Chapter Text
Winter had come along, bringing with it shorter days and a constant downpour that left your bones feeling cold and your shoes soaked through. And with it came Pearl.
It was all Joel talked about, the upcoming exchange student from Australia.
He had let Gem know that this so called Pearl was joining his sector at school and since then he hadn't stopped talking. Apparently he was making it his mission to make sure Pearl felt welcomed and comfortable upon her arrival. Though if gem had to guess, she was pretty certain Lizzie had put him up to it.
Not that she doubted her brother, but she'd certainly never seen him try to suck up to anyone before, except maybe Lizzie once or twice. But that was beside the point.
The point was that Gem's brother would not shut up, and it was becoming a bigger problem than it usually was.
Especially two days later, when Gem came home to find a stranger in her living room.
"What?" The word was out of her mouth before she could stop it. There was someone in her living room. There was a very attractive stranger in her living room.
"Oh. hi" she said awkwardly "you must be Gem ?"
"Uh- yep, that's me, and you are ?"
"Oh. sorry I'm Pearl" This was Pearl ? Pearl Pearl? The one she somehow already knew so much about ? The one she had apparently never bothered to find a picture of ?
"Huh, cool" Gem was blanking "I'm Gem"
Pearl was stunning.
Gem opened her mouth, she didn't know what she was going to say, something stupid probably. The door swung open, Gem and Pearl turned to look as Joel came barging in. The tension building in up inside of Gem dissipated at the sight of a familiar face.
"Gem ! Pearl," he looked between the two of them, "Gem this is Pearl. She's going to stay with us" He made his way across the room towards the kitchen, "Pizza movie night tonight still sound good for everyone? I cannot be bothered to cook right now."
"Uh yeah-" what? Pearl was staying here?Gem's brain was reeling, sure, it could have been the lack of sleep over the last few nights as she struggled to finish up her work for the week, but she had an inkling that wasn't the only reason. She slipped off her coat and dropped her bag off before turning to the living room without uttering a word. She snuggled down into the blanket picking up the TV remote to choose a movie, easier to slip into habit than deal with whatever was happening in her brain.
She could make out Pearl and Joel talking in the other room but chose to ignore them as she sunk deeper into the sofa. She really needed to work on getting a better sleep schedule.
Pearl came in a few minutes later to let her know that the pizzas had been ordered and would be arriving in 20 minutes. She joined Gem on the sofa. The silence felt way too heavy to Gem, but then everything did when she was tired. Joel came in and started chatting with pearl. Gem sat scrolling through movie titles adding her word here and there in the conversation.
Eventually the doorbell rang and Joel jumped up and ran to the door coming back in record speed holding proudly up three pizza boxes.
A movie was finally picked, and disregarded as the three chatted over it as they ate.
It was sometime between finishing her pizza and the end of the film that the inevitable happened; Gem fell asleep.
—
Gem woke up on the sofa, and despite her doing it more than shed ever like to admit, everything ached. The smell of pancakes and bacon seemed like it could fix her mood though so she rolled out of the tangle of blankets and made her way towards the kitchen.
"Hey dickhead" she looked up, not Joel, Gem's brain scrambled to remember who was in her kitchen before realising what she'd just said.
"Shoot - sorry, not used to other people being here" she fumbled over her words, her mouth still waking up.
"You're fine, don't worry about" Pearl looked at her amused. "Ya want somethin' to eat I’m making pancakes."
"I- uh yeah. Thank you" Gem pulled out a chair so she could sit facing the room. She watched Pearl move around her kitchen, stopping every now and then as she looked around for something, clearly still getting used to where everything was.
"How come you're up already?" Gem found herself asking Pearl stopped moving around the kitchen opting to start pouring some of the batter into a pan.
"Jet lag? I guess, and a terrible sleep schedule," she flipped the first few pancakes before adding, "what about you?"
"What d'you mean ?"
"Well, isn't it a bit early for you to get up ? It's still only quarter past six."
"Oh, right. No, I usually wake up early. I enjoy the morning air."
Pearl chuckled as she moved towards Gem a plate of fluffy pancakes in hand. She placed them down on the table besides gem before moving off again to find the cutlery.
“They're in the top left draw," Gem quietly stated.
Pearl followed her instructions and emerged victorious holding a couple knives and forks. She served the next batch of pancakes onto a new plate before coming to sit besides Gem at the table.
"Bon apettit" Pearl passed Gem the cutlery along with some maple syrup and a small bowl of blueberries.
"I'm gonna be so honest, I didn't even know we had blueberries, or like half the things you got out to make these."
Pearl laughed at that, "How could you not know what you have in your kitchen I?"
"I don't know? Joel does must of the cooking and I don't know...”
Pearl's laughing picked up and Gem couldn't help but laugh along.