“Say,” Guido said, “last night, before we went to sleep, weren’t Cera and Ducky and Tricia already sleeping nearby, and there was this swimmer who was with them, and you asked heró”
Pangaea slapped his forehead. “Gaaaaah!” he squawked exasperatedly, “I totally forgot! Anna, I think her name wasóI wanted to talk to her and Ducky and Cera when they’d all woken up! Why can I never remember these things?!” He slapped himself again and again, cursing: “Idiot! Idiot! Idiot!”
Guido was a little startled by how distressed Pangaea had suddenly become. His outburst wasn’t all that loud (certainly nowhere near one of Cera and her father were capable of), but it was something of a shock to see him act this upset, especially since he had so far appeared to be a relatively reserved and soft-spoken individual.
“Uh...uh...it’s not that bad,” Guido stammered hesitantly, wanting to calm Pangaea down and not make the situation worse, “I didn’t see them around when we got up. They must have woken up first and left already. Maybe one of them had to go home, and she didn’t want to wake us up. I–I–I’m sure we can find them again.”
Realizing that he had flustered Guido (and feeling bad for it), Pangaea hastily attempted to regain his composure. “Sorry...” he said, taking a deep breath, “Sorry. Got a bit theatrical there. Bad habit of mine. I just...forget things a lot, and tend to get mad at myself when I do. And sometimes, if I’m really frustrated, I blow up like I did just now, because I don’t know how else to get it out of my system. Trouble is, sometimes people think it’s them I’m mad at.” He looked at Guido guiltily. “Again, I’m really, really sorry.”
“Oh, oh, don’t worry about it,” Guido told him, “You just kinda scared me there.” He gave a nervous chuckle.
“Thank you,” Pangaea said, relieved that Guido was so understanding, “I’ll try to be more careful about that.”
“No problem,” Guido replied, “C’mon; if you want to talk to Cera or Ducky or, uh...that other swimmer, let’s go find them right now.”