Sponge: I'm back and better than ever! Thanks for being so patient during my hiatus. The title of the previous chapter, "Sixteen Going On Seventeen," comes from the song of the same name from the musical The Sound of Music. Congratulations to itsyagirlwithwritersblock, AJScoob, and booklovingjunebug for guessing correctly! Now let's get on with the show! Warnings: language, mentions of divorce, and some graphic Fraphne romance. Disclaimer: I don't own any of the Scooby Doo characters. They belong to Cartoon Network, Warner Brothers, and Hanna Barbera. Thank you to Google Translate for the French help.

Chapter 2: In Love With the 80's (Pink Tux to the Prom)

"Hey, Fred."

It was the day after Velma's birthday, and the following day was the Hex Girls concert. Fred was at his locker, exchanging his English notes for his government textbook between classes. He looked up at the voice, and saw Maureen Fischer approaching him.

Fred watched her draw nearer, feeling wary. Maureen had had a crush on him back in ninth and tenth grade, and had been incredibly jealous when it became apparent that he liked Daphne. She had once spread a pretty heinous rumor about Fred and Daphne having sex at a party (which had obviously not been true), but as far as Fred was concerned, it was all water under the bridge. Maureen was dating Red Herring now, which Fred thought was a much better match – especially since Red had gone out with Daphne for a long time in ninth grade. Still, Fred always felt a little apprehensive whenever Maureen was nearby.

"Hey Maureen," he replied somewhat cautiously as she leaned against the locker beside his.

"Did you get all your college applications in?" she asked.

"Yep." Fred had only applied to one school – Coolsville University. His father, the mayor, was a major benefactor of the college, as well as an esteemed alum. Everyone in the gang had applied there too – they all wanted to go to college together. "How about you?" he asked, to be polite.

"Uh-huh," she said, nodding. "My first choice is UVA. I feel pretty good about my chances."

"Cool," Fred replied.

Maureen crossed her arms and cocked her head to the side. "Can you believe that prom is in like three months?"

Oh. Fuck.

Fred broke out into a cold sweat.

Maureen fixed him with a stare. "How's your project coming along?"

"Uh..." Fuck. Fuck. "It's going great," he lied. "I've uh...I've got it narrowed down to a few really good possibilities."

"I hope you do. This is our prom, Fred," Maureen told him seriously. "When I volunteered to be head of the prom committee, and I told them I wanted you to be part of the decisions, everyone told me I was nuts for letting you help. But you're the class representative, so I wanted you to be involved." She stared at him. "You're not gonna let down the whole senior class, are you?"

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

"Nope," Fred replied, noticing that his voice sounded a little high, and hoped to God that Maureen couldn't tell. "Welp, gotta go to class, see you in bio!" He raced down the hall, away from her.

"You have until a week from today!" she called after him.

Fred sat in a daze all through government. What was he going to do? His mind raced all class long, and didn't stop on his walk to lunch afterwards. He met up with the rest of the gang in the cafeteria – Daphne, Velma and Shaggy (and thus, Scooby) all had the same AP English class immediately preceding their lunch period. But Fred was still so distracted by his predicament that he barely noticed the others as they all sat down at their usual table.

"Freddie? You okay?" asked Daphne, touching his arm.

Fred groaned and dropped his head onto the cafeteria table, his forehead making a thunk as it connected. Velma, Shaggy, and Scooby glanced at each other worriedly.

"Like what's the matter?" asked Shaggy.

"I think I messed up," Fred said into the table.

"What did you do?" asked Velma.

"I totally dropped the ball on prom," Fred moaned.

"What do you mean?" asked Daphne. "I didn't think the SGA had anything to do with prom. Isn't that why we have a prom committee? Cuz the SGA is too busy planning – you know, graduation and senior awards night and ten year reunions and that kind of thing?"

"Yeah, that's all true," said Fred, finally lifting his head up. "But I promised to help with one thing. A big thing. And I totally forgot about it until this morning."

"What is it?" asked Shaggy.

Fred sighed and put his forehead back on the table. "I told Maureen Fischer that I would look into live bands for the entertainment at prom."

The gang all stared at him in disbelief.

"Ruh-roh," Scooby muttered.

"Like, oh no," Shaggy added.

"And you've put it off till now?" Velma asked.

"I didn't put it off," Fred replied, sitting up again. "I just...forgot. Until Maureen reminded me just before fourth period."

"Well, first of all," Velma said. "Why would you ever promise to help Maureen with anything?"

"I was trying to be nice!" Fred cried. "You know. Bury the hatchet. We're seniors. We should be over everything that happened in tenth grade. Right?"

"Did you volunteer to look, or did Maureen specifically ask you to do this?" asked Daphne.

"She asked me. Why?"

The gang looked at him blankly.

