Chapter 246: Chapter 246

Even though my body would rather have had I vacuumed the fish into my stomach, I did try to take it slow enough so I could actually enjoy the taste a little. This meant that Sam was incredibly proud of me for trying the very least. It also looked like she herself was having a fantastic time with the food in the pack that we had bought from the store. Just a cozy picnic with the two of us in the shade of a tree in a calm yet very beautiful park.

“I’m going to send a message to my parents that we will get to their place in two hours, is that okay with you?” Sam asked as she took her phone in her hand.

“Do we have enough time to finish our food?”

“Plenty. It’s a pretty easy way to cycle back.”

“Then that sounds fine to me.”

“Fantastic.” Sam smiled and started typing. “I’ll ask them if we can stay for dinner too.”

“Sounds good.” I smiled back. “I love your parent’s cooking.”

“Heh. Please do tell that to them personally, they’ll love to hear that.”

“I will.” I continued to eat some fish while Sam continued a short correspondence with her parents.

It didn’t take long for her to start receiving messages back. “My mom asks if Fabada asturiana is good for you.” Sam looked up at me. “Do you know what that is?”

I shook my head. “I’ve never heard of it, no.”

“It’s a rich bean stew with pork shoulder, pancetta, chorizo, olive oil, sweet paprika, garlic and salt. It is pretty heavy though.”

“That doesn’t sound bad.”

Before Sam replied her phone buzzed again. “Ah, my dad says that there’s also gambas al ajillo if you’d prefer that, and that in any case my mom will also be making some churros for us.”

“Oh no… you are putting me in a difficult situation…”

Sam chuckled. “I’ll tell them we’ll go for the fabada, but knowing them they will probably make both anyway.”

“Isn’t that way too much?”

“It will get eaten and otherwise my mom loves to share with the neighbours.” Sam laughed as she typed our response.

I smiled as I crossed my arms over my legs, pulling them close to my chest. -I really love Sam’s parents. They always make me feel so warm when I think about them. Almost as warm as their daughter makes me feel…- I stared at my girlfriend as she beamed at her phone. -I suppose she got that warmth from somewhere.-

Sam looked up for a moment and caught me staring at which I quickly shifted my gaze to my legs.

“What’s wrong?” Sam didn’t waste a second to ask what was on my mind.

“Oh… nothing, don’t worry about it.”

“That pretty much always means there’s something wrong.” Sam countered. “I’ve seen enough tv-shows and read enough books to know that’s a thing.”

“Well…” I looked up and saw that Sam was looking at me with the most gentle of smiles.”It wasn’t necessarily a worry… I was just thinking about how nice your parents are, that’s all. They make me feel all warm inside.” I admitted.

“Awh.” Sam awed. “Well, a good thing they are pretty much your parents now too, right?”   Dıscover more novels at 𝕟𝕠𝕧𝕖𝕝✶𝓯𝓲𝓻𝓮✶𝓷𝓮𝓽

“That’s true.” I smiled.

“And you can tell them how much you love them when we get there, but be warned though. My mom might actually not let go of you when she starts to hug you after you tell her. That’s just the way she is.”

“That doesn’t sound too bad.”

“Until you need to go to the bathroom.”

I chuckled. “I’m part cat, I’ll manage to squirm myself out of her embrace.”

“Hehe, you can attempt but I doubt you’ll be successful.”

“Then I’ll have to wait and see.” I stuck out my tongue just a little which goaded Sam into kissing me. Worse outcomes have been had.

Sam finished texting her parents after which we relaxedly continued eating our delicious picnic package, taking a couple of pictures along the way so we could help promote this nice initiative. After we were done we dutifully brought everything back to the shop where Bert and his grandmother were very interested in what we thought about the food and the service.

“It was brilliant, we will definitely be telling our friends about this.” Sam handed the picnic basket over to Bert who was beaming at Sam’s comment.

“Thank you so much. We can definitely use the mouth to mouth advertisement, we don’t have a big advertisement budget after all.”

“If you want to, I can draw up a poster for you to hang around, at least that’s a little bit of advertisement.”

“Hmmm…” Bert seemed to consider my spontaneous offer.

“She studies art at university, she’s pretty damn good at drawing.” Sam immediately supported me.

“What would that cost us?”

I shrugged. “I would do it for a discount the next time we come picnicking here, if you are content with the poster’s design. And to have my name displayed on it as the poster’s artist of course.”

“That seems awfully generous.” Bert scratched the back of his head.

“I can add it to my portfolio and I really like the picnic thing, what else can I say?” I nodded calmly.

“We can always give the kid something more if we end up liking it a lot, Berty.” The grandma smiled brightly and gently put her hands on both of my shoulders from behind me.

“Well… if you put it like that.” Bert nodded slowly and pushed his glasses up just a tiny bit. “Then I’ll take you up on that offer. But only if you really want to do it.”

“I’m the one who proposed it.” I smiled and extended my hand.

Bert nodded again and took my hand in his, shaking it slightly. “That’s a deal then. I’ll give you my business card so you can contact me by mail.”

“When do you think it’s going to be ready?” The grandma asked politely.

“Grandma, don’t rush her.”

“I’m not.” She pouted defensively. “I just want to see this kid’s art.”

“I’m sorry, she doesn’t mean to be pushy.” Bert apologized.

I chuckled. “I know, don’t worry.” I then turned towards grandma. “I’ll try to send it over within four days. I already have it pictured in my mind and I was planning on drawing anyway the next couple of evenings.”

“Oh!” She smiled and clapped her hands. “I’m so excited to see what you come up with!”

“Well, I hope you two will love it when I’m done.” I smiled back and then continued with our saying goodbye as we both had elsewhere to be.

When we were out and back at our bikes Sam rubbed my back which almost got me to start purring. “That was nice of you to offer your services like that. Wasn’t expecting that if I have to be honest. Thought you wanted to take at least a little bit of rest before starting to work.”

“But you had my back anyway?”

“Of course. I will always have your back. Through thick and thin, through hell and high water.”

“Sounds a bit dramatic.” I stuck out my tongue.

“I know.” She chuckled as she unlocked her bike with the app on her phone. “But are you sure you can start working already?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ve always used art as a way to put my feelings towards something I can be proud of and just drawing relaxes me as well.”

Sam nodded as she unlocked the bike for me as well. “That makes sense, but still. It requires energy, doesn’t it?”

“So does cycling through the city.” I fired back with a grin.

“Touché.” Sam admitted. “It’s just that it sounded like work, that’s all.”

“Is work that you love doing still work?” I countered.

Sam paused right as she wanted to swing her leg over the bike and had to place it back down again otherwise she would comically fall over. I was only slightly disappointed I didn’t get to see that. “Uh… Let me think about that real quick…” She held her bike and stared at the saddle for a good minute while I saw the cogs in her head turning. “I have decided it is still work, but.”

“But, you have a nice butt…”

I facepalmed and pinched the bridge of my nose while I also tried to not blush too much because of her comment. “Sam…”

When I stopped facepalming I could see her wide grin. “But it might just be so rewarding that you can get energy out of it rather than purely investing.”

“Meaning that you should invest in AmiStocks because the line will only go up.”

“Please don’t tell me my girlfriend is an investor.” She rolled her eyes and started laughing. “Just make sure you don’t burn yourself out. I don’t think your healing powers work to counter that.”

“No, we are not going to try to find out if they do.” Sam intercepted my train of thought.

“And what if one of our friends gets one?” The train departed the station again after brief technical difficulties.

“.... Okay, maybe in that case I will allow it.” The train is on its way to greatness to get a hypothetical trainwreck back on the rails.