Author's Notes: This chapter is probably the worst one yet, and I'm sorry for that. This chapter was really hard to do, easily the hardest so far, what with the presence of Oskar being very disruptive to how I am trying to tell the story. It tripped me up a lot, but I hope it's acceptable. Next week should be back to standard quality though.


It all started when Marco had a really bad day. He had had to run inside really quick and missed the bus to school, it left with only me on it. He ran screaming after the bus, pounding on it. I heard him pounding the side and opened my window, tricky things those bus windows. It was pretty impressive how he was keeping up.

"Look at you, joggin to school, in the zone." I said.

"I'm trying… to catch… the bus!"

"Keep your focus! I get it, stay in that zone." I said. Not really having understood what he wanted, I retreated back into the bus and closed my window. At that moment, the bus came to a stop. Marco hadn't noticed, being so into trying to get my attention, and slammed his head into the stop sign that popped out.

The bus driver got up to see who hit the bus, but failed to see Marco lying on the ground, half conscious. The driver shut the doors and started driving, right as Marco stood up. Unfortunately for him, part of his hoodie got caught in the door and he was dragged along until it ripped.

When the hoodie ripped, I watched as Marco fell into some trash that was piled on the sidewalk. At this point, I finally figured out that Marco had wanted to get on the bus, not run. I tried to get the driver to stop and go back for Marco, but I was ignored.

When Marco finally arrived at the school, I saw that he had pulled a newspaper on over his torn hoodie and had a swollen eye. As he entered the premises, a girl popped up in front of him and took his picture. To make matters worse, immediately following the picture, Jeremy showed up.

As Jeremy taunted Marco, Marco tried to be the adult and ignore him. It was quite impressive, considering how rough his day had already been. Jeremy wouldn't give up however and kept taunting poor Marco.

Finally, Marco had enough, he turned to Jeremy and stamped his foot down as he exclaimed, "I said, not today!"

With a loud snap, Marco stamped his foot clean through Jackie's skateboard.

Reaching down to grab both halves, Jackie looked up at Marco and said, "Marco… you broke my… skateboard."

"Jackie, I-"

"It's fine Marco, I'll just live with it." Jackie put one of the halves down and started dejectedly scooting away. It scraped along the ground as inch by inch she left, looking sadly at Marco.

Marco's day didn't get any better as it went on, and by the time we got home, he just flopped onto the couch in defeat. He looked so dejected, rightfully so, and I tried all kinds of tactics to cheer him up.

I tried the fake mustache, he loves it, but it didn't work. So I put on a top hat and started juggling the laser puppies. When that didn't work, I put the puppies aside and pulled a giant fish out of my hat. He didn't even react. Then, the fish drooped over onto my head, encasing it. I started freaking out and running around. The fish managed to work its way down until it swallowed me completely. At least it got Marco to laugh. After that fiasco, he helped me out of the fist and was back to his normal self.


A few days later, we went to school and an interesting noise was all about, it sounded like music unlike any I had heard before. I set off to find its source. As I searched, I noticed people rolling on the ground, hands on their ears as they enjoyed the sounds. I could not hear what they were saying over the music, but assumed it was appreciation.

I rounded a corner, and saw the source of the music. Grabbing the nearby principal Skeeves, I asked him "Who is that breath of fresh air?"

I pointed to a boy sitting on the hood of his beat up car as he played a keytar. My eyes were as large as saucers as I drank in the sight of this new boy.

"Oh. Well that degenerate is Oskar Greason. I'd stay away if I were you, that boy has a record."

In my rebelliousness, that was the final push, I wanted him like a starving man wants food. I made my way over to where his car was and dreamily watched him play. I may or may not have daydreamed about him singing a song just for me while I was watching. Pulling out some sticky notes, I wrote Marco's cell number on it and told him to call me as I slunk away to class.

Throughout the school day, I could barely contain myself as I thought about Oskar. By the time Marco and I arrived at his place, I was almost bursting with anticipation. I ran to Marco and snatched the phone from his hand as I sang "I'm expecting a phone call! Form Oskar!"

"Why don't you just give him the home line?"

"I like your ring tone better." I quickly found his ringtone and played a snippet of it. It was an adorable song called Space Unicorn and was super catchy. "So cute."

