Rachel was standing in front of a dozen different types of paints, chewing on her lip as she tried to decide what colors she wanted. It'd been a while since she'd tried painting again, but she felt somewhat reinvigorated thanks to her friendship with Sun, and she felt like maybe now painting wouldn't be attached to pain. As she reached out for a yellow acrylic she heard someone step beside her. She glanced to her side and spotted a woman about her age standing there, also looking at the paints.

"Need help?" Rachel asked, "I'm a professional painter."

"Oh, no, I just...my daughters doctor said that painting can be a good outlet for her, as a kind of therapy, so I thought I'd pop in and see what I could get."

"What's wrong with her?" Rachel asked, then laughing nervously she scratched her forehead and added, "Sorry, that...that was rude. Um, I mean like, why's she have a therapist?"

"Not really a therapist, just a general specialized doctor. She's ASD and so we've been having to learn how to help her cope with things in ways that are healthy for her," the woman said, "...you're a professional painter? What do you think would be a good thing to paint?"

"Does she like animals?"

"Very much so."

"I'd suggest she start with something simple, like an easy animal," Rachel said, "You know what, why don't you and your daughter come to my studio apartment, and I can teach you guys. It's been a while since I painted, and I'd love to have some company, especially if I can help someone else."

"I think it'd be better if you came over to our place," the woman said, "It's big, and she doesn't like going to other peoples homes."

"Fair enough," Rachel said, "Give me your address."

The woman took Rachel's hand, pulled out a pen from her purse and wrote her address down on her hand. Afterwards she stepped back and held her hand out for Rachel to shake, which she did, the both of them smiling warmly.

"I'm Rachel," Rachel said.

"Scarlett, it's nice to meet you," Scarlett Bloom said.

                                                                                               ***

Wyatt was sitting in his office, doing paperwork, when he heard the door open. He looked up and spotted Ben entering, with Celia behind him. Wyatt dropped his pen on the table and smiled at them both, even though Ben looked annoyed and somewhat upset.

"Sorry, she said it couldn't wait, she said she knew you personally," Ben said.

"It's fine Ben, it's alright, she's not lying," Wyatt said, "Shut the door on your way out."

Ben nodded, exiting the office and shutting the door. Celia watched him leave, then turned back to the desk and sat down across from Wyatt, putting her purse in her lap. She laughed awkwardly.

"Wow, he's high strung," she said.

"He really is, it's upsetting considering how young he is. Nobody should be that high strung at that age. So what are you doing here?" Wyatt asked, "I haven't been able to get any of that proof you asked for yet, if that's what you-"

"Morgana is about to demolish a beautiful heavily forested park," Celia said, surprising him.

"W...what?" he asked.

"They've got friends in high places, apparently. Usually you have to wait months, fight tooth and nail for permits, but they're starting construction in just a week or so, right around Halloween. I just felt like you should know that it's not really necessary to get that proof now, because by the time we convince anyone - if we even manage to - it'll be too late."

"But that...that's like, illegal," Wyatt said, "This is bullshit."

"Well there's not much we can do at this point, so I just thought I'd drop by and let you know you can save yourself some time and energy," Celia said, "I have to get back to work. I'm on my lunch break."

"...we could sabotage them," Wyatt said, making Celia stop at the door, hand on the knob.

"What?"

"You heard me."

"Yeah, that's the problem."

"They're not playing by the rules, so why should anyone?" Wyatt asked, standing up and approaching Celia, coming around the desk, "I mean, fuck it, right? What's the worst that could happen? I'm not saying we do something awful or endangering, but just...damage a piece of equipment or whatever. Something minor yet major enough to force them to waste more time getting new equipment."

"Wyatt, I...I appreciate your attempts at taking what I do seriously, but this is beyond what I think I'm comfortable with and-"

"So you're gonna get me invested in saving the planet, making the world a better place for our kids, and then bail at the last minute?" he asked, leaning on the desk now, scoffing, his arms folded, "fuck, and here I thought you were serious."

"I...I am, I...I just..." Celia stopped and sighed, "Wyatt, I don't have a husband. I don't have a partner. I have a son to think about. If I'm taken away, god knows what happens to him. I can't risk my freedom. He needs me too much. You're different, you have a wife, you have family."

Wyatt nodded. She wasn't wrong, and he couldn't argue with that. He sighed and bit his lip, then shrugged, looking away from her. She approached Wyatt and put her hand on his shoulder, causing him to look at her again. She smiled sweetly.

"You're a good man," she said, "You'll find a way to help the environment in your own way, but it won't be this way. I'm just happy to have been able to get you interested in the idea whatsoever. I feel like I accomplished something just by doing that."

"You really did," Wyatt said, smiling back.

After a moment they hugged and afterwards she excused herself, leaving Wyatt alone in his office. He walked back around behind his desk and seated himself again. He wanted to go back to work, but he found it hard to focus, and instead after a few minutes he got back up, pulled his coat on and headed out of the room and towards the front of the store. As he approached the front door, he passed by Ben at the counter.

"Sir? Where are you going?" Ben asked.

"I'm going to see my daughter," Wyatt said.

                                                                                                 ***

"So which animal do you like best?" Rachel asked, kneeling down to Mona's eye level as she flipped through a book and then finally stopped and pointed at a tiger.

"I wanna paint that," she said, "Is it easy?"

"Everything's easy once you learn how to do it," Rachel said, propping the book up on the small table by her easel and saying, "the thing is, you need reference points. You can always look back at your source image, and then change whatever you want to your own version of it. So why don't you start by making a general outline of the tiger, okay?"

Mona smiled and nodded, quickly getting to painting, as Rachel walked back to her own easel just as Scarlett entered the room, carrying two beers, handing one to Rachel who thanked her. Scarlett stood by Rachels side and watched her begin to paint.

"Do you find painting therapeutic?" she asked, sipping her beer.

"Yeah, I guess," Rachel said, "It helps to get out the things I can't get out of myself any other way."

"Like what?" Scarlett asked.

"I don't know. Stuff you wouldn't tell anyone but an actual therapist," Rachel said, "stuff like how much you love someone but can't tell them because you fear that admittance might cause you to lose them."

Scarlett looked over at Mona, then back at Rachel.

"I've been married for years now, and I guess I don't really know what that's like," she said, "but I'm sorry if you do."

The front door opened, and Scarlett rushed into the foyer only to find Wyatt coming in. He followed her into the living room where the girls were painting, waved at them, then turned and began to head into the kitchen, Scarlett on his heels. As he set his shopping bags down on the kitchen table, Scarlett stopped and watched from the doorway.

"What are you doing home?" she asked.

"I don't wanna work in my field anymore," Wyatt said, "I wanted to see my family. That was more important than being in the office all day."

"What do you mean you don't want to-"

"Is Mona busy?"

"She's being taught how to paint," Scarlett said, "Remember? Her doctor gave us a list of suggestions and that's the one she chose?"

"Yeah," Wyatt said, "Well, that'll have to wait, cause I'm taking her somewhere."

He walked back through the foyer, into the room, took Mona by the hand and said he was taking her out for a bit. She didn't hesitate a bit and instead set her brush down and followed her father, leaving Scarlett standing there befuddled. After a moment, she walked into the room and looked at Rachel, who was busy cleaning her brush in her cup of water.

"What were you saying about being happily married?" Rachel asked, making Scarlett smirk.

"New girl, too soon for the wisecracks," she said, despite appreciating her company in the moment. Scarlett sighed and walked into the room, taking Mona's place and putting a new canvas on the easel, starting her own painting while drinking, "...I've never seen him like that. He didn't even tell me where he was taking her. He was just so direct, that's not like Wyatt."

"People are weird and can change in a heartbeat," Rachel said, "One minute you think you're doing everything right, everything that'll make those closest to you happiest, and then you do one little thing for yourself and suddenly you're on everyones shit list."

"Speaking from experience?" Scarlett asked.

"God if only you knew," Rachel said, "My parents are just...jesus. Your kid is lucky to have you guys, you guys seem cool. I wish my parents were cool. Stuffy stuck up old fashioned sons of bitches."

Scarlett thought for a moment while painting, and then nodded. Yeah. Rachel was right. She and Wyatt were in fact good parents, and Mona was in fact lucky to have them as parents. Funny that sometimes it takes a stranger to point out the most obvious things to us, she thought.

                                                                                               ***

Celia, actually, had a date that night. She just didn't want to announce that to Wyatt.

As she walked into the living room, freshly showered and well dressed, she spotted her son and his babysitter sitting together on the couch, reading a storybook. She waved at them, said she'd be back late, then kissed her sons head and exited the house. Her date, a man she'd been seeing on and off for a while lately named Arnold, was sitting in his car in the driveway. Upon seeing her, he climbed out of the car, ran around to the other side and opened the door for her. She thanked him as she got in, and he went back around to the drivers side, then started the car and backed out.

"You look beautiful," he said.

"Thanks," Celia said, being somewhat quiet, looking out the window.

"You alright?" he asked.

"...I've had a weird day," Celia said, "but it's alright. Where are we eating?"

                                                                                             ***

"Wyatt and I have been together for so long that I think at this point I'll have spent more of my life with him than without him, and it's weird to think about," Scarlett said.

"I'd kill to have something like that," Rachel said, "but I'm too scared to get close to anyone."

"It's hard," Scarlett said, "but it's worth it. He's the best thing in my life besides my kids, even if his mom is a pain in the ass to deal with. He's a good man, todays example notwithstanding. He's not selfish, he's supportive, and he's romantic. Any woman would be happy to have him as their husband."

"And you're not?"

"I'm happy to have him as my husband. I just wish I knew why that isn't enough sometimes," Scarlett said, "I mean, have I just accepted what every woman before us thought was good enough? Get married, have kids, love your husband, etc. Is it wrong to want something more? Not something different, because I'm happy with those aspects, but...something more...worthwhile? That sounds wrong. Um, something more seemingly important? I don't know how to word this."

"You wanna leave behind some kind of legacy beyond just being a brood mare," Rachel said, making Scarlett cackle.

"Precisely!" she said, looking at her canvas, "I mean...I like being a mom, and a wife, but at the same time...a few weeks ago his mom stopped by and said that women wind up being nothing more than extensions of their husbands and their children. That by becoming wives and mothers they lose all their interests, hobbies, identity, and...and while I wanted to argue with her, it seems she might have been right."

"She's not right, you just haven't proven her wrong yet," Rachel said, "if she was right, then that means my mother was right and I'm..."

She stopped, causing Scarlett to become curious.

"You're what?"

"Nothing. Forget it."

"What are you painting?" Scarlett asked, peering over at her canvas.

"Just a woman I know," Rachel said, getting back to her portrait of Sun.

                                                                                                ***

Celia wanted to forget her meeting with Wyatt, but something about it was bothering her. She wanted to put it out of her mind, have a good evening, enjoy her time with Arnold, but she was finding it difficult. All that rattled around inside her head were the things Wyatt had said to her, and she was starting to feel guilty after all...getting him so invested and then letting him down at the last minute. Seemed like he was more committed to the cause than she was at this point.

"Are you okay?" Arnold asked, breaking through her barriers, bringing her back to the moment.

"Uh, yeah, I'm sorry, I had a meeting today that didn't go the way I wanted it to," Celia said, "You know how it goes. It's just been on my mind since then."

"You gotta learn to leave the work at work, girl," Arnold said, "I mean, you do whatever you want, I'm not trying to tell you what to do, I just know that my mother was a lawyer and she brought her work home and she suffered greatly cause of it. Don't wanna see that happen to you."

"Usually I do leave it at work," Celia said, smiling, appreciating his thoughtfulness as she added, "but something about this meeting rubbed me the wrong way and it's made me feel like maybe I don't care enough about what I do. I mean, if you're invested in a cause, wouldn't you do anything to uphold your beliefs, your ideals?"

"Depends on the cause and who it affects," Arnold said, shrugging, undoing his napkin and putting it on his lap as their plates were set on the table; he continued, "I think ultimately the amount of effort one puts into something directly correlates to how important it is to the world at large."

"...this is pretty important to the world," Celia mumbled, feeling even worse now, but that wasn't Arnold's fault. He was right, after all. Just then she heard someone stop at their table and looked up to see a young woman standing there, looking at her nervously; Celia smiled politely and asked, "Can I help you?"

"You don't remember me," the woman said, "I'm Anna. I was in the meeting you had with the Morgana execs a few months back. Um, I just...I wanted to give this to you, but you cannot tell anyone where you got it."

With that, she reached into her coat, pulled out a manila envelope and pushed it into Celia's hands, then walked away briskly. Arnold looked at Celia, who looked up at him from the envelope. He leaned forward, furrowed his brow and whispered.

"Are you a secret agent?" he asked, making her giggle. She really did appreciate the way he could cut the tension. Celia picked up the envelope and opened it, pulling out a few papers, and quickly skimming them, becoming more and more horrified at what she was reading. Arnold cut into his steak and asked, "Everything okay?"

"...I need you drop me off at a friends after we're done," she said coldly.

                                                                                                   ***

Rachel stepped back from her canvas, admiring her work, as Scarlett came to her side and looked as well.

"Wow," Scarlett said, "That's wonderful. You say it's someone you know?"

"Yeah, just a friend," Rachel said, "Maybe I'll give it to her for her birthday or something."

"Someone you wish wasn't just a friend?" Scarlett asked, worrying Rachel who looked at her now; Scarlett shrugged and smirked, "I could tell by the way you said 'just a friend'. It's cool, I don't care. I'm just curious why you're tiptoeing around something you so badly want."

Rachel sighed and flopped down onto the couch, Scarlett seating herself beside her.

"I don't know," Rachel said, "I'm scared. My parents still don't know, and I'm worried what they'll think if they do, but then I think how stupid it is to even care about what they think because I'm a grown ass woman and I'm allowed to be whoever I am, right? Allowed to love whoever I love? At least you're supposed to be able to. And yet, I'm just...terrified. Also I'm scared she won't feel the same way."

"You'll never know if you don't do anything about it," Scarlett said, "Though I know what you mean; you don't wanna run the risk of ruining a solid friendship. I got lucky cause Wyatt and I fell for one another pretty instantly after meeting. I can't imagine what it would've been like if it'd had been difficult or whatever. But I think you should say something. Better to live with certainty, even if it's a certainty you didn't want, than uncertainty, right?"

"Yeah but with uncertainty I can always lie to myself, fantasize it could be," Rachel said, "I don't know."

Rachel checked her watch and sighed.

"It's late, I should get going."

"Do you wanna do this again?" Scarlett asked, "I think it's been actually more beneficial for me than my daughter, surprisingly."

"Sure," Rachel said, laughing as she stood up to gather her equipment. Scarlett helped Rachel get her things together, carried them out to the car and got it all packed in. They made a date for another painting and drinking session, then Rachel drove home. Scarlett cleaned up the house a little, and was happy to see Wyatt and Mona when they came in. Mona gave her mom a hug and then rushed upstairs to take a bath. Scarlett looked at Wyatt, both standing in the dining room.

