A/N: This chapter came out relatively quick. I don't know if many if any people are actually still reading it, but I guarantee this story will be over soon.

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"Here comes the newbie," Ruto muttered to Malon that morning, as Zelda and Leah were seen walking towards the diner. Giving them a cold glance, she nearly burned herself with hot coffee.

"Hey, kid," Malon said lightly when they walked in. "How're you feeling?"

"Been better," Leah replied, warily taking note that Ruto seemed to be positively glowering at her. "But apparently I made a complete idiot of myself yesterday... and, er, Ruto—I.. I wanted to apologize for, er, causing an upset at your party."

Slightly taken aback at this apology, the dirty look vanished from Ruto's countenance. She opened her mouth but it took her a few moments to find the right words. "It was Mikau's fault. I didn't want any drinks in that place..." She sighed. "What a jerk! Zelda! Malon! How could you let me go out with him that long??"

"Hey, I tried convincing you, remember?" Malon said. "I know he can be kind of a scumbag sometimes; I dated him, in case you forgot."

"He just better not make an appearance here today," Ruto grumbled. "I've had it, I'm through with that guy." And head held high, she stalked off to wait on an old couple that had just walked in.

"This is all my fault!" Leah whispered, putting on the apron Malon had just tossed to her. "If I wasn't so stupid, Ruto wouldn't want to break up with Mi—"

"Leah, trust me," Zelda said, putting a hand on her shoulder. "This will turn out to be the best thing Ruto's ever done. I didn't want to say much—I mean, Ruto's one of my best friends and Mikau is Link's roommate now, so... but really, he's never been remotely worthy of any girl I know. So you're actually doing us all a favor."

A small smile found its way onto the raven-haired girl's face. "Thanks. Guess I'll go talk to the boss, now."

"Good luck."

As Leah marched off towards Frankie's office, Malon remarked, "I suppose that means me and Ruto can shop the market together, now."

"Ruto and I," Zelda impulsively corrected her.

"Shut up, dweeb," Malon said, whacking her friend with a wet rag ("EW!"). "It's too bad most guys in this city are total trash." Pause. "Do you know where Link is from?"

"Nope, actually, I don't," Zelda answered, filling the newly-purchased straw container. "Hmm... I should probably ask him about that."

"Do you know if he's like, really close to his parents or anything?"

"Um... no, his parents haven't actually ever come up."

"Oh." Momentarily stymied for conversation, Malon subconsciously picked up a few pieces of bacon off a plate that was supposed to go to table six. Then, "So... did he go to college? 'Cause he's a pretty sharp guy."

"Yeah, he's smart," Zelda said. "But I don't know, Malon."

"Gotsy, Harknian! What do you guys TALK about??"

Zelda shrugged. "Stuff."

"Ah, yes, 'stuff,'" Malon said in an annoying, smiley fashion, grinning and nodding her head. "Still. I don't like to kiss a guy until I at least know the basics about him. Like, where's he's from, for example." When Zelda made no reply but instead seemed to become strangely interested in the napkin dispenser, Malon stared at her. "You... you have kissed him, right?"

"Well, not if you want to be technical about it."

"What! You two have been going out for months! And you've never even kissed him??" Malon cried, sounding both incredulous and amused.

"Thanks for broadcasting it."

"Zelda, half these people are deaf."

"Good point... but, yeah."

"Wow. That's kinda...special?"

"The right moment just hasn't come up yet," Zelda said uncomfortably. "Isn't there supposed to be like, a moment? When you're both looking into each other eyes, and then someone starts to leeean and then the other peron's all like—"

"Zelda, have you ever kissed a guy before?" Malon interrupted.

"Well, hold on," Zelda said as an old man yelled from table six that he wanted his bacon and eggs already. She whisked it off to him then came back to Malon. "I kissed Paul Cody in a game of Spin-the-Bottle in third grade, got practically assaulted by Jack Spade under the mistle-toe at a Christmas party in ninth grade, and then at Senior Prom some guy tried to get me to come upstairs with him and I was like 'no way,' and he was like, 'okay, that's cool.' So he took me home and kissed me on my porch but then he went back to the hotel and I actually never saw him again."

Malon stared (again). "Wowww... you know, Zelda, I guess you're not exactly the kind of person I pegged you to be."

"Excuse me? Are you implying that you thought I was a—"

"No," Malon sighed. "I mean I just would've thought you'd have kissed more guys, like on dates and stuff."

"I didn't date a lot in high school," Zelda said. "None of the guys could really meet my standards. But now that you mention it, I did have this one boyfriend named Duke and he kissed me. But just on the cheek. It was eighth grade, so..."

