———
A concerning amount of swear trickled down Carla's forehead as she finally understood how she was going to tackle this project, the weather definitely was a disadvantage, but she was way too motivated to quit due to just the climate.
She got about halfway through the project planning before she made the grave mistake to check her phone, where she found a text from Monty lighting up the screen.
Coffee uber 🖕🏽
Coffee uber🖕🏽: you busy?
Me: unfortunately, got to finish this stupid project for applegate.
Me: i have soo much to tell you tho omg
Coffee uber 🖕🏽: you want me to come pick you up? :)
Me: i wouldd but i really need to get this done, it's worth 30% of my grade :(
Coffee uber 🖕🏽: i can help you with it? not that you need it, but it'll be more fun to do it with someone
Coffee uber 🖕🏽: i'll come pick u up and we can do it at mine, also penny has been asking me like crazy for you to come see her
Me: sounds good to me i miss penn sm, as long as we ACTUALLY get it done, no distractions mister
Coffee uber 🖕🏽: i distract you?
Me: you know that's not what i meant monty.
Coffee uber 🖕🏽: i know it's what you were thinking
Me: whatever helps you sleep at night, be here in 15 :)
"That sly bastard.." Carla whispered, cursing the ginger out.
When Monty finally arrived, Carla was greeted with the usual gift of her favourite coffee.
"Is this going to become a tradition now?" Carla smiled at the gracious gesture.
"I suppose I can sacrifice three dollars in exchange to see you smile." Monty looked at her and grinned.
"My smile is only worth three dollars?!" Carla exclaimed.
"That's not what I said." Monty giggled.
"Whatever, your name in my phone is 'Coffee uber' so it fits." Carla said smugly.
"That's my name in your phone?" Monty asked, offended.
"Well it used to be 'Ginger dweeb' so I'd say you've been granted a generous upgrade." Carla laughed.
"..And to think I had you named as something nice." The ginger shook his head and started his car.
"Why, what's my name?" The brunette asked, clearly intrigued by the other's vagueness.
"No, you don't get to know now, you've been too cruel." Monty says.
"Oh please, I could've made it way worse, just tell me!" Carla said, impatiently.
"Nope, should've thought about that before." Monty said turning away, trying to hide his smile.
"I'll find it out, you can't hide anything from me Monty." Carla squinted at the ginger beside her.
"Oh, I've hid plenty of things from you Carla, I'm sure this won't be nearly as hard." Monty said smugly.
"What do you mean?" Carla was suddenly more alert, trying to figure out what he meant by that.
Monty decided to ignore Carla's question, he knew she would eventually figure it out, and started driving the car. He enjoyed driving with Carla as they could have a good conversation but also have comfortable silence without it being awkward. Carla also had amazing music taste so he always let her use his aux, although he used the excuse that he was 'logged out of his spotify' which he knew she didn't quite buy but she never complained.
The drive to the Montgomery household was only short, around ten minutes, which made Carla question why she had never made the effort to come visit before. As soon as she stepped in the door, she was greeted by a very happy blonde screaming her name over and over whilst jumping on her, wrapping her arms around the brunette.
"I missed you so much." Penny had the biggest grin in the world on her face.
"I missed you more honey, I promise I'll come visit you more." Carla smiled back, Penny's smile was so infectious it gets everyone in a twenty mile radius to smile with her.
Monty smiled watching Carla get a head start to getting the role of Penny's mum down, and because Carla said 'honey' but he refused to admit that even to himself, he already knew she'd be perfect anyway but seeing it in live action made it even more special.
Carla promises to watch a film with Penny and she watches the blonde eagerly runs upstairs into her room to pick out her favourite whilst the latina makes herself at home in Monty's kitchen, sitting down on a barstool at his kitchen island.
"Looks like you've grasped role of mom already, I'm impressed." Monty smiled and passed Carla a cup of coffee, which had a similar taste to the previous coffee he bought her for the drive down.
"And you've got the role of dad down." Carla thanked him and took a sip of the coffee, pleasantly surprised as to how easily Monty replicated the taste with little effort at all.
"What can I say, I'm great with kids." Monty shrugged and smiled which made Carla giggle.
"But seriously, you do need to come round more, my mum thinks we keep falling out because you never come to mine." Monty rested his head on the palms of his hands, lowering the top half of his body making an arch which Carla had to swiftly ignore before her face showed what she was thinking.
