Author's Note: All right, this is the final chapter of a rollercoaster of clouded emotions and heated arguments. There will be a two-part epilogue after this, but this is it for the main autumn narrative. If anyone's still reading this, I'd be really interested in hearing all of your thoughts on the piece.


It shouldn't have taken Phineas Flynn too long to cross the road to Isabella's house and track down what had been his best friends. It was directly across the street, after all, and from what he knew of her and Ferb they would probably be in the yard. That guess was confirmed when he noticed there were no lights on in the house. Isabella's mother was still off to see her father, a visit which he knew was about to end as a still exuberant Isabella had made that one of the subjects to ramble all about earlier in the evening, but if Isabella would have been inside the lights would nevertheless have been on. Which meant that logically, she was probably at the pool.

The memories haunted his mind of Isabella being happy, radiant, beaming, and probably hitting on him a few times that he hadn't noticed. The thoughts really hit home now. He had never consciously meant to hurt her, and now that he had… could she ever forgive him? Would she ever forgive him, for not being the guy she thought he was?

Perhaps he could explain to her. Explain how he felt for Candace, and that he could try to replicate that feeling with her but that it just wouldn't be the same. That she still meant a lot to him, only just not romantically. But hadn't he tried to say that just a few minutes ago, and hadn't that still resulted in her slamming the door in his face?

And then there was Ferb, whose departure stung if possible even harder. Somewhere he felt that Ferb would eventually forgive him – even though he didn't have high hopes for the situation right now – but even the fact that this fight had happened was bad enough. Ferb was his brother. His best friend throughout all his troubles. He and Ferb had always been of one mind on everything. If that ended, no matter how briefly… he wouldn't know what to do. Go through life alone, without Ferb? Just the thought was absolutely alien to his mind.

Fear of being hurt, however, wouldn't help him. He needed to keep his spirits up – and since when did he need to worry about that – and have faith that everything was going to turn out all right. That he would be able to talk it out so that they could all live happily ever after.

He took a deep breath, and opened the gate to the garden…

…and then he saw it.

"WHAT?"

The couple broke apart right after his exclamation, but the damage had already been done. Phineas clung to the gate, replaying the scene in his mind over and over again. Ferb and Isabella… kissing? Ferb… and Isabella? Isabella… and Ferb?

It was madness. Absolute madness. And yet within the context of this night, it made a strange amount of sense.

The two people whom he hoped he could still count among his friends after tonight uneasily looked at each other. "Okay," Isabella spoke up, "I know this is really weird but you know this is really the same thing we just experienced with you and…" She hesitated. "…with you, right?"

Phineas dully nodded. "I guess so" he mumbled, walking over. "Wow. I-I wasn't expecting that."

Isabella blushed. "It sorta came out of the blue for us too" she replied. "I mean, Ferb and I were talking, and then we hugged, and it just… happened."

Phineas nodded, and they simply stared at each other for a few seconds. "Isabella…" He nervously ran a hand through his hair. "I want to apologize for what happened tonight. I didn't realize fully how what I was doing would affect and hurt you, and that's not okay. But you did hurt me as well, and… well, you said you didn't know who I was anymore, and you wondered whether I ever cared about you, and I'm sorry for making you question all those things… but to be honest, I've wondered that myself about you as well."

He wondered whether Isabella would have another outburst towards him. What happened was, however, exactly the opposite of what he'd expected – his friend's expression looked more resigned, perhaps even guilty. She looked up, an earnest look in her eyes. "Phineas, I'm sorry for projecting all those expectations onto you all those years. I really shouldn't have done that. Maybe if I had spoken up sooner, but…" She shrugged. "I always assumed that you and I, that we…"

It was hard to be mad at her when she was downcast like that, and Phineas knelt down and gently put a hand on her shoulder. "It's all right, Izzy" he said softly. "I'm sorry for inadvertently creating those expectations in the first place when I should have seen how you felt. The thought has just always been so alien to me, of you and I being together… not because of there being anything wrong with you" he hastened to add as he saw the distraught look on her face. "I just couldn't imagine you as anything but my best friend along with Ferb. Couldn't, and can't. I can try to change that, but…" He shrugged, unsure how to go on. "It wouldn't work. But even so, I'm definitely sorry about tonight."

