There's Still Fireworks: Part 3
A Little Mother/Daughter Talk
Kim gathered her freshly washed hair up into a scrunchie, pulling it back from her face as she considered the vast array of clothing hanging in her open closet. Not being one for sitting around in a bath-robe, she instead put on her usual night-clothes, a spaghetti strap camisole and a pair of sweat pants. That would have to do until she actually decided on what she was going to wear that morning. On the one hand, she wanted to wow her new sweetheart. On the other, she didn't want to go as far over the top as she had the night before.
For some odd reason she even considered breaking out her old outfit of a green tank top and periwinkle capris. Actually, over perhaps the last year, she had actively tried not to wear that combination. Bonnie may have been deliberately trying to be hurtful when she mocked Kim about wearing it every day, but she was actually right.
Still, as she stared at the array of mostly pastel clothing hanging there, she came to the conclusion that she was not the most feminine dresser in the world. In all, she owned three honest-to-goodness dresses, and one of those was now sitting on the bed, ready for a little TLC and a bottle of woolite before it was going to be worn again.
The other two were not exactly what she want to wear for Ron that day. One, a long, navy dress, was pretty much relegated to more formal functions and it looked perfectly good on her…only, it was the same dress she had worn when she went out with Josh Mankey, and somehow wearing that for her new boyfriend didn't sit to well with her.
That left the last dress. It was most def not going to be worn by her that day, or any day for that matter. Her Nana certainly meant well, but the green dress had frills in all the wrong places, and what's more, it must have been made for her when she was ten. If it was small enough to fit one of Monty Fiske's monkey ninjas, it was way too small for her.
Perhaps if she has some tall white go-go boots…
She shuddered slightly at the thought.
Still, she didn't really want her first day as part of a couple to be spent in pants. Nana was right about that at least. Any other day of they year they were completely practical. For Ron she wanted to be sexy, and in her mind, that meant something with a skirt.
There was her rust colored mini-skirt, but that was for fall, and the fashion police would roast her for wearing it in early spring.
Sighing, she sat down on the end of her bed, realizing for the first time she had a visitor.
"Well?"
Kim's Mom was halfway through the opening in her floor that served as the main entrance of her loft, casually leaning on the edge.
"Mom, I know you and Dad are upset I got in a little late last night."
"Kimmie, honestly, I don't care so much about that. Your father might, but I think I can work on him, especially considering the circumstances."
"Circumstances? I don't…"
"I'm talking about the fight with Dr. Drakken and Shego, Kimmie, unless there's another 'circumstance' your father and I aren't aware of."
"No, no! It was just a date-date, we didn't…we just didn't!" Kim stammered, suddenly holding her crème yellow peasant top to her chest as if she were less modestly covered.
"I never said you did. It's just, the way you went on about how it really was a date-date and not just another one of your not-a-date-dates with Ronald, one might jump to certain conclusions about how the night might have gone differently, your arch-foe appearing notwithstanding. I take it, considering your mood, that things went well with the two of you last night?"
"Spankin!" Kim twirled around the room again, mentally replaying the events of the latter part of their date, her active mind already planning out what would be their first full, honest date that night.
"I also take it that Ron didn't go through with what he was planning, then." She sat down on the edge of the opening, looking squarely at her daughter.
"Huh?"
"Your teacher, Mr. Barkin called and said Ronald had some silly notion in his head that the two of you were actually dating and that he had this equally silly idea that for some reason he had to break up with you. Imagine the poor man's reaction when I told him that the two of you actually were going out together. I suppose the rest was just nerves on Ronald's part."
Kim considered for a moment what she was going to say. The news coverage pretty much centered on the fact Drakken was there to steal what was actually a quite harmless laser, and not the fact she had pretty well assaulted Ron under the influence of a hyper-charged moodulator. Finally, she came to the decision that it was pointless keeping the whole truth from her parents.
"Weeeell…actually he did break up with me, but it's a long story."
