Sorry it's been so long, thanks again for being so nice, everyone!

Chapter Four:

It had been a week since Billy had arrived, and Carmen noticed that Bee had quickly and easily settled in to having him around. Today she had walked down to the park with him to kick around a soccer ball, and Carmen had joined them later with Ryan. She was sitting calmly by Bridget - a mark of how well Bee played, Carmen realized, that she trusted her one-year-old brother not to be in danger of getting hit in the head by a stray ball.

"So he knows about Eric, right?" Carmen said, prying a twig out of Ryan's hands before it made its way into his mouth.

"See, there's the funny part, Carma," Bee said with a grin. "I didn't tell him the other day, I just couldn't."

"Don't look so unconcerned," Carmen scolded. "You need to tell him!"

Bee shrugged as she slammed the ball back towards him, not even looking at it. "I'll tell him, Carmabelle."

"Bee, Eric's coming in three days, what happens if he shows up and Billy doesn't understand?" Carmen asked, worried.

"It'll be fine, Carmen."

"He's going to be upset if he doesn't hear it from you," Carmen warned. "He's going to feel led on."

Bee sighed and stopped the ball under her foot. "Billy?"

"Yeah?" he called back, and Carmen shook her head at his unmistakable happiness.

"Billy, come here for a minute," Bee shouted back. She gave Carmen an "are you happy now?" look as he trotted over. "We need to talk."

He looked concerned, and looked towards Carmen, as though she could tell him what was wrong. She gave him the most encouraging smile she could manage. "What's up?"

"Let's walk," Bee said, and Carmen watched them stroll along the path, and with horror, she noticed that Bee was walking no differently with him than she usually would, leaning a little towards him, letting her hand brush his.

"Oh, Bee," Carmen murmured. Bee obviously didn't notice that she wasn't acting the way she was, but Billy looked so earnest and trusting that she couldn't help but feel sorry for him. He reminded her of Win in a lot of ways, so eager to help and to be loving.

Carmen watched as they continued to walk, wondering where they were in their conversation. They stopped, Carmen could see Bee's face, sweet and concerned, but not full of much emotion. Bee had given this talk so many times before, it was practically rehearsed. Suddenly, Billy was moving, quickly, the other way. Bee reached out for his hand, he pulled away and strode down the path. Carmen gave a sharp intake of breath.

Bee jogged back, and as she neared, Carmen was startled to see tears trickling down her cheeks.

"Oh, Bee," she said softly, putting her arms around her. "Was he angry?"

"No," Bee said. "Not angry. I could have dealt with angry, because they're all angry. But he was sad, so sad. Just looked like he was a puppy and I kicked him." She gazed ruefully at her tanned, strong, soccer legs. "Kicked him." She repeated.

"What are you going to do?"

"I don't know."

Carmen got to her feet. "Where is he, Bee?"

She looked puzzled, even through her tears.

"Come on, Bee, you know where he went," Carmen pressed. "I know you do, you know him well enough."

"The elementary school," Bee said in a tiny voice. "We were going every day to watch the little kids play soccer. It was a good place to talk."

"I'm going," Carmen said with finality. "I'll talk to him. Stay with Ryan?"

"Yeah," Bee said, rolling over onto her stomach. "Call Tibbadee and tell her to come keep me company."

As Carmen pulled up at the elementary school, she wondered what she was doing. Why she had followed him here, why she was going to try to talk him out of being upset when she had only met him a few days ago. She looked down to realize she was wearing the Pants, and smiled. That explained a lot, the Pants made Carma a lot more daring than she usually was.

She found him on the bleachers, as Bee had predicted. In the topmost row, away from the parents and coaches, in a little corner of solitude, safe from the outside world, submerged in soccer. She sat in the row in front of his, facing backwards so that she could look at him as she talked.

"What are you doing here?" he asked, though not in a tone that sounded angry or annoyed.

She shrugged. "You seemed upset. I thought you might need to talk."

"You knew the whole time, didn't you?" He gave her a look so soulful and sad that she understood what Bee had meant. Her heart went out to him, and she bit her lip as she watched an unwanted tear trickle down his cheek.

"Yes, I knew," she said gently. "Tell me about Bee."

"God, Carmen, she's amazing," he said earnestly, and she smiled quietly. "She left two summers ago and I missed her so much, I didn't want to chase her down, I knew deep down that there wasn't really any use to hope. That other guys had to have noticed, to have asked, to have been rejected. And then this summer, when her grandmother was coming, I couldn't miss the chance. I never thought about another girl the same way I think of Bee. I knew it was too much to hope, but I guess I still-" he broke off miserably.

"She cares about you so much, Billy," Carmen said softly, putting a comforting hand on his knee. "So much. But she can't care about you that way."

"I know," he said. "I know, but it's so hard not to hope sometimes."

"Hope can keep you going," Carmen acknowledged. "But hope hurts a lot sometimes."

"I shouldn't even hurt like this," he said. "I shouldn't care, I should be happy."

"Don't worry about 'should be'. Time takes care of 'should be'. Right now, worry about you. Do something nice for yourself."

He looked at her for a moment, then leaned forward, shutting his eyes. Carmen didn't know what to think, then his lips were brushing hers, and she put a hand out, gently, to push him away.

"You're hurting, Billy," she said softly. "Don't try to do something we're both going to regret."