"Sorry about being so brisk earlier," Wyatt said, "I just wanted to take her out and show her the world isn't so bad if she just has the right people with her and-"

Scarlett didn't let him finish. Instead she kissed him, then told him to follow her upstairs. He agreed, but first he had to get something from the car. He rushed outside, and got to his car, digging around inside for the box of candy he'd bought for her while out. It wasn't until he pulled himself out of the car again that he noticed someone standing in the driveway with him, scaring him and making him shout a little.

"Christ!" he yelled, putting his hand to his chest, "Celia, what the hell are you-"

"Read this," she said, approaching him, shoving the envelope into his hands.

Wyatt looked at her, confused, then pulled the papers out of the envelope and started reading them, thumbing through them, his eyes widening at each new page. After he was done he looked back at Celia, who was now leaning against his car, arms folded.

"Where did you get this?" he asked.

"An assistant from Morgana came up to me tonight at dinner. She had been in a meeting we'd taken a few months ago and she wanted to give me it then but she couldn't. She was too scared. Turns out she's braver than I am after all," Celia said.

"...why...why are showing me this? I mean, after what we talked about today, you made it sound like you-"

"Yeah, I take it back," Celia said, surprising Wyatt as she stared him down and said coldly, "let's sabotage the sons of bitches."

"Robert Grudin is out of the race for election," the news anchor said solemnly, "after his vehicle exploded abruptly this evening, and the hopeful potential elect was killed inside it. Police have their suspects, but no arrests have been made thusfar. The main suspect is also deceased. Still, the community mourns a man who could've been great for them, had one angry individual not taken him away from us. This is-"

The TV clicked off. Calvin leaned back against the couch, exhaling, as he rolled his head and looked over at Rachel who was seated on the couch alongside him. Rachel looked at Calvin, bit her lip and shook her head, then leaned forward and buried her face in her hands, running them up through her hair.

"...I can't believe this," she whispered, "I can't believe it happened. It all just seems so surreal."

"That mother fucker," Calvin muttered.

"What?" Rachel asked, turning and looking back at him.

"That was my goal, my decision, and he took it away from me. I was supposed to do it for my family, and he took my vengeance out of my hands," Calvin said, "mother fucker. I never liked him."

"Why?" Wyatt asked, stepping back into the living room, beer in hand, Celia right behind him; he sipped the beer then asked again, "inform me why you never liked me."

"Because you always had to be the center of attention!" Calvin said sternly, standing up now, almost face to face with Wyatt, adding, "and now look what you've done! Nobody asked you to do this for me! Nobody asked you to...to take away what was rightfully mine to do! He destroyed my family!"

"Calvin, I just saved you from a lifetime of prison, alright? Trust me, you would've been one of the first people they looked at. That situation was highly publicized, and you two were closely entwined. They would've come for you almost instantly. What I did was divert that attention to someone else, and give us a bit of breathing room to figure out what our next move is."

Wyatt sighed, wiped his mouth on his jacket sleeve then sat down on a nearby ottoman, Celia seating herself beside him.

"Now," Wyatt said, "...let's figure out a way to make sure this never comes back to us."

                                                                                             ***

Robert Grudin was heading out to his car when he heard his wife running up behind him. In an outstretched arm, she held his coffee cup, which he graciously took before kissing her on the cheek and then getting into his car. He started it up, pulled out of the driveway and headed down the street, completely unaware that the car across the street from his house, the one that'd been there all night, had also started up and was following him closely.

Calvin gripped the steering wheel tightly, his knuckles turning white. Simply being in the general vicinity of this man made him want to do awful things. He heard the sound of a chip bag crunching and he looked to the passenger seat to see Rachel sitting there, shoveling chips into her mouth and chewing noisily.

"What?" she asked.

"Nothing."

"Where are we even going?"

"We're gonna get a sense of his schedule. I need to keep tabs on it, make sure it doesn't change. That way I can pick the right day," Calvin said, "It needs to be an ordinary day, not a day where something unexpected happens."

"I'm pretty sure getting blown is rather unexpected, but I get what you mean," Rachel replied, making him smirk. She adjusted herself in the seat, tossed the now empty chip bag into the back of the car and asked, "so...you're gonna explode a politician? That's a pretty serious target."

"He deserves it."

"Frankly they all do, but that goes without saying," Rachel said, "So what did this one do? Raise taxes?"

Calvin stayed quiet. He didn't want her to have any more details than she needed to have, just on the off chance they were somehow caught before or after the fact. This way she couldn't incriminate herself and be considered a suspect. He wanted to keep her safe. This wasn't her fight, after all. She was simply along for the ride.

"Well," Rachel said, "Whatever it was, it must've been serious. People don't just blow someone up for no good reason."

"You have no idea," Calvin mumbled.

                                                                                              ***

Calvin had begun having trouble sleeping.

He'd always had light insomnia, but after the accident, after the loss, he really couldn't sleep. Which was unfortunate, because being asleep was what he wanted to escape the constant reminders of what had been lost, and yet each sleep brought with it dreams about what he no longer had. Calvin simply had no way of winning. One evening, Calvin dragged himself out of bed at around four in the morning and headed downstairs. He pulled a package of cookies from the cabinet and plopped himself down on the couch in the living room, putting the television on mute so it wouldn't wake his folks, and sat there in the dark eating cookies and staring at the screen.

Distraction was the only thing that worked. Buying himself a few precious hours from the regular rotation of pain that engulfed his mind nonstop was all he could really hope for anymore. Sitting there, he didn't even realize that he'd begun to cry. It wasn't until he felt his pajamas getting stained with tears that he was aware he was crying and he knew why. After glancing back up at the TV screen, he saw there was a commercial for some princess toy line. Something his daughter had wanted for her last birthday. Had he known it'd be her actual last birthday, he probably would've tried harder to track them down and get them for her.

Toy commercials now made him sob.

Here he was, a grown ass man, crying at a princess toy commercial. He missed them so much. His wife, his daughter, his family. The family that he only had a beginning with. He'd been told by many people - often friends of his parents - that the less you knew someone the less it hurt, but he didn't believe that. If anything, the grief was worse because with them gone, he could see how great it all could've been had they been allowed to stick around. He could see what he missed out on. What it all could've grown into. Calvin fell asleep on the couch that night, and when his father woke him about two hours later, morning cup of coffee in hand, he just held Calvin for a while, and let his son be sad. Calvin was eternally grateful for his parents, and eternally angry that he'd never get the chance to be one himself.

And Robert Grudin was going to pay for that, no matter the cost.

                                                                                                 ***

"Nobody told me that, as an adult, the majority of your time spent was running errands," Rachel said, "seriously, if I'd had known that I was going to spend most of my time doing laundry and grocery shopping, I'd have perhaps tried not growing up so fast."

"I'd kill to do something mundane," Calvin said softly, "I loved grocery shopping with my wife."

Rachel looked at him, smiling.

"That's really cute," she said, "I had that with my friend Kelly, back in high school. We were inseparable. We did everything together and it was so much fun. You never realize how much you can get along with someone until you find that someone, nor how much it hurts to lose it once they're gone."

"He killed my family," Calvin said suddenly, shocking Rachel with this random admittance. She stared at him, almost in disbelief of not just what he'd said, but the fact that he'd just so openly and casually said it; Calvin continued, "Robert Grudin killed my family. I don't mean like he meant to, it was an accident, I'll grant him that much, but...but he did it, and he never took responsibility for it."

"How could he not-"

"Because he's famous, Rachel, duh. Famous people can get away with anything," Calvin said, "It was stupid of me to believe that he'd be held accountable for his actions. And frankly, I might've even let that slide, if he hadn't then made the accident about drinking and driving. He was driving home drunk, which was what caused the accident, and then instead of accepting blame, showing he's a decent man, he decides to state that his goal while in office will be to make the streets safer and crack down on alcoholics. He used what he'd done to my family as a way to further his career."

"Jesus, guy deserves to be blown up," Rachel said.

"Exactly," Calvin said, "...she supported him. Stacy did. She wanted us to vote for him. We went to rallies and shit. Then he kills her, our children, and uses his actions to try and gain a lead over his rivals. People tell me that time heals all wounds, but I don't buy into that. I think the only thing that heals anything is vengeance."

Rachel chewed her lip and leaned back in her chair, pushing her bangs from her eyes.

"...do you think she'd want you to be doing this?" Rachel asked.

"You know, shortly after she died, my mother paid for me to see a therapist, and they asked the same thing. Course, back then I wasn't thinking about blowing the man up, and they were asking me if she'd want me to continue to not trying to get better. They said 'do you think she'd want you to live your life like this?' and I just thought the audacity of this idiot was galling, because they didn't even know her. How dare they think they'd know what she would feel. I'm the one who married her. I'm the one who knew, if anything."

"And?"

"Yeah, I think she would. We used to joke about the people we wanted dead," Calvin said, "We'd catch somebody we hated on TV or somewhere out in public and be like hey we should add them to the list."

"Yeah but, dude, there's a difference between an in joke and actually blowing a human being up," Rachel said, "You do realize that, right?"

Calvin looked down at the steering wheel and sighed.

"I do, but I don't care," Calvin said, "I got no reason to not do it, that's the thing. Sure, I got my folks, and yeah, you're my friend, but what reason do I really have for not doing it? Had he apologized, had he taken even the smallest bit of blame, hell, had he not even used it to his advantage, I would've let it go. But when someone does something so horrible, so overtly evil, they shouldn't be allowed to get away with it. How can we continue to believe in a concept like justice when it so regularly gets disproved?"

Rachel nodded. He had a point. Still...she wanted to talk him out of it in some way.

"Calvin-"

"Rachel, I appreciate your friendship, and I appreciate how much you care, but I've made up my mind," Calvin said, "his slogan was 'Choosin' Grudin!' and believe me, I chose him."

Hard to argue with that, she figured.

                                                                                             ***

Rachel felt fingers tapping the top of her head, and she slowly lifted her face off the break table in the back room, catching sight of Sun as she finished tying her apron around her waist and smoothing it down the front, now facing Rachel.

"You look exhausted," she said.

"I had a long night," Rachel said, yawning and holding out her mug, "Coffee."

Sun smiled and took the mug, filling it up with the machine in the counter, then handing the mug back to her as she seated herself across the table from Rachel. Rachel sat upwards and sipped the coffee.

"You do something exciting? Out late? You have a hot date?" Sun asked.

"God I wish," Rachel said, "No, I was helping a friend with a project."

"Oh. Well, that's still cool."

"I...yeah, I wouldn't say that, but okay."

"Would you like to come over for dinner?" Sun asked, surprising Rachel as she continued, adding, "I wanna show my mom that I'm adjusting well to being back here, and I think it'd help if she saw I had a friend. My mother's an incredible chef, if that sweetens the deal."

"That sounds good. I could use a decent hot meal," Rachel said.

"Okay, cool. How about this weekend?"

After finishing up making plans, Sun headed out to the counter to take care of the first customers, leaving Rachel behind in the break room to wonder when she'd broken her own code of expectations. Calvin didn't expect anything from her, but Sun...she was getting dangerously close to being relied upon again, and that terrified her. Rachel knew she, if anything, simply wasn't a reliable person, and nobody deserved to be regularly and repeatedly let down by her poor choices.

Still...dinner with the girl she'd been crushing hard on for the last 15 years? How could she turn that down?

                                                                                                   ***

Calvin had never really gotten interested in politics, and only did so because Stacy had been so interested. In hindsight, he wished he'd pushed back against it, and perhaps things would've been different, but he knew that living in a world of what ifs never solved anything. The ironic thing was how much politics played up the idea of "being the change you want to see in the world", and Calvin was indeed doing just that.

Sitting in his parents shed that morning, looking at how much he'd managed to get done so far, he was pleased with his decisions. He'd never been that driven to do anything too difficult, and he felt good about himself now. Calvin looked down at his mug and noticed it was empty, so he scooted his stool back, stepped off and headed out across the lawn and into the kitchen, where his parents were eating breakfast. As he shut the glass door behind him, they looked up at him and smiled.

"Morning," his mother, Amelia, said.

"Mornin'," Calvin replied, heading to the coffee machine and filling his cup back up.

"Jesus," his father, Barry, said, rustling the newspaper, "Fucking Grudin. He says he's going to allow these companies to destruct more natural resources when elected, stating the progress is more important than natural resources. Says these companies are being tied up in red tape by overbearing tree huggers. What a piece of shit. Like we haven't destroyed enough of the world. What you wanna bet he's getting kickbacks for that decision?"

"Well, maybe he'll lose," Amelia said, "He keeps pulling shit like this he's gonna piss off the wrong person."

Calvin smirked to himself, his back still to his parents. That was the funny thing, Calvin thought.

Nobody ever expected their own children to be the wrong person.

Calvin sat in his car, just staring out the window, unsure of how to feel. He sighed, took a sip from his coffee cup and then looked at the passenger side window, where the bouquet of lillies sat. He reached out, put his hand around the end and picked them up, then exited the vehicle. As he walked across the wet freshly mowed grass, he hoisted his jacket further up around his neck with his free hand to keep himself warm. Doing this sort of thing always unnerved him, but he had to do this...

...he had to let her know how he felt.

                                                                                                ***

"I can't believe you talked me into this, I don't even like athleticism," Sun said as she pulled her rented bowling shoes on as Rachel sat at the table next to her doing the same.

"Neither do I," Rachel replied, "It's just nice to get out of the house once in a while, you know? At least that's what my mother used to try and sell me on."

"I hope nobody minds that I can't bowl worth a damn," Sun said.

"It's okay, neither can I, it's more an excuse for us to socially down nachos in a public forum under the guise of teamwork," Rachel said, sighing as she looked into the distance wistfully, whispering, "...I wish there was a team for that."

Sun laughed as she pulled her hair back into a ponytail and watched as the others on their team finished getting the refreshments at the table before she looked back at Rachel, chewing on her lip nervously.

"I'm sorry, I'm not very good at dealing with other people these days," Sun said, "Not that I ever was, but before I came back to town I had to do it for work so I sort of got better at it, and now those skills have somewhat atrophied. I'm sort of...bad...at communicating."

"Well with word skills like that no one would ever guess," Rachel said, making Sun laugh; Rachel scooted to the side and put her hand on Sun's shoulder, saying, "hey, it'll be fine, okay? I'm here. I'll make sure it goes fine."

Sun smiled and nodded. She really appreciated Rachel's kindness and friendship, especially at this time in her life. Unfortunately for Rachel, she wanted it to be more than that.

                                                                                               ***

"Why are we here?" Wyatt asked, leaning against the snack table and looking at all the people in the room, many of whom were dressed in tacky clothing, unkempt looking in their hygiene and sometimes smelled of weird essential oils.

"Because this is the kind of thing you do if you want to take conservation seriously," Celia said, "You go to meetings like this, and you fight big corporations and you offer helpful insight, and considering what you do for a living, your insight will be invaluable."

"Oh," Wyatt said, "Well, glad to help. Why aren't they better dressed though?"

"Well nobody said activism was fashionable," Celia said, finishing with her paperwork before setting it down on the table and turning around to face the crowd with him, she added, "But when you're trying to save others, the last person you think of is yourself."

"That guy has on two different shoes," Wyatt said.

"Yeah, some people just can't be helped," Celia said, making him smirk as she said, "Come on, let's sit down."

