s i x t e e n ;

With three and a half more weeks before their mission in space, the administration of the garden allowed team 12191 to have a beach trip. There was a beach in the Garden, but the crew never got to go because they were always training. Raven and Roseanne had gone to their instructors for permission, and since all their training was finished, they thought there would not be any harm for the students to take a trip out to the ocean. It was a half hour drive and their instructor Violet was to drive them there in a white van from the Garden facility. She was to leave them there and pick them up at six in the afternoon. Since they got up at eight and were on the road by ten, they would have six hours to enjoy the ocean.

Honey seemed a bit paranoid about going to the ocean. The van had three rows of seats, not including the driver's seat, and the front passenger seat next to the driver. Scarlet had claimed the first chair, next to the driver. Indy, Mauve, and Ciel sat in the first row of seats since they were the taller boys in the group and Ivory and Scarlet pointed out with smart little snickers that they'd never fit in the back seat. In the second row were Honey, Seville, and Cedar. Roseanne wasn't surprised when she had climbed into the van first, going right for the last row corner seat. Raven sat next to her, taking the middle seat, and Ivory practically clawed her way to get the last seat in the back row. 

From the second row, Roseanne heard their youngest member saying to Seville with worry. "I've seen rivers and lakes in my province, since we use them to water the crops. But not the ocean. I read in the library that there are these things called tsunamis that have these really big tidal waves." 

Seville placed a hand over hers on her lap to reassure her. "I'm pretty sure there won't be any of those."

At least, Roseanne thought to herself, he was so nice and gentle when it came to Honey. He always protected her from everything, which was so unlike his personality. If it had been anyone else making a comment like that, he'd have instantly made fun of them for being a coward. But perhaps, he really liked Honey enough to change the way that he acted when he was around her. Roseanne wondered if she subconsciously changed the way that she acted whenever she was around Raven. Or if he, by chance, changed any aspects of his personality whenever he was around her. 

The drive held some chatter between the team members and when they got there, Instructor Violet had the boys get all the bags out of the trunk, as well as a grill and a cooler with food for the team. Since Scarlet was from Province of Livestock and Indy was from Province of Ocean, the two were in charge of cooking the food. They had been around those things their whole lives. As they stepped out of the van one by one, Roseanne had been the last one and Ivory grinned mischievously. She slammed the door in her face before she could step out onto the concrete parking lot. Roseanne rolled her eyes, used to this kind of treatment and behavior from her. Whenever Ivory White wasn't messing with Raven, she was being mean and petty to Roseanne. 

With a sigh, Raven looked at the girl who only giggled and skipped away to go poke Indy and Mauve for a bit. He opened the door for Roseanne and offered his hand to help her out. 

The moment they left the van, Indy looked out at the ocean with sparkling dark blue eyes and took a big whiff of the salt water nearby. It was what he knew from back home and it brought back nice memories. It was mostly hazy, since he only lived there for four years of his life. But no matter, he knew that the amount of time he spent there did not matter. What mattered was that it was his home and he missed it. 

Instructor Violet jumped back in the van and waved a goodbye at the group, reminding them that she would be back at six to pick them up. The team nodded and she was out of their view in an instant. The nice part of that beach was that it was a private beach that belonged to the garden. No civilians were allowed, and no one really visited there. There was an old parking lot that was over a thousand years old and a facilities building that was probably equally as old, but had been renovated to new technology of their times. It had toilets and changing rooms for the boys and girls. The boys carried the coolers and grill to a spot that seemed nice enough, beneath a stone gazebo while the girls headed for the bathrooms to change into their swim suits.

They had their uniform swim suits from their physical training. They usually had swimming training in the summer time to keep them cool. Three girls emerged in their one piece uniform swim suits--Scarlet in a red one, Honey in a yellow one, and Roseanne in a pink one. When Ivory emerged, she didn't have her training swim suit on. But rather she had merely stripped down to her undergarments--her bra and her underwear which were the color white like her hair and her irises. One thing that Roseanne couldn't help but notice right off the bat was that right between her chest was a bright red mark.

"What do you have there?" Scarlet asked her, wiggling her eyebrows at their crew mate.

It was only the second, going into their third week, that she was a part of their team and the two already acted like they were sisters. They were very close with each other. So much that Ivory had asked Roseanne to switch rooms with her so that she could dorm with Scarlet, while Roseanne moved in with Honey. Not that it bothered her. Honey was a sweet girl and she was nice to Roseanne. 

"A bug bit me." Ivory said simply. But the three other girls knew it was no bug bite. 

Roseanne had never actually seen one, not had she given or received one. But there was this thing called a love bite or a hickey. It came up during her free time when she was reading up on relationships. She wondered if all those fluttery feelings she had for Raven were normal. In her readings she head reached a point where things got intimate and steamy, talking about things that couples did when they were together. What Ivory seemed to have on her chest was clearly a hickey, and since she wasn't even trying to hide it from anyone, she figured her crew mate had gotten it from Cedar. 

Scarlet elbowed Roseanne gently, whispering to her knowingly. "That doesn't look like a bug bite to me."

But they left it alone and walked out to where the boys had set up. They were currently gone for the moment, likely changing into their swim trunks that they used for physical training in the garden. One by one they emerged--Raven in black trunks, Seville in orange ones, Ciel in cyan ones, Indy in blue ones, Mauve in purple ones, and Cedar in brown ones. They joined the girls underneath the gazebo and Roseanne could see how most of the other boys had their eyes glued to Ivory with her choice of clothes, and she seemed to thrive off the attention she was getting. Cedar noticed it too and hurried to her side, wrapping an arm around her waist and shielding her mostly from view. 