Realization dawned on Fred. "You think she did it on purpose," he mumbled. "Because she knew I'd mess it up."

"But we're gonna prove her wrong. You won't mess it up, babe," Daphne promised, squeezing his arm again.

"I mean...he kinda already has," Velma muttered to Scooby, who nodded in agreement. Prom was in May, and it was already February. How did Fred expect to find live entertainment in that short a time frame?

"We're gonna help you look," Daphne said.

"Like, we are?" asked Shaggy.

"Of course," Daphne replied resolutely. "That's what friends do. When do you have to find a band by?"

Fred looked at her sheepishly. "A week from today."

Everyone groaned.

Daphne remained impassive. "Okay. Hard, but not impossible. We'll get through this, Freddie. You'll see." She kissed his cheek. "We'll get the best prom entertainment possible."

x.X.x

That evening, Daphne sat at the desk in her bedroom working on her trigonometry homework. Fred was coming over later so they could work on a project for AP French and talk about what to do about the prom situation. Daphne would have much preferred to go to Fred's house, but he often spent some time with his father on Friday nights. Tonight they were bowling. Daphne was glad that Fred and his dad got along so well. They had a much better relationship than the one she had with her own father. Or her mother, for that matter.

Her parents hadn't been getting along for more than a year now, and she knew that divorce was in the air for them soon. They'd sat down with Daphne and her sisters at Thanksgiving, when everyone had been home, and told them they were separating, and though Daphne had been expecting it, she'd still taken it hard. She'd cried with the gang over it countless times in the three months since her parents had made the announcement, but she was tired of being sad. She'd rather just not think about it at all.

Her phone buzzed, distracting her. She looked at the screen to see a text message from her friend, Holden Walsh. He had graduated last year, and was in New York now for his freshman year at the American Musical and Dramatic Academy.

Holden: DAPH! I'm walking back to my dorm and you're never gonna guess what AMDA's doing for their musical this spring.

The text was followed by the image of a flier for the musical Next to Normal. Daphne laughed out loud. The two of them had acted in that musical at Coolsville High together last fall, along with the other members of the gang.

Daphne typed back.

Daphne: OMG! That's crazy! If you're Gabe again, you'll have to let me know!

Holden: Haha sure. Hey, you busy? Wanna Skype?

There was no contest in Daphne's mind. Skyping with her friend was much preferable to trigonometry.

Daphne: I'm signing in now!

No sooner had she logged on to Skype than Holden's face appeared on the screen.

"Hey!" they greeted each other, grinning. Holden looked just the same as he had before he graduated – spiky blond hair, dazzling eyes, and a charming smile.

"You look great," Daphne told him sincerely.

"So you do," Holden replied. "Did I catch you at a bad time?"

Daphne shook her head. "Nah. Freddie will be here in about an hour, but I was just doing trig homework, which can always wait."

Holden made a face. "Why are you doing homework on a Friday night in the middle of your senior year? You should be out partying!"

"I still care about my grades!" Daphne laughed. "Besides, like I said, Freddie's coming over soon."

Holden nodded sagely. "Glad you two are still going strong. How's he doing?"

Daphne chuckled and filled Holden in on the prom fiasco, which made him laugh.

"Man, classic Fred," he sighed. "Do you have any idea what to do about the band?"

"Not really," Daphne admitted. "Who'd you get for your prom?"

"Man, as if I went to prom," Holden replied with another laugh. "I was still dating Jack then, so I went to Coolsville U to see him that night." He thought for a minute. "I think what the prom committee did was talk to the employees at the Coolsville Concert Hall, and they had some options."

"Ooh, that's a good idea!" Daphne exclaimed. "We're going there tomorrow to see the Hex Girls actually, so maybe we'll ask around after the show."

"Wait, wait, wait." Holden held up a hand. "You're going to see the FUCKING HEX GIRLS tomorrow night?!"

"Yep!" Daphne replied with a grin. "We got Velma tickets for her birthday. She's stoked."

"DUDE I'm so jealous!" Holden moaned. "The Hex Girls fucking rule."

"I know, I can't believe I haven't been listening to them longer," Daphne told him. "Ever since Shaggy had the idea to go to the concert, I've been listening to their songs on repeat in preparation for tomorrow night."

"It was Shaggy's idea to get Velma the tickets, huh?" Holden asked.

"Yes. Why?" Daphne asked in return.

Holden just raised an eyebrow.

"No, Holden," Daphne said sternly. This was not the first time they'd had this conversation. "I told you. Velma would have said something to me if anything was going on between the two of them." A tiny bell rang in Daphne's head as she spoke, but she ignored it.

"If you say so..." Holden replied, not sounding convinced. "But I'm just saying...they got awfully close during the musicallast year."

