Now that summer was close on spring's heels, the sun was growing warmer, and Chris felt the heat on his back as he walked over to Gordie's house the next day. When he got there, he discovered that Gordie and Elizabeth were playing basketball in his driveway.

"Hey Chris," Gordie called, as always genuinely pleased to see him.

"Hey." He crossed the driveway and Gordie bounced the ball to him. Absentmindedly passing the ball from hand to hand as he stood there, feeling like he shouldn't be there, he said, "So uh, how's life?"

"Crappy," Elizabeth said. "Gordie gouged me with his stupid girly fingernails. I was bleeding unstoppably but then I stopped. And he cheats! Every time I get the ball, which isn't very often, he holds me back by the loopholes in my jeans or he tickles me, and I am strongly reconsidering what his actual allure is because right now I dislike him."

"I'm sorry to hear that," Chris said.

"Something wrong, man?" Gordie asked. His intuition towards Chris' feelings had always been flawless.

"Uhh…" He carelessly tossed the ball up to the net. It bounced off the backboard and missed the basket. "Me and Ren broke up last night."

Elizabeth's mouth gaped open. Gordie just looked confused. He asked, "Why?"

Retrieving the ball from a flowerbed, Chris replied, "She didn't think I cared about her. Which really isn't true."

"Harsh," Gordie muttered.

"Yeah, she cried. But I didn't know what to say to her because every time I tried to tell her she was wrong about what she thought she wouldn't believe me." He glanced over at Elizabeth. "You trying to catch flies?"

She shut her mouth. "I am both shocked and disgusted."

"Yeah?" He sat down next to her on the newly mowed grass. "I'm not too cheerful myself."

"You're both retarded."

"I am not retarded," Chris said adamantly. "Even though I don't try to buy her off like she's used to, she should know how I feel about her."

"Chris, it's not about money for her," Elizabeth said. "You know she doesn't understand what it's like to be loved."

Chris noticed that his shoelace was untied. So he tied it, taking his time, thinking about how to say what he was thinking in a way that wasn't mean. "Don't take this the wrong way. I love her, but she's a self-centered, spoiled girl who has a case of 'poor-little-me's.' When something good came along that made her happy for once, she had to sabotage it."

"Because she doesn't think she deserves to be happy!"

"When you're as miserable as Ren is, you're used to being miserable, and it's hard to get out of it," he told her. "Gordie, stop listening because I think I might get mushy." Gordie smirked at him and shrugged indifferently. "I fell in love with Ren because she showed me the side of her that wasn't miserable, and I'm not sure if you've ever seen that side of her, but it's amazing how beautiful it is. And I was under the illusion that I might even be able to save her, because with the way she was going, her unhappiness was going to kill her. But after awhile, I fell in love with the lonely parts of her too. I mean, I love her completely--everything about her--and to say that she doesn't think I even care about her is just ignorant."

"Maybe she was looking for some reassurance," Gordie suggested. "Did you ever tell her you loved her? She might have just wanted to hear you say the words."

"I don't think that was it," Chris said. "Love could bite her on the ass and she wouldn't know it."

"Hmm…two guys discussing love." Elizabeth shivered. "This seems strange."

"What do you think?" Gordie asked her. "You like to babble."

"I do not babble, I speculate," she grumbled. "Okay, to summarize the situation: Ren has always been sad and lonely, and she claims that her family doesn't give a shit about her. And obviously her old friends didn't give a shit about her either. So it's probably safe to assume that she hasn't got the slightest clue about how to accept love. And then, ta-fucking-da, Chris comes into the picture, yaaaay Chris--" Elizabeth took a break from her summarization so that she could clap for Chris. "And he treats her like the last piece of toilet paper--"

"Okay, what?" Gordie demanded. "Toilet paper?"

"Must I explain everything to you?" she sighed. "The last piece of toilet paper. You love it, you treasure it, you would kill for it, and you would never let anyone else have it."

"Those were some awfully loving words you chose to describe toilet paper," Chris pointed out. "Continue."

"Thank you. All right, as I was saying, Chris treats Ren like how she isn't used to being treated. She falls in love with him, he falls in love with her, and it's all hugs and sunshine until SHE FUCKS IT UP."

"Hahahahaha thank you, thank you," Chris said. "I am not at fault this time."

"Yeah, but guess who never told her that he loved her?" Elizabeth snapped. "Guess who never gave her any reassurance that he loved her, just left her to assume that either he did or he didn't? That would be you, Christopher."

"I've never had a girlfriend, alright?" Chris became defensive. "I'm not experienced in the whole 'oh baby oh baby I love you' thing. So sue me, the first girl I ever dated coincidentally happens to be the first girl I ever loved and I didn't know what to do. I was trying to condense a thousand feelings into one touch, and I just hoped that she'd get the message."

She sighed. "Why can't you say stuff like that to her? Any girl would be yours forever if you were to be all sweet like that."

"Except you," Gordie told her.

"Yeah, sure." she replied. "Except me. Whatever."

"Well I'm sorry, I'm not good at being smooth under pressure!" Chris cried. "I say stupid stuff like 'nice shoes' and 'your eyes look like chipmunk fur.'"

"Chipmunk fur?"

"Yeah. But I said that to a girl when we were six, not Ren, thank God," he laughed.

"Do you want her back?"

He didn't hesitate. "Of course I do. I'd have to be a complete moron to pass up a chance with her." The confident tone in his voice faltered. "But she's gotta grow up first."

"Ohhhhh you ruined it, you ruined it!" Elizabeth cried, flopping backwards onto the grass. "You were so Casanova and then you ruined it!"

"What? It's true!" he protested. "She has to grow up and see that the world doesn't revolve around her, and that not everybody's out to get her."

"Okay, how about you say all that nice stuff to her and magically neglect to say the 'grow up' part?" She smiled up at him from the ground when he looked back at her. "It would work! Oh, and tell her that you have incomprehensible sexual prowess because every girl likes that. Unless she's a nun of course."

"Or a Catholic sixteen-year-old named Elizabeth," Gordie added.

"Hey, that's me you're describing!" she snapped.

"Exactly! I have incomprehensible sexual prowess, yet you seem to be able to deflect all my efforts!" Gordie dropped to his knees and tickled her. Over her squeals of laughter, he told Chris, "Or, you could forget everything Ellie just said and wait for Ren to crawl back to you, begging for forgiveness."

Chris laughed. He didn't know what he was going to do, but it probably wouldn't involve any sexual prowess, unless the situation was drastic.