upright in her bed, eyes wide and unfocused. The familiar beige walls of her room began to fade back into view, exactly how they were when she’d fallen asleep. Lapis’ recklessly pounding heart slowed a few miles per hour, and the terror gripping her ribcage began gradually melting away like an ice cube kicked beneath a refrigerator.
That comfortable, dead-to-the-world numbness clawed its way back to grace; the last Lego brick in the precariously-built tower that was Lapis Lazuli.
She threw herself back onto her pillows, squinting across the room at her alarm clock only to remember that it was a Sunday and she didn’t have to work. She briefly considered getting up and taking a hot shower to soothe her pounding head and rinse the smell of fear from her. Or she could listen to one of the old CDs in the bottom drawer of her dresser and fold some of the clothes that were collected in piles at the foot of her bed.
But with a sudden yawn, she remembered she was tired. Enough so that her higher reasoning skills were mostly absent and that critical, nagging voice that liked to guilt her into doing the things she needed to conveniently seemed to be dormant.
She just pulled her twisted sheets over her shoulders and slipped back into a restless sleep.
Lapis didn't know how much time had passed when she woke the second time. She came to gradually, finding herself awake enough to notice little more than the surprising fact her earphones were somehow still in her ears from when she'd fallen asleep originally, listening to whatever loud, trite song had caught her passing fancy.
Which she only noticed because she was lying on her side in such a way that her right earbud was jamming painfully in her ear canal. She squinted blankly at her bedroom wall, debating whether or not the pain was annoying enough to warrant what seemed like the tremendous effort of reaching up and pulling it out.
After a few minutes of the dull, throbbing pain, she decided it was. She tugged on the cord and yanked the earbuds out, shoving them childishly away from her. Sighing, she sat up and checked the clock only to recall again that it was still Sunday and she still didn’t have to work.
As she threw herself back onto her bed, her cast aside earbuds managed to jab right into the small of her back, making a surge of explosive, aimless fury course through her. She grunted, stuffing a hand underneath herself and yanking recklessly at the cord. Unlucky for Lapis, said cord happened to still be plugged into her phone, which got slung across the room with the headphones and hit the floor with a concerning thump.
“Fuuuuck.”
Lapis pushed herself upright again and threw a leg over the edge of the bed, sliding reluctantly to her feet to retrieve her phone. Upon inspection it seemed to be fine, aside from a new scuff on the corner of the screen, and Lapis fell dramatically back onto her weary box springs.
Craning her neck upward, she unlocked her phone to check her messages. There was an email from some phishing scam site and- her eyes widened- a text from her.
In her exhausted state, Lapis skipped the anxious should I or shouldn’t I and tapped the notification immediately to open it.
‘can u cover my shift today? got a dentist appt.’ It read anticlimactically, timestamped three hours ago.
Heat rose through Lapis’ chest and into her face, knuckles going white where they were grasped around her phone. It had been months since they’d last texted, nearly a year since speaking face to face, and this was what she chose to break the silence for? Did she have nothing at all to say for herself?
Lapis put her phone face-down on her bed. Why should I bother responding if this is all she has to say to me? she thought bitterly, staring out the window at the bleak grey walls of the building across the street. I should have known she wouldn’t change; just as selfish as the day we met. I should tell her to go fuck herself.
She found herself reaching for her phone and typing back anyway. ‘what's in it for me?’
A response appeared on the screen within thirty seconds. ‘free overtime pay?? lmao’ Before she could react, another message popped up. ‘and you'd be helping out a beloved friend, of course’
Lapis had to clench her teeth together to quell the fire that began burning in her throat.
‘fuck off.’ Lapis sincerely hoped the animosity she felt was palpable in the text.
'will you pick it up or not?’
