Potential Lovers | ACNL STORY

13 - Sudden

Joe POV
2 pm. Nothing to do. I sat on a patch of flowers, cluelessly. I plucked one flower off the ground and played the game of 'she loves me, she loves me not'.
   During the middle of the game, I kept thinking of random things, specifically last night.
   I kept wondering if she had feelings for me. Or if I was delusional or something, or if it was all a dream.
   But it was real, because..it felt like it. We kissed, then she left, and I couldn't sleep until 2 am. I had to play K.K. Lullaby. Weird but it happened.
   I woke up at 10 pm, tired and groggy. Took me a while to get up. It was like nothing happened last night.
   That was what I had to look like to seem normal on the outside when I appeared next to villagers this morning. It was kinda hard since that was all I was thinking about then, even right now.
   It went quick but so smooth. It was one of the best nights I ever had since forever.
   Today is my outing that I invite them to go. So I want to make them happy, her happy. So it would be another good night. But I wasn't sure if it was possible.
   Never thought I would think about people a lot now. Normally I'd do my florist business and keep my thoughts to nature. But two days ago, on Saturday, I kept thinking about people. It's unusual.

When I noticed that I plucked the last petal, I got out of my thinking state. Was it 'she loves me' or 'she loves me not'? I shrugged it off. I placed the petal-less flower where it was originally and left the spot.

I wandered around Serenity not knowing what to do. I wasn't busy at all, but in my head I was as busy as a mayor. With nonstop things running through my mind.
   Just as I was thinking about mayors, I passed by Lily as I try to talk to Sally. I thought we met eyes or something but I didn't pay attention.
"Oh Joe!"
"Hi Sally."
She's my favorite villager. I befriended her when Anna was hanging out with Tom a lot. Sally's calm
and nice, so I talked to her when I didn't feel like doing things.
   "How have you been? We haven't talked for..a week?" She did the question emoticon. "What do you need Joe?"
"I-I'm bored right now." I admitted, rubbing the back of my neck, embarrassed. "So..do you have time to maybe..chat?"
"Yeah of course," she smiled an eye smile, "you asking to talk first makes me feel special."
I felt warm and fuzzy in the inside. If only talking to people were that easy like talking to villagers.
   "Well today's weather is nice, so the flowers you planted must be safe."
   I nodded in response.
   "I'd like to see what you planted if you don't mind?"
   I gave her a light smile and showed Sally the way to my batch of flowers.

~

Sally said she had to leave after I let her water the flowers. She loved how I arranged the flowers and the flowers I bred.
   Sally always saw the nice things about me and my hobbies and said it to me out loud.
   A lot of people notice my efforts but don't compliment me for them. I mean—I don't care, but it's nice to hear them..
   There really should be more people like her in this world, I thought.
Lily is like that sometimes. Nice..compliments me..it's just that I'm awkward with her. I wish I had more confidence.
I sighed and left the flower patch. 4 pm..about 6 hours left still. I didn't know what to do to kill time.
Why do I feel so bored nowadays, I asked myself. I normally would be fine, but recently I had been so bored. I might as well take a nap or something..

