I abruptly stopped laughing. 

I mean, what else could I do? The friend you parted ways with about a few days before in the most awkward way possible comes back suddenly to your workplace at 3 AM after your shift, and he comes right when you were indulging in your most primal sense of villainy, cackling your head off waving a suspicious, bulky, and strange machine around and wearing these things on your face. And the two people crawling around you are obviously the nefarious type, with the telltale tattoos and piercings and whatnot.

What are you supposed to do but stop cackling? No, really, tell me, what else was I supposed to do?!

Rosa didn't notice, the dense girl. She kept on cackling and chortling and waving her gun around, while I died a little in the inside.

"Uh, Rosa--"

"Crawl, you dogs!" Rosa crowed once more, her shoulders shaking in obvious delight and mirth. Not a single inch of her would make you doubt how gleeful she was over this entire situation. "You worms! You amoebas! You deserve nothing but dirt!"

"Wait--"

"Lick the dirt off the ground while you're at it, won't you?!" Wahahahahaha! she laughed. Of course she would choose this very moment to say her most ridiculous line! I shoved her on the side. "Ow!" she yelled, frowning at me. "That hurt!"

"Can you stop?"

"You had enough?" Rosa asked, tilting her head. "Didn't you want to do some more? The crawling was your idea--"

"No it wasn't!" I hissed, my eyes darting to the doorway again. Lindent was slowly backing away now. I turned back to Rosa. "Can you--"

"Yes it was. Filly, you said you wanted to see them crawling. You said--"

"Okay yes it was me but please stop," I pleaded, my face burning. I turned to the door, but all that was left was the restaurant doors, swinging shut. A sigh leaked out of my mouth. "Now we've done it."

"Yes, we have," Rosa said, her frown deepening. "We've done what we were going to do, yeah. Filly, are you okay?"

"Nooo," I moaned, planting my face in my hand. "I am very much not okay." 

Rosa nodded, looking serious. "I can tell. Let's finish it up here then." She turned to the two loan sharks, who were still glaring at each other and swearing under their breaths. "Chop chop, people! We don't have time to waste here! Go on ahead!"

"I'll help," I sighed. I took off my glasses and fell to the floor and began miserably sweeping up Vels with my hands. "Let's get this over with."

And that was how Rosa and I helped the loan sharks take their payment back, our machines strapped to our backs once again and the loan sharks watching us suspiciously and with the slightest bit of confusion in their eyes.

We ushered them out with all their Vels nicely packed up in a brown paper bag I had laying about, swept up the floor for after closing, and saw Rosa off with her half-asleep footman. (She hit him once-- he sort of squealed-- and told him to make sure there wouldn't be any reckless carriage sleep-driving, to which he replied the coachman would be the one driving.) I trudged upstairs, washed up, fell across the bed, and successfully resisted screaming into the pillow.

At least I learned my lesson, I thought, as I mournfully and absentmindedly stared at mom's sleeping figure. Revenge, I knew now, was more bittersweet than sweet.

The next day.

I trudged downstairs with an envelope of leftover Vels in my hand, rubbing my face to keep the tiredness away. After the... fiasco of being discovered by that one friend you're on awkward terms with, I hadn't been able to fall asleep at all. No, I had to keep suppressing my urge to kick the blankets off of me and scream into the sleeping world around us, and without a vent for my frustrations, I'd had too much energy to fall asleep. 

It was horrible. That was horrible. As long as I lived, I would never let myself get into Rosa's (...what were they called?) shenanigans ever again. That part of my life was over, and my friendship (if I ever had one) with Lindent was probably over too.

I heaved a sigh so big that I half-expected the restaurant doors to open by how strong my sigh was. Of course, that didn't happen, and I walked out normally.

I was on my way to the butcher's to buy the meat, where yet another of my hilariously mortifying pasts awaited in the form of the town butcher, Philip¹Filian's first love, but he grew a lame beard. He had turned out into a nice guy, not at all like the charismatic and arrogant epitome of confidence he had once been on the Row that I had originally fallen for. After losing two front teeth, he'd kind of quieted down and settled at his father's butcher shop. Good for him, but Sam and Little John²Filly and Rosa's ex-gang friends never failed to rib me for how infatuated I had once been with him.

Ah well. Meat was meat, and we only had one butcher in Minstia.

Once I neared the front of the butcher shop, Philip poked his head out of the front counter. "Oh! Hello, Filian!" Philip said cheerfully, a broad grin on his face. His two gaps in his teeth made him look more cheerful than he would be otherwise, and I couldn't help but smile back. He shook his rather shaggy brown hair out of his face. "Haven't seen you around for long."

"Yeah, it was a busy few weeks," I replied as a greeting. I waved away all melancholy feelings that I had been feeling that and thumped down the envelope of Vels in front of him. "I'm here for your best kind of beef as much as this can buy."

