Eva walked down the busy streets of Magnolia with a bag of plums in her hand. It was a Monday morning and Eva woke up quite early from a strange but delicious dream about giant plums. It had been very sweet until she had fallen down the end of her bed with a painful thud. As she stood up with a wince, her stomach was already growling for her morning batch of plums. Hanase san, her manager, offered to buy some for her when she came down the stairs looking like a lost puppy but she refused, wanting to take a walk down to the market herself.

And that’s how she ended up getting some plums early in the morning. Now walking back with one of them in her mouth, Eva’s stride had a slight happy skip to it. She wore an oversized white t shirt with baby blue jeans shorts and white converse. Her hair was left open to fly behind her back with the gentle winds washing over the city. She had the whole day to herself now since it seemed that her manager had some other work to do.

She decided to do some shopping instead. After all, it had been weeks since she last went on a shopping spree and Eva felt the need to buy some more clothes and cute accessories. She was also quite hungry. Maybe she could just go around Magnolia all day and have some fun. The sun wasn’t even too strong with all the clouds hiding it behind them.

Waking up to the beams of sun shooting into her eyes, Tori stirred in bed and turned around to escape the brightness. Suddenly, her blanket was yanked away from her, exposing her body to the frigid outside air compared to the warmth of the comforter. Her arms went limp and as she stared at the wall in front of her, knowing exactly who was responsible for interrupting her sleep. "Psy-duck!" he shouted in a chipper, awake, and...annoying tone. "Psyduck, it's too early for this. Can we please-" "Duck." She sighed before giving in and forcing herself to sit up and make her way to the dresser. She was lucky to have found a furnished house so close to the guild hall, even though she didn't want to deal with people right now. She was still in a bit of a slump and tried to rack her brain for something that would snap her out of it for a little while. Psyduck apparently caught onto this and grabbed something from the mail that had recently delivered. As she pulled on some jeans, she noticed the paper that the orange water fowl was holding. "What do you have there, bud?" she asked, prompting him to bring her what appeared to be a flyer for a local department store. It said that they were having a "Summer Blowout Sale" and that everything in the store was on sale, from clothes to jewelry and more.

She thought for a moment, all the while Psyduck averting his eyes to avoid looking at Tori while she was topless. Noticing his behavior, she looked around to see what he was avoiding looking at and quickly surmised that it was her nudity that was the problem. "Such a gentleman." she giggled, before grabbing a random bra from the dresser drawer. She then grabbed a shirt with the Fairy Tail crest on the back, but a plain white tee shirt otherwise. She and Psyduck exited the door and closed it behind them, figuring they would at least check out this sale. If nothing else, it would help clear her head for awhile.

Arriving at the department store, she could tell that it was pretty busy inside. The hustle and bustle of consumerism was alive and well. She awed at the store, as she hadn't been on this side of town much and wasn't too familiar with it even with all the exploring she had done. Psyduck stood next to her and marveled just as much as Tori did, almost regretting its suggestion. But the fact was they were here. Now it was just a matter of deciding when to head inside of that madhouse.

Eva made it to the busiest shopping district in Magnolia within a few minutes. It was, obviously, crowded as usual. A lot of people seemed to be out shopping that day. Ranging from all sizes and ages, everyone had their face up one window or the other of each shops. Among the sea of people and loud shuffling of feet, Eva too simply blended in as she walked down the narrow street, eyes wandering towards the shops, making a plan in her head. She didn’t forget to go through the numerous pamphlets that was shoved towards her along the way, either.

“Summer Blowout Sale” Eva stopped as her eyes scanned the words clearly. If she was reading that pamphlet the way she was supposed to, in case she didn’t develop some kind of idiocy on the spot, everything in that particular shop was going to be on sale that day.

“Eeeep!” she couldn’t control herself as she dashed down the street to where she had a rough idea of where the shop would be. She found the white sign board with golden boarders first before she noticed the woman standing in front of it with a strange animal. A duck?