Wyatt and Celia walked across the room and took their seats in the big circle of chairs. An older blonde woman, the only other somewhat well dressed person there, cleared her throat and looked around at the group.

"Hello, and welcome to another meeting. As you may know, but I'll reiterate for newcomers, my name is Marriane Bradley and I am the leader of SpareSun. We are a group dedicated to the conservation of the planet, the opposition of the destruction of forests and other natural preserves and of course interested in pushing back against the companies purely interested in pushing us closer to the brink of climate change for the sake of they paycheck."

Everyone said hello in unison, which only unnerved Wyatt some more, but he didn't say anything.

"We are in sort of in crisis mode right now, actually. I've just been informed that Morgana, a leading company dealing with deforestation for the sake of landscaping, is set to plow down an entire area just outside of town to create high rise condominiums for those looking to 'escape the city life' but still be somewhat near it. Obviously this is our top priority, so who has anything to say about this? Any suggestions or information?" Marriane asked.

"Morgana's a scam," Wyatt said out loud, before quickly realizing everyone was looking at him, even Celia, who was somewhat surprised by this outburst; Wyatt adjusted his tie and continued, "Uh, I mean, well, my father worked in the same kind of business, and from what he's told me, Morgana doesn't do things by the book. They cut corners, they're sloppy, they're disorganized, so on and so forth, because a lot of the money they get from the deal they funnel back into a second operation of theirs so they don't have to pay taxes on it and can write it off instead as a business expense."

"So you're saying if we could provide proof of this, we could get them tied up in litigation long enough to perhaps build a stronger defense against their actions?" Marriane asked, and Wyatt started to sweat.

He looked at his hands, nervously. What in the world was he doing here? This was a direct competitor he was talking about, and his father would kill him if he knew he had said anything he'd been told in confidence. And then he thought about Mona. He thought about how much worse things would be if even the quiet places were suddenly taken away from her, and he remembered why he was doing this.

"Possibly," Wyatt said, sitting forward, a bit more brazen now, adding, "In fact, very likely. They'd have to scrounge up a lot of paperwork, paperwork they'd likely prefer to doctor before sending over just in case it even remotely incriminates them, and then if that becomes an issue that's a whole other set of legal hoops they'd have to jump through. You can buy yourself a year or more time wise if you simply convince the right lawyer that a company isn't paying their fair share."

Everyone murmured in agreement, and the man with two different shoes hit him lightly in the shoulder with his fist.

"Right on, man, good idea," he said.

Wyatt leaned back, smiling, massaging his sore shoulder as he shifted towards Celia and whispered.

"I've been complimented on by double shoe. Clearly I am an important individual now," he said, making her laugh quietly.

                                                                                           ***

After bowling, Sun and Rachel were laying on the hood of Rachel's car in the parking lot, looking up at the stars, sharing a large container of nachos between them. Shoveling nachos in her mouth, Rachel spoke, though not particularly clearly.

"You did great," she mumbled.

"Thanks," Sun said, "It's just been so hard lately to be around others again."

"Why did you come back?" Rachel asked, "You said you were an intern at a hospital, but why-"

"I was studying to be a doctor," Sun said, "and it was grueling but I'd convinced myself that it was important because my parents had been so adamant that I do something important with my life. They always pushed me to be my best. Don't get me wrong, they aren't bad parents. They love me so much. But they also ask more of me than I'm remotely capable of giving them. After a while I burned out, and then when my dad started getting ill, my mom insisted I come home because I knew about medicine and could help him."

"Yikes, I'm sorry," Rachel said.

"But I didn't want to. I didn't wanna come back here. As you so elegantly said at work that first day, I'd gotten lucky, I'd escaped. And now...here I am, right back where I started. My mom is thankful I'm here, but you can tell she feels a bit of shame when she talks to her friends or family and all their kids are doing great things, and I'm working at a goddamned coffee shop."

"But you're helping your dad, and that's noble," Rachel said, "I'd give anything to help my parents."

"Why can't you?" Sun asked, raising an eyebrow in suspicion.

"They won't talk to me," Rachel said, "For a slew of reasons."

"I'm sorry," Sun said, "I don't know what I'd do without my folks. Sometimes it's overbearing, but like I said, they love me and they do appreciate me being here. I'm grateful to have them."

"Nobody ever tells you but the world is even lonelier without family," Rachel said, now sitting up and pulling her legs to her chest, continuing, "you grow up thinking your parents are just the worst, and even if that's true, you miss them once they're no longer in your life. You think sometimes how great it'd be to be an adult, to be the master of your own life, but even if they were extremely toxic and controlling and manipulative, you still feel like an orphan, even if they aren't dead. Nobody ever tells you how lonely life can be without parents."

Sun sat up and scooted towards Rachel, hugging her.

"It's okay," she whispered, "You're not alone."

"I just wish they loved me," Rachel struggled to say, tears starting to fill her eyes and roll down her face, her voice cracking, "all I want is them to love me, love who I am, not who I could've been."

"Well, you have people who care," Sun said, "and that's a good substitute, right?"

Rachel nodded, then turned and pushed her face into Sun, sobbing. Sun just sat there and patted her back, holding her, telling her time and time again that it was okay, that she could cry, and that she wasn't alone. But Rachel was alone. Sun just didn't know how alone Rachel actually was.

                                                                                               ***

"I'm surprised," Celia said after the meeting adjourned and they were sitting at a nearby deli having a snack; she took a bite from her sandwich and said, while chewing, "I really didn't expect you to just turn on your old life like that."

"I was sitting there and I thought 'what am I even doing' because I could get in so much trouble for sharing insider information, but...then I thought about my daughter and how the other night she couldn't sleep simply because the heater was too loud, and the heater isn't that loud, trust me. But it was loud to her. And I started to think, fuck, if society takes all the quiet places and makes them obnoxiously loud and filled with others, then where will she be able to go to feel safe and free from sound?"

Celia nodded, grabbing her drink and taking a long sip.

"...I feel disgusting for what I've done to the world, and in turn, what I've done to her, even if only by accident. I want her to be safe and comfortable, and that just isn't a possibility if we continue to damage the planet," Wyatt said, "Besides, there's also the fact that Morgana is in fact a horrible company, and that's coming directly from someone in the industry. Bad as we may be, we're not nearly as bad as they are. There's tiers to tyranny, you know?"

"I understand," Celia said, "...but...you're not just doing this to get ahead in business are you? To cut your own competitors down to size? I'm sorry if that's an awful thing to ask, I just-"

"No, no, that's totally fair to assume, sure," Wyatt said, "and I don't blame you at all for asking, but no. Maybe a few years ago I would've been underhanded and sleazy enough, but not now. Not with what I know about my kids. I just wanna give them a better place to be once I'm gone."

Celia smiled and leaned back in her chair, crossing her arms.

"You know," she said, "Back in high school, I always knew you were a good guy deep down. There was a small group of students who hated you purely because you were popular, but I always could tell you weren't a bad person. Glad to see I'm vindicated."

"Who hated me? I'll kill them," Wyatt said, making her laugh as he added, "I...I wasn't great back then, but I admit it. I mean, who really was? Teenagers are very morally grey in many ways, and I was not above that. I did some shit I'm not too proud of. But overall, yeah, I didn't make fun of the handicapped or minorities, and I never disrespected women - at least I don't think I did, I guess it's not really my place to say for sure that I didn't - so I guess I tried at least, and that's more than most."

"Can you get that paperwork? Can you get some actual dirt on Morgana?" Celia asked, "I'm a lawyer. You and I could take them down directly if you give me the stuff I need."

"I probably could. I have some contacts over there. Employees I've been flirting with the idea of poaching, but they'd have to give me what I need in order to have a job with me once Morgana is taking the punches."

"Well then," Celia said, lifting her drink, "Let's save the environment."

They clinked their drinks and then ate their sandwiches.

If only they knew what they were about to unleash.

                                                                                            ***

When Rachel got home that evening, she took a shower and then sat on her bed, put her headphones on to block out the world and painted her nails, thinking about the stuff Sun had said. The way Sun had held her, and the way she'd talked to her. God, she'd smelled so good. Rachel had so badly wanted to tell Sun how she felt, how she'd always felt, but she knew it wasn't the right moment. Hell, there may never be a right moment, and honestly, Rachel was starting to come to terms with that. Frankly, she was just happy to have Sun back in her life.

And when Sun got home that night, she found her mother already asleep, and her father still in his chair, reading the newspaper. Sun brought him a large cup of tea, then gave him his medication and then helped him to bed once they took effect. Then she sat at the kitchen table, her hands cupped around her own mug of tea, and she thought about that night. She'd had a great time bowling, honestly, better than she'd expected, and she smiled. She was so grateful to come home and immediately have a best friend.

So why did she feel so awkward about being around Rachel?

                                                                                                 ***

Calvin was sitting in the grass, not saying a thing, the lillies now resting on the grave beside him. He just listened to the wind blowing, listened to the leaves rustling, and he thought about how much he hated this day. A day he used to love he now hated. He sighed and he looked over at the grave and smiled weakly.

"Happy birthday," he whispered, reaching out and gently caressing the smooth marble.

Calvin then stood up, wiped himself off and walked back across the graveyard and climbed back into his car. Once inside, he looked back out the window, towards his wifes grave, and he wanted to shriek. He could feel he was crying, but he couldn't bring himself to make any noise, no matter how much his insides twisted and turned. He finally started the car, and he started off towards home. Back towards his shed. Back towards building his bomb. His wifes birthday was always so hard, but this year his daughters birthday wouldn't be sad, it'd be a celebration.

Because that was the day he'd blow up Robert Grudin.

"I don't wanna eat it," Mona said, looking up at her dad, "it looks...like it'd make my mouth angry."

"It's cereal, you like cereal," Wyatt said, uncapping the milk, preparing to pour it into the bowl.

"Yeah but this is all weird. It has ridges. They feel bad on my tongue," Mona replied and Wyatt stopped. He thought for a moment, capped the milk back and up and put his hands on his hips.

"How about Cheerios? Those are smooth," he said, and Mona nodded happily; he patted her on the head and said he'd be right back. Wyatt headed into the kitchen and looked through the cupboard, finding the frosted Cheerios just as the back door opened and Scarlett came in, surprising him.

"I cannot believe this," she said.

"What are you even doing up?" Wyatt asked, "When did you leave the house? It's Saturday, you never leave the house on Saturdays."

"Priscilla called me this morning," Scarlett said, "she told me that she was doing a bake sale at the school, and when she went in to use the bathroom, she passed by the notice board and saw a typed message that said they would be removing my plaque in favor or something else."

"What?!" Wyatt asked, now concerned, turning towards her.

"I know, right?! So I got up, got dressed and ran down there to see for myself, and sure enough, yeah, they're pulling my plaque out this week to make room for some new plaque about diversity and togetherness and all that crap," Scarlett said, seating herself at the kitchen island on a stool. Wyatt smiled as he poured the milk into this new cereal bowl full of Cheerios.

"You're such a thoughtful person," he said, making her chuckle.

"You know what I mean. I'm all for diversity, I'm not racist, I just...that plaque was the only thing I had as any kind of legacy, and now it'll be gone forever."

"You know you have two kids, right?"

"Yeah but I can't just parade them around for respect," Scarlett said, "...come on, you know what I mean. Remember when I got it? It was such a big deal. I tore my tendon and didn't tell anyone, continued to do my cheerleading duties and then, right after the season ended, I wound up in the hospital for weeks. Had to get a cast and have surgery and everything. You came to visit me every day. That plaque was in dedication to my dedication to the team, to leadership and perseverance."

Wyatt rubbed her back, standing behind her, cereal bowl in his other hand. He sighed and nodded.

"I'm sorry baby, but these things happen," he said, "It's a shame they won't just let you take it."

"Yeah," she whispered remorsefully.

Wyatt exited, bringing the cereal to Mona, leaving Scarlett alone with her thoughts, which was the worst thing he could've done, because she had an awful thought. Her eyes brightened, and a grin broke out across her face as she began to sit up, a plan formulating inside her head.

"...yeeeeah..." she said again, this time with eagerness.

                                                                                               ***

Wyatt knocked on the hospital door and entered slowly, holding a bouquet of flowers in his hand as he pressed his way into the room. Scarlett looked up from her magazine as she laid in the hospital bed and smiled upon seeing him.

"Hiya," he said.

"You brought flowers!" she said.

"Actually I just stole them from another patients room, but it's the thought that counts," Wyatt said, making her laugh as he handed her the bouquet and then pulled a chair up beside her hospital bed and seated himself, continuing, "So, how long are you gonna be in here for?"

"I have to have minor surgery, but otherwise it shouldn't be that long," Scarlett said, "Might have to be in a wheelchair for a few weeks while it heals."

"Maybe I'll get one, and we can race," Wyatt said, making her crack up; he grinned and scratched his head, asking, "...are you doing okay though?"

"Yeah, I'm...I'm fine, honestly," Scarlett said, "I'm better now that I have company."

"What're you reading?" Wyatt asked, leaning back in his chair, putting his hands behind his head.

"Uh, it's an article about how to please your man," Scarlett said, picking the magazine back up.

"Oh, just what I need help with!" Wyatt said, the both of them laughing.

                                                                                              ***

"I cannot believe you talked me into this," Wyatt said as they sat in the parking lot of the high school, watching it carefully, waiting for the time to get just right and everyone started to leave; he continued, "This is...this is a crime, plain and simple, you're making me an accessory to a crime, and I know women like to accessorize but this is ridiculous."

"Shut up," Scarlett said, chuckling, "This is important to me. I put my heart and soul into cheerleading, and I can't just let them take that away from me. It's one of the only things I really have to be proud of."

"Again, two kids," Wyatt said, holding up two fingers and wiggling them.

"You know what I mean, aren't you, like, proud of the work you do?" she asked, and Wyatt stopped, thought for a moment, and bit his lip.

"No, I'm really not," he said, "If anything I'm disgusted."

"Well, what about what you managed to do for the baseball team?" Scarlett asked, "Remember all the effort you put into the team? You were the star pitcher! They admired you. You were considered their most important teammate. They wouldn't have made it without you, just like the cheerleading team wouldn't have made it without me."

"...yeah, I guess I get that," Wyatt said, "It's true, I was a major part of that team."

"I don't ask for much," Scarlett said, "I'm happy with what we have, and I love our life, but...this means a lot to me, Wyatt. I don't know if I can explain it. It's what made my mom proud of me. She was a cheerleader too, and...and I don't know, she was really proud of what I managed to accomplish, just like her."

Wyatt smiled warmly and leaned across the car, kissing her cheek.

"I'm proud of you too," he said, "Not just for that, but for everything you do. Every day you help raise two kids, and you keep this little family of ours going and it means a lot to me. You mean a lot to me. I just want you to be happy, and if this'll make you happy, then yeah, I'll help you steal your plaque."

Scarlett blushed and watched her husband scout the area with their binoculars. She couldn't believe she'd gotten so lucky to have found a man like Wyatt Bloom. Her mother had had such a rocky marriage, and then a questionable second marriage, that it made Scarlett worry if she'd ever manage to find true happiness, but she had, and she couldn't be more thankful for it. Sure, she knew that, deep down, she should recognize that the real gift in her life was her family, and she did recognize that.

But that didn't stop her from wanting her plaque.