~

   The town tune played when I entered my house. I sighed and quickly planted my face on my pillow.
I asked myself a billion times if I was actually going to hold the outing for the four of us.
Why am I suddenly hanging out with them all? Sometimes things get so sudden and you just go with the flow.
   I turned my body over and stood up from bed. Out of no where, I had the motivation to redecorate my main room. So I decided to check my closet.
   All my rooms have an earthy vibe. Plants, flowers, pots, wooden furniture, books, etc. I checked the time, 4:30. Enough time.
   I then looked around my room. Antique shelf..antique clock..baby bear..banana flower basket..barrel planter..
   I didn't know what I was doing. Couldn't decide what to change even though I wanted to change something. Change my style? Change to impress someone?.. I was stuck.
   In a middle of battling my thoughts, someone knocked on my door.
"Hey Joe, you in there?"
I recognized the voice and opened the door slightly.
"Hi Tom."
He flashed a smile and asked if he could come in. I hesitated for a split second but let him in anyway.
"So since you're going to hold the outing later today," he spoke while sitting on my rocking chair,"I wanted to pay a visit to you, to y'know, get to know you more.
   I didn't get what he meant really. Are we not close enough? Do I seem that distant towards him? I then started to feel bad.
Tom was gonna take a step but stopped to ask me something.
   "Can I check out your rooms?"
   I nodded and he said a quick 'thanks' and started to look around.
He made some comments about how earthly it felt. He said my house's atmosphere felt like 'his grandma's house'.
Didn't question that, but I scrunched my face in reaction behind his back.
Then I remembered something that I didn't want him to see.
I went up to the upstairs room, my bedroom, and looked if he saw it——he didn't——yet. But he was in the room!
I walked to my drawer——steadily——so he wouldn't look at it. I quickly grabbed it and hid it behind my back. I felt a rush of relief. I turned away from him and stared at the picture.
"Hey Joe, where did you get this?..........Joe?"
   I didn't pay attention to his question as I kept on reminiscing. My mind was drawing pictures of her. Writing down unforgettable quotes from her words.
"What's that?"
   I got startled and turned around when Tom was looking at the picture.
"W-what's what?"
   He pointed at my arms hiding the picture. My heart was beating uncontrollably for I didn't expect this to happen.
I felt like my lungs were going to die on me. I swallowed a hard lump in my throat before explaining.
"It's a-a picture.." I mumbled. I immediately felt dumb after I that. He probably knew it was a picture already.
"Who is it..? If you don't mind me asking."
   I minded a lot but I couldn't hide it anymore.
"It's a..picture..of..my mother.."
   He nodded and I gave the picture to him. I kept looking down on the floor, extremely embarrassed.
   "Oh.."
Tom gave back the picture and I placed it on the top of my drawer.
   "Were you two close?"
I felt like I was being interrogated.
   "Y-yeah.."
The question led me to remembering moments with her.
   "S-she tried to teach me many things," I explained,"yet I couldn't understand."
Tom continued to stare at random things while I spoke.
   "She was very accepting, she didn't hate me for being a dumb child, but accepted me for who I was."
I glanced at him and he was now looking at the photo again. The picture of my mother, long black hair, flowery dress, pretty eyes..
   "B-but one day when I was bit older, she noticed that I was still clueless on what to do in town, my purpose in life." I paused to take a breath before I confessed more things.
"So then she started blaming herself that it was her fault that father and her divorced and that she couldn't get enough money to let me go to school."
   "Was it really her fault they divorced?" Tom asked.
I shook my head in response. "No, father was the one, he didn't like me.., so he left mother to take care of me."
   Tom didn't look that much shocked, but I think he felt something.
   "Anyways, she felt bad that I was still clueless and shy, so she told me to move to a new town to learn things 'better' than she taught me."
   "And you didn't reject?"
   "Yeah, well I tried to, but she insisted and said it was for the best, so I couldn't say no."
There was a long silence as Tom was trying to piece things together.
   "But wait—did you move here? Well of course you did—but why?"
   "Well, Serenity was rumored to be getting prosperous at the time, so my mother told me to move here to get smarter."
He nodded and looked as if he was gonna ask another question—and he did.
   "Ooohhhh, so that's why you moved?"
   I nodded and explained more. "I felt sad but believed her words, so that's how I moved here."
Tom had a face like he hit epiphany. Yet more questions came.
   "Oh! So did you actually learn anything here?"
I stared at him and he noticed my look and bursted a laugh.
   "I'm kidding!" He wheezed as he held his stomach.
