Bittersweet Symphony. I wasn't ready. I'll never be ready. Hope you guys are all okay.

Chapter 37 – Drop Everything

The Dot. 7pm sharp. Share my milkshake? - A xx

Share my milkshake. That was code for sexytimes. Or at least making out. Either way it was awesome.

Drew had read the text message over at least a dozen times and it still made him grin, then he imagined Alli's impish face when she sent it and it make him smile even more. He had a lot of reasons to smile; he was really looking forward to where he and Alli were going to go now. He couldn't help but feel that maybe, just maybe, he had been using Alli as a makeshift therapist. He'd be the first to admit that there was the slight possibility he had been using Alli as someone to carry his feelings for him when he wasn't willing to do it himself. But he was dealing with is feelings now, and Mom and Adam weren't at each other's throats all the time, and Adam was being ever-so-slightly less defensive about everything so Drew didn't feel like he was walking on unintentionally emasculating eggshells around him all the time. Life was pretty good for a change; he was at ease. And now Alli could finally just be his girlfriend and not have to haul around all of his emotional crap for him.

The date was supposed to be the day before, but Alli got herself detention for trying to sneak books out of the library. She had probably maxed-out her lending limit; it was a very Alli thing to do. It was adorable.

Only he really could have used a date will Alli the day before, considering it was finally the big Montgomery game and he was benched. Again. Armstrong said it was so Drew could have more time for his ribs to recover, but he was sure it was because Riley had been doing a better job in practice. Owen got on first team over him. Owen. Drew didn't even bother going to the game. They won without him anyway and it bothered him more than it probably should have; his team winning was a good thing, even if he wasn't there to help make it happen. He could have used someone to talk it through with-

No. He wasn't doing that anymore. Alli was his girlfriend, not his shrink. They were going to talk about nice, normal, boyfriend-girlfriend things, like their common interests and funny stories and-

"Is Mom in?"

Drew could just see the top of Adam's head as he quietly peered through the bedroom door. He had apparently managed to sneak back into the house without anyone noticing. It wasn't fair that Adam had better stealth skills than Drew; Drew was the one who needed to sneak out the most.

"Nope. School board meeting."

"Oh," said Adam bluntly. "Good."

The rest of him appeared from behind the door. He was wearing a black stripy hoodie that Drew didn't recognize, but decided that he quite liked (on Adam at least – it was a bit dark and baggy for Drew's taste.)

"Cool hoodie. Is it new?"

"Sort of," Adam said cryptically. He was about to breeze past when a distinctive smell pulled Drew into a frenzied alertness. He followed Adam into the hallway, stopping him before he could reach his room.

"Why do you smell like cigarettes?" Drew asked vehemently. "Have you been smoking?"

"No!" Adam yelped perhaps just a little too quickly, tugging at the hoodie he was wearing. "It's Eli's."

"Uh-huh. Why are you wearing Eli's hoodie?"

"He spilled guacamole on mine; his dad's washing it," Adam shrugged, "and I wouldn't have enough clothes to make it through the week otherwise."

"Huh?"

"Have you never noticed that I only have, like, three changes of clothes?"

Drew hadn't. Adam's clothes all looked the same to him, probably, he was just realizing, because they were all the same if he only had a handful of changes. Apparently Ghoulsworthy had noticed this before him, which was simply unacceptable.

He checked his watch; six-thirty, he had time.

"Well not anymore you don't," Drew sing-songed, steering Adam back into his room.

"I'm pretty sure I have to give this back," he said, tugging at Eli's lame smelly hoodie.

"No, dofus," Drew said rolling his eyes. "I meant me. You can borrow my stuff - whenever you want. Starting right now!"

Drew flung the doors of his closet open, revealing a mass of bold and brightly coloured shirts and polos. It wasn't really Adam's style at all. Or, at least, not until Drew got his way.

"Take your pick," he grinned.

Adam made a hesitant beeline towards the darker stuff on the left-hand side. Drew's stomach dropped when he remember what else was at that side of the closet.

"No-no," he said quickly, steering Adam away from the far left corner, "all the cool stuff is at the other side."