Begrudgingly, she took a moment to consider. As much as Lapis hated to admit it, she was right; in her economic standings, overtime pay would go a long way and take hardly any boss hassle. (Since the store owner died unexpectedly a few years back, management had fallen into relative chaos. They’d long since quit using the once required shift-swap paperwork; they didn’t care who picked up whose shift and who worked what overtime as long as it didn’t happen often enough for corporate to get wind and start asking about the missing documents.) Even if Lapis resented Jasper with the might of a thousand suns, and she desperately wanted nothing more than to have Jasper at her mercy and leave her hanging, she needed the money badly.
As always, Jasper knew exactly how to draw Lapis in just close enough to guide her into a trap of her own making.
With adrenaline making her shoulders shake, she tapped out a reply with twice the necessary force. ‘fine, but you owe me one. I mean it.’
Lapis checked the clock again; assuming the shift was Jasper’s usual, she only had half an hour to get ready and get to work, and for someone who had to walk, that wasn't long. Forcing herself out of bed, she bent over through the protest of her sore muscles to retrieve her green Grocery Express polo and work slacks from the heap on the floor where they’d been since Friday night.
She slipped from her room with her clothes in her arms and beelined for the bathroom but by the time she reached the door she could hear the shower already running. Vengeful, angry thoughts immediately began screeching through Lapis’ head, but she gritted her teeth and forced herself down from the edge.
Fine. It’s fine. No big deal. Sadie is my friend. She’ll understand.
Lapis knocked twice and cleared her dry throat to speak. “Sadie, I need to shower for work, are you going to be done soon?”
After fifteen seconds there was no response and Lapis was biting back a fury so ferocious that it made her head hurt.
The one day! The one time I dare to pick up a shift! Of all days, of course it’s today! How absolutely fucking convenient!
She swallowed, carefully, measuredly, and knocked again. “Sadie?”
Still there was only silence. The vicious monologue that ranted in her head began to say things she’d not repeat to her closest confidant, so she turned the doorknob and stepped into the bathroom with a shaking hand. Before she could call Sadie’s name a third time, though, she heard a muffled giggle through the hiss of the running water.
“Mm, Lars…” came Sadie’s soft voice.
Oh, of course.
Lapis stepped back, closing the door quietly. The fury in her veins drained away at once, leaving behind a gnawing guilt underneath an overwhelming feeling of defeat.
Lars was far from Lapis’ favourite person. He was arrogant, loud, encroaching, and an entire other host of things incredibly undesirable for a roommate to be, especially in such a tiny apartment. But Sadie was Lapis’ friend; she’d been there for her when she’d had no one else. And if Sadie wanted to have shower sex with the most irritating man on the planet at nine thirty in the morning, Lapis wasn’t going to disturb her out of her own childish spite.
Lapis trudged to the kitchenette in the corner of the living room, tossed her shirt and pants on the counter, and speedran cleanliness by craning her neck, dunking her unruly hair into lukewarm sinkwater, and lathering in a few haphazard handfuls of hand soap. Once rinsed she pulled the sweat-scented t-shirt she'd slept in over her head and dried her hair with it before changing the rest of her clothes speedily. She almost scoffed at herself as she "washed her face" by rubbing it vigorously with the dry portions of her soiled shirt. Hey, she rationalized to herself, it's not like ten dollars an hour is worth my cleanliness.
After gathering her wallet, phone, and keys a sudden thought struck her and she returned swiftly to the bathroom, this time not bothering to knock. “Hey Sadie, I picked up a shift at work last minute and I don’t have time to feed Blue, will you take care of it for me?”
“Lapis! We’re kind of busy here!” Lars shrieked from within the shower.
Sadie’s head appeared from the side of the shower curtain, pink-faced and apologetic-looking. “I’ll make sure he eats.”
“Thanks, Sade. Have fun,” she offered with a weary wink that made Sadie’s cheeks even redder.
Lapis slipped into the hall and locked the door behind herself. Pocketing her key, she took the stairs two at a time despite the protest of her aching back, and kept a nervously-brisk pace throughout the walk to work.
