Twenty Four: Valentine-y St. Patrick Popcorn Bowl

Much to Zelda's dismay, 'new kid' had been busy on Sunday, leaving the young rocker to her own devices. So she'd sat around all day in a fort of pillows that she'd constructed in the entertainment room, watching BBC's Pride and Prejudice (Impa had all the DVDs), and left the Tudor family with instructions that any suitors who came around were to be told that she was out for the day.

She was tired, so she went to bed early that night. Her day had been solitary; the family had gone out to dinner, but Zelda had declined their offers of coming along, not feeling like eating. Her mind was on the next day, Monday, and whatever trials and tribulations it might hold.

Valentines' day had never been Zelda's favorite holiday. In fact, she could easily say that Valentines' Day was one of her least favorite days of the year.

On Monday morning, Zelda hauled herself from her soft white sheets, glaring around her room at the many vases of joyful flowers that smiled cheerfully back at her, illuminated by the light coming in the long window at the far end of the room. There was the smell of pancakes wafting seductively through the air, though, and so Zelda got dressed quickly (but only after she made completely sure that her clothes hadn't even the slightest speck of pink), gathered her school things into her arms, and tumbled down the curved stairway in her white cotton Garfield ankle socks.

"Good morning, Zelda," Impa called cheerily as Zelda slid front-first into a wall, her excess momentum having carried her across the smooth wooden floor with painful speed. A thousand curses upon socks and their lack of friction!

"Ow," Zelda grumbled, unplastering herself from the wall dropping her books by her bag. "Good morning. Those pancakes smell really good."

"I know you don't like Valentines' Day much," Impa stated as Zelda wandered down the hallway into the kitchen, "so I figured I'd make you something special. And Mondays are hard for Link, so both of you get a treat for getting out of bed."

"Yum. Do you need me to do anything?"

"If you don't mind too much, could you go check on Link and be sure that he managed to roll out of bed? Your pancakes will be ready when you come down. Two, right?"

Zelda nodded. "Two." She set off down the hallway, sliding past the entertainment room and pulling an abrupt U-turn, skidding in a slippery half circle and nearly tripping over the first step as she began to climb up the stairwell. Her hand trailed up the banister, for balance more than anything else- her socks had no friction against the sleek wood, as she had previously discovered that morning. However, she managed to reach the top of the staircase in one piece and, proud of herself, Zelda stepped onto the lush carpet that ran down the hall that her and Link's rooms were in. Across the staircase from her was the room that Saria and Jayda shared, and the Master bedroom.

"Yo, Link, you up?" She knocked on his door twice, and heard a sleepy groan from within. "Can I come in?"

"I hate Mondays," was his way of reply, and Zelda twisted the doorknob, only to have it swing in at the last possible moment and Link tumble out onto her. "Oooof. Hi, Zelda." He yawned, blinking blearily, and managed a grin. "How is it?"

"It's squished," Zelda grunted in reply. "Get off me. Your mom made her famous pancakes for breakfast."

"Did she really?" Link looked thrilled as he haphazardly struggled off his closest friend, and then held out his left hand to help her up. Hardly thinking, Zelda grabbed his offered left hand with her own, and he began to heave her up.

BZZZZZZZZZZT!

Both teens tumbled back to the floor to land in a heap of bodies, accompanied by two extremely loud thunks.

Link howled lightly, rubbing the back of his left hand. Zelda twitched her fingers, trying to eliminate the tingling there. "What was that?" Link made a funny face as he spoke and it took all of Zelda's willpower not to laugh at him.

"You shocked me," she replied, still twitching her fingers. "Or I shocked you."

"That was one helluva shock," Link stated, doing his best to disentangle his limbs from hers.

"Are you two alright up there?" Impa called.

"Fine mom," and "fine!" the two called down, and Zelda looked at her hand, making a fist and blessing the goddesses that she hadn't forgotten to put her gloves on that morning, as the back of her hand was feeling suspiciously swollen. Zelda was the first to stand, and watched in amusement as Link clambered unstably to his feet a moment later. She paused and took him in, and then cracked up.

"You've got a sick humor, boy," she stated, looking him up and down.

"Huh?"

He wore a pair of baggy khaki cargo pants and a bright green shirt- KISS ME, I'M IRISH!

"It's Valentine's Day," Zelda clarified. "Not St. Patrick's."

"So?"

"Wrong holiday, dear."

