Paying up

As the crowds began to disappear, Ruby and Tanya walking up to the softly crying Cheri, Ruby wrapping an arm around the girl in a one armed hug as Tanya gave a sympathetic yet confused look at the girl. What just happened?

"Okay, Cheri. Two things." April began as she slowly stepped forward, eerily calm despite the angered look on her face. "First: What? Second," she got into April's face and screeched, "THE HELL?!"

"April! Stop it!" Tanya snapped, glaring at her friend. "Cheri doesn't need this right now!"

"Right, she needs to focus on paying us our $1200. Just like you three." Jack said with a smirk as she and Rachel stepped forward. "Now pay up, because there's no way that loser broke our boards!"

"But she did! I swear!" April shouted.

"Yeah. Sure." Rachel replied, rolling her eyes. "Just give us the money."

"But we don't have $1200!" Ruby said nervously.

"Well, how much do you have on you?" Jack asked with a smirk, "Y'know, as a down-payment."

"Um..." Tanya began as she reached into her bag, pulling out her wallet as well as April and Ruby's. Looking inside, she chuckled sheepishly as she admitted, "I've got twenty-nine cents."

"Fifty bucks." Ruby said as she peeked into her wallet.

"Guys, you don't have to -" Cheri croaked, only to be interrupted by April's stern glare.

"Nuh-uh, Weirdo! You are officially fired from talking!" April spat, ignoring Ruby and Tanya's glares as she dug into her wallet. "Anyway, I've got one thousand thirty-six dollars."

"So, all together you three," Rachel plucked the money out of each wallet, "had a grand total of $1076.29 to pay us. Jack, you're the mathlete between us..."

"They still owe us $123.71 to pay us off in full." Jack answered with a smirk.

"Great! Where are we gonna get that kind of money?" April said as she placed her wallet back into the beach bag, not noticing a slip of paper fall out of her wallet...

Landing at Jack's feet as the woman picked it up. "Well, what have we here?" Jack asked, getting the attention ofthe other women. "It looks like a receipt for that swimsuit shop up the beach."

"Uh oh..." Ruby whimpered, having a good idea of where this was going... and hating every second of it.

"And guess how much these three spent on their bikinis, Rach?"

"Why the hell did you keep the freaking receipt, April?!" Tanya growled angrily as the four watched Rachel and Jack walk away with their bikinis, leaving them completely butt ass naked.

"Oh no!" April snapped, "You are NOT pinning this on me! None of this would've happened if that blonde freak didn’t go from She-Hulk to Dan Hibiki in front of those gorillas!"

"No..." Tanya said, "None of this would've happened if you kept your mouth shut and not volunteer Cheri for something that humiliated the poor girl!"

"She's the humiliated one?! We're butt ass naked here!"

"So, we still have our keycard to the room and our beach bag with our phones, credit cards, IDs, and wallets. Plus, this is a place where swimsuits are optional."

"Guys! Stop, please!" Ruby shouted, momentarily stepping away of Cheri to get between her friends.

Cheri looked sadly over at her new friends, guilt eating away at her as she realized that she let them down. As she turned away again, she gasped as she saw something that made her sprint towards the shore...

"Listen guys, I know we hit a rough patch here, but Cheri feels guilty enough as it is." Ruby said.

"She should be! She's the reason we're no longer wearing our three hundred dollar suits!" April shouted.

"Only because yooooooooo....." Tanya began, trailing off as she looked over towards the surf. Her eyes went wide. "...oooooOh my gosh!"

April and Ruby turned around and went wide eyed as they saw Cheri wading into the water...

Carrying a baby whale in her arms like it was nothing before letting it go into the surf. "Take care, Little One." She said softly.

"NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO!"

Cheri spun around to see Tanya desperately holding back April, letting out a small whimper as she came out of the water. Ruby came up to her, taking a deep breath as she placed a hand on Cheri's shoulder.

"Cheri, earlier you said that you couldn't use your strength because you were self-conscious and under pressure." Ruby said gently, "What did you mean by that?"

Cheri looked down and shuffled her feet in the sand. "You wouldn't believe me."

"You hit a volleyball so hard it broke the net and a couple of surfboards, and you just carried a whale calf back into the ocean like you were carrying my grandma's Yorkie." Tanya said, managing to finally get April to calm down. "What could you possibly tell us that we won't believe?"