"It's supposed to be ironic" I heard Marco say as I ran up to my room.

I ran up to my desk and plopped down in my chair, putting my wand and Marco's phone on the table in front of me and started to wait. After a few seconds, the phone rang and I snatched it up. "Hello?"

"Hola Marco, its grandma" intoned the voice on the line. Seeing that it wasn't Oskar I immediately hung up on her.

With a groan of frustration I resumed my wait. I waited and waited, checking the phone every few seconds to make sure I hadn't somehow missed his call. As the night wore on, my hopes dwindled. Eventually, I heard Marco's voice beside me "Hey, Star."

I turned my head to see a weird shadow next to me. With a click, Marco turned on a flashlight pointed at his face, revealing he was in full clown suit. I screamed in terror as I flicked on the lights in my room. I didn't stop as Marco made a thankfully hasty retreat.

Later into my misery, I heard Marco say, "Hey Star, up here!"

Since Marco is so great, I knew it wouldn't be clowns again, and I looked to see what he was up to. He had somehow built a rocket sled in my room out of a shopping cart and a giant firework. He had a giant foam finger and a sombrero with sparklers in it on his head.

"Watch this, I'm gonna…" he trailed off as he chuckled nervously. Even I knew this was dumb, and concern gripped me and he started to climb out and say "I can't do this."

Before he could dismount however, the sled took off with him along for the ride. I watched in fear, all my sadness over Oskar momentarily forgotten as concern for Marco gripped me. I watched as the sled shot off other fireworks amongst Marco's screams, lighting the room.

Eventually, he crashed into my fish tank and slid down next to my bed in the water flow. When he came to rest, I was looking at him with concern and he weakly said "Ta da!"

Seeing that he was fine, my sadness over Oskar returned in full force. With a grunt of frustration that Marco would worry me like that with such a stupid stunt, I rolled over on my bed and stared at the wall.

Next thing I know, I hear Marco calling me from the back yard. Dragging myself off my bed I go to the window to see what harebrained scheme he was up to. What I did not expect was to see Ludo and his minions outside surrounding Marco.

"I'm coming!" I said, turning to grab my wand. However, it wasn't where I had left it, and I called out to Marco "just let me find my wand!"

"Uh, I've got it" he called back.

"Marco! Why?"

"I'll explain later, just get down here and help please!"

I rushed to the back yard, Oskar pushed to the back of my mind. I ran up to Marco and snatched my wand from him as we retreated. I blasted the monsters to slow them down as we made our way to the shed in their backyard.

Slipping inside, I lit up my wand so we could see and Marco bolted the door shut. "How could I have been so stupid?"

"Marco… what the heck is going on?"

"This may be… all my fault?"

"What? What did you-" At that point I noticed a monster's glowing red eyes as it watched me through an open window. I reached over and closed the blonds, super creepy. "What did you do?"

"Uhm, hold this" he said, showing some weird skull sculpture into my hands. "We're gonna need to build some armor"

"Marco…" I wasn't letting him off the hook that easily.

Marco was looking around the shack for something, ignoring my question. Suddenly the entire shed shook under some large impact and a device fell into Marco's hands.

"Marco." He ignored me and got to work. "Marco Diaz! What is going on?"

"Look, do you remember when I was having that really bad day?"

"I'm sorry you had a bad day Marco, but what does that have to do with right now?"

"I'm getting to that" he said, still working on the armor. Before he could continue, an arm smashed through the wall and started groping around. Marco put the sculpture in the path of the questing arm and it tore the head off. He called out after it "Thank you!"

"I was so bummed out, but you did everything you could to cheer me up" he continued after fixing the hole. "And then you met Oskar."

Hearing that, I started reminiscing about earlier in the day when I had first met Oskar.

"Star! Can you please keep your fantasies out of my flashback?"

"Almost done" I mumbled around my wand as I finished remembering the meeting, fully entranced.

"I couldn't wait to talk to him" I sighed, remembering how eager I was at the start of the afternoon as Marco strapped homemade armor to me. "I guess I'm just not cool enough for a guy with a record."

"Are you kidding? You're the coolest girl I know."

I looked down at him and smiled, he really was the best. Before I could say thanks, the whole shack shook again, knocking me and some stacked up boxes to the floor.