"No it's not. It says kiss me and that's Valentine-y, right?"

Zelda sighed, shaking her head.

"Link, I don't like you very much."

He grinned cheekily, bowing. "Love you too, princess."

"Smartass."

"I make an attempt."

Together, the two teenagers trooped down the stairs, one yawning, the other shaking her head at the one whose mouth appeared to be unable to close.

They wandered into the kitchen (Zelda didn't crash into a wall this time around)and took their pancakes, all the while profusely thanking Impa for whipping up such a delectable breakfast, and then plopped down as at their usual seats at the rectangular table, right next to one another, and began to shove with all their might.

"I see that they're good, then?" Impa's tone was amused, and Zelda looked up from her steadily-emptying plate to give Impa a gauntleted thumbs-up and a whipped creamy, masticated strawberry-y, too-much-maple-syrup and Impa-waffles grin. Link was too lazy to look, though, so fixated was his attention on his plate, and in reply to Impa's statement he nodded, his head wagging around like a bipolar dog as he fit as much of the delicious food in his mouth at one time as he possibly could. "As much as I'm flattered, you two need to slow down. You might choke, and then I'll never be able to make these pancakes again!"

Immediately, Zelda and Link's bites became very slow and deliberate. Impa burst out laughing, and then shook her head at both of them.

"Kids." And she walked out of the room, still chuckling to herself, apparently on a mission to go try and get her husband out of bed. Again.

When the teens finally finished, cleaned the sticky syrup-y mess off of their hands and faces, bid Impa and a very sleepy Haft goodbye and left, they were running a little late, and so Zelda got to try to 'get in shape', as Link meant it.

Which of course meant jogging to the train station.

"Link, I don't like to run," she whined as she tried to match his pace to his. "I don't run. I can't run. We'll be just fine, and besides, I look stupid. Do we have to jog?"

"Zelda, nobody's around to see you looking stupid," Link countered. "Everybody's either at work or at school."

"I don't want to go to school," she stated sulkily, panting a little as she cursed Link and his capability for effortless brisk trot. "I wish your mom hadn't told me I have to go to school…"

"What was the 'or else'?" Link asked as they rounded a corner.

"Or else she'd tell my dad all about my Valentines' disaster," she grumbled. "Your mom is harsh sometimes."

Link shrugged. "She does everything for a reason. We may not be able to see it right now, but said reason is usually damn good."

"Mmmhm…" Pant. Pant.

"Jeez, Zelda, you need to get into better shape."

"I know," she replied. "I'm working on it. But being in good shape doesn't entail running."

It entails having deku nuts to chunk at someone so that they're blinded, and once they're blinded you slip away.

"Yeah, but you might as well be a good runner anyway. You never know, you might need it to run away from all those overeager boys."

"Hmm? Yeah…."

She was unable to talk much more as her breathing became so heavy. Luckily, though, the train station was just around the corner and the train still hadn't pulled up. They slid their train cards through the machine and stepped underneath the overhang, and then, still breathing heavily, Zelda plopped down on a wood-and-concrete bench, glaring at Link.

"Why'd we have to run?"

Her question was answered as the train pulled up. Zelda glared mightily at Link as he smirked, and then allowed him to heave her from her seat, and together they stepped on.

"Jerk."

"I try, Princess. I try."

&-

Zelda was totally absorbed in her math book, taking refuge in the numbers and the distractions they provided- for once. She hardly blinked as another wadded up piece of paper landed on her desk, and calmly, she swept it off, continuing on with her math homework.

This had been going on for the past 50 minutes, ever since the block started and her math teacher, the jovial yet boring Mr. Tingle, began to nasally make his way through the lesson plan.

"And so you see," he said, and Zelda looked up briefly, narrowing her eyes slightly as another crumpled ball of paper flew past her vision (she hadn't detected the source yet as she had no desire to, but judging from the trajectory angle at which said paper balls were being tossed from, it was the timid little nerdy sophomore throwing love notes at her head. Or possibly the senior football player. She wasn't sure which.) "The equation is tangent to…"

Zelda looked back down at her homework, which she'd mostly figured out herself, from reading her textbook. She'd never been much for math, but ever since she'd come back from winter holiday, things had begun to become easier for her. Perhaps it was because she was trying to find distraction from life in her studies, probably the triforce's doing, or mayhap the triforce of wisdom was aptly misnamed, and should be hereafter called the triforce of all things brainy. Zelda wasn't sure which.

