Chapter Text
Crushes? Shrimpo never had a crush on anyone before. Okay, maybe once.. Or twice.. BUTS THAT'S IRRELEVANT. SHRIMPO IS BETTER THAN EVERYONE ELSE AND THAT'S ALL THAT MATTERS HERE. Point is Shrimpo never had a crush on anyone before but when the other toons at Teagan's tea party start talking about past and current crushes.. Shrimpo got a little annoyed at them.
"SHRIMPO HAS NEVER HAD A CRUSH BEFORE! I HATE EVERYONE!"
"Teagan why did you invite him? He's going to cause another mess that I'm going to have to clean up."
Tisha mumbled, clearly slightly annoyed by Shrimpo's outburst while still sipping on her tea.
"Hush Tisha dear, Shrimpo are you certain? I'm sure you've had a crush on someone before dear, and if you have it's nothing to be embarrassed about."
Teagan spoke gently, trying her best to appease both parties without causing a fight between them.
"OF COURSE NOT, I HATE EVERYONE!"
"Alright dear, I know you do, just before you leave make sure you throw your cup out okay?"
"I HATE FOLLOWING DIRECTIONS!"
Shrimpo yelled as he tossed his plastic cup into the trash can, almost knocking it over from the force of his throw. Teagan let out a small sigh as he walked out of the tea room and down the hallway. He saw through the kitchen island Sprout scrambling around the kitchen searching through the fridge while Cosmo was looking in the cabinets, both of them seem to be looking for something.
"Stupid Idiots.."
He mumbled as he continued down the hall back to his room.
When he finally reached his room he looked around making sure everything was still there before he grabbed his boxing gloves. Before the was even able to get one of them on he heard a knock on the door along with a cheery voice that made him groan in annoyance.
"Heya Shrimpo, you in there? I swear on cod I saw you go into your room!"
"NO I'M NOT, LEAVE"
"Whoa there bud! There's no need to get all crabby now, I just wanted to show you something reel-ly interesting! Can I come in?"
"FINE JUST DON'T TOUCH ANYTHING."
"No promises!"
Finn cheerfully chirped as he walked into the room shutting the door behind him and plopping himself down onto Shrimpo's bed without a care in the world.
"WHAT DO YOU WANT?"
Shrimpo asked intrigued annoyed at the interruption now putting on one of the boxing gloves.
"This morning when I was feeding my fishes I noticed one of my clams looked a bit strange when it opened! So I coax it open more and saw it had a weird bump in it. At first I thought it might have somehow gotten an infection but when I took a closer look I realized it was a pearl! So I ran to the library to quickly check a book about clams and I found out that there's a way to safely remove the pearl without killing my clam so I did that and now I have a pearl!"
Finn said enthusiastically, basically bouncing on Shrimpo's bed, tail also wagging excitedly. Shrimpo by now had gotten both his gloves on and has started punching and jabbing at his punching bag, landing each hit with a rough thud. Mostly focused on the task at hand.
"That's intre- BORING! THAT WAS BORING!"
Shrimpo sputtered the calmness in his voice quickly changing. Finn giggled before continuing.
"Anyways friend I got the pearl right here."
Finn said as he fished around in his head with his webbed hand for a quick minute before pulling a small white pearl.
"Here, this pearl is for you! For being a Fin-tasistic friend!"
Finn said ecstatically holding out his webbed hand presenting the pearl to Shrimpo with a wide grin on his face. Shrimpo paused his punches, he looked at Finn's cupped hand and looked at him. He hesitantly reached out and grabbed the pearl and then uncharacteristically proceeded to dig around his room for a container to put the pearl in. His eyes then landed on a small wooden box with metal clasp and grabbed it with his free hand dusting off the box, he watched Finn's expression as he placed the pearl into the box. Something inside him twisted as he watched Finn who was now looking at him with a beaming grin. Embarrassment Annoyance seeped into his voice as he spoke, looking away from Finn.
"WHAT ARE YOU LOOKING AT?"
"You of course! I half expected you to just chuck it onto the floor and call it a night.."
Finn responded a bit nervously, his webbed hands fidgeting around his fins. Shrimpo let out an offended huff.
"AS IF! YOU GAVE ME SOMETHING THAT CLEARLY SEEmed to mean a lot..."
There was a small pause as Shrimpo's trailed off and his face started to heat up, he glanced over to Finn who was now lightly chuckling, looking at Shrimpo with an earnest expression.
"NEVER MIND GET OUT MY ROOM!"
Shrimpo yelled as he lightly threw the nearest pillow at Finn who was now quickly retreating out his room, now trying his best not to laugh too loud to not bother the other toons. He quickly shut the door before the pillow could hit him hearing the soft thud of the pillow hitting the door and began run back to his own room. Glancing at a nearby clock as he ran down the hall, 10:15.
"FINN! I THOUGH I TOLD YOU NO RUNNING IN THE HALLWAY! YOUR GETTING WATER EVERYWHERE AGAIN!"
Finn slowed his pace to see who was yelling at him at this hour. He looked around until his eyes landed on Tisha, his glaze apologetic has he mumbled meekly.
"Sorry Tisha.. I'll try not to again."
"It's fine, just please try not to do it so much? This is the fourth time this week and it's only Tuesday. Cleaning water can be a real hassle you know?"
"Yes Tisha, I'm sorry"
"Where were you coming from anyways that you needed to run and spill water everywhere?"
"Oh I came from Shrimpo's room!"
"Oh. He lets you into his room? I've never been allowed in there before no matter how much I insisted that I was just gonna clean it and leave everything as is."
"Hah yeah, he doesn't like his stuff being moved."
"What were you doing in there anyways?"
Tisha asked, her eyes raised with suspicion as she eyed Finn's expression
"Ah you see, in short I had a gift I wanted to give him."
"And he didn't throw it away or try to break it? Nothing?"
"No actually, he seemed to like it! He had a random box and put in there."
"What was the gift?"
"It was a pearl from my fish tank!"
"Oh, he's always so unusually nice to you and almost no one else. How strange.. "
"Heh, yea.."
Finn mumbled out, his webbed hand scratching at a fin around his head, his tail lightly tapping the floor. Finn felt the water in his head begin to bubble slightly, his expression changed to light panic.
"HA YEA, ANYWAYS GOTTA GO BYE TISHA!"
He yelled over his shoulder and he started to speed walk away from Tisha.
"Wha- Finn are you ok?!"
Tisha called out not noticing the bubbling but noticing abrupt change in his mood and body language.
"NEVER BETTER!"
Finn yelled back as he quickly scurried back to his room not wanting Tisha to see his head bubbling and even remotely connecting the dots. His face was slightly pink and he opened the door to his room, slipped inside, and quickly shut it. As the door closed he leaned against it and slid down and sat on the floor. He brought his webbed face to his blushing face and sighed as his thoughts swirled.
"He didn't say he hated it, at least! But nor did he say he liked it."
He sighed as he looked around his room. He stood up feeling tired after running around all day and sat down on his bed.
"Maybe I should talk to Cosmo, he and Sprout already seem to be pretty close and they just met like what.. 2 weeks ago? Might give me an idea on how to get closer with him.."
Finn laid down on his bed as he covered his face with his hands groaning.
"Why does he have to be so difficulttttt, ughhh."
Finn then turned over to his side, closing his eyes he willed himself to sleep.