Upon arriving at work, no one from management blinked at her announcement that she was covering Jasper’s shift. Garnet, the head of the front end, just rubbed the palm of her hand with her finger tips while gazing into middle distance and spoke calmly, “I’ll override you into the time clock.”
Thus Lapis clocked in, logged into register number nine, and turned on the lane light.
The state of the store reminded Lapis why she didn’t work Sundays. Elderly people and upper-middle class thirty year olds laden with reusable grocery bags were swarming every aisle like junebugs let loose in the lighting section of a hardware store. Not used to such obscene rush, Lapis was taken aback by the line that quickly formed at her register but offered a fake smile and a carbon-copied ‘did you find everything okay?’ to each customer anyway.
The hustle and bustle didn’t make the time go faster as Lapis had hoped. She was desperately exhausted already, limbs sluggish, and far past sick of waiting for eighty year old women to fish their loyalty cards from the depths of their expansive purses.
As she finished the last transaction in a lengthy wave of customers, she saw another one of her bosses, Pearl, strut upstairs to the office. Pearl was a prim, perfectionist woman who worked behind the customer service desk and was obsessed with trying to rein in the uncontrollable management mess the store owner had left with her death. Needless to say, Lapis didn't like her too much.
As if on cue, upon returning down the stairs she swooped over to Lapis’ register like a tall, annoying hawk. “What are you doing here?”
“I picked up Jasper's shift. Did Garnet not tell you?” Lapis said, painting her expression with perfectly innocent nonchalance.
Pearl laughed haughtily, “Of course she told me! I meant, what are you doing out here?” She gestured widely at the front end of the store.
Lapis blinked. “Picking up Jasper’s shift?”
Pearl tutted indignantly. “I know that, but you shouldn't be out here. Jasper works in produce, remember? If you're going to cover for her, you need to do so in her department.”
Oh. Right. Lapis had forgotten about her department transfer. Jasper had worked as a bagger for the last six months of her and Lapis' relationship, after losing her job at the local junkyard she'd had for so long. After the breakup, though, Jasper had transferred departments, presumably to get away from her. Lapis realized with a start that ten months had passed since then. She didn’t have any excuse to still be forgetting.
Lapis sighed and turned off her register’s light.
“Go on now, the time clock is always ticking!” Pearl said, waving her hand dismissively toward the rear of the store.
"What am I supposed to do back there, though?"
“Well, I certainly don't know! Ask Bismuth, she's the produce manager.”
"Bismuth isn't here, she's still recovering from that back surgery."
Pearl made an exaggerated scoffing noise, caught out, and rifled through the papers on the yellow clipboard that had previously been under her arm. After sharply flipping pages for a few seconds, she tapped a manicured finger against something on a rear page.
"There's a produce shipment coming in at noon. You can go help unload and then get to stocking it. From there you can ask the others what needs done."
Lapis’ lips flattened into a tight line. She hated the way Pearl made her feel; like she was a caged animal doing tricks for peanuts. She just spun on her heel and strode toward the produce department, her lower back tingling with a persistent bite of pain.
An aching back. Perfect for moving boxes and stacking fruit all day.
Lapis knew before she even saw the first apple of the produce section that she was in for a long shift.
It was six in the evening when she clocked out for the night and she felt like someone had ripped her spine out and used it as a jump rope. She offered a wave to Ruby, a produce clerk who had helped her figure out where to start in the department, and resisted the urge to offer a middle finger to Pearl who'd bid her a flowery, performative goodbye on the way out.
She walked back to the apartment complex in an indefinite amount of time she'd mainly spent zoned out, considering what she was going to eat for dinner. The journey back up the building stairs was a laboured one that drew slight tremors from her overworked legs and back, but the promise of plopping on the couch with some microwave cup noodles and watching syndicated Jeopardy reruns kept her going through it. She reached apartment 316 with a sigh and leaned against the door as she rooted in her pocket for her key.