"What d'you think about her?" Malon asked, nodding towards the closed door of Frankie's office and indicating Leah. "Think she's..."

"I wouldn't know," Zelda replied. "And considering what YOU thought about ME, I don't think either of us should be making judgements!!"

"Haha, okay, okay," Malon laughed. "Gosh, you know, can we talk about something else? Like, other than guys?"

"Malon, you brought it up."

"Whatever. I say we have girls' night tonight. Chick flicks at my place. You and Ruto. And, uh, me."

"Okay, sounds good. Hey, speaking of Ruto... where did she go...?"

Malon and Zelda looked around the relatively small diner and indeed, Ruto was no where in sight. As business was a bit slow, the two of them left the counter and addressed the fellow they'd last seen Ruto waiting on.

"Excuse me," Malon said, "but do you know where the waitress Ruto meant?"

"You mean Judy Garland?" asked the old man.

"Um, no, I mean Ruto," Malon said blankly.

"Oh, that fish-looking girl," the old man said knowingly. "I think I saw her step outside. For a smoke, maybe?"

"Excusé toi, Ruto does not smoke," Malon told him.

"Oh. Well, she's outside, at any rate."

"MALON!" came a voice.

The red-head and the blonde turned around, to see Frankie at the counter, the weight of his bulgy arm rested on Leah's shoulders (she appeared to be faltering underneath it slightly). "C'mere," he said. "I need you to show LeeLee the works here. Divvy up the afternoon schedule, would ya?" Clapping Leah on the shoulder (and nearly knocking her over), Frankie stepped back into his office.

"Uh, LeeLee?" Malon asked, raising an eyebrow. Leah smirked embarrassedly. "It's weird, 'cause he has no problem with retarded names like Malon or Zelda—or Mordecai or Soloman—but can't remember something like yours, huh?"

"Guess it's just kinda forgettable," Leah said, putting her hands in her pocket and shrugging nonchalantly. "He didn't really say much about how often I'm supposed to work... but I need tonight off so I can do my shift at CVS. How long does this place stay open, anyway?"

"'Til ten," Malon replied. "When do you need to go to CVS?"

"Oh, okay," Leah said. "I don't need to start there until twelve."

"Midnight? You do a shift that late?"

"My uncle says that what kids do best," Leah replied, shrugging once again. "Sleeping all day, staying up all night. He figured I might as well be getting paid for it."

Malon looked like she wanted to ask something else, thought of better of it, and directed Leah's attention towards a white board behind the counter. "Here's our schedule for this week... now that we've got you, though, we can cut everyone's shift by like an hour and a half... or something. My math was never too good." She took down the white board, picked up an Expo pen and eraser, and got to work adjusting it.

"Um, Leah, would you go and see... see, uh, how table seven's order is coming along?" Zelda asked, vaguely waving a slip at Leah. Following her gaze, Leah saw Mikau following a very annoyed looking Ruto back into the diner. Zelda gave the girl, who was starting to turn red, a small shove towards the kitchen and that was all she needed to get through the door. Straightening up, Zelda fixed the approaching fellow with a very cold stare.

"—would you just get out of here? Please??" Ruto hissed, ducking under the counter and standing by Zelda.

"Hey, I've got every right to come into a diner if I want," Mikau said, enunciating the ends of his words in a most unusual manner.

"Why do you want be here?? You hate this diner! And we are SO through, Mikau. Just beat it."

"Would you just give me a chance, Ruto?" Mikau said, sounding more angry than pleading, which is probably what he should have gone for.

"Give you a chance??" Ruto repeated. "What do you think I have been doing for like, a year and a half? I'm done giving you chances! Your behavior, especially last night, was just inexcusable. Getting two teenage girls drunk for your own gratification? You disgust me, Mikau!"

Malon looked up from the white board.

"Never calling me when you're late, almost never wanting to do what I want to do, the only possibly nice thing you've ever done is come to the diner I work at, but then, I don't cook the food, and it IS free!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Mikau said, stalling for some time to digest all the accusations she'd just made. There was a slight pause and his hands were slightly raised up, trying to get Ruto to shut up. In the silence, none of the employees realized the entire diner had gone stock-still, hanging on to every word of the conversation. "Roo—"

"Don't call me that," Ruto said, meaning the nickname she'd had since high school. "Don't call me that now."

"Ruto," he said in a more respectful tone. "What do you expect from me, what do you want from me? I'm a guy!"

"That is one of the lamest excuses I have ever heard!" Ruto cried out. "Is Link a girl, Mikau? Is he??"

"What—Link??" Mikau said, wondering how that came into play.

