And I'm back with another chapter! I want to thank Cre8ivelybankrupt87, JW, Kryten and CukooCoa for reviewing last chapter. This chapter is going will involve some things from the episodes Married and New Bully on the Block. And will only be in Wolfgang's pov, I haven't done that for a while and would like to have some focus on his head space.
I still own nothing but the plot
Wolfgang pov
Mondays was almost never anyone's favorite day and Wolfgang was no expectation especially since he knew he would be seeing Nadine at P.S. 118. And after the fight the day before it wasn't going to be easy for him to see her around the school the downside to going to the same school with your now ex. Not being able to win Nadine over had been disheartening whether he liked to admit that or not, being called a coward on top of that made him feel very angry. So to say that Wolfgang was in a bad mood during school that day would be a complete understatement. Wolfgang was livid and on a very short fuse which scared everyone around him including his fellow fifth grader classmates whom weren't spared from his anger. In fact at times it seemed that Wolfgang would feel most angry at his classmates than anyone else without rhyme or reason.
By the time the end of the day bell rang kids were not only running out of the building to get away from school but to also get away from Wolfgang. Currently Wolfgang had just slammed his locker shut after putting away the books he wouldn't be needing.
"Hey Wolfgang." Edmund says while coming up from behind his friend.
"What Edmund?" Wolfgang asked in an annoyed tone.
"What's with you today? You're being more mean then usual even to some of the guys in our class." Edmund states. "What's gotten into you?"
"I don't know what you're talking about." Wolfgang just says as he begins to stomp his way to the front of the school of course he knew why but it wasn't like he was going to tell his friend.
"Come on Wolfgang something must be bothering you?" Edmund insists while following after his friend. "I mean you've been pretty relaxed ever since you started dating Na-" The rest of Edmund's sentence was cutoff when Wolfgang suddenly pulled him aside where no other student could hear them and slammed his back onto a locker.
"What did you just say?" Wolfgang asked in a dangerous tone one of his hands was balled up into a fist while the other was clenching Edmund's shirt.
"Calm down Wolfgang." Edmund says holding his hand up in surrender. "I just said that you've been more relax ever since you started dating Nadine?"
"What makes you think I would ever be dating a fourth grader?" Wolfgang all but growls his mind already reeling, was it possible that Nadine had been telling people at school about their thing without him knowing?
"Come on Wolfgang I know I'm not the smartest guy but I am your best friend." Edmund begins to explain. "We've known each other for years and when I started noticing you weren't around as much especially when we were fixing up the go-kart I started to wonder why. So one Saturday I followed you and found out where you were going."
"I swear Edmund if you told anyone about this-" Wolfgang began to threaten knowing that there was no way to get around it.
"Of course not Wolfgang!" Edmund says defensively. "I mean at first I thought about bringing it up but I figured that you'd just tell me when you were ready."
"But that info could easily ruin me?!" Wolfgang says completely shocked by his friend. "You could have made me a laughingstock! Why didn't you?"
"Because you're my friend." Edmund just says with a shrug like it was the simplest answer. "We've been friends since kindergarten, I knew it couldn't have been easy to realize that you liked, liked any fourth grader."
"Oh." Was all Wolfgang could say as he finally let his friend go, he couldn't helped but to feel a bit shocked over the fact that Edmund had known for who knows how long and didn't say anything. It also made him feel a bit guilty if it had been him who caught Edmund dating a fourth grader he would have told everyone while making fun of his best friend.
"So did you guys have a fight or something? Is that why you've been mad all day?" Edmund asked interrupting his friend's thoughts.
"Yes we had a fight." Wolfgang admits sadly without thinking. "She broke up with me."
"Why?" Edmund asked a bit taken by surprised.
"Cause of what I said at the Cheese Festival about fourth graders and dating fourth graders." Wolfgang tells his friend, then suddenly getting angry again when he remembered their fight from the day before. "Then yesterday when I tried to reason with her she calls me a coward just because I don't want to blab to the whole school about us!"
"Well that is pretty messed up for her to call you a coward especially if she already knew before you asked her out that you didn't want to let anyone know." Edmund says in a pondering tone.
"Oh actually I didn't tell her that before I asked her out." Wolfgang admits sheepishly. "But she should have known that people couldn't know! I'm the leader of the whole fifth grade and she's a bug loving fourth grader."
