Brief Summary: Stanley attempts conversation with a very mad Melvin as they both pack up their things to go home.
Sooo, the season 3 finale also made me kinda sad. And also mad. At this point I kinda give up on George and Harold ever being nice, and the three of them being friends.
Also did you ever wonder how it would go if Melvin ranted to an actual human instead of to a machine or animal? Like, you know, talk about his problems with people? And more of a leap here, what if someone listened? Soooo, here's this. For the record, the choice of Stanley is not at all random, he is often friendly to Melvin throughout S3 (Altitooth, Barfalisk, and Gumbilina episodes as examples off of the top of my head), so he's just a likely candidate for someone to end up listening to a Melvin Monologue. Are they friends? I dunno, but I want this child to be happy, so for the sake of this fic they will be.
Walking into his cabin to finish packing up his things, it was hard not to notice the practical storm clouds that hovered over the cabin. Stanley felt more sweat drip nervously down his back, and he wondered what, if anything, he should do. He couldn't help but be a little concerned, especially with the angry muttering coming from Melvin's side of the cabin. Experience showed that a mad Melvin never ended well, for him or anyone else
Yeah, Melvin had turned him into Poopacabra for a little but that had been more weird than anything considering how this summer had gone. It was water under the bridge as far as he was concerned. And also, the more he kinda thought about it, the more he realized that the last few days had not been kind to his cabin mate. Looking over at the cowboy outfit violently thrown in the corner, he shuffled his feet and awkwardly attempted to break ice that was several feet thick.
"Sooo, crazy summer right?"
Melvin tensed where he was folding one of many identical button up shirts into a suitcase, but did not turn around.
Stanley kept trying, "It'll be kinda nice to get home, huh?"
The other boy just silently packed another shirt and did not respond. The response - or the lack of it- made Stanely worry a little more. Usually Melvin would at least snap at him to be quiet by now. This silence was weird, and not in a normal weird Melvin way.
"Hey, are you okay?" He finally decided to ask when he could think of nothing else more subtle.
"I'm fine, you moldy sack of potatoes" Melvin snapped in reply, still not turning around. Stanley gave a sigh of relief. Snapping and Melvinsults were way more normal.
"That's good. All of that quiet was kinda freaking me out a little".
"Why wouldn't I be fine?" he continued, and Stanley was a little confused. Snapping was normal, but that was usually the end of it. But, alright, guess he had more to say. That was alright with Stanley. "I'm finally leaving this purgatory of a camp. Even though," he muttered angrily to his suitcase, as though he had forgotten that Stanley was in the room, "I'm most likely returning next summer thanks to those dead batteries George and Harold".
"Uh, okay?" Stanley stammered in reply, not entirely certain that Melvin was actually talking to him anymore.
"And it's pretty much guaranteed," he continued, "to be just as, if not more, awful, since those two numbskulls, for reasons I cannot comprehend, decided that Krupp should be in charge again. The man turned a children's summer camp into a sweatshop, twice, in the same summer, and they sided with him over me!"
This was the point where it would be normal and expected for Stanely to slowly back out of the room to avoid this awkward monologue, regret ever having asked, and leave Melvin by himself to rant to his suitcase. But he didn't. He wasn't raised that way. His parents and siblings taught him to be kind, and that when people are hurting - even if they're awful like Mr Krupp, or weird like Melvin - you should try and help. Sometimes all it took was something as simple as asking if they were okay. Something told him that Melvin was not okay. So he stayed in the room and tried to hear out Melvin's one-sided ranting.
"Who do those two broken door knobs think they are?" he raged, aggressively shoving another shirt into the bag, "Choosing to help that monster Mr Krupp when we had a deal. I thought even they would have had enough intelligence to see that he was their enemy, and that they would be on my side for once. No logical, thinking, person would possibly choose a careless, hateful, again, sweatshop making, man over my flawless reasoning".
"But apparently" he yelled, gesturing angrily and so mad that he definitely was forgetting that he had an audience, "I'm far more abhorrent than any sweatshop!"