It was weird. She saw so many of these creatures with a lot of people these days that it almost made her want one. Eva wasn’t the type to actually go through the pain of keeping a pet but she had seen something like a candle with Alisa and another one resembling a plush toy tagging along with Alice. She was starting to want one, too, even going as far as to having a discussion with her manager about it. Most likely because he knew her well, he opposed the idea immediately, only agreeing to a ‘let’s see’ when she said she will do well in her modelling projects.

“Are you here for the sale, too?” she asked the woman with the duck. Eva could already see and hear the lively shopping spree inside the store but ignored it like a professional. This wasn’t her first rodeo, after all.

Standing there and mentally deciding what to do, a woman approached her to ask if she was hee for the sale. The blonde looked in her direction and saw another blonde woman with hair much longer than her own. Her hair glistened in the sunlight, showing that she took very good care of it. In her hand was a bag half full of plums, and it looked like the woman quite enjoyed them, but maybe was done with them for now as there was still plenty left from the looks of it. "Yea, I am. Just trying to figure out when the best time to get in there would be. I don't know about you, but I'm not looking to be run over today." she giggled slightly, although she didn't really mean it. If she was telling the truth, she didn't even want to be here. She was only out of bed because Psyduck made her. She sighed silently to herself, barely even wanting to go in. She started to lose herself before she heard a familiar sound.

"Psy-y-y-duck. Duck. Psyduck duck. Duck Psyduck." Psyduck had walked up to the woman and bowed in an overly curious manner before extending his wing to offer a handshake. Tori giggled silently to herself again, thinking it was adorable how polite he was. Unfortunately, that didn't keep her attention long as she once again remembered where she was and what was ahead of her. In reality, she easily just wanted to go home and go to bed.

It looked like this woman was also here with the same mission as Eva. She looked a little unhappy, however, but Eva guessed that it was probably because of the bustling crowd inside the shop. She was truly surprised when the little yellow duck beside the woman came up and held out a wing. It quacked something that Eva didn’t understand but guessed was its way of greeting her. She blinked a couple of times but took the small hand with a leap, blushing a light red at how cute the little duck was. She was definitely going to get something like this one soon, she decided. It was too lonely to go on her adventures all alone. She was going to have to strengthen her demands for a pet to Hanase san.

“Aaaah!” she heard a frustrated scream coming from inside the shop as one of the women pushed herself out the door. Her hair was a big mess, sticking out oddly as if someone had pulled on it. Eva flinched at the spew of curses that escaped the woman’s lips as she tightened her grip on the numerous shopping bags she had in her hands. She appeared to have gone through a tornado inside there and Eva had to wonder for a moment if she was really going to do it. She wasn’t even poor! She could easily buy them even at their normal price.

But, it was to be agreed that there was a certain thrill to shopping in such an environment. It works much better when you have someone else to shop with, too. She looked at the woman next to her. “So, I’m Evangeline. You can call me Eva. Since we are friends now,” Eva moved quickly, grabbing her hands. Of course, Eva didn’t really consider this woman as her friend, but she was sure she needed company that day. “Let’s shop together,” was all the warning Eva gave before pulling the other blonde woman into the mini chaos known as a clearance sale.

As Psyduck was greeting the newcomer, Tori's attention was grabbed by a scream coming from the store. It came from a woman exiting the shop with her hair in a mess and grasping a cluster of bags in her arms for dear life. Retracting her attention back to herself, Tori started to figure out how she was going to get out of going shopping. She really didn't even want to be out right now, but now she had this other girl here and didn't want to hurt her feelings. But she REALLY didn't want to be around people right now.

Before she could say anything, the woman would introduce herself as Evangeline, but went on to say that she was called Eva by her friends, which now included Tori apparently. Really? Tori was her friend? Just like that? She was sure that if Evangeline knew what all Tori had done to her "friends" that she wouldn't be so careless with that label. Before saying anything in response, Tori felt a force grab onto her hands and jerk towards the store. Evangeline pulled Tori into the chaos of the clearance sale, Psyduck woddling along behind the blonde women as fast as his flippers could carry him. Oddly enough, right inside the store wasn't as crowded as the outside had made it out to be. This was due to the fact that the cash registers were on either side of the building with the front doors resting in the middle. Pathways were corded off to direct foot traffic out of the store in an attempt to keep the inside as chaos free as possible.