Doink. Another ball landed on Zelda's desk. She sighed, brushing it off again, and continued on with her homework, ignoring Malon's snicker from the seat behind her.

It was going to be a looooong day…

&-

In team sports that day, they had to jog the track. Unfortunately.

She tried to zone out the obscene whistles and catcalls from the sophomore football team- the little slime balls were sitting in the stands of the amphitheater-esque stadium. On the field, the special ed kids were playing catch- Zelda highly doubted that they were wolf whistling at poor Anna May Dean, who was short, very overweight, and, unfortunately, mentally retarded. And there were no other females in her unusually small team sports class except two clumsy, geeky freshman girls who kept to themselves, and also another junior that Zelda didn't know particularly well, with short dyed-black hair and a bored face who hung out with a group of massive thugs and smoked pot after school outside the gates.

Zelda sighed, shaking her head, and continued to jog, then quickly hopped backwards to dodge the red ball that came flying her way from the field. A chorus of laughter followed from the peanut gallery, and it took all Zelda's will not to pick up the bright red object and hurl it into the stands where the jerks sat. Instead, she rolled the ball back onto the field and continued to jog, blocking out the noise of the boys and concentrating on her breathing.

&-

Zelda sighed and deposited her timed writing, Analysis of Major Symbols in Kafka's The Metamorphosis, in the basket and trooped back across the room to her desk, lying her head down on her arms. She wasn't the first in the class to finish with the tedious essay, but she wasn't the last, either; the restless shifting around her, however, was only growing as the end of class neared.

Her head was hurting her, badly. She sighed into the inky black escape of her folded arms over the cheap fake wooden desk and closed her eyes. She didn't hear the rustle or zip of her Prada bag, and didn't notice when it was returned to its spot just next to her desk. When the bell rang she straightened up and slung her backpack over her shoulder, wandering out of the room to study hall, which was, of course, in the same room as homeroom. Luckily, though, it was silent and she was left to her own devices, and nobody in there harassed her.

I think I'll write a note to Lulu, Zelda decided. She hadn't been able to talk to the beautiful girl much lately, to her infinite sadness- Zelda loved Malon dearly, but sometimes (quite often, actually) she needed a break from the colorful chaos of Malon's personality for the calmer, more soothing but equally passionate existence that Lulu held.

She reached down for her bag, unzipping the pen pocket, and her fingers closed around a narrow stick. Curious, she drew it out- when had she gotten a popsicle?

It was cherry, her favorite, in the shape of a cupid, and Zelda was pretty sure she'd never seen it before. Tied to the bottom:

"You're so hot, say you'll be mine
Baby, you're my Valentine"

…..Gr.

&-

Lunch, Zelda spent hiding in the library, choosing starvation (not that she was particularly hungry, anyway, as the day's chaos and random being-assaulted-in-the-hall-ness had left her without an appetite) and then she went to French, hoping that the worst was over.

She was right, mostly. Sort of.

Class began and the teacher began to speak. And then, behind her, in her ear- "Bonseiur, mi amour."

"Shove off," Zelda replied to the whisper from the seat behind her.

"Come now, my dove. Is French not the language of love?"

"French doesn't do it for me anymore- I'm afraid I had a bit of a bad experience with a Frenchman over the holiday. Now would you please go away? I'm not interested."

Unfortunately, Zelda had to deal with the guy in the seat behind her (a guy named Tiel, if she remembered right) dropping notes over her shoulder the rest of the block asking about this Frenchman and begging her to do unseemly things with him.

At the end of the block, Zelda practically dashed from school, only to, unfortunately, careen straight into poor Tael as he made his wide-eyed way through the mill of happily conversing students.

"Sorry, little brother, but I've gotta jet," she apologized, patting his rumpled dark hair, so deep a red that it was nearly black. It reminded Zelda a lot of Lulu's hair, except…well…red. Ish. It did compliment his pale skin in an oddly nice way, though. Astoundingly.

"Hide me," he squeaked, and Zelda sighed, grabbing his wrist.

"You live near me. You ride the train?"

"Yeah…" Wide-eyed nod. Zelda grinned inwardly. Cute little fishy.

"Come on. We're getting out of here."

She half dragged him and half was dragged by him off of campus, and as she passed her beloved friend, she grabbed Link's elbow and hauled him along too- the attractive young man seemed very confused as to why Zelda and this random freshman were moving as though the devil was on their heels.

