A/N: No, your eyes are not deceiving you. It is I. The dumbass. Back to give you another installment of whatever this is.

Sorry to anyone who was expecting an update to Phil's chapter, but I really needed a break from all the BS. I wasn't expecting it to go on for as long as it has, and we're getting into the really important, complex, emotional bits, so needless to say I've been spazzing. A lot.

Anyway, this has been needing to be written for a long time, so I'm finally getting around to it. How long will it be? I'm thinking around 3 parts, maybe 4. Oh, who am I kidding, it'll prolly be 8. Will it be interfering with Breathing Slowly? Well, no, actually the reason I started on this is because the next BS bit has a lot of Amanda and Chris, so I thought it'd be a good idea to get some of their history established. As I said before, BS deals a lot with them, so this will actually be helping me. Though Chris doesn't actually show up until the next bit…

Do not be alarmed if this doesn't gel with the early chapters of Breathing Slowly. I've been pretending they don't exist for quite some time now and don't plan on breaking tradition. Really, the beginning of Looking Up is vomit-inducing, too, but I'm trying not to let any of that get me down. x'D That wouldn't be conducive to improvement.

All that said, I hope you enjoy. :)

SPECIAL NOTE: NerdilyNi posted the first part of a cracktastically insane story we talked about a long time ago, as a chapter of "Lucky One-Shots." It's titled, "Parent Teacher Conference." I highly recommend giving it a look. :D

Disclaimer: Kori Johanssen is xxP00h67chu's beautiful character. Taro is metalheadrailfan's radtacular creation. I think Sydelle has become something of a love child between NerdilyNi and I, so I can't claim full ownership of her. Inspiration for her taken from "Lucky One-Shots" and discussions with Nerdil. (She's not present in this chapter but will be in later ones.) All other unrecognizable characters are my own. Obviously. Ask me before you go trying to screw around with them, thank you. Or at least have the decency to tell me that you did screw around with them after you already… screwed around. Because I keep coming across old fanarts and stuff that I never even knew happeneD? Like waht? THAT'S RUDE, YOU GUYS. RUUUUDE.

Not that I have the best track record for keeping up with this stuff, but hey. It's nice to feel in the loop. *shrug*

AAAAnd sexy new cover by puffball17! Check out the full picture on her dA account, along with her other awesome works :)

Finding Faith

Part 1

Prologue

"Then I kicked the guy back into the sewer and Kori welded the pothole shut, so we got away unscathed," Josh finished, still sawing his knife rhythmically back-and-forth across the large hunk of pork on his plate, as he'd been doing for the past five minutes. The pork had yet to cut, but he kept at it as he added, "We should probably avoid the less populated areas of the city for a while, though. He really didn't like that I stole my pendant back."

Everyone at the table blinked at him, all activity paused and eyes circular. At length, Arnold said, "Something really needs to be done about that man."

"I don't understand how he's not dead yet," Helga commented absently, not terribly interested in the topic as she poured more gravy over her food in the hopes of making it edible. "What was he when we were kids? Like forty-nine?" She snorted, her eyes gaining some clarity when she rolled them. "And obese, to boot, I mean criminy. What, did the over-exposure to sewage mutate him or something so he's immortal?"

Arnold furrowed his eyebrows at her. "Helga, this is serious."

"If it's so serious, why didn't you do anything about it when we were kids?" she countered, her eyebrows digging severely into her eyes in response to his appalled expression. Of course, outwardly he just looked vaguely troubled, but she knew him well. He was always trying to temper his natural reactions to things, especially in front of the family—Didn't matter. She knew what was running through his head. She pointed a fork at him. "The man is sick, Arnold. Don't even think about it. Repeat after me: some people are too far gone to help."

"Some people are too far gone to help," he repeated dutifully, before a worry broke across his features. "I knows he's crazy, but he's trying to go after Josh now. We can't just sit back and allow this. There must be something we can do."

"It's okay," Josh cut in brightly, chewing on a piece of charred broccoli now, his pork abandoned. "It was fun."

Amanda looked intrigued, Phil remained in a frowning stupor, incapable of anything but staring, and Zack coughed into the ensuing silence, wherein Arnold was looking even more troubled than before, and broke into a grin. He was seated across from Phil and between Josh and Arnold as he laughed, "You better invite me next time. This sounds like it was a regular hootenanny."

"Yeah, we might need your chess skills next time. I'll page you," Josh responded agreeably, then blinked and raised an eyebrow. "What is a hootenanny anyway? Or do I want to know?"

Zack's grin widened and he took the moment to tip his Yahoo back and take a long sip. Directly across from Josh, Amanda sat beside a now gaping Phil and began bouncing excitedly atop her booster chair. "I wanna come, too," she squealed. "I wanna know what the sewer is like, and if Nessy is happy in her new home!"

Helga began coughing into her water glass just as both Phil and Arnold erupted from their seats with the words, "Absolutely not," one in a commanding exclamation and the other a hoarse yell. The two snapped their heads over to blink at each other, and Zack burst into laughter, spewing Yahoo into his mashed potatoes. Josh blinked at the sudden calamity and stopped chewing. After a moment, Phil recovered and shot a serious glare in his siblings' directions, fingers curling against the tabletop. He rushed out, "The sewer king is an unpredictable lunatic with no regard for basic civility and you're all talking like having him wanting to drag you down to live all eternity in toilet water is a game and this has gotta be the stupidest thing you've ever done, Josh, you should have just left the stupid pendant or let the authorities take care of it and that's all I wanted to say, okay, you're all idiots." With that, he fell heavily into his chair and crossed his arms, pouting at his plate. Zack laughed harder.

Josh just blinked again, eyebrow suspended. "There was no way I was letting him get away with my pendant," Josh stated in a high, disbelieving tone.

Zack was able to temper his laughter enough to lean across the table towards Phil and gleefully tease, "And some might could say you're a bit of an unpredictable lunatic yourself, Philly—"

Arnold broke in before Zack could say more or Phil could start whine-yelling, spreading his arms out in a placating gesture. "No one is going back down into the sewers," he said with finality. The kids all blinked at him. The remaining stack of pork chops smoked casually at the center of the table. Helga rested her head in one hand and raised an eyebrow at him, interested to see how he was planning on handling the situation. Arnold spoke again quickly, before anyone could interject, "Phil is right, there's no telling what that man is capable of. Now, when we go over to the boarding house next week, I want you all to stay near the house—You are not to go out without my or your mother's express permission, and not without a responsible adult. Is that understood?"

"I like how you had to specify 'responsible' adult," Zack said, grinning dopily up at him with eyes a little glazed. Arnold lowered his eyelids at him.

Looking dangerously at her eldest, Helga asked, "Did you process anything your father just said?" Her words gained an edge of sarcasm. "Or anything of relevance, that is?"

Zack's eyes shot wide and alert at the warning in his mom's tone. He blinked at her. "Uh. Yeah, of course." He started to stand. "I just remembered I told Jaron I'd call him tonight, I should—" Arnold's hand on his shoulder stopped him. Arnold guided him back into his chair, looking distinctly unamused as Zack smiled with false-sheepishness.

Josh repeated suddenly, "There was no way I was letting him have my pendant."

Arnold's eyes softened at the defensive look on his face. "I know how important your pendant is to you, Josh, it's okay. I'm not blaming you. I understand. But it was still dangerous, and I'd ask that you not do it again."

Josh narrowed his eyes, still frowning.

Arnold sighed and sat back down, letting his hand drop from Zack's shoulder. "I just don't want any of you getting hurt."

Phil shot Josh a smug look and Josh's frown deepened as his eyes alighted on it. He looked back to his dad. "The sewer king isn't dangerous. He's an old, fat guy with a stump for a leg. The rats down there concern me more than him."

Arnold scooped up some of his mashed potatoes and said tiredly into his plate, "Just humor me on this. And don't say 'fat,' Joshua, you know better."

Josh's frown reached critical levels, but he just ducked his head and didn't reply.

Amanda blinked at the odd conversation and turned her attention down to her food, her focus devoting itself to poking around at her own potatoes. A fork was slowly run up one side, then a spoon prodded into another, working on sculpting the mash into a scale replica of the eiffel tower.

Helga hummed, her eyes on Amanda as she tapped her fork against the table. "You know, maybe this is a sign. Maybe we shouldn't go to the boarding house, after all—"

Eiffel tower suddenly went splattering across the table. "No, we have to go," Amanda yelled, face twisted in anguish.

Helga's eyes widened. "Amanda—"

The room exploded into protests from all the kids, Phil and Amanda predominately. Words piled over words, overwhelming Helga with the resounding objection until finally she raised her voice over the chaos in an exasperated declaration, "I was just saying!"

"I have to start preschool, and you said we were going to stay at the Sunset Arms 'cause it's closer," Amanda insisted, despite that everyone else had quieted. "You already held me back last year and it's not fair. I wanna go!"

"Okay," Helga raised her voice. She swallowed and lowered it, "Okay. We'll go."

Amanda tilted her head down, still looking upset. Helga held her eyes, and felt Arnold's hand enclose over hers across the table. Helga exhaled slowly and turned to take another gulp of her water.

The silence was uncomfortable.

Phil broke it in a petulant tone, eyes on the pork chops dancing around his fork, "I don't know why you want to start school anyway. It's not like you learn anything useful there."

Arnold, the second grade teacher, sat higher in his chair with rising eyebrows. Phil ignored him, focused resolutely on his food.

Amanda threw him a narrowed look. "That's not true. Preschool is important for—societal... development... And they have snacks." She swiped a finger in the mashed potatoes on the table and eyed it. She mumbled so everyone had to strain to hear, "And there are kids my own age."

"You get to play with kids your own age all the time, whenever the guys come over," Helga said, voice harsh and grating through what had quickly become a tense environment. Her eyes clearly broadcasted her anxiety and Arnold squeezed her hand. "You know, like Elli and... uh... There were those times with Squinty."

"Squinty only ever wants to talk about pumpkins," Amanda complained.

"What about Elli?" Arnold asked curiously.

Amanda blinked and looked back at the table, scooping up some more potato. After a moment, she poked her finger back in and started drawing. "Elli's nice," Amanda softly allowed, unable to say elsewise, then looked back up with determination. "But I still wanna go!"

But Helga could hardly stop herself now that she'd gotten started. "Kids are vultures, Amanda," she stressed, "and look at you, you're still just a sweet, little girl—pure, untainted—vulnerable! I don't know that I'll be able to stand seeing that taken from you so early in life. And it's just some preliminary K-5 crap anyway, it's not like you'll be missing out on anything important. You're already smart as a whip. This is all so unnecessary!"

Arnold clapped her hand and leaned over, urgently lowering his voice, "Helga, we talked about this—"

Helga groaned helplessly to the ceiling. "And what kind of parents are we for going through with it?"

"Geez, Mom," Zack said, eyebrow flying as he took in her mental breakdown. "It's just kindergarten. Josh, Phil and I all attended and we turned out fine." He side-eyed Josh and Phil. "Arguably."

"Excuse me?" Helga hissed in violent disbelief, slamming a palm down on the table with her eyes going round. Zack's eyebrow snapped higher. "Have you forgotten all the stolen snacks? All the cookies I baked just so some snot-sucking little weasel could strong-arm them away from you? How your precious, little stomach would rumble every day when I came to pick you up? I asked the teachers for months to make sure no one was able to bamboozle them away again, and what happened? Nothing. Not a darn thing. How can you look at me like that didn't negatively affect you?"

Zack blinked calmly, half his eyebrow cocked and hands stacked atop each other on the table. "I gave them away willingly, Mom, it wasn't like there was some dastardly cookie bandit on the loose."

"Ugh, right, and there you go—Kindergarten taught you the magical value of 'shar – ing'," the word dripped with derision, "and next thing I know everything I give you is gone within twenty-four hours. They taught you to finger-paint and the living room gets coated that same day; the couch is destroyed; the TV's sprouted facial hair. They taught you to make paper chains and ope, there went the newspaper! Taught you the alphabet and suddenly you think you can read and all of our books have been drug off the shelf to heck-knows-where. You know I only just recently found Tom Sawyer behind the washing machine?"

A bright, toothy grin sprung across Zack's face. Helga growled at him and whipped her head around to Arnold, who met her eyes drowsily. "What did I tell ya? The only thing preschool accomplishes is scarring kids for life and teaching them new and inventive ways to drive their parents insane." She snorted and leaned back. "I bet Zack would be downright docile if we hadn't sent him off to preschool."

"Oh, I wouldn't count on that," Zack teased wolfishly. Helga put a hand over her eyes.

"Scar kids for life?" Josh questioned.

Helga burst, "Well, doi, look at Phil!" Her hand snapped off her face and over to jerk her thumb at Phil. Phil's fork clattered to the plate in alarm.

"Huh?"

"And you," Helga went on, throwing a finger at Josh with her eyes slicing in half. A frown flopped across Josh's face at the finger suddenly in his face. Helga repeated, "You – You and your unholy obsession with winning everything and asserting dominance like some kind of chimp. Coming home bruised and bloody and grinning every darned day. Nearly took out the city's supply of band-aids, you." The finger trembled.

Josh blinked, still chewing slowly on the same piece of broccoli. "It's not unholy and it's not an obsession," he replied simply, reasonably, as if that should settle the matter. Zack snorted. Josh's eyes snapped to him and narrowed. He snorted back louder. Zack raised half his eyebrow, grinning crookedly, and took a deep breath before snorting thunderously, making ripples explode across his glass of Yahoo. Josh's eyes caught fire and he braced himself on the table to push back and take in an even deeper breath, then snorted loud enough that spit flew halfway across the table and hit Phil in the cheek.

"Ack," Phil choked. "Disgusting!"

"Stay out of this, Phil," Josh retorted, eyes locked on Zack, "this is personal—"

"More personal than the saliva splattered across my face?"

"Aw-haha, you're so cute," Zack chuckled deeply, eyes half-lidded, "you think you can actually snort better than me. Snorting's like number twelve on the list of things I excel at, and twelve's pretty high. It's a long list."

"Ugh," Josh burst, bracing himself against the table with a scowl as he threw himself forward in Zack's direction, "that's only because you're a pig."

"You're both pigs," Phil declared, muffled against the napkin scrubbing vigorously across his face.

"Well I guess that puts us on even ground then," Zack said with a relaxed smile. That smile gave way to a short cackle when he concluded, "At least species-wise. I'm still a way better pig than you'll ever be."

Josh growled. "We'll see about that!"

While the boys descended into a foot-stomping snort competition with Phil yelling from the sidelines, Amanda leaned around Phil's chair to look at Helga, who was rubbing a hand methodically against the side of her face. "Mama," she said tentatively, wary of her mother's mood now but wanting too badly to let the subject go, "I—"

Helga sighed harshly and waved a defeated hand at her. "No, no, it's okay, Sweetheart. I know, you want to go and you will. Mama's just being ridiculous again. I'll get over it."

"I think Mama needs some time with Uncle Buster," Arnold said, adjusting himself so he was leaning a little closer over the table, chin resting on his fist. His smile was soft and subtly smirky, and Helga narrowed her eyes at him for it. He widened his smile and squeezed her hand. Amanda ducked her head a little, drawing his attention, and his smile then was so warm and honest she was put instantly at ease. "It's okay, Faith. This isn't nearly as big a deal as your mom's making it out to be—and she's only freaking out now because she's been under a lot of stress. Don't worry. No matter what happens, everything will work out just fine." He looked briefly back to Helga and leaned back. "You'll see."

"Gah," Phil suddenly exploded, throwing himself back in his chair with arms shielding his face from further attack and effectively startling Amanda back into her seat, "you're both so stupid! I refuse to believe we're related anymore! I demand a blood test!"

Zack giggled, seizing on the moment of cease-fire with zest. "Man, what is it Kori's always calling you? Ham, right? Ham is dead pig, you kno—"

"And there's no way a dead pig can snort better, let alone snort at all, yada yada, bla bla," Josh finished flatly, ending with a quick roll of his eyes. "You're so predictable, God."

Zack giggled again. "That's funny coming from the most predictable person I know."

"There's nothing predictable about," Josh started to say, but stopped when Zack spoke the words back verbatim right over him. He narrowed his eyes and tried again, "You think you're so," but stopped when Zack did it again. He clenched his teeth at the smile in Zack's eyes and ground out, "If you don't stop that," then blinked in surprise when Zack said nothing. Instead, Zack had turned back to his food with a sigh and grabbed up his glass to finish off his Yahoo. Josh was confounded.

"You…" his eyes seemed to stutter, "stopped?"

"Hm?" Zack glanced at him, face blank and a little distracted, as if Josh had just turned to him and started up a random conversation. His eyes lit up in recognition then and he sat his empty glass down with a chuckle. "Oh, right, the game. Sorry, it was just so easy to guess what you were going to reply with each time that I got bored."

"That's it," Josh shouted. Not a second later, he was lunging at Zack, who ducked just in time and sent Josh instead pushing Arnold half-out of his seat. Arnold grunted at the blow but had no time to react past looking askance at the two. Zack was cackling now, and Josh punished him for it by kicking out of his chair and grabbing Zack up out of his own by the back of his shirt. Zack apparently expected this, too, because he wasted no time in slipping his arms out of his over-shirt and grabbing Arnold around the shoulders, nearly throwing him out of his chair again. Zack laughed into his shoulder, "Save me, Daddy," while Arnold careened wide-eyed to the side and had to grab the table to prevent himself from falling on his ass. Josh threw the shirt to the floor and snatched two fistfuls of Zack's black undershirt, trying to yank him off of Arnold while Helga gaped and Amanda gawked.

Arnold just gasped and tried to reason with them over all the yelling, "Kids, kids, guys—"

"Stop trying to kill Dad," Phil shouted and started throwing pork chops at Josh and Zack. Neither boys let up, and a pork chop ended up inadvertently landing in Arnold's hair. Then another bounced off his nose. "Not helping, Phil," Arnold grunted as Zack's arms tightened and he nearly lost his balance again. A glob of mashed potatoes suddenly smacked him in the cheek and he screwed his eyes shut as it slid sloppy and wet down his face. Apparently Phil had run out of pork chops.

