Arthur was bored. It was nearly six o'clock and he was tired of looking after his little cousin Peter, and he wished his parents would hurry up and take them out of the overheated department store before all that remained of him was a few bones and one of his eyebrows. Indestructable, those things. What a terrible way to spend the summer holiday. With a great effort, Arthur managed to rise from the sofa he was sitting on and gestured Peter towards him, who was alternating between biting his brown overalls and hitting a rubber duck over the head with a book. "Why don't we play hide and seek Peter?" Arthur asked, injecting as much excitement into the phrase as he could muster. "You hide first, Arthur," replied his cousin gleefully. Peter started counting, and Arthur dashed off in the direction of the farthest corner of the store, silently applauding himself on how much of a saint he was.

Soon enough, Arthur came upon the 'Blankets and Throws' section of the store. "This is brilliant," Arthur thought, "Nobody ever goes in here!" He began to busy himself with hiding under the throws, pushing them together so no one could see him, even going as far as tightly wrapping himself in a tie-dyed sheet as a final method of defense. Having squirmed in underneath the musty drapes and throws, Arthur began to wait. And wait. But Peter had not turned up. The prickly heat from all of the fabric was not helping Arthur's mood at all, and he could feel himself flushing a bright shade of red. Arthur refused to give up, and stuck to his base doggedly, Seconds turned into minutes, and the minutes blurred together as the suffocating heat pressed down on Arthur. His stubborness appeared to pay off however, because after what seemed like yet another age, he heard Peter's reedy voice calling for him. Arthur smiled grimly to himself. The little sod was going to pay. Arthur decided to abandon all of the previous pretenses of hide-and-seek, and decided that scaring the living daylights out of his cousin would suffice. Arthur coiled himself up like a spring, and prepared to pounce on the git. Peter's voice grew ever louder. Arthur couldn't help but release a dark chuckle. "Arthur?" Peter called out, and Arthur managed to make out from between the cotton folds a pair of legs approaching him. Arthur's hand shot out of it's own accord, latching on to his cousin's jeansed leg as Arthur shrieked, "Got you now, Peter, you little rat!" in sheer elation. He heard a scream, and then his cousin laugh hysterically as the leg jerked away from him. But that didn't matter now; King Arthur was a predator, and he struggled from underneath the blankets and throws, rainbow sheet and all, all the while preparing busily to destroy his prey. He must've looked a sight, with his blond hair developing a life of its own, but the champion didn't care, as he stood up to face his enemy, who was not as short as he ought to have been. Who was actually not Peter at all. Arhur faced the owner of the leg awkwardly, neither saying a word. Arthur stood stock still, burning in sheer embarrassment, while the other stared him down, very much bewildered. Arthur became aware of his cousin still laughing manically, and prayed that the Earth would swallow him. It didn't.

The stranger was the first to break the silence. "You were on my leg," he began. "I thought you were my cousin." Arthur replied shamefacedly. "Isn't that kid your cousin?" Oh God, he was American. "Yes, but I thought he was your leg."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"Well, I'm Alfred. Me and my mom just moved here." The American ran his hand through his sandy blond hair, before extending it to Arthur, who was still recovering from a severe shade if beetroot. Arthur grabbed the foreign object awkwardly, and made a display of shaking it. He seemed friendly, at least. Arthur took a deep breath and shook off the discomfort he was feeling at having raped a stranger's leg. "Charmed, I'm sure. I'm Arthur."

Somehow, Arthur found himself back on the same couch he was on before, only this time with the American by his side. Arthur was just beginning to get into the conversation, when his mother materialised by the sofa, both hands full of shopping. He saw a tie-dyed throw poking out of one of the bags, and nearly died. His mother had clearly seen the leg rape; she wouldn't buy something so hideous in any other circumstance. She was very subtle, his mother. She nudged her husband. "Oh look, darling; Arthur's made a friend!" Arthur didn't have time to rebutt this statement, as Alfred turned around and immediately began introducing himself to Arthur's parents. "Hi, I'm Arthur's friend Alfred. Me and my mom just moved here from America", he said excitedly, once again extending his hand, l as both husband and wife had their hands full of shopping bags, Alfred had to put his down. But only aftet an uncomfortably long time. Arthur's mother glanced at Arthur with a jovial glint in her eye, and Arthur understood that she approved of this one. While Alfred began answering the inquisition that Arthur's parents were subjecting him to and Arthur's thoughts began to descend into boredom once more, a tall, lean woman wearing a loud, fuchsia coloured faux fur jacket stalked over to the group, her bright smile framed in magenta lipstick. She introduced herself as "Pamela, but call me Pam": Alfred's mother. Arthur wrinkled his nose. She had clearly also had the bad taste to be born American, thought Arthur badnaturedly. He realised that his parents would probably have to invite them to dinner. American as he was, this Alfred appeared to be an excellent conversationalist.

