And now, with no due respect to David Letterman, S-Chrome proudly presents the Top 11 Reasons 'Why Tales of The Awkward hasn't been updated for the past nine months!' (In good ol' black and white!)
11 - S-Chrome had been eating far too many cheese sandwiches to reach the keyboard.
10 - The acoustics were too high.
9 - S-Chrome spent six months on lock-down for attempting to raid houses belonging to Mark McCorkle, Bob Schooley, and Steve Loter in an attempt to make a fifth season with Ron & Bonnie getting together in the series finale.
8 - S-Chrome temporarily doubted his storytelling ability when he found out there were more sports references than story. How embarrassing.
7 - S-Chrome held a brief period of Rufus/Shego shipping mania.
6 - S-Chrome was mourning the reality of another championship-less season in The Bronx... but happy in the fact that the Red Sox won't be winning anything in 2008 either.
5 - S-Chrome actually found himself a real job. Or two.
4 - S-Chrome was a lot more interested in what John Cena was doing.
3 - Like the New England Patriots, Tales of The Awkward was highly touted and overhyped... and won nothing.
2 - New York Giants defensive end Michael Strahan said that Tales of The Awkward, along with the other NFC nobodies (Especially the Dallas Cowboys) got (BOOM) Stomped out!
1 - Hang on, what is a tale that isn't awkward anyway?
Tales of The Awkward: Chapter 15 (Embarrassment Central! Part One)
It's aliiiiiiive.
"S-s-s... after they finished arguing, I saw them from the corner... (sniffle) and then, I saw him... I-I saw him... I saw..."
"Saw him what?"
"I saw him... I saw him... and her... and they were..." Tara tried to stiffen up, but the tears overcame her and as a result, the blonde-haired girl broke down once again. It was rather difficult to explain what had happened earlier in the day, as she was between loud, gasping, Topanga-at-criminal-court like sobs and broken speech. Everything aside, it was extremely hard to explain oneself while there was a large lump in one's throat, and add to that, a lump in one's heart as well.
Forever impatient as she was, Bonnie continued to press her friend as to what happened to make the blonde-haired girl look and sound like a total wreck. The brunette knew that it had something to do with Stoppable, but due to Tara frequently blubbering between sentences, she didn't have much of an idea what. From either side of the queen-sized bed in the brunette's bedroom sat Bonnie and Tara, one of them eager for information, the other too hurt to give it to her.
She intently listened while the blonde struggled to find the words to describe that kind of situation. "I just can't believe he would choose her over me!" The heartbroken, crestfallen blonde girl whined.
Bonnie, though trying to comfort her friend as best as she could, rolled her eyes. If it was up to her, it would be illegal for decent girls like Tara to have it so bad for losers like Stoppable... but then, she too, would partly be in the wrong as well. Not that anyone on the planet Earth was going to know about that. Maybe those out there in Saturn or Neptune may know the truth, but here on this third rock from the Sun... no way, Jose.
"Tara, I'm not going to know how to help if you're unable to tell me the whole story," she said calmly, attempting her Oscar-worthy role at being the understanding friend that she almost never was. Well, she always thought she would make a great actress. After all, she did take three or four drama classes in three years of high school. It took several moments for the emotionally spent girl to speak up.
"It started Friday night... when Ron and I went out on our date," she momentarily paused. "I-I mean, we had a nice time together... so, after we saw a movie, he wanted to walk me home. So, we're walking through the park and we heard some rustling in the bushes. So, Ron and I went over to check it out and..."
In a couple of moments, Miss Rockwaller heard quite possibly the biggest single piece of gossip since the fearless leader of COINTELPRO liked sashaying around in ravishing evening gowns... maybe bigger than that. What Tara was telling her couldn't possibly be for real. In her mind, Kim Possible had to be the biggest closeted freak on the planet to do what she did... or every silly girl in a thirty-mile radius were falling for Ron Stoppable. In any event, this was so going to ruin Little Ms. Perfect once she spread the word out.