Amanda's eyes flew around frantically as she took in the scene. The whole situation had dissolved into a full-blown catastrophe in mere seconds, and her mom appeared to be in just as much shock as her dad. Ordinarily Amanda left these matters up to her parents or another adult, and would pump her fists and chant "fight, fight, fight" on the edge of the brawl with the happy knowledge that no real damage would be done, but it was late, they were all tired, and if something didn't happen…

"I'm gonna kill you," Josh yelled, and then growled when Zack laughingly repeated the words back. He leaned down, grabbed Zack about the waist and pulled—and Amanda had had enough.

"Hey," she tried to yell over the boys' shouts and grunts, and frowned when they didn't react. She sat up and screamed, "Stop it! Stop, you're gonna hurt Dad—Please stop—Listen—"

Phil scoffed at her whiny tone and threw a handful of broccoli. "If they won't listen to me, what makes you think they'll listen to a stupid, little girl?"

Amanda started to reply, meaning to say that she had to at least make an attempt, but was interrupted by another shout from Josh, and Phil's attention was back on the fight that same second. She watched open-mouthed as Phil threw more potatoes, and then over to how Zack kept laughing and Josh was now trying to yank his leg out of its socket. Her mouth popping closed, she sunk into her seat and looked down.

Helga shot up out of her seat with a sudden, deafening clatter of chair against hard floor and shouted, "If you don't stop this horsing-around in the next three seconds, I'm gonna make you wish I never gave you life!"

And just like that, everything stopped. The kids all froze and stared at her with identical saucer-eyed expressions, and Arnold released a quiet sigh and sagged in relief. Sagged, that is, just enough that what little ass still perched on his chair slid off and he went slamming down into the floor with a gasp, pulling Zack with him so he awkwardly sprawled over the previously occupied chair, his leg kicking up out of shock and clocking Josh in the chin. Josh stumbled back with a yelp and grabbed his face in one hand.

All was silent for a moment while the three caught their breaths.

Then Phil burst into laughter and pointed a finger at them. "Serves you jerks right!"

Helga's fist bashing against the table in front of him shut him up quick, and she gave him a swift, stern look while leaning over that fist. He slammed backward and cowered, and she squinted, scrutinizing. Assured of his silence, she walked slowly, dangerously, around the table to stand before Arnold. He looked up at her with large, incredulous eyes, and she kept her austere expression as she offered him her hand.

It was as the two stood at the head of the table that Helga ran her eyes over Zack while he coughed and pushed up from the chair and Josh rubbed his chin, then at the destroyed table setting, smattered with runny mashed potatoes, black broccoli and burnt pork chops, before finally rolling her eyes to the ceiling. "Well, dinner's ruined again," she stated dryly. A coughed mutter resounded from… somewhere, which Helga ignored. "Unless you kids want to go to bed hungry, I suggest you clean up this catastrophe so I can throw in some instant meals."

All the boys' eyes went to the mess.

"Uh," Zack began.

Josh sighed and leaned down to start picking up the pork chops littered across the floor. Zack watched him for a few seconds before pursing his lips and following his lead. It went on this way for several minutes. Three minutes in, Arnold and Helga fled to the kitchen to locate something everyone might actually like to eat, Helga rubbing Arnold's back as they went, and it didn't take long for the whispered accusations to start flying the moment they were out of the room.

"This is all you morons' faults," Phil quietly screamed at them as he mopped up Amanda's mashed potato splatter with a napkin. "If you could just shut the heck up for five measly seconds—"

"There's no fun in shutting up," Zack mused, seemingly to himself, bent slightly over a handful of broccoli. Half the collar of his overshirt brushed against his cheek, and the other was bent and rumpled from where Josh had stepped on it—repeatedly.

A particularly chunky piece of black pork was suddenly shoved into Zack's mouth. Josh smirked at his spluttering. "Maybe not fun for you."

Zack turned his eyes on him and squinted. Josh's eyes had only a second to widen before the pork was suddenly spat into his face. Zack smiled at Josh's cry of disgust and turned his sights on Amanda, who was still drooping in her seat like a sunflower past its prime. His smile widened cheerfully. "So, Faith, your first day of preschool coming up. You excited?"

Amanda perked up immediately, paying no mind to Josh's groaning. "Yeah! It's gonna be so much fun!"

Phil scoffed, "Fun—"

Zack tossed a piece of broccoli at his forehead and spoke with quick precision, "Shut up, Phil, you're not allowed to sound like a bitter old prune for at least another forty years. Faith—" the smile grew teeth at Josh's startled laughter, "I'm so happy for you. Preschool is a pivotal stepping stone to ultimate world domination." Josh's laughter spiked and was then smothered in a fist as he ducked under the table to gather more pork chops. Phil just grumbled and scrubbed the table harder.

Amanda nodded happily, but then a thought sent her blinking and a frown settled across her face. Leaning back, hands gripping the edges of her booster seat, she asked the floor, "Why can't Mama be happy, too?"

Zack shrugged. "There's a mystery not even I can solve."

Phil slammed the soiled napkin down in exasperation and straightened. "She's just worried."

Josh lifted himself up by an arm on the table. "Well, obviously."

Phil threw a peripheral glance at Amanda and said, "Mom had some bad experiences in preschool is all. In school in general, actually."

Zack's eyebrow flew up. "Philliam! You know things we don't?"

Josh turned his head to look incredulously at him. "What are you talking about? I've known that since first grade." When Zack's eyes flicked his way, head unmoving, Josh's eyebrows furrowed. "You didn't know?"

Phil screwed up his face at Zack's blinking mystification, then crossed his arms and peered through slanted eyes, as if trying to decipher a puzzle. "You know, for someone who acts 'exactly like Mom,' you don't seem to spend very much time with her."

Zack looked cornered for a moment, but the startled expression was gone just as fast and replaced with a cocky, half-smirk and a light, helpless shrug. "Ha, I don't know. Dad's always been more fun to bug, I guess."

"Nah," Josh said, glancing down as his hand brushed against another pork chop, "I think this is probably just you not listening again."

Zack glanced lazily down at him, eyes a little more distant than usual. "I'm sorry, what?"

Phil snorted and walked over to the dish cabinet to retrieve a trash bag. Josh sighed and dived back under the table, grumbling something about predictability. Zack smirked. Amanda observed all of this keenly, then turned her eyes to the table. Wanting to feel like she was helping, she reached over to pick up the soiled napkin and dabbed it at the table. Zack watched her movements with delighted, warm eyes for a little while, until Amanda said nonchalantly, "Preschool won't be bad. It can't be."

Zack softened. "I'm sure it'll be great."

Amanda nodded sternly, narrowing her eyes at the napkin. "It will." She dabbed harder.

Phil humphed, facing away, and slammed the bottom cabinets shut. Spiriting around the table to hold a trash bag out, he said, "I don't care what any of you say, school is pointless." As Zack let the broccoli in his hands fall into the bag, Phil hummed and threw his eyes casually away. "Or at least it is for me. Maybe for the rest of you, it's necessary. But even still, Mom's right—kids are vultures."

Josh could be heard muttering beneath the table.

Zack picked up the pork dish still smoking at the center of the table and upended it unceremoniously into the bag, catching Phil off guard with its weight and yanking him to the floor. Josh and Amanda exploded into laughter. Zack twirled the tray between his fingers once before placing back on the table with a flourish.

Helga stuck her head in suddenly, looking sharply about at them, and the laughter was immediately choked into silence. Helga puckered her lips suspiciously and clipped her eyes. "I heard laughter—you chuckleheads better not be horsing around again!"

Zack put a hand over his heart with a big, cheesy, earnest grin, while Amanda turned in her chair to offer a single tittering giggle and a shake of her head. Phil, breathing heavy on the floor, crawled under the table to hide beside Josh. Josh just continued picking up pork chops, biting his knuckles.

Finally, Helga made a humming sort of grunt and gave a firm nod before popping her head back into the kitchen. Zack relaxed his shoulders and let his grin fall into a light smirk. He shifted his eyes to Amanda with this smirk and wiggled his eyebrow. She snorted out another giggle into her hand.

Josh jumping up from the floor startled them both into silence again. He raised an eyebrow at the two of them before dumping his handful of pork chops into the bag he'd plucked up from the floor where Phil had left it.

Zack smiled at him for the interruption. "You need a shower."

"You need a... a... Oh, shut up." Josh sighed and turned to sweep the last of the soiled food into the bag.

"Could you really have gotten hurt?" Amanda had to ask.

Josh's eyes snapped to her. "What?" He blinked when she opened her mouth to ask again, the question processing, then quickly replied while he looked back to the bag he was tying, "Oh, no. Like I said, the sewer king's no one to be worried over."

"Still a lot of trouble to go to for a pretty rock," Phil remarked from the floor, head propped on his hand beside Josh's feet. Josh jerked his head to glower down at him for the flippant, disapproving tone.

"It's not just a pretty rock!" The bag was abruptly dropped, directly in front of Phil with a frightening thump, so Josh could yank his shirt open and fish out his pendant. It hung on an intricate golden chain: a small, jagged chunk of bright green mineral. It seemed to radiate with an inner glow as it swung from his fingers, but he only allowed them all a brief look before he fisted it and brought it reverently to his chest. "It's my pendant, my lucky charm, my—my heart. I couldn't leave my heart in the hands of an old fat guy who bathes in sewer water. It's like dad's old hat, mom's locket, Zack's shirt—" Zack blinked, "and Amanda, it's a little like your hair clip." He offered her a quick wisp of a smile before snapping his eyes back to where Phil was peeking up at him. Amanda fingered her pink hair clip as Josh asked, "Don't you have anything special to you like that?"

Phil blinked, a little wide-eyed. "No." He narrowed his eyes then and disappeared beneath the table. His voice was scratchy and irate as he continued out of sight, "And good thing! No one should have anything important enough to them that they'd risk their life for it."

Josh frowned and clutched his pendant closer while Zack ran a finger along the collar of his plaid shirt, eyes a little unfocused. Amanda frowned down at the edge of the table, fingers tight around the sides of her chair as she said, "I wouldn't risk my life for my hair-bow..." She looked at Zack and Josh with a longing frown. "I want something special too—"

Her chair suddenly started shaking and Amanda gasped, gripping tight enough that her knuckles went white. Just as quickly as it had started, it stopped, and Phil's hoarse snickering was easily discernible below her. Amanda sighed, taking it for the admonishment it was, and strained her foot down to tap the top of his head. Phil wrapped a hand around her ankle and gave it a light, warning squeeze, but she twisted it away and leaned down to stick her tongue out at him. He looked at her, face cast in shadow, and scrunched up his face. "Real mature," he said.

"Just following your zample," she replied with a bright smile, and Zack and Josh's chuckles were poorly restrained. Phil narrowed his eyes.

Arnold chose that moment to stroll in and position himself at the head of the table in perfect military stance, as if he were preparing for battle. Even still, the snickering didn't stop until he cleared his throat. "Right," his voice was almost as dry as his expression as he looked over them. "Let's take this to the living room. Dinner—Excuse me, Dinner Attempt II should be ready in ten minutes. Since you ruined your mother's meal, she'll be picking the movie tonight, and as usual any food you drop on the furniture will be cleaned by your own hands. Any questions?"

When no one said anything, Arnold hummed. "Okay. I'll ask one then. Where's Phil?"

Phil's hand flailed from under the table, and Arnold stared at it for a moment before breathing slowly out. "Would you mind coming out?"

It took a few seconds, but Phil obediently edged out from under the table and stood hesitantly for his father's perusal. Amanda took one look at him beside her before latching onto his neck and shifting her legs to wrap around his sides, hooking at his front. Phil choked and tried to dislodge her hands, but she just moved them so she was gripping fast to his shirt, so finally he just sighed and slumped, dragging his feet into the living room after Zack and Josh.

Amanda caught her dad's eye on the way out and sent him a beaming grin.

And just like that, all severity, exasperation and exhaustion was wiped from Arnold's expression. He smiled softly back.

Later, while they were settled in and chewing on microwave meatloaf, Amanda looked up at her mom. Her arm was around the back of her seat, and Helga glanced down at her when she felt her eyes. Amanda's face was soft and thoughtful. "Mama, why is the sewer king too far gone to help? I thought everyone was worthy of help."

Helga's eyes widened slightly before relaxing. "Oh, well," she replied a little slowly at first, shifting back into the couch, a hand running down her pajama-covered thigh, "of course the sewer king is worthy of being helped... But he doesn't want it, wouldn't even accept it. Heck, he'd probably spit in each one of our faces if we offered it. See, Faith, you can't force help on someone who doesn't want it." Her eyes had shifted to the TV at some point during her explanation, and remained there now. She mumbled under her breath, "That's a recipe for disaster."

Amanda looked down. The TV flashed, lighting up her vision with a flare of blue, then green, then gold. She blinked at her meatloaf. "Oh."

For the fifth time in two minutes, Amanda threw her weight forward. The cart scooted half an inch this time, and she held back a frustrated whine as she reached her arms forward for the Sugar Chunk cereal sitting on the shelf. Zack glanced at her with a sudden blossoming of amusement in his face while Phil stood dead-eyed beside her and Josh casually ran his eyes over the selection of breakfast cereal a few feet away.

Helga was standing engrossed in reading the back of a container of oatmeal when Phil turned suddenly to her and let out a long sigh, tapering off into an agonized groan. Helga's eyebrows knit but she didn't look away from the container. "Something the matter, Phil?" she asked a bit sarcastically.

"Yeah. I'm dying."

Helga blinked and put the container back on the shelf before picking up another kind and going on to read that. "That's unfortunate."

"Can I go look around in another aisle?" he asked forcefully. Helga snapped a sharp look on him for the attitude and replied just as forcefully back, "No, you may not. Now you stay put and practice being patient."

Phil threw his head back, barely restraining another groan, and turned violently to cross his arms across his chest, sulking. Helga snorted slightly and went back to reading. Amanda threw her weight forward again with a creak.

A few minutes later, Zack began to wander. When it became clear he wasn't only traveling a small distance, Helga snapped a look on his back and said sharply, "Hey, you get back here!" When he didn't react, she barked, "Zachary!"

His shoulders shook with apparent laughter. He kept going. Helga growled a little under her breath before grumbling something about leashes and muzzles and turning her attention back to the shelves. Phil watched all this through wide eyes with pupils the size of pinpricks. "What the...?" he trailed skeptically off.

Helga glanced at him and he blinked grandly at her. His voice was even more incredulous than before when he asked, "Why does he get to go?"

Helga forced an even breath in and out of her nostrils. "Because he's an oaf. He won't listen no matter what I say."

Somehow Phil's eyes managed to get even wider and he burst around, hands going straight to his hips. "So, what? If I just wander off and don't listen when you yell me to come back, it's okay?"

Helga took one look at his adorable scrawny stature before retorting, "Hell no."

When Phil's face went red, Helga sighed and snapped her eyes back to the shelf, unable to look at him any further. "It's not the same, Darling. Zack's fourteen and has basic martial arts training. I don't have to worry about him getting snatched up like I do with you. Maybe… when you're older, we'll see."

Phil quieted at that. The cart squeaked beside him as Amanda threw herself forward again. Josh stared at the back of a cereal box maze like the fate of the universe rested in its completion.

Suddenly Phil's eyes brightened and he strained up on his tiptoes towards her. "Could I go with Zack?" His voice rang with hope.

Helga, having grown impatient with his needling, exploded with a, "No," which had the effect of Phil likewise exploding in an instantaneous, "Why not?"

The commotion got to be so loud that Zack overheard and came striding back. "Hey, what's going on?" he asked when he reached the two, who were now just glaring heatedly at each other. He shifted his eyes between them with a mixture of alarm and hilarity.

"Mom won't let me go explore, not even if I stick with you," Phil said with accusing immediacy.

Zack blinked stoically at this and looked to Helga, swinging one arm off his hip to gesture to Phil. "Well, why can't he? I'll keep an eye on him."

Helga snapped her glare to him, outrage spelled out in every crack and crevice of her face. The next moment saw her arms and eyes being tossed to the ceiling. "Criminy, they're ganging up on me! Look," she pointed a finger at Zack, "I said I don't want him wandering off and that's final. This is a dictatorship, not a democracy, and it's about damn time you got that through your thick head!" She gave that head a hard poke for emphasis, and continued with a raised eyebrow as he rubbed at the spot, "And while we're on the subject, I'm not exactly comfortable having you prancing around outside of my supervision, either."

Zack raised half his eyebrow with a slight smile, and that might have infuriated her more if he hadn't still been rubbing his head as if her poke had actually hurt him. "The store isn't that big, Mom. This seriously isn't that big a deal." He dropped the hand down in a casual gesture. "I mean, I'd get it if we were at the mall, but it's just a little grocery. Where's the harm in just looking around for a bit?"

Helga gawked. Feeling Phil's eyes on her, she looked down to see him giving her the most pitiful puppy dog eyes she'd ever seen, and placed a hand over her face. Slid it down. Sighed. When she looked at Zack this time, it was with a note of resignation. "You're not exactly the most attentive person on the planet, Zack," she deadpanned.

Zack's eyebrow went flying. "I'd never let anything happen to Philly."

"Oh, sure, not on purpose, but when you get distracted and zone out? He could easily get..." She threw a quick glance down at him again, looking just out of the corner of her eye.

Zack actually looked a little offended by that. "If you can trust Dad to keep Phil safe, you can trust me."

Helga opened her mouth to refute that, when she felt a tug and looked down to see Phil had fallen to his knees and was gripping her skirt in both hands. "Please," he nearly sobbed, looking totally wrecked. "I'll die if you don't let me go! Please, Mom, you don't understand... the boredom, it's... too much for my... young, meager heart to take..." He dropped his head between his gripping arms and visibly trembled.