                                                                                               ***

Scarlett hugged the soft plush bunny Wyatt had brought her as he pushed her down the hall in her wheelchair. They weren't going anywhere in particular, he was just taking her for a small ride around the hospital so she wouldn't be so cooped up in that little room all the time.

"Don't you have, like, homework to be doing?" Scarlett asked.

"Naw, I'll just pay some nerd to do it," Wyatt said, "Besides, hanging out with you is way more fun than homework."

"You didn't have to come every day," Scarlett said, sounding almost embarrassed.

"Yes I did," Wyatt said, slowing down as they passed by a long series of windows in the hallway that overlooked an enormous garden, adding, "It isn't fair for you to be in here by yourself with nothing to do. I wanna keep you company."

"I have my parents stop by, and other friends," Scarlett said, "I don't wanna monopolize your time."

"Like I have anything better to do," Wyatt said.

After a few moments of going by the windows slowly, Scarlett pushed some of her hair back behind her ear and lowered her voice.

"...but would you still be here even if I'd be in this wheelchair forever? Like...let's say that I was in some horrible accident and now I'm in this chair for the rest of my life, would you still be here? Would you still like me as much as you do now?"

Wyatt stopped pushing the chair and came around it, kneeling in front of her and holding her hands.

"Hey, there's nothing wrong with being handicapped, and yeah, you're still you, even if your legs didn't work," Wyatt said, "why...why would you even ask that?"

"I guess cause some of the boys I've dated have only seemed interested in my looks, and what I can bring them as a social status," Scarlett said, "Like, it's all about physicality with them. I'm a cheerleader, I'm popular, so they use me as some kind of trophy. I guess I just was curious if you'd still like me even if I couldn't walk."

"Scarlett, that's ridiculous," Wyatt said, "your legs, nice as they are, are not your entire person. You're more than just your beauty, and any guy who doesn't see that is an idiot. Okay, I admit it, I've dated girls before simply because they were pretty, but I always wound up finding things I really genuinely liked about them after a while. But with you, it's been the opposite. I found you were really funny and nice first, and only after a while did it begin to dawn on me just how pretty you were."

Scarlett blushed as Wyatt reached up and put his hand on her cheek.

"I really like you, Scar," Wyatt said, "even if you resemble Steven Hawing."

She laughed as he leaned in and kissed her, and she kissed him back. Yes, she'd fallen for Wyatt Bloom long before, but this was the moment she realized she was going to spend the rest of her life with this man, for better...

...or for worse.

                                                                                                ***

The door opened easily enough with some force, and Wyatt and Scarlett made their way inside the school. Walking down the halls in the dark, with only a flashlight to guide them, something made Wyatt nervous. He shivered as he handed Scarlett the flashlight and crowbar and zipped up his windbreaker.

"Boy it's creepy in here," he said.

"God, it seemed like we'd be here forever," Scarlett said as they passed by a row of lockers and she reached out, touching her fingers to them, running them along as they walked on by, saying, "I just couldn't fathom one day not being in school, even though I knew it was inevitably an eventuality."

"I'm so glad to be out of here," Wyatt said, "This place was hell. I mean, it was certainly easier for kids like us, who were well liked, popular, but...it still was awful. I do not look forward to our kids being in high school, especially Mona. Ever since her diagnosis, I've had to re-examine every aspect of our lives and make sure nothing makes her uncomfortable, and high school is unrelenting and the kids are monsters."

"Not much different from adults, in all honesty," Scarlett said, spinning the crowbar in her hand.

"You know what I mean. They find the one kid with the worst handicap and they just latch onto them and torture them for the next 4 years, and I don't want Mona to go through that," Wyatt said, stuffing his hands into his coat pockets and looking at his shoes as they walked by, continuing with, "I just...I want her to be safe."

"Wyatt, look," Scarlett said, hitting his arm and pulling his attention to a glass case wherein a slew of awards and photos and trophies were.

"Wow," Wyatt said, "Look, there we are."

"...are you dissatisfied with life? Like, when you look at yearbooks or come to reunions, are you ever unhappy with where you ended up instead of where you thought you'd end up?" Scarlett asked.

"...not really, no. I mean, I...I'm not super pleased with my job a lot of the times, but as far as where I am, with you and the kids, I'm really happy. I'm exactly where I wanna be," Wyatt said, kissing her head and making her blush.

"Alright, enough cute shit, let's smash this bitch," Scarlett said.

"That's my girl," Wyatt said, as he stepped back and let her smash the glass around the enclosure before handing him the crowbar and letting him peel away at the plaque, attempting to free it from the shelf it was stuck to. After a few minutes, still struggling, Scarlett began to get giddy.

"This is so exciting!" Scarlett said.

"It is kinda exhilarating, yeah," Wyatt replied.

"Let's make out when we get outta here," Scarlett said.

"Don't gotta convince me," Wyatt said, finally tugging hard enough to lift the plaque from the shelf, grabbing it and tucking it under his arm as he took his wifes hand and the two of them raced down the hallway and out the front doors of the school back across the parking lot and into their car.

"Gun it!" Scarlett shouted, and Wyatt did just that, the both of them laughing loudly and whooping as they made their getaway, Scarlett's plaque in tow. It was the first real 'crime' Wyatt or Scarlett had ever been involved in, but it wouldn't be the last. As they laid on the hood of the car in a field miles away, Scarlett hugging the plaque to her chest as they looked up at the night sky, she couldn't feel happier.

"Thank you," she whispered.

"Of course baby," Wyatt said, "you know I'd do anything for you."

"Sometimes I think that's half the problem," Scarlett said, laughing, "I could talk you into anything."

"You're really a liability, yes," Wyatt said, the both of them laughing now.

They went quiet again for a while, watching the night sky, listening to the crickets chirping around them and the wind softly rustling the leaves of the nearby trees.

"...I know it's just a plaque, and I know I have more to be thankful for, but...we're taught to obsess over youth and I can't let that go. This was my greatest achievement in academics, and it was in cheerleading of all things. I loved it, and I still do, please don't think I'm trying to diminish its importance by saying it wasn't math or science related or whatever. I just...other kids got scholarships, or they got honor roll, or they were valedictorian...but this...this was mine, and it was something I could be proud of."

"You never have to explain yourself to me," Wyatt said, "I get it. I really do. It's important that we find things that mean a lot to us and hold onto them as tightly as we can, even if they are, by definition, ridiculous. People act like pride is some horrible act of vanity, when really its simply an act of respect towards ones self, something nobody seems to do anymore."

"I love you," Scarlett said quietly, making him smile as he rolled onto his side on the hood of the car and kissed the side of her head.

"I love you too," he said softly, "...can we go home? I like to pretend like I'm still young and limber, but lying on this thing is killing my back."

Scarlett cracked up and they both slid off the hood, pulled the car doors open and slipped into the interior. After buckling their seatbelts, Wyatt started the car up and they drove home. When they got here, he took her upstairs and after she put the plaque on the bedside table, he made love to her. Scarlett couldn't imagine a more perfect evening, in all honesty.

                                                                                                   ***

Scarlett woke up the next morning to an empty bed.

When she rolled over, she found her plaque was gone, and she worried. She then noticed a piece of paper on the bedside table that simply read "downstairs" with a little heart drawn next to it. She got up, somewhat puzzled, and pulled on her pajamas, heading down the stairs where she stopped, noticing the plaque hung on the wall, and then saw Wyatt had made breakfast for everyone at the kitchen table. She stood there for a moment, simultaneously confused and surprised. Wyatt often made breakfast, but he never made a spectacle of it like he was doing this morning. Upon seeing her, he grinned and waved at her.

"Good morning," he said happily, "We have something for you."

He helped Mona get out of her chair and handed her another plaque, which Mona carried across the room and handed up to her mother. Scarlett took it and read it, tears forming in her eyes.

"This plaque is dedicated to Scarlett, the best mother, wife and friend anyone could ever ask for, and for her amazing work in the line of duty," Scarlett read as she knelt down and hugged her daughter, "I love it, and I love you."

"I love you too mom!" Mona said happily before racing back to the table to finish eating. Wyatt approached Scarlett and kissed her.

"It's not the same, but I felt you deserved a new one," he said, "Now you got two to be proud of."

He then led her to the table, where they all ate breakfast together, and, for the first time in a long time, Scarlett felt like part of a team again, and it made her happy. She had been the best cheerleader, but now she was the best mom and wife, and that was just as good. She'd lead this team to victory too, even if it meant taking some heat herself. She looked down at the plaque sitting on the table and she smiled again. She was so loved, and she felt that love fill her heart.

Sitting there, eating and watching her family, Scarlett couldn't help but understand what Wyatt meant the other night. Yes, this was the place they were supposed to be, and she was happy to be here, all 5 of them.
Wyatt, herself, their two kids and, of course, the little plush bunny that Mona now slept with, never knowing its origins, but loving it just as much as her mother had when Wyatt had given it to her back in high school.

Wyatt was sitting at his desk in the office, tapping his pen on the table repeatedly as he chewed on his lip, his eyes never leaving the sight of the poster attached to the wall nearby which simply read "There's No Such Thing As An Endangered Forest". He had a nasty, gnawing feeling in his stomach, and he couldn't shake it all morning, no matter what he did. Finally he stood up, walked over to the frame in which the poster hung, and pulled it off the wall. He then headed out of his office, walked all the way downstairs, opened up the backdoor of the building, lifted up the lid of their dumpster and tossed it inside. He then went back indoors and went back to work. The nasty gnawing feeling didn't go away, but it felt a little bit better at least without having to look his guilt directly in the face.

                                                                                               ***

"I'm destroying the planet," Wyatt said sourly as he and Celia sat at their table at the nearby bistro for lunch; he continued, "my children are going to have to live with the decisions I've either made or helped make for the sake of money, and their children are going to have to suffer as a result as well. It's making me sick."

"Well, I don't think you're solely to blame," Celia said, "but I do think it's good you're recognizing your hand in it nonetheless. You know, I work with a lot of people who would like to enact change, but can't afford to leave their higher paying jobs. I could put you in with one of those groups. You could do some outdoor petitioning, maybe start a community garden...you know, just dip your toe in the water and see how it feels."

"I'm afraid to dip my toe in any water at this point, god knows what's living in it now," Wyatt replied, making her choke with laughter; he smiled and added, "but thanks, maybe it is something worth looking into."

For the last few weeks, he and Celia had been having lunch like this most days. They each worked downtown, and only about 15 minutes away from one another, so they compromised by finding a spot smack dab in the middle of their office buildings and getting lunch together there. It was a good place, because they each knew nobody from their jobs would travel that far from their respective offices for lunch, so they had nothing to worry about in regards to being seen together, not that they were doing anything besides having lunch.

"What's it like? You know...to care about the planet?" Wyatt asked, "Cause my dad, god...he doesn't give a shit about the Earth. He says we have every right to destroy it simply because we live on it. He says the idea of resources vanishing entirely is ridiculous, because why wouldn't the planet just continuously make new resources? Course my dad isn't the sharpest cheese in the drawer."

Celia laughed again and nodded, replying with, "Yeah, well, leave that to the generation that thought tupperware was the greatest invention since the invention of inventions."

Wyatt smirked. He appreciated Celia's viewpoint on things, and he was beginning to open up to the idea of trying to help the planet instead of hurting it. He and Scarlett had gotten Mona tested a week earlier, and they were simply waiting for a diagnosis, but it seemed like ever since the parent/teacher conference he'd become so much more invested in making the world better for his children, and the children around him, than worse. How much effort would it take before he felt like he'd done right by his kids? Hard to say.

But if there was one thing Wyatt was, it was dedicated.

                                                                                                ***

"I'm late, I know, I'm sorry!" Rachel said as she entered the employee section in the back of the coffee shop, adding, "and I know, how can I be late when I live literally upstairs from the place? Well, it's possible that my alarm didn't go off because it's possible that I threw it at the wall last week and-"

Rachel stopped, hands still behind her back as she was tying her apron. She didn't speak. She could barely breath. There, sitting at the table in front of her, was Sun Rai. Her manager, an older woman named Debra, was standing there, holding a clipboard.

"Rachel?" Debra asked, finally pulling Rachel back from her shock.

"Uh, what?" Rachel asked.

"You're late, but it's fine because I'll be on register today while you train our newest employee," Debra said, motioning to Sun, "I'll leave you two to get acquainted."

Debra turned and exited the break room leaving the girls alone.

"...you're here," Rachel finally said, "...you...you didn't come to the reunion, but you're here."

"I didn't go to my high school reunion because I wasn't in town," Sun said, an eyebrow raised, "Do I know you?"

"I'm Rachel Minnow," Rachel said, holding out her hand and shaking Sun's, adding, "uh, we...we went to high school together. We had gym class together, do you re-"

Sun stood up and hugged her, surprising Rachel, who cautiously hugged her back.

"I do remember you!" she said, "You were one of the only kids who were nice to me. I'd ask you how you've been, but considering where we're working..."

Rachel laughed.

"Yeah, it, uh, it hasn't been great," Rachel said as she pulled her hair up into a ponytail, "What about you though, what are you doing here? I figured you were some successful something somewhere or other."

"Boy you're good with words," Sun said, smirking, as she sat back down in her chair and sipped her coffee, "Actually I was a successful something somewhere, but I had to come back home, so. Couldn't stay there anymore. Dad needs me, plus I just...I needed to get away from where I was."

"And back to where you escaped from?" Rachel asked, surprising Sun. Rachel turned and grimaced, scratching her forehead as she added, "I'm...I'm sorry, that was rude. Um, it's just that, to so many people we tried so hard to get away from where we're from. Yet, like a magnet, it continually pulls us back to it, and it seems like no matter how much effort we put in, we'll never really be clear of the place."

"...is this part of my training, or are you just always this maudlin?" Sun asked, making Rachel laugh.

"Well," Rachel said, "I'm happy you're back."

"Well, that makes one person," Sun said.

                                                                                                ***

Wyatt was stood in an aisle of the hardware store, looking at weed killers. He had a clipboard in his hand, taking inventory, but he couldn't get past the imagery on the weed killer bottle; a dozen or so ants killed surrounding a dandelion, which was also wilting presumably from the weed killer. Wyatt reached out and gently touched the bottle, his stomach churning.

"Wyatt?" a voice asked, making him jump as he turned to see one of his younger employees, Ben, standing there.

"Jesus Benjamin!" he shouted, "don't sneak up on people like that!"

"Uh, I was just curious where you wanted this shipment of-"

"Ben, can I ask you a question?" Wyatt asked.

"Uh...I...I guess, sure?"

"Do you think the planet's in trouble?" Wyatt asked, "Do you...do you think we should be doing more, as a species, to perpetuate our longevity instead of killing innocent animals and ruining precious land? I'm standing here, and I'm staring at this weed killer, and...and we consider anything smaller than us a 'pest', you know? Ants, gophers, fucking dandelions. Anything that shouldn't be where we think is okay to be is considered a nuisance, yet we never seem to admit to ourselves that we're the ones who moved in uninvited. We're like an untrained dog mother earth just brought inside without thinking twice, and all we've done is bite the hand that feeds."

Ben rubbed his arm, surprised but also a bit confused as to Wyatt's speech. He cleared his throat and waited for Wyatt to finish.