Kim's Mom crossed her arms. "I'm off from the Medical Center and Dr. Guberman is on-call, so I literally have all day. The young woman who came in the house singing to herself and skipping up to her room was not one who had just broken up with someone. She seemed a lot more like someone who had a new boyfriend."
"Well, I do have a new boyfriend, but he did break up with me." She stopped, and fixed her mother with a sly expression. "Mom, don't you think it was a little strange that suddenly, out of the blue, I was going on a date-date with Ron?"
"Actually, I was thinking more along the lines that the two of you had finally come to your senses, but yes, it did seem awfully sudden, not to mention how over-the-top you went with it." She glanced over at the bed, where the little black dress was laying in a heap.
Kim got her purse off her desk and pulled out the cracked remains of the moodulator. "I was going to give this to GJ to check it out. I so wasn't going to let Dr. Bortel have it back, after what it did to me."
The elder Possible woman took the device and studied it. Even with her expertise as a brain surgeon, she really couldn't make heads or tails of it, since it really looked like nothing more than a green button with small metal prongs around the outside edge.
"What does this have to do with you suddenly wanting to put on a dress that your father is wondering exactly how you got it into this house without his knowing about it?"
"Long story short, that thing made me think I was crushing on Ron."
Suddenly apprehensive, she stared at the broken mood controller again. "Controlled? How?"
"Let's just say that when I said certain kinds of science were ferociously unethical, I wasn't even scratching the surface. I think Dr. Bortel has crossed over to the 'mad science' side."
"So you're not actually in love with Ronald?"
That stopped Kim short. "I…of course I love Ron. How could I not?"
"Kimmie, there is a big difference between the obvious kind of love you and Ronald have always shared, and the kind of love that would make him your significant other. That's why we say love and 'in love,' or the more cautious way you teens have of describing it. Like-like, isn't it?"
"Yeah, I guess you could say I like-like Ron now, but even though that thing was controlling my emotions, it got me to thinking. Could it be the guy I really wanted was right beside me all the time? Mom, I think I love him, but I just don't know."
"You seem to like-like him enough that you're having a clothing crisis about him. That's never happened before."
Kim made a slightly rude noise. "Next you're going to tell me Ron would like me in a burlap sack. So not. He might be the sweetest guy on the planet and maybe, just maybe this new relationship will make him think of me first, I don't think he'll stick around too much if I let myself go."
"Honestly, I was going to say exactly that. Kim, Ron cares deeply for you. I don't think calling him your boyfriend is going to change that. Remember last Christmas?"
"How can I forget. What do you think? Can I get away with this combo?" She held the mini-skirt and the peasant blouse up to her body.
"The skirt, yes, that shirt, well, I know it's comfortable, but as far as Ron is concerned, I think the only plus would be that he might want to start playing with the laces on it now, if he already hasn't been."
"Mom, this is Ron we're talking about here."
"And he's not a guy, he's Ron. Honey, face it, Ron is a male of the species and you are a very pretty, and dare I say, sexy young woman. If he hasn't been thinking about it, at least privately, I think I need to do a little brain-exam on him, if you know what I mean."
She got up from the edge of the door and sat down beside Kim on the bed. "Kimmie, this changes things. I know Ron has been your best friend for almost as long as you can remember, but it's not going to be the same. You're heading down a different path now and it's not going to be just the two of you doing all the things you did before with just a little hand-holding and kissing thrown into the mix."
"Why shouldn't it? Ron and I have always enjoyed doing things together. Heck, sometimes it feels like we've been dating for a long time."
"Ron night?"
"Well, yeah, but not officially."
Kim's Mom put her hand on her daughter's back and rubbed slowly. "I certainly hope the two of you stay best friends. There's a bond between you that would be a shame if it was ever broken, but you have to think about the future now. He just might be the one. Now, granted, you're a little young to be searching for that quite yet, but that's up to you to decide. On the other hand, you have to consider that this might not work out, and that's where the really hard work will come if it doesn't."
Kim frowned slightly. "I've already broken up with him once, I don't think I want to do that again. This time it would be real."
"I know that, honey. Let's not dwell on that, though. You're at the start of a relationship, and now is the time to think about all the good that can come of it."