Helga slammed her eyes shut and groaned. "Ugh. Fine."

Phil hopped up with a grin. "Great, thanks!" He grabbed Zack by the edge of his shirt and pulled him down the aisle before his mom could change her mind. Zack snorted and let him. Amanda scooted the cart forward another half an inch.

Helga stared after the two with the razor-sharp focus of a hawk for an entire twenty seconds, catching every minute detail of their interaction. She saw when Zack said something to Phil and Phil yelled loud enough for her to just make out the words, "Yeah, right, like I'm the one who needs monitoring," and she saw when Zack said something back and Phil hit him and—well, that was it. Helga's eyes lurched to Josh, who'd been trying desperately to turn into a chameleon, and stared hard enough that hairs rose on the back of his neck. His shoulders burning with tension, he reluctantly met her gaze out of the corner of his eye. She pursed her lips and lifted her eyebrows imperiously. He gave a defeated sigh, sat the cereal back on the shelf and went sprinting after his brothers.

Helga monitored him a short while, watching him catch up with her other two slap-fighting kids, then let out a quick huff of breath and grabbed the cart, advancing briskly down the aisle before her better judgment could kick in.

Amanda surged into instant protest, twisting around to look at the cereal she'd just nearly reached. "Mama, no! I want the chunks!"

"Sweetie, I already got you a tray of cupcakes, gumdrops and those roll-up whatevers. The last thing you need is more sugar," she muttered, dully taking in the passing shelves.

Amanda turned a frown on her, eyes wide, green and sparkling cutely. "I wanted those for my lunch box for preschool, though."

Helga stiffened enough that her steps faltered a moment, but then she continued on, smiling with the unhinged glint of the hopelessly damned in her eyes. Amanda knew the look instinctively as a bad one and lengthened her frown. When Helga didn't reply for a minute and just continued on, the cart squeaking every other second, Amanda faced forward and added, "'Cause I'm finally getting to go to preschool, I want it to be prefect."

"Perfect," Helga corrected automatically. Then she raised an eyebrow. "And what do you mean finally? Both your dad and I started preschool in K-4."

"But Zack and Josh got to go to K-3," Amanda exclaimed.

Helga blinked twice, dryly. The cart gave a particularly loud squeak, forcing a huff from her, and she stated flatly, "That was different. They were insufferable."

Amanda looked at her again with a frown. "Insuffble?"

Helga met her eyes and brought a hand up in gesture. "Yeah, it basically means they were brats. And I kinda needed a break, so I sent them to school a little early so I could breathe." She quirked her mouth to one side in a sudden show of affection and leaned forward to nuzzle her forehead with a kiss. "I'm not anywhere near so eager to get rid of you," she teased. "And not only because I've finally gotten the hang of this whole Mom thing."

Amanda pursed her lips. "I still wanna go."

Helga pulled back with a sigh. "I know, I know. Anyway, you're not getting the cereal." She turned the cart out of the aisle. "Come on, I need to go pick up a fish for tonight's dinner."

Amanda was wary. "A raw one?"

Helga translated 'raw' to 'fresh' and rolled her eyes. "Oh, wipe that look off your face, Arnold and Miles are doing the cooking tonight, not me."

Amanda brightened and whipped back around to face front. "Oh."

Helga briefly shut her eyes and breathed a little deeper than usual.

Lucky for Helga, the fish were right beside an assortment of cakes and cupcakes, so she got to listen to Amanda's labored breathing while she spoke with the butcher. She actually managed to scoot the cart a whole inch closer to the display, so great was her desire, but Helga grabbed the cart back with a grunt as she exchanged her money for the fish.

Helga rounded the cart to place the wrapped salmon carefully into the basket, feeling Amanda's eyes on her the whole time, then mentally braced herself and glanced up to assess the damage.

Of course, Amanda's eyes had gone supernova. Helga slapped her hands down to grip the edges of the cart and sighed. "Okay," she began as if she were speaking with one of her underlings at the beeper emporium, "you can have one cupcake—one. A reasonably sized one, none of that 'bigger than both our heads combined' business. But this means you can have no more sugar for the rest of the day, and you have to take your nap without complaint. Do you understand and accept these terms?"

Amanda bit her lip and nodded vigorously. Helga raised an eyebrow, smiling a little wryly, and sauntered around to the front of the cart so she could push it over to the display.

Unbeknownst to the two, a similar conversation was taking place just on the other side of the chicken stand.

A small Elli Berman in a warmly knit lavender sweater was looking imploringly up at her mom, her hands nearly white over the cart's handle as she strained her body forward. "Please, may I have a cupcake?" she politely begged.

Patty slowly spun the display of cards one last time before turning her head a little to look at her, hair falling in thin strands over her shoulder. "What do you need a cupcake for? I already got you the cookies."

Elli ducked her head and tightened her fingers over her stomach. "I don't feel very good," she mumbled like she was going to cry.

Patty's eyes widened. Abandoning the cards for now, she stepped over to the cart and put a large hand on her shoulder. "Why? What hurts?"

Elli quickly shook her head and hunched over a little more in shame. "Not outside bad."

Patty blinked. After a moment, she relaxed into some measure of understanding. "Oh. Is this about kindergarten again?"

Elli's bottom lip wobbled. Patty clucked her tongue and gave her shoulder a warm squeeze. "It'll be okay, El. You know it's only six hours, not even a full day. And your dad'll be checking in on you."

"There'll be mean kids," Elli muttered, eyes to the side.

Patty's mouth flattened, and she took a second to gather her thoughts before she said, "Well, there probably will be. You know your dad and I had a hard time growing up, and you'll probably have some hard times, too. But," she shrugged, "they'll be worth it. Trust me. It'll be fun and interesting and you'll have your friends there to help every step of the way, remember?" She lifted her hand up to run Elli's hair back out of her face, placing it behind her ear as she smiled. Elli glanced up at her vulnerably. Patty blinked affectionately. "You'll see, pretty soon all this badness will be just a memory. In the meantime, I don't see any harm in you having a cupcake if it'll make you feel better."

Elli nodded timidly, offering a watery smile. Patty kept her own smile and picked up the card she'd thrown in beside her. "Well," she sighed, "guess Harold's cousin'll just have to deal with..." she made a face at the oversized puppy dog eyes, "whatever this is." She dropped it back down and grabbed the cart, maneuvering it efficiently around the chicken stand.

Maneuvered it, that is, in such a way that Helga's parked cart on just the other side was obscured to her until the very last second, and her cart was bashing into it before she could even fully process it was in the way. All eyes snapped up to meet.

"Patty," Helga exclaimed, immediately straightening from where she'd been squinting at the price tags.

Patty blinked. "Helga. Hey."

Helga wasted no time in wiping the alarm from her face and replacing it with a wide teeth-filled grin. Leaning over the handle of her cart, she nonchalantly stretched an arm out and knocked a box of saltines on top of the fish. "Fancy running into you here so early in the day," she managed, not breaking her grin. "How are you doing?"

"All right," Patty drew out a touch suspiciously, turning her head a little, not breaking eye contact. When Helga's grin didn't diminish, the lines around her eyes softened and she said normally, "It's Harold's cousin's birthday today, I just came to pick up some stuff for the party. How about you? You look good."

"Thanks! I'm doing good, pretty good. Arnold and I are preparing for an extended family visit actually. 'Bout a month or two. Taking some time to unwind, getting Amanda into preschool, getting ready for her and Phil's birthdays. You know how it is." Helga chuckled a little hysterically, slapping a hand against the side of the cart. The saltines rocked to the side. "Kids—crazy how fast they grow up, huh? One minute they're in diapers, the next they're heading for the hills."

"Yeah." Patty eyed Amanda, who was sitting on her haunches in a plush purple seat cover. Amanda met her eyes and blinked, bright-eyed, and Patty looked back to Helga. "Do you think it's safe for Amanda to be sitting like that?"

"Huh?" Helga looked at Amanda, then back, and repeated the process twice before exclaiming, pushing herself back up, "Oh, yeah, she's been sitting like that for months now. She has a nice little nest, perfectly safe." But she looked uncertain now. "Right, Amanda? You feel secure, not wobbly at all?"

Amanda's eyes widened. She snapped around almost violently. "Yeah!"

"Okay, okay! Just checking."

During this exchange, the cart had been rattled just enough that the saltines had fallen completely to the side, leaving the fish in plain view. Patty's eyes fell to it like a meat-seeking missile, and in a moment she was stepping forward and tilting her head to get a better look at it. She blinked and looked back up at Helga, whose attention was still devoted to looking pained at Amanda's determined face. "Where'd you get the fish?" she asked like it wasn't obvious; like she believed it must be a mistake.

Helga's eyes shot to her and expanded several sizes. "Fish?" she practically shouted, suddenly falling forward, nearly crushing Amanda, and throwing several boxes and cans on top of the salmon. "What fish? I didn't buy any fish!"

Patty furrowed her eyebrow, not unkindly. "Helga. Come on."

Helga remained in her pale, hunched position for a couple seconds longer, but then she broke and pulled back, dropping all pretenses with a harsh sigh. "Fine, sorry. It's all this stress lately that's getting to me. It's just that the salmon's cheap so I buy it here sometimes. Not always," she raised her hands, "just sometimes."

Patty raised half her brow. "You know why the fish is cheaper here, right?" She knocked aside a few boxes and pulled the fish gingerly out of the basket, bouncing it a bit in one hand as she tilted her head. "They don't hold themselves to the same code of excellence Harold does."

"So…" Helga looked cockeyed, "what? Your meat is fancier than their meat?"

Patty shrugged and shifted the fish to both hands. "Essentially, I guess. It's health code stuff, where they get the fish from... I don't completely understand it if I'm being honest, but Harold's always going on about it so I know it's important."

Helga smirked. "Oh, right. Does he mumble rapturously about that in his sleep, too?"

Patty couldn't stop her smile as she placed the fish back in the cart, a flash of teeth making Helga's smirk broaden. "Sometimes," she revealed with mock-solemnity. Helga cracked up.

While the two descended into a trade of wise-cracks at their husbands' expenses, Elli sat twisted around, gawking at Amanda, who sat staring back with a smile that spanned the whole bottom half of her face and shone brighter than ten suns. Elli swallowed and blinked. Amanda blinked back, eyes gigantic and green and oh no she was opening her mouth—

"Hi," she whispered conspiratorially, her tongue poking out between her sparkling teeth.

Elli swallowed again, trying to rid herself of the sudden congested feeling she was having. "Hi," she muttered reluctantly back.

Amanda placed a hand against the cupcake display glass and used it to push herself forward. The carts clanged against each other again, but their parents seemed too involved with each other to take note past a brief glance. Amanda didn't seem discouraged by it, either, because she pushed herself forward again. Elli winced at the clang this time, but Amanda just leaned forward and whispered excitedly, "You're starting preschool, too?"

It was like a balloon had been popped. Elli went tense as a board and snapped back around with a forceful, "Uh-huh."

She hoped the reaction would make Amanda stop talking to her, but instead it ended up being the final straw that alerted their parents of their interaction. "Oh," Helga said, grabbing hold of the cart again, "you two probably want to visit, too, huh?" She manipulated the cart so that their seats were directly beside each other. Patty stood off to the side with a smile as Helga patted Amanda on the back, pleased with her own thoughtfulness. "There ya go."

And just like that, she was back to chatting with Patty, leaving them about as alone as two toddlers could be without being in a playpen or cradle. Elli stared straight-forward with a face of stiff horror while Amanda leaned towards her with sunbeams blazing out of her expression. "I can't wait for preschool," she babbled happily on right into her ear, somehow managing to resound even over the deafening pounding of Elli's pulse. "It's gonna be so cool and fun and there are going to be so many other kids!"

Elli was going to die. "Mommy," she whined, slowly gaining volume as she twisted herself around.

Amanda misinterpreted her anxiousness and fluttered her hands wildly about for no good reason, coming just shy of whapping her in the face. "Really," she exclaimed. "My brothers went so I know all about it. They teach lots of cool things and we get snacks and there's a playground! Of course, Mama said that Zack got his snacks stolen, Joss got beat up, and Philly got scarred, but—"

Elli cried out and reached desperately for Patty. Amanda was visibly startled.

Patty stopped mid-sentence and turned to blink at Elli, her response time as always a little delayed before she came bounding over. "Elli? What's the matter?"

"It hurts worse," Elli managed, wiping at her face with the backs of chubby hands.

Patty frowned. Her gaze slid briefly to Amanda before she picked Elli out of her seat, giving her a light squeeze. She felt Elli melt into her embrace and faced Helga. "I think we oughta get going. Elli hasn't been feeling too good lately."

Helga was the picture of concern. "Oh, is she gonna be okay?"

"Yeah, don't worry, it's nothing serious," Patty was quick to reassure, running a hand through Elli's thick hair. "She's just been a little... nervous about preschool." Elli started squirming and Patty frowned, working her arms a little to keep her from losing balance. She turned back to her cart and sat Elli in. "Anyway, we should go."

Elli sniffled and poked her finger against the display glass. "I want that one, Mommy."

Patty looked at the pink, strawberry-decked cupcake and smiled at her, running a hand down her arm. "You got it."

As Patty asked for that cupcake, Helga took the moment to step up to the display, too, and gestured to it while smiling at Amanda. "Well? How about you, Honey? Go on and pick your poison." She made a point to gesture only to the regularly sized ones.

It proved to be pointless, though, because Amanda pointed immediately to a standard-cup with lemon frosting. One of Helga's eyebrows gave a twitch in reaction. While she turned and ordered it off the shelf, Patty was already paying while Elli burrowed her mouth into the frosting. Amanda stared, face unusually blank but eyes wide and intent. Elli didn't meet her gaze again, not even after their moms had exchanged their goodbyes and she was rolling away. Amanda watched her go.

Something bright, sugary and yellow entered her vision and she took it out of surprise. Gentle fingers brushed her bangs back, ghosting over her hairclip, and moved to straighten out her drooping pigtail.

Amanda held the cupcake closer.

Rolling down the frozen foods section, Patty kept an eye on Elli. Her face was covered in powder pink frosting, the juice from the strawberry dripping down her chin as she chewed. Her eyes had glazed over in contentment by now, but the intensity of her earlier disconcertion was still fresh in Patty's mind. So she watched, and she grabbed a bag of peas, and she moved on, but she didn't stop watching. One of the cart's wheels gave a jerk when she maneuvered them around a corner, so finally, she asked, "You feeling okay, El?"

Elli's eyes drifted up to her. Mouth full, she nodded her head.

Patty restrained a sigh and just decided to cut to the chase. "You seemed pretty upset back there when Amanda was talking to you. Wanna tell me why?"

Elli's eyes widened. She swallowed abruptly, the cake going hard down her throat, and gaped slightly before remembering that that was rude. After a moment, she looked at her legs and muttered a simple, "'manda's annoying and crazy," just low enough that Patty had to strain to understand what she'd said.

When she did, she laughed helplessly. "All the Shortmans are crazy," she said once she'd recovered, taking a silent breath with sparkling eyes. "Crazy, annoying, kinda clueless sometimes, but their hearts are in the right place. You shouldn't say things like that about her. Whatever Amanda said, I'm sure the last thing she meant to do was upset you. She's your friend."

But Elli looked horrified at the prospect. "She's not my friend, she's crazy," she insisted.

Patty's smile fell, but she made an effort to stay her expression lest her true emotions rise to the surface and frighten Elli. The truth was that she didn't have very many friends her own age (though more than Patty had ever had), and Amanda was the best and most supportive of the bunch. She'd been counting on that friendship to help guide Elli through her anxiety, so seeing that Elli didn't even like her was… disquieting, to say the least. Her next words were more thoughtfully chosen, "You know, I used to think similar things when I was first getting to know Mrs. Shortman, but we turned out to have more in common than we realized, and now we're really good friends. I bet if you gave Amanda that same chance, you'd see that she's not so bad. I mean, it's like I said, the Shortmans can be pretty out there, but at the heart of things, they're good people."

Not a second after the last word left Patty's lips, water began scattering down in small, crystal droplets from the ceiling. The two were quickly and efficiently drenched within fifteen seconds, after which a loud incoherency was exclaimed from someplace far off, followed by frenetic feet stomping rapidly in their direction.

Before either mother or daughter could process what was happening, a flash of black and blue was bounding past them, quickly identified as Zack when his voice yelled out, "A freaking deluge system in a grocery store! You've got to be kidding me!"

Several paces behind came Phil in a frenzy of legs and breathless shouts. "I told you to stay away from the sprinklers, you idiot!"

Zack's laughing voice came again with a touch of hysteria, fading fast behind the pair, "I didn't think we'd flood the entire building, holy crap!"

"Zachary Shortman," Helga's screech was earsplitting and caused even Elli to instinctively duck, even though she was several aisles away.

"Mom! A deluge system in a grocery! Can you believe it?"

"Oh, I can believe it, all right! And that's the saddest part of this whole disaster!"

"You really think? I was thinking the saddest part was gonna be the water bill—"

"Zachary!"

Patty gave a single, listless blink and started forward again, water sliding off her back as she rambled down the line of sopping shelves. "Good, good people," she mumbled.

Elli stuffed the last of her cupcake in her mouth and swallowed.

Helga stood facing him in the checkout line, her scowl etched like stone across her face.

Zack frowned back for a long time. The register pinged, and more items were scooted forward by the person in front of them.

Helga scowled. Zack frowned. The register pinged again. Zack's eyes fluttered.

"A deluge system," he pointedly enunciated for the twelfth time in the last twenty minutes.

"Darling, I don't care if their system involved the entire roof sliding open and commanding the very heavens to rain down," Helga said pleasantly, in mocking contrast with her still-scowling face. "For as long as you live and breathe on this Earth, I am never letting you out of my sight—again. You are going to be old and growing hair out of your goddamn eyeballs and I will be right there with you, watching you like a tarsier monkey."