"But Wolfgang if you're the leader doesn't that mean that the whole fifth grade will have to respect whatever you do even if they agree with it or not?" Edmund says in a confused tone. "I mean even if someone had a serious problem with it couldn't you just beat them up? Besides it's not like you being with Nadine has to mean that you or the rest of us have to be nice to every fourth grader just Nadine."
Wolfgang went speechless as he analyzed his friend's words. "Oh my god Edmund you're right." And just like that it clicked, how was it possible that his slower friend was able to see this before he could? Right because he was too obsessed with his reputation to listen even though according to his friend his reputation would have still been intent. "But it's too late she hates me now."
"Well you might want to try to do something to win her back soon. If you really want to be with her." Edmund tells his friend. "I heard that that fourth grader Rhonda has some kind of marriage predictor game, she's been pairing off all the fourth graders in her class together all day."
"Oh no Rhonda is Nadine's best friend she's totally going to pair Nadine off with some guy from their class." Wolfgang first says in a worried tone but then calms down. "But there is no way that Nadine would go along with something like that! She doesn't really like that kind of junk too much. And I mean we just broke up it's not like her feelings for me suddenly went away so quickly." He says with a laugh as the two walked out of the school.
"Ah Wolfgang?" Edmund says in a nervous as he looked down the steps and sees Peapod Kid excited walking over to Nadine.
"Nadine I've just gotten some terribly, terribly exciting news!" Peapod says happily. "It would appear that Ms. Lloyd has predicted that we will get married when we get older!"
"Oh? Well that's very nice." Nadine says with a polite smile.
"May I walked you home?" Peapod asked. "That way we can discuss our future together further."
"Ah sure?" Nadine just says with a shrug and the two walk away together.
From the top of the school steps two fifth graders silently watched as the entire scene took place, one was caught by surprise while the other was now seething in anger.
"Oh man Wolfgang I'm sorry that must have-" Edmund begins to say but gets interrupted by Wolfgang.
"Oh Edmund don't worry about me." Wolfgang says in a dark tone narrowing his eyes. "Clearly I was wrong for ever thinking things could be different. From now on things will be going back to normal times ten." He says and starts stomping towards home his heart feeling like it was ripping apart with each step.
"What does that mean?" Edmund asked running to catch up with his friends.
"It means that from here on out those fourth graders won't ever know what peace is ever again." Wolfgang growls.
And true to his word Wolfgang had increased his bullying factor by ten for the following two weeks the students of P.S. 118 had to put up with the terror that was a heartbroken Wolfgang. Though of course they didn't know that their torment was because the fifth grade bully was heartbroken. And it wouldn't have exactly been easy to figure out between the constant tripping, shoving and pranking there wasn't a moment's peace to wonder why Wolfgang was being worse than usual especially for Mr. Simmons fourth grade class.
The students weren't even safe after school as Wolfgang would now always show up during their games and push them out of Gerald's Field even stealing whatever ball they were using that day. In fact today was one of those days as Wolfgang and his friends had already stolen the fourth graders football and began to play a game of his own.
"Don't fret Arnold he'll probably give us our ball back when he's finished." Stinky tries to reassure a dejected Arnold.
"Yeah he usually does." Arnold says with a sigh.
"Wolfgang…I wish he'd find somebody else to beat up on." Gerald says shaking his head.
"You can say that again." Stinky says in agreement.
"Yeah it would be nice especially since Wolfgang has been acting worse than usual." Arnold states.
"What do you mean worse than usual?" Gerald asked. "Wolfgang has always been bad."
"Yeah but lately it's like he's unreasonably bad." Arnold explains. "You think he might be upset about something?"
"Please Wolfgang does not need a special reason to be bad he just is." Gerald says dismissing his friend. "And even if he was upset about something he probably deserved it and a whole lot more."
"Hey Monkey face!" A voice says out of nowhere catching Wolfgang by surprise.
"Who you calling Monkey face?" Wolfgang asked forcefully walking over to a newcomer.
"You butt wad." The newcomer a boy whom was just as large as Wolfgang states.
"You want to dance?" Wolfgang asked squaring off with the other boy.
"Maybe later, but right now I want you to clear out of my vacant lot." The newcomer demands poking a finger at Wolfgang's chest.
"Your vacant lot?" Wolfgang asked forcefully poking back.
"His vacant lot?" Gerald and Arnold question together.