Isabella smiled at him. "That's okay, Phineas. You didn't mean to…"

"But I did" Phineas replied, sighing. "Maybe not actively so, but I should have realized that you wouldn't take a dinner platonically. I knew you had a crush on me at that point, so I really should have been able to connect the dots. I even considered telling you the plan upfront, so that we could have laughed about Candace's exaggerated suspiciousness together – but Ferb had said I shouldn't tell you about me and Candace." He didn't want to involve his brother as long as he didn't know whether the latter had calmed down, but credit where credit was due.

Isabella nodded knowingly, shooting a fleeting glance in Ferb's direction. "I understand, Phineas. I would be lying if I said I wasn't hurt, but we've all been hurt in one way or another over the last days, and we've all said things we didn't want to say or mean to say. Maybe we should just try to get over it and move on."

Phineas frowned. "Meaning…"

"Meaning that we all accept we didn't mean what we said and did to hurt each other, and try to rebuild our friendship" Isabella said, the last word still making her grimace. "Although perhaps we could take a breath first. And it also means I have to accept you… you and Candace."

Phineas knew he had been called oblivious a lot lately – most of the times entirely correctly – but even he could see just from the look on her face that this was still something that took a lot of effort for Isabella to say. "I… I love her, Isabella. I know that's hard for you to understand. Heck, it was hard for me to understand when I realized it the first time. But I know I love her now, and I'm not going to break up with her again."

Isabella looked at him and nodded slowly. "No, I suppose I can't ask that from you. Not for my sake, at any rate." She shook her head. "You and me… was it ever going to work out anyway? I mean, considering how much we'd been keeping from each other and how little we apparently really knew each other…"

Phineas tentatively shrugged. "Well, I couldn't really tell" he replied. "I never seriously considered a relationship with you before."

There was still a clear troubling of Isabella's features before she replied, but it was gone soon enough. "I know. I wonder if I'm just saying this to get myself to accept that this is the way it is, and that it can't be changed." She sent off a fleeting glance in Ferb's direction, which ordinarily would have gone over Phineas' head but which he noticed since he was paying extra attention tonight. "Perhaps… perhaps I shouldn't even want it to change."

Her friend didn't really know what to say to that, so he just put a hand on Isabella's shoulder. She flinched for a moment, but then accepted it with a bittersweet smile. "You know I still care about you, right?"

Isabella hesitated. "I wasn't sure before" she replied. "I am now. It's just going to take some time if we want to recover our friendship. We might have to rebuild it from the ground up after all the things we said tonight. Maybe we're just all bad at romance, in a way."

Phineas nodded. "After what happened tonight, that's not a bad conclusion. Although I do think I've got to be the worst, if I didn't notice you having a crush on me for ten years."

Isabella shook her head. "I really should have said something at some point. I just kept expecting that one day you were going to pick up flirtations and become romantic… but tonight I realized that you're never going to change all that much in that regard, and if you do you'll do it because you want to and not because I want you to."

"I don't think I'd ever become a romantic, no matter how hard I tried" Phineas replied. "I've needed help from Ferb to come up with things to do with Candace. The first time I tried to ask her out after she and Jeremy broke up I almost messed everything up. And that's not even mentioning the time she found out about my crush." He shook his head, noticing to his relief that Isabella's face wasn't souring from the way he talked about his sister. "This romance stuff is complicated. I keep looking at it the same way I look at science, but that just doesn't seem to work."

The neutral expression was replaced by a broad grin. "Now you're getting it" Isabella said, playfully shoving against his shoulder.

Phineas nodded and smiled, glad to see one of his best friends since childhood was okay with him again. Now he just hoped the other would have the same sense of reconciliation. He took a deep breath and turned to face his stepbrother. The tension immediately came back up again. Isabella's expression turned back to neutral as she realized her friend wasn't concentrating on her anymore, and Phineas wasn't feeling very optimistic either. Yet, this had to be done.

"Ferb."