Tori stood in the open entryway and looked around at the 10 registers on each side, all with lines several people in length. Some people and one or two items while others had hands full of things. In front of the two women were signs pointing to different departments in the store. Tori stood wondering which direction to head to first before looking at her new 'friend' for direction. It was then that Psyduck managed to squeeze through Eva's legs, mistaking them for Tori's. His sight was obviously hindered by the large crowd of people in the area and was simply trying to make his way to the front. He had surely squeezed through the legs of others to make it this far, which admittedly made Tori giggle as she saw him panting after the obstacle course he just went through.

Eva was expecting a bigger crowd when she launched herself and the woman into the store. But strangely enough, it was a lot more mellow than how she thought it would be. Of course, there was still a large crowd, but not as much as she had estimated. The woman next to her seemed surprisingly quiet despite having been dragged into the stores by a girl she had just met several minutes ago. Strange, since if it was Eva, she would have been mad or at least openly irritated.

Eva looked down once she felt her legs being pushed apart, finding a little tired looking yellow duck between them, slightly thanking herself for deciding to wear dark blue jeans shorts that day. She reached for the duck, grabbing it under its arms and lifting it off the ground. Surprisingly enough, it weighed quite a lot for its size but felt as soft and squishy as a plush toy. “What were you doing down there?” she asked, amused and interested in the little thing. Eva wondered why she hadn’t considered keeping a pet before.

She placed the duck down in front of her, resisting the urge to carry it around like a plush toy, and looked around the store. Eva knew just where she wanted to attack first. “Let’s get the shoes,” was all that she said once again as she grabbed the woman’s hand and steered them into the direction that she believed was the way to where they had pretty shoes up in a neat display. It wasn’t that Eva was short on footwear, in fact, she had a mountain of them back home, but it was a sale and she had enough money to splurge and make herself happy.

“Hmm, what should I get today?” she asked the woman while her eyes wandered over the assortment of shoes, types, and styles, all that looked absolutely wonderful. Maybe she should try some on and decide that way.

Tori watched as the other blonde picked up Psyduck and gave him a hug, causing him to blush and Tori to giggle. She was actually surprisingly starting to feel better, all things considered. Eva said that the two women should go look at shoes before she was once again pulled in that direction. The two looked at the huge selection before them and Tori gasped at the sight. She had never seen so many shoes in one place before. Heck, she only ever owned a pair of sneakers and a pair of work boots. She was never really a girly girl growing up. As she grew older, though, she wanted to learn about the prettier things in life.

She walked over to a nearby table and found a pair of gorgeous heels about 3 inches tall. They were baby blue and looked almost glittery under the right angle of light. And after a minute, her demeanor started to shine like the shoes in her hand. Her attitude would be noticeably different moving forward with the day. "What do you think of these?" she asked, her voice now ringing with a happiness that she hadn't felt in quite some time. Psyduck gave his version of a thumbs up, and that's all she needed to try them on. She tried them on and halfway modeled them for Eva and Psyduck, giggling the whole time she did her faux catwalk. She changed back into her street shoes before taking the heels under her arm and proclaiming that she was going to buy them.

Just then, out of the crowd came a man's face. She didn't know him personally, but Tori had seen him around the guild hall a time or two. "Tori, the guild master sent me. She needs you." After delivering his message, she turned to Eva. "I'm so sorry. My guild master has never called for me personally before. It must be important. Please, understand." she turned to leave and took 3 steps before stopping in her tracks. Giving the shoes to Psyduck to hold for a moment, she turned back around to face the other blonde who inadvertently made her day. "Thank you, Eva. You have no idea how much I needed today. And I just realized that I never introduced myself earlier. I'm Tori Lancaster. It's been the greatest pleasure to meet you." she said before giving Eva a strong hug.

She turned around a got lucky enough to find a register that was empty and paid for her new shoes before taking off as quickly as she could towards the guild hall. Maybe things were finally looking up for her after all.

-exit-