She could hear Lars and Sadie yelling about something through the door. Lapis rolled her eyes. Wonder what it is this time…
As she slotted her key in the lock, she heard their indistinct words instantly cease.
“She's here!” came Lars’ frantic hiss.
Oh, that couldn't be good.
She pushed her way into the living room, suspiciously eyeing Lars and Sadie who were frozen in place with hands full of balled up paper towels and faces full of restrained terror.
“What's going on...?” she said slowly.
They exchanged a panicked glance.
Sadie raised a placating hand as if she were calming an angry tiger. “Lapis, we, uh. There's a bit of a… situation, regarding-”
“We poisoned your cat!”
Lapis blinked, staring dumbly at Lars who was sweat-soaked and visibly shaking. She turned towards Sadie. “What.”
“We didn't poison him! We fed him this morning like you asked and he was fine, but he wouldn't eat all afternoon. We thought he just wasn't hungry but now he keeps… puking all over.”
Lapis’ breath escaped her. “Where is he?”
“In the corner.”
Lapis stepped over a half-cleaned puddle of vomit to where Blue was laying in a heap by the refrigerator. She sank to her knees in front of him, running a gentle hand along his head, to which he responded with a weak, pathetic-sounding mrow.
She gathered him in her arms and stood up, expressionless.
“Call me an Uber,” she said without turning around.
“To where?” Lars asked hesitantly.
She turned around slowly to glare at him with rage shining in her eyes.
“The animal hospital, Lars,” Sadie urged, grabbing her phone from the end table by the couch and arranging the ride as quickly as she could.
“They'll be here in six minutes,” she said to Lapis who had sat down on the couch with Blue still in her arms.
Lars swallowed nervously at how still and quiet Lapis had become. “Do you, uh, want me to grab your cat carrier?”
She said nothing. He and Sadie met eyes. “I'll grab your cat carrier.”
Once the cat was secure in the towel-lined cage, Lapis stood.
“Do you want us to go with you?” Sadie asked as Lapis opened the door.
“No.”
She glanced at Lars. “We should go with.”
“But she said-”
“Just,” she grabbed his wrist and pulled him toward the hall where Lapis had already begun descending the stairs, “come on.”
The three of them piled into the backseat of Uber driver Mike's silver 2007 Subaru Legacy and rode to the animal hospital in silence.
Lapis, Sadie, and Lars sat in the Empire City Urgent Pet Care waiting area in a similar silence. Lapis was stone-faced and speechless, hunched over in her chair and staring between her knees at the floor. Sadie and Lars were several chairs away, exchanging a look.
“Should we go talk to her?” Lars whispered into Sadie’s ear.
“I don’t think it would help much. You know how she gets.”
“No,” he hissed back matter-of-factly, “I don’t, because she hates me! How am I supposed to know how she gets when she never even talks to me?”
“She doesn’t hate you, she just,” Sadie glanced across the waiting room at her crumpled figure, “has a hard time warming up to people. And you haven’t exactly helped the process yourself.”
Lars acquiesced with a groan. “What do you suggest we do, then?”
“Honestly? We should probably just leave her be. I love Lapis, but she’s... not very receptive to other people’s help.”
“No shit,” Lars said under his breath, looking away.
Sadie glared briefly at him. “Don’t be like that. I don’t think she can really help it. She’s been through a lot and doesn’t want to be the host of some big pity party.”
Lars turned his gaze back upward, somberly watching Lapis readjust in the corner. She was leaning back limply, face turned away and hugging herself with fingers clutching the fabric of her hoodie.
“I don’t want to throw her a pity party! I just want her to stop acting like I’m going to eat her or something. You two have been friends for, what, six years now? I’ve lived with you guys for almost one and she still treats me like crap.”
“She’s not trying to be malicious, it’s just hard for her to trust people, even if she’s known them for a while. It took her like a year of working at the Big Donut with me for her to ever agree to hang out outside of work. But once she opens up she’s super funny and genuine, and a really great person to be around. I think she’s just been having a hard time lately.”
