Chapter Text
The first time Marina sees the flowers is when she’s checking the mail.
It’s a Sunday evening, early April when the weather can’t decide if it wants to be cool or warm, and Marina’s been out running a few errands (dropping something off at the studio for work tomorrow, picking up groceries, grabbing food from the Crust Bucket for dinner) all day. There’s a lull in the air, the calm before the promise of a busy work week, and the only thing she wants to do is get home, change into pajamas, and relax with Pearl before they have to go to sleep early and prepare for the news and whatever else the hectic work week will bring them. The weekend was spent stressing over the upcoming Splatfest instead of relaxing, and as much as she appreciates the fame, sometimes she feels if she has to write another script or sing Color Pulse one more time she’s going to be completely sick.
Earlier she hurried the walk to the studio, she hurried through her grocery shopping, and when she finally gets home to the lobby of their apartment building sore and tired and hungry, she makes the decision to do one last chore and check the mail with the promise of pigging out and relaxing with Pearl just ahead of her motivating her to take one more minute out of her day.
What she doesn’t expect is what she sees when she opens up the little mailbox.
Her hands are full of bags of groceries and her arms ache from carrying them all the way back to the apartment building as she stares at the flower petals spilling out of the mailbox. White chrysanthemums, Marina guesses, shoved crudely in the small slot, bent and torn and squashed together in a mess that would otherwise look quite lovely if it weren’t making a freaking clutter in her mailbox. There’s petals making a mess, floating down to the floor and stuck against the inside of the mailbox and stems twisted around and leaving marks on the metal.
“What the hell,” Marina says.
There’s no stamps, no letters, no anything attached other than a mess she knows is going to be a pain to properly clean up. For now, she settles on shoving the flowers to the side of the mailbox as much as she can so she can grab the rest of their mail and tells herself she’ll clean it all up another time when she doesn’t feel like her arms are about to fall off. It’s a nice thought, she’s sure, as flowers usually are, but she doesn’t know who could have put them in their mailbox in the first place, and the fact that they were shoved in so carelessly and making a complete mess fills her with more irritation than anything else. Besides, she really doesn’t want to deal with the possibility of she or Pearl having some sort of secret admirer. They’re both busy with work, busy with personal life, hell, they have a contract…
(And Marina feels a little bit of jealousy at the idea of someone else winning Pearl over with flowers.)
So the first time she sees the flowers while checking the mail, she curses and shoves them to the side, grabbing the few letters tucked in the back before stomping up the stairs home.
“Welcome back!” Pearl greets when Marina finally pushes through the front door. It’s just after 6 o’clock, when the sun is already starting to dip below the horizon and paint the sky with ashy greys, and she’s already in her pajamas and lounged out over the couch. She’s been in the same spot ever since Marina left to run her errands a couple hours before. “How was it?”
“Thanks, lazybones,” Marina says, giving Pearl a strained smile before bringing the groceries over to the kitchen counter and reaching under the sink for the disinfecting wipes. Already she feels her sour mood disappearing just a little with Pearl’s friendly greeting and her familiar presence— it makes her feel warm and safe and home, and it’s almost enough to make Marina forget about the flowers. At Pearl’s prompt, though, her smile slowly falls and she feels the sour feeling returning. “It was alright, I guess. Someone left flowers in our mailbox.”
Pearl peels herself off the couch and comes over to where Marina’s putting away groceries. She hops onto the counter next to her and starts kicking her legs. “Flowers, huh?” she says lazily, stretching out like Judd just after a doze in the sun. “Why d’you look all mopey then? That means someone likes you, ya know.”
“I don’t care that someone likes me,” Marina mumbles. She opens the container of disinfecting wipes with a little more force than necessary and tears one out of the packaging. “I’m too busy for a relationship. Besides, they could be for you. I just dealt with the huge mess your soulmate left us.”
