Chapter Text
“Bismuth, I can't remember; do you drink tea?”
Bismuth looked up from her place on the couch and towards the kitchen, recalling the events from the evening as she took some time to unwind. It almost felt like things were becoming normal. No, it wasn’t the same normal as before, it was different, but she knew that this was how things were supposed to feel.
So much of life before was spent fighting and living in fear, but this wasn’t the way things were anymore. Everything was at peace. There was no more reason for fear. She wasn’t used to feeling this calm or being able to spend so much time with the people that she loved.
Most of Bismuth’s day consisted of teaching classes at Little Homeschool. Afterwards, she came back to the temple to organize some things with Pearl regarding some new courses they were looking to initiate. Pearl made sure that she stayed in charge of keeping everything organized. As she said, nobody would have been able to do it as well as her. However, she trusted Bismuth’s input and wanted to keep her involved as well. After what seemed like hours of organizing with Pearl, they decided to relax before starting their day again tomorrow.
“Uh…. I don’t think I’ve had tea before.” Bismuth replied, raising an eyebrow.
Pearl took 2 cups from the cabinet and placed them on a small wooden tray. “Ah yes, I don’t think I started making tea until a couple hundred years ago.” She poured a small amount of tea in each of them and made her way over to the couch to join Bismuth. “I’m not a fan of drinking it myself, but I love making it. The cup gets nice and warm and it emits this absolutely wonderful smell, it’s very relaxing.” She slowly picked the cup up and brought it to her nose, breathing in the aroma before placing it back down.
“I do enjoy the heat,” Bismuth replied, letting out a small laugh. She brought it to her nose and took a deep breath, mirroring Pearl. “Am I… supposed to drink this?”
Pearl nodded. “That’s what the humans do with it.”
Bismuth eyed the cup and brought it to her mouth, finishing it with one quick sip. “Ooh, that burned real nice.” She put the cup back down next to Pearl’s and leaned back on the couch.
Amethyst opened the front door and walked in with a pizza. Her eyes widened when she noticed the tea sitting on the table. “Yo, got any leftovers?” She didn’t wait for a response before coming over and grabbing the tea bags out of the cups and shoving them into her mouth. “Thank you!” She exclaimed as she ran backwards into her room in the temple.
Bismuth and Pearl both laughed and locked eyes with one another. Bismuth blushed and focused her eyes in the other direction. She cleared her throat.
“Hey Pearl, I’ve been meaning to talk to you.”
A smile played Pearl’s features. “Of course, what is it?”
“I just wanted to say thanks for introducing me to all your human friends the other day. It was really nice getting to know them.”
Pearl smiled. “It’s no problem, they really liked you.” Bismuth thought it looked like Pearl might say something else, but nothing followed.
“Could we maybe do it again sometime?” Bismuth asked.
“Of course. Let me set a reminder on my phone.” Pearl pulled her phone from her gem. “Tomorrow I’ll send out a text and ask everyone when they are available again. Saturdays usually seem to-”
Bismuth interrupted her. “I was actually thinking,” she started, “that we could spend some time alone. Just the two of us.”
Pearl let her phone retreat back into her gem. “Was there something wrong?”
“No… no not at all,” Bismuth stammered in response.
Pearl raised an eyebrow inquisitively. “I know it can be strange socializing with groups of humans at first, but I promise after some practice it’ll feel much easier.”
“That’s not it.” Bismuth replied.
“Then what is it?”
“I just want to spend time alone with you. Come on Pearl! Since I came back there’s always been other people around. Before I was bubbled that first time you and I-“
“You promised we wouldn’t talk about what happened before you were bubbled. That was a long time ago, Bismuth. Things are different now. It’s been thousands of years.”
Bismuth stood up from couch and paced towards the kitchen. “Pearl, you know how I feel. And I know she came in between that a lot. You may have had thousands of years to process everything, but I haven’t been afforded that same luxury. We need to talk about it.”
Pearl angrily stood up with tears in her eyes. “I don’t WANT to talk about it, Bismuth. Please. It’s been hard enough as is.”
“The other night, things felt different. You can’t tell me you didn’t feel it too.”
Pearl walked quickly towards the temple door. “I’m sorry you misinterpreted my feelings, but I don’t want to have this discussion anymore. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Bismuth watched as Pearl entered her room and the door closed behind her. She let out a sigh and placed herself back on the couch, running a hand through her hair. Since being let out of her bubble for the second time, she hadn’t found a good opportunity to speak to Pearl. She hoped that because of the events that unfolded a few evenings before that this would have been the perfect time.
She remembered what it was like over 5000 years ago the last time she tried to have this conversation with Pearl and hoped things would have been different this time around. Bismuth collected her thoughts and stepped outside, onto the beach. She tried to come up with a plan for tomorrow.