After taking our sweet time drinking our tea, we finally went outside to happily sit back down in the wagon. With the chamomile doing its job way too well, I could already feel myself drifting off into sleep. What made the situation even better was that Cecily noticed my sore neck and offered me a small pillow she had in her suitcase meant for long wagon rides. Now that I had everything set up all fine and dandy, my Eyes slowly began to blink. The blinking turned to my Eyes shuddering, and before long, just as I had closed them...
"Ack!" I jolted as the wagon's tires peeled off, "What the hell, Beth?!"
"I told you to hurry it up, dammit! You guys made me wait half an hour in here!"
Geez, that scared the crap outta me. Is that even legal to do? To just... make such a loud and scrapy sound with your wagon, won't it get damaged that way? Well, even if it does, she'll be the one to have to pay for the repairs, but I still dislike how violently she woke me up with it. Ugh, now I feel way more inclined to argue than to sleep, in all honesty...
"You kids always just wanna rush things." I spoke just like my dad in that moment, "Instead of properly basking in the moment, you just wanna drink your energy cans and speed off to the next place!"
"Yeah, dipass, my entire livelihood depends on rushing." She shot back, "And besides, if you pride yourself on inventing them so my, how come you don't like them, huh? Your made-up story just shot you in the foot!"
"I never drank a sip of the stuff! Do you have any idea what's in there!?"
"Don't care! It tastes good and gets me through the day, so I'll drink it even if it's horse crap!"
"Guys, guys!" Cecily tried to de-escalate the situation, "There's no use in arguing, okay? Let's just calm down, apologize to each other and..."
"Don't think you're in the clear either, Piss n' Period!" Beth gave Cecily the most disgusting nickname ever to be dished out in the heat of the moment, "This guy's just being a prick, but why the hell did you take your time as well!?"
"What..." Cecily's muttered, "The FUDGE did you just call me!?"
"Mmm, fudge..." Cene drooled a bit in his dreams, happily sleeping through our petty argument.
"I called you what you look like, hag!" Beth seemed to like provoking the tigress, "You not only failed to keep your husband in check, but you also got roped into spiting me WITH him! What a useless harlo-!"
"Stop the car right FFFUDGING now!" Cecily yet again passively censored her swearing, "If you wanna go, let's go right now! I'll beat the snot outta you!"
"Pssh, what can you do?" Beth didn't believe her, "Lady, sit down and relax. I may look just like some kid to your Eyes, but I'll have you know I throw a mean slap."
"Phah! A slap?" Cecily couldn't resist staring directly at her soul through Beth's rear-view mirror, "I'll rip both your arms off and shove them into your ears."
Hearing her serious tone and nightmarish glare, even someone as ignorant about Cecily's fighting capabilities as Beth would be hard-pressed to not shiver in this scenario. While at first doubting the lengths Cecily will go to to erase someone who tried to mess with her, she soon found out from my numerous warnings that it would probably be best to let the situation go while she still has all her body parts in place.
"Beth, it's alright. I'm sorry, so please just let it go." I honestly begged her.
"Tch, hiding behind your wife now, mister?" Her voice quivered as she tried to muster the last bit of courage in her, "That's not a good look for you, y'know."
"Beth I'm serious, drop it." I tried being sincere with her, "Cecily wasn't kidding when she said what she said. Just please keep quiet and continue driving normally."
"I-Is it really that bad?" She gulped.
"I've killed more people than you've driven in your life." Cecily didn't even blink as she revealed, "Keep talking and you just might join them, yeah?"
"...F-Fine." Beth finally caved, "Just go the hell to sleep and I'll wake you up in a few hours."
Thank goodness, she's not dumb at least. Oh, it seems this argument served as a pretty good way to pass the time for everyone, because I recognized that giant tree off in the distance. We passed this tree just around when we entered Secundis, meaning we should be closing in on the border. Though it's good that we made it so fast, I still feel it's kind of a shame. I wanted to sleep a bit, but thanks to the nature of the argument, I don't think I could doze off even if I wanted to from the start. It's just too noisy.
"That tree, it's said to have been planted by king Mezzo himself almost a thousand years ago." Beth regaled us with a short history lesson, "Back then, the entirety of Entropa was practically the Carmen Empire, and some even say modern day Secundis was where the capital was at the time."
"Don't care, didn't ask, plus you're scum." Cecily cupped her ears as she ignored her completely, "I don't listen to snobby, bratty teenagers. Especially not ones that call me such abhorrent names like-"
"I-I'm listening!" I shouted to calm everyone down, "Go on, Beth! For the love of the Gods, please don't stop talking!"