Indy went into his bag and found a speaker to play some music. Everyone sat around for the first hour they were there, setting everything up and putting sunscreen on. Roseanne had forgotten to bring her own, but Raven was nice enough to share his with her. He had even offered to rub some lotion on her back and she accepted shyly. When she offered to help him too, he nodded with the same amount of shyness. Mauve and Scarlet had helped each other and Roseanne had noticed weeks earlier that Mauve was recently always hanging around Scarlet. Maybe it was because everyone either had a friend or a romantic partner and they were the last two. But Roseanne thought it was nice. If they had something, she thought they looked cute together.

She had mentioned it to Raven and he said, crinkling up his nose, that he didn't see it. He thought Scarlet's personality would never allow her to fall in love with someone. But he was also open to the fact that he could be wrong. 

Ivory kept to herself for the first hour of their stay at the beach. And then Roseanne looked to Raven with an excited grin as she looked out at the water. "Lets go in the water!" She said with pleading eyes. Everyone else perked up as they heard her suggest it too.

Everyone wanted to go into the water too, they just didn't want to be the first ones to do it. They all looked at each other, agreeing on going together as a group. The only ones who seemed unsure were Scarlet and Honey. Honey seemed afraid of going into the water, while Scarlet had other things in mind. "I think I'll stay behind and get started on the food. I was thinking Indy could help me cook the fish?" She looked to their crew mate with blue colored hair styled into a quiff. At the mention of his name and the possibility of not going into the ocean, his excited smile dropped an octave.

"Maybe in a little bit." He told her nervously, scratching the back of his head. "Its my first time back in the ocean in sixteen years and I really missed it."

Scarlet rolled her eyes at him, and then placed her hands on her hips as she announced proudly. "Whatever. We don't have to eat fish anyway. We can just eat beef. Either way I'm an expert cook and I brought some seasoning I researched from back in my province."

No one said anything to her and she ended up staying behind alone. Honey had been coaxed into going into the water by Seville and they spent most of their time embracing each other and making out. It was the first real time any of them had seen their two crew mates showing any public displays of affection like that. Cedar and Ivory had been the same. Until Ivory got it in her head that she wanted to mess with Raven once more. She swam over to where Raven and Roseanne were swimming together, minding their own business. She splashed Raven in the face hard and then laughed about it. 

The salty water had gotten in his eyes, nose and mouth, and he gagged. He could feel the salt burning his throat. As he tried to wipe the salt water from his eyes so that he could see, his eyebrows furrowed into a look of annoyance. With his free hand, he reached up and splashed her back. Only Ivory had jumped back behind Roseanne who had taken the impact. Now the girl with pink colored hair was coughing and gagging through the burning in her throat. 

Raven hurried to her side, offering a stream of apologies. "Sorry Rose, I just wanted to get her back so bad I didn't see where I was aiming."

Rosanne gave a shake of her head, reassuring him. "Its fine."

She then playfully splashed him back and they had a little splash fight of their own. They then both agreed to attack Ivory back with salt water. Both of them laughed, finding this moment actually amusing and soon the rest of the crew joined them. They played games in the water like chicken, in which a girl would climb onto one of the boys' shoulder and would try to knock down another boy and girl pair. It had mostly been Raven and Roseanne against either Honey and Seville or Cedar and Ivory. Roseanne had to admit that when she played against the latter two, she tended to get much more competitive.

They were in the water for what felt like minutes, but then Scarlet called them over, announcing that the food was ready. There was only meat, since Scarlet was from Province of Livestock and it was the only thing she knew how to make. Roseanne tried to eat it, but she didn't like meat all that much and she realized she should have brought a different option for herself to have for lunch. Still, when Scarlet asked her proudly what she thought of the meat, Roseanne, told her that it was pretty good despite not having tried it. She didn't want to hurt her feelings. 

After they finished their lunch, they played some card games and finally started picking everything up before Instructor Violet could return. They changed back into their dry clothes and Roseanne noticed that Indy was waiting for her outside the changing rooms.

She smiled awkwardly. "Hi Indy." She greeted him. Immediately sensing that something was off, she asked him. "What's wrong?" 

He closed the distance between them in two strides and leaned down to whisper into her ear. "I did something horrible to Cedar." He confessed to her. 

Roseanne felt her heart drop into her stomach because in the short time that Ivory and Cedar had joined the team, Roseanne had grown to care about the boy from Province of Lumber. He was so nice and funny. He was like a younger brother to her. Since Indy and Cedar were room mates too, Roseanne knew that the two had become good friends. But they were only human and it was normal to make mistakes. This mistake, however, Roseanne was absolutely positive had everything to do with Ivory White.

Roseanne pulled back just enough to look into his blue eyes. There was so much regret within them that she didn't doubt for a second that he felt bad about it.

Without her even saying anything to him, he knew there was a question in her eyes.

"I made out with Ivory last night."

-

wow so i havent updated this in a while. i was a little busy with my first week coming back to work after my vacation. things with the crush are going pretty well. he had another moment where he made me a little bit mad. but we talked it out and he apologized and we're cool again.

and he texted me like five times this week, all on his own. he is clearly past his man period. but not much more to say now. i have to go sleep bc i gotta get up at 3am tomorrow morning to shower in this like 40 degree weather and head to work.

he literally begged me to call off work today (which i did b i'd do anything for him, and bc he calls off whenever i ask him to. and i ask him to A LOT). all so that we could go eat chick fil a breakfast together. goodnight guys.

-clary