Lars crossed his arms. “What, because of what happened with that Jasper chick? They broke up ages ago.”
“I don’t think that’s the only thing. She seemed okay for a while after the breakup, but for the past few months she’s hardly spoken to me. I keep trying to instigate it and make things go back to how they used to be, but she either acts like she’s a thousand miles away or shuts me out and goes silent. I think she just needs something to pull her out of this slump she’s in right now.”
It was Lars’ turn to sigh then, readjusting so his arm was around Sadie’s shoulders and glancing at the time in the bottom corner of the local news program that was playing quietly on the wall-mounted television. “The things we do for this chick…”
“You mean like poisoning her cat?” Sadie replied with a smirk.
Lars pursed his lips. “...Shut up."
Lapis’ foot was bouncing. Not necessarily by choice, but bouncing.
She couldn’t stand the atmosphere of the hospital; it was the smell of antiseptic and the glaring white lights and the conspicuous silence and the fact that an hour and a half had passed without an update.
Lars and Sadie had been on their own halfway down the row of chairs the whole time. They hadn’t spoken a word to her since before they’d gotten into the Uber, and Lapis was simultaneously hurt and relieved.
She wasn’t sure what she wanted. Did she want to be left alone? Not really, because being left alone only gave her tumultuous thoughts free range to run amok. So then she must want Lars and Sadie’s company after all, right? Except she didn’t; the last thing she wanted was to be patronized; all they’d do was walk on eggshells like she was a spooked deer that would bolt if someone raised their voice a single decibel. It was a lose-lose situation, so she’d been crumpled, motionless, in the corner for hours, and she was beginning to feel like she was going insane.
Her body seemed to move of its own accord as she uncrossed her legs, planting her feet on the floor and leaning forward with her elbows on her knees. She shot a furtive look in Lars and Sadie’s general direction- Lars was boredly staring at the television with his left hand supporting his chin and his right gently stroking the upper arm of Sadie, who was slumped against his side, asleep. The sight was cute, but made a sour feeling accumulate in her stomach; both of them had to work in the morning and were being kept up by her problem. She shook her head and jumped to her feet- she had to get out of the room.
She strode through the sliding glass doors of the hospital and into the cold night air. She took in a big breath and surveyed her surroundings numbly. The parking lot was mainly empty and illuminated by uncomfortably bright fluorescent street lamps. She walked to the far end of the lot where a cluster of employees’ cars were parked and leaned against one to gaze into the distance. The city was beautiful at night with its twinkling lights and blue-black sky; she just wished she could appreciate it more.
The streets were far from empty, (it was Empire City after all,) but traffic was much sparser than usual. Sundays were the calmest days the bustling city ever achieved, especially in the evenings once most of the population had been consumed by their weekly existential crises about the imminent arrival of yet another week. A car hadn’t gone by in about two minutes, which was shocking compared to the average nightlife of the so-called sleepless city.
The traffic drought was then broken by the high beams of a car that shone in Lapis’ eyes as it turned into the parking lot. It pulled into the handicapped parking space closest to the door and a short figure holding a cat carrier exited, disappearing inside the building.
It was funny, in an ironic sort of way, that everyone else was living their life normally when Lapis’ had been turned upside-down over a cat.
She sighed and shoved her hands in her pockets, kicking a piece of loose asphalt from a shallow pothole. She wished she wasn't like she was. She wasn’t a depressed kid anymore; she didn’t spend her nights bawling her eyes out in bed anymore. She didn’t break down anymore; instead she just shut down.
There was something wrong in her head, something dark and sticky that slept behind her eyes, constantly in waiting. It weighed down her skull, made the air seem thicker, but stayed dormant until provoked, at which point it would throw a tantrum. It made Lapis feel like a petulant child, mentally repeating childish mantras. It’s not fair! Why me? I don’t wanna!
