Miss Brightside (Negovanman)

Epiphany Time

And there they are, walking side by side. Natasha letting her inner girl scout surface as she's trying to figure out where the hell they have to go next to get to the restaurant with Elise still walking next to her, silently freaking out. Her eyes are wide and her breathing has gotten quite shallow leaving her mouth slightly agape as she is still processing this realization.

'No... Nooo no no no no no no.. Nahhh.. I mean- come on?! This- NO! You are not falling for your best friend! For fuck sake! What is wrong with you?! You're just misplacing certain feelings of.. jealousy.. with feelings of love. Yeah, that's it! You're just scared of losing your best friend to her girlfriend, lover, fling, flirt, whatever! Yeah, this seems logical. Okay. Cool. So just.. chill.'

She's mentally picturing herself taking a deep breath in some sort of yoga pose. 'Yeah, unless I'm just gonna casually lay down on this here sidewalk doing that pose... not helping, Bauman.'
"Fuck.." She sighs out uncontrollably but quiet she thought, it came out just loud enough for Natasha to hear.

She nonchalantly looks up from her phone. "What?" And is met by a shocked expression, wide eyes staring into nothing, Elise almost seemed to be scared by something.

'Moootherfucker you did not just say that out loud! What the fuck do I do now?!' A wave of fear is running through Elise's body leaving her unable to respond.

"Elise? What the.. is something wrong?! Are you okay?" She stops and grabs hold of Elise's shoulder bringing her to a halt as well.

That wave still had her paralysed for a moment but she slowly turns towards Natasha. It's just that the shocked expression was still plastered on there. She takes a breath to gather herself and finally snaps back to reality placing some sort of a quasi smile on her face.

"Yeah, no I'm fine! I just- I.. I zoned out there for a minute. I guess the hangover tried to get the best out of me." she says nervously with a little scoff. Realizing this probably wasn't going to cut it for her she grabbed Natasha's arm and started walking again. "Are we almost there yet?"

A bewildered Natasha starts looking back and forth between her phone and Elise, trying to figure out how to react to this but her mind comes up blank so she shakes her head a bit in confusion. "Uh.. Yeah, n- no." she stammers.

"You know, I should've brought along my backpack for you there, Dora." She says with a more convincing smile this time, trying desperately to make Natasha forget her shocked expression earlier. "Get it? Cause we're lost.. Monkey.. No?" She clicks with her tongue. "Tough crowd."

'Okay, so if just keep this up then maybe she'll actually just shake this of as a hangover leftover or something and forget all about it. Sounds like a plan.. right?'

Not knowing how to react to the obvious change of subject Elise is trying to pull off Natasha is left with a face that has uncertainty written all over it. "Yeah.. Sure.. Okay." 

'Did that really just work?' Scared to look Natasha in her eyes she kept her gaze pointed toward the sidewalk in front of her. 'I mean, that is all this is. Just misplaced feelings. Nothing awkward going on, just keep doing what you always do! Nothing, and I mean nothing has changed. So just act normal.'

With those words she calmed herself down a bit. She may have had to repeat them to herself a couple of times on the rest of the way to the restaurant but she tries to think nothing of it.

--

Finally, after 15 minutes (what felt like an hour) of walking in what Elise thought was awkward silence, they arrive at the restaurant. Natasha on the other hand was way too focused on getting there to notice the awkward silence Elise was experiencing during the walk. She just glanced over to her a couple of times along the way, feeling the need to check in on her but as far as she could tell everything was fine again with the little bean.