"What am I doing here?" Wyatt asked, "You know? Look at this shit, there's poison in this. There's poison in this and we're putting it on the place we live on. The place our children live on. And somehow we think that's okay, somehow we justify the actions we take because oh, we won't be around for the consequences, as if that makes it alright. Ben, please, tell me we're not the bad guys."

Ben shrugged and grimaced.

"I mean...we're the bad guys, Wyatt," Ben said, "There's...there's no arguing that."

"Fuck," Wyatt said under his breath, "...alright, you know what? New store policy. We're not stocking anything with poison in it, and we're not stocking anything that might kill an animal. I don't care if people take offense at my stance, I'll take the hit for it, but I refuse to continue to be an active participant in the ongoing destruction of the planet."

Ben nodded, looking at the weed killer, saying, "I'll pack it all up and have it shipped back asap."

"Than you," Wyatt said, turning and walking away down the aisle.

"Uh, where are you going?" Ben called after him.

"To see a lady about a purpose," Wyatt answered.

                                                                                          ***

"God, how do you stand it here?" Sun asked as they sat at a small table in the corner on their break, eating bear claws and people watching; Sun continued with, "like, all these people who think they're better than you. Though, shameful to admit, I used to be like them, so. Who's the real hypocrite here?"

"Mostly I just fantasize about slowly killing everyone in their sleep," Rachel said, "...what do you mean you used to be like them?"

"Before I moved back home I was working at a hospital, doing internship while I was getting my degree," Sun said, "and I used to go get coffee for everyone, and I was kind of rude to the people who served me. The people who were just trying to survive themselves. I just thought because I'd worked hard, or because I was in a field that was inherently considered 'worthwhile' - because nobody sees the service industry as worthwhile despite them literally giving us things we need everyday - that somehow I was better than them or something. I feel so bad about that now."

"Eh, I think being a doctor is more worthwhile," Rachel said, shrugging, "but perhaps I'm just so jaded that I can't help but be critical anymore. I mean, sure, the service industry is a necessity and sure, nobody deserves to be treated poorly because of the line of work they're in, but let's be real here...a barista never removed somebody's kidney to save their life."

Sun giggled and the sound of her laughter filled Rachel's heart with joy. She hadn't heard Sun's voice, Sun's laughter, in ages, and it was just as beautiful as she could remember it.

"I mean, I wanted to be an artist," Rachel said, "So maybe I'm not the one who should be making judgements about peoples career decisions."

"I'm glad you're here," Sun said, "There's nothing worse than getting a new job with nobody you know."

Rachel wanted to cry at this statement. She'd been so upset at Sun not showing up at the reunion, and now she was going to get to see her every day, all day, and she began to feel like, perhaps, she did win in the end after all.

                                                                                                ***

Celia was sitting on her couch, reading a book, when a knock came at her front door. She put a bookmark between her pages, stood up and walked to the door, answering it, only to find Wyatt standing on her porch. She was, admittedly, surprised.

"Are you alone?" he asked.

"Well, you're here," she replied, making him smirk.

"You know what I mean. Your kid's not here?"

"Of course not, it's the middle of the day. They're at school," Celia said, "Please, come inside."

She stepped aside, allowing Wyatt to enter the building. He smoothed out his hair as he entered and Celia shut the door behind him. She crossed her arms and leaned against the wall as he paced across her living room floor.

"What are you even doing here?" she asked.

"I had an epiphany today," Wyatt said, "I'm the bad guy. I don't wanna be the bad guy anymore. I don't wanna be remembered by history as one of the men who helped doom the planet and his own species for the almighty dollar. That isn't a legacy to be proud of. Who's going to remember me if nobody's around to remember me?"

"Astute observation," Celia said.

"So I just..." Wyatt said, scratching his cheek, "I need to do something more. Something better. I need to do some kind of protest work or something. I can't keep doing what I do and ignoring the long term effects for short term results. Just because something makes me money doesn't make it okay to do. Ask the people involved in illegal pornography. Sure, they make buckets of money, but that doesn't make it morally okay."

"A weird comparison, but alright," Celia said, half laughing, "Well, we can sign you up for protests and events and whatnot. Any help is appreciated. I'm proud of you, honestly, it takes a lot to admit you're doing the wrong thing, especially when you're directly involved."

"Scarlett would never say she's proud of me," Wyatt said, surprising Celia as she crossed the room to the kitchen to pour Wyatt a drink; he continued, "I mean, she loves me, she's my best friend, but...she also loves the money. She loves what I bring to the family, and the lifestyle. She'd be angry at me for leaving it behind."

"Well," Celia said, uncorking a bottle of wine and pouring some into a glass for him, handing it to him across the counter as she said, "I can't blame her. It's hard to turn down comfortable living for the sake of continued living for the future of the species. I'm not short sighted, Wyatt. I see why these people do what they do, and I understand it. Just because I don't agree with it doesn't mean I don't get it. You can be wrong for understandable reasons."

Wyatt took the glass, nodded, and then downed the entire thing in one swallow. He wiped his mouth on his sleeve and sighed.

"I need to know that I did everything I could to make my childrens lives, and in effect, their childrens lives, better...not worse," Wyatt said, "How can I be a good father by hurting mother earth? That's just misogyny."

"Well I wouldn't go that far, but sure, I get the sentiment," Celia said, chuckling, "It takes a big man to admit he cares about something other than himself."

"Well I am the biggest man," Wyatt said, "I am huge in manliness."

Celia laughed and patted his shoulder as she headed down the hall to her home office.

"Come on, let's look at some of the possible groups we could assign you to."

                                                                                             ***

Rachel flopped down on the couch when she got home, just sighing, staring up at the ceiling. Sun Rai was back in her life suddenly, out of the blue, and her world felt so much brighter because of it. It was amazing what just having the right person around do for someone. She wanted to go onto the roof of her apartment and just scream about how happy she was, but instead she took a shower, made some soup and fell asleep on the couch to an old western movie.

Unfortunately for Sun, her homecoming wasn't as good for her as it was for Rachel. When she arrived at her parents house that night after work, she found her father already asleep in his recliner. She muted the TV, then gently woke him up and took him to his bedroom, where she helped him lay down and put the blankets up around him. Afterwards she wound up in the kitchen, where she found her mother, Shen, making some tea and reading a magazine.

"Dad's in bed," Sun said.

"Thank you," Shen said, "What do you think of this patio furniture?" she asked, holding the magazine out so Sun could see it.

"I think it's garish," Sun said, "But if that's the look you're going for then it's spot on."

"How was work?" Shen asked.

"...you know what?" Sun asked as she opened the freezer and pulled out a carton of ice cream, "...it was good. I had a good day. I haven't had an actual good day in a long time, but I had a good day today, mom."

Shen smiled, walked across the room and kissed her daughter on the forehead.

"I'm happy for you," she said, patting her cheek, "I'm going to bed. Sleep good, Cricket."

After Shen disappeared, Sun sat down at the kitchen table and ate ice cream out of the carton, thinking about her new life, her new job, her new old friend, and she smiled. Rachel was wrong. There was no such thing as a more respectful line of work. In fact, work didn't even need to fulfill you. You just had to be happy that you were managing to survive. Still, she appreciated Rachel's point of view. She picked up the phone off the wall and dialed a number.

After a few rings, Rachel answered, sounding groggy; Sun asked, "I didn't wake you did I? Okay. Sorry. Do you wanna do something? I don't wanna be at home right now. Okay, come get me and we'll go."

Sun hadn't had friends in her last job, her last life. That was the best thing she got out of this return home. Not the job. Fuck the job. No. The best thing she got was the friend. Because friends are worth more than careers. It had just taken her a long time to see that, and admit it. So Rachel came and picked her up, and the two of them went to a nearby minigolf course. They had ice cream bars and they had pizza and they played minigolf, and for the first time in a long, long time, Rachel and Sun Rai were both happy again.

All in all, Sun was right...it really was a pretty good day.

Sitting in the hallway of his childrens elementary school, Wyatt Bloom couldn't help but feel anxious. Parent/Teacher conferences always put him on edge. It wasn't that he was uncomfortable with people evaluating his children specifically, it was that he found the mere act of child evaluation sort of sickening overall. You never know what a parent might be like, and if they hear something that's less than stellar than their perception of their child, they may go home and abuse said child in any number of ways, ranging from physical to verbal to emotional. That's too much pressure to put on a kid, frankly. He tried to push the thought out of his head and flipped the page of the magazine he'd brought with him when he heard someone seat themselves in the chair beside him.

"So," Celia said, "Come here often?"

Wyatt smirked, replying, "Oh yeah, I'm a regular here. Probably spend more time here than is healthy."

"Boy," Celia said, "You've got a problem, you should see someone."

They both laughed as she positioned herself more comfortably in her chair and sighed.

"It feels like a totally different life, doesn't it?" Celia asked, "Like, high school still seems fairly fresh, but elementary school...it seems like it happened to someone I just watched vicariously instead of living."

"I know what you mean, the passage of time screws me up if I think about it too long," Wyatt said, "I know I went to elementary school, I know I did homework, I know I ran on the playground, it just isn't stuff I'm too capable of remembering vividly."

"I think it's because a childs brain is still forming at that age, and their long term memory isn't exactly functional because, well, they haven't really lived long term just yet," Celia said, pushing her hair from her eyes, "but I actually am able to remember more than most people it seems. I have more than a handful of very vivid childhood memories and adolescent recollections."

"That has to be awkward," Wyatt said.

"It certainly makes things, uh, weird, yeah," Celia said, chuckling, "but it's also nice, ya know, it's nice to fondly remember things, especially if it was a good time and it really was, for me at least. I had a good home life, I had friends, I did well in school. Nothing to really complain about."

Just then the door to the classroom in front of them opened, and a woman stepped out.

"Mr. Bloom?" she asked.

"That's me," Wyatt said, standing up and, looking back at Celia before leaving, he added "don't wait up."

They chuckled and he headed inside.

"Please Mr Bloom, have a seat," the woman said, shutting the door behind him as he sauntered inside; she walked around to the back of her desk and sat down, clearing her throat and rifling through a small stack of folders before finding one she opened. When she looked up, Wyatt was squeezed into one of the childrens school desks. She almost burst out laughing, but years of teaching had given her an incredible amount of restraint. Instead, she merely readjusted her glasses and asked, "...how are you doing?"

"I think the blood circulation to my legs is cut off," Wyatt remarked, "but please, go on."

"Let me start off by saying that Mona is such a great kid," the teacher, Ms. Dinsburg, said.

"If you have to start with compliments, that usually means it only gets worse," Wyatt replied.

"You're not wrong," Ms. Dinsburg said, "She's a great kid. She's very easy to talk to, she does her homework and she listens better than anyone else I have. That being said, she doesn't really fit in with the other children. She seems to have absolutely no interest in playing with kids, she's somewhat reserved and she seems to have trouble concentrating sometimes and instead prefers to stick to fantasies."

"Well, I don't know if you're aware of this, but...she is a child," Wyatt said, making her smile.

"Certainly, but it goes beyond that. She often has an aversion to touching certain things, certain types of paper. For example, recently we did a small class project, and it involved handling construction paper. She wouldn't even touch it after the first time feeling it, she said it made her feel yucky. Same goes with glue. She got glue on her hands one time and, when needing the dry glue peeled off, she started to cry. Normally I might chock this up to just fairly heavy sensitivity, but there's too many correlations between her and other students I've had to ignore it."

"...what exactly are you trying to say?" Wyatt asked, now sitting up more directly, concerned.

"I think your daughter has a disorder, and I'd recommend you get her checked out for it. Now I'm no medical professional, but it seems to me she some sort of sensory processing condition," Ms. Dinsburg said, sighing before finishing with, "have you ever heard of ASD?"

                                                                                                 ***

"So your folks have no idea?" Rachel asked, standing at the sliding glass door in the kitchen that led out to the backyard as Calvin fixed himself a sandwich.

"Nope," he said, screwing the lid back on the mustard, "they know it's my personal space that I use, and besides that, I changed the locks, so they couldn't go in even if they wanted to."

"They aren't suspicious of that at all?" Rachel asked, surprised.

"Please, I've never given them reason to suspect me of anything. I've got a completely clean record. I've never been arrested, never even for minor offenses like traffic violations, and I've always been fairly forthcoming with my parents. All that goodwill eventually leads to you being able to tell your parents anything and having them believe it automatically."

Calvin finished his sandwich and, together, they walked back out to the patio in the backyard and seated themselves so he could eat. Rachel sipped on the beer he'd given her and wiped her mouth on her flannel sleeve before exhaling.

"And you've never even built a bomb before?" Rachel asked.

"Nope," Calvin said, taking a bite of his sandwich, chewing and swallowing before replying again, continuing with, "it's surprisingly easy, actually. For something they don't want people to do, they sure allow a lot of people to write about the subject."

"When do you think you'll be done?" Rachel asked.

"No idea," Calvin said, shrugging, "I have a date in mind, but who knows if I'll reach it."

"You know," Rachel said, "you could theoretically use coffee beans. If you keep beans in a sealed container, like a mason jar, without opening them daily, it produces an effect called offgassing. This means that, when finally opened, it could explode. It isn't dangerous exactly, but perhaps, in mass quantity. See, coffee beans have carbon dioxide when roasted, and carbon dioxide is what's often responsible for explosions through gaslines."

"Why do you know this?" Calvin asked.

"I really liked science in school," Rachel said, shrugging, "Either way, I can get a bunch of beans from work and we can see what we can do with it."

"That's a possibility, but the thing I've noticed about bomb building, especially from watching shows about true crime, is that you don't want to stick out. You don't want to be unique. The greatest thing you can accomplish when building an explosive is to be as mundane and standard as possible. A fingerprint makes you far more identifiable."

"Yeah but you're only building one," Rachel said, "Besides, there's receipts with your name on it for fertilizer. They can trace that. But if some coffee beans just disappear from work, a workplace you don't work at by the way, they would never expect that."

Calvin tossed his bangs from his eyes and looked towards the shed. He sighed and shrugged again.

"I suppose we could see," Calvin said.

"Alright then," Rachel said, "Let's commit some crimes."

                                                                                                ***

Wyatt was sitting back in the hall, reading over some papers Ms. Dinsburg had given him, when Celia approached and sat down beside him. He leaned back and sighed deeply, running his hands down his face, putting the papers on his lap. Celia cocked her head and looked at the papers and then back at Wyatt.

"Not go well?" she asked.

"Have you ever heard of ASD?" Wyatt asked.

"Autism Spectrum Disorder?" Celia asked, and Wyatt nodded.

"Yeah. She says my daughter is an excellent student, but she thinks she has sensory processing issues and wants us to get her checked out," Wyatt said.

"And that makes you mad? You don't like the idea of having a disabled child?" Celia asked.

"What?" Wyatt asked, looking at her now, an eyebrow raised, "no, no I...I don't care. I'm mad at myself. I mean...Mona's never really liked crowds. She's never really liked lots of noise. And what do I do for a living? I work in an industry dedicating itself to the deforestation of the earth, bringing in more civilization, making the world a more crowded, noisy place. I'm directly responsible for making the world around her worse for her. I don't want her to have a life that's painful for her because I had a hand in making the world worse for her."

