My Best Friend's Best Friend

Chapter 8: Cindersap Forest

While Sebastian spent his morning at the doctor's office, Penny spent her morning screaming into her pillow.

"Gahh! What is wrong with me!"

The memory of kissing Sebastian's cheek had played over and over in her mind all night. What was she thinking! Of all the half-witted, impulsive, embarrassing things she had done and said in her life, this took the cake.

She had to move. She had to flee the country. Maybe she had a fifth cousin thrice-removed in the Gotoro Empire she could live with. Would that be treason?

At least this current calamity distracted her from thinking about Sam and Maru, which had consumed her over the last week. Were they already dating? She hadn't asked them or heard anything about it; maybe they hadn't realized their feelings yet themselves.

She'd expected to see them at the movies, but neither of them had made it, thank Yoba. Maybe Penny had lost her marbles with Sebastian because she was so glad not to have to watch them on a movie date.

"Penny? Are you alright?" Her mom was knocking on the door.

"I'm fine!" She got out of bed and smoothed her hair before opening the door.

"Aren't you tutoring today, kid?" her mom asked. Pam didn't usually keep up with Penny's schedule, but it was a stroke of good luck that she did this time.

"Oh! The picnic!" Penny shut the door again and hurried to get dressed. Then she rushed out to start packing the basket. She'd done most of the preparations the day before, or else she'd be screwed.

It wasn't until Penny reached Vincent's house to pick him up that she started worrying about running into Sam and Sebastian. And though it was for very different reasons, seeing either of them would be unbearable. When Vincent had trouble tying his shoelaces, Penny thought she might lose her mind standing there waiting for him.

Finally, they left for Cindersap forest. She picked a nice spot for the blanket and sent Jas and Vincent off with jars and plastic baggies to collect 'scientific specimens' while she set up the food. Tomorrow they were going to bring their discoveries to Gunther at the museum to learn about them.

"Vincent! Don't get your shoes wet!" she called, though it was a lost cause.

"Miss Penny, Miss Penny, look!" Vincent came running back, with his hand outstretched.

"Wow, that's a really neat snail, Vincent. Let's look it up in the book." She opened up a big encyclopedia of animals and turned to the snail section.

"Miss Penny, what's this?" Jas ran over with a glass jar full of murky water.

Penny held it up to the light. "I think it's a crawfish, but I think it might be dead."

"Eww," Jas and Vincent said together.

They sat down to eat, and the kids finished quickly and were off again to collect more samples. Penny took the chance to look over some of their classwork while keeping an eye on them. Before long it was time for the kids to go home, so they packed up some of their samples and walked into town. Penny let them go on ahead while she cleaned up the rest of the picnic.

But it was a lovely day, and Penny was considerably more relaxed than she'd been in the morning. She had nowhere to be, so she decided to stay a while. She stretched out in the sun and closed her eyes.

"It's a little late for a picnic, don't you think?"

Penny blinked. She must have drifted off; the sun was setting. She sat up to see who had spoken.

"Sebastian!" she gasped, her face draining of color. There was no one in the world she would less like to see.