It didn't take long for Drew to regret keeping that damn hoodie in his duffle bag. He should have just thrown it in the fire with everything else. The whole point of going to the ravine was gain some closure. Hiding Gracie's things in a duffle bag wasn't closure; it was a big giant door wedge made of his own stupidity. Now it was just stuck in Drew's closet, making him nervous anytime someone went anywhere near it, fearing it would be found and that he'd have some explaining to do. He considered throwing it the trash, but he was sure it would be found. He even considered sneaking it out of the house and disposing of it somewhere far, far away, but he just knew that someone would inevitably see him leaving with it. So it was stuck there until he could figure out what to do. It was like this short story he had to read for English one time where a guy murders some bug-eyed old dude and hides the body under the floorboards, only he can still hear the guy's heartbeat. It was just like that, but without the murder part.

He steered clear of the tell tale hoodie and pulled out an orange shirt from the opposite side of the closet.

"Here, take this," he said, throwing it over to Adam.

Adam examined it blankly.

"Well?" Drew said.

"Well?" Adam echoed.

"Put it on."

"What, now?"

"Yeah now, you dweeb," Drew sighed. "Okay, I won't peek. Heaven forbid anyone sees you in a t-shirt!"

He made a melodramatic show of covering his face with his hands as Adam finally took of Ghouslworthy's stupid ugly hoodie in favour of Drew's much cooler shirt. Drew took the pointlessly large sigh as a sign that he could look over.

"You like it?"

"It's fine," Adam said lazily, "it's very orange, but it's fine."

Drew took him at face value. If Adam really didn't like it, he'd make a sarcastic remark, and if he genuinely liked it, well, he'd make an even more sarcastic remark. As it stood, it was "fine" and that was fine. Drew grabbed him and dragged him in front of the mirror. He felt a tiny bit anxious about the move once they were both facing it; Adam didn't have the best relationship with mirrors.

"You need to tuck one side in," he advised, "just one side."

Adam didn't comply. Instead choosing to stare at Drew suspiciously.

"… why?"

"It's cool," Drew insisted. "This side says: hey, I'm smart and put together, and the other side says: I'm a fun guy who likes to party!"

"So what you're saying is that this is the mullet of shirts?" Adam deadpanned, starting to unbutton the shirt again. He was back to his old smartass self; he appreciated it after all.

"No, no," Drew said, stopping him. "Walk up and down."

Adam managed not just to roll his eyes, but his whole face somehow. Drew didn't let it faze him; he knew it was Adam's weird way of saying thanks.

"Yeah, sure," Adam said, "after you, bro."

Drew punched his shoulder and Adam returned the favour (this, Drew had been learning, was the new code for hug, at least for the time being.) Drew had succeeded, not that he was worried about failing; he knew that it usually took a few attempts before Adam was willing to admit that the actually appreciated anything Drew did for him. It was a little frustrating; everyone else got Adam's approval instantly (he was willing to bet that Eli got a high-five and "thanks bro" the second he gave Adam his douchey hoodie – and he only did that because he was stupid enough to spill something on Adam's other one) for some reason, he always made Drew work for it.

"You want this back?" asked Adam, apparently choosing not to walk up and down after all.

"Keep it for school," Drew insisted, "the ladies will love it, trust me; your fairy god-brother is on the job now."

"No offence," Adam said wryly, "but you don't really make a good fairy."

"Ok, uh, wizard god-brother."

"Yeah, that's much cooler," Adam grinned, before adopting a more sincere expression. "Thanks. For this, I mean."

"No problem, bro."

He managed to resist giving a shoulder pat, if only just. It was starting to get pretty sappy, even for Drew. He had to bring it back down to a more manly level and start talking about clothes again.

"Okay," he said, clapping his hands together, "now we have to start thinking about patterns. You like plaid?"

"Yeah," Adam said, more earnestly than he would usually sound about non-food related things. "I mean, sure. Whatever."

Drew worked out the criteria pretty quickly; no short sleeves, as much plaid as humanly possible and purple only as a last resort (which Drew thought was a real shame because Adam would quite suit purple.)

"So," he said proudly as he carefully hooked a shirt back onto its hanger, "am I a style expert or am I a style expert?"

"I would say that you-" Adam stopped abruptly, checking his watch. "Wait, weren't you going out?"

Alli. He had forgotten about that. He didn't dare check his own watch, scared at what it might say.

"It's okay," he told Adam (and himself,) "I have time."