"Your mum is like, my favourite person on the planet." Carla's grin widened at the thought of Monty's mum, who was the loveliest person to ever exist in her eyes.
"And I'm not?" Monty pretended to look hurt and clutch his heart.
"I wouldn't get too ahead of yourself, sweetheart." Carla smirked cynically.
There was a long pause as Monty widened his eyes and flushed a deep shade of pink, before clearing his throat.
"Sweetheart?" He managed to choke up.
"Don't think too hard about it." Carla cursed herself internally for letting that slip.
"Hm, okay sweetheart." Monty decided to use this 'slip up' to his advantage.
"Don't mock me." Carla groaned, hiding her face from him.
"I'm sorry, sweetheart." Monty smirked, amusing himself as he walked up to her.
Penny called after Carla to come into the living room to help her with her hair, which gave Carla a perfect excuse to leave this embarassing situation.
"I hate you." She walked away from Monty and sneered as she said that, before quickly exiting and striking up a conversation with Penny.
Monty laughs quietly to himself and sits by himself in the kitchen for a bit, before interrupting Carla and Penny's 'tea party' to ask them what they want for dinner.
"I don't know." Penny shrugs, pouring her teddy a nice cup of imaginary tea.
"Carla?" Monty asks for her opinion.
"Literally anything, apart from chicken nuggets." Carla coughed, evading eye contact from Monty after their awkward encounter a couple hours ago.
"You hate chicken nuggets?!" Monty exclaims.
"Yeah? They're disgusting, don't tell Nugget though because he will genuinely kill me." She whispers the last part, finally looking up and meeting Monty's eyes.
"Literally everyone likes nuggets, what is wrong with you?" Monty crumples his face up in disgust and confusion.
"Monty! Don't talk to Carla like that, that's mean." Penny frowned at her father figure.
"Sorry Penn." He said quietly, giving her a pity smile.
"You talk so nice about Carla in private, you say how funny she is, and how her hair looks really pretty when she-"
"Okay that's enough! Decide what you want for dinner and let me know." Monty buts in to Penny's sentence to shut her up.
"Can we get sushi?" Penny asks with puppy eyes.
"Sushi is a good shout, to be fair." Carla smirks at Monty, who is now a similar shade of red as before.
"Sure, whatever you want, sweetheart." Monty took Carla's smirk from her as he watched it drop as he said the last word.
"When on earth are you gonna drop that?!" Carla groaned loudly and buried her head in her hands.
"Never, you'd have to kill me." Monty grinned.
"Doesn't sound like a bad idea at the moment." Carla gritted her teeth as she said that, Penny laughed and continued playing with her stuffed animals and telling Carla about her day.
Once the food arrived the three of them sat on the sofa and watched one of Penny's favourite disney films of all time, Tangled. Carla tuned out to Penny's rambling at some point and smiled to herself, reminiscing in this moment that she knew would be a fond memory some time in the future. She felt so at home with these two people she'd formed such close bonds with in such short time she couldn't help but feel so warm and fuzzy inside. They had shown her so much love and comfort she had never know she needed before and she was eternally greatful.
She truthfully didn't want this moment to end.
"Jesus, that didn't take her long." A voice snapped her out of her trance.
"Huh?" Carla said confused.
"Penny's asleep already, it only took her.. twenty minutes, that's a new record." Monty checked his phone for the time.
"She did sound like she had a tiring day though, I can't blame her." Carla shrugged and smiled.
"She did good to be fair, she's been exhausted all week with all these counselling appointments to try help her with the accident and what not." Monty sighed, looking at the sleeping blonde inbetween him and Carla.
"Bless her, I'm glad she's finally getting help with it all." The brunette smiled and also looked towards the blonde.
"Me too, I just hope it works." He sighed once more before turning back to the TV, changing the channel to what looks like to be a horror movie.
"You know if she wakes up and sees you've changed it, she's gonna kill you, right?" Carla giggles quietly at the ginger's braveness.
"Well, let's hope she won't because I don't think I can bare to watch Tangled for one more second." Monty raised his eyebrows and pressed play on the film.
"How dare you talk about Rapunzel like that!" Carla exclaimed, grabbing the pillow behind her and throwing it directly at the boy's face.
"Oi! I only say that because she's put it on repeat for the last week, I could recite it off by heart." He scoffs at the girls braveness and decides not to chuck it back at her.
"Still." She sneers at him before crossing her arms and at some point, drifting off into a deep sleep.