The brunette's devious thoughts took a slight turn once she noticed that Tara had broken down into tears again. She really pitied her blonde cheer teammate, yet she didn't know whether it was because Tara was truly hurting or because Tara actually harbored real feelings for such a loser like Stoppable. However, she did have a nice course of action to... subside some of her friend's emotional pain. She scooped the trembling girl into her arms in an attempt to comfort her. In their embrace, the sobs of the blue-eyed girl ceased gradually.
"Shh, it's OK, T," Bonnie consoled gently. "It's going to be all right. I know what we could do to make it better," she said, a developing grin on her face.
"What?" The teary-eyed girl asked.
Bonnie smiled. "What if we tell all of Middleton High that their Little Miss Perfect ain't so perfect…"
"No," Tara replied.
The brunette was taken aback with Tara's answer. "What? Why not? Look at what Possible and Stoppable did to you! They both broke your heart!" Bonnie exclaimed, disbelieving in Tara's answer. "I mean, why wouldn't you want to get even with those two?"
Tara didn't answer. Perhaps she was thinking it over in her mind. Maybe she did have a little more than air underneath her hair. Bonnie continued to grow impatient with the blonde's indecision.
"Tara, I'm trying to help you out," she said, narrowing her eyes at the other girl.
"I'll get over it in my own way," Tara replied firmly. "Besides, if Ron is as close enough to Kim to forgive her for what she did that night, then there's nothing that could come between them," she calmly said. "And I don't know how starting some ugly rumor is supposed to help me," now it was Tara's turn to narrow her eyes at Bonnie. "I told you what I told you because I thought you wanted to help, not use it to destroy your sworn mortal enemy."
Sworn mortal enemy?
"I am trying to help," Bonnie replied defensively. "I think it just stinks that Possible comes off as being this model of perfection, who gets away with everything and cons everyone into believing her, regardless what she does and who she hurts in her pursuit of perfection! Normally, I could stand it… but this time, she hurt you, one of my friends, and I can't have that."
Tara was touched and unnerved at the same time. The blonde was moved by the fact that Bonnie considered her a friend. Past that, she would've been absolutely lying if her cheerleading partner didn't have a point about Kim.
"She's not perfect, Bonnie. No one is," Tara simply said. "And I'm sure she'd tell you that, too."
"Yeah, but… if only everyone else could see that…"
"Bonnie, is Kim really worth all the trouble?"
The brunette's ego screamed 'YES! YES! FOR THE LOVE OF PAUL KARIYA, YES!' but the words from her mouth had a different answer.
"No, I guess not," she whispered. Darn that Tara and her making so much sense.
"So, you're not going to tell anyone of what I told you?" Tara asked hopefully.
The tanned young woman sighed in defeat. It appeared that Tara wasn't going to agree with her type of help that she was offering. "Fine, Tara… but only for you," she said with a cheeky smile.
Tara enveloped the unsuspecting brunette in an embrace. She was glad that she had a friend like Bonnie. Sure, she was a bit rough around the edges, but when push came to shove, she would do the right thing. She pulled away to beam at the girl who unknowingly helped her feel much better.
"You know, Bon… I don't feel so bad anymore," she said. "And… there are other guys out there other than Ron."
Bonnie was thrilled to hear that from Tara. She chimed in "Guys that are better looking… guys that are a lot cuter… guys that aren't total losers… guys that are…"
"Bonnnnnnie…" Tara scolded.
"This is my house, I'll say what I want," Bonnie playfully replied. It held true to whatever decision she made…and whether Tara liked it or not, she was going to do whatever she wanted. It was obvious to the brunette that Tara wasn't mature enough to accept her help, and she wasn't intelligent enough to get direct satisfaction from the result.
Naturally, and as she always had to do, Bonnie had to take matters into her own hands. She wasn't doing this just for herself. She was doing this for herself and Tara, because that's what friends did for another!
Besides, Tara would thank her when it was all said and done.
"This is Temporary Sanity; the next stop on this Awkward Local will be Embarrassment Central. Step in and steer clear of the falling psyche."
Ding-Dong! The chimes meant that the doors were about to shut... no going back.
"I heard she stalked them for four hours straight, and after she was found out, she stood outside of Tara's house with a loaded pistol."