He raised his eyebrows at me, a familiar twinkle in his eyes, and he took the envelope and started counting. "24 Vels," he counted. "Do you care which kind of beef?"

"Nah, as long as it's not the leftovers." We'd only ever been able to afford the strips of meat that was left over from cutting out all the good parts, but we had Rosa's allowance now. I reached into my pocket and slid over a Belidian, leaning in closer. "We're here for the good stuff today."

His eyes practically popped out of its sockets. "Is that a Belidian?" He regarded me closely. "I've only ever seen it once."

"Yeah, Rosa's noble dad gave it to her. It's the first time I've seen it in real life."

He chuckled and gingerly took the Belidian from me. "Pretty neat. How does some tenderloin sound?"

"Whoo! Tenderloin!"

Philip went to the back and brought out a giant paper bag. "What's all the meat for?" he asked as he handed it to me. "Check if it's what you want."

"We're having a dinner party celebrating Rosa getting allowances from her noble dad now," I answered, taking the bag. I peeked inside-- that was a lot of meat, and the quality was way better than the strips I was so used to having. Holding the meat like this made it very clear this time-- it really was over, wasn't it? I'd be able to have days off now, stop working a shift or two every day, didn't I? Happiness at the sight swelled up in me, and I blinked back tears. "Looks great," I croaked.

I gave it back to him, and he weighed it on his giant scale. "I would think so. This is our best meat."

I swallowed the lump back and flashed him a grin. "Perfect! Perks of being friends with the town butcher, huh?"

We chatted for some time more, exchanging information (and the smallest bit of gossip) about our mutual friends and acquaintances, as he finished packing up my meat and handed it to me. When he was too busy packing up my meat into a bundle for him to talk, I lapsed back into my previous post-mortification mood, mourning my luck, though I hid it whenever he turned back.

"Well, hope you enjoy your dinner," he said, his eyes flitting behind me for a second. His eyebrows rose just a fraction, but before I could look, he continued talking. "I packed enough for everyone in Rosa's family, and you and your mom."

"Thanks! More perks of having history with the town butcher, huh?" I joked, and we laughed together. "No, but really, thanks," I said again, taking the bundle from him.

He handed me most of the Vels back for change. "I'm keeping the Belidian," he explained. "For luck."

"Same," I laughed. I flashed him one last grin. "And tell Iliana I said hi, okay?"

He rolled his eyes. Iliana was his little sister, only seven years old, and we all doted on her like nothing else. "You all need to stop spoiling her. She's going to turn out horrible."

I scoffed and waved my goodbyes, then turned around. What was next? Right, some potatoes and lettuce. I directed myself towards the stall I knew would be selling them and took a step, then promptly ran into someone.

"Oof, sorry--" I blinked up and gasped. It was Lindent! Of course it was! And he was just, well, just standing there. Without a word. Not even blinking. "Guah!" I yelled, stumbling back. "Lindent! How long have you been there?"

Philip was laughing behind me in loud guffaws. "For the past five minutes!"

"What?!" I exclaimed, my eyes widening. "Why?!"

To his credit, Lindent looked a bit embarrassed, but I still didn't know why he'd been standing there and apparently not saying anything for the past five minutes, so I glared at him, clutching my bundle of beautiful beef tenderloins to my chest. "You need to stop doing that! Sneaking up on me like this!"

"Sorry," he said, looking slightly crestfallen.

Once the shock was gone, I cleared my throat, straightened up, and realized what situation we were in. I let the awkwardness wash over me. Right. Hahaha. This was awkward.

Very awkward.

"Um," I managed (that was all I managed), then turned to glare at Philip, who was now bent over from laughing too hard. I reached over and slapped him on his arm. "Stop laughing! It's not funny!"

He didn't, in fact, stop.

I huffed. "You're as bad as Little John."

"Ah, does he still make fun of you about me?" he chuckled.

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah. It's horrible."

"Hey!"

I stuck my tongue out at him and spun around. "I won't have it. I'm not going to stand for this anymore," I announced. "Bye Philip!"

With that, I stomped over to the street. The effect was sort of ruined when I kind of looked at Lindent and we had a little weird moment where I wasn't sure if I should ask if he would be coming or not (because was he here because of me or was he here to buy meat? Or did he just stop to say hi?), and he seemed unsure if he should follow me or not. We might have done that dance a bit longer, but Philip's continued guffaws spurred me on. I huffed and told Lindent, "I'm going to buy lettuce and potatoes," as a sort of half-invitation-half-do-what-you-want, and he nodded and came after me.

I took a deep breath. One embarrassment was over with, but now what was I going to do with this new one?

I was so not looking forward to this.

A/N: Ah, Filian, you may not be looking forward to it, but I definitely am. (Cue Rosa's cackle of glee >:D )