He didn't have time.

"You're forty-five minutes late," Alli said, not bothering to look up from her phone as Drew sheepishly sat down beside her at their table in The Dot.

"Sorry," Drew muttered, scooting himself closer to the table, "last minute emergency."

"Really," Alli asked, her concern making Drew feel incredibly guilty, "is everything alright?"

"It's fine now," Drew said, choosing to hide his guilty face behind a menu, "crisis averted."

Alli didn't say anything back, which made Drew glad; he really didn't want her to push him on it. He read the menu in silence despite knowing what he wanted and waited for Alli to pick up the conversation again. She didn't. It made Drew nervous; Alli could talk for Canada, but she wasn't making a sound. Drew braved the elements and put the menu down.

She was texting, her brow furrowed.

"You okay?"

"Jenna," she said, not looking up, "she's kind of having a little crisis of her own. Well, a big crisis of her own."

Jenna. Of course it was Jenna. Jenna ruined everything.

"I can't really talk about it," Alli whispered, looking up at him. She had the biggest, brownest puppy dog eyes he had ever seen. He couldn't believe how stupid he was to be late for a date with a girl as beautiful as Alli. He had to find a way to let her know that.

"Your eyes are like a dog's," he said affectionately.

Alli pulled her phone down.

"Sorry?"

"No, no, it's good," Drew insisted, "I like dogs. They're nice. Your eyes, I mean – and dogs too, but I'm saying that your eyes are nice."

She pulled a baffled smile, leaned over the table and gave his a quick kiss on the forehead.

"Thanks. I think you're pretty nice yourself."

"It's good to be nice."

"Yeah."

Drew looked at his menu some more. He was feeling more stupid that usual. Why was he finding it so hard to talk to her? He had plenty to talk about, just as long as it wasn't emotional stuff. He was trying to break that habit.

"So, what do you like?" he asked. It felt like a strange thing to be asking a girl who had officially been his girlfriend for a few weeks, but he had never asked it before so he figured that it was probably as good a time as any.

"I was just going to get a latte-"

"No, I mean like… what things do you like? You know, in life?"

Alli's already large eyes widened even further.

"That's a pretty broad question."

"Well what's the first thing that comes to mind?"

She opened and closed her mouth a few times, apparently trying to find something resembling words.

"Dancing?" she eventually said, "I like to dance."

"I've seen you dance actually," Drew grinned, "you're good."

"I'm really not," she said, her cheeks turning pink. "I started a dance troupe but it kind of fell apart. Our only good dancer was Bianca."

"Oh." Drew said in a low voice. He didn't have the highest opinion of Bianca, at least not after she told everyone about Adam. But Alli didn't sound like she liked her much either, so that was one thing they had in common.

"Nah," he said, "I bet she just dances like a stripper."

"Well, she can lift her leg over her head."

Drew scolded himself for imagining it.

"Okay, okay, new topic," he said, trying to avoid the subject of sexy Bianca things (he figured that it would be much easier to hate her if she wasn't so ridiculously hot.) "How about movies, do you like them?"

"C'mon, everyone likes movies," she laughed. "But I adore A Walk to Remember."

"That's not a real movie," Drew scoffed. "Now Con Air, that's a real movie."

"It that the Tom Cruise one?"

"No it's the Nic Cage one. The rule is, if your movie has Cage, Stallone, Van Damme or Schwarzenegger in it, then it's automatically a real movie."

"I didn't know that rule," said Alli bemusedly. She looked down at her hands, still smiling and proceeded to spin her phone around on the table. Drew picked at the frayed laminated corners of the menu, pulling the pieces of plastic apart even more. He tried to listen in on the conversation of the couple sitting across from them, but they seemed to be talking about boring stuff, like how much they were allowed to spend on one another for Christmas.

"Top Gun," he said, breaking the growing silence.

"What?"

"You were thinking of Top Gun. When I said Con Air."

"Oh, yeah. Probably," Alli shrugged. "I haven't seen either."

"Can I get you guys something?"

A waiter who wasn't the usual Peter stood over them, notebook in hand.

"Can I have another latte please?" Alli asked. She had already finished a drink waiting for Drew. He suddenly felt bad again.

"The usual for me," he said.

