With the day finally over, Arnold Perlstein left his office and began the drive home, knowing that his weekend wouldn't be as relaxing as everyone else's. While everyone would be enjoying the days off from work, Arnold would still be incredibly busy. His busy weekend began when he started driving and had to fight traffic in the big city. Of course, once he got home, he would be even busier.

Yep, Arnold had a busy life, which is just the way he liked it. A busy life meant that there was always something to do, which meant order and stability. He hated when things got crazy. That's the reason why every time he went on one of Ms. Frizzle's field trips, he always wished that he had stayed home that day. To this day, Arnold still wonders why he didn't just start homeschooling so that he could stay home or transferred to another school that was more normal. He still could not figure out what stopped him.

Either way, that third grade class left him feeling like he was permanently scarred from what happened. Arnold hoped that moving on would bring order and normality back into his life, but things were not so orderly in high school. There were rowdy teenagers everywhere, plus he still hung out with Wanda, who tried to get him to join in on the chaos by going to parties or drinking. Luckily, he never did get caught up in the confusion of high school. Still, Arnold found himself wishing that he had stayed home more than ever.

This desire to stay home only grew when he started getting more attention. He had always been pretty quiet and shy, and he still had glasses. He also still maintained his rock collection. You would expect that he would be bullied in high school since he would be a nerd, but that was not the case. Arnold switched his thin, wire glasses for more stylish frames. He also joined the swim team in his freshman year and became one of the best swimmers. This helped him grow to 6'0", and it helped him gain a toned body with many muscles, so he was basically one of the jocks. He also started shaving for the swim team, so there was no body hair to block the view of his body. He had the personality of a nerd, but because he didn't look like one, no one bothered him. He was happy for that, but what he didn't like was that he became a chick magnet.

Girls were draw to his hot swimmer's body and his well chiseled face. Many of the girls at Walkerville High saw him as man-pretty.

No one thought it was possible to describe a guy as pretty, but there was Arnold.

Any other guy, like Ralphie or Carlos, would love all of the attention, but girls made Arnold nervous. Remember, he was still quite shy, so all of the attention scared him. There were times when he was at the mall, minding his own business, and then a girl that he barely recognized from school would start following him, and then he would run into more girls as he tried to get away. Pretty soon, he had anywhere from 15-20 girls following him. This is why girls made him nervous. They were so unpredictable and unstable, which reminded him a lot of the chaos that was high school. It took him a while to get used to the fact that he was popular, though by the end of high school, he still wasn't 100% used to it.

Despite the fact that he was uncomfortable with all the attention, he didn't really mind some of the girls. They were quite pretty and gorgeous. He went on quite a few dates in high school. Not as much as Carlos or Ralphie, but about the same as Tim, if not a little more. None of the relationships lasted very long. He felt that most of the girls were incredibly self-absorbed and didn't really care about him. Sure, they were hot, but he hated their personalities. The one time he went out with Wanda almost made him stop dating altogether. They both cared a lot about each other, but Wanda had a huge promiscuous personality and didn't want to settle down for long. Arnold was bitter about it for a few weeks until the gang managed to get them alone together, which led to forgiveness. It was undeniable that Arnold and Wanda had this special bond between them since third grade, so nothing could keep them separated for long.

After the Wanda drama, Arnold went on a few more dates with shallow girls until he thought he had found his dream girl. He asked out Phoebe in the middle of their junior year, and she accepted. They went out for the remainder of high school, accompanied by tearful pleas from girls trying to get Arnold to reconsider being with her. Arnold and Phoebe were happy together, and they both felt like they would spend the rest of their lives together, but that all changed towards the end of high school.

Arnold had gotten a swimming scholarship to Stanford, and he was excited to attend. The gang was happy for him, but what made them upset was when he decided that maybe he would stay in California after college. Everyone had this special connection to Walkerville, the town that raised them and made them who they are. None of them could be separated from it for too long. Sure, they were going far away for college, but they all planned to move back to Virginia to live close to Walkerville. They all hoped Arnold would feel the same way, but apparently, he didn't. Phoebe tried to talk to him about it, but that conversation led to the end of their relationship.

Arnold explained that he wanted to leave Walkerville for good because he wanted to leave behind the memories of third grade since he felt permanently scarred from the field trips. Phoebe couldn't understand why he would feel that way since everyone else felt so lucky they were able to experience what they did. This conversation became an argument over the third grade and whether it actually was a good thing. This argument led to some resentful feelings about Ms. Frizzle surfacing, and Arnold said some things about Ms. Frizzle that upset Phoebe greatly. Phoebe berated him for his comments about Ms. Frizzle and for feeling that way, and then she broke up with him, and they have rarely spoken since. When Phoebe told the gang about what Arnold said, they all stopped talking to him for a long time. Arnold felt a little bad for alienating the whole gang, but at the same time, at least the friend drama from high school would be gone, and he could have some more order and stability in his life.