"Get this; from what I hear, she tried to beat up those three ushers who kicked her out of the 'plex when she was disturbing the movie..."
"Well, I heard that she stalked him the entire night because she was pregnant with his child! In fact, I saw her get tickets to go on the Maury Show just last week."
"Forget what you heard about all that! I heard that she followed him around to make it look like she liked him. In truth, I heard she's not even interested in guys. Do you see how she's like when she fights that weird green-looking chick? It looks like she's a little comme ci-comme ca, if you know what I mean."
"She ain't the only one... I mean, why would that Monique girl hang with her, anyway? There's something going on with those two, I know it."
"Well, I heard she was chasing after Ron with two flashlights, a pair of binoculars, and a helper monkey."
"I don't care anyway... I always knew Possible was a freak."
"I know, right? Always thinking that she could do everything and all that stuff... I can't stand her no way."
"This is Embarrassment Central. Transfers are available to Poor Self-Image and Public Humiliation. The next stop will be the Reputation Pillory. Step in and stand clear of the damaged ego."
"Ding-Dong"
Rumors were often false and/or grossly fabricated. Any adult with a reasonable level of maturity knew that for fact.
If only adults were the demographic who Kim Possible was dealing with.
Now, in a world where gossip ruled every establishment, from the quaintest of elementary schools on through the Wisteria Lanes of Any-town, USA, to the largest of the misguided media outlets, it was never good to be the subject of widespread rumors. Because rumors had that little tendency to spread like… drunken actors caught on tape, and as they spread, they would gather more steam, more momentum and became more and more odious as the discouraging word were passed from one overeager chatterbox to another. Then again, you know what they say: Any press, good or bad, is good press.
OK, you try telling that to an eleventh grader, and you'll probably find yourself screamed on for a couple of hours.
High school was a completely different animal. The law of the commanding populous was often the law of the halls, and if one word of solitary gossip was put out, one-hundred thousand others would add to the equation. Anyone who wanted to be the subject of gossip either had never been the subject, or happened to hail from the Spears family.
Middleton High was no exception to this norm.
Kim knew that about the repercussions that came with her... surveillance the instant that a speechless Ron was dragged away out of the park by Tara when she was unable to explain her motive, but when her fellow students stopped socializing to turn an accusing eye toward her when she walked by—and the low whispers after she passed them by, that, like another Rush Hour movie, was something she wasn't prepared for.
No wait… everyone was prepared for that.
While the lithesome redhead had an idea who spread these hideous rumors, she couldn't go to that source and do anything objectionable to her as then it would confirm the… uglier-than-Renee-Zellweger rumors that were swirling around, and ultimately sink her deeper into the bottomless abyss.
Wait, if the abyss is bottomless, how can you sink deeper?
"That's Kim Possible, isn't it?" A girl asked from behind her.
"You mean that crazy stalker chick that hijacked a bus to follow that Stoppable guy around?" Another girl whispered back. "Yeah, that's her… she looks more like the quiet psycho-type to me."
It took a good deal of restraint for the redhead to just walk by and accept the blatant assassination of her character. Well, it wasn't too much of an assassination it was her character's murderer was likely on the grassy knoll before it unloaded three or five shots into her character's skull, then took it to the town hall and was hung, drawn and quartered. Oh, this was going to be one, tough, nasty day to endure. One way or another, she had to grin and bear it…even if it meant every capillary busting in her body due to highly contained rage.
By the time the lunch period came around, young Kimberly-Anne had overheard every last rumor that could be said about her. She couldn't believe that people could spin all these kinds of lies in the face of what really happened. Still, however, there was very little that she could do about it. Heck, the Friday Night Massacre did occur, and the past couldn't be changed… unless one of the redhead's great uncles happened to be Doc Brown.
As more whispers came from behind her as she strolled along down the lunch line, she wondered if this was just karma coming back on her for something she did wrong in the past. B-but, she only tried to do good deeds, didn't she?
She had a lot of time to think things through, as it was the lunch period and she wasn't much in the mood for eating. The redhead lamely picked through the grotesque mass of brown and purple matter that was this day's main course. She scanned through the cafeteria from left to right, not a friendly face in the entire bunch.
