Chapter 9

Needless to say, Gil was pretty excited about the following day. He was up early, which was rare. Considering there isn't much to do at seven am on a Saturday, he decided to make Ludwig breakfast.

Gil decided he probably shouldn't do that ever again.

The only successful part of breakfast as the orange juice because even Gil couldn't mess up pouring it from the carton to the glass. But the eggs were as black as the pan, the bacon had turned from meat to something like tar strips, and the pancakes were probably good enough to play hockey with.

Ludwig awoke to the smell of things burning and came into the kitchen quickly. His hair was a mess and he looked like he had been expecting a blazing inferno.

"…You tried cooking again." Is what he said after a while

"Yeah…I had thought it was a good idea."

Ludwig crossed his arms.

"It wasn't a good idea."

"No shit, Sherlock." He growled. Ludwig actually liked the house, he wasn't looking for it to be burned down.

"You know, I think I'll get some donuts."

Thirty minutes later Gil was back with donuts and Ludwig had cleaned up the kitchen.

They ate and Ludwig smirked slightly. "So, tell me Gil. What are you going to do on your date with Liz?"

Gil shrugged "I guess I'll ask about how she and Roderich are and take it from there."

"If they break up what are you going to do?"

Gil considered it. Liz had dated Roderich longer than anyone else he could think of. It had to have been at least…what, three or four months? Gil didn't know, he had spent a lot of that time not speaking to Liz or sulking.

"I'll do my job as a friend I guess. I'm not an asshole, if she's hurting I'm not going to jump on her to date me."

Ludwig nodded and stood up. "Well, I'll be with Felica. And uh…before you go, maybe you should wipe off your face. You look like you've done cocaine."

Gil frowned and wiped his face. Oh, powdered donuts.

He cleaned up the house a bit and watched TV until it was a reasonable time to go get Liz for lunch. He texted her at about twelve that he was driving over.

Ten minutes later he was sitting in her driveway. It took her a minute or two to come out and she slipped into his car.

"Hey."

She nodded. "Hey."

He began to drive off "So how was your morning?"

She shrugged "I'm still fighting with Roderich."

"Is it worse than any fight we've had?"

She was quiet for a solid minute before sighing "No, probably not. We have had some bad fights."

"Well it's not like it was my fault." He teased.

That brought a bit of a smile to her face. "Right Gil. We never fight because of something you did or said."

"No never."

She rolled her eyes and he got serious again. "So if your friendship survived a worse fight what's the matter? Can't make this one work out?"

"When we fight you scream and swear, hit a wall or something and in a few days at most, get over it. When I fight with him, he…handles it like girls do. I swear Gil, every bump in the road complies with him. This fight brings up something that happened back two months ago. He holds onto every little grudge and that makes it hard to get past."

"Have you told him that?"

"Why, so he can hold that against me too?" she asked

His fingers drummed on the steering wheel. "I thought he was this proper gentleman, 'the lady's always right' kind of guy?"

She sighed glumly "Yeah, me too."

When Gil pulled into the parking lot of the diner he looked over at her as he killed the engine. "You know we don't have to do this now."

She shook her head "Well, I want to. And…I like talking to you about it."

Just Gil's luck. But he smiled at her "Well let's go in before we lose the tables to the crowd. Then I'll try my best."

She nodded and they walked in together, getting a table. People stared and smiled, probably thinking they were a cute couple.

Gil sat across from Liz and looked into her eyes. She was hurting, he could see it. "Have you talked to him since last night?"

"I did, we just screamed at each other mostly."

"Do you want it to work out Liz?'

The question seemed to take her by surprise "Of course I want my committed relationship to work out!"

"I don't think so. Liz I think something is holding you back. Either some gut feeling that you know this won't work out, or something else. Think about it, he's pissed you off how many times? But yet you're still with him. I can't imagine why, because these are the things that get guys dumped. You're really serious about him, I can see. But now what. You're going to let a few fights end it? Damn, I'm glad I fought so hard for our friendship. Wouldn't you fight harder if it was me?"

She looked down "I would fight harder if it was you."

