I was all set to go, and so was Violet, but unlike me, she still sat on the bed. As to be expected, she wasn’t looking excited at all about us meeting with Mathilda. She’d never kick a fuss, but with the way she was easy to read, Mathilda would know she didn’t want to be there.

“I don’t remember you being reluctant when we had our first hangout,” I told her, expecting some nostalgia would get her in a better mood and at least a bit excited about it.

“…Back then I didn’t have. I mean, I did, but… You know what I mean.”

I was glad to see she only needed me in her life to be happy, but that was also extremely worrisome. I knew her, and I respected her, but…

“Don’t you think it’d be good for you to have someone to talk with besides me?” I asked as I set my arms around her neck. “There might be some stuff you either can’t or don’t want to talk about with me, right?”

“…I don’t like keeping secrets from you,” she told me, her head hanging even more.

Did that mean she had some? I was very curious, but again, I respected her so I’d keep it to myself. And with the way she was, if she thought it was important for me to know, she’d tell me anyway.

“I didn’t mean it in that way. What if something comes up about me or us that you need some advice or to just vent out? That’s what I was meaning when I told you that. Do you have anybody you can talk about that kind of stuff?”

“…I had Margaret…”

The two of them were that close? That was a bit surprising, specially because she never talked about her workmate. But then again, if what they talked about was me and her, I shouldn’t be surprised after all.

“See? Wouldn’t it be good to have somebody else? And just to be clear, I don’t mean as a replacement.”

“…I guess.”

“…Come on then!” I cheered as I grabbed her hands. “We can go have a date after we are done with her.”

“Sorry, I might feel like coming back home straight after.”

That was fine with me too. Coming back home to cuddle while watching a movie was also nice. She’d probably also start to smooch and play with me too. Yup, all of that sounded very nice indeed.

“By the way babe, do you think you’d like to come with me to buy some clothes?”

“New clothes?”

“You know, that style change I’ve been thinking about lately.”

“Erm, sure. Honey.”

Calling me that was an afterthought, but one that tickled me the right way.

Since she was already up, I turned around and pressed my back on her while sweetly asking her to call me that again.

“…No,” she meekly refused.

“Pretty please?” I pleaded, rubbing my nose on her neck. “I promise I’ll behave.”

“…I don’t mind if you don’t.”

“Hehe, trust me, I know,” I giggled back, turning around and pulling her head down to nibble her jawline.

My teasing backfired—not a complain—because it flipped some switch in her, and Violet ended up getting so into messing with me that we got to the meeting place a bit late. Not that big of an issue really, it was only by five minutes, I got to be called honey a couple more times, and it got Violet in a way better mood than before. Who’d ever have guessed that tickling and osculating me would ever make her that happy? I certainly would. I’d call anybody saying that a big fat liar.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

“Did you two change something about your skincare?” Mathilda asked after we exchanged greetings.”

“Erm, no,” I answered.

“Really? That’s odd.”

“Why?”

“You two look prettier than before, somehow. Like, you two are kinda… glowing, I guess?”

I used the fact Violet quit her job and now we both get a lot better sleep as a result as the excuse. It certainly was partially the reason, along with how much we acted lovey-dovey when nobody could see us, but that would stay a very well kept secret between me and Violet. Assuming Violet could connect those dots.

“So, what are we going to do girls?”

“Violet?” I asked.

“Erm… h-how about… a movie?”

A place where we could be out of the sun she so hated, and that we wouldn’t talk all that much, huh? Nicely played. It got my vote at least.

“Oh, I’m glad you say that! There’s this movie I wanted to see, but nobody else seems interested,” Mathilda said, sounding awfully excited.

“Ok, let’s watch it then,” Violet said, getting hooked on the idea of not having to talk for a long while. Not me though. I was worried what kind of movie it was for only Mathilda to be interested in, so I asked her about it.

“Well, you see… this movie is a romance with two female leads.”

I quickly understood where this was going, but it took a bit for Violet to get on the same page.

“Between the two?” Violet asked.

“Yeah. And also… I heard there’s a… spicy scene between the two. Nothing explicit! Nothing explicit, but…”

Had she planned this? She couldn’t, but Violet was probably thinking that. I was too to a certain extent, but how could she predict we’d suggest going to the cinema? Then again, she began by asking us for suggestions. She was a dangerous girl, wasn’t she?

I turned to Violet. The poor thing had cornered herself into a hard spot and wasn’t going to say no, was she?

“Well… if it’s not explicit…”

Yup, I guessed it.

“Thank you so much! You can’t even begin to guess how much embarrassed I was feeling about going to watch it alone!”

Well, even if she had planned this out with some ulterior motive, she seemed genuinely excited about watching it.

“You see, the director of this movie is my favourite one, but he always does movies that are more… fringe. His horror ones are amazingly good! Like, he uses the usual tropes, but he twists them into something new! And I don’t mean just the horror movies, I mean ALL of them! It’s like—”

She kept going on and on all the way to the cinema, barely even breathing. The result was Violet already looking at a third of her battery when we got there.

“Are you sure about this?” I whispered to her while Mathilda went to buy our tickets. Since we were doing something she wanted, she demanded to be the one paying for everything.

“I mean… if it was that raunchy, they wouldn’t let minors like us watch it, right?”

“Babe, I’m the only one of the three that looks like a minor,” I pointed out before thinking it through.

Violet got very red at the possibility of seeing something she thought she shouldn’t, so I pointed at the movie poster.

“Look, it says it is rated for sixteen plus, so we are in the clear. They can’t be showing too much if it got that rating, right?”

“R-right… y-yeah, of course not.”

Mathilda soon returned to us while happily waving our tickets. She thanked us again for coming with her to watch it, permanently burying my suspicions about her having planned this due to what she thought was going on between me and Violet. I had to pretend to be excited about stuff for so long, I’d like to say I’m some kind of expert in catching on to the fakery.

We sat somewhat in the middle of the room, the total amount of people being counted with two hands, and after way too many commercials, the movie started. Right off the bat was the scene Mathilda told us about. It was with the two women in bed, but the camera never moved beyond their faces as they kissed and there was the narration of a man we soon found out was the father of one of them. You see, one of the girls was his daughter and how she got with her brother’s bride. The engagement was all just a farce, and idea the three involved had to hide the relationship of the two girls from him. It was quite the rollercoaster, let me tell you. There were no pauses since there were so little people inside, so we got to enjoy it in one continuous go, something I saw as a blessing. But what about Violet?

“…That was… something else,” she said hollowly.

“You didn’t like it, did you?” Mathilda asked.

“Not exactly… I think I needed a break to digest what was going on.”

“Oh, yeah! I get what you mean! His movies are always so hard-hitting, it’s difficult for newbies to watch them in one sitting!”

Yeah, Mathilda was a bit odd in her tastes in movies. It made me wonder about everything else.

And to my surprise, the two were chatting along just fine with me holding Violet’s hand while sitting in the sideline as opposed to how it usually went. Maybe because Violet had grown used to my excitability and that allowed her to better deal with Mathilda?

“I certainly didn’t expect the father to die in an accident before he could tell his daughter he gave her his blessing.”

“Right! And it didn’t come out of nowhere! They clearly alluded to the cause when he kept having problems with his tractor! He even said the tractor would be the death of him as an off-hand comment!”

“Hehe.”

“Hmm? Why are you laughing?”

I was just happy to see my Violet being so sociable now, despite how much against it she was before we left the house. It made me feel strangely proud of her. I’d be very sure to tell her that once we got home.