Until, of course…
"K.P., where've you been?"
In the random chattering of the rest of the students in the area, Kim didn't need to turn around to recognize whose voice it was. Heck, her disposition went from chilly to uncharacteristically jubilant in record-setting time. She made an attempt mask to her excitement of seeing him as he sat across from her and found it quite difficult. She momentarily looked away from her sidekick-of-sorts and focused in on him once again.
Still, that feeling of some kind of anticipation still didn't escape her. Kim couldn't remember being happier to see Ron, unless she hadn't seen him in a reasonably long while, and last she checked, eighteen to twenty-four hours was not a reasonably long while. In fact, as she checked her internal memory banks, the last time she remember being this ecstatic to see a boy was...
...Josh Mankey.
Hm, who was that guy anyway?
She had little problems then admitting her crush on the aspiring artist, but with Ron, it was much different. The redhead didn't deny her newfound sentiments toward her best friend, at the same time too, she couldn't quite accept it either. In her view, there was just something a bit off with crushing on someone who she knew for as long as she did, yet not off in a bad way. It was as if the good qualities of Ron began to shine through all of the weaker ones... not that Kim was focused on the bad ones. What kind of friend would she be if she only focused on the bad qualities...?
Oy, she was so confused right now. Maybe it would become clearer to her, but for now...
"K.P., I swear I'll give you my last slice of pizza if you'll stop staring a hole through me..." Ron said to her, his voice a bit shaky.
It didn't take Kim more than about two seconds that she didn't take her eyes off of her confidant whilst she was ruminating the weirdnesses and pleasantries of crushing on said confidant. Though she was caught out in the open, she did cover quickly for it.
"I'm not staring at you, I'm staring at that spot on your..." She reached across the table with a finger to poke a spot of tomato residue off of Ron's cheek. She was surprised to see Ron shrink away from her touch, but the redhead still couldn't resist a slight grin at his sudden hesitance. It was refreshing to see Ronnie look a bit unsure at what she was doing rather than the opposite... though, he looked like a deer in the highlights when she boldly pecked him on his cheek in front of Barkin, basically reinforcing his thought that they were lovebirds... and when she winked at him a few moments after that.
Wait... since when did she label Ron as 'Ronnie'?
'OK,' Ron gathered as he avoided eye contact with Kim. 'Since when did Kim care about foodstuff residue being stuck to his face?'
The entire week had been filled nearly to the brim with 'Since When's' when it came to the blond teenage boy. Like, since when did Kim get all touchy-feely with him, much less kiss him in public? Or, since when did so many people pay attention to him? He was fully comfortable with being that mildly uninteresting second-fiddle that played the background. More importantly, as he stared at that slice pizza that he'd have scarfed down already, since when did the term 'Legitimate Contenders' and the Boston Celtics fit in the same sentence?
He hated instances where he'd rather think than eat.
The two friends, who usually found more than enough topics to converse about, remained silent for several minutes. During those rare times when they were at upset at one another they could often have more to say than at this moment. Neither teen spoke a word in passing to one another, even when that familiar ring of a bell however broke the cafeteria from their lull. Kim & Ron were no exception. Both responded quickly to the bell. Ron found that he had walk a bit quicker to catch up with the redhead, who appeared to be a rush. He finally got to her in the stairwell.
"Wait up, K.P.! Physics class cannot be that exciting..." Ron called as he came within a couple feet of her.
There were two things that made the girl stop dead in her tracks; One, that blasted goofy look on Ron's face that she found more endearing by the day, and two: He was actually holding her hand. A pair of green eyes focused in on that hand that appeared to be grasping hers. It was as if nothing else was going on outside of Ron's hand touching hers. Heck, even if Richard Simmons was gored to death by wild steers, it wouldn't have made a difference to Kim and Ron.
Not that anyone would want Richard Simmons to be gored to death by wild steers...
...riiiight?
'Forget about all of the weirdness,' Kim thought. This was actually nice. Still, though, for as awkward and at the same time, nice as it was... this was really, really nice.
