TAKE A SIP

she eventually convinces him to open the door. she has to guide him to the bed so he'll sit down because he's an ugly, sobbing mess. he can't get any words out. she sits with him until he stops crying, which is a while. she doesn't know what to say. she's never seen him cry before.

ribbit goes to apologize for overstepping his boundaries about his mom, but he stops her. he's the one who apologizes. profusely. every other sentence is him apologizing. everything else is how he's a horrible person and how much he hurt ribbit. she forgives him

for a while, ribbit is the only person he wants to see. they hang out all the time. ribbit gives the rest updates on how he's doing. pomni keeps trying but he can't bear to think about what he's done to them now that he knows everything was real.

eventually, jax comes out to ribbit. she's scared at first at what ribbit would say, but ribbit just tells her that she's known. ribbit gifts her her bow and they both pick out a new name for her. lola. lola likes it because it reminds her of her favorite character from a movie she watched when she was a kid. ribbit keeps calling her lola bunny. lola is upset at first but finds it endearing after a while

when lola finally leaves her room, ribbit is the one leading her out. she brings them to the main area, where everyone is, and introduces them to their new friend, lola. lola tries to flee but ribbit holds her in place. pomni, of course, is the first to be accepting. the rest of the day is the four girls (excluding gangle) hanging out and getting to know her. the real her

at the end of the day, she pulls pomni aside and apologizes. its awkward and she can't look pomni in the eyes but she does it. she apologizes to ragatha only a few days later with encouragement from ribbit and pomni.

lola avoids apologizing to gangle because she knows exactly just how much she's put gangle through. she knows that gangle has been avoiding her and she sees the glares she gets from zooble. she's hanging out with the group and says something that upsets gangle. gangle runs off, crying. zooble yells at lola, thinking she intentionally did it.

lola swears up and down that she didn't mean it and zooble backs off. ribbit offers for them to go to her room, but lola gets up and follows gangle. she's in a corner, practically curled into a ball, crying. lola just stands there for a moment.

gangle eventually looks up and wipes her tears. she's angry. angry at lola. at pomni. at ragatha. at ribbit. at everyone. lola abstracts and comes back a different person and it's like no one remembers what she put them through. the abuse. the harassment. its not fair. its not fair that she feels like the outcast because everyone wants to befriend her abuser. no one even asked her how she was feeling aside from zooble. no one seems to care about her... again.

lola softly issues an "im sorry" before walking away. she kicks herself as she does, knowing she wanted to say more. knowing her head has been filled with guilt and turmoil from thinking about what she's done. especially what she did to gangle.

with efforts from everyone, gangle and zooble are included more often, though lola keeps her distance. she doesn't initiate interactions unless gangle does. it goes on like this for a year. lola and gangle talk more and more but there's still something in the air between them. gangle is afraid to trust her and lola is afraid of hurting her

they wind up alone at one point, which hasn't happened since her abstraction due to zooble being ultra protective of gangle (per gangle's request). lola notices immediately and gets up to leave but stops. she stays looking away from gangle, both so there's no pressure on gangle and for her own comfort (so she doesn't have to see gangle expression). she apologizes, again, this time reassuring gangle that she doesn't need to be nice to her, that she can hate her. that she'll never talk to gangle again, or whatever else. she knows she doesn't deserve gangle's forgiveness and knows gangle might be is too shy to say anything. she reassures her that whatever boundaries gangle wants, she'll respect. and then she leaves