"Yeah, my vacant lot." The newcomer says forcefully to Wolfgang again.
"Hold on a minute this lot was full of junk when we found it." Arnold interrupts.
"And we cleaned it up and turned it into Gerald Field." Gerald adds in. "Where were you guys?"
"Yeah, well I've been away at juvenile hall for a couple of years." The newcomer explains. "But this used to be my vacant lot."
"Oh yeah I think I remember you." Arnold says starting to recognize the newcomer. "Your name is Ludwig right? You've…grown."
"That's right, and I'm reclaiming my vacant lot football face." Ludwig states picking Arnold up by his shirt. "I'm in charge of you fourth grade wussies now."
"Hey, those are my fourth grade wussies! Put the football head down." Wolfgang says forcefully smacking Arnold out of Ludwig's hand.
"Fight, fight, fight!" The older kids shouted as Wolfgang and Ludwig began shoving each other.
And so began a new rivalry for Wolfgang between him and Ludwig, it seemed that every time he tried to use the vacant lot there was Ludwig with his friends and they'd both always ended up fighting each other for that reason. It was frustrating for Wolfgang because all the time he could have been using bullying the fourth graders was now being used to fight back Ludwig. Which was making him act even more cruelly at school to the point that his mother was informed of his behavior, which in turn made him act a bit worse. At some point it seemed that even the fourth graders were getting frustrated with not being able to use the vacant lot because Arnold came over to speak with both bullies.
"Look you guys, we have at least have as much right to use the vacant lot as you do." Arnold says trying to be reasonable. "From now on we want you to share it with us. What do you say?" Instead of a verbal answer Arnold received a punch to the face by both bullies leaving him with a large black eye.
The two bullies went back to fighting soon after until at some point they both had to go home. The next day at school all the younger kids stayed as far away from Wolfgang as they could get. It would seem that word had spread around the school about Arnold's black eye. Which suited Wolfgang just fine as he enjoyed the extra amount of fear on the lower classmen's faces at least until he saw that fear on Nadine's face as well. It was a look of both grave disappointment and complete fear, it wasn't something he'd ever seen, even before they started hanging out. And it sank his heart a little bit more to know that he had caused that fear, so he shoved a kid out of his way and laughed to cover up that awful twisting pain in his chest.
By the time recess had come and Arnold had told him Ludwig had given up trying to best him Wolfgang actually felt a bit of relief. Without that rival around he could at least calm down enough to not get in trouble with his mother. He and his friends had made their way over to the vacant lot after his oboe lessons only to be surprised to find Ludwig and his friends there as well.
"Hey, what's he doing here?" Wolfgang asked forcefully.
"What's he doing here?" Ludwig asked just as forcefully.
"What are you doing here?" Wolfgang and Ludwig say at the same time.
"I invited you both." Arnold explained to the two bullies.
"Huh?" Wolfgang says confused.
"What for?" Ludwig asked.
"To settle this thing over a football game." Arnold explains. "Whichever of you wins gets to use the vacant lot and the loser has to find another place to bully."
"You can't make us do anything football head." Wolfgang says forcefully lifting up the fourth grader by his shirt.
"What? You don't think you can beat Ludwig at football?" Arnold asked.
"What are you talking about I'd kick his butt." Wolfgang says defensively.
"Oh yeah?" Ludwig says smacking Arnold out of Wolfgang's hand.
"Yeah!" Wolfgang says back.
"Then you're on." Ludwig says.
"Fine. My guys against your guys." Wolfgang says until he hears the other fourth graders showing up to play a game of baseball on the street. "Hold up, I got a better idea. Why should we kill each other? We'll use the fourth graders."
"What?" Helga asked and began to walk over to the vacant lot with the other fourth graders.
"What are you talking about?" Ludwig asked not understanding Wolfgang's idea.
"We'll split them up into teams stupid. You and me coach." Wolfgang explains. "Winner gets to run the vacant lot."
"Oh, no I am not going to be part of your dumb little football game." Helga says standing her ground the two bullies both looked ready to attack Helga when Nadine spoke up.
"Yeah neither am I." Nadine agrees and begins to walk away. "I wanted to go to the park today anyway."
"Hey where do you think you're going?" Ludwig asked going after Nadine and stepping in front of her. "You all have to stay here and play."
"No I don't." Nadine says while trying to walk around him, but he grabbed her by the arm before she could. "Hey let me go!"
