The gang is starting middle school, everyone seems to be fine with the changes but Tj and Spinelli struggle to find out where they belong in the new school.
So I'm not much of a writer, though I love cartoons, so I'm just taking a shot at it.
Let me know your thoughts, comments, concerns, ideas, or just help me fix my grammar. (Certain characters will use slang)
Also just a warning I'm the queen of run on sentences, and I often put comma's in places they don't belong. Feel free to correct me when you see a mistake, I can take it.
So this story starts in September, 2000 (Recess starts in 1997 while the gang are in 4th grade so by the time the gang are going into 7th grade it is the year 2000)
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"Well this whomps, anyone got any ideas?" Tj turned to his friends hoping for some useful advice. They sat around the counter at Kelso's sipping milkshakes, Tj called this meeting of the gang to assist him with an urgent issue.
"How bout Old Glory?" Spinelli suggested.
"Who?"
"Gus you know that kid Donny that helped us fly Prickly's pants up the flag pole!"
"Oh yeah I still can't believe that plan worked." Gus laughed at the memory.
"No way he's Randal's cousin! At any given time he can become a snitch!"
"Vince the sharing of genes does not cause people to have identical social behaviors, for example- you and your brother Chad. I believe Donny would do quite well, let us ask Galileo for his two cents."
Gretchen hadn't changed too much since the 4th grade, she still relied on Galileo to assist with her research, though now that she's getting older she is finding more difficult subjects to research. As for her appearance that hasn't changed much other than growing a few inches, as did all of her friends.
The rest of the gang pretty much stayed the same. Same ole personalities, same taste in style, same aspirations for life. Mikey's voice had started to change during the previous summer, now the other guys voice's are following suit, and Gus hit a bit of a growth spurt, making Spinelli the shortest in the gang again much to her chagrin.
"Good morning Gretchen what can I assist you with on this fine summer day?"
"Galileo, As king of the play ground Tj was given the task of appointing the next king, his first choice just announced that he is moving Vancouver and will be unable to perform his duties, would you agree that Donny would be the next best king?"
"Gretchen I would love to help you but I'm afraid I don't know who this Donny fellow is."
"What!? Of course you do! He helped us send Principal Prickley's pants up the flag pole, and in response King Tj formally nicked-named him Old Glory. Of course you know who he is, check your files!"
"I'm sorry Gretchen there is nothing in my system about Donny."
"This doesn't make sense I had pictures and a video of the event" Gretchen fumbled around with Galileo and did a manual search hoping it was just a glitch in the system. "... Oh my! Everything from that prank and afterwords is missing! Hopefully I have everything saved on my personal computer at home, I am going to run home and check, I'll meet up with you all later!"
"Actually I gotta bounce too, almost time for practice, you guys wanna come over tonight and have a fire, maybe make some smores?" Vince stood up and collected his baseball gear, while other members of the gang stood up preparing to disperse.
"I'm not sure I'm going to be able to eat smores later, I have to go to the orthodontist to get my braces tightened, usually I can only do liquids after that, but I'll still go." Shortly after the start of 6th grade, Gus was sentenced to 3 years with braces as if glasses weren't bad enough. Luckily his best friend was king of the playground and passed a law forbidding any one to call a kid four-eyes or brace-face, now he just has to deal with the physical pain of the gear.
"Sounds like a plan! Well, I am going to see if I can find Donny, we only have a week left before school starts and I think he is best fit for the position. Spinelli you wanna come?" Tj placed his hand on Spinelli's shoulder a gesture that usually persuaded her to follow his plans.
"Sorry King Teej, I have to go back to school shopping with my mom." She gagged.
"Ouch good luck." Tj wrapped his arm around her shoulders. "You coming to Vince's tonight?"
"Yeah why not, I'll call Mikey and tell him to meet us there once he gets outta practice, good luck with Donny."
"See you guys later!" Tj waved to the gang and made his way to Donny's house to appoint the next king of the playground to the throne.
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"Hi Tj how are you doing sweetie!" Flo Spinelli warmly welcomed Tj inside her home.
"I'm doing good , how are you doing Mrs. Spinelli?"
"Oh just Wonderful! Ashley and I just got back from shopping, we had a wonderful afternoon!"
"It was mediocre at best!" Spinelli shouted as she made her way downstairs.
"Oh Pookie one day you'll cherish these moments we had together."