With that out of the way, Arnold started focusing on college and his career, which began with him choosing what to pursue. He had wanted to be a geologist probably since he was born. He loved rocks because unlike high school and girls, they were stable and didn't cause drama, so he could always depend on them. However, geology wasn't a career field that was in high demand, so he felt that it would be better to go for something with a better chance of a successful future. He still has his rock collection and attends some GRANITE meetings, but rocks have become more of a hobby for him. It was in his senior year that Arnold found a good substitute for his career: business. Arnold loved the idea being a successful businessman, especially since business could provide a feeling of order and stability in the office. Business would also allow for his name to be recognized, especially if he was a top executive. With this in mind, Arnold became more excited to attend Stanford.

I mean, Stanford was the school of many people that founded a lot of famous companies. The founders of Hewlett-Packard, Google, Instagram, Netflix, Snapchat, YouTube, LinkedIn, and other companies all went there at one point or another. Arnold felt that Stanford had the resources and reputation to help him become the founder of a huge company and elevate him to the status of people like Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, and Elon Musk. With that, he went to Stanford to pursue his new dream of business.

He continued swimming for Stanford's swim team and became one of Stanford's best swimmers. You would expect that an athlete like him would not have a lot of time for academics, like Ralphie, but Arnold managed to have a great education while being an athlete. This was good since time management would be essential for business. While at Stanford, Arnold found out that Mikey also went there to pursue a career in engineering. Arnold was surprised at first, but then remembered that Mikey had actually skipped a few grades since he was pretty intelligent for a young boy. Heck, he knew how to program a computer while the gang didn't know how computers worked. Arnold didn't remember at first because he hadn't seen Mikey in quite some time. He didn't go to Walkerville High like the gang. Instead, the Ramons sent him to a fancy private school in the next town over, which was the main reason why they couldn't get Carlos his own car for his 16th birthday like the rest of the gang. (Well, that, and they pulled in thousands of dollars to have the family minivan with a VMI Northstar conversion so Mikey and his wheelchair could fit inside. But that's straying a bit from the story, isn't it?).

Anyway, while they were at Stanford, Arnold and Mikey decided to work together in the future. It made sense, Arnold would run the business. Mikey would design the product and help build it along with the workforce, and he was already something of a computer whiz and was studying computer science in the engineering school, so he would be a great help. Arnold loved the idea of forming a company based in the technology industry, such as Oracle, HP, Samsung, or Apple. With that, they continued their education while working together every now and then to plan the future company.

After four years as undergrad students, Arnold enrolled in Stanford's MBA program with his GMAT score of 740 while Mikey continued his engineering education. They both had a great time in their respective schools and loved hanging out all the time. While there, Mikey introduced him to a friend of his from the engineering school. Her name was Jyoti Kaur, and she was an aspiring inventor studying mechanical engineering. Arnold and Jyoti started hanging out together and had a great time. All the time they spent together led to them developing feeling for one another, and then Arnold asked her out. She accepted and they started dating. After they both graduated from their programs, they continued going out.

Arnold started forming a small computer business close to San Jose, and Jyoti and Mikey worked together to design products. The three of them formed a great team, but it would still take a while for Arnold's dream of being the CEO of a huge corporation would come true. He figured that the first thing to do was to come up with a better name. The current name of the company is Perlstein Electronics, Inc. Even he thought it was lame. He wasn't sure how the founders of Google, Apple, Oracle, Facebook, Microsoft, etc., were able to come up with cool company names. He hoped that one day, he would be able to come up with a cool sounding name.

Anyway, about half a year after the company was founded, Arnold asked Jyoti to marry him. She accepted and they were happily married a year and a half later. Arnold invited the old gang, but only Wanda, Ralphie, Tim, and Carlos showed up. DA, Keesha, and Phoebe were still bitter about Arnold's feeling towards Walkerville and Ms. Frizzle. Even though four of his friends were there, they didn't really talk to him. They felt kind enough to show up, but they didn't really want to interact with him. They only one that really did talk to him was Wanda. They still had a small part of the special bond between them, and when they started talking, they started working on repairing it. It led to Wanda partly forgiving Arnold for how he felt towards the past. About a year later, Arnold and Jyoti traveled back to Walkerville for Keesha's grandmother's funeral. The whole gang was there, but no one wanted to talk to Arnold, except for Wanda. Ever since then, Arnold hasn't seen anyone in the gang since.

Once Arnold parked his car in the garage, he went in the house and was greeted with "Daddy!" Ben, his two-year old son, then went running towards his father.

"Hey, little man," Arnold said as he grabbed his son and lifted him off the ground. It was obvious that they were related, as Ben had unruly orange reddish hair, just like Arnold.

"Hey honey, dinner's almost ready," said Jyoti as she walked out of the kitchen. She arrived home about two hours before Arnold, as he had a lot of stuff to do as the owner of the company.

"Great, I'll be ready in a minute," Arnold responded as he let Ben down and kissed his wife.

"Alright," Jyoti replied as she turned to Ben "and you're gonna eat some vegetable tonight, right Benny?"

"No!" Ben shook his head and took off running.

Arnold and Jyoti sighed. They loved their son, but the Terrible Twos were just that.

