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“But…I’ve been into for ever, dude!” Cal splutters out in confusion when his best friend in the whole colony answers yes to a question he now wishes he had never asked, “I love her! You know that!”
Sol shrugs nonchalantly like she hasn’t just broken Cal’s entire world. She does that a lot: shattering a wide held truth for Cal and then shrugging it off like she had just pointed out that water was wet. Before today it was one of the reasons he liked Solana. She’s constantly reinventing his idea of things. She’s always surprising him. Now he knows he liked those surprises more when it had to do with solving the famine, and less when it had to do with liking the girl he had set his heart on for years.
“Tammy can make her own decisions.” She tells him.
“Y-yeah! I mean, of course, but…” He stutters, suddenly ashamed. He didn’t mean that Tammy couldn’t like Sol, or that Sol couldn’t like her. He didn’t own Tammy or anything, “I mean, yeah, obviously…”
For the second time in the past thirty seconds Cal wishes he had never thought to ask Sol. Well he wishes a lot of things but that’s the main one. Mostly he’s just reflecting, Solana and Tammy had always been close. It had been the three of them since before they had landed. But Solana had asked Tammy to join the Secret Funtimes Club when they were kids, not Cal. She never forgot Sol’s birthday, nor did she forget Tammy’s. In fact, every season Sol went out of her way to get her one of the yellow flowers she liked or a slice of cake, a treatment Cal hadn't still earned, despite them raising Socks together.
Null, Sol had even saved Uncle Tonin all those years back. An accomplishment Cal could never have hoped to achieve. But still, he and Tammy make more sense; they always have. Ever since they were kids, it was Tammy and Cal. It wasn’t Tammy and Sol. Besides, Solana’s always off on some expedition or other. She couldn’t take care of her like how Cal could. Every Glow it was Cal soothing Tammy in the creche not Sol. And maybe that a was a petty reason for why they shouldn't get together: considering he was as helpless in a fight as a newborn baby. Besides he knew it was due to Solana’s actions that Professor Hal and Governor, well former Governor, Eudicot were alive.
At the end of the day, it was his friends' quick thinking that had netted them so many victories. He still remembers two years ago, dangling his feet off the wall with Anemone, watching as Sol and Kom tag teamed a rampaging Bushbub. His friend was punctured through and leaking like a faucet. Kom screamed at her to head back, but she refused. Grabbing a piece of rebar, twisting into a spear, she ran it through the beast’s gaping maw.
He asked her once why she always threw herself into the fray, “What if it made its way into the creche?” She responded.
“So you don’t trust Kom or Chief Rhett to protect us?”
“No it’s just,” She shook her head, “It’s like farming I guess. Everyone lends a helping hand from time to time. So then even if the crop fails and you don’t succeed you know you and everyone else tried their best.” Cal made a confused noise. She shrugged, “We wouldn’t turn down Kom if he wanted to shovel dirt for a day or two during Pollen. He wouldn’t turn us down if we wanted to help out during Glow.”
Although Sol never hung around creche often, either out on expeditions or with him in the fields she always kept Tammy close at heart. Cal remembers mentioning Tammy to Dys at which point he groaned out, “Not you too…” When the farmer had prompted further, Dys reddened as if he had been caught. He muttered that he wasn’t meant to say, but after much prodding he quietly disclosed that Sol tended to ramble about Tammy a lot when they were on expeditions together.
Moreover whenever she was away, his and Tammy’s conversations always seemed to steer to what the missing girl might’ve been up to. Whether it was his crush worrying about her safety, preparing meals for her arrival back, or occasionally asking him what he thought she'd brought back for her this time. She always blushed when she asked. Besides, Sol always ran to Tammy after Glow season, ready to protect or help her anyway. And Tammy always greeted her with open arms. As much as Cal didn’t want to admit it, they made sense together.
A herd of flow cows lowed in the distance.
“I guess you two’d be good together too…” He sighed, attempting hold back the sniffles, “You’re one of my best friends after all. I just…I guess I just kind of thought…” He took a deep breath, desperately focusing on the dirt. The joyous simple ground, how versatile it was. If he focused on that maybe this won’t sting as much, “I guess I kind of took her for granted. I just assumed ,” And he was so stupid for assuming. What was that one naughty phrase his mom used? “I mean, I’m not even sure she likes -like me too. She’s so shy,” Always quiet, always polite, the only time he really sees her light up, get loud, is when, “But she talks about you all the time.” He spits the words out like they burned him. In a way they have.
Then Solana shrugs again, giving off that effortlessly chill vibe like she always has. When faced with an impossibility, she’s always so stupidly calm. Calm in the face of the famine. Calm in the face of The Faceless, it stands to reason that she would stay calm even when confirming his worst fears, “Tammy and I are endgame, buddy. Sorry.”
“Oh…” Cal breathes out willing the tears back, “O-oh,” Part of Cal wonders what happened to Tammy can make her own decisions. That reasonable part is drowned out by the rest of his mind scream-sobbing, “Well,” Recalcitrance’s a good friend. He’s considerate to others. He’s strong, “Okay…”
If it wasn’t Solana asking this of him, he’d let her words roll off him like water. But it was Solana, Solana who worked alongside him in Geoponics for as long as he could remember. Solana who had helped raise Socks. Solana who had saved his life during the first Glow. It was Solana who Tammy talks about endlessly. It was Solana who protects the crèche better than Cal ever could. It’s Solana who makes Tammy smile with every flower given, every joke made, and every step taken.
Even if he loved Tammy first, he can’t deny the facts, Solana loved her better.
He clenches his fist, “B-but you have to promise you’ll take care of her okay?! You always gotta be nice to her, and I mean like really nice, or I’ll know! A-and you have to protect her, and always tell her that things are gonna be okay, because she gets scared easily!” He continues, if he isn’t going to be the one to date Tammy he’s gonna make sure she is in good hands. He’s not going to tear up, “A-and her favorite kind of soysweet is the yellow kind that tastes like lemons” He’s not going to cry, he won’t do that to his best friend. After all, she probably feels bad enough. Cal would at least, “And she really likes it when you rub behind her ears.” Something he will never do again.
And just like that the tears burst through, Sol goes to rub his shoulders but he doesn’t let her. He won’t let her feel any worse than she must feel right now. He won’t make her feel guilty for liking Tammy. After all, Solana didn’t get all teary when he told her,
“Just…be good to her, okay?”
Solana smiles gentle and sweet, “Of course.”
“You promise?”
Solana crosses her hand over her heart, “I swear.”
Cal gives a wet smile, before running over to shed that no one’s ever in. He’s cried in there more times than he’d like to admit. But that doesn’t matter right now.
There are only two things that matter: Cal is a good friend, no matter how much he wishes otherwise. And Solana would love Tammy better than he ever could.