   I stood with a blank face until he finally caught his breath.
"I did....from kind people here.." I replied with a smile.
"Yeah, she influenced me too.."
I looked up from the ground and gave Tom a curious look.
"U-umm who?"
   He coughed and cleared his throat abruptly. I must have been seeing things, but I saw his face flush a little.
"Cough..! I-I mean—-everyone here also changed me," Tom blurted out.
   I shrugged it off and my mind ran off to think about the person who 'taught' me things.
She introduced me to Serenity and was so sweet and kind. Never had things been so simple and clean before.
She cared about me a lot and I understood myself more because of her.
But then she left for a while..it was pretty lonely but I got used to it.
Then a few months, she came back after I told her some of my feelings. Soon we hung out more and——-kissed.
"But hold on, do you and your mom write letters to each other, I hope you two do."
"Yes we do, just not too often."
   "Ohhh, so—wait—have I told you how I moved here?"
   I tried to recall any times I hung out with Tom or if he told me that story. But nothing ringed in my head.
   "No, I don't think so.."
   "Well sadly my story isn't that interesting," he laughed awkwardly.
   "I just moved because I wanted to, kinda wanted to explore y'know," he explained while looking down. "My parents and I had no problems though, they let me, so we're in good terms, it's not anything bad."
"Oh and I also heard Serenity was popular, but I took awhile since another guy was gonna move in until he had to move into a different town, so then it took a couple months to move in."
After his words, I started to think about how Serenity grew. I heard Lily was liked a lot in her old town Oakland, and Anna was her best friend.
She wanted to become mayor and once she became mayor, Serenity became popular. Anna followed Lily since they were friends after all.
Then I moved because my mother told me it was for the best. Few months later Tom moved in because he wanted to and heard that Serenity was popular too.
The original mayor was Tortimer but he retired so Lily took over I guess. He must be so proud.
"You thinking about Serenity's history too?"
I nodded and he had a far-away look.
"The girls know our stories right?"
"Y-yeah, Lily asked us why we wanted to move in before we actually move in."
"And Anna was curious so we both got interrogated by her right? Or was that just me?" Tom laughed at the end.
"Yeah, she asked me too, but I didn't tell too much details. I just told her that my mother told me to move since she heard Serenity was popular, not the divorced part."
He gave me a 'wow' look. Tom probably didn't expect me to open up.
"Phew. Long talk here wasn't it?" he asked after checking the time.
I checked the time and it was 5:40 pm. I have never spent so much time with Tom alone.
"Seems like I spent enough time here, it was cool to check your house and get closer, hope to see you at 10."
I waved goodbye and he headed downstairs to the door. Abrupt leave but he did stay long.
   Today's crazy so far, I thought. I opened up to Tom, who I avoided ever since Anna became friends with him.
Guess we got closer since we shared our stories to each other.
Lily and Anna said around the same words when I told my half story.
They told me that my mother was really nice, she made a good choice, and that I'll enjoy being in Serenity.
Tom was different though. Like how similar we were on moving to Serenity...Talking to people isn't too bad.

   I walked downstairs and headed to the door. I opened the door and went outside.
When I stepped outside, my mind went back to the history of Serenity. Did everything just happen so suddenly?
Serenity was taken over by Lily last year in December and became well-known in January and February. I moved in at February and Tom moved in at April.
We hung out a few times all together in April as a get-to-know-each-other thing and suddenly quit at May and June-ish.
And then we started fully hanging out all together again at July. Time goes by fast, sudden, I have to say.
   I clapped my face to clear my thoughts away. Yes, everything was so sudden, but it's how life goes right?
I learned a lot and smiled a lot due to those sudden changes.
I couldn't wait to spend tonight. By then, nothing will feel sudden no more, because you get used to it and later you feel like time flies in a different way.

I planned to head to the café since it'll be 6. Then go back to my house to dress up early for the outing, for I had planned to decorate the Campground to make the outing special, for the four of us.
I hoped they didn't think my sudden enthusiasm with the outing is strange. The thought of the outing hit me after I stepped out so I had many things to prepare. Why do I feel so excited? So....sudden...but in a good way...

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A/N:

thanks for waiting about a whole month for another chapter;;
hope it doesn't seem sudden

hope you understand the 'history' of Serenity a bit now.
i'll promise to make it more interesting in the next chapter :D