"Oh, no Nadine!" Rhonda says in dismay completely scared for her best friend.
"Hey! Let her go!" Wolfgang says forcefully surprising everyone there.
"Excuse me?" Ludwig asked still holding onto Nadine's arm.
"You heard me!" Wolfgang says forcefully glaring at the other boy and getting into his face. "Let her go now!"
"Why should I?" Ludwig asked just as forcefully. "You know she was trying to get away right?!"
"Yeah well-" Wolfgang begins to say he was trying to find a good reason for his outburst when he realized that everyone was staring at him in shock. It hit him suddenly how strange this must seem to everyone because as far as anyone knows Wolfgang shouldn't have a problem with how Ludwig was treating Nadine. But it was Nadine being threaten and so Wolfgang was quick to react despite their breakup he still cared about her no matter how much he tried to push those feelings away.
"Well what?" Ludwig asked again. "Why did you stop me from wailing on this fourth grader?"
"You can't wail on her!" Wolfgang says angrily poking Ludwig in the chest.
"Why not?" Ludwig asked completely confused while still having a tight grip on Nadine's arm it was starting to cause Nadine to whimper a bit in pain.
"Because!" Wolfgang just says trying to come up with an excuse. "Because she's…a girl!" It was a flimsy excuse considering that they were both going to hit Helga not too long ago honestly he should have probably said because then they'd be down a football player to coach but it was too late for that hopefully it would be good enough excuse.
"Because she's a girl?" Ludwig repeated mockingly. "Are you kidding me that's your excuse?! No wonder these fourth graders are so out of control. You're too soft on them, well I won't be!" Ludwig states evenly then raises a fist to hit Nadine, he's stopped though by Wolfgang whom has now grabbed a hold of his arm.
"Let. Go. Of. Her." Wolfgang says darkly in a very serious tone his hand gripping Ludwig's arm very tightly with each word. All the onlookers gasp at Wolfgang's seriousness having never witness him act like this before.
"You're acting awfully protective of this fourth grader Wolfgang." Ludwig says with a malicious smirk as he gripped Nadine's arm harder causing her more visible pain. "What is she your girlfriend or something?" he asked then started laughing as Wolfgang's face became red whether it was from anger or embarrassment he didn't know either way it was humorous.
"Yes!" Wolfgang admits while still gripping Ludwig's arm much to everyone's surprise. "Nadine is my girlfriend and you'd better let her go!" Ludwig finally decides to let Nadine go…by tossing her hard into the ground sending Wolfgang into a blind rage. "That's it!" Wolfgang launches himself at Ludwig knocking the other fifth grader onto the ground.
The two bullies began to fight though this time it was a lot more brutal than their previous fights, all of Wolfgang's anger was really going into this fight. Everything he had been feeling for weeks but not really admitting was fueling this fight and if it was anyone else besides Ludwig he was fighting than that person would have really gotten hurt really quickly. Ludwig and Wolfgang were pretty evenly matched which meant that their fighting usually lasted for a long time but today was different Wolfgang wasn't just fighting for control of the vacant lot he was fighting to defend Nadine which was why he was finally able to overwhelm Ludwig and beat him.
"Get out of here!" Wolfgang yelled down to the now bleeding and bruised Ludwig. "And don't you dare ever come near this vacant lot or bother these fourth graders especially my girlfriend ever again! EVER!"
Ludwig had no choice but to accept defeat for now so he and his friends begrudgingly left the vacant lot while the fourth graders cheered as the other fifth graders left.
"Well Wolfgang since Ludwig won't be a problem anymore. How about we agree that we should just share the vacant lot equally what do you say?" Arnold being the optimistic that he was decided to try to reason with Wolfgang again to see if he would agree to share the vacant lot hopefully it would be easier now that it was just Wolfgang he had to deal with.
"What makes you think that I would-" Wolfgang begins to threaten only to get interrupted by Nadine.
"Wolfgang." Nadine says before he could say anything further. "Can I talk to you?"
"Yes!" Wolfgang said rather quickly than blushed when he suddenly remembered his earlier confession and noticed that all the kids at the vacant lot were staring at him. "I mean whatever." He walked over to her in a nonchalant manner, it was after he walked over to Nadine that he noticed that the other kids were still watching him. "Get lost!" He shouted to them forcefully shaking a fist at them causing them all to run away no one wanting to risk being Wolfgang's next victim. "Hey Nadine." He says rather shyly once they were alone.
