Disclaimer: Once Upon a Time there was a girl named Cloudy. She did not own Dead Poets Society. The End.

Living Like A Dead Poet

Chapter 7: Gifts

Picking a Gift for Someone When You Don't Know What They Want Like a Dead Poet:

They had been there for hours. Or at least it had felt like hours to Todd who had been dragged aisle by aisle through the store looking for the perfect birthday gift for Knox's little sister.

"What about this?" Meeks asked for what must have been the twentieth time not even bothering to look at what he had picked up. Knox tilted his head and appeared to ponder the item (some sort of craft thing with beads and excessive amounts of glitter).

"Nope." He finally decided turning back. "That's not quite right."

Meeks threw his hands up in frustration. "That's it, I give up, come find me when this whole ordeal is over with." And with that he stalked away muttering under his breath angrily. Todd sighed, the only ration one had now stormed off leaving the five of them...wait a minute five! Todd looked around in a panic but his worst suspicious were realized, Neil was no longer present. Which could only mean one of two things, he was in trouble, or he was going to be.

"Have you seen Neil?" Todd asked looking to Pitts who was admiring a pyramid of bright yellow boxes.

"No! But have you seen this!" He gestured at the pyramid, "It's the Magic Wad! It absorbs anything! Well not solids, but any liquid, probably also semi-liquids, like Jello!"

"Well I guess that's great, but I'm pretty sure a 7 year-old girl doesn't need a Magic Wad." Todd said carefully not wanting to hurt Pitts' feelings.

"I guess," Pitts said frowning slightly, "Well hey! I guess that means more for me!" And before Todd could stop him he had reached out and grabbed one from the pyramid which wobbled pathetically and crashed down rather anticlimactically. Pitts clutched his Magic Wad to his chest "Errrrm." He said to which Todd responded by pulling him away from the scene of the crime as quickly as possible.

However thanks to the brief ordeal they had completely lost Knox, Cameron, and Charlie who were presumably still on the quest for a birthday present. Todd sighed wondering how the hell he was going to track down Neil and the others and find a suitable present before they all lost their sanity. That moment though the answer came from above. Or rather from over the PA system.

"Could Todd Anderson please come to Customer Service, that's Todd Anderson to Customer Service."

Todd exchanged a look with Pitts, a look that said 'oh dear god what has Neil done now'. In actuality however Neil had done anything wrong, well other than being 17 and getting lost in a store, but hey it's happened to the best of us. Or at least that's what the security guard told Todd when he came to claim the missing Poet.

"What a wonderful young man! I mean sure, he got lost but it happens to everyone, my uncle once got lost in his own neighbourhood the poor fool!" He told Todd while Neil looked sheepishly at the ground and Pitts had run off to look at another display of as-scene-on-tv products, his formerly beloved Magic Wad abandoned. "Anyways," The security guard finished "You'd better keep close tabs on one another."

At this Neil nodded enthusiastically all former reservation suddenly dropped. "Ay ay sir!" He saluted the security guard and grabbed Todd's hand pulling him in the direction of the toy section (hey that rhymed!) with Pitts following behind with some sort of blender.

"Uh Neil?" Todd asked waving their joined hands at Neil. "You don't actually have to hold my hand."

Neil just grinned at him like a 6 year-old in a candy store in his birthday. "But I don't want to get lost again."

However at that very moment Knox, Cameron, Charlie, and Meeks returned. Knox was holding a rather large stuffed pink sparkly elephant and Meeks and Charlie were having a rather heated discussion about the application of chocolate body paint.

"It's not an appropriate gift for a 7-year-old! It's not an appropriate gift for anyone!" Meeks insisted. "Besides," He added in a much quieter tone of voice, "It's a total rip off anyways, you can always just buy chocolate and melt it."

Charlie pondered this for a moment before nodding "I guess you're right," He placed the bottle on a random shelf. "Oh Hey! Look it's the Wonder Twins! And why are you holding hands?"

Todd wreched his hand out of Neil's grasp, "Are you guys ready to go?" Todd asked quickly wanting to change the subject as quickly as possible.

Knox nodded and said something that was muffled by the sheer size and fluffiness of the elephant. "Cameron found it!"

Now it was time for everyone to turn and look incredulously at Cameron who shrugged, "It was pink, girls like pink things. Right?" Todd who was sick and tired of this store just nodded encouragingly and steered everyone towards the check out. Where Knox bought his elephant, Charlie bought half a dozen bars of chocolate, and Pitts bought a Magic Wad. All in all it was a successful shopping trip.

But not so successful as Neil's plan. Codename: Get-Lost-to-Trick-Todd-to-let-you-Hold-his-Hand.

A.N. Neil really doesn't understand how codenames work.

-C