Afternoon Drinks

Penelope was driving, rather slowly this time, to the pub. She was lost in thought, whether or not to tell Fiona about the dream she had about Arthur, and the feelings she had for him already. 'No she will think I'm even more crazy then I already am', or whether to say about meeting him on the hill... 'that's all I will tell her' she thought, 'maybe she saw him talking to me'.

Fiona already knew Penelope had her issues, but she always thought they would somewhat dissipate if she found a man of her own, instead of listening to her talk about her hurricane love life, but she never told her that, due to the fact she still very much missed her family. But she thinks a man might come as a good distraction of sorts to Penelope, 'who knows, the man of her dreams might be at the pub this afternoon' she thought to herself while she got the drinks in, waiting for her to arrive.

Penelope arrived at spot on twelve o'clock in the afternoon, parking her car in the spaces out front, a few males inside turnt their heads to look at Beauty, no not Penelope, the car... 'Men and their cars' she laughed to herself. She picked up her bag from the passager seat and got out, locking the doors. She glanced into the pub window to see every man turnt their heads back to their drinks, apart from a handsome man in the corner, which Penelope failed to notice. She spotted Fiona sat on one of the benches out front, and she breezed over to her.

"Well afternoon drinking now what has become of us?" She laughed as she sat down opposite to Fiona.

"Oh we are going down a deep deep rabbit hole Pen, try to keep up" Fiona laughs.

They both have a little giggle together, then Penelope get's down to the important questions...

"So you and Dan had sex yet?" She saids suddenly.

"Penelope!" Fiona laughs embarassed.

"That's not an answer" She laughs back at her.

"It's none of your business!" Fiona grunts.

Penelope stares at Fiona for a few seconds, and they both burst out laughing again (unknown to them, the handsome man had moved tables to the window closest to where they were sat outside).

"Soooooooooo" Penelope presses Fiona.

"Oh my god fine! I have to tell at least someone. We had sex..."

"Wooooooo" Penelope claps excitedly, "but why did you pause, was it not very good?"

Fiona suddenly cracked.

"It was soooooooo good, we had sex in my bed, we had sex on my sofa, the kitchen side, the table, he broke my fucking vase!"

Penelope roars with laughter, clutching her stomach as amused tears stream down her face, Fiona put her hands over her face to hide the redness from her sudden outburst.

"I can't... I can't.... Oh my god Fi!" Penelope was still laughing, clutching her stomach.

"Stop it" Fiona starts to laugh along with her.

Penelope's laughing fit ended abruptly as she spot another woodpecker, sitting on the bird table.

"That's weird" she stares at the woodpecker.

"What is?" Fiona looks where Penelope's gaze is, and looks at the woodpecker.

"Pen it's a woodpecker, I thought you loved animals?"

"I do it's just... I keep seeing a woodpecker around my house when I rarely have ever seen them before, now there's one here" her voice trails off.

Fiona looks at Penelope, confused.

"Pen, tell me what's going on, what happened yesterday" Fiona saids quietly.

'Oh I knew she was going to ask me about this eventually, I might as well tell her' Penelope thought to herself, 'I'm not telling too much'.

"Well, so... Do you know yesterday when I was at work?"

"Yes Pen I spoke to you at work yesterday" Fiona replied sarcasticially.

"Oh har har har listen, did you... Did you see me speaking to a man?"

"Oh my god have you met someone?!" Fiona shook Penelope's arm excitedly.

"Fi please be serious, did you see me speaking to a man?"

Fiona, knowing that her good friend was confused, answered her quickly and without humour this time.

"I didn't no, when you ran off screaming, I looked up where you ran from and there was no one there, then again, I was lower down the hill than you were, so I may have just missed him".

"Mmmmmh" Penelope looked at her hands and twidled her fingers, briefly remember Arthur healing them for her.

"So why did you scream and run off, did this... whoever... touch you?"

"God no, no no no he didn't touch me like that, and his name is Arthur" Penelope said defensively.

"Looks like someone is on the defence already" Fiona furrowed her eyebrows at her.

"Bugger off" Penelope scoffed, smiling.

"So if not that, why did you run away screaming?"

"Nevermind" She replied to Fiona abruptly.

Not wanting it to end up in bickering, she joked.

"Was he just so beautiful you felt like screaming, it got too much for you?" She laughed at her own statement.

"Fuck off" Penelope laughed and crossed her arms.

"I can't believe you left your equipment behind, more than anything, who the hell dropped that off for you? I asked everyone else and they didn't know anything about it" Fiona wondered.

Penelope's eyes widen at Fiona's statement, but it didn't surprise her. The only one who could have known about her leaving her equipmemnt, and now somehow knew where she lived.

"Arthur" she whispered to herself...