"We all got close during the musicallast year," Daphne reminded him. "Like that day we had our full-cast bonding session and we found out about how Shaggy's baby sister died and how Fred's mom left him and how Tony's brother was an alcoholic?"

"Okay that's fair," Holden relented. "I have never worked with a cast that close before or since."

"Really? Not even at college?" asked Daphne.

"It's different," Holden told her. "But still awesome. You'd actually love it out here, Daphne. Did you apply to AMDA?"

Daphne shook her head. "No. I applied to NYU though. I should be hearing about a possible audition for them soon."

"Awesome! Where else?"

Daphne bit her lip, remembering. "Elon, Carnegie Mellon, and Coolsville U. We all applied to Coolsville, actually. It's our first choice."

"Where else are the rest of your friends applying?"

Daphne starting ticking off her fingers. "Shaggy applied to a few culinary schools – one in New York, one in Rhode Island, and one in Chicago. Velma applied to all of the Ivy Leagues, plus Stanford – they sent a recruiter to the science fair last winter and her winning project caught their eye, so she sent in an application."

"What about Fred?" asked Holden.

"Just Coolsville," Daphne replied. "But like I said, we all applied there."

"Well, I hope you get into NYU," Holden told her. "You seriously would love the city."

"Tell me about it," Daphne said, leaning forward to listen. "What are the best parts?"

Holden talked about all his favorite things about New York City for almost an hour and only stopped when Daphne's doorbell rang.

"Jeepers!" she shrieked. "That's Fred. I gotta go."

"Tell him I said hey," Holden said.

"I will. Miss you!"

"Miss you too. Have fun tonight! Don't do anything I wouldn't do!"

Before Daphne could retort, Holden had signed off with a laugh.

She shook her head wryly before leaving her bedroom and taking the stairs two at a time. She flung open the front door to find Fred standing on her porch, shivering in the cold, the Mystery Machine parked in the street out front.

"Hey, babe," she greeted him, letting him in and kissing him on the cheek.

"Hey. Man, it's cold out there," Fred replied with another shiver.

Daphne giggled and took his hand. "Come on. Let's go to my room."

"Where are your parents?" asked Fred as she led him up the stairs.

"Mom is resting," Daphne replied. "And Dad..." she trailed off. "I don't know where Dad is."

Fred stopped her. "Are you okay?" he asked, blue eyes full of concern.

Daphne sighed, but smiled at Fred all the same. "I'm fine. Really." She kissed him again. "Do you have your French notes?"

"Yep," said Fred, gesturing to the bookbag he had slung over his shoulder. They continued up the stairs and made it to Daphne's room.

"By the way," she said. "I was Skyping with Holden before you came over. He says hi."

Fred's face lit up. It had taken awhile for him to come around to Holden last year, but now they were friends. "That's awesome! I miss that guy. How's he doing?"

"Pretty well," Daphne replied. "He loves New York. And he had a pretty good idea for what to do about prom."

Relief visibly washed over Fred. "He did? What was it?"

"Let's talk to the employees at the Coolsville Concert Hall tomorrow night," Daphne told him. "They can probably point us in the direction of some good bands who will play prom for us."

Fred nodded. "That is a good idea. I'm glad you talked to Holden tonight."

Daphne grinned. "How was bowling with your dad?"

"Pretty good. I bowled a 180," Fred said with a shrug. "But I was counting down the minutes till I could be here with you."

Daphne giggled. "Because you're so excited to work on this French project?"

"Not exactly," Fred murmured. They had arrived at her room now and closed the door behind them. No sooner had the door shut than Fred's arms were around Daphne, and his mouth was on hers. She closed her eyes and kissed him back fervently. Ever since senior year had started, they had begun to get more physically intimate every chance they got. Daphne wasn't sure why. It wasn't as if they weren't going to be together next year. Coolsville University was her first choice, because it was where Fred would be. Though there was something intriguing about New York...

Daphne found she couldn't focus on any other thoughts as long as Fred was kissing her like this. She let go of Fred's neck briefly in order to untie his ascot so she could leave a trial of kisses from his mouth to his neck. Fred's hands found the zipper on the back of her dress and undid it. The dress fell to the ground and she stepped out of it as she tossed her scarf away. When Fred moved his hands slowly down her torso, she gasped at the feel of his fingers on her bare skin. Swiftly, she moved her own hands down to the hem of his shirt and pulled it up so his bare chest was exposed. They'd reached her bed now and fell onto it, Daphne hovering over Fred and peppering kisses all along his chest as he reached behind her to unfasten her bra. She shrugged out of it and tossed it to the floor. Fred sat up to admire her exposed chest.

"You're so beautiful, Daphne," he murmured. He said this every time they fooled around, but it made Daphne's heart flutter nonetheless. He always said it like he meant it. Like he really saw her. His fingers grazed her neck and ear before twisting into her luscious red hair and pulling her close for a lingering, open-mouthed kiss.