"And that is?" the waiter asked blankly. Of course he didn't know Drew's usual; this guy was not Peter.

"Ice tea, thanks," Drew muttered.

Not Peter turned around without a word and headed back to the counter.

"On the bright side?" Alli said in a hushed voice. "Still better service than anyone ever got from Holly J."

"Holly J used to work here?" Drew asked.

"Dumped a milkshake on a customer's head more than once," Alli said impishly.

"You're kidding," Drew said. "Man, I hate Holly J sometimes."

"Please don't say the words "I hate Holly J."" Alli groaned. "It's just… very bad idea - trust me!"

She picked up her phone and began to text (probably Jenna) again. Drew wasn't entirely sure what he had done wrong, but felt bad for it anyway. He started concentrating on pushing down the skin below his fingernails. He had learned from overhearing far too many teenage girl conversations that the skin below the fingernails was "ugly" and "gross." He looked over to Alli's fingers. She didn't have the "gross" skin thing, which made Drew happy, even though he thought thinking that skin was gross was kind of stupid.

"Your drinks," Not Peter said, dumping Drew's ice tea on the table. He hoped that Alli's hot drink would somehow warm her up again.

"Uh," Drew tried, putting on all the charm he could muster, "I thought you said you wanted to share a milkshake?"

"You're too late," she retorted, Drew couldn't figure out if she was being funny or annoyed, "I drank the milkshake already."

Drew wasn't deterred, if Alli was anything like Adam, it would only take a few more tries before she would be on his side.

"Did you know that this is our first real date?" he said, moving his hand nearer to hers. "Out alone, just the two of us?"

She put her phone back on the table, allowing herself a half smile.

"I suppose it is," she said, taking his hand. "I guess I'm just a little distracted tonight. Sorry, it's been a weird few days."

Drew wondered if he should ask her if she wanted to talk about it, but that seemed like a gateway conversation into doing the same thing himself. And he really, really wanted to talk about all the things they had in common, like… well Con Air and a Walk to Remember were both movies, and football and dancing were both activities. So they had liking movies and activities in common. That was a good start.

"Oh, hold on."

Alli's phone started vibrating aggressively on the table. Drew didn't need to guess who it was.

"Jenna," Alli needlessly explained. "I should take this. I'll be right back."

She darted off her chair and slipped into the washroom. Drew checked his own phone to see if any of his friends wanted to call him (K.C. had sent him a myriad of texts the day before to tell him that Jenna was a finalist on Next Teen Star; a show that was supposed to be a singing contest, but was mostly a ploy to see who could get the most sympathy votes. Drew wasn't really a big fan.) He didn't really share K.C.'s enthusiasm; Jenna would probably be voted out after the first week anyway – why would anyone in their right mind sympathize with her?

He focused on drinking his ice tea and hoped that he didn't look like a loser sitting all alone in a café. Then he remembered that he let Alli sit all alone in a café for forty-five minutes so that he could dispense fashion advice. Still, he was willing to bet that being a wizard god-brother was a worthier cause than whatever Jenna needed Alli for.

Alli rushed back to the table, not bothering to sit down again.

"Jenna's having an emergency," Alli said, picking up her purse form the floor and putting it on the table. "She needs me to look over her contract for Next Teen Star. Sorry, Drew, I need to go."

"You're ditching me?" Drew asked indignantly. "For Jenna?"

"Hey," Alli said sharply, adopting The Head Tilt, "I've cancelled girl-time with Jenna to help you with math before, I don't see why it should be more of a problem the other way around."

Drew felt that it was a low blow. She knew how much he struggled with math, and she knew that he felt bad about it. It just felt like she was throwing it in his face.

"We've not even been here half an hour," he complained, sounding a little more irritated than he had intended.

"Well maybe if you weren't late we could have spent more time together," she said tartly.

"Well-" Drew began, but he had nothing. He let out a large sigh instead, just so that his breath wouldn't be completely wasted. "Do you have to go now?"

"She needs me."

"It's just a stupid television show."

"It's not about the show, it's-" she stopped herself, pressing her hand to her forehead in a move that reminded him way too much of Mom. "I can't talk about it, but can you just trust me when I say she really needs me right now?"

Drew chewed on his tongue. He knew that it was more his fault than Alli's that the date was cut short (but then again, it was more Jenna's fault than his.) He couldn't really get mad at her for it.