Arthur felt a bad mood beginning to set in, and leaned on the arm of the sofa to savour it. His eyebrows began to knit together as he grumpily arrived at the conclusion that he was some sort of magnet for lunatics. They sprang up however when his mind alighted on the guilty party. This was literally all Peter's fault. Bloody Peter. He wouldn't have jumped on a stranger's leg otherwise. A familiar hand tapped his arm, shaking him from his reverie. He became aware that Call-Me-Pam was asking Arthur something. "So how'd you and my son meet?" Alfred chuckled, and replied,"Actually, Artie jumped my leg." His mother turned to Arthur, a question visible in her eyes. Arthur was so flustered he didn't even realised that he had acquired the brand new title of "Artie". He could feel the heat rushing back to his cheeks. "I thought his leg was my cousin," he mumbled lamely. Call-Me-Pam managed to restrain her amusement just long enough to ask if that was how they greeted people in Britain, before bursting into laughter. Along with his parents. Arthur didn't know how much he could take of this, and imagined his parents would end up telling him off later for the legendary scowl he was displaying. Oh well. Arthur didn't care. He put a great effort into restraining himself, because even though ordinarily Arthur would have emitted a trite chuckle to please the foreigners, today Arthur was in a terrible mood; he was tired and he was bored and the godforsaken shop was boiling and he wanted to go home and sleep and he could feel his temperature rising, before pushing it down with a gargantuan effort. He was just congratulating himself rather gratuitously for managing to stay calm, when he felt a hand on his shoulder. Were all Americans this touchy-feely? "Sorry, Artie. My mom makes bad jokes sometimes." Alfred whispered, as the adults seemed to have resumed the conversation.

"Get off me! But thank you." Alfred began talking everything and nothing once more, and yet Arthur had been so surprised that he felt that he owed it to this stranger, this American, to listen. He even let a couple of his own words into the conversation, sprinkling them like fish food when the conversation began to wane, and he discovered after a while that he was genuinely, y'know, interested. Talking about things that didn't matter allowed Arthur to insert his own opinions, how he felt into the conversation. Which was nice. Eventually Alfred asked, "Can I have your number?" Which interestingly sent Arthur's mind into chaos. Because, Arthur thought, it was such a weird thing to ask. Why would he want my number? Does he want to text me? Does that mean he wants to hang out? Does he mean that in a weird way? And if so, what kind of weird is it? Is it the bizarre stalkerish kind of weird, or is it THAT kind of weird? Arthur's mind was still reeling a couple of seconds later, when he managed to say, "Um, what?"

"You know, like your phone number? So I can text you." Oh? "In case you wanna like, hang out." Ah. Now if only there was some way to find out if it was intended weirdly, and what kind of weird it was. Tragically, Arthur's sense of decency prevented him from keeping his company waiting any longer, and in an almost automatic way he replied, "Oh, of course. I'd love to hang out. Where's that blasted thing?" He asked, rubbing his now sweaty hands (which he assumed was from the heat) on his trousers, and began a hunt for his phone through his pockets. He found it in the second pocket he looked. "Alright," he said, squinting. "And if I just go through, uh, no... hang on. Um... here it is." Alfred began to laugh. "Oh my god! You're exactly like my grandpa! He doesn't know how to use a phone either! Oh my god that's the greatest thing!" Arthur, partly out of confusion, and artly out of tiredness, decided to not even question this one. Besides, he didn't even know how to respond to being compared favourably to a 'grandpa'. Was that a compliment? Arthur wasn't quite sure. He found letting it go was easier than he expected. He gave his number to Alfred, and shuffled over to his mother's side, sensing the polite conversation coming to an end. They all bid each other goodbye, and hoped they'd all meet each other again, and left.

Arthur noted with some disappointment that he had forgotten to collect Alfred's number himself, and found himself hoping that Alfred would send him a text. Thinking back, he was probably just being the American of polite. He probably had thousands of numbers on his phone. Oh well. At this stage, Arthur was just glad to finally be going home. Arthur began to doze off, and thought he heard his mother say to his father,"What a delightful woman. We should invite her to have dinner with us, don't you think darling?" But Arthur couldn't be sure. When they got home, at around nine p.m., Arthur mumbled a couple of excuses, and went straight to his bedroom, pondering on the events of the day as he prepared for bed. He was puzzled to hear a buzzing sound coming from his dresser, and saw thst he had received a message. He unlocked his phone and was completely unsurprised to see a short video of a cat in a sombrero dancing while eating a burger. The caption read: 'It was great to meat you today'. Arthur snorted to himself. It was such a bizarre thing to send, and yet, Arthur thought, so thoughtful in its own little way. He played the cat video again. It was brilliant. He decided to send a smiley emoji in return. Arthur went to sleep, feeling more contented than he had in quite a long while.