There wasn't much for him to do this weekend since he's been able to catch up on his work. Since Henry decided to take a break on his plan, he's been able to focus more on his work, something he knows his parents are happy about. After finishing his homework, he decided to work on his latest comic. The next 2 hours went by fairly quickly, the first hour Henry was able to get through nearly 2 pages before he decided to catch up on a new series he started reading.

"Hey, Henry, come here."

"So I found the perfect loophole"

"…Go on."

"So instead of those boring, long books your Mom tries to get you to read, how about instead you read this?"

"…"Return of the Fallen Knight?"

"This is my favorite comic. I know you'll love it."

Henry places the comic on the bed and heads down to the kitchen with his Ma. "So how did it turn out?"

Emma is hovering over the open over, sweating a little. "Well, I think it turned out pretty good, but uhm…do you know how to tell when this sucker is done?"

"A meat thermometer, I think it should be at least 145 degrees."

Emma straightens up and looks to Henry with her eyes narrowed and eyebrows creased, "Fahrenheit, right?"

"Well, this is the U.S., Ma." Emma still looks to Henry confused, and he just lowers his head and shakes it slowly "Yes, Ma, Fahrenheit. Where's your thermometer."

Emma goes back to inspecting the roast and with no shame answers, "I don't have one."

Henry has begun to look through the draws and even the cabinets to find a thermometer but stops dead and turns his entire body to face his mother. "Then how will we tell if it's done or not…Please don't tell me just by looking—"

"By looking at it." And probably through the connection of motherhood, she answers her son's unspoken concerns with, "we'll be fine."

Henry turns back and begins to close everything that he had opened while explaining the following to his mom. "You'll be fine, I'm going out to buy a thermometer and finishing the roast." Emma looks to her son with a raised eyebrow. "Respectfully." Henry did always know when he was about to cross the line.

Emma finally closes the oven and moves over to the counter. "Oh, come on, live a little Henry, this will be a great experience to look back on."

Henry finally turns back towards his mom. "Yes, in heaven, but I will be the only one there after Mom brings you back to life and drags you to hell for killing us."

"…Ok, good point." Emma turns off the oven and they head outside to the bug.

Henry sets his fork down, grinning smugly with light oil on his lips. "See, that was the perfect roast, and it was all thanks to the thermometer. You're welcome."

Emma finishes wiping her face with the paper towel. "Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was pretty good, even though I still think it would have been fine if we did it the old fashion way."

"We're living in the 21st century, the 'old fashion way' is outdated."

As Emma is gathering up the dishes from the table, she dramatically feigns a chest wound, stumbling. "You're hurting me, Kid, you're hurting me."

"So, how's your Mom's cooking; any better?" Grace and Henry talk as they carry their lunch to a table.

Today Henry decided to eat lunch from school despite his mother disagreeing, but today was meatloaf Wednesday . It's not as good as his mom's but it's still a school favorite by everyone. "It's gotten better, but she still needs work on temperature. Sunday night she tried to bake a pizza and the dough was still raw."

Grace says nothing, just shakes her head.

"Exactly what I said. You know my mom, so you can bet she was disappointed."

Both Grace and Henry laugh at his mom's expense as they eat their lunch and throughout the rest of their classes. At the end of the day, even while they studied, the thought of Henry's mom trying to cook a full meal in the kitchen brought a laugh to the teenagers, this was going to be their school year insider for sure.

Henry walks back front seeing Grace and her dad drive off, and heads to the kitchen where his mother was finishing washing the dishes. "So, how's school thus far?" Regina asks as grabs to glasses to fill them with water. Henry pulls out a bar stool and takes a seat as she hands him one.

"It's about the same as usual; classes go pretty well, teachers are organized for the year, and kids still bully me for my parents." Henry nonchalantly adds the last point as she casually takes a drink of his water. Bullying isn't really new for Henry, he just chalks it up to kids, and on occasion, some adults, just have underdeveloped minds and they'll eventually see the error of their words, so he lets the words roll off of him. Despite this way of thinking, even after explaining it to his parents, they're still his parents and they will always worry about him, so before his mother could even finish her pitying facial expression, Henry tries to reassure her. "But more importantly, me and Grace are finally in more classes together, so that helps."

