Author's Note: This takes place somewhere between Chapter 13 and Chapter 14 of Bookends. There are two reasons why I wrote this: one, Hoagie is really fun to write, and two, I wanted to show how awesome Katie is.

Katie Dumped Me

Dejected.

If there was a word that he could use to describe how he felt right now, it would be dejected. He was by no means a big reader, nor had he ever fancied himself a particularly eloquent individual, yet somehow he picked up that word somewhere. It meant depressed or something. Anyway, it didn't really matter what its literal definition was. All he knew was that he felt it now.

He was sprawled against the grass in his backyard, his hands tucked behind his head as he stared up at the sky above him. He had been there all afternoon, and as the clouds slowly passed over him, the knot between his eyebrows tightened ever so slightly. Dejectedly. Even while alone his face hardly showed any emotion, yet he could feel all of it inside, whirling vividly like a pool of lava within a dormant volcano. He then decided that maybe melancholic would be a better word to describe how he felt, and he was surprised that he knew that word too. Nigel would be proud.

He squeezed his eyes shut, and instantly his mind drew back to that night at the Ferris Wheel. He could still picture it clearly in his mind - the look on her face as he closed in - and though he didn't want to believe it, he could swear there was a flicker of excitement in her eyes, as if she felt the same anticipation he felt that moment. Torturously, it gave him hope. Hope that he didn't want to have.

He sighed heavily through his nose. Or more like he fumed. All his sighs tended to be fumes. "She has a boyfriend," he whispered to himself quietly, as if he were afraid that even the silence around him might hear.

The minutes passed quietly as he stared up at the sky, his eyes gleaming like an emerald sea, then he heard the distant sound of his front door zealously swinging open. It was followed by greetings from his family - all oddly unbothered by the sudden commotion - then came a series of stomps getting closer and closer. He didn't even need to wonder who was coming. Hoagie was such a natural (and rather loud) presence at his house that his very arrival pretty much announced itself.

"NUMBUH FOUR!" Hoagie said as he burst through the back door. "You. Me. Video game marathon in your living room. LET'S GO!"

Hoagie then added flair to his invitation by hopping on top of a lawn chair and planting his hands on his hips, striking a pose worthy of a superhero on the cover of a comic book.

Wally didn't move. He didn't even turn to look. "Not interested."

"What?!" Hoagie exclaimed, his hands dropping from his hips incredulously. "Dude, there's only a few weeks of summer left! We only have so much time to cram all this gaming goodness before school is back on! Let's go!"

Wally shut his eyes apathetically. "No thanks."

It got quiet, and even with his eyes shut, Wally could tell that Hoagie was studying him.

"Dude, what's wrong with you?" Hoagie eventually asked.

Wally's first instinct was to mumble a passive 'nothing', but then he remembered that he actually had news to share with Hoagie. He blinked his eyes open and furrowed his brows, surprised that it hadn't crossed his mind until now. He then let the silence draw on for another beat before he delivered the news.

"Katie dumped me."

Hoagie fell even quieter and seemed momentarily frozen, which looked funny given that he was still standing on top of the lawn chair. He then crouched down and dropped into the seat with a goofy plop. Strangely enough, there was something about that motion that Wally quietly appreciated. He had to hand it to Hoagie. The guy was an endless well of jokes and shenanigans, but when the time came to be serious, he was pretty on point.

"Geez, I'm sorry to hear that…" Hoagie said sincerely. "You alright?"

"I'm fine," Wally said plainly as he closed his eyes again. There was not much else to say. He really was fine.

"You wanna talk about it?" Hoagie prodded.

Wally's age-old instincts kicked in again, and for a second, he almost went for a cursory crack at Hoagie. It was, after all, their way. They don't talk about these things. They just resort to off-handed insults and aggressive rough-housing. If there was any way that they talked about their feelings, it was that way.

And yet, no friendly insults came to Wally's mind. Not even a crack at Hoagie's clumsiness or his lame jokes, which were always easy targets. Instead what came was an unexpected willingness to talk. There was something oddly comforting about the thought of opening up, so with a prideful and dismissive sigh, Wally merely said, "Sure, I guess."

Hoagie lifted his cap and ruffled his hair before putting it back on, then he leaned back into the lawn chair. "So what happened?"

Wally's eyebrows knotted together as he thought back to the event, and passively, he began to tell Hoagie about it. The day had started out normally, at least as normal as it could be with an odd-ball like Katie. They were out in town, and things took a strange turn when she started acting even more bizarre than usual. She tried holding hands with him, which he thought was weird given that they weren't the type to hold hands. Then things took an even weirder turn when she let go and started constantly scuttling away from him, running into walls and tripping over trash cans along the process. Then a strange sort of goose-chase ensued, and after a few rounds of the madness, he finally lost it. Fortunately for him, she was a terrible liar, and it didn't take long for him to get the truth out of her.

"That's...actually pretty hilarious," Hoagie remarked, unable to keep himself from cracking a smile.

Wally laughed slightly. It was a pretty comical break-up now that he thought about it. Leave it to Katie to try and literally outrun an awkward conversation that she had been planning to have.

"So why did she break up with you?" Hoagie asked.

Wally's face strained once more. "She said…that said she wanted to be just friends. That I felt more like a buddy than a boyfriend. And that she couldn't really see us becoming genuinely romantic with each other."

And then there's that other thing, he thought quietly. The part where she mentioned her. The part where she said that she wanted him to be happy. The part where she practically handed him his freedom and encouraged him to go for something that he had zero-chance of obtaining.

The side of Wally's lips curled up slightly at the thought of it. Katie, he realized, was not just a cool girlfriend. She was an even cooler ex-girlfriend.

"Geez, I'm really sorry to hear that…" Hoagie said sympathetically, misinterpreting Wally's silence for a bout of heartache.

Once again they were quiet, but before long, Hoagie clapped his hands together and jumped off the lawn chair like a man with a mission.

"Alright, new plan!" He said excitedly. "You. Me. And that gloriously violent zombie movie you've been wanting to see at the theater. Let's go!"

Wally shut his eyes and sighed with an edge of irritation. "Hoagie, I'm really not in the mood."

"I reject your rejection!" Hoagie hissed in jest. "Nothing soothes a broken heart like blood and gore, so let's go!"

"Hey, idiot, my heart's not - "

"Let's GO, Wally!"

"Hoagie, if you don't shut up and leave me alone, I swear I'll clock you harder than I ever have in my life."

Hoagie considered his threat for only a second, but as always, he came out unaffected. He then walked over to where Wally was laying and crouched down with his hands on his knees, as if he were part of a football huddle. Then he turned his head to the side and shut his eyes, giving Wally clear access to the side of his head.

"What are you doing?" Wally scowled.

"Go ahead."

"Go ahead what."

"Hit me."

"What?"

"Hit me!"

"You're an idiot."

"Wally, if you want to hit me, hit me, but I swear on all the Yipper cards in the world that I am not going to let you sit here moping for the rest of this glorious summer day. So take your pick: hit your best friend, or watch a zombie movie with him."

Hoagie squeezed his eyes shut even harder and waited for the impact, going as far as to let his head descend slightly even lower towards Wally.

Wally managed to scowl for only a few seconds more before his lips caved into a reticent smile. He had to hand it to Hoagie. The guy was an endless well of jokes and shenanigans, but when the time came to be serious, he was pretty on point.