Chapter Text
Shelly wasn’t not the smartest toon.
Not by a long shot. She had a lot of good expertise and smarts in fossils and history, but that was it. In terms of general knowledge, she was quite average.
(Such a foolish thought, a main being
average
of all things. It was almost funny to her.)
However, she was observant.
Much more than she was thought to be. The others gave her too little credit, in her opinion. She noticed things. Many things. She noticed how Flutter subtly communicated what she meant. She noticed how Vee seemed to fidget with her mic before a show nervously, though she would never seem nervous to others. She noticed how Dazzle would subtly get Razzle out of situations he may be uncomfortable with. She noticed.. A lot.
She had a diary filled with observations. It had quite a few.. personal messages that she would not mention the contents of. But, a lot of it was observations.
That was to say, she didn’t miss what was going on with Dandy.
Something was up with him, whether he would admit that or not she didn’t note. It started about a month ago now. He seemed more tired in general. He would forget things while recording, which was annoying to the others as it made them redo the scene. Dandy rarely ever forgot the script, so Shelly was surprised rather than upset when it began happening.
Then she found him in the library a lot more. Dandy, as kind as he was, was definitely not the type of person to read often. That was to say, when she found him he wasn’t reading. He was sleeping on the tables. Whenever she made her presence known, he would panic and say something about how “reading was great!” and he “should lead children by example!”
It was all a lie. She knew that.
Shelly frowned as she wrote down a lot of this.
He also seemed a lot more nervous. Stammering whenever people would ask how he’d been, even if it was just polite small talk. Dandy was confident, he never stuttered or stammered. Something was up, and Shelly was going to find out what it was.
She closed her diary. It was late now, and she couldn’t do anything quite yet. She planned on confronting Dandy privately the next day.
Shelly sighed as she hid the diary. She couldn’t let anyone find this, she thought they would find her weird.
She thought of what was going to happen tomorrow as she turned off the lights. She was worried Dandy would be mad at her concern. He wasn’t like that at all, of course. He was a good friend and she couldn’t see a reality where he would even consider doing that. It didn’t stop her worries though.
She drifted off thinking of what she would do.
Shelly woke up bright and early, as always.
She was one of the best toons at waking up early. It was a small achievement she took pride in. You had to enjoy the small things in life, she learned in her time here.
She stretched, yawning, before quickly putting on her work clothes. They didn’t have to record any episodes today, but that didn’t mean she didn’t have work to do. Children would begin filtering into the museum in a few hours. She loved them dearly, as they were always so curious and kind, but they were also quite a ruckus and tiring.
She walked out of her room, a bounce in her step.
“What's got you so happy?” Sprout asked as he served her breakfast. He was the head chef, one of the best cooks they had. Him and Cosmo were also some of the toons that were early risers, as they had to be to make sure everyone was fed.
“Oh, nothing.” She smiled, slightly embarrassed that Sprout had noticed such a small detail. “I just.. Feel like todays gonna be a good day.” She exclaimed as she breathed in the cold morning air. It was always so nice, the early morning air.
Sprout just chuckled, mumbling something among the words “classic shelly”. He continued serving food, but as he did he had a little bit of a bigger smile. A bit more energy in what he did.
Shelly could only manage to smile. She loved encouraging people, either through words or actions. Sometimes something as small as making someone laugh was so important for their day. She liked to do that, to change someone's day for the better.
What was life to only live for yourself, anyways?
As she ate, Shelly remembered she planned on confronting Dandy today. Dandy was awake now, getting food currently, as most other toons were.
Shelly sat alone at her own table. She could go join the mains.. But nah. She would only be intruding on their conversations. Plus, this gave her time to review her fossil facts for today.
She paused, glancing at Dandy and how off he still seemed.
Today was going to be quite interesting.
Shelly sighed in exhaustion as she cleaned up her fossil exhibit.
The children were well behaved today, as Shelly had hoped they would be. That wasn’t to say that they did make quite a mess. It was to be expected, of course. Children so young always made a mess, no matter what she did.
Still, it didn’t make cleaning up after them any less tiring.
Shelly wished the toon handlers did this at all. However, they seemed to have more pressing matters. Somehow. It did mean that the responsibility was always hers, unless she got sick or couldn’t attend work.