Zack squinted one eye and ran a hand over his cold neck. "Mom, I don't think you understand. When we took that lighter to the sprinkler—"

"You," Phil corrected. Josh flared his nostrils and pulled his jacket on tighter over himself, eyes on the ceiling.

Zack ignored them, "only one, two at most, should have gone off. In the bathroom. Which was already wet from those kids fighting in there. It shouldn't have been a big deal. One or two sprinklers, that's it. That's how the typical system's supposed to work. But instead—"

"You nearly drowned us all and instigated significant water damage," Helga deadpanned. After a beat, she added, even pleasanter than before, "That you'll be working months to pay off."

Zack had the nerve to snort at that last part. "You think I'm going to suffer through slave work for someone else's stupidity? Think again!" He stepped up onto the side of the shopping cart and leaned over to address the cashier, "Hey, worker drone, what do you have to say for yourself?"

The cashier glanced at him dryly. He was short, looking to be around his age, with floppy pink hair curling at the base of his neck and deep-set eyes rimmed with eyeliner. Really, he looked like just the type of character to treat him like he was the gum beneath his all star blacks. And indeed, rather than answering, he scanned a can of green beans, corn, and a box of condoms, all without breaking eye contact. The tiny Hawaiian woman in front of them glanced warily between the two.

Zack's eyebrow lowered over his eyes at the lack of response, but he wasn't the least bit discouraged. He raised his voice over the register's ping, "Whose bright idea was it to forgo wet pipes in favor of turning the place into the next Wanky Water World?"

"I have no idea, sir, we've never had this problem before you," the cashier replied with the exact amount of flatness Zack expected from him. Which was to say a lot.

Putting on an exaggerated angry face, he gestured gracelessly to the damp hair falling heavily over his eyebrow. "Come on, I need to know! I have to sue them for ruining my hair!"

"Honey, your hair was ruined before the water ever got near it." The cashier punctuated the remark with a loud snap of his wrist on the cash register. The drawer shut with a clatter of metal and change.

Zack's eyes widened. The Hawaiian lady coughed and quickly grabbed her bags, skittering away as both Phil and Josh burst into delighted laughter. Amanda's head snapped up and alert at the suddenty of the sounds around her, really taking in her surroundings for the first time since the sprinklers had stopped. Helga just pushed the cart forward and reached into her purse with a smirk. The motion snapped Zack out of his astonishment and a grin spread across his face. He was just opening his mouth to retort when Helga said, "I knew there was a reason I liked you."

The cashier blushed and busied himself ringing up her purchases. "Right, Ma'am."

Helga clucked and playfully narrowed her eyes. "'Ma'am'?"

He ducked his head, abashed. "Helga."

Zack looked at his mom in surprise. He hadn't known they were acquainted, let alone on a first name basis, but it wasn't so strange that he couldn't recover. His mom knew a lot of people. Within seconds, he was hopping down from the cart, skirting around the baggage area and slapping his hands down on the metal end of the counter. "Why don't you come out from around that counter and insult my hair like a man?" he said mock-seriously.

Rather than snarking back like he'd expected, the cashier appeared strangely uncertain at the joke. He looked momentarily between Helga and him, hands still idly working on ringing up their items, before meeting his eyes head-on and saying, "Actually, I'm, uh… I'm a girl."

Zack's face didn't change, but he did go oddly still. In contrast, Amanda's head popped up again out of sheer surprise, along with Phil's, the motions so animated it seized the cashier's attention. A beat passed, then Phil was scrambling up the side of the cart and twisting his face at eye-level with the teen. The cashier looked back with an unnerved widening of her eyes while Phil squinted intensely. After a long moment of scrutiny, he declared, "You're a liar."

Helga slapped the top of his head. "Phil!"

Phil shot a strong frown on her. "Well, he is! I don't care how pink his hair is, there's no way!"

Helga straightened to her full height, eyes flashing dangerously. "Have I really never told you about transsexuals?"

Phil squinted again. "Is that like transvestite?" He suddenly groaned. "Oh, no, this isn't like Mr. Hyunh again, is it? I don't know how many more men prancing around in dresses I can take!"

The few customers that had started lining up behind them all looked on with interest as Helga began loudly explaining, one hand on her hip while her other flew through the air in passionate gesticulations, "No, it's completely different! A transvestite is a man who enjoys dressing up like a woman. A transsexual is a man who wants to be a woman."

"Um, actually," the cashier began in mortification, but was interrupted by Phil gasping out, "Why would anyone want to be a woman?"

Helga slapped him atop the head again. Phil yelped, Josh grabbed him by his collar and lifted him off the cart, and the cashier rubbed a hand over her eyes. Amanda stared down at Phil as he smacked Josh's hand away and crossed his arms in a huff. He caught her looking and screwed up his face at her. She blinked and turned her eyes back to her lap.

Zack broke in suddenly, "You know, you're kinda cute."

The cashier's hand snapped down so fast the air could be heard whooshing past it. She gaped at him, and he grinned. "You single?" he asked brightly.

Helga exploded out with a shocked, "For Pete's sake, Zack," and slapped her card down on the counter with a grimacing sort of smile. Her eyes were all apology. "Ring me up and we'll get out of your hair. Sorry for all—this."

Red-faced, the cashier wordlessly took the card and swiped it through the system. She turned the screen around for her then and pointed to the line flashing accusingly for her signature, and Helga picked up the stylus.

While Helga did that, Zack hummed and sank back on his heels, hands drifting to his hips. "A deluge system," he muttered to himself. "It's a miracle any of the technology still works in here."

The cashier ducked her head and appraised him beneath her lashes. After a moment of hesitation, she offered quietly, "The cash registers are water proof."

Zack flashed another grin at her for it, and her eyebrows lifted.

Helga cleared her throat, effectively startling the cashier back into work mode. "Receipt, please," Helga said, eyes on Zack. He met them while pulling his clinging overshirt from his back and blankly held the look as the receipt cranked out. Helga's eyes cut and his widened in tandem before he turned them away, then down.

Once the receipt was safe in her purse, Helga let the bag drop to her back with a loud sigh. "All right," she went straight to business, "I'm afraid we can't stick around anymore, but you have my number. When the manager gets back in, you know what to tell him."

"Your son's an idiot but he's perfectly willing to work off his debt," the cashier repeated her earlier words back to her, bobbing her head once and making a point of not looking at Zack as he muttered something again. Then she smiled. "You and your family have a nice day, Mrs. Shortman."

"Yeah," Helga exhaled, but she managed a less pained smile for her sake, letting the name slide. "You too, Kate." She turned her sights on Josh at her side, the direct attention immediately catching his eye. "And you, sir, can carry the bags since you let your brothers run loose." Leaning down, she whispered in a voice full of shaky betrayal, only half falsified, "I trusted you."

"It was only for a few minutes—" Josh tried, but Helga just shook her head and rolled the cart towards the exit. Josh pursed his lips and, having no other option, began shouldering the bags.

Zack still stood at the end of the counter. Bracing himself against it, he pushed himself up on his tip-toes and slurred as he dropped back down, "You didn't answer me on whether or not you're single, Katie Lady."

Helga made a sharp noise and snapped around to snatch him by the collar and jerk him towards the exit. Just catching the stunned look on Kate's face before she turned, Helga scoffed out a harsh, laughing, "Welcome to womanhood," and Zack threw a flirty wave and a wink as he was dragged away. Kate watched them leave.

Just before they stepped out of the building, Phil looked back one final time and furrowed his eyebrows.

The doors slid shut.

The trunk door fell closed with a distinct thump and click.

Helga rested her hands on top of it and hung her head there for a minute. Birds tweeted, wind gently gusted by, and all was peaceful until her shoulders rose and fell once, and she turned her head just so, peeking out beneath lowered eyelids. She pushed up and stepped over to where Zack was ringing out his shirt in the median. "Zack," she began, hands folded formally behind her back, "do you mind kindly explaining to me what the fuck?"

Zack's head turned vaguely in her direction, but he didn't look. "Explain what?"

"You know exactly what."

Zack did look at her then. His face looked almost sleepy in its relaxation. He eyed her for a moment, then said, "You seem agitated."

Helga's eyes narrowed. "No. Whatever would give you a crazy idea like that?"

Zack hummed and gave his shirt another twist without looking. "Well, I don't know, it's just this vibe I've been getting—"

Helga growled him into silence. "You're not funny, Zack."

Josh finished folding his shirt from the other side of the car and raised an eyebrow, his head moving such a way that Zack's eyes slid in his direction. "Yeah, seriously, that was weird. I didn't know you were gay."

"I'm not."

"But—"

Helga waved an erratic hand up for them to quiet, her eyes flickering closed a second. "Not the point. Look, Zack, Kate's at a very difficult stage in her life. I know how she seems, but the reality is that she's really sensitive right now and I don't want you messing with her head."

Zack stepped fully around to face her, his arms falling to his sides. "I wasn't messing with her."

Helga's eyebrows narrowed humorlessly and her voice dipped low, "You'd really be willing to go out with her? Seriously, no jokes?"

"Yeah, seriously." He brushed past her and opened the car door. Amanda and Phil sat inside already, Phil closest with his head laid back against the seat and eyes closed. Zack tossed his shirt in on Phil's unsuspecting head and got in. Phil spluttered into motion.

Helga huffed and spun on her foot. "Zack—"

Secure in his seat now, with one hand on the handle, he raised half his eyebrow at her. "Hey, I like sassy girls. Really. I was just trying to lighten the mood and make her feel better. You're the one who basically declared to the entire store that she was trans even though it was clearly embarrassing to her. Out of the two of us, I don't think I should be the one getting scolded." With that and a pointed raise of his brow, he pulled the car shut with a quiet click.

Helga gaped, hands on her hips and legs a little spread. It was too similar to her war stance for anything but discomfort, so Josh sucked in a breath and quickly opened his own door, ducking in before anything could blow up. The action had Helga blinking, and she gave her head a small shake before walking around to get in the driver's side.

While she was doing that, Josh spread his folded shirt out on his lap and sniffed, laying the side of his head on the back of the driver's seat so he could peer at Zack. "Y'know, I get that she was trans and all, but you do know she's still got a… and she doesn't have any…"

Having tossed Zack's shirt into the passenger seat with the rest of their soggy clothes, Phil shot a look at Zack. "You sure you don't have anything you'd like to tell us, Zack?" he asked sweetly.

Zack snorted at the both of them and laid his forehead against the window. Helga's door was clicked open then, and she shook her hair out in the wind one final time before locking them all in. As she was starting the car up, Zack said a little cheekily, "You know if I was gay, I'd have fallen for Jaron a long time ago."

Josh made a very strange face at that. Phil's lips just thinned. "You really have no shame, do you?" he asked rhetorically, settling back in his seat.

Zack turned to face them all, looking a little tired all of a sudden. "Look, I just don't think there's anything wrong with wanting to… reinvent yourself, kind of. Or, feeling like there are important, neglected parts of yourself you'd like to bring more to the surface. I get it—I get her. She feels like a girl, and I like girls, so what? It's all pretty cut and dry to me." He grinned then and laid his head down on top of Phil's. "Besides, what if my soulmate is trapped in a guy's body? I can't let a little thing like a wiener get in the way of true love."

Phil scoffed and shoved him off. "Criminy, you are a girl."

Zack stiffened slightly. His forehead clunked back on the window. "Am not," he muttered.

Phil heard him, though, and raised his voice, "Are too!"

Zack huffed. His forehead slid down a little as they turned out of the parking lot. Feeling his hair crinkle, he winced and shifted his head around to look askance at Phil. "You kidding? I'm machoness personified. Really, look at these guns." He pushed his shirt sleeve up so he could flex his nonexistent muscles. Phil eyed his arm incredulously.

Josh looked vaguely nauseous at the display. "No kidding, you're the girliest person I know and my best friend is a girl. Not to mention Grayson. I mean, the way you talk about things sometimes…"

Zack's arm fell to the seat as he threw his head back. "Oh please."

"You're girlier than Dolly, too," Phil was all too happy to add, but then the sheer truth of his statement hit him full force and he turned rounded eyes forward. He stared hollowly at the dashboard, unblinking and furrow-browed. "Way girlier."

Zack eyed him with a hint of distaste, content in the knowledge Phil would never know it, then crossed his arms and turned back to the window. "I'm more of a man than you'll ever be."

In a second, Phil was rigid, and the next he was bouncing up and screeching, "Take that back!"

"What's wrong with being a girl?" Amanda shouted out of the blue, eyes huge and filled with equal parts distress and rage as they blared into them.

Everyone stiffened. Tension flooded the car. For a long time, nobody breathed.

Then, Helga let out a long, weary sigh and slowly explained, "Boys are dumb and think being feminine makes them weak in some way, Sweetie. It's okay, I used to get pretty offended when people said I was boy-ish." She cast a dry look back. "Didn't much care for the thought."

Zack grinned, Phil scowled, and Josh shut his eyes.

Amanda wasn't so easily appeased, though. "What's wrong with being a boy?" she asked, her voice a little squeaky in her duress. "No, but if—if a boy can feel like a girl and a girl can feel like a boy—what does being a girl or boy even mean?"

Helga looked back again, finding her daughter's questions very interesting. She looked so distraught. Her mouth twitching, she looked to the road. "Well, generally, girls are thought to be more mature, delicate, nurturing and emotionally driven, and boys are more aggressive, direct, take-charge and—"

"Better," Phil cut in haughtily.

Helga's eyes did a slow roll. "You know, in some ancient societies, women were held up as goddesses."

"Doesn't surprise me," Phil droned. "You've all got god-complexes."

That got a small grin out of Mom. Before the conversation could completely derail, Amanda declared, "There's nothing weak about being a girl and boys aren't dumb. But," and here she looked at Helga again with that look of baffled distress, "Mama, Dad's way more mature than you, and you're more 'gressive, charging and direct. And—Phil is really delicate and emotional."

Phil was too horrified to speak.

Amanda turned a loving look on Zack, who returned it with a surprised smile. "And Zack's nurturing and not 'gressive at all." She looked at Josh. "And Joss is mature, so…" She looked forward, light creases beneath her questing eyes. "That's not right."

Helga felt warm. "Yeah," she breathed, and moved to turn the heater up a notch in the back. Clearing her throat, she lilted, "It's true, I've gotta admit. Girls and boys aren't all that different, when you get down to it. It's just stereotypes, Faith. They get to people."

Zack leaned over and placed a hand on Amanda's leg, softening his features. "There's nothing wrong with being a girl. Sorry I got kinda weird."

Amanda smiled at him. "It's okay." A frown touched her face then and she glanced down as Zack's hand fell away. "But then, if boys and girls aren't different, how can you feel like one or the other?"

"Well…" Helga began slowly, before gaining speed, "could you say you feel at all like a boy?"

Amanda jerked her head back. "I'm a girl!"

Helga laughed. "Then there ya go."

The car was silent for a while after that. Helga had turned onto Vine Street and was just pulling in to park when Phil exploded out in what could only be described as a shriek, "I'm not delicate!"

Zack turned smiling eyes down on him. He jokingly ran his eyes up and down him then reached up to pluck a few soft brown strands of hair up, letting them fall back down one by one. "Look pretty delicate to me."

Phil slammed his hands down on the car seat and howled, "Take that back!"

Zack reached around the passenger seat to grab his shirt. "Well, I would, but you know how Dad feels about me lying."

"It wouldn't be a lie! Take it back!" Realizing who he was screaming at, he jerked around to glare meaningfully at Amanda. "And you take it back, too!"

Zack snorted, ticked the door open, and grabbed Phil by the back of his t-shirt. "You need to cool your ranch, baby bro."

"What does this have to do with chips?" Phil cried incredulously, hands scrabbling to gain purchase on something – anything – but he couldn't get a good hold and Zack succeeded in pulling him out. The car door was kicked shut and Zack's voice was muffled as he said, "Criminy, you're hysterical. Tell me the truth—you've started your period, haven't you?"

That was when Phil started kicking him.

Helga huffed and groaned at the entire thing. She fell back against her seat once in complete exhaustion before resignation set in and she jerked her door open. Following the slam, Helga yelled, "Stop! Stop it right now, or so help me!"

Josh made a point of re-locking his door. The car rocked a little as the altercation outside got more out of hand, and Josh looked wearily over at Amanda. His jacket was zipped up all the way, a dark, navy blue with gray sleeves and a yellow stripe at the top. It was juvenile, but he still managed to look older than he was. Amanda thought again that he was definitely the most mature of her brothers.

"Hey," he said softly, leaning closer with intent blue eyes, "you feeling okay?"

Amanda blinked. "Uh-huh."

"Yeah? You were pretty quiet before."

Amanda's eyes widened. She hadn't thought anyone had noticed her mood. She held his gaze a moment, then looked down at her hands. Her fingers were still stained a little yellow. Slowly, her eyebrows lowered. "I need to go to preschool."

Josh's head tilted back. "Oh." The single syllable rang with a wealth of understanding. She looked at him. "You want a break from the crazies."

Amanda's eyes went round, just as another tremor rocked the car. She snapped a look out the back window once before looking back. "I love—"

He put a hand on her arm and smiled. "It's okay, Amanda, you don't need to feel bad about it. We all need our space sometimes. It's normal. I know I'd be out of my head if it weren't for my friends."

Amanda went silent at that. They sat that way for a few minutes, the car still rocking and the sounds of shouted threats and wicked cackling muted within its walls. Josh seemed content to lay back and relax like that, but Amanda couldn't handle silence for too long without getting edgy. Being reminded of her previous reticence had only succeeded in bringing the cause behind it back to the forefront, all the bad, confusing feelings crashing down on her and building up from a hot pit in her stomach. Her arms started quivering after a point, and when her bottom lip began to tremble in tandem, she blurted, "Do you like me?"

Josh's eyebrows flew up. His eyes on her were a little wide now, but after a moment, his cheeks expanded on a breath before he let it out in a puff. "Well, you are my little sister," he said, looking a little confused. He tilted his head then, assessing her, and asked, "What about you?"

