Girl Talk/Boy Talk:
An excerpt from Epilog Two "No Time to Waste"
by TheRealXenocide
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Disclaimer: I do not own the characters, settings, or anything else you recognize from the show Lizzie McGuire. The plot, at it's base, has been around since Homer, and this variant since Henry Ford. However, this is the first I've seen it applied to Lizzie.
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IMPORTANT NOTE: This is a missing scene from a MUCH larger story if mine titled "No Time To Waste". If you haven't been reading that story, much of this won't make a lot of sense. Don't let that stop you completely! I invite you to read "No Time To Waste", as well as the earlier R-rated excerpt, then come back to read this. According to most of my reviewers, you won't be sorry.
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A/N: The rating is due mainly to parts two and three. Larry fans should especially enjoy part two.

A/N: With the high percentage of females in my extended family, I have heard more than one 'girl/woman talk' conversation I was never meant to hear. The girls' parts of this will draw on my memories of those overheard conversations. If the girls' scenes in part two aren't common of most girls, I ask for your understanding. The women of my family are a bit . . . unusual, but they're all I've got to work with.

A/N: When Larry mentions 'gaming', the term is used in reference to hobby games, such as the Role-Playing Games we learned he was into in the episode "Gordo and the Dwarves". The gambling industry has started calling itself the gaming industry, but to my knowledge, hobby gamers were using the term first.

Timeline placement: This happens on the Wednesday before Kate's announcement party.
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Aside from Epilog Two:
Girl Talk/Boy Talk

Part 1
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It was only after Kate decided to make her announcement at a party that everyone realized that she'd only given a week to get it together. As a result, Lizzie and Miranda were coming over every day to help Kate get everything ready.

By Tuesday, Ethan was asking for the girls to bring Gordo and Matt with them.

As Wednesday was also the only day before the party that Larry would be available to go over the music, Kate decided that it would be good to get everyone together. Larry was planning on starting his own business in providing music (he hated to use the term DJ), and agreed to so for Ethan and Kate.

The band Ethan had been in wasn't doing it because they had dumped him. Not because of his blindness, but because of his marriage. Apparently, they only kept him around for all the groupie girls they expected him to attract. They saw his marriage to Kate as an end to that possibility, so the dumped him for another pretty-boy chick magnet.

As the trio had to wait for Matt to get out of practice, they arrived after Larry. They were surprised when they found not only Larry, but Parker there as well. It surprised everyone because her parents had become very strict about her and Larry being alone. But all Parker would say was something about 'not looking a gift horse in the mouth', so they let it go.

Now, at 6:00 p.m., everything that didn't have to wait until the day of the party was done, and they just finished a pizza dinner. The eight of them were in Ethan and Kate's rooms for a rest before the guests had to go home for the night. It didn't take long for Kate and the girls to retreat to the bedroom for some "girl talk", leaving the guys in the living room.

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"Man, Larry, I thought Miranda had a lot of music." Matt remarked, not for the first time today, as he marveled at the size of the song list Larry had on the PDA he'd brought. "How can you afford so much?"

Larry shrugged. "Just what I've collected over time. Getting a lot of 'greatest hits' and collections helps, but really, until Parker, I didn't have much to spend money on but sci-fi, gaming, and music."

"Come on, man, I know you had girlfriends before Parker. At least one."

Larry shook his head. "I don't count one date as a girlfriend, and Miranda and Parker are the only girls who ever said yes to a second date."

"Ya know, Larry," Gordo came into the conversation here, "that's one story you've never told me. How did you and Parker first get together?"

Larry paused, the look on his face suggesting there was an unpleasant memory involved. Both Gordo and Matt jumped slightly when Ethan spoke. "If I'm why you're not talking, it's okay. They know both Kate and I have pasts we're not proud of. They've heard about some of Kate's, it's only fair they know some of mine."

Larry was looking hard at Ethan, judging his face against his words. "Parker's right, you know. You have changed. For the better."

"I'm suddenly not sure I should know this." Gordo remarked. "But you've got me curious. How does Ethan fit in to how you and Parker got together?"

Larry thought about it a moment. Then he went to the bedroom door, and knocked. The others guessed correctly that he was asking Parker if it was okay with her. When he sat back down, he smiled. "This may sound like something from "The Twilight Zone", but your better halves," he indicated Gordo and Matt, "just asked mine much the same question." He took a breath. "Okay, it happened like this . . ."

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A/N: The stories the two groups hear, while not identical, were very similar. I'll be switching you between rooms at certain points, so you can get the whole story.

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"The summer you all went to Rome, I was stuck here." Parker began. When she said she would start at the beginning, she meant it. "My little sister, Maddy, refused to leave me alone. This was nothing new, but I finally had enough. I asked, then begged my parents for a better lock for my room. The one I had could be popped with a nail. They refused, at first. Then one day, I lost it. I yelled some pretty nasty stuff at her, bad enough she broke down into tears. Of course, that didn't go ever well with our parents, and with the mood I was in . . . let's say it was a day we all want to forget. It was a week before we were able to talk sensibly with each other. But they finally agreed that it was in everyone's best interest for me to have a sanctuary that Maddy couldn't get in to. So once I came off my grounding, I would be allowed a lock on two conditions. First, both Mom and Dad had to have their own keys. Second, I had to earn the money to have it done."