She sighed as their tongues collided, and let her hands travel down his bare torso to fiddle with the button of his blue jeans. Fred helped her unfasten the button before reaching back up, this time for one of her perfect breasts.

Daphne broke away from the kiss with a sharp gasp when Fred's fingers made contact, and he moved his mouth down to her neck. She could feel him smiling as he gently sucked and bit his way towards her collarbone.

They had switched now so that Daphne was the one laying on the bed as Fred hovered over her. The hand that had been caressing her breast had begun to move steadily downwards until he was right on the edge of her pink tights. His mouth bypassed her collarbone and landed in the valley between her breasts. Without meaning to, Daphne let out a quiet moan. She let her hand wander into his pants and touched him.

He detached from her with a hiss. "Fuck, Daph," he breathed, pleasure coursing through him.

"I love you, Freddie," she whispered back. She felt as if her whole body was on fire with love.

Creak.

"WHOA WHAT THE HELL?!"

Startled, Daphne and Fred sat up to find that Daphne's older sister Delilah had opened the door and was staring aghast at them from the open doorway. Hurriedly, Daphne pulled her bedsheets around her half-naked form and Fred buttoned his pants and dove off the bed to grab his shirt.

"Delilah!" Daphne cried. "Jesus. Knock much?"

"I didn't think I needed to!" Delilah at least had the good grace to shut the door and talk to Daphne from the other side.

"What are you even doing here?" Daphne called as Fred tossed her dress and bra back up to her. Delilah had moved out ages ago for law school. She was studying to become a JAG in the Marine Corps.

"I borrowed one of Mom's serving dishes, and I came to bring it back. And I thought I'd come see you. Though…I didn't expect to see this much of you."

Daphne grimaced as she finished dressing. "Well, you can come back in now," she grumbled.

Delilah slowly opened the door, her face still slightly flushed with embarrassment – though it couldn't possibly compare with how humiliated Daphne and Fred felt.

"Fred," Delilah nodded to him. "Nice to see you."

Fred nodded back without meeting her eyes. "Hello, Delilah."

Delilah was the closest of Daphne's sisters in age to her, and she was also the first member of the family who had given Fred her seal of approval. But it didn't make this any less awkward.

"We were uh…just about to start on some French homework," Daphne said.

Delilah nodded. "Right." Daphne heard the doubt in her voice. "I just came by to say that Mom told me you were going to see the Hex Girls tomorrow. Is that true?"

"Yep," Daphne replied. "We got Velma tickets for her birthday."

"Well, make sure you get there early," Delilah told her. "One of my old friends from college is opening with her band."

"That's neat," Fred said, clearly trying to get past the awkwardness. "Did she graduate with you?"

"Nah, she was a few year younger than me. She's a senior now at Coolsville University. Her name is Priya Dandekar. She plays keyboard in her band."

"That's great," said Daphne. "Well, Fred and I should get started on this homework."

"Yeah," said Delilah wryly. "Homework."

Daphne groaned. "Please don't tell Mom."

Delilah rolled her eyes. "Of course not. I remember how it felt to be in the throes of young love. Your secret is safe with me. But are you using protection?"

Mortified, Daphne threw a pillow at her sister. "Oh my God, get out!"

"Okay, okay!" Delilah grinned and waved over her shoulder before shutting the door behind her. Once she was gone, Daphne groaned and flopped backwards into her pillows, hands over her face.

"You okay?" asked Fred.

Daphne nodded. "Yeah. Just humiliated." She sat back up and grimaced at Fred. "Sorry about her."

Fred shrugged. "It's not your fault she walked in on us."

In the silence that followed, Daphne reflected on what had just happened. She and Fred really were getting more and more amorous every day. Was it time for them to have a talk about going all the way?

"I love you too," Fred said.

"Huh?" asked Daphne, pulled from her thoughts.

"Before we got uh…interrupted," Fred continued. "You told me you loved me. And I don't ever want to leave you hanging when you say that. So…I love you too."

Daphne smiled and snuggled up against him. She couldn't believe how wonderful he was. Or that she once upon a time had cursed the very ground he walked on. Thinking back to the beginning of sophomore year, how he'd relentlessly pursued her and she kept rejecting him, seemed impossible to her.

"We really should start on that French project," she said with a sigh. Reluctantly, they got up from her bed to move over to her desk.

"Maybe afterwards we can ah…pick up where we left off?" Fred shot her a cheeky grin.

Daphne giggled and kissed him. "Je t'aime," she murmured – French for I love you.

Fred kissed her back. "Je t'aime aussi," he replied.

Sponge: There's chapter 2 for you! Thanks for reading. More next week! Review if you please, and don't forget to guess where the chapter title comes from!