"NO! Link is a guy, just like YOU, you scumbag, but he treats Zelda like a princess!" Ruto finished. "And they've none each other maybe half as long as I've been going out with you, but look at what they have! They have a real relationship. Let's face it, ours was so one-sided."

"Ruto, come on, you can't... you can't compare me to Link, that isn't fair," Mikau said, pretty feebly.

"It isn't fair? You want to tell me what isn't FAIR?" Ruto practically shouted.

"You put her up to this!" Mikau said, pointing at Zelda accusingly. "Because you're so—you're so conservative, you just couldn't handle that—"

"This doesn't have anything to do with me!" Zelda said at the same time Ruto burst out, "This doesn't have anything to do with HER!" The latter continued, saying, "You think I'm not smart enough to make up my own decisions about my life??"

At this moment, Mikau started a furious debate with Zelda, completely ignoring what Ruto had just said. Malon, poked Ruto in the back with her pen, then motioned behind her. In the order window was a freshly made apple pie. Ruto stared at it, then saw Leah behind it, who nodded once.

"We don't want you here, so just get beat it and don't show your face around here ever again," Zelda snarled dangerously.

"You gonna stop me, princess?" Mikau sneered. "I'm not done here."

"Oh, I think you are," Ruto said. Mikau looked up, but before he had time to register the fact that Ruto was holding a gigantic pie in her hand, it was in his face.

There was a shocked silence, brought on mostly by the fact that a lot of people couldn't believe she'd just done something so apparently immature. But then Malon tried unsuccessfully to stifle a giggle, which triggered Zelda's tittering into the back of her hand, and then Ruto laughed triumphantly, and soon everyone in the restaurant started to clap and guffaw their approval (which just made the three girls involved laugh harder).

Unable to find words to fit the situation, Mikau wiped the pie off his face with his arm, then wiped the pie off his arm onto the floor, and stalked out of the diner. He tried to slam the front door, but it was a bit too heavy and moved much slower than befitted the circumstances—this had Ruto actually on the floor.

"Thank you, thank you; no applause," she said graciously the old people who were still clapping.

"Way to show 'em, Roo," Zelda said, high-fiving Ruto.

"Hopefully that will have gotten the message across," Malon sighed, sticking the white board back onto the wall.

Leah walked out from the kitchen and was taken by surprise when Ruto gave her an excruciatingly tight hug. "Thank you, girl!!" she cried. "Because of you and your pie, I've seen the light and finally been able to do what I should have done a long time ago!"

"Uh, you're welcome?" Leah said unsuredly. When Ruto finally released her, she shoved some loose strands of hair behind her ear and said, "Well, let's get to work, huh?"

"Of course!" Ruto said a little giddily. She picked up a tray and headed off to table two with it.

"She's going to be walking on air for the next three weeks," Malon remarked, as Leah erased 'LeeLee' on the chart and wrote her real name. "Breaking up with Mikau was the best thing I ever did."

"Hey! That old lady just gave me five bucks for kicking Mikau to the curb!" Ruto exclaimed, waving a five at her friends. "Ha, ha, ha!!"

"Will this be kind of awkward, though?" Malon wondered. "I mean, now that Mikau is on bad terms with, well, all of us, and he's letting Link stay at his house?"

"Hmm... that may present a problem," Zelda acknowledged.

And lo and behold, coincidence of coincidences, who should walk in at that very moment but Link.

"Hi!" Zelda greeted him.

"Hey," he said back, smiling and sitting at the counter.

"Do you want anything?" she asked him.

"Yeah, I'll have the cute blonde waitress by the register, please," he said, in such a sweet tone of voice that it didn't sound perverted at all.

"Awww!" gushed Zelda, Malon, and some random old lady at the end of the counter. Link raised an eyebrow at her, smiled weakly, then moved one seat further away.

"Could I just get a... I dunno, your chocolate-chip stack of pancakes?"

"No problem," Malon said, communicating the order to the cook in sign language. The cook stared blankly at her, and rolling her eyes she went over and told him.

"Did Mikau come by here, by any chance?" Link asked.

"Yeah; you just missed him," Zelda informed him.

"Hm. When I woke up this morning, his car was gone, so I had to take the bus," he said, twiddling with a straw. He chuckled. "There were these two kids behind me, I dunno, maybe fourteen, and the guy..." Link hung his head slightly and gave a short laugh. "This kid goes like... aw, man! I can't believe I forgot what he said, but it was some pick-up line for the girl next to him about boogers..."

"EW!" Zelda cried. "A pick-up line about boogers?!? What will they think of next? Or do I want to know..."