The girl's face began to flush... that's rarely happened... ever. Still... she did have to get to class. She was running late as it was.
Slowly, and hand in hand, Kim led Ron out of the corridor and into the third floor's main hallway. There was still a light volume of students making their way in and out and probably not enough to take notice that the school's international heroine was holding hands with her loyal partner. Heck, people around the school weren't that nosy...
...or were they?
Sure, Kim thought. 'I'm a girl and my boyfriend... er, friend that's a boy. No! Best friend... is simply walking me to class...
'Even if he had to chase her down and grab her hand inadvertently. But, that wasn't here nor there. It was their moment.'
...no one would take notice. There's plenty of people in this school who are boyfriend and girlfriend... and don't keep a low profile, and...'
Her physics classroom was well down the hall, and people were starting to stare at the both of them. Kim tried her hardest to believe that maybe something else was worth staring at from these loitering and/or hustling students. Life was starting to look oh so hard when you're accused of being a stalker.
"Hey, K.P.," Ron whispered amusedly. "Look, we're a power couple."
Where the heck did that come from? Did he say that in jest, or... the closer she got to class, the more pairs of eyes fixated on them. Abruptly, Kim jerked her hand out of the grasp of Ron's. Maybe that would stop the suspicion, for the moment, for the moment.
For the moment anyway.
A voice came from the seemingly endless amount of people watching them. "Ron Stoppable!"
Oh, Kim knew that voice. She knew that voice much too well.
The voice that cut out from the crowd presented itself. Short brown hair, bluish-green eyes, and the unmistakable expression on her face...
Bonnie Rockwaller.
She rushed over to Ron, much to Kim's disdain.
"Ron, what on Earth are you doing with her?" The brunette asked pointing at the redhead.
Kim's Urge To Kill Bonnie: Rising (And at this point, Kim was highly capable of doing so. But then there would be the murder trials and conviction, and who had time for that?)
Just thought you'd like to know.
With teeth as gritted as Jonathan Papelbon's... well, maybe not as yellow, Kim was about to intercede when Bonnie timely continued.
"I know you two are friends or whatever, but how could you even talk to her after what she did to you?" She needled.
"What she did is none of your business, Bonnie!" Ron responded, his voice came out high enough to startle both Bonnie and Kim. The red-haired girl was both surprised and pleased with Ron defending her. Well, kind of defending her.
"Ugh, sometimes you boys just don't know what's good for you," Bonnie scolded, a hand cocked on her hip.
Quickly, she interlocked her arm with his and forcefully pulled him away from Kim's reach much to both Ron and Kim's bewilderment. If there was any juncture that had Kim Possible more ticked off than this very moment, she had to search her internal memory banks... then again, there was little time for that. She was sick as ever with the meddling Rockwaller and everything she did to throw Rocky Wrenches into her life... and now, Kim was going to do something about it, damn it. Totally ignoring the fact that she was about ten or twelve minutes late for Physics. She attempted to follow Bonnie and Ron, unfortunately her progress was impeded. By two relatively unknown boys.
"Ex-cuse me!" Kim irately said to the boys.
"Oh no, Possible. Your stalking days are over." One of the guys said.
The volcano was well ready to erupt, she backed away from the boys, very much prepared to lay down some sixteen-styles of Kung Fu down on these clowns, however...
"OK, STRAGGLERS! CLEAR THE HALLS! GET TO CLASS!" Bellowed the voice of Mr. Barkin.
In mere moments, the students that were eavesdropping on the goings-on between herself and Ron scattered. As for Kim, she slowly ambled to her scheduled class. Oh, she was not in a very place right now.
Embarrassment Central.
She knocked on the locked door to her classroom. As she waited for the teacher to opened, she looked toward the ceiling as if to say to the heavens, 'What did I do to deserve this?'
(Heh, you know what you did, Possible... You did a bad, bad thing.)
End of Part 1
Yay, S-Chrome's back! Start dancing in the streets! ...or, just sit there and appreciate it. Or... whatever you want to do.
Whatever you do, good readers, make sure you drop the Chromed one a review or something or the other.