"What's the rush?" Link managed to reach into his backpack and jam his dying green hat atop his unruly wheat locks.

"Valentine bad for Tael," stated the little freshman. Zelda nodded in wholehearted agreement.

"Yes, bad, very very bad…."

"What happened?"

"Nothing," the two chimed as they skidded through the bars into the train station and stood, antsy, at the edge of the platform, waiting for the train to arrive.

"Bad."

"Bad!"

"Evil demons."

"Stalking."

"Predators."

"Going to abduct me."

"Eat our souls!" Zelda squeaked and hopped into Link's arms, wrapping her arms around his neck and burying her face in his shoulder. "Protect me!"

"I thought you said you wouldn't ever need me to protect you again." Link stood there, puzzled, totally oblivious to the fact that his arms had gone up on autopilot and caught poor, twitchy Zelda.

"I lied."

"Here's the train!" Tael hopped up and down from one foot to another, looking oddly comical as he twisted the hem of his shirt in his hands.

Zelda poked Link and grudgingly he dropped her, and as the train pulled to a stop with a hiss of hydraulics in front of the three, Zelda and Tael bolted on, hardly waiting for the doors to open, and Link followed at a rather tortoise-esque pace, puzzled.

"So what's this you two are mumbling about? And by the way, I don't know you, dude."

"I'm Tael."

"Honorary little brother," Zelda added, petting his head and looking out the door as though expecting someone to leap through with buckets and bouquets of over peppy flowers and statements of undying ardor.

"Nice to meet you, Tael. I'm Link." He jerked his thumb at Zelda, grinning wolfishly. "Her brainless bodyguard."

"You do a terrible job of it, it might be added," Zelda interjected, and then sighed as the doors closed.

"So what happened today?"

She looked him up and down. "Nothing." It was a sigh as Zelda and Tael slumped over on one another, unanimously shuddering. "Sort of," Tael added.

"Sounds like both your days were the same."

"Probably," Zelda replied, and looked at Tael. "How bad?"

"Mortifyingly horrid."

"My condolences."

"Accepted and appreciated."

"Are you two sure you're not siblings?" Link looked between the young blonde and the dark headed freshman with a smirk. "You sound exactly alike."

"Nope, just disturbed at the moment. We should be back to normal shortly."

"Shortly meaning never."

"Of course."

Silence.

"Are either of you going to tell me anything or will I have to beat it out of you?"

Zelda and Tael shared a look.

"Our lips are locked," Zelda stated plainly.

"If you touch her, she might maim you," Tael added, pointing at Zelda. "Don't touch her."

"Listen to the man, Link. He knows what he's talking about."

Link shook his head. "You guys are so weird."

&-

Zelda was sulking. She'd had a bad day, and both Malon and Lulu were out on dates with their boyfriends, which, of course, made her feel worse.

"We're really sorry, Zel," Lulu had said over the conference call.

"Yeah. We'll be back before too long," Malon added, and the young women had said their goodbyes, leaving Zelda to her own devices. Of course, Zelda's "devices" wound up to be moping, throwing things, glaring at the perky flowers, and then finally taking refuge in the entertainment room, again, and watching Starsky and Hutch in her pajamas, accompanied by a large bowl of popcorn and one Valoo.

"I hate Hallmark," she told Valoo, throwing a kernel of popcorn at the television. "It's Hallmark's fault, this whole stupid Valentine mess. Yeah. Hallmark."

Valoo blinked twice and stretched.

"I mean, it's not like I try and get myself into messes with boys constantly. It's not like I even flirt with guys. Hell, I mostly keep to myself, don't I? But Hallmark said, hey, let's make Zelda's life a living hell and get a lot of extra money while you're at it! Boys, want her to sleep with you? Give her a card and some flowers and she'll be your personal whore in no time!" Zelda sniffled, shoving a handful of popcorn down her yap. She chewed blearily for a moment, swallowed, and continued. "I don't ask for this trouble. I really don't! I mean, they only like me because I'm in a rock band and the band just so happens to be good. They don't even know me. They just know that I'm a chick and that I'm not completely cursed in the looks department and that's good enough for them, my feelings aside." She sighed. "Oh, Valoo… whatever am I supposed to do?"

"Do you always talk to yourself?"

"Go away, Link."

"You sure you don't want some company?"

"I'm sure." She didn't bother to turn and look at him- she remained steadfast in front of the television. "Please, I just want to be alone right now."