"Anyway, you were so sad. It was my turn to cheer you up. And that's when I realized, nothing makes you happier than when you're narwhal blasting a monster! So… I tried to lure one with your wand." He explained. "I opened a portal where one of Ludo's monsters was working by himself and tried to lure him through. I did not expect him to bring friends."

"So you brought these monsters here to cheer me up?"

"Yeah… I just didn't expect so many" he told me with a nervous chuckle. "But don't worry, this armor will hold them off!"

Next thing we knew, the roof of the shed was torn off, a monster reached in and snatched Marco out of his armor. I made a mental not to tell Marco about the armor capabilities of my dresses when this was all over. I leapt out of my armor and over the wall to get into the yard after him.

"Give it up Star Butterfly, you're outmatched!" exclaimed Ludo while one of his minions held Marco twenty feet in the air.

"Ludo, what's with all these new monsters?" I asked, seeing quite a few faces I did not recognize.

"What? These are all the same monsters I always bring."

"I dunno…"

"I've never seen this dude in my life" said Marco as he pointed to the monster holding him.

"You mean you've never met Man Arm?"

"Hey" said the newly introduced Man Arm.

"Surely you know Spike Balls?" asked Ludo as he gestured to another one of his Monsters.

"Well we were never formally introduced" he said, though I didn't recognize him. He walked over to Marco and offered up one of his hands to shake, which were actually giant spike balls. "Hi, I'm Spike Balls. I'm usually in the back."

"Now that you all know each other… get the wand!"

The monsters leapt into action and charged me while I ran to free Marco. I ran over to Man Arm and blasted him with a rainbow fist of magic. He was knocked flying and dropped Marco to the ground.

Marco and I fought to clear an area, allowing me to jump up and cast a spell. "Honey Bee, Tornado, Swarm!"

A sheet of magic swept over many of the monsters, sucking them into a vortex of magic. While trapped, all of the monsters were stung repeatedly by the magic bees that were infused with the spell. There was one flower monster however who seemed to enjoy it.

I landed and joined Marco in fighting the monsters who had evaded my magic. I was loving this and said "You were right Marco! I'm totally cheered up! I don't even car if Oskar calls!"

Of course, at that moment, I hear Marco's adorable ringtone coming from my bag where I had put his phone. All of the fighting stopped while everyone contemplated the situation.

"What is that terrible ringtone?" asked Ludo.

"It's supposed to be ironic!" exclaimed Marco.

I reached into my bag to check the phone and saw Oskar was calling. With a gasp of joy, fighting monsters and talking to Oskar, I was stoked. I turned to where Marco was fighting still "It's Oskar!"

"Well talk to him."

"Oh, rightrightrightrightright" I said before hitting answer and flipping my hair over my shoulder. "Hello?"

"Hi, I'm calling this phone number, on my phone" he intoned.

I blasted a monster as it took a swipe at me and replied "Thank you for calling. I mean, hi…"

"Hi."

"So what are you-" we both started at the same time.

"I leapt back and smacked a monster with my wand as I said "Oh, oh, oh, oh, I'm sorry, I interrupted you."

Before he could respond, a monster walked up and roared at me. Normally not a huge problem except this time he did it almost directly into the phone. I just looked at it with a look of disgust before holding the phone back up to my ear and saying "Oskar, can you hold on for like one second?"

Swinging around, I let my annoyance become clear and yelled at the monster "Hey! I am on the phone! You monsters are so rude!"

I let my anger channel the magic into my wand as I cried out "Syrup, Tsunami, Shockwave!"

My anger helped fuel the spell as I flooded the Diaz's back yard with the spell, taking out all the monsters at once. I returned to my call, "Sorry about that…. Cool."

"Cool."

After a long pause, I said "Okay, bye… I like your phone voice!" and hung up. I sighed, almost melting with joy.

Everyone was peeling themselves off the ground and recovering as Marco approached me, also covered in goop. He never complains about my spells accidentally hitting him, which is one of the things I love about him. "Thanks Marco, you did know just how to cheer me up. And, Oskar called anyway! Hugs!"

I pulled him in close for a hug, forgetting about the magic syrup. I tried to pull away, but found that we were stuck together. It wasn't that bad, there are worse people to be stuck hugging, but it was ruined when some guy came past on his bike and started laughing at us.