As she struggled to push a box back into its original place, she heard a familiar voice call out.
“Hello Shelly! My favorite archeologist! I see you could use some help?” Dandy called out as he walked into her exhibit.
“Ah, Dandy! Just the flower I wanted to see right now!” She exclaimed back, “oh yes please. Help would be greatly appreciated.”
Dandy just smiled, running over to help her move the box and clean anything else she needed help with.
It only took a few minutes of work after Dandy joined. It probably would’ve taken her another thirty minutes had he not swooped in to help her.
“Thank you so much again.” Shelly said, thanking him for maybe the tenth time already, “it really means a lot.”
Dandy just shrugged, “what are friends for? No need to thank me.” He said with a smile.
“Ah- wait” Shelly said as she saw him begin to walk out of the room. “I, I wanted to ask you something.” She said, taking the opportunity to confront him. Getting Dandy alone was quite the task, and this may be her only chance today. And she didn’t want to embarrass him like that in front of the other mains.
“Hm?” Dandy said as he turned around. “What is it?”
“I..” She paused, trying to find the words. “I- I’ve noticed some things recently. About you specifically. I wanted to ask you, uhm, if you are okay? I guess?” She finally said. Dandy looked at her, some sort of weird confusion mixed with knowing in his eyes.
“Ah- Shelly i’m fine.” He stammered out, lacking his usual confidence.
“Dandy, please be honest with me. I can tell something is wrong.. I’ve noticed it over the past month, "she admitted awkwardly.
There was a moment of silence between them. Finally, Dandy sighed.
“... Was it that noticeable?” He asked, dropping any act. His voice sounded tired, and possibly sad.
“Oh, no no.” She quickly reassured me. “I’m pretty sure no one else has really noticed, save for maybe Astro. But he’s your best friend, y’know.” She said, wincing at how tired Dandy really looked.
“Ah.. good.” He mumbled.
Shelly gestured for him to sit down at one of the many tables. He relented, and she sat next to him.
“Sorry, I’ve just seen you seem much more.. tired I guess? And you’re much more nervous around us.” She explained her reasoning for being so worried.
“You’re quite perceptive, Shelly. I’m surprised, I was trying to make sure no one really noticed. Guess I couldn't escape your observant eye.” He chucked slightly, still sounding sad. “I’m.. fine truly.”
“Really? You can tell me anything, Dandy. I’m your friend.” Shelly reassured him. She wanted to make sure he knew she wouldn’t judge him, for anything.
“I know, I know. It's just.. Something related to higher ups at the museum. You don’t have to worry about it. It's gonna be alright.” He said. There was something more, but Shelly didn’t want to pry. It did make sense, though. Dandy was much more involved in general decisions the owners made. So maybe it was a new policy that was stressing him out.
“Alright then.” She smiled at him. “Just know, if you ever need to talk I'm here.” She said softly.
“Thank you.” He mumbled out, before checking his watch. “Ah crap! We’re supposed to be at dinner!” He exclaimed. Dandy rushed out, leaving Shelly alone in the room.
Shelly chuckled to herself, he was always so expressive. She finished some small details about the room, before deciding to go join the others in the cafeteria.
That had gone a lot better than she actually expected.
Shelly wrote slowly and methodically in her diary.
She prided herself on having good handwriting. She knew no one else would probably ever find this diary, at least she hoped. But it was nice to be at least decipherable. It was much nicer than her notes that she read a lot more. But it was more for her, her enjoyment. It was hers of all things.
She wrote about the day's events. How she finally confronted Dandy. He had opened up a lot more than she actually expected, not dodging it. Though he was always pretty honest, so it wasn’t that much of a surprise thinking about it more.
All in all, she had a pretty good day. Other than that, nothing much more noteworthy. She wrote about a few funny experiences she had with some of the kids there. She closed it, hiding the diary yet again. She yawned, before collapsing in her bed dramatically. She had already changed and done her nightly routine. So she was pretty much ready to sleep.
She couldn’t help smiling contently as she layed. It only took a few minutes for her to drift off to sleep, the exhaustion of the day disappearing as she closed her eyes.
She had good dreams that night.