NOVEL NEXT 19: Admiring… Heh
Following her little promise with Valencia, Astrid’s life continued to inch on day-by-day as she walked the road of recovery once more. No longer bedridden after the first day, Astrid spent a week resting and hanging out upstairs as Valencia ran the store during the day and kept her company at night.
Without too much to do during the day, Astrid spent most of the week in the living room sprawled out across the couches as she dazed off whenever the urge hit her.
Of course, to avoid becoming a full-on sloth, Astrid made sure to squeeze out some productivity and... well... recovery? During her waking hours?
Number one productive activity! Drawing!
Being a virtuous, ever-kind, always amazing girlfriend, Valencia had brought over all of Astrid’s drawing supplies. Her pencils, her art books, her drawing tablet, and more!
Having found the box full of art supplies on her second day of recovery sitting in her closet, Astrid began practicing her art skills once more while brainstorming for her anniversary art piece. After all, her previous idea of depicting their graduation from school seemed a little... out of date.
Spending a fair bit of her free time just doodling and generally art-ing, Astrid had also begun a fair few other “productive” activities!
Number two productive activity! Watching videos on her phone! With the advent of Mytube and Live, Astrid always had a plethora of videos to bor-... to entertain herself with!
Falling down one rabbit hole after another, Astrid had spent most of the week putting videos in the background to just listen to as she passed time cleaning, drawing... or sleeping. At one point, she even tried to find videos giving a brief rundown of the new city she lived in!
All her efforts in information gathering, though, were all for naught...
There was nothing! It was as if there was an invisible veil on the city, blocking any information from being put online!
Astrid found more information about her hometown than she did about Marcen’s Cliffs despite living in Marcen’s Cliffs!
Marcen’s Cliffs wasn’t a small city either by any means. Even Astrid, who had seen about as much of the city as a worm coming out of the dirt during a rainy day, could tell the city was large. There were skyscrapers near the heart of the city soaring into the sky, there were parks, there were residential districts, and... well, a lot of buildings.
Cities, after all, were usually larger if they had more buildings.
Heh. Genius, right?
That was just one of Astrid’s many genius-level observations!
Her third and last productive activity—if watching videos on her phone was considered the second—was stretching!
Being about as limber as a brick after spending so long in a coma, Astrid had felt her legs and body screeching every time she moved. Unlike Valencia who was always the embodiment of flowing water because of all the stretching, fighting, and working out she did, Astrid... didn’t do those.
So... because fighting wasn’t something Astrid was inclined to and working out seemed a little too early for her sick body, Astrid decided to start stretching!
A great way to spend a recovery week!
Feeling better, Astrid wanted to go on a date the immediate day after, but... given how sudden her health could take a turn, both she and Valencia agreed to wait a couple more days while waiting for the weekend when more things would be happening.
And so... a week and a half passed and Astrid was ready to go!
---
“My dress still fits!”
Twirling in front of her mirror to give herself a final once over, Astrid laughed as she patted down her sundress.
Checking to make sure it wasn’t too loose, Astrid struck a pose in front of the mirror for good measure. But with the dress being a light, cream colored one dotted with a sunflower floral print, her pose came off looking more corny than anything else.
Satisfied with how she at least didn’t look like a child wearing a dress two sizes too large, Astrid grinned. Sure, she had gotten a tad thinner, but she didn’t start out with a lot to begin with...
Confident her dress would stay on without issue, Astrid checked over her makeup one last time before leaving her room.
It was date time! The day had come!
“I’m surprised you’re already done.” Valencia looked up from her phone, a smile blossoming on her face as Astrid flashed a peace sign.
Seeing Valencia dressed in a white blouse, cream cardigan, and light blue jeans, Astrid couldn’t help but stroke her chin.
Dang... her girlfriend looked good. Like, as a good girlfriend, Astrid felt it was her responsibility, her duty even, to make sure Valencia was appreciated! And... appreciating she was doing...
Heh.
Whoever is dating this Valencia girl is one lucky lass.
Wriggling her eyebrows and chuckling to herself over her own joke, Astrid yelped as Valencia planted a finger on her forehead. “What...?”
“Shall we get going, love~?” Valencia offered her hand with a teasing grin. “It’s a brilliant Sunday, let’s go explore the city.”
Freezing up for a moment, Astrid patted her dress down once more before taking Valencia’s hand. “O-Of course! Mhm... sounds like a plan. I’m looking forward to it, Cia!”
With the little date just getting started, Astrid followed Valencia down the stairs where they took a seat to pull on some shoes. Electing for a pair of sandals herself, Astrid smiled as Valencia pulled on a pair of flower-patterned sneakers. “I remember those! You still have them!”
“Of course I do,” Valencia pulled Astrid into a side hug while picking up a book bag filled with some water, money, and more. “Why would I throw away these shoes if you like them so much?”
“I don’t know...” Astrid trailed off as Valencia pulled her up onto her feet. “I was just thinking, like... knowing you, you could probably work your way through a pair of sneakers pretty fast. Aren’t sneakers not very good against... kicking people?”
“I haven’t kicked anyone recently.” Valencia shook her head as Astrid squinted at her. Yet, with Astrid continuing to doubt her words, Valencia let out an exasperated sigh. “Okay. Fine, I was lying... I haven’t kicked anyone with these shoes recently.”
“Heh,” Astrid smiled as she wrapped herself around Valencia’s arm. “You know, you’re not good at hiding when you lie, Cia... Also, one night recently, your boots were suddenly a little more scuffed so I assumed you got into a fight with a robber or something.”
“Oh yeah...” Valencia scratched her head. “I even cleaned up the blood, so I thought you wouldn’t notice... But yeah, robber sounds about right for what that person was. He had a bit too much of an ego and just decided to come here to teach me a ‘lesson’.’”
“I didn’t know you had rival stores!” Astrid’s eyes gleamed, “I’ll have to make sure your tea skills keep improving, okay? We can’t have you falling behind the competitors!”
“S... Sure...” Valencia laced her fingers with Astrid. “I’ll look forward to it. Let’s talk about the date though, you mentioned you wanted to go to a flower shop, right? I know of one near us, so would you like to go there first? Or maybe stop by a cafe or other food place?”
“Let’s go get a flower! Or maybe a small bunch of flowers!” Astrid squeezed Valencia’s hand with a point forward. “Onwards! C’mon Cia! Towards the promised land!”
“... It’s the other direction...”
“Oh...”
