Chapter Five: Losing for Winning.

January, 1999

"I was looking through the paper and saw that the music store was having a sale this week," Gwen's mom said. "I was wondering if you'd like to go take a look? Maybe a last minute birthday present will catch your eye?"

"Mom…" Gwen rolled her eyes and hid her head in her arms. She'd been lying on her stomach on the floor in the living room, and the carpet tickled at her nose as she tried to bury her head in it.

"How about the French horn? I'm sure we could still get you into a music class and I always thought you'd sound lovely playing a French…." The words died with a wince. "I'm doing it again, aren't I?"

Gwen turned to look at her mother and forced a smile. Mom had been on edge since Christmas. Not just because of the fight, but because some small part of her knew that Ben's mom was right. Which only made things worse. "Only a little."

It had only been three weeks, but the holiday had already become known as Bloody Christmas in the Tennyson houses. It had been years since her family and Ben's had seen each other for more than ten minutes at Christmas. There had always been too many parties and volunteer work and shopping that left everyone too beat to go visiting.

That was the excuse anyway.

But after the trip to Christmas Village, Ben and she had pestered their parents into spending a few hours together for Grandpa Max. To give him the holiday he wanted.

Grandpa had been thrilled when he found out. Way more thrilled than either set of parents had been. And since the Rust Bucket was closest to Ben's house, they were the ones that got to play host.

When Gwen and her parents had arrived, Ben did the best he could to pull her arm out of her socket as soon as she got through the front door because he finally had someone to play the new Sumo-Slam II with. If he was stronger – or Fourarms – he probably would have just scooped her up and carried her to the television. As it was, he all but dragged her across the living room. She'd barely had time to pull her coat off before he shoved a controller in her hand.

And they spent the next hour lost in the game as they tried to prove who was the best.

They only stopped playing when Grandpa Max had shown up and it was time for presents. Ben and Gwen both did their best to look surprised when Grandpa told them about the Road Trip sequel.

It was the perfect day. Everything Grandpa had wanted.

Until dinner. Until those two sentences.

"That's just ridiculous, Sandra. Frank and I don't pay any attention to those parenting fads and look at how well Gwen is turning out."

"Oh, yes. You just keep the poor girl so busy jumping from activity to activity that she doesn't have time to breathe, much less live her own life."

Not even Grandpa was able to stop the fight after that. Gwen's mom and dad didn't even wait for dinner to be over before they stormed out, dragging Gwen behind them. They'd been in such a hurry that they were half way home before they realized that they'd forgotten the presents.

Grandpa Max had to come by and drop them off the next day.

It was a week before Gwen could even mention Ben's name without her mother giving her the evil eye, and another three days before she finally got her mom to agree that Ben could still come to her party, and for Ben's mom to agree that she could still go to his.

The one that was on her real birthday.

Not that she was still bitter about that.

"'No, you take it.' I can't believe I fell for that…"

No, not bitter at all.

"What was that, hon?" Her father asked.

"Maybe we should hold off on the pinata until after presents," Gwen answered as she lifted her head back up. Her plans for the party were scattered on the floor around her - a mess of papers and a schedule with a light blue folder to keep it all in. The papers themselves were a covered in pencil and erase marks.

"If you want," her mother said from the couch across the room. She had a similar – but much cleaned up – folder of her own in her lap. "But that means holding off on cake."

"Yeah," Gwen said as she looked at the schedule and absently doodled on the edges of it.

"We could keep the party going for a while longer…"

Gwen sighed and shook her head. Three hours was already pushing it. Especially since they had to be at school the next day.

"Or we could just get rid of the video games."

Gwen couldn't hide the frustrated whine in her voice. "Mom!"

Lili looked down at her. "We have enough real things to do. You know I don't like you staring at the television…"

"Oh, let her have her video game time, Lili," her father said from his place on the couch. "It'll help her hand-eye coordination. Why not open the party with the pinata? It'll be a heck of a start."

"Yes. Beating things with sticks is always popular," her mother drawled.

Her father leaned over and grinned through his beard. "Hey, it's how I met you, isn't it?"

"I thought I felt something hit the back of my head." Lili smiled back, the scowl on her face melted away as the two leaned together for a kiss.

Gwen closed her eyes and made gagging sounds. "Focus, people! The party's only a week away."

"Sir, yes sir!" Gwen's father saluted when he finally pulled back from his wife.

Lili hid her smile under one hand while she swatted at his leg with the other. "You aren't your father, Frank."

"Of course not, Lili. He never would have saluted."

No matter how much she tried, Gwen couldn't imagine her Grandpa Max saluting anyone. How he made it through the army was a mystery. "Dad."

"I know, honey. I'm focused. It's not every day my baby turns eleven."

"Dad!"

"No baby?" her father asked with a pout. "What about the others? What were they? The Red Menace? Choo-choo? Oh, I remember! Bumperbutt!"

Gwen's face burned with every name until she finally had to bury it in the floor again.

Her mother did nothing to help. "If you keep it up, Frank, you'll get your invitation taken away. Isn't that right, Bumperbutt?"

"You two better not do this in front of people."

"We won't," Frank promised. "We just have to figure out which name to put on the cake…"

Gwen thanked every deity she could think of, up to and including Tom Cruise and Oprah, when the phone decided to ring. "I'll get it!" she shouted and rolled to her feet. She grinned when she saw Ben's number on the caller ID.

She hadn't seen him since Christmas, and barely talked to him on the phone even before the fight. Her parents had taken her cell phone away before Thanksgiving. She'd found a spell to soundproof her room, but somehow she'd miscounted how much time she'd spent talking to Ben and went way over free minutes.

She still didn't get a chance to talk to him. He didn't even let her say hello before he blurted out two words.