"I've wished for years that I could have a Matt-proof lock, but I don't think there is such a thing." Lizzie remarked.

"Hey!" Miranda loyally protested.

Lizzie ignored the outburst. "But you had to pay for it?"

"Yeah. My folks said it was to teach me responsibility, but I think they were still mad at me. Anyway, I was looking in the newspaper when I saw a want ad for tutors for an unnamed high school student. Among the subjects listed were English Lit. and grammar. I've always had good marks in English, especially in the Literature sections, so I thought I'd check it out."

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"We were back from Rome by then." Ethan explained. "My dad had given me a 'I'm disappointed in you' speech about my grades and such, and I finally decided I needed to catch up to you guys. But I didn't want everyone to know about it, so I put an ad in the paper with no name, but a contact number nobody knew was mine."

"When I called," Larry added, "I got a machine telling me to leave my name, number, and a list of the subjects I could teach. It wasn't even Ethan's voice. Machines are no big deal for me, and I wanted the money, so I left a message."

"I almost didn't call Larry," Ethan said, "but he was the only call I had for math by the time I wanted to get going. I ended up hiring Larry for Math and Science, Parker for Grammar and Lit, and two more people who finished the subjects I was after."

"Back up a step." Gordo cut in. "Why be so secretive?"

"Because of the other thing I'd decided to change. You know I've never had a problem getting a girl's attention. But until . . . we returned from Rome, I never pushed for more than their attention, so I'd never gotten more."

It took a second for the meaning of Ethan wording to register. "You mean with all the girls who were after you, you'd never . . ."

"I mean I hadn't even gotten to second base except by accident."

"How . . ." Matt began to ask.

"We tripped over each other, and she was in a tube top." The three listeners all snickered at the image that brought to their minds. "Anyway, I'd decided to make an effort to get more. To get everything, if I could. But I thought it was only the 'big, cute, dummy' Ethan that so many girls wanted to get close to, and I didn't want to chance losing that image. So, I wanted my tutoring to be a secret."

"If course, that's not what he told us." Larry pointed out. "Something about not wanting people mocking him about the tutoring, as I remember. We, and our parents, had to sign contracts that included a non-disclosure agreement. But the pay was much better than anything else I had the time for, so I had no problem agreeing to that."

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"So, you and Larry got to know each other through tutoring Ethan." Lizzie cut in. "But that doesn't explain why you and Kate, or Larry and Ethan, had a problem with each other."

"Because, since Larry and I were the most organized to the group, we made out the schedule for Ethan's tutoring that gave everyone the time they needed. It was while working together on that that I got past his geek image, and came to think of Larry as a friend. Something I had precious few of."

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"Miranda and I didn't break up until after I made friends with Parker. I honestly didn't think of her as more until it seemed like it was too late."

"While I was working on my fast seduction with the girls I was dating, I saw Parker as the perfect chance to work on my slow seduction." Ethan admitted. "And I mean slow. It wasn't until after Thanksgiving weekend that I decided to try to go past flirting with her. Even though I had finally gone all the way with somebody else, I wanted to take my time with her."

"When Parker started finding ways the schedule things so that she was always last on her days, she admitted to me that she was falling for Ethan, and she said that he was starting to feel the same way. I hadn't admitted to myself yet that I might be feeling more than friendship for her, so my only warning was that it was unwise to start seeing a client as more than a client. She seemed sure that everything would be fine, so I didn't press the issue."

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"Ethan didn't want anybody to know we were seeing each other. He said he was afraid that people who knew I was a tutor might see us together, and make the connection." Parker shook her head. "Dumb as it sounds now, I was so far gone for him, I fell for it. So we met at his place, and mostly stayed in. If we did go out, it was someplace fancy, and over an hour away."

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"Things progressed physically as well as I had hoped. By winter break, I was sure I could get her in bed as soon as I chose." Nothing in Ethan's tone suggested bragging. "I choose New Year's Eve, when I knew I'd have the house all to myself until around noon the next day. Dad left for a party at 6, and Parker arrived at 6:30."

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"Something in the way Ethan told me his dad wasn't there made me guess how Ethan wanted the night to end. And I was so sure I loved him, I wanted it, too." Parker admitted. "The night started like so many before it. Dinner in the fancy dining room, then to the home theater room for a movie. But this time, once we started making out, we didn't stop except to change rooms." She looked at Kate. "I'll give Ethan this, whatever his intentions are for a girl afterward, he's very considerate during sex."