"I trust you."

"Thank you," she smiled, couching down to kiss him on the cheek, her hair tickling his neck. "How about we double date for lunch tomorrow? You, me, Jenna and K.C. in the caf?"

Drew could have done without Jenna being there, but figured if she was sitting infront of them, then Alli couldn't ditch him for her.

"Yeah, fine."

"Great," she said, straightening up and slinging her purse over her shoulder. "See you tomorrow?"

"See you."

And without another word, she left.

She didn't even pay for her half-finished latte.

.

oOo

.

It was spaghetti day in the caf. Usually it would have been Drew's first choice, but he was technically on a date, and it was going to be his first complete date with Alli, so he didn't like to idea of having spaghetti mouth. Spaghetti mouth wasn't romantic. He had a sandwich instead. It was okay.

Even with his pretty boring sandwich, Drew couldn't help but notice that no one else at the table seemed that keen on eating lunch. Jenna hadn't even picked anything up, the space infront of her totally empty. Across from Jenna, K.C. had brought a lunch, but mostly sat, pulling the crusts off his sandwiches and grinding them into crumbs over the brown paper lunch bag. Across from Drew, Alli had bought a salad, but barely touched it, choosing to fidget nervously instead. There was a weird atmosphere at the table; like the gravity was pushing harder against everyone. Even though Drew didn't know what was causing it, he was sure he could feel it just as intensely as everyone else.

K.C., having reduced his crusts into a fine power, started to fold down the corners of his lunch bag, then turning to the new corner he had created and folding that corner down, until the whole bag began to tightly collapse in on itself, leaving no room for air to get in. Drew was pretty sure he knew how that bag was feeling.

No one seemed to feel like talking, so Drew, in a bid to break free from the tension, busied himself with his lunch, taking his time to eat his tuna sandwich, savouring each reasonably adequate bite.

But one can only eat an average sandwich for so long.

"So," he said after he had nothing else to do, "we won the game the other day."

K.C. took a second to realise that Drew was talking to him. He snapped back to reality just enough to respond.

"Yeah. You weren't there, though."

Drew was pretty sure that K.C. was just pointing out the obvious and not trying to be a jerk so he let it slide; there really didn't need to be any more animosity at the table.

"So how did it go?" He asked, despite not really wanting to know how awesome Owen was or how Riley was a much better QB and that the team didn't really need a dumb junior holding them back.

"Defence was shaky," K.C. mumbled, further flattening the folds in his lunch bag. "But the ref awarded us more penalties. Are you doing that thing today?"

At first, Drew thought K.C. was asking him the question, but then he saw that K.C. had looked up from his bag and was staring at Jenna across the table.

"Yeah," Jenna said quietly, her voice hoarse as if she hadn't been used to using it all day. "I'm going with Kyle after fifth period."

"That's good," K.C. said flatly.

Drew nodded with encouragement despite not knowing what was happening, where Jenna was going and who Kyle was (he guessed it was about her dumb TV show.) Beside Jenna, Drew spied Alli squeezing her hand underneath the table. She clearly knew more than Drew did.

"You think we won on penalties then?" Drew asked, trying

"I don't know, maybe," K.C. grumbled. "Armstrong was happy either way. Will you call me after?"

Jenna, who K.C. was addressing once again, nodded.

"Do you want to meet up, or-"

"We can work it out later," Jenna cut in, casting a quick glance at Drew. She didn't want him to know her top-secret plans. Whatever. Drew didn't care what she was up to; her stupid talent show thing didn't bother him in the first place. He turned his attention to Alli instead.

"Do you want to do something tonight too?" He asked. "My parents are going to a concert so they won't be there."

Alli looked over at Jenna, having a silent conversation with her.

"I should probably keep my evening free," Alli said apologetically, "sorry."

"What do you think they'll say today," K.C. asked in a low voice. "I mean, like, how long?"

"I don't know," Jenna admitted.

"Well, can you give me, like, an estimate?"

"I'm not sure," Jenna said, her voice creeping up in the throat. "I- I don't know."

"How can you not know?" K.C. said, much louder than Drew was expecting.

"K.C., don't," Alli said gently.