Pearl’s silent for a few moments when Marina takes a long, deep breath. “Sorry,” she says after a moment. “It’s been a long day. The flowers would’ve been really pretty if they weren’t smooshed together and leaving dust all over our mail.”
“It’s the thought that counts,” Pearl shrugs, and she hops down from her place on the counter to start putting away the groceries as Marina finishes wiping them down. Marina’s glad she doesn’t seem hurt over her little outburst, but she still feels a prickle of guilt like rose thorns pressing against her skin and silently promises to make it up to her somehow. “Y’know, maybe you gotta read into them. There’s a whole language of flowers. Maybe the ones they put in mean something in particular?”
“Huh,” Marina scoffs. “If my admirer wants to tell me something, she’ll have to say it to my face. I’m not interested in riddles, not when we’re so busy.” She doesn’t notice the way Pearl falters. “Is there a way to say ‘tell me to my face instead of making a mess in my mailbox’ in flower language?”
“It doesn’t take that long to google it, you know.”
“I guess it’s not really that.” When the last of the groceries are disinfected she puts the wipes back underneath the sink and waits, letting Pearl finish putting the rest of groceries away. “I just don’t think I’m ready for that kinda thing. I mean, with the news and splatfests and working on music, I don’t think I can squeeze time in for a relationship. The only person I’m around enough for that is you.”
Pearl freezes for a split second, just enough for Marina to catch it, and she feels the thorns of guilt pierce her again. Pearl's unusually jumpy today, and it's probably because of her sour attitude. “Not that we’re in a relationship. I’m just putting it into perspective. I’ve never been one for romance, anyway.”
That seems to do the trick, because Pearl relaxes again and melts back into her normal self. She puts the last of the groceries away in the cabinets and then turns around and puts her hands on her hips. “Well,” she starts off with a smug grin. “If I were your girlfriend, I wouldn’t leave a mess of flowers in your mailbox. Have I won ya over yet? Am I romancing you?”
The idea of Pearl being her girlfriend makes her head feel light and she desperately tries to ignore the flutter in her chest and the way her cheeks grow warm. No, she does not have a crush on her musical partner and closest friend. Pearl’s her best friend, her anchor, and she can’t risk losing her because of her own silly feelings. She tries her best to think of anyone else to make her heart flutter instead— Marie’s absolutely beautiful and she’d be lying if she said she didn’t get tongue-tied and nervous the first time she talked to her.
No matter how hard she tries to imagine holding hands with Marie, though, her mind always ends up supplying her with someone a lot shorter and a little rowdier.
It’s useless to try.
She might as well play along with Pearl, just for now. “Hmmm.” Marina feigns heavy thought, bringing a hand up to her chin. “I think you’ll have to try a little harder. My girlfriend would get our dinner ready at the couch while I changed into pajamas probably.”
Pearl’s face lights up with a bright grin. “Roger that!” she says with a quick salute, and Marina watches with a small smile as her partner grabs the takeout bag from the Crust Bucket, a few napkins and utensils from the kitchen drawers, and then stomps her way to the living room like she’s on an important mission. Marina watches her go and tries to ignore the painful feeling forming in her stomach. Pearl’s her best friend. And she’s Pearl’s best friend. That’s all they’ll ever be, but even if Marina will never be able to tell her how she truly feels, at least she has these small moments where she can pretend that things are different.
Pretending is more than enough for her, even if it hurts a lot a little. She tries not to dwell on it.
Instead, she pushes herself away from the counter and heads to her bedroom to change into pajamas. Work starts tomorrow, and now that groceries are put away she’s going to enjoy a night of relaxing and dinner and watching dumb movies with her best friend before a busy week.
She tries her best not to think about white chrysanthemums shoved into the mailbox.
(She still googles what they mean, though, and feels sick when she imagines someone trying to win Pearl over with ‘devoted love and loyalty.’ She also reads that they can symbolize death and grief, and decides that matches how she feels perfectly.)