She didn’t understand, but at the same time she really did. Her life was exponentially better than it was when she was a kid, but when it came down to it, it still sucked. She worked a dead-end entry-level job for two dollars above minimum wage, she had no degree, she lived with two roommates in a hole-in-the-wall two bedroom apartment on the poor side of town where roads and buildings were constantly falling into disrepair, yet the rent was still hardly manageable between the three of them. Worst of all, that was all she had. There was no real family to call after a hard day or travel back to on the holidays, no friends to make plans with other than the one that she lived with that was almost always equally as busy as her, no girlfriend (not anymore, not that she wanted to relive the time she spent with her…)
This was it. This was all she had going for her. Working paycheck to paycheck to stay alive, only getting to look forward to eating cheap junk food and watching mindless local broadcast television and sleeplessly scrolling through social media in bed with her cat curled up on her hip. So basically she had a grand total of about three things keeping her going, and one was incapacitated in the hospital. Of all the mental shutdowns she’d ever had, she could at least say that this one was the most warranted. Not that the knowledge necessarily helped her.
She found her feet carrying her back into the building where she saw Lars and Sadie standing up and watching a nurse walk away from them. Their posture seemed relaxed and Lapis felt a glimmer of hope. She strode over to them, dropping a tentative hand on Sadie’s shoulder.
“What did they say?”
Both of them jumped, turning around startledly. “Oh, Lapis, you’re back!” Sadie blurted.
She didn’t have the care in her mind to be bothered by their spooked deer treatment this time, so she barrelled on. “Uh-huh, what did the vet say?”
Sadie and Lars exchanged a long, heavy glance. Lars suddenly lifted his hand to place his index finger on the tip of his nose.
“Not it,” he declared.
“Lars!”
Lapis looked between the two of them, brows knotted and lips parted. “What’s going on? What did they say about Blue?”
Sadie stared pointedly at Lars. “Tell her!”
“I’m not telling her, I already opted out!”
“Putting your finger on your nose doesn’t mean anything!”
“Says who?”
“Says me, because this isn’t second grade musical chairs!”
Lapis’ eyes humorlessly wandered from the scene in front of her and by chance met with the curious, amused gaze of a short, olive-skinned woman with curly, clearly dyed blonde hair sitting on the other side of the waiting room. She briefly smiled at having caught Lapis’ attention before wordlessly motioning toward the arguing Lars and Sadie with the slightest tilt of her head. Lapis shrugged deeply, lifting her hands and raising her eyebrows dramatically in response. The stranger snickered, eyes crinkling, and Lapis felt a warm, swelling feeling in her chest, grinning back without thinking.
She suddenly remembered what she was doing and turned back to her friends. “Okay, you guys have ten seconds to tell me what’s going on with my cat in as few words as possible. Go.”
Eyes widening to the size of dinner plates, Lars and Sadie frantically exchanged a look once more.
“He swallowed some string,” Sadie said.
Lapis frowned. “Go on…?”
“The doctors x-rayed him and…”
Lars jumped in to finish. “-and he’s just gonna poop it out.”
She blinked, stunned into an uncomfortably long silence. “You guys were getting all worked up over telling me that he’s going to be okay?” Fury almost instantly began to quell in her throat and her fingernails proved it by jabbing hard into her palms. What did they think, that she was going to explode like a wild animal upon the news that everything was going to be fine?
“Well, we knew how worried you were, and we didn’t want to upset you...”
Lapis zoned out of the conversation as she abruptly remembered that the woman on the other side of the room was still there. She glanced over to find the stranger’s eyes were still firmly locked on her with an interested, almost assessing look on her face. As infuriating as being treated like a child was, she couldn’t make a scene. Not when people were watching.
She turned back to Lars and Sadie’s shaky forms without hearing their words. The anger that had suddenly begun burning in her belly fizzled away in an instant and an almost drunk tranquil washed over her.
She interrupted their anxious blathering, abrupt and unconcerned. “Nah, you guys shouldn’t have been worried. That’s actually pretty funny.”