"Well it can't be that hard," K.C. said, not bothering to lower his voice. "It's just some basic math, Jenna."

Drew wasn't sure if it was the yelling, or the math insult, or her incredibly helpless looking face, but Drew actually felt a little sorry for Jenna. It wasn't her fault that Kyle the producer at the TV show was going to make Jenna work for long hours away from K.C. (Drew was pretty confident this is what they were talking about.)

"I've been really stressed with everything lately," said Jenna in a strangled voice. "It's been hard to keep track with all this other stuff going on."

K.C. seemed to be quite aggressively chewing the inside of his mouth, he didn't say anything, but looked liked he really wanted to. Eventually that look disappeared and he remained silent, turning his paper bag around to start folding the corners on the other side. Drew tired to look at anywhere else but the people at his table. His eyes eventually wandered to Adam's table, where he sat with Clare and Eli, the later of whom was pointing animatedly at a book. Adam pulled a funny face, apparently doing a whiny emo impression that reminded Drew of Ghoulsworthy. The others laughed. Even talking about books looked like more fun that what was going on at Drew's table. K.C. sat, his thumb pressed so forcefully against his temple, it looked like it was going to rip through the skin and stab him in the brain. He thankfully removed it to push himself away from the table.

"I have to-" he started, but didn't finish. "Call me when…"

He nodded, lifted up his bag and walked away, not bothering to look back.

Drew wondered if he should maybe leave too; clearly Jenna and Alli wanted to talk about something that Drew wasn't supposed to hear. But if he left, he'd probably be expected to help K.C. with… whatever it was that he was in a bad mood about, and he just didn't want to have to deal with anyone's problems; he was starting to finally get into a nice, problem-free zone and he liked it there.

"So," he said, trying to break the wall of tension, but feeling pretty sure that his words just bounced off the wall and smacked him in the face instead. "We should talk about something else."

"Like what?" Alli asked.

"Well," Drew began. "We can discuss movies."

Neither of the girls seemed all that interested.

"Or activities," he tried. Still nothing.

Drew snuck another glance over at Adam's table. Eli still had the book (from what Drew could see, it looked like one of those stupid vampire love stories) and was pointing at a passage, rolling his eyes. Clare playfully shoved him as Adam laughed at what Eli was reading out.

Alli and Jenna went back to their silent conversation. Drew finished folding the corners of K.C. abandoned lunch bag. Once again Jenna had sabotaged one of their dates. If she weren't there, Drew and Alli would have plenty to discuss about movies and activities. If they managed to get some genuine alone time, they would finally be able to find out what they had in common.

Drew just knew it.

.

oOo

.

The whole thing was organized. Little Miss Steaks. No phones. No Friends. No TV or distractions. Seven pm sharp.

Nothing could get in the way. They could finally just talk and be a couple.

Drew got there twenty minutes early, not wanting a repeat of what happened at The Dot, ordering a table for two in advance. He didn't even bother taking his phone with him, deciding that if he was going to have it switched off the whole time, then there was no point in brining it at all. He was starting to regret that decision as he waited. He was getting pretty bored until Alli showed up at exactly seven o'clock.

"Hey," she said, walking straight over to him and giving him a quick kiss. Her lips were all sticky and shiny, but they tasted very nice, so Drew didn't mind.

"You look great," he said, pointing at her.

"Thank you," Alli beamed, "you too."

They both smiled and nodded at each other for a stupidly long time, like those little bobble-headed toy dogs you see in the back of people's cars.

"Should be order a table," Alli eventually said, pointing to the front desk.

"I did that already."

"Oh," Alli said. "Than should we-"

"Yeah, yeah," Drew stammered, showing her the table he had saved while he waited. He pulled out her chair for her to sit on and feeling weirdly like more like her waiter than her date.

"Can I take your order?" he joked feebly. Alli smiled.

"Nah, it's okay," she said, still grinning.

Drew sat down in his own seat, suddenly realising that he was directly across from the booth he was sitting in with Grams the week before. He tried to readjust his chair to avoid seeing it; he was trying pretty hard to forget about that night.

He hastily picked up his menu and shoved his head as far in as he could while still being able to read it.

"Hungry?" he heard Alli say, sounding amused.

"Starving," he muttered.

"Oh. Okay."