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Somehow we've found ourselves in a situation where Cecily and I have to listen to Beth's history lesson on some random tree. Don't get me wrong, it's definitely an Eye-catching and interesting looking specimen, especially when you take into account its sheer size and almost devilish shape. It's like the roots are above ground - There're barely any leaves on its crown, and the ones that are there are mostly dried out and falling. This is something you'd expect of a tree in fall, but right now it's spring. The color of the tree is almost pure black, and if it really is just under a thousand years old, then that really puts things into perspective. Still, if Beth stops talking, she's almost guaranteed to die in that very moment by the hands of a provoked Cecily. I need to keep the conversation going until Cecily cools her jets.
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"Got anything else to say about it, Beth?" I chuckled nervously, "I wanna know more."
"Nah, that's about it." She shrugged, "I'm not really a history nut, I just know what my dad told me. Who knows if it's true, but hey, the more you know."
"So you're saying you might be blatantly spreading misinformation to us." Cecily looked even more enraged.
"It's just small talk. If you're so dumb to believe everything I say as undeniable acts, then you really should rethink your life decisions up until now." Beth clicked her tongue, "Like I said, you're free to believe my stories if you want to, just like how your husband keeps making stuff up to try and make himself seem more interesting."
"Whoa now, are you trying to get yourself killed?" I furrowed my brows, "And by the way, I never lied about a single one of my stories. You'd be surprised by the sheer insanity both Cecily and I went through in our youth."
"It's a gazillion times better than some stupid ols tree you keep boring us with." Cecily rolled her Eyes.
"Oh yeah? Then please, enlighten me with a few good ones." Beth smirked, "Go on, the craziest story you know of your past? I don't care what it is, it can be anything! Let's see what you come up with."
Well, she got us there. Thing is, if it was just telling her any one of our stories, then we could go on for days without any issues, but she doesn't wanna believe us no matter what. She's a difficult person to get along with, and unless it's something I can prove with hard evidence, then she's just not gonna buy it. So then, what to show her? Maybe my Iro Abilities? No, that's not something to flaunt to random people all willy nilly. No, I got something way better in store!"
"Oh, my pinky!" I recalled, "Maybe you noticed this already, but I lost my pinky finger while exploring a dungeon with a party of adventurers in the north pole."
"I think I read a book about that exact topic once..." Beth nodded along with a disinterested face before doing a double take, "Hold on, did you say you lost a finger!?"
"Yeah, count for yourself - One, two, three, four... and no five." I put my hand out next to her, "Now do you believe m-?"
"Whoa!" Her Eyes lit up, "That's gross, haha! And you said you lost it while on an adventure!? Why didn't you say anything sooner!?"
With both Cecily and I utterly dumbfounded and stunned by this sudden change of heart from Beth, we eventually snapped out of it enough to have me tell her the story. What's interesting to note is that Beth actually remembered Marina's name from a previous conversation, so the farther we got into the story, the more she started liking her. It felt nice hearing the young girl praise my previous wife, but it kind of ruined the rest of the story. It almost felt like she completely zoned out on the rest of the characters and plot and just solely focused on the random side character who was, at least at the time, not that important yet. By the end, Marina was all she was talking about, and I'm pretty sure she long forgot all about my missing finger.
"Man, no wonder you had an affair with her." Beth said something outrageous in front of Cecily, "I'm more surprised you came back to this hag instead. What the hell drove you to do that?"
"Her death." Cecily grumped, "She accidentally got shot in the stomach and died. Though I'm not sure if he would have ever returned to us had she not died back then, I still wouldn't wish her such an untimely fate either. From the stories I've heard about her, she seemed to be a bright and happy person."
"Ah, shoot..." Beth then glanced back and asked, "Just to make sure, you weren't the one who...?"
"No. It was my best friend." I defended Cecily, "He shot her, not Cecily."
"Wow, some friend you have. And what, did you seek revenge?"
"No, we made up after a few years of no contact and are now neighbors." I looked out the window as I recalled the events of that day, "He didn't do it on purpose, and I think you can still tell in the way he conducts himself that he took her passing to heart. She was, in a way after all, his friend as well."
"........"
"But never mind that." I pointed over yonder, "The border's over there, right Beth?"
"Hm? O-Oh, right." Beth made a last second turn just in the nick of time, "Phew, thanks for that, mister. I would have drove us all the way to Tertis had you not given me the heads up."
"Should we request a new driver after all, dear?" Cecily teased, "This one's no good."
"Don't worry, we'll dock her pay." I joked as well.
"Oi! It was just a little flub, come on!" Beth feared losing that juicy gold coinage, "Look, I'll make it up to you by speeding it up a bit, okay!?"
"No, not okay." I shook my head, "We don't want you running any more animals over. Gods know the local ecosystem is gonna be in shambles with you passing by."
"Okay that's just taking it too far!" Beth yelled as we approached the border to Primis.