Life's a Beach | A Beach of a Day

“Wait, seriously? You’ve seriously never been to the beach before?”

Mynte found himself nervously fidgeting with the flower in his hand, not quite having expected the sheer incredulity that Poppy was expressing at this very moment.

“Is… is it really that… strange…?” Mynte couldn’t help but ask softly; a phrase the hermit found himself uttering quite often ever since befriending a pair of greed buns.

As was something of the norm at this point, Poppy had stopped by Mynte’s shack to pick up an order of bouquets from the hermit. Of course, since there was no way of contacting Mynte ahead of time she had to travel all the way to him, give him the order, and chill for a bit while he put everything together. In these moments the energetic greed bun tended to keep herself busy either helping Mynte pick the necessary flowers, play with the various imps, munch on some of the snacks she’d been offered and, well, talk. Catch up.

Summer was in full swing, so it only made sense to talk about summer things; like going to the beach. Colour Poppy all kinds of surprised at the knowledge that her gardener friend had never been to the beach before. She knew he was quite the secluded bun, but…

“You… Do you know how to swim?”

“Of… Y-yes! Yes, I…” A pause. Then quietly; looking away, “I can… T-there are l-lakes, s-so…”

“Lakes aren’t the beach, though!” The shorter bun threw her hands up in the air; startling Mynte both with that action, as well as her voice raising a little as she did so. “What do you do out here all summer long? Melt?” A pause. “You do know what a beach is, right?”

“Of…..” Mynte’s voice trailed off, unable to bring himself to fully complete his sentence. 

Of course he knew what a beach was. He’d heard other buns talk about it, read books, seen pamphlets, etc. He’d just… never felt a particularly strong need to go. Beaches sounded… crowded.

…but he couldn’t deny that maybe, just maybe, there was the slightest bit of curiosity about why going to the beach seemed to be such a big deal for his… f-friend.

Not that he had the courage to voice that thought aloud.

It didn’t seem like that courage would be needed though, as after a couple seconds of debatably awkward silence between the two buns, Poppy suddenly started pointing up at the taller bun. “Okay, my mind’s made up. We’re going to the beach! Tomorrow!”

Unsurprisingly, a look of surprise took over Mynte’s features at the sudden proclamation. “T…tomor–?”

“Mhmm, tomorrow~!” Poppy singsonged playfully, trying to lighten up the suddenly, though understandably, tense air as it seemed like Mynte was about to start down some kind of panic spiral at the thought. Her expression turned mischievous as she continued to speak, “Or… what? Am I not good enough, and you’d rather Sajjita be the one to pop your beach cherry–?”

She didn’t even get to finish the full teasing thought before Mynte turned beet red and exclaimed an incredibly flustered, “N-n-no!!!” Wincing slightly as the sudden loudness of his own voice caught him off guard. “T-that’s… I-I mean…”

Poppy simply laughed in response to Mynte’s flustered stuttering before closing the gap between the two of them to pat the taller bun on the arm. “I’m teasing, I’m teasing~ Take it easy, Mynte.” She smiled what she hoped was a comforting smile up at the sloth bun. “But I’m serious. I really think you should give the beach a try at least once.” And then in a softer, more comforting tone, “It’ll be fun. I promise.”

There was still a look of uncertainty on Mynte’s face, as well as a lingering blush, but with the persistent encouragement of not just Poppy, but some of his imps, too, well… The sloth bun eventually found himself caving to the idea.

Fine. One beach day with a f…friend… couldn’t hurt, right…?

Right…

And all he had to do leading up to tomorrow was survive a spontaneous shopping trip with the spunky little greed bun, because there was no way she was letting him wear that to the beach. Something about being ‘way too cute and pretty’ to wear such a ‘ratty looking piece of swimwear.’ She didn’t care how many times he’d gone swimming with it before now; they were buying something new together. And, while they were at it, something new for her, too. Because she deserved to look super cute tomorrow, too.

The only thing left was to wait for tomorrow.

A tomorrow which came… surprisingly fast, even for the hermit who tended to wake up pretty early to tend to his ever-growing garden. Mynte wasn’t even entirely sure he had slept before a loud honk startled him awake. A groggy peek outside his window told Mynte that they’d be traveling by car… Which made sense, but was the honking really necessary?

