"Why are you so mad at me?" Dessie demanded at snack time.
Jazz, as well as their other friends, Colby and Flint, looked up in surprise.
"I don't want to talk to you." Jazz said miserably.
"Friends don't let friends act like this!" Dessie insisted. "Friends help friends! Now tell me what's wrong, or-or...!"
"Or what?" Jazz demanded.
"Or... or... I'll hold my breath until you talk to me about what's bothering you!"
"Dessie's going to die..." Flint muttered to Colby.
"That's sad. I liked Dessie." Colby's lower lip began to tremble. "She and I were going to get married."
"What?" Dessie and Jazz asked in unison.
"Why would you want to marry her?" Flint added.
"I'm her prince!" Colby said confidently.
"Well, I'm going to hold my breath now." Dessie said, waving him off.
"Try it." Jazz replied, crossing her arms.
Dessie took a deep breath. Slowly, she began to turn red as Jazz still stared at her impassively, and within a few minutes her eyes rolled back into her head and she collapsed.
"Ms. Myrtle!" The children screamed. "Dessie's dying!"
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"What the lumps happened?!" Fionna demanded, running into the kindergarten, Marshall on her heels.
"It appears your daughter decided to attempt to manipulate Jahzara into talking to her." Ms. Myrtle replied coolly, an iron grip on Jazz's shoulder.
Jazz wiped her eyes. "I didn't mean to kill her."
Marshall looked up at the ceiling in exasperation while Fionna dashed behind the curtain to the cot where Dessie was.
Marshall pulled Jazz away from Ms. Myrtle,and they joined Fionna.
"Friends again?" Dessie asked Jazz.
Jazz shrugged. "You don't get what my problem is!"
"Miss Mertons, Mr. Abadeer, if you will step this way to fill out some forms..." Ms. Myrtle said.
"Are you okay, Dessie?" Fionna asked.
Dessie nodded, and Fionna stepped away with Marshall.
"Then what is the problem?" Dessie asked.
"If-if he marries her, I'm going to be all alone." Jazz muttered, wiping her eyes again. "It's always been just me and Daddy, and she'd take that away."
Dessie considered this. "I would stay with you."
"Why?" Jazz demanded.
"Because we'd be sisters."
"So? What if you all left me alone?" Jazz huffed.
Dessie tried to pat her head from the cot. "We won't. We would be family. It's like Disney says. Ahona means family. Family means--"
"No one gets left behind, or forgotten." Jazz finished. "I know, I know. But I'm not Stitch! I'm Jazz! And if that was really true, then my mommy wouldn't have left us in the first place!"
"My daddy left too." Dessie confided. "Mommy didn't say how, but he did. Something to do with his parents, I think. But that just means that we'll stick even closer together. And anyway, even if bad things happen... I'll stay with you. 'Cause you're my friend."
"Even after all of this?" Jazz asked.
"Yeah."
"Alright, Blues. Let's pack it up. It's time to go." Marshall said, returning with Fionna.
"You too, Dessie."
Desdemona held out her arms to be picked up.
"Can you walk?" Fionna asked her.
Dessie nodded, pouting, and Fionna helped her down.
"So, friends again?" Marshall asked Jazz.
"Yes."
As the four of them reached the outside, other children were beginning to leave. Flint ran up to Dessie and Jazz, chattering excitedly, and with him came a redheaded man.
"Um, hi. I'm Phoebus, Flint's uncle. Well, I adopted him after my sister died, but... yeah." He shook Fionna's hand, smiling a little nervously.
"I'm Fionna, Dessie's mom."
Marshall watched the conversation with an eyebrow raised.
"So... maybe we should get the kids together sometime? For a playdate?" Phoebus said.
Marshall cleared his throat, and Phoebus smiled forcibly. "Jazz can join them too, of course! Or, uh..." He shifted awkwardly from foot to foot, his attention was again focused on Fionna, though he occasionally glanced at Marshall. "You two aren't a thing, right...?"
"No, I'm single." Fionna smiled.
Marshall frowned slightly, and the children watched the event with interest.
"Great!" Phoebus said. "Great, so... want to go get a drink sometime? Or coffee? Or... whatever?"
"I'll definitely think about it. Let's trade numbers, okay?" Fionna smiled.
Phoebus smiled back. "Awesome, mine is..."
Marshall tuned them out, looking at Jazz. She was watching Fionna and Phoebus with a satisfied look on her face, while Dessie was staring at her mother, confused. Flint seemed to consider the entire thing a non-event.
When Fionna and Dessie joined them on the walk back, Marshall sent the kids ahead. "I want to talk to you."
"Jealous?" She smirked at him.
He scoffed. "No. Of course not. But if you play with fire, you're going to get burned."
"And what's wrong with him?" Fionna asked. "Besides the fact that he's not you?"
Marshall briefly considered this. "I... he... he's dangerous, okay? Not like 'oh, he'll break your heart' but in a different way! The only way he'd be more of a problem would be if he was actually made of fire."
Fionna huffed. "He seems nice enough. And you just seem mad because I'm not going out with you anymore."
"We never actually dated!" Marshall snapped. "Just... not him, okay?"
Fionna looked ahead, and he sighed. "Promise?"
"No. You have no say in my love life anymore, Marshall Lee." She pointed out. "I'm not dating him yet, but if I did, it would be because he's a nice guy. I don't need a boyfriend to feel complete, I don't need anyone to help out with Dessie, I just want someone to talk to sometimes and not be a total butt."
"Rude." He huffed. "I'm not a total-- hey."
She poked him in the cheek. "I get that you don't want to be a couple. That's fine. But that didn't mean we couldn't be friends."
"I never said--" But she was already gone, running to catch up with the kids.
He scoffed to himself and kicked a pebble. "Jealous. As if. Of what? What the hell am I jealous of? I've got a great kid, a nice apartment, a kickass job, and what does he have?"