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“I think we should break up.”
Floyd hummed and glanced up from the carrots he’d been chopping out of boredom. Shrimpy stood right at his elbow. Her tomatoes looked more like soup than the diced shape Azul had demanded. He could tell she was serious because of the deep crease between her eyebrows.
Floyd jabbed the crease with the tip of his finger. “Naw. I’m good.”
Shrimpy huffed, but Floyd had already turned back to chopping carrots. “I’m being serious! I don’t think this is working out at all.”
“I don’t have a problem with it.”
“We shouldn’t be tied down to one another if we want to see other people.”
“I don’t wanna see nobody else.”
“And what if I want to see other people?”
Floyd huffed. His knife came down harder on the cutting board. “This is about Sea Snake, isn’t it? It’s not my fault he’s so slow. He shoulda asked you out before I did if he wants to pout about it.”
“This doesn’t have anything to do with Jamil!” Another knife came down onto his cutting board, bisecting a whole carrot. Floyd scowled at the red tomato juice on his carrots now. He turned his glare on Shrimpy, but she just glared back up at him. “This isn’t fair to you either. What if you found someone else you wanted to date?”
Floyd rolled his eyes. He clicked his knife against hers. “Why would I be interested in anybody else? Everyone on campus is boring.”
“You could meet someone down in the town.”
“Also boring.”
“There could be a cute mermaid back home just waiting for you.”
The thought of any of the mermaids back in the Coral Sea wanting to date him made him snicker. Shrimpy had no idea how those girls were. They were way too boring and prissy to be any fun. They squealed like annoying seagulls when they saw his shadow.
Now, if he could find a shark mer that might be a different story. Even another squishy cephalopod like Azul would be more preferable. At least then he’d have some fun when he went in for a squeeze.
Shrimpy chopped done on another one of his carrots. Little tomato seeds flicked onto his cutting board. Floyd’s humor disappeared. “You better watch it, Shrimpy, or the next squeeze I give you won’t be so easy to slip out of.”
“Your grumpy moods don’t scare me.”
“I’ll just give you something to be scared of then.”
Shrimpy stabbed her knife into one of his carrots. Floyd had her flung over his shoulder before she even realized what was happening. A delayed squeal followed them as he stomped across the Mostro Lounge’s kitchen. He flung open the two-way swinging door and ignored the startled looks shot in their direction.
He scowled when Jade popped up in front of him just as he was about to exit the Mostro Lounge. “Move it.”
Jade simply grinned. “Now, Floyd. You know better than to bring raw shellfish into the dining room.”
Shrimpy’s offended “Hey!” was cut off by a sudden squeal when Floyd shifted her on his shoulder. “Shrimpy’s trying to break up with me, so I’m gonna go toss her in a fish tank.”
A sharp knuckle dug into his hip bone. “Don’t you dare!”
Jade chuckled. “I doubt Azul will be very happy to have a shrimp in the tanks.”
“So?” Floyd yawned and ignored Shrimpy snapping the suspender strap of his uniform. “I don’t care what Azul thinks.”
Jade hummed. He leaned to the side to look around Floyd. “I was under the impression you had only asked the prefect on one date.”
“Yeah,” Floyd answered. He was getting really bored, really fast. “And she stood me up.”
“I was kidnapped .” Shrimpy snapped his suspenders again. He jostled her until she squealed. “Just like I’m being kidnapped now!”
“So,” Jade said, ignoring the wiggling Shrimpy on Floyd’s shoulder, “technically, you can’t have a breakup without having actually dated , correct?”
Floyd frowned, not liking the smarmy tone Jade had. Jade widely smiled. Shrimpy wiggled on his shoulder.
Floyd suddenly grinned to match Jade’s smile. “You’re totally right! Shrimpy you can’t break up with me ‘cause we never went on a date.” Floyd patted the back of her thigh, earning a harder punch to his hip. “We’re gonna go on one now so we can breakup!”
Jade snickered into his knuckles. “Oh? And where will this date take place?”
“In the fish tank!”
Shrimpy shouted some kind of protest, but Floyd completely ignored her. He left Jade snickering in front of the Mostro Lounge and ambled through the dorm to the large tank big enough for him and Jade to swim around in if they wanted to. She wiggled, huffed, and cursed the whole way, but Floyd’s grip was stronger than her wiggling. He giggled as he climbed the steps connected to the open top of the tank for easy access for feeding the fish. “In you go Shrimpy~.”
Floyd threw her into the tank. Or he would have had she not grabbed him by the top of his pants. Floyd wasn’t able to keep his balance with her yanking on him and went tumbling into the tank with her.
Azul was not happy when he found them splashing around the tank later, but Shrimpy didn’t bring up the whole “breaking up” thing again.