Ok, now Stanley had no idea what to do. This was getting dangerously close to "I'll show them, I'll show them all" territory. And also uncomfortably personal, more so than he was used to from the young scientist.
All the same, the words worried him. Melvin didn't really think that did he? It just wasn't true. Sure, Melvin could do some bad things (Like the laser monster. That had been pretty bad), but with all the times that Stanely had tried talking to him, he didn't think that Melvin was a bad person. At least, he didn't think he was as bad as illegal child labor. Over the course of the summer, he had seen Melvin try before. A bad person, he reasoned, would never try to be better. Maybe it was time someone told Melvin that.
So instead of making himself scarce, he decided to do the opposite. Climbing the ladder of the bunk he sat down next to Melvin, and before he could yell at him said, "Hey I might like sweat, but, like, you're better than a sweatshop, you know?"
At first Melvin just startled, having forgotten that Stanely was in the room, but after pulling himself back to the present, he actually had to think for a moment about what the sweaty boy had actually said. "What?" he asked, and for the first time in this "conversation", the young genius actually turned to face Stanley, his features warring between disgust and confusion as he processed Stanley's words. (And if his eyes looked slightly wet, well, Stanely wouldn't say anything. They could just blame allergies.)
Stanely shrugged, "I don't really know everything you're talking about, but I think you're an okay guy. I mean, you're weird, but that's okay." he laughed, awkwardly, "I'm weird too".
"Don't compare me to you, you freak of nature!" he retorted, but the insult was more defensive and confused than angry. "What are you even doing up here? You're getting my bunk all gross and wet".
"I'm just trying to be friendly" he offered hesitantly, "You seemed like you wanted someone to talk to, and my parents always say to try to be nice to people".
"Ah, so you're only talking to me because your parents told you to,'' replied Melvin, looking strangely satisfied. That just confused Stanely even more. Why'd he look like he had won an argument, when they weren't even having one? Scratching his head, trying and failing to figure out the other boy's logic, he just said simply, "Huh? No. I just thought, I'unno, that you could use a friend. Or something".
"Friend?" despite his intelligence, Melvin said the word as if it were a foreign language. "We aren't friends you overripe banana".
Stanely was a little disappointed at that. He had thought that they were, since they had talked quite a bit over the summer, "Oh. I thought we were".
At that, Melvin stopped short in his packing,dropping the half-folded shirt in his hands, and stared at Stanley, his mouth slightly agape. Stanely wasn't sure if he had ever seen Melvin dumbfounded before (since "dumb" and "Melvin" were two words he hardly ever thought about next to each other), but that was the only way he could describe his cabin mate's expression.
"You...did?" the young prodigy asked, disbelief evident in his voice. It made the farm boy wilt some, that Melvin was that offended at the idea of them being friends. Sure, he was just simple country boy Stanley, and Melvin could, like, tear apart the universe in an hour, but he hadn't thought that Melvin disliked him that much.
"Yeah" he replied, embarrassed, and he scooched to the edge of the bunk bed, ready to leave, "But, I mean, I just thought. We don't have to be friends, if you don't want to be". He turned to climb down the ladder, but was stopped in his tracks by a sudden soft-spoken
"I…" Melvin cleared his throat awkwardly, biting his bottom lip anxiously and looking practically bashful-another first. He hadn't meant to reply, the word had just burst out of him, and he warred over whether he wanted to voice his thoughts out loud.
Stanely hovered over the edge of the ladder, patiently giving Melvin time to say what he wanted to say. The ginger toyed with his hands and glanced around the room, considering, evaluating, debating. Seeming to come to a conclusion, he took a steadying breath and said, in a stronger but still hesitant voice, "I… do. Want to be...friends." He tested the word uncertainly, like he was still getting used to how it sounded.
"Oh! Ok, then!" Chirped Stanley cheerily, climbing back up onto the bed.
"I mean...that is...I suppose you have been good company this summer," Melvin said, fiddling with the zipper of his suitcase and not looking at Stanley.
Stanley laughed, sitting back down next to his friend with a small sploosh, and he smiled wider when he saw that it looked like Melvin was actually trying to hide a shudder of disgust at the sweat that was soaking into the bed. "Well, I try" he replied jovially.