Phineas and Ferb just sat there for a few moments, looking each other in the eye, with Isabella not daring to break the tension by speaking up. Phineas, for his part, knew he would do anything to have Ferb as a brother and a friend again. Ferb was his partner, his inventing buddy, who was always at his side. If Ferb didn't want to speak to him again, or even if their relationship was strained for just a few months – he wouldn't know what to do next. Where would his inventing skills go without Ferb to help bring them into practice? Sure, he could still create stuff, but the same kind of spirit wouldn't be in it without his brother. He wouldn't have the spirit he needed to invent if he hadn't got Ferb at his side.

The moment lasted perhaps ten seconds. It felt more like ten minutes. But then, just as Phineas was wondering whether he should make the first move, Ferb reached out and gently touched his brother on the cheek, right at the spot where he had landed that blow under ten minutes ago. He had a quizzical look on his face.

"It's fine, Ferb" Phineas said softly. "Candace put a cold washcloth on it, and it barely hurts anymore by now."

Those words generated a look of relief and a smile on Ferb's face, resulting in turn in great relief washing over Phineas as well. He reached forwards and tackled his stepbrother into a tight hug, incredibly relieved that this wasn't the end, that he hadn't lost Ferb forever… no, no sense thinking such dreary thoughts, everything was all right again. And he could see that clearly as Ferb grinned at him and, in return, patted him on the shoulder.

"I'm sorry" he said.

"Don't be" Phineas replied. "Let's just hope this won't happen again."

Ferb nodded and the two separated, Phineas suddenly realizing the time, the cold – a fresh breeze hitting his cheek – and he blinked. "You know, it might be better if we go home now" he said awkwardly. "Give everything time to sink in."

He hoped he hadn't said anything wrong this time, and sure enough Isabella nodded and smiled. "You're right, Phineas" she replied. "Maybe we should just take a break from each other. We have all been a little too close lately, and perhaps it could be time to… you know, spend some time alone. Contemplating."

Phineas considered that for a few seconds, but eventually nodded. It would probably be for the best if Isabella would have some time to let it all sink in. "All right" he said. "Just as long as we're still friends… right?"

That got him a hearty grin. "Friends" Isabella replied, clasping his hand. Phineas squeezed it firmly, and it was with a relieved heart that he made his way back to his home.

He was already out of the gate when he noticed that Ferb wasn't following. He frowned – he thought they were all right with each other again, and he knew he could read his stepbrother well enough that Ferb's emotions had been genuine. Confused, he turned back through the gate and noticed Ferb still standing by Isabella's side, gentlemanly helping her upright.

"So…" Ferb spoke up. "I understand how you're feeling now, and you can just dismiss it if you think it's too soon, but I just need some clarification on this and…"

"Just say what you're going to say, Ferb" Isabella said gently.

Ferb nodded. "If you have time, would you mind going out for dinner sometime?"

Isabella blinked, surprised, then pondered the question. "You know what? I-I think I'd actually like that. How does Saturday sound?"

Ferb grinned charmingly at her and replied "Saturday" before walking out of the garden. He bypassed Phineas, who, though momentarily stunned from the sight, soon ran to catch up with his brother. "So, you and Isabella, huh?"

Ferb said nothing in response, but from the mysterious smile Phineas got, he definitely knew enough. "Oh, come on! I told you everything about me and Candace, and you're just going to keep mum about you and Izzy?"

His brother smiled. "Well, you know I'm not a talker. Although getting over that is one thing I think I've learned tonight. I probably could have prevented all this if I'd said something either to you or to Isabella sooner."

Phineas shrugged. "Hey, we've all messed up in one way or another. Let's just try to get over it and move on. Not to say that you shouldn't talk more, but hearing that would sound really strange."

"I guess" Ferb replied. "Not to mention it would hurt my throat."

There was a momentary pause before Phineas burst out laughing. Ferb clasped his shoulder, and the two just walked on home, basking in the presence of their family – each other. Now this, this meant things were all right again.

And yet, they both knew nothing would ever be quite the same anymore.

They'd gone through a great many summers and autumns. But the memories of this one were ones that would last.


Author's Note: I admit that I wasn't quite sure how to end this chapter and that I extensively rewrote my original scene there by touching more on Ferb's thoughts and feelings (Ferb's role in the story as a whole seems to have gradually grown from conception to completed product).