Luckily, Ben was mildly cooperative during dinner. Afterwards, Ben was in the living room, playing with his toys while Arnold and Jyoti watched him. While they were watching him, they started discussing a new type of computer that Jyoti was trying to build, or rather, invent.

"I still don't get how I'm going to be able to build it properly. I had everything planned out, but I keep finding a new problem to fix."

"Isn't that the point of engineering: to learn from your mistakes?"

"Yeah, but I didn't expect too many flaws to find. I feel like I'm losing my touch, Arn. In high school and college, it didn't take nearly so many tries to get something right. Now I'm struggling to get this new computer that I thought up finished."

"You're putting too much pressure on yourself. Nobody's perfect. As long as you continue finding those flaws and fixing them, you'll finish the computer soon enough.

"I hope so, Arn. I'm lucky that Mikey is helping me, but I've never needed so much help in my life."

"Well, everyone needs help at one point or another. It's what makes us human. Just promise me you won't give up."

"I won't, Arn. I'll keep trying. I just get so frustrated when my inventions don't go as I wish."

"I know, Jyoti. But don't worry. You'll get it right soon enough."

"Thanks, Arn. I'll keep trying." Jyoti than kissed Arnold and went back to watching Ben.

Arnold got the mail from the side table and found the letter from Walkerville Elementary. "Hey look. A letter from my elementary school."

"Your elementary school? Why would they send one?"

"No idea, but I don't feel like reading it."

"What? Why not?"

"Well, remember what I told you about third grade."

"You mean with all of those 'magical field trips?'" She added air quotes for emphasis. "I still don't understand what went on, but you said that it scarred you for life."

"Yes. It did. Since that's the case, I don't want to read this letter. I don't want to be attached to that old elementary school anymore, and it's probably not important."

"Maybe it is. Why else would they send it to you? Just read it and see what it says."

"No."

"Arn, I may not completely understand how third grade could scar you forever, but it's way over now. It's behind you. Just read the letter, please."

Arnold looked at Jyoti and saw the concern in her eyes. "Fine."

Arnold opened the letter and read it. Once he finished, there was a shocked expression on his face.

"What is it, Arn?"

"Ms. Frizzle passed away."

"Ms. Frizzle? Your third-grade teacher?" Arnold nodded. "Oh, well, I'm sorry."

"Don't be. I don't really feel sad over this."

"How could you not be sad? It's your former teacher."

"Yeah, the one who took me on those trips that are burned in my mind forever. I'm not saying I'm happy that this happened, but I don't feel sad either. If anything, I feel some kind of relief."

"Arn, how could you say that?"

"You haven't experienced what I did Jyoti," Arnold responded "If you did, you would-" Arnold was cut off by his phone ringing. He answered it.

"Hello?"

"Hey Arn. It's Wanda."

"Oh, hey Wanda. What's up?"

"There's something I need to ask. Have you gotten a letter for Walkerville Elementary?"

"Yes, I have."

"Well, will you be joining us at the funeral."

Arnold thought about how to respond, but he knew his answer would upset her, nonetheless. "You know what, I don't think I will."

"Arnold! How could you not want to come?"

"You know how I feel about all that."

"I know, but she died. Don't you have at least a little sympathy for her?"

"No. I've told you many times about how I feel about what she did to me in that class."

"But Arn, she's still a big part of your life. I know you wouldn't understand, but we were incredibly lucky to do on those field trips. And this will be your only chance to say goodbye."

"I don't want to say goodbye, and I'm not going."

"But-"

"No, I'm not going. End of story." Arnold then hung up. He turned to Jyoti and Ben, who were now staring at him.

"What's going on, daddy? Why are you mad?" Ben asked.

"It's nothing, Ben. Don't worry about it."

"Okay." Ben then went back to his business, but he was still unsure of what was going on.

"Arnold, how could you talk to your friend like that?"

"I had to make it clear that I do not want to go."

"I know, but you could have been less harsh."

"I know, but the gang doesn't understand that I know longer want anything to do with Ms. Frizzle. That was probably the only way to make them understand."

"Well, if you say so. Just don't act so rude the next time they call."

"Don't worry. I won't." With that, the family went back to their normal routine, and Arnold was satisfied that he had given his friends the message that he truly didn't want to be associated with the Friz anymore.

A/N: Jyoti Kaur is from The Magic School Bus Rides Again. She replaced Phoebe, who goes back to her old school in that show. I included her in this story because I did not like the way she was characterized in the show. She was perfectly perfect and had no flaws. If she wanted to build something, she would get it right the first time. This all makes for a bland character. If you watch the show, you'll understand. By including her here, I can work on her character and make her better by giving her some flaws, so she is not so perfectly boring and predictable all the time.

Jyoti is the only character from Rides Again that I will include in this story. To reiterate, I don't see Rides Again as canon. As you can tell from this story, Jyoti was never part of Ms. Frizzle's class. Nobody met her until they were adults.

Don't kill me for making Arnold hate the Friz. This will be important later on.

Now that all of the exposition is out of the way, we can finally begin the story!

Next chapter coming soon.