The car ride itself was thankfully not so bad. Poppy allowed Mynte to doze off a little longer while she drove, and the fact that she’d allowed a good chunk of his imps to tag along was also an immense relief for the shy bun. At least, it was a good deal comforting, snoozing a little with Thyme in his arms, Beebee on his head, Bloom on Poppy’s head and Cinnamon… being a wee bit of a menace in the back of the car. Curiously inspecting all sorts of things that the greed bun had brought with her.

By the time the duo of buns and small horde of imps reached the beach, it was still pretty damn early. There were barely any succubun there, which had been entirely on purpose. Knowing how nervous Mynte tended to be around crowds? It seemed like a smart move to get there early, find a relatively secluded spot to set up and take in the early morning atmosphere of the beach before the crowd arrives. Then once that came into play, Mynte had somewhere to hide away while Poppy could have her own fun. She didn’t know what the sloth bun would do to kill time in that meantime, but, well… He was a big bun. She was sure he’d figure it out.

Still… the beach first thing in the morning really was quite a sight to behold. It was so… serene. Peaceful. As much as Poppy usually quite enjoyed the active and bustling energy, this was a bit of a reminder to herself that this was nice, too… And maybe she ought to make a couple more early morning visits like this.

As for Mynte? It was only after having been woken up and helping the shorter bun find a place to put all their stuff that he’d managed to take a moment to take everything in himself. The beach… The Forneus Sea… It was all much different from the outskirts. Sand and sea instead of grass, trees and lakes.

Granted, the moment to take everything in ended up getting cut short when Cinnamon decided to let their presence be known and started dashing towards sea.

Cinnamon didn’t know how to swim!

And so Mynte, and eventually Poppy, found themselves running after the rascally pampki, with Poppy managing to be the one to snap up the little menace before they proceeded to try and drown themself. Phew. After handing the rascal off to their rightful owner, the two buns proceeded to take a bit of a walk alongside the water. Beebee buzzing near Mynte’s head, Bloom chilling atop Poppy’s, and Thyme keeping up next to the sloth bun, though curiously peering towards the water every now and then.

As much as Poppy tried to convince Mynte to take a quick swim in the water before more and more buns started to trickle onto the beach, the fact that Cinnamon was such a wild card and couldn’t be trusted made that… difficult for Mynte to do. Maybe another day? Maybe another day… Next best thing then, maybe? Building a sandcastle together!

Since Poppy wanted Mynte to experience all of the things here though, she opted to hold onto the pampki for a bit and let the shy bun try and do his thing. With a bit of coaching here and there from her on how to best shape the sand. Y’know, important stuff, like the sand to water ratio for maximum stability! Shells to decorate it with! And once Mynte was done making his little masterpiece, with some help from his imps?

Poppy was sure to snap a picture of him and said imps together with said masterpiece of a castle. It wasn’t the sturdiest or prettiest looking thing around, probably wouldn’t be winning any sandcastle building contests, but honestly? It was pretty damn perfect as is.

By the time they were done with that little activity though, the beach was starting to get quite a bit crowded. Crowded enough that, once that realization hit the shy bun, they were visibly starting to look a little nervous… Which told Poppy that maybe it was time for them to head to head back to their spot and let Mynte chill there. Something which Mynte was pretty grateful for.

Taking a seat on one of the laid out towels beneath a parasol, Mynte quietly watched Poppy pull the surfboard she had shoved earlier into the sand out and dust quickly dust it off. Of course she didn’t just run off without a word, but after a short back and forth between the two buns about what they’d probably be doing to keep themselves entertained for the next several hours, Poppy proceeded to run off towards the water. Holding her surfboard high up above her head.

It was… a little lonely. Watching Poppy run out and have fun, and his mind couldn’t help but wander, wondering what it’d be like if certain, different greed bun were here also, but at the same time… It was fun. This was fun.

Mynte was honestly pretty glad he got to experience the beach today, and maybe… Maybe next time he’d actually go for a swim.

Next time.