Bella was happy she'd gone to the friend speed dating. She felt like she met some really interesting people, the guy who had lived in a city under the water was interesting. All of the fun of meeting new people and hearing exciting stories was lost in a memory as she looked down at her device and read Chuck Hansen. Bella didn't believe it at first. She blinked a few times as the reality that he was really gone sunk in. Her breathing got a little shallow as the weight of the reality of what that meant sank down.
Bella knew in his world he died, which meant that he was gone, really truly gone. She took a deep breath in, raged, painful as she squeezed her eyes shut, trying to keep herself together as best she could. She swallowed painfully trying to keep herself together.
"Damnit," she breathed out finally. Elvis came running up to her and jumped awkwardly up. The little corgi she'd adopted because of Chuck. Well, not because of him, but it was sort of how they started, juice and Elvis. She hugged the little guy tears beginning to drift down her eyes. The last thing she wanted was for Morgan to come home with Tony or Peter and find her crying in the living room.
"Come on," she whispered out raggedly. Getting Elvis's doggie life jacket on and grabbing his doggie paddleboard she left the house. Bella had gotten it for him, so it was easy to swim to Mako with Elvis on the paddleboard. He seemed to really love it too. She even had some of her magical friends help her make a little bubble for him to breath in when they had to go underwater, or in this case, also protect him from the drizzle that seemed to match her current mood.
She did everything in her power to avoid anyone she might know. Bella didn't want to be around people right at that moment. When she got to the water, she got Elvis on his paddleboard secure and dove in, pulling the paddleboard behind her.
It didn't take long for them to get to Mako, and when they were both safely in the moon pool Bella felt like she could let go of what she was holding in. She pushed the paddleboard towards the edge and Elvis jumped off, laying down and licking Bella's face as she cried.