True to her very excited and caps locked word, Deryn showed up at the beach at the appointed time. And she came bearing gifts. Lots of gifts.
She parked her little pink and yellow scooter, and rifled through the basket attached to the back, pulling out a tupperware of blueberry muffins, a shopping bag full of bubbles (she was still sure they'd work on the beach, even if Del said they didn't), and a yet to be inflated beach ball. She'd wanted to do it before hand, but it really just wouldn't have fit anywhere on her scooter.
All that plus her purse (a giant messenger bag fill to the brim with everything minus a sink) made it a wobbling sort of mission to get to the first picnic table she found on the beach, but she managed without even falling over once. Really, it was a victory.
Del was building sandcastles without Deryn. Well, no, she was more building sand lumps without Deryn, but close enough. Maybe if she built enough lumps they would eventually be a castle. Her hair was everywhere and there were a few bits of sand in it from where she thought she might make sand angels. Those didn’t work so well. There were people staring, but Del learned a long, long time ago how to not pay attention to them. She would just keep on doing what she was doing.
Once Deryn had her hands free, Del wasn't hard to spot -- hair that color was hard not to notice. The tiny blonde girl let out a happy burst of noise (not quite a yell, not quite a laugh) and threw her hands up in a mad wave. "Hi hi! I brought things!"
Unsuccessful sand angel or not, Deryn hopped over it, avoiding mess even as she came closer, plopping down in the sand with her muffins and her bubbles.
Del grinned brightly, trying hard to scramble up to help. The other girl was more stuff than she was girl at that moment. “You brought everything!” she said, catching a tin of muffins before they fell over and got all sandy and blech. “Did you bring a little froggie in there too?”
"No," Deryn hadn't known she was meant to. "Sorry." But she forgot she should bother being sorry after another second, when she was tearing the beach ball out of it's packaging. "But if we eat the muffins fest enough, we can totally use the container to help make shapes for sandcastles." Because that was what was going on here, right? That lump? It totally had sandcastle properties, or something.
“Okay!” Del said, taking a muffin and having a hearty bite of it. “These are delicious,” she said around the bite. “How many did you bring?”
"Six." Which wasn't a huge number, but three each seemed fairly generous. Anyway, Sam had eaten all the rest, citing them as healthy enough because they had fruit in them. "But I can always make more later if you like em. I really like baking." Because clearly now that they were sitting here on the beach eating muffins together, they were already fast friends. "Do you live around here?"
“Do you bake a lot of things?” Del asked, heartily eating her muffin. If she ate it fast enough, maybe they could make sand castles faster. “Like pie and quiche and bread and cake and casserole and…”
Did casserole count? Deryn supposed she did like casserole. "I've never made real bread." She frowned at that, wondering why it'd never occurred to her. "But.. pie and cookies and… yep. Lotsa things!" Then she laughed, because it was just sort of a thing that she did often for no real reason other than because she liked to. She finished off her muffin and wiped her hands on jeans.
“Do you ever make up new things to bake? Liiiiiiiiiiike,” Del had to think about it for a long moment. “Like little bitty pies on top of muffins so it’s like pie cake only really delicious.”
Deryn paused, tilting her head up to look at the sky thoughtfully, long blonde hair cascading over her shoulder with the movement. And then she shrugged and laughed before blowing into the beach ball, and then sticking her finger over it in order to speak again. This'd be a while.
"No. But I should try. Sounds delicious. Food in a food. Mm."
“We’re gonna be best friends,” Del declared, watching Deryn blow up the ball with wide eyes, blue hair all over the place. “Like sisters.”
Deryn paused mid blow at that, lighting up brighter than a bulb with extra wattage. She tossed that poor abused and getting nowhere beach ball to the side and tackled Del in a hug that was proper and full of enthusiasm. "I've always wanted a sister!"
Del laughed brightly, hugging Deryn tightly. “Yay! We can be sisters and paint nails and oh we can do each other’s hair! I like being sisters!”
Del had such pretty hair that Deryn was already delighting in the idea of being able to do cute things with it. She was sure she had some amazing neon nail polish for the both of them too (it all matched with the bandaids she so often sported).
"Me too. This is really the best day of ever." Even with a failed beach ball, and the fact that she'd totally just smashed up the not-sandcastle. Whoops.
“It really is!” Del agreed, bouncing. They could build a new, better sandcastle. Del had another sister, that was the best thing.