"I'm glad he made that enjoyable, but there was actually a selfish reason for his 'selflessness' in bed." The girls looked at Kate, puzzled by that. "It's one of the things Ethan's confessed to me. A bachelor uncle of his had a talk with him, and shared some 'tricks of a successful bachelor'. One of them was that if he made sure to put his partner's wishes, and orgasms, ahead of his own, word would spread through girl talk, and he'd get more sex because of it." Parker's face fell slightly. "I'm sorry, but you already knew how selfish Ethan was back then."

"Yeah, I know. And I can tell how much he's changed."

"Parker." Miranda got her attention. "Am I right in guessing that Ethan dumped you after that?"

"With the old 'it wouldn't work out can we still be friends' speech."

"I'm sorry he did that, and I'm not trying to sound insensitive, but what does that have to do with you and Larry getting together?"

"Because in my heartbreak over Ethan, the first friend I thought to turn to was Larry."

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"Not long before their night, I'd finally admitted to myself that I felt far more than friendship for Parker, but she seemed so happy with Ethan. When she came to me after he dumped her . . . I'm not sure how long it was, but I let her cry on me as long as she needed. When she finally was able to speak so I could understand her, I was madder than I've ever been. But I swallowed it down, and focused on comforting her. While doing that, I accidently told her how I felt about her. We both knew she wasn't ready for that, and I agreed to try to wait for her before we talked about it again. When she finally felt okay enough to go home, I asked mom to drive her. There was something else I felt I had to do."

"Uh, oh." Matt cut in. "I know that anger."

Larry nodded. "I tracked Ethan down to a club just outside town."

"I've always been able to pass for older than I am. I didn't want to test my luck with a fake ID of 21 yet, but that dance club only needed 18. My fake for that had been working for three months by then, and it worked that night."

"I was lucky in a way, because he was just getting to the passenger side of a car to leave with some girl I didn't know. So I got close, called his name, and as soon as he saw me, I charged."

"He might not look it, but when he's pissed, he can hurt you." Ethan remarked. In what had to be an unconscious act, he rubbed his wrist as if it hurt.

"Wait a minute." Gordo cut in, remembering something. "You come back from that winter break with a black eye, broken nose, and broken wrist. I remember you said it was a skiing accident. Was that all Larry?"

"That and the cracked rib my shirts kept me from having to explain."

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"BOYS!" Miranda exclaimed. "Why do they think they have to pound whatever they think threatens us?"

"Years of training. But I don't think you have to worry about that as much." Miranda looked at Lizzie as if she were crazy. "I mean, if somebody actually hurt you, I'm sure he'd attack. But he's close enough to his old self now that if it's something else, like a really disgusting insult, he'd be more likely to throw his dirtiest pranks at them until they're crying in defeat."

Miranda remembered some of the stories she'd heard about Matt, as well as their confrontation with Clair and Brett at the mall, and smiled. "You're probably right."

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Matt cut in here. "Hold on a minute. How come we didn't see any signs of a problem at the Park party?"

Larry answered first. "You know Lizzie invited us the Tuesday before the party, right?"

"Yeah." Gordo answered.

"Right after Lizzie hung up, Parker called me about it. Even though it had been a year and a half, I still didn't want to have anything more to do with him than was absolutely necessary. But Parker was insistent, wanting to hear everything Lizzie had promised we'd find out about then, and wanting to get away from her parents for a while. By the time we said good night, I had finally agreed to "think about it", but all I could think about was finding a way to get out of it that wouldn't upset Parker."

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"When I hung up with Larry, I knew that even if I could get him to go, he and Ethan's first meeting could turn ugly. I wasn't sure what to do before I went to bed, but I woke with an idea. Lizzie had said that Kate was changing, even trying to reconcile with them. I'd already come to terms myself about Ethan, but I hadn't spoken to him about it. I thought that if Kate was changing, Ethan might be, too. So, I decided to call Kate, both to see if she was changing and to find out more about Ethan."

"Somewhere in the apologizes, I mentioned our having that big meeting." Kate said. "Parker latched onto the idea, and we eventually decided to try it for the four of us."

"It took some convincing, and some shameless use of guilt, but we got it set for my place the next day."

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"I wasn't looking forward to it, but I knew I wouldn't hear the end of it if I didn't try." Larry admitted.

"I think I had about as much fun as Katie did at hers." Ethan observed. "But we must have gotten through, because he agreed to give me a chance."

"I liked Kate's idea about 'probation'." Larry remarked. Matt and Gordo exchanged a look at that, but said nothing.

"Can I ask you something about that?" Ethan asked.

"Sure."

"You've been friendlier with me lately. Does that mean I've somehow gotten past that with you?"

Larry was silent for a moment. "It was the way you spoke about Kate being pregnant. Having been there myself, I know there's no way you could have talked like that without having changed."

After a heavy silence. "I guess all this explains your cryptic "it's an old debt" remark when you made Larry best man." Gordo remarked. Ethan nodded.

"Speaking of the wedding, why did Parker need to talk to Kate before she became a bridesmaid? Was it still this?" Matt asked.

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"I wanted to believe they'd both changed, but marriage is such a huge step, I wanted to make sure Kate knew what she was doing." She smiled. "By the time we were done, I was as sure about it as they were."