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The last thing Susie would expect to be doing today was sneak around, hiding from Noelle’s mom. It wasn’t the sneaking around part that was the problem in this, she did that plenty of times before! All the times she snuck in the supply closet without anybody spotting her to steal some chalk to snack on during Ms. Alphys’ boring class brought her more than enough experience to be able to do this, despite her fear of Carol.
It wasn’t that. It was the fact that she was trying to sneak in Noelle’s house, to hang out with her. It was the fact that Noelle herself invited Susie to her house, so she could help her out with ‘something’. It’s not like this wasn’t a common occurrence or anything. Ever since she became friends with Kris, Noelle started to seemingly always seek for a chance to be alone with her, for reasons that Susie was yet to figure out. At first, she thought it was because she was onto their identities, as the heroes in the prophecy, especially after they had Noelle in their party for the Cyber World. But as she got closer to Noelle, it wasn’t that hard to be able to tell that she was absolutely clueless about all that was going on, and trusting in Susie’s lie that it was all ‘a dream’.
And so, here she was, climbing the huge mansion’s brick walls to be able to get in Noelle’s room. Her scraped knee that she got from falling the first time she fell (while Noelle was yelling at her to just get in from the front door,) was still aching, making it harder to climb as Noelle looked down at her from her window with a concerned face. Once she reached far enough, Noelle reached out to grab her arm, and pulled her into the room. The pink couch she landed on was soft, almost fuzzy, as if she was sitting on clouds. She never knew rich people had this privilege.
“Fahaha.. I swear, you can be such an idiot sometimes..” Noelle gave her an awkward smile, face painted in a red tint as she picked up the box from her desk and brought it over to the couch, and placed it in front of Susie.
“H-hey, who are you calling an idiot?! You were the one that told me to be careful about your mom..” Susie said, snapping her head to the side.
“I.. I told you to be careful about her when she came back from work.. B-But it’s okay! At least you got here.. well, safe..” Noelle opened the box, taking out all sorts of Christmas decorations that were stored inside, along with an undecorated, bland wreath. “Er, um, I called you here because I was hoping.. you could help me decorate it..? If that’s okay with you! If it’s not, we can—”
“Hell yeah!” Susie grabbed the wreath, holding it up to sunlight. “I’ve always wanted to, uh, decorate.. something. Like this. I guess.” Her tone was, well, bland. The idea didn’t excite her as much, and she would’ve probably just turned it down, if it was someone else asking for help.
“Um, okay! So, what we’re gonna do is, we’re gonna wrap it with these LED Christmas lights first.” Noelle picked up the tangled rows of the lights, showing it to Susie, before pulling from the end to untangle it and starting to wrap it around the wreath. “Here, you can make the bows!” She handed Susie the red ribbon strips, looking down as to avoid eye contact.
“The bows..?” Susie took it from Noelle, not paying much attention to how the girl in front of her flinched at the contact. “You.. want me, to make the bows?”
“Er, if you.. do you not know how to tie a bow..?” The deer stared at Susie dumbfounded, left hand still on the other’s.
“No. I don’t. Heh, what type of person do you think I am?” Susie half grinned, almost as to cover up the embarrassment.
“Fahahaha, sorry.. That’s okay! How about you stick these stickers on it, then?” Noelle placed the Christmas sticker pack in front of Susie.
“Now that’s something I could do.” Susie opened the wrapper, way harsher than how Noelle would’ve. Inside the wrapper was all sorts of Christmas stickers, from gingerbread cookies, to Christmas socks. Taking the sticky parts off, Susie started to place the stickers on wherever looked pleasing, as Noelle tied the giant ribbon that would go on top. “So.. why exactly did you call me to help you with this?”
Noelle looked up at her. And looked, and looked, and looked. “Uh.. Um,” she was noticeably fiddling, as she locked eyes with Susie. “To.. hang out.. with you?”
“Oh.”
“Is that— Is that a problem? I see you as.. my.. um, friend..?” Hearing that sentence, it sounded like there was another word that was hidden before ‘friend’.
“No! Why would it be, idiot? I’m just honored you chose to hang out with me, out of all people.” She lightly punched Noelle’s shoulder before speaking again. “Couldn’t you just call Kris to do it? I’m sure they would’ve helped much more than me. Heh.”
“Well, I did once before.. when we were children.” Noelle giggled, with a rather awkward look on her face about the topic. “It ended up.. somehow catching on fire, from the LED lights. Gosh, my mom was so mad at us after that. When she yelled at us, I started crying, and Kris had to take the entire blame so I would stop.” Realising what she said, her face turned red with embarrassment. “It doesn’t matter, though! I just know I’m never calling them for this ever again. Besides, your help was enough!” Noelle finished off the bow, pulling back to stare at her creation before placing it on top of the wreath.
“Jesus. I don’t know what I expected to hear.” Susie snorted, looking down on the wreath. “What will we do with this now, anyway? Doesn’t your room door already have one?”
“It does! But I wanted to make one for the front door as well, it’s Christmas soon, after all!” Noelle smiled, standing up, and picking the wreath up. She looked happy. “Come on! We still have to hang it before mom comes. It should be any time now..” The deer girl rushed downstairs, careful as to not accidentally ruin the wreath, as Susie followed along.
Noelle stood in front of the door, reaching to place the wreath. With Susie close to her. With Susie really close to her, more than she could endure before she lost all focus on whatever else she was supposed to be working on. Noelle was sure that if she took a step back, Susie would practically be hugging her. It took her all the mental strength she had to focus on hanging the wreath. “Er… it’s.. that’s it! Doesn’t it look nice, Susie..?” She stepped back, careful as to not step on Susie’s shoes.
“I guess it does. Not that I’ve helped other than placing the stickers, but..”
“No— what, it’s okay! At least.. At least we had fun.” Noelle stood next to Susie and stared at the wreath before turning to face her. “Gosh.. my mom.. should be coming any time now.”
“Oh. Yeah. Time really did fly. I should, uh, leave now, right. Before she comes, and all that.”
“Um! Well, yes.. Fahahah, I don’t think she’d react well to you being here..” Noelle looked down with a smile, fiddling.
“Dude, yeah.. I’ll.. see you, I guess.” Susie stormed off, waving at Noelle before closing the gates and walking off to her house.
Before getting inside, Noelle snapped a picture of the wreath they made together. She was never forgetting this.