From the gap below his menu, he could see Alli's hands as she picked up her own to read. No one said anything for a long while.

"Hey," Drew said, trying to make some sort of conversation, "They've changed the menu since last time I was here."

"Hm?"

"Yeah, they've added the calories and stuff. I don't think they had that last week. Weird."

"You were here last week?" Alli asked inquisitively, "who with?"

Drew didn't particularly want to talk about that. The dinner with Grams was not one of his prouder moments. He ignored the question and started looking around at all the things on the walls instead.

"Heh, skull," Drew said, pointing to a buffalo skull hanging on the wall behind Alli. "You ever watch Pokemon?"

"No."

"Oh. Well there's a Pokemon who wears a skull that looks just like that – Cubone. He's a ground-type."

"Mm-hmm," Alli droned from behind her menu. Drew took that as a sign to take a better look at his. He was pretty sure they had added new pictures too, that was interesting. He looked at the desserts, despite the fact that was pretty sure he wasn't going to get one. His chair rocked a little bit; the front left leg was a little bit shorter than the others. He considered changing it for another chair, but ultimately decided not to. The rocking gave him something to do.

"The tapas is a false economy."

"Hm?"

Alli had put her menu flat on the table, examining two of the pages.

"Well the tapas offers any three starters for twelve dollars, with the average price of a starter being six dollars fifty," she exposited. "But if the number of calories listed for each suggest that the tapas versions are significantly smaller."

"Uh-huh,"

"If we assume a regular starter to weigh one hundred grams-"

"-I'd be pissed if my six-fifty starter was only a hundred grams-"

"-It's just for argument's sake. Let me work this out."

She produced a pen and started writing on her napkin. It felt way too much like school for Drew's liking.

"Okay, so six hundred and fifty cents per one hundred grams…"

Drew's mind moved to other things; he wondered if he could stick one of the spare coasters under his short chair leg without Alli noticing that he'd stopped paying attention to her math lesson. He decided that he probably couldn't and instead found himself trying to remember the Pokemon rap; he used to be able to recite the whole thing from memory. Was it Rapidash, Magneton, Snorlax, or Rapidash, Caterpie, Snorlax? He'd have to look it up. If only he had his phone.

"-So you're actually getting less for your dollar," Alli concluded, dropping her pen triumphantly. "You're paying for variety, basically," she passed her napkin equation to Drew to examine. He'd have to take her word for it.

"Well yeah," Drew shrugged, "why have a lot of one thing when you can keep things interesting with a little bit of everything?"

Alli raised an eyebrow.

"You'd honestly pay more for less?"

"Well it's not less," Drew insisted, "it gives you the chance to try something new. What if you're curious about, I don't know, the carnitas, but you've always tired beef burritos and you're happy with it and all, but it turns out that carnitas is your favourite food, and you never find out because you've never tried it? Well, try a little bit and you can you discover your food destiny!"

"I'm happy with beef burritos," Alli said dully, grabbing her napkin back.

"Variety is the spice of life, Alli."

"Yeah, well too many spices spoil the broth, so-"

Drew would have corrected her and told her that it was "cooks" that spoil the broth, but he was pretty sure that she already knew that. She seemed mad at him, but he had no idea why. He was going to blame Jenna anyway. And Little Miss Steaks too - his dinners at Little Miss Steaks never went well. He should have stuck by his vow to never set foot in the place again.

"What can I get you, partners?"

Alli smiled over to the waiter, making Drew suddenly realise just how little she had been smiling before.

"I'll have a veggie enchilada and pepper fries, please?"

She looked over at Drew expectantly, like his order was going to be some sort of test that he had no idea how to pass. She was mad at him. He didn't even do anything yet. He had followed all her rules to a tee; he was on time, he didn't bring his phone, he even un-mulleted his shirt by tucking in both sides.

"And for the gentlemen?"

Drew sighed, wondering why the universe was so hell-bent on making sure he couldn't just have a nice date with his girlfriend.

"I'll have the tex-mex tapas, please."

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oOo

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- It's Rapidash, Magneton, Snorlax. Just in case you were wondering ;)

- 20 percent of Canadian teens smoke, but none of the kids on Degrassi are ever seen lighting up. I find this highly suspicious!

In the next chapter: The Torres brothers have slightly different views on forgiveness.