"I know I'm hurting, Carmen," he said, and another tear rolled down his cheek. "It hurts so bad."

"I can't comfort you that way," she said steadily, gently. "I'm so sorry."

As she drove home, she was crying.

Lena was comfortably relaxing up in her room, painting her toenails purple. Some days, it was just necessary to paint your toes a weird color, so you felt free to be weird and flamboyant and have fun.

Also necessary was the singing out loud to the radio. And Lena was most definitely belting. If anyone but Effie had been home, she would have kept it to a more reasonable level, but Effie couldn't carry a tune if her life depended on it, so she wouldn't say a thing about Lena's singing voice.

As Lena waved her toenails in front of the fan to make them dry faster, she started to work on the other foot, singing all the while. Summer afternoons were the best times, Lena thought upon reflection. The window was open, so the warm breeze was floating in, but the fan kept her from sweltering. Isolated outside because of the heat, so there was no one to hear her sing. It was blissful.

And, of course, it helped that she was supposed to go out with the other girls tonight, they hadn't had any time alone in forever, not when it was just the four of them. But Tibby had called all three, informing them that each of them desperately needed a night out. Lena hadn't yet heard the gory details of Carma's and Bee's situations - those were being saved for tonight, when they would all talk for hours on end, but apparently both of them needed a purple nail polish night, one to forget all their troubles.

Plus, Lena had gotten the Pants from Carmen late last night, which meant nothing was allowed to go wrong. The Pants had an air of confidence about them, one that made Lena feel secure. A new song came on the radio, one of her favorites. She belted a little louder, wondering how loud she'd have to get before Effie came up to scream at her for the volume.

As Lena warbled the chorus, she thought she heard the doorbell ring. Oh, well, Effie'd get it, Lena didn't want to get up and break the magic spell of her bedroom, the isolation and the safety and the happiness.

Moments later, the sounds of shouting came from downstairs, and Lena abruptly stopped singing, wondering if she should go down and see what had happened. Was Effie okay? The noises were muffled, she couldn't tell who it was.

She got to her feet, and froze, unable to decide whether to go. She mentally berated herself - where had that air of confidence gone?

"Stop it!" Lena heard Effie scream, the first clear thing she'd been able to hear. "You can't go up there!"

So this person, this intruder, was coming upstairs. Lena looked around desperately for something, anything to defend herself with. She came up with a rolled up pair of socks and a sneaker. Not much help. But the door was swinging open...

Lena felt her jaw drop.

"No," she whispered. Then, "No," more firmly.

"I heard you singing," he said, with a lopsided grin.

"Get out." Lena said, jaw clenched.

"Lena." Kostos crossed the threshold of the doorway, stepping into Lena's private land of happiness. This was the last straw.

"Get out!" she cried. "I don't want you here!"

"Lena." He sounded sad. "I'm sorry. Maybe I shouldn't have come. But I wanted to talk, to explain."

"What is there to explain?" she asked. She wasn't near tears, only angrier than she could ever remember being. "I loved you, you left, I had to move on." She realized how cold she sounded, and it chilled her.

"Lena, I did what it was my duty to do."

"Then consider it your duty to leave, now." Lena said. "I mean it. You can't keep coming back, reopening the wounds, thinking that nothing has changed, that I'm still here waiting, that I'm willing to be here waiting."

"Is there someone else, Lena?" he asked. He crossed the room in a few short strides to grab her arms - she quickly extricated herself. "Is there anyone else?"

"No," she said quietly. "But there is no you anymore." She pulled her socks on, not caring that her toenails were wet, and jammed her feet into her shoes. She walked past him silently, into the hall, where Effie was almost in tears.

"I told him not to go up, I told him," she shrieked hysterically. Lena simply passed by, a quiet pat to tell Effie things were okay, and then she was floating downstairs, out the door, down streets, until she somehow found herself at Tibby's house.

Tibby herself answered the door, thankfully, and wordlessly pulled Lena inside. She looked uncomfortable, but that was understandable. Tibby was not the comforter, that job usually fell to Carmen, but right now, Lena wanted Tibby's cynicism and obvious one-sidedness. Not kindness, she wanted Tibby to make horrible jokes about Kostos and make her laugh until she cried and things were better.

"What happened, Lenny?" Tibby said, shoving a glass of water into her hands. "Drink, then tell me."

As she gulped the water, Lena spilled the story.

"You told him off, Lenny, good for you!" Tibby said. "Well, not really, but for you, it was telling him off." She giggled a little. "I bet he still doesn't know what hit him."

"I shouldn't have left Effie alone," Lena said regretfully, now that she was thinking more clearly. She kicked her shoes off. "That was awful, I should go back and-"

"No, you shouldn't," Tibby said sensibly. "You should stay right here and trust that Effie knows how to take care of herself."

Lena reached down to take her socks off; they peeled away with layers of grape-colored nail polish stringing out between them and her feet. Lena looked at Tibby, who exploded with laughter. Lena bit her lips to prevent herself, but eventually she let herself go with the laughter, and just as she'd wanted, she laughed until she cried, and things were better.

"I'm going to call Carma," she said decisively once she was done. "We're going on a little trip."

"Oh really," said Tibby, obviously amused. "Where to?"

"To Al's house," Lena said, dialing. "I'm going to see Paul."