The couple met each others’ eyes again, this time in shock. “Funny?”
“Yeah, we were all keyed-up for nothing. I mean, that’s cats for you. Little rascals.”
Sadie and Lars looked around puzzledly like they were in the Twilight Zone. “Uh. So you’re okay?”
“Yeah! Why wouldn't I be? I’m just glad he’s okay.” She smiled uncharacteristically good-naturedly with calm, half-lidded eyes. “When is he going to be released?”
“They didn’t say. They gave him laxatives and said he’d be ready to go after he poops and they make sure the blockage is… in there.”
“Cool. Hey, do either of you have cash for the vending machine?”
The sudden question made them momentarily freeze in place. Lars took out his wallet in a daze and handed her a five dollar bill.
“Woah, I don’t need a whole five. I’ll give you the change.”
“Keep it,” he said after a moment.
Lapis eyed them suspiciously for a bit before shrugging and heading for the vending machine in the corner. She inserted the dollar bill and got one petite bag of chips, collected the returned quarters, inserted some, and got another bag. She then pocketed the remaining coins, collected the snacks, and sat down across from Lars and Sadie, right next to the woman who had been watching her.
“Lays or Doritos?” She offered, extending both bags to the stranger.
She smirked. “Cheetos.”
Lapis smiled but tilted her head. “I didn’t buy any.”
“You have enough left for a bag. Your friend said you could keep the change and you only spent two dollars and fifty cents of your five.”
“Well, someone’s observant,” Lapis remarked lightly. “What’s in it for me if I buy you Cheetos?”
“Nothing. But I have a sneaking feeling that you will anyway.” A challenging mirth danced through the woman’s eyes, and Lapis felt goosebumps form underneath her hoodie sleeves.
“Fine, watch my things,” she said, her tongue trapped between her teeth in a grin as she dramatically placed the two bags of chips on her chair. She walked back to the vending machine, counted out four quarters, and returned with a fun size bag of Cheetos.
“Your cheese flavored snacks, m’lady,” Lapis said in a hideous butchering of a British accent, performing a mock curtsy. She wasn’t sure what was happening to her, usually she’d never act the way she was, but something about the strange girl made her shoulders tight with nervous energy.
The stranger took the bag. “Wow, thanks.”
Lapis sat down and opened the Lays. “So, what brings you here?”
“My cat broke his leg.”
Lapis’ brows rose. “Big ouch.” Big ouch? What adult says that in a real life conversation?
“It’s no big deal,” she replied, monotone, after politely chewing behind her hand. “This has happened before.”
“This has happened before?”
“Twice, actually. I assume it’ll happen again after this.”
“What on Earth does your cat do?”
“Nothing out of the ordinary behaviors for cats, but each time he’s broken a different limb. I assume he’s attempting a clean sweep.” A slight upward cast tugged the girl’s lips in accompaniment of the twinkle in her gaze.
Lapis chuckled through a mouthful of potato chips, earning a small, self-satisfied smile in return.
“So, what’s your cat’s name?” Lapis asked after swallowing.
“Pumpkin. I’ll give you three guesses on what color he is,” the woman deadpanned with a straight face but the same evidently trademark sparkle in her emerald green eyes.
“Hmm. Black?” Lapis felt off, but in an almost pleasant way, as the words left her mouth. She was bantering. With a stranger. Since when did she strike up conversations with random people like a soccer mom at a PTA meeting?
“Do you see black pumpkins often, Lapis?”
She grinned like the Cheshire Cat both at her own joke and the shivering feeling of being addressed by name. The girl must have been listening to her previous conversation intently if she’d caught her name. “Yeah, actually. During Halloween they have craft stores full of them, haven’t you heard?”
The stranger rolled her eyes easily. “You,” she punctuated her pause by taking a bite of another Cheeto, chewing, and swallowing, “are what I believe is known as a smart ass.”