"...wow, that's...that's deep," Celia said, patting his knee, "but, you're not responsible. These things happen. Like you said at your office, you need to support your family. People with ASD find ways to cope, ways to manage, ways to survive. She knows you love her, and so long as you support her-"

"How can I support her while simultaneously making the world worse for her to exist in?" Wyatt asked, sitting up again now, "that's not supportive! If anything I'm being unsupportive! In fact, she's so unsupported that I may as well change my name to Adobe Software!"

Celia laughed, which made Wyatt crack a little smile.

"I just...I don't know what to do," he said flatly, "...I need to do better."

"We'd all like to do better for our children, by our children, but in the end sometimes the most we can do is simply love them."

"You said I'd get disenchanted with what I do, with the life I lead. You're not wrong. I already was. I just didn't wanna admit it. I have everything. Everything one could strive to attain in the modern world, and I have it. A comfortable home life, a loving family, a cushy job, and...I'm so far from fulfilled. How original, right? Wow, someone who achieved the "american dream" and finds it's more a nightmare than a dream. How cliche. But you know what? Maybe it's a cliche for a reason, because it keeps happening, because it's that true."

"...I don't know what to say," Celia said quietly.

Wyatt, leaning back on the bench, rolled his head towards her and smiled.

"I want to do something more with my life, something I can look back on - something my children can look back on - with pride. You're lucky. You're a good person, and me? I'm just a person," Wyatt said.

Celia felt her heart hurt for Wyatt, and wanted to hug him and tell him everything would be okay. Tell him that, deep down, he really was a good person, but she knew she couldn't afford to be that affectionate upfront towards a married man in their kids school no less. After a few minutes passed, a handful of other parents passing them in the hall, chatting and laughing, Celia looked back at Wyatt and smiled warmly.

"I have to get home, but maybe you'd like to go get something to eat first?" she asked.

"...I could eat," Wyatt said after a pause, getting up and following her down the hall, adding, "but please, nothing healthy. I've suffered enough today."

                                                                                              ***

Rachel and Calvin were sitting in Rachel's car, parked in the lot across the street from her place of work, waiting for the shop to shut down. She had a pair of binoculars in her hands, peering through them, waiting for the lights to switch off inside. She pulled the binoculars down and looked at Calvin, who was reading one of his many library books on bombs.

"Why are you doing this?" Calvin asked, without looking up.

"...what? Helping you? I don't know. I guess cause I've got no reason not to. Look at my life, Cal. I dropped out of college, I live by myself, above the place I work at, and the brightest spot in my life recently was my high school reunion and only to see someone who didn't even show up. Not exactly a fairy tale life is it?" Rachel asked.

"A few weeks ago you told me you were 'living the dream' and now you're saying this is no sort of life to be proud of? Make up your mind!" Calvin replied, chuckling.

"Something being easy doesn't equate it to being good," Rachel said, "Yeah, sure, there's no expectations on me and that means there's no pressures, but that also means I have absolutely no goals to reach for because I'm too scared to even try anything. Yeah, I'm alive, but I'm not doing much living."

Just then the lights switched off, Calvin pointed and Rachel got out of the car. Calvin watched as the last employee of the night exited out the front, then watched as Rachel ran across the street and around to the back. She used her key, gained entrance, all while the other employee got in their car and drove away. After what seemed like ten of fifteen minutes, Rachel came back, carrying a box full of bags of beans. Calvin got out, took her cars and opened the trunk, watching her plop them inside. They shut the trunk and looked at one another, and Calvin shook his head.

"You shouldn't throw the possibility of a life away just because you don't have one now," Calvin said, "I've already lost what I had, but you can start over. I cannot."

"But you're my friend now, and I have to stick by my friends. I screwed that up once already, I can't screw it up again," Rachel mumbled.

Calvin furrowed his brow. He wasn't sure what she meant by this - he had no context for her past with Kelly - but he appreciated her honesty and companionship nonetheless. Suddenly Rachel hugged him, then the two of them climbed back into her car and drove back to his folks house. After she helped load the beans into the shed, they bid one another goodnight, and Rachel went home. When she arrived back to her apartment, she heated something up for dinner in the microwave and pulled off a photo album, seating herself on the bed and flipping through the pages while she ate.

Photos of her and Kelly during the summer at amusement parks, having birthdays, sleepovers, holiday get togethers. The girls had once been inseparable, and now the only time they'd seen one another in the past decade was at their high school reunion. She'd let Kelly down, and she'd always felt bad about that. She couldn't go through that again with Calvin. Rachel needed to have friends. She needed to help. She needed to be needed, even if it meant perhaps being involved in something criminal. Sure, Calvin was right, she could start over, but really...

...that was too much effort too, and he knew how she felt about effort.

                                                                                               ***

"I just don't feel like things were so hard for kids when we were kids," Wyatt said, looking out the window near their booth in the diner, his hands wrapped around a mug of hot coffee as they waited for their order; he continued, "I mean, I know there's always been worry about illness, disorders, stranger danger and shit, but...it just seems like kids today have it so much more difficult than we did, and we're only making things harder for them as they get older. Instead of making the world fairer, easier, less difficult or complex to navigate let alone exist in than it was for us, we're making it more difficult for them as they grow up. That doesn't seem right. The people who come after you shouldn't have to suffer in the same ways you suffered, am I wrong?"

"Not at all," Celia said, pouring sugar into her coffee and stirring it, "between the housing market and student debt, the continually decimated economy and wars in countries we have no business even being in, yeah, shit's gotten worse. We like to pretend it hasn't. We like to say we have better technology or are more accepting and open minded, but better technology only leads to more expectations and we're not more open minded, we just pretend we are. The majority of us are still bigots. The mere fact that you, a once white prominent high school baseball star is even having coffee with me, a black woman who works in environmentalism, is something to be surprised by, even if it shouldn't be. We still have all the racist, sexist ideals we once had. We're just better at hiding them now."

Wyatt nodded as the waitress set his steak and eggs on the table and then went back for Celia's food.

"I just want her to be happy," Wyatt said, picking up his wrapped utensils and freeing them from their napkin tomb, adding, "She's my daughter, she's the world to me, and I wanna give the world to her. But when I see how fucked up the world is, especially for someone with her potential disorder, is it even something worth giving?"

"She'll be okay if you just get her tested, find out for sure and help her cope," Celia said, "It's not a terminal illness, Wyatt, it's just a processing disorder. Sounds are sharper. Textures are rougher. Lights are brighter. These people find ways to have perfectly happy lives in spite of their differences. So long as she has that support, and you seem nothing if not overly supportive, she'll be fine."

Wyatt smiled at Celia's kindness as he started to cut into his steak. The waitress returned with Celia's food - a small salad and a watercress sandwich - and placed it on the table, then said if they needed anything she'd be nearby, before turning and leaving them alone. As Celia dug into her food, Wyatt couldn't help but feel good about what she'd said. He was a supportive father, and he wasn't a bigot. Scarlett said nice things about him all the time, but it's harder to take compliments about your person at face value when they come from someone who can only see the good in you.

But coming from a stranger? Yeah, those he could see a genuine.

"Maybe I should become a vegetarian," Wyatt said, chewing on his steak, "if I wanna help make the world a better place and all."

"God, life is hard enough, don't make it worse for yourself," Celia said, the both of them laughing.

Rachel Minnow had vomited until she couldn't vomit anymore.

Flopping down onto her back on her bathroom floor in her dorm, she couldn't take it. She knew she had to go to class in about 15 minutes, but the way she was feeling...she couldn't afford to blow it off, but she also couldn't afford to throw up on everyone she came into remote contact with. Rachel eventually gathered herself back up, cleaned herself off, got changed, gathered her things and headed to class. She had to go. After all, people expected great things from her.

That was all she'd been told her whole life. That people expected great things from her. From the moment her natural artistic talent began to show through, even at such a young age, her parents repeatedly told said, "You're going to be so successful that one day you'll be able to take care of us!"

The level of unwarranted pressure that puts on a small child is despicable, Rachel quickly realized, and the last thing she wanted to do was take care of other folks, when she could barely manage to take care of herself. Now, as an adult who worked at a low effort coffee shop, she couldn't be happier with where others expectations of her lay. In fact, the only person she could let down at this point was herself, and she had the lowest expectations of all for herself, so she was rarely disappointed. Rachel still liked to paint. It wasn't like she'd given up on it entirely. She just couldn't handle the pressure that came with the potential success. Some people are built for fame, but most people aren't.

Rachel, however, was built for fame. She just didn't want it.

                                                                                                 ***

"Do you think we'll go to the same college?" Kelly asked, lying on Rachel's bed one summer afternoon in Sophomore year of high school. Rachel was seated at her desk, doing some light sketching while Kelly flipped through a magazine.

"I doubt it," Rachel said, "mostly because I'll be attending an art college."

"Maybe I could attend art college too," Kelly said, making Rachel laugh.

"You don't have any artistic skills," Rachel replied, "You could barely manage to make a diorama for school!"

"Yeah, I guess you're right," Kelly said quietly, sighing, then adding, "it's just not fair. I don't wanna go back to not having any friends. I got used to having you around."

Rachel spun around in her desk chair and looked at Kelly. She smiled.

"Hey," she said, "don't worry about it. We'll still be friends even if we go to different colleges. That'll never change."

It did, in fact, change, and it didn't even wait until college to happen. Rachel stopped being friends with Kelly before high school was even over, and she rarely, if ever, felt bad for the fact. The reasoning? Certainly not anything Kelly could ever figure out, and was always too afraid to ask about. Instead she sat on the sidelines, seeing write ups about the up and coming future star painter, until one day, Rachel dropped out of college, and then dropped out of sight.

Kelly never knew why this happened either, but at least this time, she was a bit more curious to find out the reason.

                                                                                                ***

"I'm livin' the dream," Rachel said, sitting at the table by the window, the usual spot she and Calvin and taken to meeting in the last few weeks; she bit into a bagel and said, "yes sirree."

"This is the dream?" Calvin asked, trying not to laugh, "Gee, and the rest of us thought we had it made with the house and the family and the high paying job, when in actuality we got it all wrong. We're so stupid."

"I don't necessarily mean the way I live is perfect, but, like, this way I have absolutely no expectations put on me, and it doesn't make me anxious. When I was in college, and my painting started getting noticed, it was stressful as hell. All those galas, all those shows, it was just...too high strung. Everyone always expected my best work. Mediocre or even middling work was never acceptable. Always had to be top notch stuff. But this? Nobody expects me to make the best cup of coffee they've ever tasted. That level of pressure I can live with."

Calvin sipped his coffee and nodded, running a hand through his hair.

"Yeah, I know what you mean," he said, "Once you've removed all the stressful things from your life, or in some cases had them removed for you, it does become somewhat easier to gauge what exactly matters the most. Keeps your mind clear. You're able to think more cleanly."

"Exactly," Rachel said, "My head was fogged and clouded so often, and now...I mean, I have extreme depression but at least I can think about how to handle it without worrying about a million other things."

A moment passed as they watched a mom and her two kids leave the coffee shop, both kids happily eating pastries while the mom drank her coffee. Calvin smiled at the sight, and Rachel sighed.

"I used to think the most important thing in life was doing it perfectly," Rachel said, "meet someone, get married, have some kids, have a career, never allow a blemish on this plan...but now..."

"It has its perks, I'll admit," Calvin said, "having people to care about and who care about you, but again, pressure."

"I can barely handle a relationship. The last woman I was with became so intensely clingy that I felt bad when I split up with her because I didn't want her to assume it was the clingyness and not the fact that we were merely incompatible as partners."

"And?"

"I mean, it was partially the clingyness, but still, she shouldn't have to feel bad about it," Rachel said, the both of them laughing softly.

                                                                                                 ***

The last person Rachel ever expected to see the night of graduation was Kelly, and yet here she was, standing on the front porch. Rachel hadn't gone to any of the graduation parties, but she was dressed and ready to go out with a few friends she'd met at a summer art program in senior year. Kelly, on the other hand, was wearing a band t-shirt and jeans, looking like the kid she always looked like.

"What are you doing here?" Rachel asked.

"I needed to pick something up. I left something with you a few years ago and you never returned it," Kelly said, "it's a photo album."

"Oh, okay, come on in," Rachel said, stepping aside and allowing Kelly entrance into the house.

The two girls headed up the stairs to Rachel's bedroom, and Kelly began looking through the closet, knowing this was where most of the stuff she left over eventually wound up. The girls used to be as tight as ever, always borrowing one anothers belongings, leaving things over at one anothers houses for years at a time, but now this item was the only thing of Kelly's left in Rachel's presence, and even that was about to leave. Rachel sat on the bed and watched her former best friend search.

"I'm going out, if you wanna come," she said quietly, surprising even herself at the offer.

"Uh, no thanks, I have to take this photo album to my grandma in the hospital," Kelly said.

"Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't know," Rachel whispered.

"Besides, you didn't want to see me in high school, what would make me think you wanna see me now that it's over?"

"I was just trying to be nice," Rachel said.

"There's something you haven't done in a while."

"You don't have to be a bitch," Rachel snapped.

"No, actually, I kind of do. After the way you treated me, I think I need to stand up for myself once in a while, even to the people I never once would've expected to be mean to me," Kelly said, still searching through the closet, not even looking at her, "because you were the one person I never thought I'd have to defend myself from. It hurts."

Rachel didn't even want to respond to that, because she wasn't really sure how to. Instead, she just stayed seated on the bed and waited until Kelly finally managed to uncover the photo album. The two walked back downstairs, and once Kelly was on the porch, she thanked Rachel for the invite, and apologized for what she said. As Rachel watched her former best friend leave, all she could think of was how bad she felt for Kelly. Rachel had always been weird, but she was able to at least make friends. Kelly couldn't make friends. It had been a miracle she and Rachel had become friends at all, and Rachel wondered what life must be like, to be that lonely.

Now, as an adult, she understood exactly, and she couldn't lie, she felt kinda bad about the whole thing, even if she did enjoy her solitude.

                                                                                              ***

"It's not all it's cracked up to be," Calvin said another day, this time sitting in his car in the parking lot so Rachel could have a smoke break; he continued, "being alone and stuff. I mean, sure, it's got its perks, but there's something to be said about the level of comfort that comes from having those around you who want you there without expecting anything of you, and that's what a good relationship actually brings."

"It's too hard. Everything's too hard," Rachel said, blowing smoke out the window, "I'm just not cut out for things that take any effort."

Calvin laughed loudly at this and nodded.

"I understand that sentiment all too well," he said, "these days I find it harder and harder to do anything that doesn't feel required of me. I can give my all to a project that feels necessary, but the small stuff? Laundry, cooking, having friends? Seems so much harder."

"I didn't realize it at the time, but...I kinda need the structure school gave me. I think that was partially why college didn't work, because it was so unstructured. Like, sure I was expected to do the work and show up for classes, but what was the ultimate punishment if I didn't? Nothing, really. Unless you allowed it to get so bad that they flat out dropped you, but even that took some level of effort. I need that rigid structure that general school gives. Apparently I can't be damned to care about anything if nobody is expecting me to do it."