Amanda blinked. Josh smiled at the look and elaborated, "Opinions on you aren't always going to be good, that's something you're just going to have to accept. What's really important is what you think of yourself. So, what do you think?"

Amanda's face scrunched in concentration. Her blinks were slow when they came, and Josh waited patiently. Finally, Amanda said, "I dunno." She frowned. "I wanna know what you think."

"Why?"

"Because you're my bother."

Josh's eyes wrinkled slightly, then smoothed. "Brother. But I already told you, you're my little sister, so I'm pretty much programmed to like you."

"You don't like Zack or Phil," she pointed out.

Josh huffed involuntarily and rolled his eyes. "That…" He struggled, a war written clearly across his features, before he finally sighed and forced himself to admit, "That's not true. I do like them, it's just that they're… really annoying, sometimes… A lot of the time. Most of the time." He unclenched his teeth and ran a hand casually beneath his nose, averting his eyes. "Doesn't mean I don't still care about them."

"I bet everyone likes you," Amanda despaired to the ceiling.

Josh's eyebrows furrowed slightly. His eyes softened, and his voice got a little faraway, "I guess. I mean, there's nothing to really dislike, but then there's also nothing to really like. Honestly, I don't think people have very strong feelings about me either way. Unless it's got to do with my batting average or something, but that's not…" He trailed off as he got a good look at her in the shadows. "And I'm confiding in a four-year-old," he muttered, seemingly to himself. Amanda tried not to frown, but she couldn't quite restrain herself. Josh frowned back and said simply, "You're a smart, sweet, funny girl. Those are facts. Just remember that the next time you're feeling insecure. That's what I do."

"Try to remember you're a smart, sweet, funny girl?" Amanda asked in confusion.

Josh choked and had to pound a fist to his chest to get his lungs to work again. A second later, he coughed, "Yeah, that's what I do."

The door to the boarding house flew open suddenly, the sound loud even in the relative security of the car, and the sight of Arnold striding out was clear from their window. He looked alarmed. "What's going on out here?" he raised his voice, and Dad never raised his voice. Both Josh and Amanda winced their eyes closed. His voice came again a second later, sounding closer, "And why are you all wet?"

Helga's voice was harried but laughing, "Oh-ho, Football Head, have we got a story for you!"

Evening came, and Stella was left in charge of her. They were working on a puzzle while dinner was being cooked, and as usual, Stella ended up nodding off about halfway through. Amanda pulled a blanket over her lap and kept her steps light as she padded away.

The hall was alive with life and sounds from all different directions when she reached it, and she had to stop, caught in the middle of this grand, distending cavern as a surge of wonder swept over her. The boarding house always felt castle-like in its largeness, filled with untold mysteries and intrigue and adventure. Just as well, it could feel like a dungeon, and she knew waiting around every corner was someone who'd jump to grab and deposit her someplace she 'couldn't get into trouble.'

Couldn't have any fun, was the reality of it.

She was just starting to take that first, bold step into the unknown when the voices grew louder from above. Panicking, she dove for the first hiding place she could see. Which just so happened to be the hat stand, in the midst of a bunch of heavy coats.

She felt stupid as soon as she did it, and was about to come right out and face the music when she realized exactly whose voices she was hearing.

"Hehe, a boy who wants to be a girl, eh?" Grandpa Phil.

"Isn't that the saddest thing you've ever heard?" Brother Phil. Amanda's eyes narrowed.

"Oh, I don't know about that."

"Criminy, Phil, can't you talk about anything else? All the girls I've known have been kickass. It's not like it's bad." Zack. Amanda's scowl lifted into a bright smile.

"You just cursed. I'm gonna tell Dad." There was a thump, laughter, then, "Ugh, don't you even care? Girls are always out to cause trouble. They're vicious and cruel. Doesn't it freak you out at all? That you could be talking to a boy and he could turn out to have been a girl the whole time? It's like, you're never safe!"

"Ahhh, well," Grandpa chuckled. "I've found that once you reach a hundred years old, all the care has pretty much been collectively zapped outta ya. I mean, I thought I didn't care when I was ninety, but good gravy—I didn't know what not caring was!"

"You've ascended." Phil sounded admiring. Amanda couldn't remember the last time she'd heard him sound like that. She peeked out a sliver, but all she could see was Grandpa's leg.

"No, I've descended—we just came down the stairs. Dagnabit, boy, haven't I taught you anything?"

"I didn't mean—"

"Yeah, Philly, learn your prefixes already. I had those down when I was five."

"Shut up, Zack, you couldn't even count to five when you were five."

"Ah, well at least I could say I was more than five inches tall."

"Grr…"

The voices and laughter faded off into another room. Amanda stepped out with a heavy glare levelled at their backs, namely Phil's. She looked down at her pink sneakers, her red socks, and then dusted her hands down her orange and tangerine-colored dress, before ghosting one over her pigtails and hairclip, all unquestionably feminine in their construction. With a huff, she marched straight-backed down the hall and back into the parlor, where Stella was still snoozing peacefully.

Only cause trouble, she thought. Vicious and cruel.

She finished the puzzle. Then she pulled out another one, and she finished that, too.

Minutes passed, and she found herself sick of the child puzzles so she scaled the side of the shelf and grabbed down one of her brother's.

By the time dinner was ready and Helga was coming to retrieve them, Amanda was just setting the final piece down. Helga stopped dead in the doorway and blinked her eyes into adjusting. And then her mouth fell open.

Puzzles were everywhere. A pyramid of blocks sat on the couch; daisies spanned the rug in all directions; a rainbow of fishes stared up at her; a farm scene was laid out beside the coffee table—but what really caught Helga's eye was on the coffee table.

Gingerly, she stepped around the puzzles and positioned herself on the other side of the table, where Amanda was sitting all doe-eyed, and leaned down to pick up the box. What she read confirmed her suspicions: 150 pieces. Her mouth remained a little open as she looked from the box, to the lighthouse on the table, to her four-year-old daughter. She kept her eyes on her for a long time.

Amanda blinked. "I was angry," she explained.

Helga exhaled, lowered the box from her face and slowly shook her head. "Smart as a whip," she mumbled, and smiled dolefully when Amanda's eyes filled with steel.

The kitchen sat in tranquil shadow, dim and calm with the tap-tap-taps of an early morning shower against the Sunset Arms boarding house. Kori and Josh sat sequestered closely together at the table, a deck of cards before them, while Amanda swayed happily at the other end, smacking quietly on a plastic bowlful of raspberry oatmeal. The atmosphere was still, both with concentration and vestigial lethargy, and a light nip drifted comfortably through the air.

Gertie threw herself into the room in full Victorian garb, complete with a sparkling tiara. "Who's up for some broiled bones and devilled kidneys?" she asked cheerfully.

Everyone at the kitchen table called, "Pass."

"How about some anchovy paste or black pudding?"

"Pass!"

"Pheasant legs, pig's cheek, collared tongue?"

"Pass," "Pass on all of that," and "No, thank you" were all called out with nary a glance.

"Ohhh," Gertie bemoaned, sidling up to the table with her skirts swishing from side to side, an ornate silver tray balanced on her protruding hip, filled to tipping with dishes. Her eyes twinkled behind her glasses as she held up a cup, dancing it in front of their vision. "What about some custard? It has raisins and lemon!"

"Actually," Kori lifted her head for the first time in fifteen minutes, reaching for the custard with brightening eyes, "that sounds pretty good." Realizing herself only after the cup was in her hand, she eased back into her seat with a soft, apologetic, "Thank you."

Gertie put her free hand at her hip and leaned back with a sweet smile. "My pleasure, Ms. Bronte." She watched Kori pop the first careful spoonful into her mouth and start chewing before she added, "Can you believe you're the first one who'd have anything to do with the spotted dick today?"

Both Josh and Kori went still as a painting, Kori with her hand on the spoon and Josh's hand mid-air with a two of clubs. After a heartbeat, Kori forced the bite down her throat and asked reluctantly, "Spotted…?"

"Spotted dick! A delicious English custard!"

Kori sat the cup down with a clatter and started coughing. Josh gave an abortive choke and stuffed an abrupt fist into his mouth to keep from reacting, neverminding that stuffing a fist in his mouth was in itself a reaction.

But Gertie was already moving on to stand beside Amanda. "How about you, little miss," she all but cooed, grin stretched long across her wrinkled face. "Would you care for some custard?"

Amanda blinked and turned her eyes back to Kori and Josh, who were both motioning theatrically for her to decline. She just caught Josh mouthing "wiener" with a finger sliding over his throat before she looked back up at Gertie's face and gave her head a vigorous back-and-forth.

Gertie pouted. "Turning down an early dessert? Well, that doesn't sound like you at all." She rested a palm against her forehead. "You don't feel like you're running a fever, but then my hands are already warm."

Amanda scooped three fast spoons of oatmeal into her mouth and muffled out, "I feel fime."

Gertie withdrew her hand and hummed lowly.

Amanda smacked while she ate, mouth wide open. Gertie's hum tapered into a snort, and the tray was slid onto the table just so Gertie could properly snatch her spoon from her. "Now that's no way for a young lady to eat," she announced, raising her eyebrows when Amanda's mouth remained open in her mystification. She tapped her chin so she'd shut it, then offered the spoon back. "Chew with your mouth shut, ma'am—the world will thank you."

Amanda flushed and worked her jaw slowly up and down, lips firmly sealed this time. Gertie nodded her approval and softened her Lady persona into something more approachable. "So what's eating ya, milady?"

Amanda gaped again at that, despite Gertie's frown. "Ah'm eatin' oatmeal," she corrected, and Gertie looked confused.

Josh placed a card up on the table and stated without looking up, "Amanda's starting preschool tomorrow." Kori glanced over curiously, and Amanda looked back with flying eyebrows.

Gertie gasped, pulling everyone's attention to her. "That's wonderful! An education is a privilege in this society, you know. Basket-weaving, needlepoint and piano are all lovely, of course, but there's nothing quite like history, science, medicine—"

Amanda's eyes had grown wider with each subject, until Kori politely interjected, "I don't think they'll be teaching anything that advanced this early on, Mrs. Shortman." She didn't notice Josh's tensing shoulders until the words were already out of her mouth. Kori readied a cringe.

"Mrs. Shortman?" Gertie burst on cue. "I'm Queen Elizabeth!"

Arnold chose that moment to wander in, prompted by all the noise, and was just in time to see Gertie bring one heeled foot up onto a chair and push herself up. She careened sideways for a heart stopping instant, jarring the tiara to where it was just clinging to the side of her head, before she managed to right herself. Arnold had just been taking a swallow of coffee when this happened, and ended up spewing half of it out onto the floor in shock. Thus, she declared, "And I decree from henceforth that only subjects applicable to the real world will be taught in schoolhouses! No more of this ABCs and one-two-threes nonsense!"

Arnold hastily wiped the coffee from his chin and rushed forward. "Grandma," he exclaimed, "what are you doing? Get down!"

Gertie looked down at him a second, eyes sparking with interest at his sudden appearance. "I'm just trying to cheer up the young princess."

Arnold was taken aback. His concerned eyes switched to Amanda. "Cheer her up?"

"Indeed! It would seem our heir apparent is a bit apprehensive about beginning her education."

Arnold took a moment to parse that out, before his eyelids fell to blankness. "Ah." He cleared his throat unassumingly and sat his cup down. Glancing back to Amanda, he raised his eyebrows a tad and asked calmly, "You nervous about preschool, Faith?"

Amanda spluttered over her oatmeal. "No!"

Josh cut in before Arnold could open his mouth again, eyes still on the table, "She's afraid nobody'll like her."

Arnold's surprise was palpable, not only at the news, but because his plan to shoo Gertie down had just been derailed. He blinked in rapid succession and opened his mouth again—

"No," Amanda snapped, glaring searingly at Josh, "I'm not afraid at all! I'm excited!"

Josh looked up at that, looking genuinely astounded. "That's not what you told me," he said.

"Well, yeah…" Amanda reluctantly allowed, then bore her teeth again, "but that was a long time ago!"

"It was just a few days—"

Gertie wobbled on the chair again, and Arnold grabbed her arm with a yelp, "Okay! Look, Grandma—"

"You can call me Lizzy," Grandma sweetly interjected.

"Lizzy," Arnold deadpanned, with a face to match. That face dropped back into unease the next moment. "What made you think Amanda was nervous about school?"

Gertie shot an arm straight into the air like a rod, her forefinger up. Arnold grabbed her with his other hand to keep her from plummeting to the ground. "She turned down an early dessert," she declared, and Arnold was distracted again from his concern for her.

"What dessert?"

"Dotted wiener," Amanda informed him thoughtfully, tilting her head to one side in a way that would normally make Arnold melt. If it weren't for the fact 'dotted wiener' had just come out of her mouth.

Arnold gaped. He caught Kori moving out of the corner of his eye, and looked to see her uncomfortably holding up a cup of custard and gesturing to it. All the pieces fit into place then, and Arnold's mouth popped closed in time with his swiftly reddening cheeks. "I see…" He cleared his throat, taking but a moment to collect his thoughts before giving his grandmother a gentle, suggesting pull. "Grand—Lizzy, I don't think Amanda is nervous, or sick, or anything. She's probably just still a little tired from yesterday. There's no need for you to cheer her up, so why don't you come down and we can—Is that Helga's bridal tiara?"

"What, this?" Gertie asked, hooking the tiara from her head and twirling it on one finger. "These are the royal jewels, of course!"

Arnold hissed through his teeth and snatched it from her finger. "Grandma! You're confused. Why don't you get down and Mom—I mean, your lady-in-waiting can attend to you. After cooking all that food, I'm sure a nice, warm bath would feel fantastic, yeah?"

Gertie clapped her hands together and beamed. "Ooooh! I have to admit, that does sound lovely." She softened and glanced uncertainly back at Amanda. "Will the young princess be okay while I'm gone, though?"

Amanda raised a finger and opened her mouth in a wide oval to reply, but Arnold was quicker as he eased Gertie down from the chair, "I'll take care of her, don't worry. You just go relax, I'll check on you in a bit."

"Well, okay…" Gertie trailed off, clacking off towards the door. Arnold led her to it with a supportive hand on her arm, then watched her off as she ambled down the hall. Assured, he released a sigh and turned back to the children. Light bags sat beneath his eyes, but those eyes were bright with amusement as he walked over to sit down in the vacated seat. Arms resting overtop each other on the table, he leaned over them and divided a smile between them all.

"She's not as spry as she used to be," he said. "Her age has been catching up with her for a while, but she doesn't know it. Makes for some interesting situations, huh?"

Josh sighed through his nose and shuffled wordlessly through the cards, Kori offered a tiny smile and nod, and Amanda shook her head. "Grandma's spry as a chicken," she adamantly exclaimed. "She has no age, she's a god. Like corn on the cob."

"Bacab," Arnold corrected thoughtlessly, having had to do so many times before. His smile was particularly affectionate. "That… doesn't seem too likely, but I can't make any good arguments against it. It'd certainly explain a few things."

"It's true," Amanda affirmed.

Arnold looked down and took a few bracing lungfuls of air. Now was not the time for any talks like this, so the next moment saw him fiddling with the tiara in his hands, glancing up at the tray of food growing cold in the middle of the table. "You know, about preschool…"

Amanda was fast to assure him, "I'm excited." He looked at her, and she grinned, teeth stained pink from her oatmeal. "Do they really teach pre-med?"

Arnold chuckled. "No. They do have anatomy and biology classes later on in middle and high school, though. And there is science."

Amanda hummed, prodding at her bowl like she hadn't heard him. "I wanna be just like Grammy Stella," she murmured dearly, and looked up to see Kori and her dad smiling at her. Josh continued to shuffle through the cards. "I wanna make people happy, and fix people. And I wanna write poetry like Mama. And be a cop like Grandma. And have adventures!"

"That's a lot of aspiration for a four-year-old," Arnold commented, leaning his head on one hand. Despite his words, his tone was warm.

"Princesses are all about aspiration," Amanda informed him, sticking the last spoon of oatmeal into her mouth and pushing away her bowl.

"Again, I can't argue," Arnold laughed. The tiara felt suddenly heavier in his hand, and he adjusted it in both, holding it up with one eye squinted shut so he could observe it more keenly. The diamonds sparkled under the sunlight streaming muddily in from the window, rain still streaking down in light patters and dew caked across the glass. A sapphire managed to catch a stream of sun and winked at him. He smiled. "You know this tiara's your mom's," he said mildly, making a point of not looking at her, even as he felt her eyes large and attentive on him. "She wore it on our wedding day, with this long veil trailed with flowers. It… surprised me when I first saw it, because your mother's always been more the showy, uptown type, and I'd expected her to pick one out a little more extravagant. But she said anything too big and she'd have felt like Big Bob."

Amanda giggled at that, and Josh snorted. Arnold went on quietly, "I was still surprised, but not in a bad way. There's no pink on it, which as you kids know is pretty unusual for your mom, and I had never seen this stone before." He indicated the blue components. "It's called indicolite. It's very rare, and according to your mom, promotes inspiration, healing, harmony, tolerance, kindness, and is said to lessen fear and protect against danger. Of course, I don't believe it actually does any of that, but it's a pretty thought—your mom is full of those." He smiled. "Naturally, we both grew pretty sentimental about it. We keep it along with our other valuables tucked away, like my hat, some ribbons, old letters we sent each other… That's why I was so surprised at Grandma having it. I can't imagine how she got a hold of it."

"Why didn't she choose something pink?" Kori asked, too absorbed in her curiosity to feel self-conscious. "Tourmaline comes in a variety of colors."

Arnold shrugged. "She said it felt too 'junior prom,' but... really…" He bit his lip, not wanting to veer off his main point with all this, while still wanting to satisfy the expectant look on Kori's face. After a beat, he swiftly admitted, "She wore something blue on every one of our dates after I told her it was my favorite color—a hair tie, an earring, a bra—" He coughed. "It was just something cute she always did. I hadn't expected her to extend it so far as our wedding, though." He ran a hand over his mouth, hiding a smirk. His voice stayed level. "Of course, pink was incorporated in other ways."

