Talk to Me

Chapter 8

It's been a couple months of this same routine. Forest wakes up, goes to work, misses her niece and best friend, contemplates her feelings, then goes home.

However, for the first time in the last couple months, Forest was actually excited for the work day. Today was the day they were leaving for Smosh Summer Games Wild West. It's been crazy here since Lasercorn and Anthony left but this would be a well needed break for the whole cast.

Forest was also excited to meet someone new. Due to the fact Dakota wouldn't be joining us as she's still trying to get over her boyfriend's absence, Damien was bringing his sister in to fill her place.

From what Forest has heard from Damien, they were going to get a long great. Forest parks in her usual space, grabbing her bag and luggage before heading inside. As soon as she walks in, she spots Damien standing along a girl with wavy brown hair who must be his sister.

Forest starts walking towards the two, pausing to set her bags down at her desk before continuing. As Forest walks up, she realizes how similar the two look. They practically have the same eye shape and color, and the same kind smile.

Forest walks up with a smile on her face as she sticks her hand out to introduce herself "Hi, I'm Forest. It's great to meet you. I've heard so much from Damien." She glances over at Damien before returning her attention to the girl by his side.

Eloise takes her hand shaking it as she introduces herself "I'm Eloise, It's good to meet you too! I've heard a lot about you too." Eloise winks slightly at her brother before looking back at Forest.

Forest thought she had to be imagining things at this point. Damien talked about her? And why did Eloise wink? She's overthinking it, she has to be.

Forest laughs slightly pulling herself out of her thoughts realizing she probably looks stupid just standing there. Forest decides to focus her attention on Eloise instead of the boy she's grown closer to over the last few months.

"So Eloise, tell me about yourself." Forest says, trying to open up a conversation with the girl but also trying to distract herself from what just happened and what her brain is thinking right now.

"Yeah. So, I used to be an actor, but now I have a podcast since I wanted to just stay more local and close to family." She signals to her brother. "But I'm also a dance teacher now, which I really love."

Forest nods along as she talks, showing that she's listening to every word. "Oh really? That's so cool! What kind of dance do you teach?" Forest asks, obviously interested in Eloise's life.

Excitement was shown across the girl's face as she began to talk about her work. "I used to just teach tap, but the studio director gave me some freedom to do a little more. I do some makeup classes and just basic technique classes too." Eloise says while fidgeting with her jacket sleeve.

Forest smiles brightly as she listens. She can tell Eloise loves what she does and loves teaching. "That sounds like so much fun! I used to do a bit of dance but I wasn't all that good." She says with a nervous, almost embarrassed chuckle.

She thinks back on a time when she was younger doing dance. She was definitely not the best on the team, but she loved what she was doing. The emotion that she could express through her lyrical dancing. Forest ended up quitting dance because of the coach but she never truly stopped dancing.

Soon after quitting, Forest joined her school's guard team and she became known as one of the best dancers in the team. Anyone watching her could tell she loved dancing and she poured every emotion into her movements.

Eloise scoffed in a joking manner with the roll of her eyes. "I doubt that."

Forest laughs slightly, fidgeting with the hem of her shirt. "I mean according to the teacher I wasn't all that good, but I definitely enjoyed it."

"Enjoying it is the first step to being good. I always tell my students that if you have the passion for it, then you're good at it." Eloise starts, taking a brief pause to clear her throat. "Of course, it takes time and effort, but that's at least a good start."

Forest smiles at the huge difference in how Eloise and her old dance teacher talk. "I'm sure your students love you. You sound like a great role model for them."

"That means a lot, Forest. Especially because I had an old dance teacher that would always be angry at me, so I try to teach the way I wanted to be taught, you know?" Eloise says, finally letting some more emotion come out between the two.

"Oh I know more than you can imagine." Forest pauses to laugh slightly. "Maybe it's a right of passage to always have that one horrible teacher, but I'm glad yours pushed you to go further." Forest says expressing the same amount of emotion Eloise has offered.

Eloise laughed, causing Forest to join. "Maybe it is a right of passage. But, yeah, I just finally created a close bond with her my junior year which I was lucky for. She definitely helped me out a lot."

"Personally, I just had to find a different way to express myself. I found another place where I could dance without being belittled." Forest says expressing how different the same experience could turn out.

Through this conversation neither girls noticed that Damien had left to talk to Shayne at some point. Mostly because the girls seemed to get along so well immediately so conversation came effortless to them. Something about the Haas family clicked well with Forest.

Eloise nodded in understanding. "That's amazing, Forest. I'm glad you were able to do what you love in a better and more positive environment."

"Yeah it ended up great, led me to getting a scholarship for college and got me my degree." Forest says excited to have someone to talk about this with.

Right as Eloise was about to respond the girls heard Ian yell for everyone to round up. With one more quick look to each other, Eloise and Forest walk side by side towards the group. Ian explains what is happening to the group of people before letting them all grab their things to lead into the bus.

Forest and Eloise smile at each other once more before going to grab their bags. From just that simple conversation Forest can tell her and Eloise were going to be best friends.

Forest loads her bags into the bus before helping others load theirs as well. They all pile into the bus. Aaliyah in the passenger seat, Courtney, Olivia, and Bose in the front row, Wes, Ian, and Sohinki in the third row. Mari, Flitz, and Joven in the fourth. Shayne, Keith, and Noah in the very back, and Forest somehow ending up in between the two siblings in the second row.

Throughout the ride, a vlog camera was passed around as the whole cast made jokes. They stop a couple times for bathroom and snack breaks. Forest took advantage of every stop, loading up on snacks and some water for the rest of the ride.

After about 2 hours of driving Forest felt insanely tired. Damien was simply reading and listening to music and Eloise was scrolling on her phone, every once in a while tilting it over to show Forest something on her feed.

Having nothing else to do, Forest puts her headphones in softly playing music as she tries to fall asleep. She quickly fell asleep due to the comfort of the drive. However she didn't feel her head slowly fall onto Damien's shoulder comfortably.