"Yeah Pookie lighten up." Tj laughed at his friend's nickname but stopped after he was reprimanded by Madame Fist.
"Tj would you like some cookies? We have Chocolate chip, oatmeal raisin, peanut but..."
"Ma we gotta go, we're going to Vince's place for smores."
Spinelli grabbed Tj by the jacket and headed for the door.
"I'll take a rain check, thank you Mrs. Spinelli! " Tj waved goodbye to Flo and followed Spinelli to Vince's house.
"That women is nuts!"
"Sounds like shopping went well."
"It was terrible, she keeps trying to turn me into some prissy little girl! Look what she did to my nails!" Spinelli flashed Tj her french manicure.
"Ooooh girl! You got your nails did!" He mocked in the girliest voice he could possibly make.
"Dude shut it. She also tried buying me a ton of new shoes, like I'd ever take off my boots." Spinelli slowed her pace and looked down at her boots, Tj wrapped his arm around her shoulders, he knew what the boots meant to her.
"How much time does Vito have left?"
"4 years! I haven't seen him in 3 years, I really miss him."
Tj wrapped his other arm around her and pulled her into a hug.
"Well there's nothing you can do about it, lets just go to Vince's enjoy some smores, friendship, and the last week of summer.
"Yeah okay, say how did it go with Donny?
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Tj and Spinelli were the last to arrive at Vince's house, the whole gang was already there sitting around a fire.
"Hey you guys finally made it." Vince greeted the two.
"So Tj I heard you payed Old Glory a visit, so does third street have a new king?"Mikey asked, being absent from the last meeting due to his choir practice, as summer came to a close the school teams and clubs began practices to prepare for the upcoming school year, Vince became busy with baseball and football, Gretchen with math club and science club, Gus grew an interest in history and joined model U.N club, Mikey as mentioned was in choir and continued to take dance lessons with Mademoiselle Pavlova as does Spinelli. Tj didn't find any clubs that he cared to join and spent the summer hanging out with his friends when they weren't participating in extra curriculars.
"We're still working out some of the details, but yes 3rd street has a new king."
"Shoot we only have 5 chairs, I'll go rummage the garage for another." Vince started towards the garage but was stopped when Tj spoke up.
"Don't worry about it, this one is big enough to share, let's get this party started." Tj sat down on a folding chair in front of the fire and motioned for Spinelli to join him.
"Since you're forcing me to sit next to you are you going to make my smore for me?" Spinelli said as she sat next to Tj, resting her back against the arm rest, her body crossing over Tj and put her legs on the other arm rest.
"I'm on it."
"Speaking of food service, remember when Lawson bet Vince that he couldn't eat the entire helping of the cafeteria mystery meat, and he had to make Vince lunch for the rest of the week." Mikey remembered a elementary bet fondly.
"I could never forget that, I wasn't able to eat any of those lunches, that mystery meat wrecked my stomach for the entire month! I had to give those lunches to Mikey."
"That's what I loved best about that bet, he may not have been Chez Vince, but Lawson knew his way around the kitchen."
"I miss beating him on everything."
"Well we are going to deal with him and his gang starting next week, Gus your marshmallow is on fire." Gretchen pointed out.
"Ahhh!" Gus waved around his stick trying to put out the small torch, finally Gretchen stopped it by blowing it out, she rolled her eyes, typical Gus. "Thanks Gretch. Yeah, I can't believe we're starting middle school next week."
"It is strange, the years are flying by, next thing we know we'll be in college!" Gretchen replaced the burnt marshmallow on Gus's stick and positioned it perfectly to reach it's full potential.
"Kinda whomps to think about it."
"What do you mean Vince?"
"Well we're all so different, who knows where we'll end up in college."
"You're right Vince, I doubt any of you will be applying to Yale or Harvard." Gretchen frowned.
"Not if you don't want me to." Spinelli joked.
"I don't think I'm going to college I'm probably going to enlist to the Army right out of high school."
Mikey opened his mouth and said something, but all the sweets in his mouth prevented him from saying anything audible.
"You said it man... Well you said something." Spinelli turned to Tj who was looking down at the ground, she threw a marshmallow at his face.
"What... hey let's not talk like that, we can go to different schools and still be friends." Tj spoke up.
"We can try."
"I want you guys to promise me that no matter where life takes us we will still be friends."
"Yeah man."
"Sure Teej."
"Promise."
"I swear."
"Yeah why not, now where's that smore you were supposed to make me."