“And you have poor cat-naming skills.” The taunts were sliding past her lips smoothly, like she was a regular person with a regular life and regular social skills. It felt essentially how she imagined doing crack felt.
“As if you’re one to talk, owner of a cat named Blue.”
“Hey, it’s a good name!"
"Perhaps. Unless, perchance, he's of the Russian Blue breed…?"
Lapis gaped for a moment, then pursed her lips and looked away in playful defeat.
The woman laughed loudly, eyes squinted in delight. Lapis watched her face with slightly parted lips, feeling a fiery sensation rush from her forearms to her chest to her stomach.
“What’s your name?” The question was abrupt but bursting at her lips, suddenly the only thought in her mind.
Her laughter calmed. “Peridot.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Peridot.” She meant it, truly, and felt a smile split her face.
“And you as well, Lapis.” Something about her formality was endearing in a way Lapis couldn’t place but heartily enjoyed.
There was a lull in their conversation, coincidentally marked by a nurse entering with a cat carrier and calling Lapis’ last name. She stood and rushed over, taking the cage and peeking through the bars at her healthy, albeit tired-looking, feline son.
“Thank you,” she breathed to the vet tech.
“Thank him,” he replied with a chuckle. “He’s the one who did all the work. Just keep him away from any wayward balls of yarn from now on, okay?”
On any other day, Lapis would have rolled her eyes and offered a dismissive affirmation at such a pointless comment, but all she could do was grin and reply with a sincere, “Absolutely.”
She returned to Lars and Sadie, setting the cat carrier on a chair near them. “Can you keep an eye on him? And order another Uber home?”
If they were harboring any more distress towards her uncharacteristically level-headed behavior, they didn’t show it. Lars nodded tiredly and pulled out his phone while Sadie lifted the crate onto her lap and cooed quietly at Blue.
Lapis returned to Peridot. “My boy is okay,” she announced as she fell back into her chair.
Peridot chuckled. “We knew that ten minutes ago.”
“...Still.” Lapis didn’t know what to say now that her departure was imminent. The high of meeting the odd, fun character that was Peridot had worn off slightly as she remembered what her life was like. There was little chance she could remain in contact with her, but there was something new buzzing in her that made her feel more alive than she had in months and reminded her hopefully that slim chances hadn’t stopped her before.
“We should organize a playdate between Blue and Pumpkin," Lapis blurted, surprising herself. "I think they’d get along seeing that they’re both dumb as rocks.”
“Hey, you don’t even know Pumpkin! You may be correct… but it's still rude!"
Lapis threw her head back to laugh silently. “Is that a yes?”
“Yes. Do you want my phone number or shall I give you mine?”
Lapis was shaking. “I’ll add a contact for you right now,” she said, taking her phone from her pocket.
“My number is 555-867-6309,” Peridot recited clearly before adding, “I know what you’re thinking, and yes, I’m aware of my number’s similarity to the Tommy Tutone song.”
“Damn, you beat me to the punchline, Jenny.”
Who am I? Lapis thought briefly until Peridot shot her a look that drew profuse snickering from her.
Sadie then interrupted them, standing with Blue's crate in her arms. “Lapis, the Uber is outside.”
“I’ll be out in a second.” She said, hardly shooting a glance over her shoulder.
She turned back to Peridot. "When is a good time for you?”
“You can text me whenever. As for playdate arrangements, I have classes weekdays, so Saturdays and Sundays are often a safe bet. My latest class ends at six in the evening, so I could theoretically be available after then as well, however that is a bit late to be out and about. We can arrange something over text.”
“Sounds good,” was all Lapis could choke out. “I work from two to ten most days.”
Peridot hummed out an appraising noise. “I will keep that in mind.”
She stood and looked down at Peridot. “Talk to you soon?”
“Naturally. Goodbye, Lapis.”
“Bye, Peridot.”
With that, Lapis strode from the building, joined Lars and Sadie in the cramped backseat of their driver’s car, and fell asleep on the ride home with a content smile on her face for the first time in months.