"It's beautiful," Amanda said longingly, something almost dejected in her eyes as she looked at it. Arnold dropped his hand and flashed a grin at her for the remark. In a single movement, he reached over and sat the tiara atop her head.

"I agree." His grin broadened at the look on her face. "What? A princess isn't complete without her crown." He softened his expression then, earnest as he reached over to push the tiara a bit so it wasn't on her bow, and smoothed her hair with a warm hand. His smile was faint as she blinked owlishly at him. "Everyone gets a little insecure sometimes, Amanda. It doesn't make you any less of a person—or a princess. Everything will work out so long as you stay true to yourself. That's all you can ever do."

"Yeah," Josh added. Arnold's hand fell away as they both looked at him, stacking cards on the table, still without looking up. "Nobody's confident all the time. It just wouldn't be human."

"Afraid nobody'll like her?" another voice pierced the air, making them all jolt in their seats, and the sound of pounding feet up the hall sent eyes jumping to one another in communal distress. Not a second later, Zack was there, a hand braced on the doorway with the most perturbed look on his face imaginable. His eyes were at once on Amanda, and that perturbed look somehow grew more intense. Quieter footsteps closely followed, and then Jaron was behind him, peering around him with utter bemusement on his own face. Zack snapped a skeptical glance on him and proclaimed, "She's wearing a tiara!"

Jaron blinked, eyes squinting a bit more than usual in his disorientation. "Uh."

"She's doubting her perfection in a tiara!"

Amanda frowned apprehensively. "Zack?"

He began bounding forward. "Your middle name is Faith," he went on, as he stopped on the other side of the table, eyes trained steadily on her tiny face, "but you can't even have faith in yourself? I can't believe it. Is this a joke?"

Arnold's eyes were wide as he looked at him. "Were you eavesdropping? Or—" He looked around his chair, suddenly alarmed. "Did you bug the kitchen?" Jaron used his distraction to snake around Josh and Kori and slink into a chair so he could look over the food.

"What?" Zack muttered distractedly. "No, Greatie told me."

"I told Grandma to take a bath."

Zack spared him only a brief glance as he replied, "She was saying something about grabbing a book and it came out. Look, Faith," he placed his palms down on the table and leaned over them, closer to where Amanda was blinking rapidly, "you're a Shortman. You know that, right?"

Amanda moved her hands under the table to straighten her dress. Her eyes gleamed from under her bangs as she looked up at him. "Doi."

Half Zack's mouth sprung up. "Then it's about time you learned just what that means."

Arnold made a strange, quiet noise. "Zack—"

Zack's hand shooting over to gesture palm-up at him startled him into silence. "Our dad: teacher, philanthropist, demigod, ambassador, loved and respected by all." Arnold groaned and dropped his head into his hand. Zack's moved to gesture towards the hall. "Our mom: award-winning author, poet, business woman, demigod, loved and feared by anyone with half a brain cell. Our grandmother: doctor, botanist, hero. Our grandfather: anthropologist, humanitarian, hero. Both adventurers. Now, our great-grandma: former police officer, martial arts master, pianist, landlady. Our great-grandpa: decorated private during World War II, chinese checkers champion, landlord—"

"They're both gods," Amanda added, and Zack laughed, agreeing with a wave of his hand. Even Arnold, in his mortification, had to crack a smile.

"Okay, okay, right. Both gods. And on Mom's side, of course, we have our grandma: successful business woman, not to mention a former Olympic athlete and bull riding champion, and our grandpa: successful business man. Then there's our broadway actress aunt, whose accomplishments are nothing to scoff at, or stare at, or even gape at—Her IQ is off the charts. You seen how many awards she's won?"

Amanda nodded dumbly, wondering where this was going. Zack grinned brightly, like he could read her thoughts.

"My point is that we come from a long line of really incredible people." His eyes darted around, and he grabbed a chair. In a quick motion, he moved it around Arnold to sit it in front of Amanda and plopped down. Yet even seated, his presence was ebullient. "Leaders, officers, artists, geniuses, gods—that's what's running through our veins right now. What's running through your veins right now. You have it in you to do great things, to be an incredible person, and already you're witty, intelligent, kind—and all before you're even five-years-old!" He patted her shoulder warmly, his grin radiant with encouragement. "You don't have anything to be worried about!"

Amanda was blushing profusely by this point, jaw-slacked and eyes particularly big. Kori was in a similar, stunned state, and only snapped out of it when she heard Josh sigh. Glancing over at his annoyed expression, she squeaked and leaned over to whisper, "Oh my God, I know you two have your differences, but how can you not be in awe of a speech like that?"

Josh didn't bother to whisper as he responded, "Because I've heard it a million times. Zack loves going on about our family's achievements. More than that, he likes going on about himself—normally there's a long bit in there about how he's the embodiment of everything it means to be a Shortman. I am kinda surprised he didn't do it this time. He must be tired."

Zack smirked over at them, eyes half-lidded and gleaming. Slouching over his legs as he was, it was a simple thing to lean over to Amanda and add, "Of course, there's always gonna be those intimidated—dare I say jealous—of our perfection. But you can't let that get in your way of being the best you can be."

Jaron gagged and threw down a chicken leg that looked just a little bittoo much like a chicken leg.

Amanda giggled and, before anyone could quite process it was happening, took the tiara off her head and placed it on Zack's for safe keeping. With that done, she flew forward and hugged him tight about the torso. "Thank you," she squealed into his shirt, still a little pink with embarrassment. "You're right. But…" she adjusted her head so she was looking up at him, "I'm not afraid. I'm excited."

Zack blinked down at her, surprised. "Excited about… preschool?"

"Yeah!"

Feeling eyes on him, Zack looked over to see one of Arnold's eyebrows predictably raised. Zack gave a light shrug. "I just heard the 'afraid nobody will like her' part and came running."

"I'm not afraid," Amanda insisted, frowning punishingly now with a dogged glare, though her arms remained like iron bands around him.

Zack smiled affectionately at her. "Right, Faith."

"Man, you look like your mother," Arnold said out of the blue. Zack looked at him. Arnold's arms were folded over the table, and he lifted one a little to indicate his head as explanation, mouth tilted to one side while he stared. "The tiara."

"You really look like a girl now," Josh muttered, shuffling a few of the cards in his hand with a barely restrained smirk.

Zack blinked once, blandly, before looking over to Jaron. "Jarry, am I beautiful or am I beautiful?

Jaron scratched at his chin, still rummaging through the food, and replied distractedly, "A goddess among men, babe." Kori gave a strangled snort. Josh looked back to his cards.

"Yeah, that's what I thought."

"Zack," Amanda's sweet voice piped up, calling his attention back to her. Her eyes met his at first, but then shifted down and around, like she was anxious but trying to hide it, and Zack was perturbed all over again. "Did kids really steal cookies away from you when you were my age?"

Zack's eyebrow flew to the ceiling, and he exclaimed, "No," right as Josh said, "Yep."

Zack huffed and pulled Amanda closer, so she was in his lap, and bounced her once on his knee. "Ignore your less beautiful, goddess-like older brother. You remember I told Mom I gave them away willingly."

Amanda flailed a bit before grabbing his torso again, and hugged tight so he wouldn't be able to bounce her again. "To… share," she recalled, cheek pressed to his chest.

Zack, Arnold, Josh and Kori all snorted in perfect unison. Both Amanda and Jaron jolted. "Not exactly," Zack chuckled, while he reached up to take the tiara off. He paused then, considering. "Well, that's what I told Mom, but the truth is her baking skills weren't all that great back then. She's a lot better now, but the cookies she always sent me to school with tasted like concrete. So when people asked, I was more than willing to let them have them." He placed the tiara back on her head with a gentle smile.

Despite all this, Amanda had to frown. "You lied," she stated in a low tone.

Zack hummed at this, not looking particularly guilty. Amanda's arms withdrew from around him completely, coming to rest in her lap, but Zack's grip stayed strong. "Well, technically," he said, something almost laughing in his tone that had Amanda looking down. "But there are different kinds of lies. This one was a good lie."

"A good lie," Amanda deadpanned. It was so opposite how she usually sounded that Zack finally seemed to take notice of her mood, though he gave little indication. He shifted slightly, so he was closer to their dad.

"Yeah. See, there are bad lies. Lies that are selfish or cruel, that hurt people. Then there are good lies. Lies that you tell to protect, or even help. Not letting Mom know that her baking was awful back then was good because if I had told her, it would have just hurt her feelings and discouraged her from baking altogether. You know how frustrated Mom gets about these things. Really, people don't have to know everything, and sometimes it's really better that they don't. You know?"

Amanda had softened sometime during this explanation, and nodded a little now, even as a part of her still didn't feel quite right. "I guess."

"Or," Josh drawled, reaching over to pluck a card from the deck, "Mom might have taken it as a challenge and tried even harder."

"Yeah, and then the entire kitchen would've been burned down," Zack drawled back sarcastically, before breaking into a smirk. "Come on, it all worked out, didn't it? That cake Mom made last month was great."

"It was," Jaron said, words riding on a gusty sigh as he fell back into his chair with a wistful upward gaze, having just concluded there wasn't a single edible thing in the entire house. Kori bit her thumb nail and glanced at Josh, but he was too busy staring holes into his cards to notice.

"Ignorance is bliss, huh?" Arnold's voice droned suddenly from behind Zack, startling him. "What an interesting way of looking at things."

Zack flashed him a grin over his shoulder. "You taught me well, Pops."

Arnold huffed through his teeth and reached over to take Amanda from him. "I never taught you that."

"Sure you did, you taught me to be tactful, and all being tactful is is learning to phrase your thoughts in such a way that they no longer sound anything like what you were originally thinking."

Arnold laughed despite himself, helping Amanda adjust more comfortably in his lap. "So I said one thing and you took it in a completely other way. That's great."

"No, I think I took it exactly how you meant." When Arnold looked dubious, he raised half his eyebrow. "Come on, Dad, you skew the truth all the time. You did it just a few seconds ago. You were thinking, Where did I go wrong in raising this boy? But what you said was, What an interesting way of looking at things."

Arnold's eyes narrowed a fraction while Zack just grinned shamelessly, satisfaction clear in his eyes. Amanda looked between them a few times, feeling a sense of foreboding, until finally, Arnold reached out, grabbed a plate of something squishy and brown, and sat it in front of Zack with a clatter. "Stuff your face and shut up."

Zack chuckled and folded his arms over the table, eying the food. "Ah, see, you just put devilled kidney in front of me. But if you'd put the collared tongue, you could've said, 'Bite your tongue.' But you're not that clever, are you, Pop—"

A fork was thrust into his face. His face, though still glowing with amusement, was stern. "Eat. And stop trying to teach Amanda to lie."

"Seriously," Josh spoke up, almost scowling as he slapped his cards facedown on the table, "she obviously asked because she wanted to know if she should be worrying about grabby kids, and you just completely bypassed the point."

Zack snorted. "I hit the point out of the park."

Josh's face scrunched. "What does that even—No." His face hardened in an instant. "You don't get to do that. Amanda," he turned his attention to her, fully and deliberately, ignoring Zack's pointed look, "Zack's lying to you, and not in the 'good' way," his tone oozed mocking, before levelling out into something softer. "The fact is, there probably will be at least one kid who tries to take something from you. I had it happen to me—Zack had it happen many times—but you just need to lay down the law is all. Let them know what is and isn't acceptable, and—"

"I did not lie to Amanda Faith," Zack stated, sitting taller in his seat with rounding eyes. He sounded so offended that Josh actually stopped mid-speech, mouth hanging open as his eyes shifted to Zack. Arnold looked to him as well, Kori's eyes flicked up, and Jaron looked vaguely concerned. Amanda just sucked her lower lip in and stared buggy-eyed at the tabletop.

For a brief moment, Zack paused, his eyes flickering before his presence seemed to settle, becoming laxer, less pronounced, and more his usual demeanor. Before the change could be detected, his eyebrow extended on one side. "Did you forget the point of this entire conversation was to make Amanda feel better?"

Just like that, Josh's eyes were narrowed once more. "I think it's more important that she be prepared."

"But you're not preparing her," Zack chuckled, a little high-pitched and helpless-sounding as he shook his head, "you're just freaking her out! Seriously, confidence is everything. If you believe without a shadow of doubt that things will be all right, then they will be. Simple as that." He began casually twirling his fork betwixt his fingers, leaning an unassuming grin in Amanda's wary direction. "Trust me, it's been my philosophy for years and I'm doing fantastic."

"That's complete crap," Josh exclaimed, appalled

"Ha! And yet who continues to be number one around here?" Zack raised his arms up high and pointed his thumbs back at himself with a cocky grin. And just to be really annoying, he shot a wink at Amanda.

Really, Amanda wasn't a big fan of the boys' current subject—the fact she'd brought it up notwithstanding. She supposed in retrospect she should have foreseen Josh and Zack finding some way to turn her simple inquiry into an argument, but the thought hadn't even occurred to her, so now a fight was raring to blow and she wished it wouldn't, if only because it drew further attention to her anxieties.

Not that she had any, of course.

But despite all this, when Zack's eyes turned in her direction and one screwed shut in a theatrical, over-exaggerated wink, she had no choice but to giggle.

And naturally, Josh then had no choice but to clench his teeth, flare his nostrils and pound his fists – lightly – against the table. "You know what? Whatever. Believe what you want, play your games—We'll see who's laughing in five years or so. But Amanda doesn't need you putting ridiculous ideas in her head. She's gonna be completely blindsided when she gets around the other kids."

Zack's only response to the heavy words was a gooey smirk and a lowering of his eyelids. The look had Josh's shoulders immediately stiffening and mouth flattening out, and Zack's eyes tracked these developments with a show of teeth. Leaning himself further over the table, he gave him a steady look and said slowly, meaningfully, "I'm sure everything will be all right."

For a moment, Josh simply stared. And then his eye started twitching.

Arnold released a loud breath and stood. Amanda hugged him tightly around the neck as he said, "Okay, that's enough. It's too early for one of your fights."

Zack shrugged and stood as well. He swayed over into his dad's warmth and smiled, face-to-face with Amanda. "We never fight, we just have spirited discussions—Isn't that right, Faith?" He wiggled a finger into her stomach, prompting another begrudging giggle out of her. Arnold snorted out a chuckle of his own and swung a surprise arm around him, pulling him stumbling into a tight, half-embrace.

"Yeah, whatever you say," he said sarcastically, releasing Zack just as quickly into a wobbly hunch and pushing him towards the door. "Come on, it's about time we all got dressed. Last day of summer—Better make it count."

"Oooh, that's right," Zack gasped. "Jaron! We gotta get a move on if we wanna be first in line to Party Wagon!"

Jaron reluctantly dragged himself up from his chair, groaning under his breath, "But I didn't get anything to eat."

Kori coughed innocently into a fist and bumped her custard towards him with her elbow. His eyes predictably flew to the movement and widened as he took in the sight of–of—some kind of pastry-looking thing closely resembling a cookie. In a moment, he had it nabbed and was giving a long, slobbery swipe of his tongue to the spoon, humming in pleasure at the flavors he found there. "Mine now," he whispered fiendishly as he passed Kori's chair.

"Oh, JarJar, noooo," Kori whispered back in poorly feigned anger. Luckily Jaron was far enough away that he didn't notice. Kori sucked her lips in, her eyes shifting to meet Josh's stare. He'd been sitting in a tense stupor ever since Arnold interrupted, and remained tense as Zack and Jaron vacated the room, but by then what she'd just done had finished processing and his jaw sank to the floor.

"Today's gonna be a total hootenanny," Zack's voice came as a distant murmur from the hall.

"If you say that word one more time…" Jaron's faded away after him.

There was a pause, then… "Hey, what are you eating? Give it to me!"

"No," Jaron shouted, and there was a series of bangs and stomps before silence reigned.

Arnold sighed, bent over to give Josh's shoulder a parting squeeze and moved to the door. "Now that all that's outta the way, let's get you dressed!" Arnold beamed at Amanda, holding her closer with one arm, the other coming up to adjust her tiara. Amanda gasped out an, "Okay," and waved a hasty goodbye over his shoulder as they disappeared out the door.

Once everyone was gone, Josh blinked, and said, "I can't believe you just did that."

Kori finally broke down in snickers and picked up her cards, carefully fanning them between her fingers. "Well, it's about to get even more unbelievable, because…" she laid her cards face-up, revealing six unhappy uncles, and grinned, "I just won again."

Josh stared, and she stared back, her grin only widening with each second that passed while the corner of Josh's mouth twitched, revealing a hint of teeth.

Then they both burst into laughter.

Arnold took his time getting to their room. His hands were running through one of her pigtails, and his feet all but danced up the hall in slow, swaying motions. Every few seconds, he would hum something through his breathing, and Amanda's eyes would flutter against his shoulder. The smell of sandalwood and tea spice surrounded her, like it always did when her dad wore one of his t-shirts, and Amanda wondered if he was trying to distract her.

If he was, he was only partially successful.

She bit her lip. "Daddy?"

"Hm?"

"How did you deal with mean kids?"

His stride stuttered, for just an instant, before his fingers shifted to stroke the fine hairs at the back of her neck. "Ah, well…" his voice was soft, "I was nice to them."

"You were?" she matched his pitch. Her fingers dug into his shirt. "Why?"

Arnold's pace slowed, and he hummed again, thoughtfully. "It just seemed like the right thing to do, I guess. I mean, of course I got mad sometimes, but when someone is mean, you know, you have two choices. You can let it get to you and do something about it. Or you can shrug it off and move on. I tried to do the latter as much as possible, because it seemed to me that being that mean and nasty all the time had to be punishment enough."

Amanda pressed her mouth to his shirt, looking deep into the fibers. "Oh."

He ran his hand down her back and added, "You never know what someone is going through to make them behave that way. More often than not, it's a cry for attention."

"There's never any reason good enough to be mean," she said matter-of-factly, muffled.

