Chapter 11

Something More than Friends

Now, when you've got a group of teenage boys and teenage girls living in the same house (or in this case, the same sewer lair), things start to happen. Emotions start to surface. "Relationships" start to develop. Even if the occupants are mutated turtles, the emotional state of a bunch of teenagers is always on edge. One push in the right direction can send them crashing into the wall of reality. In other words, if you live with someone for a long enough time, you either end up despising them, or to falling for them.

As four weeks passed by, emotions did start to surface. Relationships slowly started to develop, although no one said anything about it. The boys and girls started to split into pairs; spending most of their time with whosever company they enjoyed most. Splinter, always so observant, was the only one who saw what was really going on, and he was pleased about it. This had been one of the reasons he had let the girls stay with them.

Lizzie and Mikey were the most thrilled at the situation of sharing the same lair. They spent nearly all of their time together, playing video games, Mikey teaching Lizzie how to skateboard, reading comic books, etc. Some nights the two of them would fall asleep on the couch while staying up to watch the late show. If Mikey woke up to find Lizzie sleeping with her head in his lap, he wouldn't be able to take his eyes off of her. In truth, Mikey really did find her attractive, he especially loved her eyes. She was the only one of her sisters to have blue eyes, just as he was the only one of his brothers to have blue eyes. Plus, her personality was so identical to his it was like a dream. If he had his way, Mikey would stare at Lizzie for hours on end, but seeing her asleep was his only opportunity to do so, at least until he fell asleep as well. If Lizzie woke up to find herself lying down with her head in Mikey's lap, she'd blush, then close her eyes and listen to the sound of his breathing until she fell back asleep. Lizzie also found Mikey attractive, thinking that the combination of his personality and good looks to be something girls could only hope to find in a fairy tale (in her opinion). Of course she could never admit to any of this, because it would be all too convenient if he felt the same way about her.

Cleo and Don spent all of their time working in the computer area. They had decided to use the time that the girls were staying with them to build Cleo's "Instant Override" chip. Between the two of them the project took about a week. Their combined intelligence helped the operation go much smoother than when Cleo had done it on her own. Cleo's job was to design and construct the software, and Don's job was to wire the circuitry. It was a long process that kept them up late, but it was, nevertheless enjoyable. For six days, they talked as they worked, sharing stories of how they helped their siblings with their inventions and of the many projects they worked on during the course of their lives. On the seventh day, they installed the software into the chip.

"Okay," said Don, "let's test it." Cleo inserted the chip into a Gameboy. Instantly, the gaming system shut down all functions and would not turn back on.

"It works!" they exclaimed together. The two of them jumped up and down, laughing and cheering. In the heat of the excitement, Don and Cleo hugged. They didn't realize what they were doing until about five seconds later. When they did, they quickly let go, looking embarrassed, but pleased.

Leo and Joan spent most of their time working out together. I mean, the two of them generally worked out for three hours a day, but they did it a little more often, so as to enjoy each other's company. Oddly enough, a competitive side, usually brought out by their younger siblings, started to emerge, mingling with their growing feelings for each other. If Leo started doing push-ups, Joan would start doing more than he was. If Joan started doing crunches, Leo would start doing more than she was. If Leo worked on fighting moves for defending against five, Joan would work on moves defending against ten. This unofficial competition amused the both of them. Leo was the leader of his team, so he had a little more athletic prowess than his brothers (well, maybe not Raph, but that's another story). Since the girls had no leader, it was untested to see who had more athletic prowess then the others. But Leo could easily see that Joan had enough prowess for all four of the girls. Eventually, the two of them decided to test to see which of them had more athletic prowess than the other. The challenge was to fight each other in light touch combat, without weapons, until the end of a song. At the beginning, Joan drove Leo nuts by swerving, dodging, and practically dancing out of the way of his punches and kicks. But this just made Leo more determined. By the middle of the song, the two of them were landing "hit" after "hit" on each other. But this was all done in good humor; they were chuckling the whole time. There was one instant where Joan threw a punch at Leo's face and missed. The momentum knocked her off balance and she landed in Leo's arms, their faces close to each other's, just as the lead singer the band they were listening to sang something about the boy finally getting the guts to kiss the girl. Joan quickly removed herself from Leo's arms, blushing. When the song ended, the two of them fell over, Joan on top of Leo, absolutely howling with laughter.

