Gerry and Julius rode in silence for about ten minutes when Gerry broke in with, "Sheri and me were a couple since the summer before seventh grade and I asked her if I could kiss her. She said yes, then told me that if I ever told Alan she let me kiss her, she'd knock my teeth out."

"Did you tell?" Julius had to ask.

"Are you kidding? Sheri would have knocked my teeth out! She don't make idle threats, besides I think everyone, Alan included, figured it out pretty soon." Gerry laughed.

"So, why did you break up?"

Gerry sighed. "Sheri is like, this totally awesome dancer, you see?"

"Yeah," Julius said, automatically, though he really didn't see what that had to do with anything. "I've seen her. At pep rallies and games. She's pretty good."

"No, I don't mean that cheerleading junk. She just does that because she can't play football, and that's a way to still be around it, ya' know?" He continued before Julius could speak. "I mean, like real dancing. She's a ballerina and all that. She's taken lessons since, practically forever. When we were little, she was such a tomboy, her mom insisted she take dance to make her more lady like, or some crap like that. I don't really remember."

"Does this have a point?" Julius was tired of trying to keep up. Gerry could sure ramble on when he was trying to avoid answering something.

"I'm getting to that. Anyways, last Christmas she got this audition to this program Juilliard was putting on for young dancers, and she made it. Now, how she ever convinced Coach to let her stay in New York City, alone, for over two months, I'll never know, but she did. So the day after Christmas, she left. We had made this promise to each other, to go out and have fun, and hang out with friends, same as we would if we were together. So, I hung out with Ray and Alan, going to parties and shooting pool down at Hal's, stuff like that. Anyway, everywhere I went there was this girl, Letty, and she would try to hang all over me and stuff, but I would just brush her off, ya' know?"

Julius nodded, now completely lost. The only thing he understood was that Sheri went to New York, and some girl named Letty, tried to put the moves on Gerry.

"I ain't too proud of the next part, so, what ever you think of me, save it, cause I done told it all to myself hundred thousand times since then, okay?"

"Okay," Julius agreed, not too sure he wanted to hear the next part.

"It was about a month after Sheri had left and I was over at Ray's, and his girlfriend came over with her friend,..."

"Letty," Julius finished.

"Letty." Gerry nodded. "Anyways, it didn't take long for Ray and his girlfriend, who's name I can't say, cause you know her, and she's really changed, and I wouldn't want anybody to think bad about her,"

Julius rolled his eyes. At the rate this story was taking he would be an old man before it was over. "Get on with it, man."

"Do you want to hear this or not?" Gerry snapped.

"I'm listening, ain't I? Go on."

"Like I was saying, it didn't take long for Ray, and his girlfriend to forget that Letty and I were even in the room with them, and they were all but,... well..." Gerry faded off.

Julius held up his hand, motioning that he understood.

"Anyway, I got tired of trying to ignore them, and I was pretty sure Letty was tired of it, too, so I asked her if she wanted to go for a walk. Of course she accepted. So we left. We ended up just sitting on Ray's backporch, talking. She asked me if I really loved Sheridan. I told her yes. I did. I do. so she asked me, why? Then she kissed me, and, though for the life of me I can't figure out why, I kissed her back. When I realized what I had done, I stopped. I jumped in my Camaro and took off. I didn't do anything, but kiss Letty, but I felt so guilty. That night, Coach called and asked if I wanted to go with him and Sheryl to see Sheri the next day. I had my mom tell him I was sick. Anyway, to make a very long story, somewhat shorter, Sheri came home in March and everything was fine. No, they weren't fine, but they weren't bad either. Until, one night, I was over at her house, and me and her and Sheryl were watching t.v. and Coach came in the den and told her she needed to go in the kitchen and answer the phone. He had a funny look on his face, but I didn't think anything about it, I just figured it was her mom calling. They didn't let Sheryl talk to her much cause it just upsets her, so I figured that's why he sent her out of the room, ya' know? But when she came back, she was upset, and asked me to go outside with her. She ended up telling me about this guy, Quinten, that she met in New York. She said they went out a couple of times, and obviously, he didn't think it had ended when she left. I kind lost it. I went to yelling at her and she just sat there, cause she thought she deserved it, but truth was, she didn't, I did. Sheri has a temper too, and she will only take so much before she gives some back and after a few minutes, she asked me about Letty. I denied it. I told her nothing happened with Letty. I don't know why I did, except that I was still trying to convince myself it didn't happen. Then she told me that Letty had already told her all about it and Ray had backed her up saying he had seen it. I was caught, so I admitted it. I apologized, like should have in the first place. then she told me she had never done anything more than have dinner with Quinten. She also said that she could have forgiven me for kissing Letty, but she couldn't forgive me lying to her. So, we broke up, and that was that. A few weeks later, she started dating Kurt, and I started dating Emma." Gerry fell silent, the tale now told.

"Man, that sucks," Julius said, after a few minutes. He wasn't about to say it, but he had a feeling Superman had been set up by his so-called friend. "Did you ever try to tell her you still loved her after that?" He had definitely heard that "I did. I do."

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because, Sheri isn't the easiest person to get to forgive you. Once she gets mad at you, she'll freeze you out, anytime you talk about something she don't want to hear." Gerry explained.

"So, that's why you told Sunshine she was an ice princess."

"No," that boyish grin replaced the grim look on Gerry's face. "I told Sunshine she was an ice princess because he had already got the best of me earlier that day. He wasn't going to get my girl, too. Don't repeat that please. Sheri would kill me for calling her that."

Julius couldn't help but laugh too.



Gerry slowed down as he reached the dirt road Ray and Sheri had pulled down earlier. Much to thier surprise, they could see a figure walking towards them. Gerry stopped and jumped out.

"Sheri?! Are you okay?" He asked as Julius joined them.

"Yes, I'm okay. What are you doing here?!" She demanded.

"Trying to help you out," Gerry replied.

"Oh, really? You wanted to play the knight in shining armor? well, guess what Lancelot? You're about five minutes too late for that," she snapped. "I told you I could take care of myself. I don't need your help. Hello, Ju."

Julius nodded.

"Where's Ray?" Gerry asked. "Did he tell you to walk home?"

"He's back there," she pointed behind her. "Recovering from an unwelcome knee to a very sensitive spot. Give me ride, please."

"Thought you don't need my help."



"Look, Big Head, just give me a ride, okay?"

"Get in the car," Gerry replied.

"Thank you," she turned to get in the car but Gerry caught her arm and pulled her into a warm embrace. "Are you sure you're okay?" He whispered. She nodded, and hugged him back, glad that she could still count on him, though she didn't like to admit that she sometimes needed even his help.

"I'm fine, Gerry, really. Though Ray may be sing saprano for awhile," she grinned.

Gerry laughed, "You are something else, Sheridan Rose."



Julius watched the two as he climbed in the backseat and settled in for one of the strangest rides of his life.

"Yep," he thought. "There is definitely hope for these two. We just got to get them back together."



(There you go, now you know how Gerry and Sheri broke up, but can Julius and the team get them back together? P.S. Brownies to the person who can guess who Ray's girlfriend was!!!! P.P.S. Kora, was that too damsel in distress-ish for you? LOL)