Arnold chuckled, neither agreeing or disagreeing. She felt him shift, and when she looked, it was to see the stairs descending. She tightened her grip on him.

"You can't control how other people act, Faith," he said as he took the first step. "You can only control how you act. You just need to ask yourself what you believe is most important, and set an example."

"Joss said I should lay down the law," she mumbled, eyes on his feet. "Because kids were grabby and beat him up."

Arnold snorted, but then tried to pass it off as a cough as her eyes flicked to him. Reaching the top of the staircase, he adjusted her more securely on his arm and ran a finger over a piece of chipped wallpaper. "Your experience will probably be a little different from Josh's, Sweetie. He instigated a lot of the grabbing and beating."

Amanda frowned. "Why?"

"He thought it was fun." At Amanda's confused look, he smiled and shrugged. "He's a boy."

"He's Josh," she corrected.

Arnold grinned his agreement and pressed the wallpaper back into place, only for it to peel back when he reached for the doorknob. He made an eye at it as he grabbed the knob, but before he could turn it, Amanda asked, so gently that it gave him pause, "How was Phil scarred?"

After a beat, he looked into her leery green eyes and cocked an eyebrow. With a flick of his wrist, he said, "Why don't you ask him?" and opened the door.

Light – bright and golden – spilled into the corridor. It cast down from the skylight, spattered with gray from the droplets of rain resting against the glass panes, and set the bright oranges, yellows, blues and greens of the room on fire. Helga laid propped against a pillow on the bed, legs half-tucked, a heavy book open on her lap. Phil leaned against her, looking at it, while Taro sat on the end in lotus position.

Taro looked up at the door opening and offered a smile, but then snapped his head back when Helga laughed out of the blue and Phil bit his hand to help lessen a sudden onslaught of snickering. Helga waved a hand in Arnold's direction without looking and said, "Oh, Arnold, listen to this. A guard says, 'They say the queen's getting to be an old woman but I swear she looks younger than my wife, whom I married a young thing, six years come Easter.' And this other guard says, 'It would age a girl fast, just the look of you.'"

Taro laughed openly, and Amanda's heavy mood lifted, revealing a bright, genuine grin. Arnold had the grace to fake a disapproving look before he chuckled. "What are you reading?" he asked, moving to the closet.

Helga turned a page and hooked an ankle over the other. "A play called 'Elizabeth the Queen.' Phil asked me who she was and I didn't know what to tell him past 'old English bat,' so I just pulled this off the shelf."

Arnold scoffed at that as he pulled out a shirt. "Helga."

She gave a long hissing laugh through her teeth and raised an eyebrow. "Oh, what? He only asked 'cause of Gertie, and there have been more than one Queen Elizabeth, you know. How am I supposed to know which one she's impersonating?"

Arnold 'hmed' and walked over to sit Amanda on the couch with several articles of clothing under his arm. Once seated, he started unbuttoning her sleep shirt. "Pretty sure it's the first," he said, and faltered as his eyes were caught by a flash of twinkling blue. He stared at the tiara a moment, popped out another button, and asked, "Helga, did you know Grandma had your bridal tiara?"

Helga's head popped up, just as the last button did. "What?" she barked, suddenly on the alert. The tone was answer enough and he frowned, making quick work of grabbing up an orange dress and turning it right-side out.

"Grandma was wearing it when I went to the kitchen. You didn't know?" He gave one of Amanda's elbows a tap, and she raised her arms.

Amanda saw as her mom thrust the book into Phil's hands and shifted her feet to the floor, but then her view was obstructed, a second passed, and when her sight was cleared Mama was right next to Dad, and directly in front of her. Her eyes bulged at how quickly she'd made it across the room.

"Football Head, I love Gertie to death, but I'd sooner tattoo 'Big Bob's Beeper Bitch' on my forehead than let her touch my valuables."

"Don't curse," Arnold and Phil said in unison, and Helga's eyebrows went that much deeper. And then even deeper than that.

Arnold blinked at the beady look and mustered a charming grin. She kept the beady look as long as she could under the assault, but ultimately had to throw her arms up.

"For cripe's sake, Arnold, seriously! If she's gonna start rifling through my best stuff so she can act out her whacky delusions, I'm gonna need to buy another safe. That tiara was in a metal box in my suitcase. I'm really upset." She looked at Amanda then, her pigtails fallen past her shoulders and a too-big tiara perched atop her head, and lovelight burst in her eyes, so strong that it cancelled out every other emotion in her expression. Her entire presence softened and melted like a dove bar over a fire. "Awww…"

Arnold gazed at her with a tiny, bemused smile. When Helga gave no signs of snapping out of it any time soon, he leaned over and said into her ear, "I'm sorry."

She blinked herself back to reality and sent a look his way.

Arnold's mouth formed a small smirk and pressed a brief, firm kiss to her own. Pulling back, satisfied with the level of calm and control on her face, he stepped closer to Amanda and knelt so he could grasp the bottom of her blue sleep pants and tug them off. He addressed Helga, "We'll talk about it at the next family meeting; get everything sorted out so this can't happen again."

"Yeah, we better," she muttered.

Arnold went on, while he pulled Amanda's shorts up and smoothed down her dress, "Until then, just remember to keep your bag in the secret compartment."

Helga reached a hand back and scratched the back of her neck, her eyes twirling along the carpet. "Yeah, okay." Her eyes eventually landed on Amanda, catching her looking, and her gaze riveted, relaxing. She smiled. "Hey there, Dearheart. You look awfully pretty this morning in my tiara."

Amanda blinked, and beamed. "I know!"

Helga chuckled wryly. "Yeah. You'd look more regal if your pigtails weren't all flopped over like that, though. C'mere." She sat down on the couch and turned Amanda so she was facing her. Arnold leaned an elbow over on the couch, still crouched, and watched as Helga made quick work of pulling her hair ties out and ran her fingers through her loose hair. Her fingers caught on a knot halfway down, and she raised an eyebrow at Arnold. He stood wordlessly and walked over to the nightstand to grab a hairbrush.

Phil chuckling called Amanda's attention back to him. With Helga gone, he'd laid the book out between Taro and himself, and now sat indian style, head supported by his elbows on his knees as he looked at it. He read aloud, quietly, "'Is there no limit to a woman's deception, wench? Would you go so far as to appear pleased if I kissed you?'" He gave his head a slight shake. "I don't know what it is, but I think I'm really gonna like this play."

Taro took a thermos from the shelf and gulped some of whatever it contained down his throat. Apparently pleased with whatever he'd just ingested, he thoroughly licked his lips and turned the page. He laughed suddenly and pointed to something. "Oh, man, there's a character named Bacon."

Phil muttered sarcastically, "And it just keeps getting better."

Amanda felt eyes on her and shifted her gaze a little up. Arnold was there, just stepping away from the bed, hairbrush in hand, and giving her a meaningful look. She hesitated a moment, but then blurted, "Phil?"

"Mm?" he murmured flatly, eyes still scanning the page.

"What happened to you in preschool that made you scarred?"

For a long moment, it looked as if he hadn't heard her. Then his eyes rolled up. "What are you talking about?"

Arnold made it back to the couch and handed off the hairbrush to Helga. As she raised an eyebrow at the conversation and began running the brush through the length of Amanda's hair, Amanda folded her fingers together and said, "Well, Mama said that you got scarred, so I wanted to know how, so I asked Dad, and he said I should ask you, so I'm asking you. What made you scarred?"

Phil looked at her blankly, his eyes having widened only a fraction as she elaborated. Helga looked up after a few moments of silence, sharing a look with Arnold before eyeing Phil, and he blinked. At length, he said with an air of confused annoyance, "I wasn't scarred?"

"But—"

He yawned loudly, cutting her off, and hopped off the bed with book in hand. Taro's eyes widened at the sudden removal and opened his mouth to softly say, "Hey," but then seemed to give up and took another swig of his thermos. Phil wandered over to the bookcase, speaking dismissively, "Look, I have a very busy day ahead of me, so I don't have time to be answering any stupid baby questions. I thought you weren't worried about going to school?" He pushed the play back into place with the rest of the books, right in between a family photo album and a hardback of The Mean Old Witch and the Weird-Headed Boy.

Amanda's reluctantly curious expression soured. "I'm not! I was just wondering—"

"Well, quit wondering. Never wonder. Wondering makes you learn, and when you learn, you realize, and when you realize, you realize life sucks."

Helga snorted, half-laughing, half-scoffing. "For pity's sake, Phil, would you just answer the poor girl's question?"

He turned his head, pouting. He obediently grumbled, "I don't remember anything about preschool." Without waiting to see if they'd heard his admittance, he pivoted on his heel and began towards the door, shooting Taro a sharp look. "C'mon, we have stuff to do."

Taro rolled his eyes with a smile and waved his thermos at him. "I've still got half a breakfast smoothie, you know? I'm not ready to go anywhere."

Phil whined at the door, hanging from the knob, "You have it in a thermos, let's go." Again, without waiting, he drew the door open and slipped out. His steps could be heard stomping hastily down the stairs, announcing without words that he was going whether anyone followed or not.

Taro huffed and stood from the bed. As he walked to the door, he threw a smile Arnold and Helga's way. "Look at me, taking orders from an eight-year-old."

Arnold chuckled, and Helga asked while her hands worked on putting up the first of Amanda's pigtails, "Where are you taking him today?"

"Library. Again. I swear, he's almost a bigger nerd than Jaron." He sucked in a breath suddenly and turned to speedwalk towards the closet. "Oooh, almost forgot. Clothes."

Amanda, radiating with tension, grew annoyed with the change of topic and snapped a look up at Arnold, jerking Helga's hand so that her pigtail came loose. Helga gasped as Amanda said, "You told me to ask him, but he didn't like it."

Arnold met her look with surprise. And then discomfort, and a bit of guilt. "I'm sorry. I was kind of curious of the answer myself."

Amanda frowned. "Huh?"

Helga hurried to get her pigtail back in before Amanda could freak out again and sighed, "Phil started acting weird sometime around the middle of preschool. Things were fine in the beginning, even great, but then one day, bam—he came home really quiet and it was like World War III trying to get him to cooperate with anything." She snorted. "I mean, more than usual, anyway. It went on for weeks."

Amanda tried to look back at her, but Helga caught the motion in time and snapped a hand up to keep her head in place. Amanda blinked a couple times. "Why? What happened?"

Helga finished with the second pigtail and threw her arms up. "We don't know! No one does. I asked his teachers, and zilch. He certainly wouldn't talk about it. I even sat in a few days to watch out for anything weird but everything was completely normal. And, I don't know, for a while I thought maybe it wasn't as big a deal as we feared, because he was going through this cute scarf phase and he seemed to get over it, but then it occurred to us to question why he wouldn't go to school without a scarf." She ran her fingers through her hair again. "It was all very confusing."

Arnold placed a hand on Amanda's shoulder and smiled apologetically. "I had no answer to give you when you asked, so I was hoping he might tell you. Since you're his little sister."

Helga hummed and dusted the fallen hairs off of Amanda's back while said girl looked at her hands. "Maybe it's best that he's forgotten?"

Arnold shrugged.

Taro walked past them, pants on and just popping his head out of his shirt as he looked at them. "You guys aren't really still worrying about his little girl problems?" He clicked the lid onto his thermos and stopped by the door, grinning with easy reassurance. "Come on. You know they just like him, it's no big deal. I've seen it time after time. They'll fight, one of them will figure out the other likes them, and the problem will solve itself. Whatever happened in preschool, I'm sure it's an entirely separate thing."

Arnold hummed through a small smile, shifting his weight. "Here's hoping."

Amanda was confounded. "Girl trouble?"

Helga was disinclined to filling her in on such a delicate, baffling and frankly frustrating situation, though, so instead pulled her gently into her, swaying her closer into her warmth. "Sweetheart, what's brought all this on so suddenly?"

Amanda closed her eyes, lulled into a peaceful, sleepy haze by her mother's arms. But something inside her still wouldn't calm—was still hot and unruly in her stomach that she couldn't ignore. Her eyes opened a sliver. "I dunno."

Helga rocked her for a few more seconds, before hope began rising in her. Tensing infinitesimally, she gentled her voice until it was barely above whispering and asked, "Do you wanna maybe take a year off from preschool and—"

Amanda jerked out of her arms and crossed her arms. "I'm going!"

Helga jumped back and forcefully huffed, "Fine!"

Taro blinked, looking a little dumbfounded. "Wow, you're really nervous about preschool?" Before Amanda could tear his head off, he went on, "Because you shouldn't be. I had a great time when I started school, and you're not that dissimilar to how I was as a kid. I made lots of friends, all the teachers loved me, we had naps and snacks and all kinds of toys. It was awesome."

Amanda's mouth hung open. "You made friends?"

Taro nodded, barely thinking about what he was saying as he laid all her fears to rest, "Yeah, of course. You meet so many kids that it's impossible not to. You'd have to be making a consecutive effort not to interact with anyone to make zero friends."

Amanda blinked several times.

Just then, the front door was heard slamming, and Taro seized the doorknob with a snort. "I better go catch him."

"Yeah, keep a close eye on him, don't let him wander off," Arnold said in passing, heading over to the bed, "and be back before five."

"Of course."

He was almost out the door when Helga stood suddenly and said, "Hey, you didn't get any clothes for Phil."

Taro made a 'tff-ing' sound, barely slowing as he started down the steps. "The kid's always bossing me around and acting like he's the babysitter. Let him walk around in his pajamas." The door shut on his smirk.

Arnold pulled out a small pair of sneakers from under the bed and came back to push them onto Amanda's feet. Once they were on, he pulled back, draping his arms over his hunched thighs, and gave her a soft grin. "You remember how to tie your shoes, Faith?"

Amanda smiled, because she did.

At it would turn out, tending to Gertie ended up being a pain in the butt for the next twenty minutes, and Stella came in demanding to take Amanda to the museum for some down time. Arnold had some research he wanted to do that morning and Helga was still determined not to leave the bedroom, so it was settled without argument. Within minutes, Amanda, Stella and Miles were out the door and wouldn't be back for a couple hours.

Arnold set up his laptop on his legs and lounged comfortably on a stack of pillows on his bed. He half-expected Helga to head straight for the other computer and get some work done of her own – she'd been toiling over the first draft of her new book for months, with her editor yapping in her ear every week, and had confessed great difficulty in thinking of anything else – but instead, she climbed over his feet and crawled up to him, tucking herself almost aggressively into his left arm. Arnold was hardly about to complain, but he found it a little odd. Not odd enough to comment on, though. So he rubbed her back absentmindedly and read a few articles he'd had set aside.

Then her stomach growled.

Arnold shut his eyes a moment. "Helga, have you eaten anything?"

She tilted her face into his chest. "Maybe."

Her stomach growled again.

Arnold tried to push himself up with his free arm, but Helga barred him, held him down. He huffed, and she slung a leg over him, clutching at him with all her strength. He kept the struggle up for another minute, but it was half-hearted, so finally he just fell back and gave the top of her head a dirty look. "Helga, you need to eat. I can't believe you haven't already."

"Yeah, well," she grumbled into his chest. Then her arm tightened. "Maybe if you'd put a mini fridge in here like I wanted we wouldn't be having this problem."

Arnold sighed. "You're gonna need to face Zack eventually."

She spluttered out a snort. "Oh, yeah, and tell him Kate wants his phone number? And that her boss found out their pipes had been tampered with so they're letting him off the hook? And he wants to apologize in person for the inconvenience? So, y'know, he can be insufferably smug for the next millennia or so?" She lifted her head just enough to glower heatedly at him. "Have you lost your football-headed mind?"

Arnold rolled his eyes and made to sit up again. She hissed, snapped his laptop shut, and rolled on top of him. Then, without warning, she dropped, placing her full weight directly on top of him and putting them nose-to-nose. She glared into his soul. He blinked dully at her.

"He's probably out of the house by now," he said reasonably, keeping his voice low and smooth. "He and Jaron said something about needing to be in line early. You're getting worked up over nothing, Helga. As usual."

"As usual you're getting worked up over nothing, Helga," she mocked in a nasally voice, tilting her head and crossing her eyes.

Arnold jerked his head back, pressing it into the pillows with a suppressed smile. "You know, babe, you've really matured with age. The adult in me is really impressed."

"Not without a condom, it's not." She sighed and rolled off of him. While he sat up, she ran a hand over her forehead, flopping her bangs out of her face so she could stare stupidly into the sky. "God, what has my life become?"

A deep voice whispered in her ear, "Blissful happiness with a successful career, a wonderful husband and four darling children?"

Helga struck out. Arnold snapped back from her beating hands with a snicker and slid the laptop onto the shelf. Helga huffed at him and said, "Really, Arnold, I'm hiding from my own kid."

Arnold hummed as he trodded unevenly over the mattress to the other side of the room. "Well, to be fair, it is Zack."

"Yeah, yeah, but still. School starts tomorrow. He's gonna be a freshman, starting a bunch of new classes, making friends, chasing girls, and I'll still be busting my ass trying to finish my book and having mental breakdowns over the idiots at the beeper emporium and who even knows what else. I'll be seeing him less and less—I should be spending this time with him, but I can barely look him in the eye, I'm so embarrassed."

Arnold had been digging around in his desk while she spoke, and looked back at her with a concerned frown now as she concluded. "Why are you embarrassed?"

She blinked at a stray gray cloud still lugging along overhead and ran a hand over her eyes. "Oh, I don't know. Lots of reasons." She adjusted her finger down to roll some gunk out of her eye and sat up to flick it in the trash. "You know, I hate to say it, but I think I almost understand Big Bob now. Having a kid that looks and acts almost exactly like you really screws with your head."

Arnold bounced back over, his eyes still focused on her. Once before her again, he sat down on the edge of the bed and asked as he stretched back, "Is this about what happened with Kate?"

Helga winced, and Arnold understood.

Pushing a pillow over on her side, he gave a slight shake of his head and leaned over to murmur into her hair, "You put too much pressure on yourself. She doesn't expect you to be perfect."