What the actual fuck did that mean?

"So tell me, why are you waving the white flag? You aren't a quitter. Liz I've never seen you fail to get something you want. I doubt I ever will. You wanted this dream guy, who did all these great things and you found him. That's a lot more than any girl can say. Don't lose him if you still like him. Liz….you have this beautiful fire in you…don't let it die. Don't let anyone put it out. If you want Wonder Bread then you better go get his sorry ass."

Wow, Gil didn't believe himself. He literally just tried coaching Liz into getting Roderich. Did he lose his mind? If he was a smart boy then he should have ripped Roderich apart, show cased his bad parts, and told her that he was no good.

But he wasn't a smart guy. He was a good guy. And Liz was his friend, and he'd never use her pain to his advantage.

Pain seemed to be twisting Liz apart from the inside and Gil had to guess it was because she didn't know how to handle Roderich. He reached over and touched her hand in a friendly way. "Hey, if my advice sucks you can always crash Ludwig's and Felica's date and ask her."

She shook her head. "No Gil, its ok. You are a great help…" she smiled at him. "It's just something else is bothering me too."

"What is it?" he asked her gently

She shook her head "Nothing big. So tell me Gil. You've heard all about my love life for the past few months. What about yours?"

Oh boy, what a question. He could hardly say 'Oh well its non-existent because I love my best friend and she's dating a prick.'

"It's…had better times." he said with a laugh "I think rumor spread that I'm a bit of a player…girls don't want much to do with me."

"They just don't know you." she said

They were interrupted by the waiter taking their order and Gil took that as an out to not reply to her.

"So anyway we didn't finish. What are you going to do about Roderich?"

"I think…I'll do what you said. I did want this perfect boy and he's everything I had wanted. I'll give it a week and see how I feel."

He grinned and winked at her "See, there you go. That's the Lizzy I know."

She kicked him under the table "Stop with that."

His smirk gave her the feeling that he wasn't going to do that.

Their lunch changed course and instead of talking about love lives they just started talking like friends did. Gil had to note that Liz too seemed eager to talk about other things, and usually she loved gushing about Roderich. He was getting the feeling that they were really over. Nothing else made sense to him. That had to be why she was dodgy.

It wasn't like she was hiding affection for her best friend.

They got their lunch and ate in peace, joking about school and friends and bad movies they'd seen. It felt good to Gil. He really felt like this was old times, back when everything was normal. But the feeling didn't last, because every laugh of hers gave him a jolt, every touch of the hand sent fire through him, and every smile felt like a stab. He knew he didn't like her. He knew he loved her.

He really loved her, so much that it hurt.

When they both finished eating Gil ended up offering to pay. "I didn't really need a pity lunch, and I am the one who offered so I got it."

With some arguing and pouting Gil managed to pay, but in turn she would help him pass Chemistry with a B. Which would be a lot more time consuming than paying a $30 bill.

They left and got in his car and Gil looked over at her. "So should I drive you home?"

She sighed and nodded "Yeah you can. I need to think about how I'm going to talk about the party to the other girls without showing I want to strangle Roderich." she paused "And I need to figure out how to make up for last night…"

Gil smiled at her "Liz. I know you can do anything. But if it all gets much, holding everything together, trying to fix fights…I'm always up. You can scream at me. Never judge, ok?"

There was a flicker of something in her enchanting green eyes but Gil didn't know what it was.

"Ok Gil." was all she said.

He began to drive and he started laughing.

"What?" she asked

"Maybe ok will be our always."

She smiled at that and laughed softly, and hit him in the arm. "Shut up."

Still chuckling to himself Gil drove her home and stopped in the driveway

"I'll see you." he said, waving as she got out of the car.

Liz nodded and smiled at him. "See you, Gil."

He watched her walk into her house and close the door and he glanced over at his now empty passenger seat.

And that empty seat looked like the loneliest thing in the world to him at that moment.

So you thought it'd be easy after the last chapter huh? Ha! This is Liz and Gil! There's plenty of OTP frustration ahead!

So, follow, favorite, and review! Give me those thoughts! Whats with Liz eh?