Kim nodded toward the closet. "I've got some major shopping to do, it seems."
Her mother shook her head, smiling. "Since when did you need an excuse to go shopping. In fact, that's something the two of you could do together."
"Ron shopping? Puh-lease."
"I'm sure he'll be glad to, just like you'll be glad to do some of the things he likes."
Kim made that noise again. "Cage bats and video games? Next thing you're going to tell me is I need to go to J. P. Bearymore's with him."
She visibly grimaced at the thought. Neither woman could stand the place, and it had nothing to do with her father getting hurt a couple years earlier. "I don't think such drastic measures are called for yet, though I do like the idea of you going to the batting cages with him."
"You make it sound like what I'm supposed to do is just what we've always done, but with a little kissing and other stuff thrown in."
"Other stuff?"
"Mom!" Kim's cheeks blushed crimson.
"It's going to come up. I know you're not the most experienced young woman when it comes to dating, but like I said, Ron is a guy after all, and one way of looking at kissing is that it's a prelude to something else."
Kim frowned again. The thoughts of what she wanted to do with Ron under the influence of the moodulator had been clear, yet sitting on her bed with her mother talking about it, all that clarity seemed to slip away. Once again, thoughts like that were being relegated into something that was dirty.
"I…I just can't think of him like that."
"You did kiss him?"
"Well…yes."
"And I'm sure you have thought about it."
"Mom, I've thought about getting my nose pierced, I've thought about getting a tattoo. That doesn't mean I want to, I just logically thought about what might happen if I did."
"So you don't want to have sex with him?"
"I didn't say that. I just haven't thought that much about it. I've barely even kissed him by this point, let alone…"
"That's what I wanted to hear. I've taught you enough that you know all the mechanics, and you know the dangers. Even if you used protection, that's not one hundred percent guaranteed. I'm certain, as smart as you are, you'll make good, healthy decisions. What I am warning you about is that it may come up, sooner or later between the two of you. It's normal and natural and it's nothing to be ashamed of. It's how you act on those impulses, whether they're yours or his that means if you're being good kids."
"You think Ron's going to want…that?"
The older redhead's eyebrows went up. "Oh, I'm sure he does, more than you can imagine. Raging teen hormones aren't just an old wive's tale. That's why, as parents, we have to make sure we've taught you about right and wrong, and when it's right and wrong to give in."
"When is it right, Mom?"
"If I had my druthers, the night after the two of you walk down the aisle, but I need to be realistic. What I do know is now isn't the right time. Kissing is fine, though I have a sneaking suspicion your father wouldn't be fine with too much of that. Just, if Ron gets it in his head to try something."
Kim shook her head. "No worries there. It's not like he'd be able to…"
"Not what I'm getting at, Kimmie. I don't think Ron would ever try to force you to do something. What worries me is that, somewhere along the road you might be tempted to give in because you think its necessary because you love him. That's a far stronger pull than you might imagine, especially if your own teen hormones kick in as well."
"You're still not telling me when it is right." Kim said plainly.
"I don't have an easy answer for you. There could come a point when the two of you are ready and you're sure you're in love with each other. For now, why don't we settle on a promise that you'll wait at least until you're eighteen."
"But that's like…forever!"
Her mother arched one eyebrow once more. "Now you're making me think the two of you are a lot further along than just kissing."
"No." Kim pleaded.
"Good. Now, enough of this mother/daughter talk stuff. We need to get you dressed, unless you want to go see him in your PJs."
"Nothing wrong with what I've got on. He's seen me in these plenty."
She got up and headed towards the closet, but instead of reaching for any of the hanging clothes, she pulled a box out of the bottom. "Remember, Kim, I said everything has changed. I'm afraid that one of those changes has to do with you behaving like a proper young lady. For one thing, it's not right for him to just be in your room at all hours. If he sees you like that now, it's going to have a very different meaning. Now, let's take a look at some of the other things Nana has sent for you."
Kim cringed as he mother opened the box and started pulling the sun dress out.
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