After a beat of silence, companionable instead of heavy now, he asked, "So, crazy summer, right?", going back to his original conversation starter. But this time, the ice had thawed somewhat, and the cabin as a whole felt lighter.
Melvin got back to packing, but this time responded with a good-natured eye roll (or as good natured as you got from Melvin anyway), "That would be one way to describe it, yes".
Leaning back, Stanley tapped his feet together, reflecting, "Yeah, between all of the monsters, and climbing that mountain, and starving in the wilderness, it'll be kinda nice to be home"
"Hey", he added, wondering now about said giant monsters (many of which were in some way because of Melvin), "How are you going to get all of your inventions home, anyway? I don't think the Goat-Getter will fit on the bus".
"Oh, that won't be a problem. I brought my do-you-want-size-with-that 2000 for just such an occasion" the genius replied, grabbing what looking like a cooling fan from the edge of his bed.
Stanley blinked owlishly at him, "Yer what?"
Melvin made a conscious effort to not snap at him for not understanding his invention. He just got this, he just said that they should be friends, he couldn't ruin it already. Instead he swallowed his snarky reply and simply said instead, "Uh, it's a shrink ray. There were some...extenuating circumstances when I was naming it. Not my best work. But, name aside, it makes packing easier".
"Cool" Stanley replied good-naturedly. Stanely continued to keep Melvin company while he packed, ooh-ing and ahh-ing obligingly when he shrunk his summertime inventions to put them away. They talked a bit, Melvin unsteadily and awkward in such a casual conversation, about the summer and about going back to school. Melvin was surprised (though in hindsight he really shouldn't have been) to have a semi-intelligent conversation about botany. At one point he actually got so caught up conversing that he forgot to be packing. It was...different. It was nice.
After some time of talking, Stanley finally slid off the bunk bed to grab his own things, mostly-packed on top of his own bed. Waving to Melvin, he slung his bag over his shoulder and crossed the cabin for the door. "Well, my parents will be here soon, so I gotta go. See you at school, friend".
Melvin blinked at the title for a moment, still a bit thrown off by Stanley's so easy acceptance of what for him was a major leap, but carefully responded, "Yes, I suppose you will. I'll… be seeing you. As well. Bye?" he offered uncertainly with an awkward wave.
Stanley didn't mind the awkwardness, and grinned largely at the attempt, glad that Melvin considered him a friend, too. Before he went out the door, he turned around and on a whim offered, "Feel free to come over to my house if you want. My mom loves an excuse to make snacks for people" he laughed at the Peet family inside joke.
Despite shuddering at the thought of where those snacks would mostly likely come from, Melvin smiled at the suggestion. It was a small, gentle smile, an expression not usually seen on the genius. He couldn't say he had ever had snacks at a friend's house before, or that anyone had ever offered, and the idea sounded...pleasant. But, (this time) he wasn't going to be a fool. Stanley, he warned himself, could change his mind. It could still be taken away.
So, "Maybe" he said, not willing to fully commit. The complexity of the situation was clearly lost on Stanley, though, because he kept smiling, seemingly taking the "maybe" as a "yes".
"Okay, then. See you around" he cried cheerfully one more time, before leaving Camp Lake Summer Camp behind. Melvin was left alone in the cabin to do the rest of his packing, but this time it felt different. Less...permanent. Now he could look forward to returning to school for more reasons than one.
There's my attempt to make the ending of S3 less awful for our boy. (Although it's funny, practically right after I finish writing this and say that I give up on George and Harold, the amazing and wonderful show writers gave us the Hack-o-Ween special. If you haven't watched that yet somehow, go watch it! Especially if you are a Melvin fan. Now let's just hope George and Harold mean it, and that Melvin gets to continue to be happy in whatever next season may come.)
Also had to re-upload this chapter after the ending didn't originally post for some reason. So that was annoying. Enjoy the new, improved, and actually completed second oneshot in this collection.
R&R if you can, reviews make me happy. :) See you in the next oneshot.