"Hey." Nadine begins to say looking down at her feet. "Thanks for saving me from Ludwig."
"You don't have to thank me for that it's my job to defend you since I'm your-" Wolfgang begins to say but then catches himself. "I mean I was your boyfriend."
"Yeah well it's still nice that you saved me even though you're clearly mad at me." Nadine continues to say.
"I'm not mad at you!" Wolfgang insists very quickly.
"Really because you've been acting really badly lately." Nadine says forcefully. "More so than usually to the point that you were terrifying for weeks."
"You're right." Wolfgang admits shamefully to her. "I was really upset about our breakup and then I overheard you talking to Peapod Kid about getting married to him and then Ludwig showed up…I guess I just started having all this rage."
"That's scary Wolfgang." Nadine tells him honestly still not looking at him. "I don't think I've ever been so scared of you even before we dated you weren't this scary."
"I'm sorry Nadine." Wolfgang says in a panicking tone, it twisted his heart further to hear that Nadine had become so scared of him. Granted that had been his intention at the time but now he was worried that Nadine would never look at him again. "But I promise that I won't be that bad anymore and I don't mind if people know that we're together anymore. It was stupid of me to want to keep it a secret!"
"I thought that your reputation was important to you though?" Nadine questions finally looking him in the eye. "It was the most important thing."
"Yeah it was but…when I thought that Ludwig was about to hurt you…my reputation didn't matter to me only you did." Wolfgang begins to explain blushing. "I mean I know it doesn't make any sense…we are broken up…but the only thing I could think about at the time was that I had to protect you. So yeah my reputation wasn't important only you were."
"Really?" Nadine asked hopefully.
"Of course." Wolfgang says taking a hold of her hand. "You're my Bug Girl right?"
"Yeah." Nadine says with a blush squeezing his hand.
About half an hour later Arnold and the other fourth graders made their way back to Gerald Field and found that Wolfgang and Nadine were still there sitting on a bench. Nadine was checking over his bruises and putting bandages wherever it was needed. It would seemed that even though Wolfgang had won the fight he wouldn't be getting out of it without any battle scars.
"Hey is everything alright?" Arnold asked being the only one brave enough to speak up.
"No worries football head my girlfriend is just making sure I'm all fixed up." Wolfgang says in his usually arrogant tone turning to face Arnold instead of Nadine.
"Ah that's great I guess." Arnold says in an awkward tone still not knowing what to make of this newfound relationship Nadine the sweet nature loving girl going out with a brute like Wolfgang just didn't make sense.
"Yes it is great." Wolfgang continues on. "And I've decided since you wussies fourth graders are lucky enough to be friends with my girlfriend that I'll allow you to share the vacant lot with us much superior fifth graders."
"Really? Wolfgang that's great." Arnold says excitedly as the group of fourth graders cheered happily in the background. "Does that mean that you're also not going to trip us and be mean and push us around anymore?"
"No." Wolfgang says in a deadpanned tone, which stopped the cheers in its tracks. "But you can use the vacant lot again football face."
A/n and that is the end of that chapter and wow was this one not very easy. For me I consider New Bully on the Block to be Wolfgang's worse episode mostly because he's a lot more mean spirted and violent here. I don't know if it's because Ludwig is there or what but there was some moments where I kept thinking 'but Wolfgang would never do that!' even with the little character development we got in the series it still felt very left field. I mean there is some funny stuff in the episode like with Curly during the football game but I decided to cut it mainly because it doesn't sit well with me to put in that Helga gets punched by the two bullies. I get it if the intent was to be darker than normal and show that not everything will always work out but I feel that that goes too far. Even I remember as a kid that if you were a boy who ended up hitting a girl it wasn't something you could just get away with bully or not. I'm not saying that Wolfgang has never been shown to be rough regardless of gender but he never went that far! And I couldn't picture Nadine taking him back after punching Helga. Maybe Ludwig makes him worse because he never shows up again after that episode despite now being Wolfgang's friend who does continue to show up in the series. I decided to make it a little bit better here where the fourth graders get to use the vacant lot again but Wolfgang is still his bullying self…so basically how the series continued on without Ludwig. Speaking of Ludwig let me know if you think he should appear again or not. And as always please read and review!