"You win."

"What do you mean, I win?"

"Mom's gone and rescheduled the party," Ben said, the words stumbling over each other. "She said that there's a new author coming into town next Saturday for a workshop and she had to get his opinion on something or other. I don't know. So you win. Our birthday's yours."

Gwen wanted to bang her head into the wall. She settled for pressing her hand into her temple. If she pushed hard enough, maybe she could black out and forget that Ben had called.

"I can't change it now. I already sent out the invitations. You should have gotten one. Don't tell me you lost it."

"Are you sure you can't change it?"

She could have strangled him. Everything was set. Everything was set five months ago. It would have been set six months ago if he hadn't tricked her out of giving up her birthday. Somehow she managed to shove all of that annoyance into a single three letter word: "Yes."

"Gwen? Honey? Who's that on the phone?" her father asked as he looked up from his book.

"Ben. There's some kind of problem with his party," Gwen answered.

"What kind of problem?" Gwen's mother asked. All of the humor that had been in her voice a second ago was gone.

Gwen closed her eyes. This was the last thing she wanted to deal with. "One of Aunt Sandra's authors is coming into town next Saturday so she's rescheduling. Ben wants me to know that I can have my birthday back if I want it."

Lili shook her head. "There's no way. We've already…"

"I know, Mom. I told him."

Gwen thought that that was the worst of it until her father chimed in, "When's she doing the party then?"

Ben must have heard him. "Are you absolutely positive you can't change your party?" Ben asked, his voice hollow.

Gwen froze. "She didn't."

"Didn't what?" Her father asked as he sat up from his recliner.

"I'm sorry, Gwen."

"But… I had everything scheduled…." Her eyes went to the folder that was sitting open on the carpet. She'd had it all ready. The games, the cake. It was going to be wonderful. She sat down on the floor next to the couch. "I was even going to have time to kick your butt at Super Sumo Slam II again."

"I know, and I was thinking – Wait. You never kicked my butt. Sure you beat me a few times, but that was all beginner's luck."

"Was not. Besides, you were a beginner, too," Gwen said. "You were thinking?"

"Oh, yeah. Grandpa and I'll go and do some laser tag in the morning so he can still go to your party…."

"But what about…?"

"I want him to go to yours. I'm not going to make him choose."

Gwen blinked as her eyes blurred, but she didn't have a chance to say anything.

"Gwen, what did that woman do now?" Gwen's mother asked.

And that was it. An hour later – heck - ten minutes later and Gwen would have calmly told her. Instead she spun around and glared at her mother. Her party was crumbling around her and the last thing she needed was to listen to another 'that woman' rant. "Mom! Can I have a second?"

The woman froze. Her father didn't. He gave Gwen a look before he stood and held his hand out to her mother. "Come on, Lili."

"Frank," Lili said, her eyes still on Gwen.

"Come on. We have to let them work it out."

Lili opened her mouth to say something, but closed it so hard that Gwen heard her teeth click together. She nodded and let herself get led out of the room, but the surprised hurt never left her eyes.

"Gwen? Still there?"

Gwen watched her parents to make sure they really left, and then collapsed into the couch that her parents had just vacated. "Yeah."

"I wish your Mom and Dad didn't have to listen in," Ben muttered.

Gwen blushed, mortified that he'd heard her mother. "Ben, she didn't mean…"

"Yeah, she did. She always does."

"Well, can you…" Gwen snapped back. Or started too, until Ben's breath hissed in her ear. Gwen closed her eyes and banged the back of her head against the arm of the couch. "How could she? You did get the invitation, right?"

"Yeah."

There was a pause. "This is about Christmas, isn't it?"

"It's all your mom's fault…" Ben muttered.

"My mom? Mine isn't the one…"

"I know," Ben said. Gwen was shocked to hear him agree and for the first time realized how tired he sounded. Knowing him he'd been fighting with his mom all day over this. "I just wanted to say sorry. I already talked to Grandpa and he said he'll be fine. Though he told me to go easy on him. 'Or else he won't be able to dance with the birthday girl.'" Ben finished the quote with a gag.

"But, what about you?" Her voice cracked at that. It wasn't fair. This was going to be the first time they could hang out together for more than a couple of hours since summer. It would have been almost the whole weekend. Heck, it would have been three days, counting Christmas.

And now their moms had managed to ruin all three.

"I can't skip my party," Ben said, his voice bitter. Bitter enough that Gwen knew he had actually tried. "And it stinks, 'cause I spent actual money on your present this time."

"No more hand-me-down video games?"

"Not as long as you don't get me another book."

"Deal." It wasn't this year. His gift was already wrapped up and stuck under her bed. Still, she just couldn't resist. "There aren't anymore 'Where's Waldo's' out anyway."

She heard him blow a raspberry at her and giggled.

"I'll give my present to Grandpa, and he can give me yours," Ben offered the idea up, but there was no enthusiasm in his voice.

"I guess." Neither said much after that. After he hung up she curled up on the couch and stared down at all of her plans. Five months of work. Everything else was set. All of her classmates would be over, there would be games and cake and presents. She'd even get Grandpa…

She just wanted to cancel the whole thing.

And then it got worse.

"Honey?" her father said as he peeked out from the other side of the door. Her mother was right behind him. They hadn't gone far. They probably heard every word she'd said. "Is everything all right?"

"Ben's not coming."

"I'm sorry," Gwen's mother said. Whatever anger Gwen had seen a second ago was gone, replaced by more than a little embarrassment. She sat at the end of the couch and put her hand on Gwen's shoulder. If Gwen hadn't looked up, she never would have seen the relieved look in her mother's eyes.

But she had. Gwen shook her mother's hand off and stood. "Its been a long day. I'm going to bed."