Raph was very pleased with the girls' staying with them for a while, but with this pleasure came a distinct shyness that kept him quiet about the whole thing (which was weird, because shyness was not something he experienced very often). The second night after Suzuki's arrest, Raph went topside (to the surface) to mull over his mixed feelings. Freida saw him leave and decided to follow. She trailed Raph to Chinatown, where she found him practicing some moves on the roof of a restaurant. The restaurant had a clear view of the marketplace, where fruit stands, fish stands, fireworks carts, and family owned clothing stores lined the narrow walkways over which hung ornate red, green, and gold paper lanterns, which bathed the pavement with a soft colorful glow. The roof itself was nothing special; it contained only a heating vent and two small water towers in opposite corners of the roof. Freida sneaked up behind him and whispered,

"Come here often?" Raph jumped two feet off the ground. He swung at her diagonally with the heel of his left foot. "Easy Raph!" said Freida, catching hold of his ankle before it connected with her head. "It's me."

"Oh," said Raph. Freida let go of his ankle. He let out a sigh of good-natured exasperation. "You should know not to sneak up on me like that."

"Sorry."

"What are you doing up here?"

"I wanted to see where the mysterious ninja snuck off to." A mischievous smile carved Freida's face. Her teeth were very white. Raph gulped. "So, do you come here often?" she asked.

"Yeah, actually I do," answered Raph. Freida looked around, nodding.

"I can see why. You can actually see the stars and moon from here."

"Yeah." Raph looked down at his feet. He had never felt so shy before; it was as if the confidence he usually carried with him had evaporated completely. He couldn't talk right. "Uh, you wanna sit down?" he asked, gesturing to the flat roof ledge.

"Sure!" said Freida. Raph sat down on the ledge and Freida sat down on his left (not right next to him; about a foot of space was attained).

"There's not as much crime in Chinatown," said Raph, kind of offhandedly. "People are safer here."

"Ah," nodded Freida, "that's always a plus." She shifted her weight, looking down at the busy street below. "The lanterns are nice."

"Wha? Oh! Yeah." Freida laughed at his delayed reaction.

"What's the matter?" she asked teasingly. "Is the calm night air making you sleepy?"

"No." Raph thought quickly. "I was just thinking about something Mikey said once. He wondered whether or not those lanterns would make good fishbowls." The two of them laughed nervously. Frieda put her hand down next to her, at the exact same time as Raph put his down. Their hands touched. They gasped and drew their hands back. They looked at each other. A moment passed, during which both Raph and Freida experienced an explosion of butterflies in their stomachs. Freida smiled slightly, and slowly held out her hand. Raph looked down at it, then back up at her face. As he became absorbed in her warm, friendly eyes, the butterflies in his stomach did a kind of drunken Maccarrena that carried them up to his shell. She was just so…so…pretty. No, that wasn't the right word. Beautiful. Yes, that was it. As soon as he thought it, Raph knew it was over. The emotions that had been threatening to overflow had taken over. He was officially attracted to Freida. A tiny little smile edged itself along Raph's face, and he took Freida's hand. Instantly, the caldron of attraction bubbled up into a full-blown crush (yes, stuff like that can happen fast). Across the foot of space that separated the two of them, Freida was experiencing the exact same thing. She had finally come to the conclusion that had been ramming itself into her mind ever since she saw Raph on the wharf the night she had been captured: if she hung around him long enough, she was going to develop a crush on him. The two of them turned back to look at the moon, their green three-fingered hands clasped on the ledge beside them. They didn't consider it a boyfriend and girlfriend session of holding hands, but it was a step in the right direction.

So the four weeks stretched on, and eventually everyone had a crush on somebody. The more time the turtles spent with each other, the stronger those crushes became, until eventually everyone had boiling pots of feelings nestled inside their teenager's hearts. It wasn't long before they all were head-over-heels for each other. Of course, no one admitted to these new feelings, because, like all teenagers, they feared finding out that their crush didn't like them back. You know as well as I do that at that point there wasn't a snowball's chance in heck that that was true. But no one wanted to take any chances. The dramatic tension was so great that the lair was filled to the brim with it. To Splinter, it was like watching a soap opera: the awkwardness, the shyness, the friendliness, the dreamy eyes…you get the idea. Anyway, despite the awkwardness, the turtles felt a sense of unity with their strengthening bonds. Tempers lengthened, moods lightened, and sibling rivalries were forgotten for the time being. The turtles were content to go on nightly outings around the city without anyone on their tails. It was one of those rare periods of peace that settled over their lives whenever nothing major was

happening, like the aftermath of a war…..

…..But unfortunately, it wasn't meant to last…