Regina just nods slowly as she takes a sip, "Well that's good." Regina takes another sip before she pours the rest down the sink and begins to wash it. Henry finishes the rest of his and sets the glass down in the sink as his mother asks him another question. "How's Grace and her father doing? I heard they're moving."

"Oh yeah, they're doing pretty good, Grace really likes her new room, but that reminds me, can I help Grace and her dad move this weekend? I already asked Ma and she said yes, so I want to make sure it's ok with you."

"Yes, that should be ok." Regina dries her hands on a tea towel before folding it back up and lying it over the sink and turning around "Alright, time for bed."

Henry jogs right up to his room with no arguments. His parents would always go back and forth over his bedtime, but his mom was never on the side of letting him stay up late, and she was never the one to lose the argument either.

That Saturday weekend, Henry was the first to rise, although he was the last to get to bed, too excited to get any sleep. He sat around his mother's house for about a hour and a half before she woke up. Ate a bowl of cereal, read a quarter of the old magazines on the coffee table, and washed the rest of the dishes. His mom would be proud.

His mom had to reassure him multiple times that he still knows the way to their house, chuckling to herself each time.

Henry had called before they had left, so Grace was waiting outside when they arrived. Henry held it in long enough to allow his mother to park and turn off the car. They walked up to the house, Emma stopping at the bottom of the steps, waving to Mr. Jefferson when he walked out, while Henry walks up to greet Grace.

Emma mentions the time she would be back to, but Henry misses everything as he talks to Grace.

The two head upstairs, straight to Grace's room.

"So, what do we pack up first?" Henry walks over to the bed, looking in all the open boxes and all that's left around the room.

"Well, my school supplies, clothes, and things will be last, which leaves my books, paintings, and stuffed animals."

Grace points to her bed where all of her stuffed animals lay. They take up nearly a third of her bed, sitting from tallest to shortest, a variety of dogs, bears, giraffes, and penguins.

"Wow, I didn't know anyone count have this many. How did you get them all?" Henry moves closer, picking up one of the smaller penguins in the front. It was pink and white, wearing a red bow with black hearts.

Grace had walked over to the wall next to her bedroom door, taking down the paints she had tacked up. "My dad, he gets me a new one for every birthday." Grace turns around to place the paintings on her desk. "Sometimes he gets me another gift along with it, but really, I only look forward to the animals; I like to see what colors and patterns they have. This is one is my favorite." She moves over to Henry, showing a stuffed rabbit keychain. It was white, wearing a yellow vest, red coat, and a purple tie. "He got me this when for my 8th birthday after mom passed. He said this reminded him of me and how I was his push to keep going." Grace smiles down at the keychain as she goes to place it back on her desk.

Henry and Grace spent more time than expected packing everything up. Despite them talking for the first quarter, they were still packing her room after they ate lunch. They had finally finished everything up in Grace's room and had gone to look for Mr. Jefferson. They first looked in the kitchen to help, but everything was already packed up, then they checked the living room, same thing. They were going to check the back yard before they heard noises coming from the bathroom.

"Hey, Dad."

Mr. Jefferson continues to back things in the box while talking. "You guys all done?"

"Yeah, we can help you with the rest."

Mr. Jefferson places one more thing in the box and closes it up. "Well, everything is all done for the day, so you two can just hang around until the sheriff comes to pick up Henry."

"Oh, I guess your room took us longer than planned. Sorry I wasn't much help today, Mr. Jefferson."

"No need to apologize, Henry, you came to help Grace and you did that, so mission accomplished."

Henry apologized a couple more times until Grace dragged him to the living room. The two talked while Grace's dad cooked dinner and Henry waited for his ma to show up.