"Alright, fine! I give, I give." I tapped the ground beneath me a few times with the arm that wasn't currently being wrenched behind my back, giving up. "That's two to two, this month, right?" I asked Pepper as she picked her foot up off of my back and helped me up.
"Nice try. You always try to make me forget that first win, Tarble. Three to two. And today's the fiftee-eenth." Pepper told me in a sing-song voice.
"Dang it. I still say that was a cheat."
"You should've been more specific about the rules, Tarble." She said, still grinning from ear to ear as I pulled myself out of the crater that she'd made with my face.
"You started early! Not to mention the thing with the bucket! How is that sportsmanlike?!" I complained.
"You weren't clear about when we'd start. You said 'Ready!' You also said that wrestling was like fighting, but without ki. You taught me how to fight."
"Oh, so you're blaming me?" I rolled my eyes.
"You taught me to use any dirty trick I can to win, Tarble. That's on you!" She declared, getting nose-to-nose with me. Though she was a bit taller than me, it wasn't so much that I felt like I was at a disadvantage or anything.
I chuckled, pulling back. "Fair enough. Guess you did get all of your bad habits from me."
Like the adult she was, Pepper replied by sticking her tongue out at me. "Nehhhh!"
"Alright. Fine. One match per challenge, one challenge per day, every half-month, the winner gets a demand. Those were the terms. So lay it on me, Pep. Whaddya want, a date, a spar, a new outfit, something physical, like a hug or a kiss, or are you gonna make me do something as revenge for something like that April Fools stunt?" I asked, listing the various demands she'd made of me in the past when I lost our little ongoing bet.
Basically, we could each challenge the other to a wrestling match. No ki, no outside interference. No more than one challenge a day, for the purpose of ensuring that we didn't waste all of our time play-fighting.
Whoever won the most at the end of a half-month, got to make a single demand of the winner. Anything at all. It was a scary power in the hands of people as free-spirited and petty as Pepper and I could be.
For example, for April Fools Day, I'd made Pepper wake up in her pajamas on a raft in the ocean on the other side of the planet. She'd been woken up to the realization that this world did have giant killer squid monsters.
One less giant killer squid monster now. Lynn cooked it… it tasted amazing.
After losing six wrestling matches to Pepper over the course of the next fifteen days, I'd spent April 16th in a chicken suit. All day.
Pepper had then spent May 1st in a chicken suit all day. To my annoyance, she loved it and actually looked incredible in it. She even managed to convince Miss Dahlia that, since I was being mean to her, she deserved a snack. Zeck's mother ended up making a mountain of fudge for every kid in the village. So much for a punishment.
In fact, I was pretty sure that was the day that the village kids pledged a slice of every pie their parents made to the girl as payment for her 'sharing' her fudge on behalf of Miss Dahlia. Lucky girl.
"Alright, Pep. So what do you want from me?" I asked.
Pepper's eyes twinkled mischievously.
…
Later that evening, I found myself lying down on a small stretch of beach on the other side of the island. My foot pressed against an old wooden board on the dock that I'd made around five years ago, lightly shaking. The wood creaked quietly with every motion, which told me that it wasn't quite rotten yet… I think.
It'd never been a quality dock, anyway. Just a pet project. If it was rotten, or a board or two had gotten loose or something, it didn't really matter. I'd originally built it to try fishing, but I was a terrible fisherman, apparently. Or maybe this was just a bad spot… I didn't really care.
It'd always been more about simply spending time here than anything else, after all.
"You have your thinking face on, Tarble. I guess that means you want to talk with me, huh?" Lynn noted, slipping down off of the grass slightly above and sitting on the sand beside me, her knees pulled up in a slight effort to lessen the amount of sand that gets on her pants.
"It's that obvious, huh?"
"You only come here when you want to spend time with me. You know, I could take a little trip back into town, we could have a little picnic?" She asked.
I shook my head slightly.
This little grove was a small little inlet hidden on the far side of the mountain that covered a good portion of the island that our village was on. Without a boat, or the ability to fly, it was nearly impossible to get to.
It was also a nice small patch of grass and dirt that only contained one tree and a small strip of sand. None of the villagers would ever go there, it was simply too much of a pain to get over to this little area. Lynn liked to do a lot of her gardening here, since it was so isolated.
Between the small, white-sand beach and the many colorful, Celatian flowers that covered the ground, it was the most beautiful little spot on the entire island, no two ways about it. Like a little slice of paradise that Lynn had created with her own two hands.
When I got stuck on a project, or simply wanted to spend some time with Lynn, I tended to make my way out here, maybe to relax on the beach, clear my mind, watch the waves, or sometimes even picnic with Lynn. She had a tendency to spend a lot of time out here, and often packed an extra large lunch in a capsule.
But what Pepper had told me earlier ran through my brain.
"Hey, Lynn. Do you want to go on a date with me?" I asked.
Lynn sharply inhaled. Our relationship wasn't like… Lynn was almost four years older than me, and she tended to act like it more often than not. She was basically Pepper's opposite, until you stepped on her toes and awakened the dragon. Composed and a bit quiet. She wasn't the type to go out and say exactly what she wanted and how she wanted to get it.
As a result, our relationship was… a bit easy. If Pepper brought out my childish, wild side, then Lynn brought me down to Earth. Relaxed me.
As such, she tended to fade into the background a bit. While Pepper pulled me from my research when she wanted to spend time with me, Lynn would just show up, set a cup of tea on the desk beside me, rub my back, and leave without another word.
Sometimes, it just hit me, just how much Lynn did for Pepper and I. She cooked for us, reminded us of things, smoothed over problems, and provided a certain much-needed stability in our lives.
She deserved more than Pepper's demand for that (yes, Pepper's demand was to give Lynn a demand of her own). I should be taking more time out of my day to spend with Lynn.
As an aside, Lynn used Pepper's demand to have me shuttle in various exotic foods from all across the planet, through Capsule Corp's networks.