"Expectation is both a blessing and a curse then, it sounds like," Calvin said, "when I was married, my wife expected things of me, but they weren't huge things, and I did them not because they were expected but because I wanted to make her happy."

"That's sweet," Rachel said, smiling.

"But these days, I totally get it. Without that need, I just...I don't care."

"...I think I could make it work with someone, if I met the right woman, but...the right woman is never the woman I meet. That's the problem. And it takes so much effort to meet someone you can really see a future with, and that's a whole other set of expectations that I just can't deal with."

"What's with the aversion to expectation? I mean, I kinda get it, I just don't-"

"I had this agent, when I was in college. He was highly recommended, was said to be very supporting of the artists he promoted, and honestly he didn't seem that bad. But the more I learned about him, particularly from other women he had as clients, the more I realized I couldn't give him what he wanted. He wanted perfect work every time. He wanted a good part of the commission. When I stopped turning in high quality stuff, and when I demanded that I be paid my fair share because I'm the one actually making the art, he got...mean."

"What kind of mean?" Calvin asked.

"It was at one of the showings, but everyone had left and we were clearing things up, and he tried to...anyway, I was lucky. One of the waitresses there who came back because she'd left some of the catering equipment walked in on his attempt, and helped me stop him. It didn't get far, but the effort was enough. He put effort into that. He planned that. He made sure it happened when we were alone. Effort, ever since then, has just seemed wrong. He expected me to give him what he wanted, and when I wouldn't, he tried to take it anyway."

Calvin couldn't believe his ears, his jaw somewhat slack.

"And you never told anyone?" he asked.

"Why would I? They'd never believe me," Rachel replied, "but let me tell ya, ever since then, I never want anyone to expect anything of me, nor do I want to put any effort into anything. I've seen where both of those can lead you, and I don't wanna go back there."

"Well," Calvin said, finishing his coffee and wiping his mouth on his sleeve, "I'll add him to the list of people to blow up then."

Rachel laughed at this joke, fully unaware Calvin actually meant it.

                                                                                              ***

Rachel didn't see Kelly again after that night until the night of the reunion, and judging by Kelly's reaction to her, she'd either forgiven or outright forgotten the last conversation they'd had. When she arrived back upstairs in her apartment that night, Rachel thought about what Calvin had said, about how being alone wasn't all it was cracked up to be, and despite admitting he was right in some regards, she couldn't allow herself to become involved with anyone. Hell, this weird pseudo-friendship she had with him was tough enough to manage.

Rachel took a shower, then made something for dinner. As she watched TV while eating, her thoughts turned to Sun Rai.

Despite the way she felt, she couldn't deny the fact that she had gone to that reunion solely to see Sun again. She did obviously want to have that human connection, she couldn't deny it, no matter what she might've told Calvin. The fact that she yearned to see Sun said it all. She still had romance within her, even in light of what had happened to her. Rachel finished eating and laid back on the couch, then reached to the end table and picked up the cordless phone. She dialed a number and lifted the receiver to her ear, listening to it ring.

"Hello?" Calvin answered.

"What're you doing?" Rachel asked.

"Just working on a project," he replied.

"Can I come over?" Rachel asked, and after a moment of silence that she took as apparent hesitation, he said yes, then gave her his parents address.

                                                                                                 ***

"Nice place," Rachel said upon arriving, making Calvin smile.

"Yeah, it has its charm," he said, opening the back gate and letting her follow him, as he added, "I'm surprised you wanted to hang out."

"Well, I was just thinking about what we were discussing and I guess you're right, I didn't wanna be completely alone. I only went to that stupid reunion to see someone, and she didn't even show up, so," Rachel said.

"Glad to be a fallback," Calvin said, making her smirk as they approached the shed; he opened the door and walked inside, letting her follow him in. Her face took on an immediate change of both intense curiosity and mild confusion.

"Are you an engineer or something?" she asked, half laughing.

"Naw," Calvin said, "this is just what I've been working on for the last few months."

"What...what is this?" Rachel asked, approaching the table and looking down at the device Calvin was building.

"It's a bomb," he said.

"Really? That's pretty cool," Rachel said, "...why are you building a bomb? Just for kicks?"

"Because I'm going to blow someone up."

Rachel looked at Calvin, and Calvin looked at Rachel, and after a moment or so, she nodded.

"Alright," she said, "So, tell me, who we killing?"

Calvin Klepper was sitting on the couch in his parents living room.

It was busy, people circling all around the room, talking in low hushed voices, barely audible, but he took no mind to them. A few people stopped and tried to give him a refreshment, a drink or a snack, but he politely declined each time. He sat there and he didn't say a single word the entire time, and after the wake was over, Calvin stayed there late into the evening, well after his parents had gone to bed. Eventually he fell asleep on the couch, and the next morning, he woke to his mother making breakfast. He ate, then he drove to his well paying job, quit on the spot and headed to a local hardware store.

Calvin bought a handful of various items, piled them all into his trunk and then drove back to his parents house. He outfitted their shed in the backyard with his new purchases, creating a small workshop of sorts, and he told them he'd be back in a bit. Calvin Klepper then drove to his apartment, told his landlord he wouldn't need the space anymore, and that he'd be moving back in with his folks. Calvin moved back into his childhood bedroom, did some light redecorating, and then, when his folks were asleep, he went back out to the shed, and he got to work.

                                                                                            ***

"Say cheese!" Calvin's mother, Amelia, said, snapping a picture.

Calvin and his soon to be wife smiled, and then kissed after the photo was taken. Amelia turned away to speak to Calvin's father, Barry, momentarily, while allowed Calvin's wife, Stacy, to look at Calvin and straighten his tie.

"Do I look okay?" Calvin asked, and Stacy smiled.

"You look fantastic," she said quietly, patting his cheek, "did you trim your beard?"

"Yeah, hah, I figured it should be somewhat presentable," Calvin said, "After all, we only get one wedding."

"Unless I leave you and you remarry," Stacy said, "Not that I plan on doing that, but you never know. I might run into a celebrity, and I'm sorry baby, but you just can't compete with the likes of Brendan Fraser."

"Oh I don't blame you, I'd leave you for Brendan too," Calvin said, making her laugh.

Calvin had waited for this day for so long. As he watched Stacy be whisked away by his mother, so she could help prepare the flower girl - a sweet little neighbor girl named Annie - Calvin watched her and felt a warmth inside of him that nothing else in his whole life had ever given him. Calvin had met Stacy in college, but the two of them stayed friends until their last year, when she suddenly showed up to his dorm room one night because she heard the music he'd been playing from a party down the hall, and it turned out to be her favorite band. The two stayed in his dorm the entire night, just talking about music and themselves, and went to breakfast the next morning. They were seriously involved less than a week later.

Stacy had chestnut colored hair and almond colored eyes, both differing shades of brown but both so beautiful, and each seemed to glitter when the light hit them. She had majored in nursing, hoping to get a job as a school nurse, which Calvin found sweet. Soon they had an apartment together, and shortly after that, Stacy was pregnant. A year later, they had a pair of twin baby girls named Chelsea and Lacie, and Calvin finally realized what he'd been longing for his entire life...fatherhood.

He could still recall the day they were born, and he stood there looking at her while Stacy got some sleep. He promised he'd never let anything happen to them, or his wife either, really. Sadly, Calvin would find out, that was a harder promise to keep than he expected.

                                                                                               ***

Calvin was sitting in his car, a pair of binoculars strung around his neck, as he waited. He sighed and checked his watch again. After so many months, you'd think he would've known this mans schedule by now, but no. He was still guessing, at best. He picked up his book on the seat beside him, the one he'd gotten from the local library, and started skimming it again. He wanted to have everything perfect. Then he heard a door slam shut, and he quickly dropped the book, raised the binoculars to his eyes and watched.

There he was.

Robert Grudin. Clean cut, nice suit, approachable haircut, perfect smile. Bastard. Absolute bastard. Swore up and down he was running on a platform that was meant to help keep the streets safe, keep families afloat, but Calvin knew it was all just a lie. He waited until he saw Grudin disappear into the building he'd parked in front of, then quickly got out of his car, raced across the street and knelt down, taking measurements. He pulled the pencil from his teeth, jotting numbers down in a little notepad, then once he was finished, shoved the measuring tape back in his pants pocket and headed back for his car, taking off before Grudin ever reemerged.

Halfway home he spotted a "Choosin' Grudin!" sign plunged into someones lawn, and, his blood beginning to boil, he quickly pulled off to the curb, hopped out, raced up to the lawn and yanked the post from the dirt. He then walked back to the street and bashed it against the curb and his car until the entire thing lay in tatters. Satisfied at his destruction, Calvin then climbed back into his car and headed home.

He'd chosen Grudin, all right.

He just hadn't chosen him to be elected.

                                                                                          ***

"Can I help you?" a voice asked, making Calvin jump in his skin a little as he turned in the aisle, spotting Wyatt's face. Wyatt didn't recognize him, that was for sure. Calvin scratched his forehead and blinked a few times before speaking.

"Yeah I'm...I'm looking for a fertilizer, a certain kind, immodium nitrate," Calvin said, his voice sounding hoarse, like he'd spent the entire day screaming.

"For sure, we have that. You redoing your backyard, or is this something or a job?" Wyatt asked, leading Calvin down towards another aisle, adding, "I only ask because it's not generally the one people buy to do small gardening around their home. We have much nicer stuff."

"You work here?"

"I own this place," Wyatt said, grinning, "Well, my dad owns it, but I basically own it now. He's long since retired and leaves me to do everything."

"Good gig."

"Not a bad life, no."

"...yeah, I'm in landscaping," Calvin said, lying, "I need quite a bit of it, maybe all you got."

"Doing a large project?" Wyatt asked.

"Country club," Calvin said.

"Well, then we got you covered," Wyatt said.

Wyatt helped Calvin pick out his bags, and even helped him load them to his car. Standing there in the parking lot afterwards, Wyatt patted the trunk and then shook Calvin's hand, still smiling like an idiot.

"Good luck on your job, man. If you need anything else, come back and I'll see what I can do," he said.

Calvin wondered why he'd been so concerned about seeing Wyatt at the reunion now. He hadn't even recognized him. Why would he, anyway. It wasn't like they were friends. Wyatt had been somewhat kind to Calvin in high school, but more often than not he'd also antagonized him quite a bit, and that left Calvin with some bitter memories he wished he could forget. His parents were on a small vacation to see his aunt a few hours away, so Calvin had the house to himself for a bit. He decided he would need caffeine in order to get some of this job done, staying up so late, so he pulled off into yet another parking lot, hoping to get some coffee.

Calvin entered the coffee shop, and waited in line. When he finally got to the front, he was surprised to see, of all people, Rachel Minnow standing on the opposite side of the counter from him. She was in an apron with a dorky little hat, and she immediately recognized him.

"I didn't know you worked here," Calvin said, "I swear I'm not a stalker."

"Please, stalk me, make my life more interesting," Rachel replied, monotone, "What do you want?"

"Uh, large plain black, and some kind of muffin if you have any," he said.

"We have blueberry, raspberry, strawberry, peach, apple-" Rachel said, quickly listing them off until he interrupted her.

"I just want a muffin, I don't wanna start a fuckin' farm," he said, making her smirk.

"Go take a seat, I'll bring your coffee and surprise you with something," Rachel said, "my break is coming up anyway."

Calvin seated himself near the window, furthest away from everyone. After about 8 minutes, Rachel finally brought him his coffee and a small platter of different muffins. She seated herself across from him and had a cup of coffee for herself too. She picked up a muffin and took a bite, watching as he sipped his coffee.

"Weren't you like, a successful artist?" Calvin asked, "Didn't you get accepted to like a really prestigious art academy?"

"Wow, bring up my failings immediately, cool," Rachel said, "Cause I don't think about those enough on a daily basis."

"Sorry," Calvin said, laughing, "I didn't...I'm not good at talking to people, even people I've already met. I'm just kinda surprised to see you working in like a half assed coffee shop. Hey, you're not the only one, alright? I failed plenty."

"Good to know I'm in the presence of such spectacular failing company," Rachel said, smirking, taking another bite of her muffin and eating it before continuing; "I just...I was, yeah, I was accepted, and I went. And uh, I was doing pretty well, getting noticed by agents and even galleries during student presentation weeks, but it didn't really pan out."

"...how's being an artist not pan out? I mean, aren't you kind of your own boss?" Calvin asked.

"Uh, because about 3 years in, I tried to drive my car off a bridge," Rachel said, "I should explain, it wasn't...it wasn't intentional, at least I don't think. I was given medication for a few different medical issues, and I guess they didn't really mix well, and then I went to this really fancy gallery show one night and I drank a little and that only exacerbated the issues all the more and before I knew it I was heading home and I kind of...fell asleep at the wheel, I think? I don't know if it's a dream or I hallucinated. I saw this...this totally strange looking horse standing in the road, and you could see through his skin, and you could see his skeleton and his insides and...I don't know, the next thing I know I was being taken to the hospital and people thought I was suicidal and that was the end of school."

"Jesus," Calvin mumbled, sipping his coffee, "that's horrific."

"I fucking hate horses," Rachel said under her breath, "annyyyywaay, what about you? How'd you fuck up so badly?"

"...actually I didn't," Calvin said, "I was doing great. For as shitty an adolescence as I had, as terrible as high school was, I actually flourished in college. Met a woman, got married, had two daughters. Things were...kind of perfect, storybook life."

"And what, you don't have any of that anymore?" Rachel asked.

"...no," Calvin said, "no I don't."

"But you didn't do anything to make them leave?" Rachel asked, raising an eyebrow.

"No, I didn't," Calvin said, "...someone else did."

This only made Rachel all the more curious, but she decided not to push it, and instead she changed the subject.

                                                                                          ***

Calvin was making dinner that night.

He was making his wifes favorite dinner, and he already had the table settings placed. He was humming along to the song blasting out the radio in the kitchen, and was just about to take the meal out of the oven when the phone rang. He picked up.

"Hello?" he asked, expecting Stacy, but it wasn't Stacy; he waited then replied, "...yes, this is Calvin Klepper, why?"

Calvin couldn't really remember much after that. He remembered dropping the phone, hearing it break. He remembered the sound of the timer on the oven blasting away, indicating his meal was burning, and he remembered falling slowly to this knees, panting, clawing his way to a wall until he slid further down, finally laying facedown on the kitchen floor. Eventually his neighbor in the apartment next door came over to see if he was okay, and when she finally got him off the floor and he told her he needed help, she agreed to drive him.

It was over so quickly, they told him. Stacy and the girls probably didn't even suffer, because it was so fast, so swift, so headon. When Calvin learned that a local potential politician was responsible for the accident, he was told there'd be justice. He was told that somebody of this caliber couldn't get away with something so horrific, and he'd stupidly believed them. What was he thinking? Of course famous people could get away with anything. And then, the clincher, a few weeks later during a press conference was when he heard the very same man who'd killed his family - who never took any blame for this act whatsoever - say out loud that he'd buckle down on public intoxication, and that families had a right to safe streets.

That was what pushed Calvin over the edge. Later that night, still stewing in rage from the hypocrisy, he stumbled onto a show on the History network all about bombs, and that lit an idea within his brain. Yes.