"Okay…"

She heard him slip quietly from the room, and, feeling a lump in her throat, Zelda promptly dumped out all the popcorn in the oversized bowl and pulled it over her head, beginning to sob. He was at her side in an instant. The security of him, the near warmth of him, the strong arm wrapped tenderly around her shoulders only made her cry even harder.

"Zelda, now, please tell me what's wrong."

She shook her head, and the bowl spun slightly.

"At least take the popcorn bowl off of your head?"

"No."

He sighed, and Zelda couldn't tell through her sobs whether it was one of amusement or frustration. "Your hair is going to get all greasy."

"I don't care. Maybe then people will leave me alone!"

His arm tensed momentarily, and Zelda instantly realized what she'd said. "I'm sorry, Link, I didn't mean it… well, I did, but not about you…" She clutched the edge of the large blue plastic bowl and pulled it up over her watery eyes and swollen, blotched cheeks, looking at him. "Really. Without you I'd probably be insane. Er." She sniffled and buried her head back in the bowl. Link sighed and pulled it off her head, and gently removed the greasy popcorn remnants from her hair, even as she turned away.

"Come on, Zelda," he said gently, his voice washing over like a calming wave. "It's okay to cry."

She turned to him, her eyes rimmed scarlet, and sniffed. "Really?"

A gentle smile spread across his features as he brushed a strand of hair from her face. "Yes, Zelda, really."

And she was clinging to him for dear life a second later, sobbing out all the day's frustrations on his shoulder, her popcorn-greased hair in his face, but he didn't seem to mind as he whispered in her ear that things would be okay, that everything would be fine, that everybody who was chasing after her wasn't worthy of her in the least, that she was a queen among queens, magic…

He rocked her quietly for a while, waiting for her sobs to subside. After what felt like forever and no time at all, Zelda pulled away from Link, smiling blearily.

"Thanks, Link. Ugh," she sniffled, wiping her eyes on the back of her hands. "I must look like a mess."

"No you don't," Link said, brushing a strand of greasy hair away from her face. Zelda let out a short, staccato laugh, pressing her pale lips together.

"Yes I do. I bet I look like heck, ugh, probably like a cow, all splotchy…"

"You look beautiful," Link replied sincerely, and Zelda looked away.

"I'm going to have a horrible headache later… crying hurts my head… I'm going to go take a shower."

"You do that. It'll help you feel better. If you need anything, come get me, okay?"

"Okay." Watery smile. "Thank you, Link." Her tone was sincere.

"No problem."

He watched her go and then turned, looking at the TV screen. And then just a minute later, Impa appeared in the door.

"Yeah Mom?"

Impa smiled at her son, and then jerked her head in the direction of the kitchen. "A big pot of flowers arrived for Zelda today from her brother. Hibiscus blossoms. Sheik sent her a plant for Valentine's Day. I need you to carry it up to her room. It's too heavy for me."

"Did he send a letter with it?" Link had met Sheik briefly in his visit to "The House", and the young man had intrigued him and amused him beyond all imagination.

"Yes," Impa replied to Link's question. "There's a letter for us there, too."

"For us?"

Impa nodded. "His mother has moved to Mr. Harkinian's house, and has begun to understand why Zelda left."

"Oh…" He wasn't sure where this was going, wasn't sure he wanted to know.

And then Impa dropped the bomb on him, just as she had nine months before in June, knocking him breathless.

"Shiek's moving in with us next month, just after spring break."

&-

uploaded: 7:10 PM

Wednesday, April 13, 2005

A/n: Hiiii people. Sorry this took so long. I'm struggling through the next chapter and so far things aren't looking happy. My utmost apologies. Updates are now going to hopefully be on Saturdays and Wednesdays, a week apart. Reason for this is stress and stuff, yeah, I know, you've heard it all before… blah, whatever. No new news, I don't believe, aside from soap-operatic prom mess (yeah, prom is this Saturday) and crappy life stuff. Whatever. Go ahead and contact me. I can't say that I'll get right back to you (as I'm very busy and am also playing through Wind Waker so that I can fill in the last of the gaps) but I WILL reply. Probably. Thank you to all your support so far, and stick with me. Things are going to ROCK soon. And bwahahaha, we get to see more of Shiek. Fangirls rejoice, and everybody else, roll on the ground laughing hysterically at everybody's favorite spandex-boy.

So long, farewell, until we meet agaiiiinnnnn! glass cracks