Fine Apple | ✓

s h o r e

❝The cure for anything is salt water – sweat, tears, or the sea.❞ —Isak Dinesen

dedicated to robinwithouthoodie for making the absolutely STUNNING cover above; thank you so much!! this being the first fan art i've ever received, i'm especially grateful. love you!

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"TINKERBELL."

"Aria."

"Did you seriously just? I can't believe you just did this!"

"Just surfed a wave and landed in your chimney?"

"What? No--I mean, literally five minutes ago, someone knocked on the door and when I opened it I found this HUGE basket just full of mangoes... guavas... and these little egg-shaped oranges that I can't--"

"Kumquats."

"Ohh. Well, they're really freakin' tasty. Seriously, I just love this so much!"

"Dang, who could have done that? That's so weird."

"Smooth one there. Seriously though, how did you get it here so quickly?"

"Sheesh, Riddle, why are you assuming I had anything to do with it?"

"Will you STOP pleading innocence for once?! Who else could it have been?"

"I'm just glad you got it in time. It's almost ridiculous; you know how when you order something, you can either pay shipping and get it in a week, or you can pay a little more and get it in a couple days? So I figured, well, I should be able to pay 299,792,458 times the normal shipping cost and get it at the speed of light or something."

"You didn't."

"Naw, they wouldn't accept that rate. Something about not 'being able to exceed human physics.' Which is kind of absurd, if you ask me; I mean, it's 2017--shouldn't we have already figured out how to do that? Honestly, Star Wars took place in 'a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away' and they had already mastered light speed. Where did we go wrong?"

"We're a disappointment to our ancestors, apparently."

"In some ways, yes. In other ways, we've way exceeded what they expected of us. Take the book 1984 for instance--I mean, whoever wrote that didn't even seem to expect the human race to last this long."

"George Orwell. And he wrote that book primarily as a human satire; it's not like he actually was trying to predict the future or something. Also, I thought you didn't graduate high school; how do you even know about that book?"

"You always jump to conclusions. Yeah, I didn't graduate. Dropped out after junior year to support the fam. But I still took three years of high school... kinda."

"Kinda?"

"I mean, I went to classes when it was convenient. Did homework when it wasn't too hard. Took a course of beachology every day i.e. lay on the sand and procrastinated on everything else I was supposed to work on."

"Wow... it doesn't sound like you were especially motivated."

"How could I have been? My true love the ocean was calling, and I had to be there for it. And at least the seagulls were nice to me when... when no one else was."

"Aww... what do you mean?"

"I mean that the seagulls were incredibly friendly and occasionally let me stroke them."

"No... no, about no one else being nice to you."

"Yeah, the kids in my class were kinda lacking in the love department. A lot of them came from rough homes... so... I won't push them too hard over the edge. Let's just say the ocean often provided a helpful antidote so I didn't have to think too much about the harder parts of my life."

"Aww, that... that really doesn't sound good... Are you sure you don't want to ta--"

"Hey, I don't want to keep you too long from studying. Enjoy the fruit--the guavas are reputable for boosting brain power. At least that's what they always did for me. Take care, okay, Aria?"

"Okay... Tink."

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just thought i'd let all you lovely readers/fans know that this story has now reached #36 in short story! *stifles scream* aaaAAAHHHHH!!! i definitely couldn't have done it without all the incredible support! *passes out pineapple slices* love all you so so much and hopefully we'll have more updates coming soon!

tina