"Ah, the cheesy pick-up line," Malon sighed. "I think the best one I ever heard was... let's see, I was fifteen and it was at camp. I was heading back to my cabin after being in the lake, and this boy taps me on the shoulder and is like, 'Excuse me, do you have a band-aid?' And I was like, 'Sorry, no;' and he said—"

"'Cause I kinda hurt myself when I fell for you!" Zelda finished, giggling.

"Ha, ha, yeah," Malon laughed reminiscently. "Did you just guess, or is that was the Dukester used on you?"

"No, his was the pirate pick-up line," Zelda answered.

"Ah," Malon said.

"What, pray tell, is the pirate pick-up line?" Link asked, looking amused.

With a catty smile, Zelda crossed onto his side of the counter and in a macho voice, said, "If you were a pirate, would you keep your parrot on this shoulder—" she tapped his left shoulder, "or this shoulder?" She reached across his back and laid her hand on his right.

"Nice," Link chuckled. "Um, let me see if I can make one up on the spot... okay. If I you were wearing a messenger bag, would the strap go like this?" He slung his arm around her so that his hand was resting on her waist.

"Yeah, I would," she said in a reverent, kind of serious sounding voice before he could inquire about the other way.

It seemed like 'the moment' Zelda had been describing in the beginning of this chapter. Link was leaning, and she was giving him the look, but before anything could actually happen—

"PDA!"

They both jumped—Zelda actually fell off her stool—and turned around to see where the voice was coming from.

It was Frankie, and strangely enough, he appeared to have just entered from the front door instead of the office door. He was frog-marching a young, red-headed man towards them, and repeated, "I do not allow PDA concerning my employees in this establishment, Zelda Harkinian!"

"Boss, don't spazz," Zelda said, looking flustered and a bit embarrassed.

"I am not being a spazz!" he said back. "I just want you two—and Ruto and Lela—to meet my son."

"Are you Soloman?" Zelda asked.

"Actually, I'm Roy," said the guy. "The youngest of the three."

Zelda and Link exchanged glaces as if to say, 'That name is surprisingly normal.' She looked up at Malon, but instead of returning the look, Malon was staring in an awestruck fashion at Roy—and not being very subtle.

"Roy, meet the crew," Frankie said. "Maybe not the most reliable people in the world, but they're pretty good for how we do. This is Zelda, this is the person she was about to break the rules with—I don't know his name—that's Ruto, in the corner there" ("YO!" Ruto called, waving at him) "that's Lela, who's about to trip on that man's cane" ("I am not," Leah sniffed indignantly, only to trip on it on her way back) "and this young lady at the cash register here is Malon."

"Hi," said Roy for the first time.

This acknowledgement seemed to bring Malon out of her reverie. "Hi," she said warmly back and vaguely wishing her uniform wasn't so dowdy.

"Roy will be staying with me for a while, and if he is unable to find a suitable job, he's going to come back to work for the old man," Frankie said, clapping Roy on the back. Link and Zelda stared between him and Malon, who had stopped looking transfixed and was busy pretending she was actually doing something with the cash register.

"Hope you like it here, man," Link said, as Frankie went to the kitchens to tell the cooks how cool his son was. "City's a pretty neat place."

"Yeah, that's what I hear," Roy said. "Oh, is there like a bulletin board in this place where I could put up a notice?"

"Nope; things here pretty much go by word of mouth," Zelda replied. "What message do you want out?"

"I'm looking for a roommate," Roy answered.

"Whoa, me too!" Link said quickly, shaking Roy's hand.

"Oh, really?" he said, surprised at having found success so soon.

"Yeah! Well, I mean, actually I'm kind of staying with someone, but we've kind of had a, er... falling out, and I need to get out of there as soon as possible, you know what I mean?"

"Sure, yeah," Roy answered.

As the two of them started discussing Roy's apartment, Zelda walked back to the worker side of the counter and nudged Malon. "What about Mordecai, honey?"

"Mordecai Shmordecai," Malon said. "Look at Roy! He's like a puppy dog!"

"Are you into that?" Zelda asked.

"Aw, he's so cute," Malon sighed under her breath. "This'll be real great if Link becomes his roomie. Not only will it eliminate the awkwardness problem I foresaw, but it might also mean we can, y'know..."

"Yeah."

Frankie walked out of the kitchen and stared at the back wall. "Malon," he said.

"Yeah, boss?"

Indicating the white board, he said, "Who is Leah?"

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A/N: Sorry if the joke with Leah's name is getting confusing. By the way, I KNOW Roy is not a Zelda character, but I decided it would be more interesting to have someone some people might recognize as opposed to Mordecai, another one of those annoying original characters. So feel free to review (and tess, that includes you).