"Arnold, I announced to the entire building that she was transsexual," she exclaimed.

"It's not like she keeps it a secret."

"Maybe not, but she's not shouting off of rooftops, either. She didn't need me to do it for her." She scooted closer to him and closed her eyes as he pressed his mouth to her forehead, soaking up what comfort she could from his presence. She sighed quietly. "She's had enough stupid, inconsiderate people in her life."

"Helga, please. You were just trying to stick up for her, and she knows and loves you for that."

"Still…"

"No still." He gave her head a few pecks before laying down, pulling her with him so she was comfortably tucked in his arm over the pillows, and held up a cereal bar. "Just food."

As soon as her eyes landed on it, they brightened and she took it with an adoring grin. "I love you."

"Good." He wrapped her more securely in his arms, his smile tranquil. "Then maybe you'll consider taking some time off from the emporium."

She gave a questioning squeak over a mouthful of cereal.

"You've been too stressed lately. You're overthinking, worrying about trivial things, having frequent breakdowns—I really think it'd be for the best. I mean, I know your parents are old now, but they're still fully capable of running the business. A month or two away isn't going to send the chain into bankruptcy." When Helga blinked a few times and opened her mouth, he added, just to really drive the point home, "And we did come to the boarding house so we could relax."

Helga's eyes narrowed. She stared him down a few long seconds with her cheek puffed out, jaw slowly working, hand clenching around her breakfast. Finally, she swallowed, ran her tongue absently over her teeth, and asked lowly, "You really think I'm being that irrational right now?"

"It's not just now, Helga. This has been going on for months."

She bolted up out of his arms and stuffed the last of her bar into her mouth, just so she could violently ball up the wrapper and throw it down on the bed. Chewing fiercely, she cried, "I didn't even think, Arnold! Zack had to call me out on it for me to even realize what I'd done! Zack. My fucking kid, and not just any kid, but the one most infamous for moral twisting and stupid misunderstandings, and even he—God, what is wrong with me? I'm thirty-seven years old and I'm still doing stuff like this! I'm still just spitting out whatever pops into my head and not giving a single thought or care to how anyone else is feeling! What does that say?" She raked her fingers through her hair.

Arnold sat up and made to grab her back into an embrace, but then he really looked at her, hunched over and staring in vacant desperation at the covers, and the arms that had been reaching out for her lowered. Instead, he scooted over so he was beside her and moved a hand up to rub her back, peeking at her face from under a messy bang. She didn't look at him. "Well, the fact that you're getting so worked up about it says that you're a wonderful, thoughtful person who cares," he said softly, and moved his hand up to run it over the nape of her neck. His touch was tender. "Really cares."

Her eyes flickered, and blinked over in his direction. He smiled and leaned gently against her side. "You and I both know you don't do these things on purpose. It's just that you have difficulty reading people—You're very passionate, you get excited, and excitement can make us blind. But your heart is good—"

"Oh, don't you 'good heart' me," she sighed. She tried to insert some iron into her voice, but she just sounded tired to her ears. "You always say that like it excuses my actions, like it's some all-powerful scapegoat that means whatever horrible thing I do is a-okay, but it doesn't and it's not. 'Oh, sure, you mouthed off at a bunch of nuns, but you have a good heart.' 'Oh, you made a six-year-old cry, but you have a good heart.' 'Oh, you nearly got us all killed for the sixth time today, but you have a good heart.'" She ran a hand over her face, pushing her hair out of her face, and turned her head up and over to look him in the eye. "Sometimes, having a good heart doesn't cut it."

Arnold frowned. "Helga." She blinked at him, and something about that felt like an arrow through his chest. His face constricted. "Oh, Helga." He gave in and pulled her in close to him, and was pleased when she came willingly. He nuzzled the side of her face almost unconsciously. "Yours more than cuts it, because you don't use it as an excuse. You take action. You apologized and Kate said it was okay. You're really beating yourself up over nothing. And you'd be able to see that if you weren't working yourself so hard that you can't think straight."

She snickered a little, her breath brushing warmly over his nose, and gripped the front of his shirt. "Okay, okay… I'll take some time off." He went lax with relief, and she hummed, her eyes closing halfway. "I don't know. It's just this whole idea that not only am I screwing up my own kids, but I'm screwing up other kids, too."

Arnold went back to rubbing along her spine as she thoughtfully continued.

"It's weird, you know. I never did like kids growing up. Most of the ones I was around were serious brats—but I liked the idea of kids, for you and me, and I love them now, but… I guess for a while there I figured I was just one of those people who love their own but can barely function around others. But then, when I meet kids like Kate… I want to protect them."

"I know."

"But I failed," she murmured, her eyes drifting low. "I know she said it was okay, but it's only because she sees me as a role model, and I don't like feeling like I'm taking advantage of that, intentional or not. And it reminds me… all the therapy in the world can't change who I am, Arnold. It can't change what my genetics are, where I came from, what my upbringing was like. At my core, I'm still a real nutjob." She sighed lightly, some arid humor entering her eyes. "I fear the domino effect."

Arnold's hand paused. "The what?"

"Domino effect. Y'know, Big Bob had a screwed up childhood, so naturally he grew to be a screwed up adult, and he ended up screwing Olga and I's childhoods so we grew to be screwed up, too, and, I don't know, I worry sometimes that I'm just doomed to screw our kids up, too. That maybe I already have, just by being their mother."

At that, Arnold had to propel himself backwards and widen his eyes at her. "You're talking like I'm not bringing some pretty screwy backgrounds into the picture, too."

"Arnold—"

"Dementia, abandonment issues, a crazy extended family, countless family curses, countless enemies, the Green Eyes, La Sombra, my grandpa," he listed with nary a thought. And then smirked at the raw hilarity burning in Helga's eyes. He pulled her back. "I never expected our kids to be perfect, only to be ours. Everyone's a little screwed up. It's just the way life works. We're all bound to mess our kids up a little." She melted against him, and he smiled. "But we'll be messing them up together, and considering we never had any experience prior to having them, I think we've been doing a pretty good job."

She sighed into his neck.

"Feel better?"

"A bit." She smiled. "Sorry I reverted back to a tormented teenager. And not even having the decency to be wearing my Metallica t-shirt when I did it."

He chuckled. "It's okay, I'm glad to hear you talking like this again. It's been a while. You needed it." His hand swooped hard down her back, pushing her towards him. "I missed you at breakfast."

"Oh yeah?" she murmured. Her hands came up to slide along the opening of his shirt. "Did I miss anything interesting?"

Arnold gave a deliberating hum and tapped his fingers one at a time on her back. Spirited discussions, spotted dick, and Grandma in a billowing gown ran through his head, before he replied, "Nothing out of the ordinary."

"Mmmhm?" She rose up and pushed him suddenly onto his back. His eyes popped open to see her looming over him with a naughty grin. "Wanna make it even more ordinary?"

She paused, and slammed her eyes shut, falling against him in laughter. "That didn't sound nearly as sexy as I thought it would."

Arnold blinked in surprise at the sudden weight. He felt something rise and scooted a little up the bed in discomfort. "I wouldn't speak so soon."

Helga felt it, and snapped back up on her arms so she could gape at him. "Really? Ordinary got to you?"

Arnold smiled a little sheepishly and a lot ruefully. "It's been a while," he repeated.

Helga smirked and tilted her head up. "Ah, I see now. The true motivation behind you wanting me to take a vacation. All is becoming clear."

Arnold rolled his eyes and grabbed the back of her head, pulling her into a deep, silencing kiss. Helga laughed against his lips.

Hands wandered with maddening slowness, feverish and savoring, running under clothing and over soft curves, rough bends, and long, smooth inclines. A sensitive spot was brushed. Helga moaned and Arnold sighed.

There was a strange clicking sound that just registered enough to put a crease in their eyebrows, but not enough to get Arnold's hand to cease its current ministrations. Until there was the sound of a gargling shout, and a loud thump.

The two sprang apart in annoyance and snapped their burning eyes to the door. The sight of Josh standing there with pure, unadulterated horror etched on his face softened their looks.

"Josh," Helga sighed, light but longsuffering.

"Why," he said helplessly. "Why do I miss everything interesting but get a front row seat to the things I don't want to know anything about?"

"What's going on?" Kori peeked around Josh's arm. Her eyes widened as she took in Arnold and Helga's positions. "Get it, Mr. Shortman," she whispered without thought.

Josh choked. "Kori!"

Arnold's hand sprang away from Helga. Helga rolled her eyes to the sky and sat up. "Okay," she exhaled, putting on her reasonable, parently persona. "I get it, it's all very traumatizing, we feel really bad, dear. Just tell us what you came in for, we'll get this whole awkward thing over with, and then you can scuttle off and never look us in the eye again. All righty?"

Josh looked ill. His eyes shifted a little, and his hands fisted into each other over his stomach, twisting and pulling. His words stumbled out, "Uh… well, I just came in to ask what time I should be ready for wrestling."

Helga blinked. "Ready for what?"

Josh's eyebrows furrowed. "Wrestlemania." When her confused expression endured, he hesitated and added, "Dad said you were gonna take me."

Helga blinked again, then narrowed her eyes just ever so slightly, shifting them in Arnold's direction. "Oh, did he? When did he do that?"

"Last week."

Her eyes snapped back to him in surprise. "Last week? How am I only just—" She took a breath, and stood. Her arms folded casually over her chest, and she tilted her hip a bit to the side. "And how come you haven't been doing backflips off the walls?"

Josh flushed. "I have been, you've just been so busy lately, I guess… I guess you didn't notice?" Her eyebrows lifted, and he started moving unconsciously out of the room. "You didn't know?"

"Football Head?" Helga's voice raised with each letter, her shoulders and facial muscles tense with mounting upset. Despite her address, her eyes remained trained on Josh.

Arnold had been propped on his elbows throughout the exchange, not looking particularly repentant, and scooted himself backward against the shelf now with a mild, placatory look. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean for it to come out this way. I wanted it to be a surprise." He pried a hand beneath himself and rooted around in his pocket, before pulling out two center seat tickets and holding them in her periphery. When her shoulders just grew more rigid, he said a bit weakly, "Surprise?"

Her breathing grew intense and shoulders started to shake, bouncing along to the rising of emotion inside her, before she spun around with fists flying to her sides. "Ohhh, I see now. You've been planning this for weeks—buttering me up with peanut butter granola, deep talks, and hot sex—oh, and putting my tiara on Amanda! That was low even for you, Shortman!" She hissed and pointed at him, her eyes fiery and brows set in a look that was positively baleful. "Plotting to get your wife to take an extended vacation and go to Wrestlemania shows with our son! What kind of a husband are you? How can I ever trust you again after a stunt like this?"

Arnold stared at her, his jaw hanging. All at once, he scoffed, laughed and slapped a hand over his brow, radiating raw, trembling incredulity. "God, what can I say, I guess my dark side comes out when I see my loved ones refusing to breathe." His hands fell heavily to the bed. "Come on, Helga, you said yourself you should be spending more time with the kids, and you really need a break! Look at you. You're a mess."

"Your face is a mess," she shouted maturely.

Arnold's face condensed in sarcasm. "Helga."

Helga threw her arms up. "Criminy, no wonder you've been in such a disgustingly good mood lately! You knew all along!"

"Can you stop acting like I killed someone? You're only further proving my point."

"Oh, further, is it?" She connected her wrists to her hips and glared. "Josh, do you think I've been acting irrational lately?" He didn't answer, and she raised her voice, "Joshua?"

She looked back, but he was gone. Helga immediately dropped her arms and blew out a harsh breath. "Phew, he left!"

With that, she jumped back on the bed and snatched Arnold by the shirt, pulling him in for an enthusiastic kiss.

Her mouth grazing against his before digging in with hard, tugging nips was like fire, and Arnold snapped back to gasp, "You're not upset?"

Helga scoffed. "Oh, I'm upset, all right. Upset that clothes are mandatory in civilized society." Her hands pulled impatiently at his shirt. His hands coming to push at her arms gave her pause, and she grinned at the look on his face. "Geez, Arnold, I'm not that crazy. I'm thrilled that you cared enough to put so much thought into this. You're an angel. A dirty, manipulative, scheming angel." She leaned in and licked her lips. "I'm so proud."

Arnold blinked, and blushed a little, his eyes flicking down. "Well, to tell the truth the Wrestlemania tickets were mainly to distract Josh away from the whole Sewer King issue. But I wanted to have an ace up my sleeve in case you refused to cooperate, too." He raised the tickers back up to her vision and fluttered them a little with a vague, wavering smile. "Surprise?"

Helga clasped her hand around his over the tickets and lowered her eyelids, falling against him. "Surprise," she whispered against the side of his mouth, her teeth sliding over his cheek, his jaw, his ear…

Arnold's eyes went round.

It turned out Arnold wasn't the only one with an ace that morning.

The early evening saw Amanda bouncing on the couch, a bowl of ice cream in her hand while an old thriller played on the TV. Phil was sprawled on the other end, a pillow over his face and his breathing slow and regulated despite Amanda's good mood.

Zack and Josh were fighting over the armchair at that time, and their parents were getting a refill on drinks, so Amanda seized the opportunity to bounce closer to Phil and ask, "Philly, what would you do if nobody liked you?"

He threw the pillow off and glared at her, as she suspected he might, and tossed a leg over her lap to try and stop her bouncing. It didn't work. She only bounced more furiously to compensate. "I hate it when you've had sugar," he muttered.

"No, you don't," she panted. An explosion burst on the TV and flared off her face in the darkness. Her eyes looked wild. "Zack and Joss said your life is boring and you need more ess-cite-ment."

Phil shoved his socked foot in her face. Amanda grabbed it and started digging her fingers into the heel.

Phil laughed so hard he fell off the couch.

Amanda leaned over and grinned down at his prone form, bouncing all the while. Another explosion burst, and she happily exclaimed over a spoon of chocolate, "You're welcome!"

A/N: Lmao, don't you love how I can write half a novel and call it Prologue? I know I do, hahahaha… ahahaeheheuhuhu… huh…

Nah, but you know how in the above A/N I said that I hated the beginnings of Looking Up and Breathing Slowly? Well, it's always been like that with me and beginnings. I've never been any good at them, and until this point that's something I'd kinda just accepted about myself. I actually had an alternate beginning to Finding Faith that was pretty… Well, anyway, I chose to rewrite it. Into this. So this is actually the first time I've ever put any true thought or effort into the opening of one of my stories. This is a milestone for me. I'm, like, proud of myself and shit.

So, let me know what you think? Pretty please? Handsome please? Gorgeous, sexy, covered-in-scented-oil please?

Questions are, as always, quite welcome. :)

I'll be resuming the Breathing Slowly arc proooobably after the next part of Finding Faith, and after that I'll just be writing them together. My mental health pretty much depends on me doing this, because there are too many stories in my head. I can't stand them. They hurt, guys. They really hurt. It makes sense to write these two together anyway, they happen in the same time period. xp

Legend

F = Feedback

R = Reply

Q = Question

A = Answer

F – okay, first off, THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR MY THANK YOU! -and I'm just going to stop it right there cuz I know if I let myself gush it's going to turn in to 'No, thank YOU so much for YOUR thank you for my thanks for your thank you of my thanks!' and it will just go on and on like that till one of us finally snaps like 'JUST SAY YOUR WELCOME ALREADY YOU BITCH!' and the other one ends up dead... so, your well come. :)

R – Thank you for my welcome. :)

Huhuhu…

F – I seriously love it. Seriously, I loved how fleshed out Sara got in this chapter, and how we see the beginnings of the Zack and Sophie (Zophie?, Sack?, Zaphie?, Sock?) dynamic. Beautimous. :D

R – Okay, so Zack and Sophie's pairing name so has to be Sock from now on. x'DDD Omg

Q – Is Christopher father Torvald and Torvald left because he was emotional scared to be bad dad because his wife/girlfriend left him and Chris?

A – Sounds plausible.

Q – Is the Chapter reveal Ham crush going to appear soon? Seriously. I want to know who Ham crush is. I got some ideas, but really I want YOUR image of Joshua 'Ham' Shortman crush!

A – You know, I've actually been debating whether or not to reveal in Breathing Slowly? I'm very indecisive. I guess we'll see. If I don't, then it'll become ridiculously apparent once I begin Ham's book. Really, it's not anybody too left-field. It's exactly who you'd expect it to be.

I'm really sorry for leaving you guys in suspense like this. I wish I had more time to write for this story so I could let you guys in on all the juicy details as quickly as possible, but I'm afraid it's always going to have to come second in my life. It's hurting me just as much as it's hurting you guys, trust me. Maybe even more… Probably more. *rubs eyes*

Q – What will Dolly do now that she heard and saw Phil and Sara having strangely good time for emotional day? Dolly is not like Brainy and is not going to take this lying down. I don't what she will do, but it will be a incident. Not something crazy, but something to be remember and cause something to happen in Phil and Sara life. Maybe just Phil, because she has a super crush/obsession for Phil Shortman.

A – You're right, she won't be taking it lying down. :'D She won't be taking it lying down at all! *delighted hiccupping cackling*

OH, okay, and before I forget—I started a LwtS tumblr like two years ago that I'm only now starting to take advantage of, so if any of y'all darlings are interested, hit me up at the link on my profile :ppp Of course, I kinda had to start using it eventually, because I have this whole HEY ARNOLD! obsession going on (Idk if you guys are privy to that or not, but yeah, I do, and it's pretty bad), and I can't reblog anything but the occasional post on my main account because my best friend follows me on there and *highpitchedgigglesnort* no one can ever know *shifty eyes*

Of course, my main account is being mainly dedicated to gay astronauts these days :P Which is perfectly acceptable for people I know IRL to be privy to. Totally. Yeah. It's not embarrassing at all, I'm cool. *heavy breathing*

Okay, okay, that's it for now. Love you, guys! Thank you, and goodnight! (Or good day. Morning. Whatever it be.)

REVIEW!