That was the night Calvin Klepper decided he would blow up Robert Grudin.

                                                                                               ***

Calvin was standing outside the classroom, reading a book as he waited for the door to unlock and class to begin. He heard a few other students join the area, but he didn't pay any attention to them. It wasn't until he heard a backpack be set down right next to him that he finally looked up, only to see Wyatt Bloom standing there, leaning against the wall. Wyatt grinned.

"Isn't this cool, man?" Wyatt asked.

"...what?" Calvin asked.

"Shop class, dude," Wyatt said, "Like, all the tools and stuff. Get to learn how to bend metal and make it do whatever we want. It's gonna be sick."

Wyatt then offered Calvin some gum, which he graciously accepted, unwrapping and popping it into his mouth, chewing.

"My dad owns like a hardware store, and so I get to hang out there a lot and look at all the tools, and some of them look so dangerous, but you just know they're fun. I'm gonna make a buncha stuff," Wyatt said, chewing his own stick of gum before adding, "Wouldn't it be cool to make something unexpected though? Like, make a bomb or something?"

Calvin nodded.

"Yes. It would be cool to make a bomb," he replied.

                                                                                              ***

Calvin awoke in his parents shed the following morning, having fallen asleep at the table he was working at. He stretched, yawned, then stood up. He grabbed the now empty coffee cup on the table near him and shook it, before thinking. Calvin headed inside, and he took a shower, then he got dressed, then he went to the coffee shop. When he entered, he saw Rachel sitting at a table, reading a magazine. Calvin sauntered over to her and plopped himself down in the chair across from her, surprising her.

"Oh, hey," she said, "What're you doing here? It's really early."

"...you wanna go get some breakfast?" Calvin asked.

"I guess, my shift doesn't start for like another hour," Rachel said, checking her watch, "But sure, let's do that."

Calvin drove Rachel to a nearby diner, where they sat in a booth and ordered. He offered to pay for everything. Sitting there, Rachel couldn't imagine why this weird guy she barely knew from high school was asking her to breakfast, but she did at least feel as though it wasn't for any romantic kind of reasons.

"So," Calvin said, putting his menu down, "You ever meet up with Sun?"

"No, she never showed," Rachel replied, "I was stupid to think she would. I just...I guess I thought she might, and that'll teach me to ever have hope."

"Hah," Calvin chuckled, "Why did you wanna see her so bad anyway? You guys weren't really friends, right, you said it yourself."

"I..." Rachel stammered, unsure of what to say, until she started sniffling, making Calvin reach across the table and hold her hand; she finally managed to say, "...I was so in love with her, and it's never gone away. I just wanted to see her again. See how well she's doing. See if maybe she...I don't know. It's so hard to be unable to be with a person you care about so much."

Calvin nodded, saying, "Yeah, I know what you mean."

So Calvin and Rachel ate their breakfast, talked for a bit, and he took her back to work. They agreed to hang out again soon, before Calvin headed back to his parents house. He locked the door once back inside the shed, an entire palette of coffee cups in a brown styrofoam holder placed on the table beside all his tools and effort. He sighed and looked back at the photo on the wall, running his fingers across it. Tears rolled down his cheeks. He had to do this. For everyone who'd ever had someone taken away from them, in one way or another. Calvin set up his materials and got back to work on his bomb. Grudin had promised that he'd make the streets safer, and Calvin was going to hold him to that promise. The way Calvin saw it...

...by removing Grudin entirely, the streets would be safer.

Wednesday night, 9pm. The kids were asleep, and it was now time for Wyatt and Scarlett's weekly scheduled sexual encounter. Scarlett, on her back - her thighs wrapped around Wyatt's hips - was moaning loudly into the sock she'd stuffed in her mouth, while Wyatt worked as best as he could to keep her happy. She gripped the sock, removed it and started talking.

"Come on, come on, give it to me," Scarlett whispered sensually, winking up at him.

"Give what to you?" Wyatt asked, grunting, sweat running down his forehead.

"You know what," she replied.

"I...wha...a...a venereal disease?" Wyatt asked, squinting, making Scarlett crack up.

She started laughing so hard that she pushed him off of her and rolled onto her side, doubling over in laughter. Wyatt rolled onto his back and stared up at the ceiling, his feet up on the pillow near her head. He smirked, and rested his hands on his chest as she rolled back onto her back and stared up at the ceiling, running her nails up his leg next to her head.

"Do you remember the first time we had sex?" Scarlett asked, and Wyatt nodded.

"Yeah, I do," he said, "that was my first time. I was nervous because you were so beautiful, and I didn't wanna ruin your makeup."

"Awww, you're so dorky," Scarlett said, chuckling and kissing his ankle. Wyatt turned and climbed up, lying beside her, running his hands through her reddish blonde hair, losing his fingers in its depth as he looked in her eyes.

"I still worry about that," he said quietly.

"Really?" she asked.

"Yeah, you always look so perfect," Wyatt said, "I just...don't wanna ruin that."

He shut his eyes and rested, as Scarlett stared at his face. This face she'd seen every single day for the last 15 years almost. So familiar, so comforting. She didn't know what she'd do if she had to face even a single day without his face in her presence. She buried her face into his neck and pulled his arms around her. He squeezed her gently, and she smiled. Scarlett Bloom had it really good.

The following morning, Wyatt was sitting at the breakfast table reading the newspaper. His almost 11 year old daughter was sitting at the table, tapping her spoon on her cereal bowl, and it was starting to grate on his nerves. He sighed, lowered the newspaper and looked at her.

"Alright, what?" he finally asked.

"I'm tired of cereal," Mona said, "I want something different."

"Well there's an entire pantry of breakfast food in the kitchen, just pick something," Wyatt said, "Have a poptart if you want."

"Mommy won't let me have poptarts for breakfast, she says they're too sugary," Mona said, sitting back and crossing her arms in annoyance. Wyatt glanced at her, his brow furrowing, as he leaned forward.

"Really?" he asked, making her nod; he looked towards the staircase, knowing Scarlett was in the shower, before looking back at his daughter and adding, "well, mom's not in charge of breakfast today. I am, and I think poptarts are on the menu."

Mona squealed, then raced from the table to the kitchen. Wyatt smiled to himself as he went back to reading his paper and sipping his coffee. Scarlett hurried down the stairs about 10 minutes later, drying her hair with a towel as she kissed Mona's head, who was by then seated back at the table eating her poptart. Scarlett patted Wyatt on the shoulder and leaned down beside him.

"Evan isn't feeling well," she said.

"Does he have a fever?"

"Yeah, so I'm thinking if you'll run Mona into school on your way into work, I can stay behind and look over him," Scarlett said. Wyatt nodded and kissed her hand, telling Mona to finish her poptart and get her backpack. As he piled his daughter and himself into the car, Wyatt couldn't help but look around his small, safe neighborhood and exhale deeply as he watched a long line of other parents - all of whom looked exactly like him and Scarlett, who lived in houses just like theirs, with children just like theirs - do the same thing. Was this all there was to life after school?

Wyatt climbed into the car and started it up, fastening his seatbelt, waiting for Mona to buckle hers before he pulled out of the driveway. He dropped Mona off at school, waited until he saw her get indoors, and then headed downtown towards the office. When he showed up, he headed straight for his office, mostly so he could check his messages, but as soon as he was inside, he heard his secretary knocking lightly on the door as she entered, a bad habit he'd yet to break her of. He smiled up at her as she walked in cautiously.

"Sir, Peterson is in Conference Room B, and says he needs you to join him," she said, "there's a guest here to see you two."

"...a guest?" Wyatt asked, confused, "alright sure, thank you Winona."

Wyatt checked his work messages, made a quick phone call and then headed down the hall to conference room b. Upon entrance, he was surprised not just to find Peterson looking worried, but also to see their guest, sitting there calmly as could be...none other than Celia Moss.

                                                                                                   ***

Scarlett had never in her life expected to be a stay at home mom.

She had never really given up on the idea of being a parent, in fact she'd always assumed she would be, but she also had never really counted on being the kind of parent who stayed home and took care of the kids, and more the kind of parent who paid someone to do that sort of work while she went to a high profile business somewhere. But once she had the kids, she found she didn't really trust anyone to watch the kids other than herself and her husband. Well, and their usual babysitter. Evan was napping, having taken some cold medicine, so Scarlett might have been playing "stay at home mom", but she found today she had quite a bit of alone time on her hands.

She figured she'd tidy up the house a bit, and maybe get some reading done. Lately she'd been reading awful romance novels, mostly because she didn't seem to have the concentration for anything more genuine, but it was good enough for the time being. Lying on the couch, baby monitor on the coffee table beside her, Scarlett was chewing on her lip as she read when she heard a knock at the door. Scarlett was somewhat surprised, as she hadn't been expecting anyone. Nonetheless, she got up and went to answer it, only to find Wyatt's mom on the porch.

"Oh," Scarlett said, genuinely unprepared to see her, "Priscilla, what are you doing here?"

"I actually need to borrow your sewing machine," Priscilla said, "if that's okay. I'm trying to alter some curtains I've been working on, and mine jammed up. I remember you used to make Mona's Halloween costumes when she was little, and so I figured-"

She heard a little moan come from the baby monitor and glanced at it, then back at Scarlett.

"Is someone here?" she whispered.

"It's Evan, he doesn't feel well, and you don't have to whisper, he can't hear you through it," Scarlett said, trying not to laugh, "and yeah, you can absolutely use my sewing machine. Come in. I'll have to dig it out, it's in the garage at the moment because I haven't used it in ages."

Priscilla followed Scarlett further into the house, and through the kitchen to the door that led into the garage. Scarlett put her book down on the kitchen table before entering the garage, and Priscilla stole a quick glance at it the book before following Scarlett into the garage.

"Everything okay between you two?" Priscilla asked.

"What?" Scarlett asked as she dragged a small stepladder to a shelf and started climbing it.

"In my experience the only women who read awful romance novels are the ones who are unsatisfactorily pleased with their marriage," Priscilla said, making Scarlett laughed.

"No, god, it's just something to waste some time in," Scarlett said, "Wyatt and I are perfectly fine. I would like to get back to reading more complex literature, I just...I don't have the time or patience, and I'm always so fried after being with the kids, so I just don't have a very good attention span anymore. This at least keeps my hobby alive in some way, so maybe one day I can get to the stuff I actually wanna read."

"You won't," Priscilla said, surprising Scarlett, who - while gripping her sewing machine and trying to scoot it towards her off the shelf - looked over her shoulder at her mother in law, a grimace on her face.

"What?"

"You won't ever get to it," Priscilla said, "you'll lose all your hobbies. I did. Every woman does. We like to pretend we don't, maybe by keeping them alive vicariously through our children, but in the end we're all just moms and nothing else. It sounds hopelessly depressing, I know, but you get used to it. Just be glad you and Wyatt still like one another. That's more than most couples have."

"Uh, thanks for the concern," Scarlett said, climbing down the stepladder and handing her the sewing machine now, "but I still have hobbies and I don't intend to lose them simply because I chose to pop out a few kids. I was having problems concentrating on reading well before I had children."

"I'm just letting you know what happened to me, and so many of my friends," Priscilla said, taking the sewing machine, then asking, "when do you need this back?"

"You know what, why don't you keep it for a while," Scarlett said with a smile.

Anything to keep Priscilla from coming back anytime soon.

                                                                                                ***

"I'm representing a nature conservation society, specifically one interested in defending the rights of an endangered insect, whose main habitat just happens to be where you're interested in logging, leveling and constructing on soon," Celia said, opening a file and sliding two pieces of paper - both identical - to Peterson and Wyatt. Wyatt took the paper and started skimming it, his lips reading silently; Celia continued, "We're willing to not move forward with court proceedings, granted you give us adequate time to perhaps relocate enough of the species."

"...that sounds fair," Wyatt said, surprising Peterson, who looked at him in near disbelief. Wyatt had been brought onto the board at his young age because he was a shark, and he often took these kinds of people to town for the sake of the company, saving them face.

"I figured you'd understand," Celia said, smiling, "We'll have another proposal ready for you in a few weeks. I have to get going, your firm is one of the few I have to stop at today and serve papers to."

Celia stood up, pulling her purse onto her shoulder, as Wyatt quickly stood up and followed her out of the room.

"Let me walk you to the elevator," Wyatt said.

Wyatt and Celia headed down the hallway, and stopped at the elevator, where Wyatt pushed a button, calling it to their floor.

"I didn't know you worked here," Celia said after a moment, "believe me, this didn't give me some kind of perverse pleasure or anything. Honestly, if anything it just made me feel worse, because after our talk at the reunion, you don't seem like the kind of person whose out for oil and industry."

"I'm honestly, not, I only have the job I have because my father was friends with the chairman," Wyatt replied, "and it pays well, and I have to make good money to afford to take care of two kids and a wife, so. You ever think about the irony in your last name associated with your line of work?"

Celia chuckled, nodding as the elevator doors opened and they stepped inside; she pushed the main floor button and said, "Actually yes, all the time, it's one of the few things people realize about me pretty quickly. You know, your last name is Bloom, that could also work well in my line of work, given how much effort we put into saving flora and fauna."

"Heh, yeah, sure, but I can't just switch careers at the drop of a dime," Wyatt said, "it would raise too many eyebrows, and in the suburbs you need to remain as unremarkable and disinteresting as possible to your neighbors, otherwise you run the risk of their kids alienating your kids, which in turn makes your kids hate you."

Celia suddenly pushed the emergency stop button and turned towards Wyatt. She started digging through her purse and pulled out a card, handing it to him.

"This is my personal business card. Call me when you find yourself sick of the suburbs, the fake plasticity of it all, and decide you wanna do something more with your life. And believe me, that moment will come. Ignoring your dissatisfaction only gets you so far, trust me on that."

Wyatt slipped the card into his back pants pocket and looked at her, confused.

"...do you have kids, Celia?"

"Yeah, a son," she replied, hitting the button so the elevator would continue its decline.

"So you know what it's like to do something you dislike so your kids can have a good life then?" Wyatt asked and Celia, not looking at him, bit her lip.

"I did," she said, "before I left my husband. Women put up with a lot when they're married, and almost always silently and alone. You and Scarlett seem happy, but trust me, she's grappling with it too. Eventually everyone wants something a little more than what they have, even if what they have feels perfect. Contrary to popular belief, perfection isn't unattainable, but it is unsustainable."

The elevator came to a stop and the doors slid open. Celia looked at Wyatt and smiled again.

"See you soon," Celia said, shaking his hand before leaving.

                                                                                                  ***

When Wyatt got home that evening, having stopped off to bring dinner in, he found Scarlett lying facedown on the couch in the living room, her face muffled against a pillow. He set his briefcase and then the bag full of food on the coffee table before standing and looking down at her.

"You okay, mopey?" he asked.

"Do you think I'm anything other than a mom? Do you still see me as a person?" Scarlett asked, and Wyatt sat down on the arm on the couch, running his hand up her back.

"Of course I do," he said, "what makes you think you're not?"

"Your mom," Scarlett said, somewhat muffled by the pillow.

"Well okay, you don't have to tell me, but insults from the early 2000s doesn't help," Wyatt said, making her laugh.

"No, literally, your mother," Scarlett said, rolling her head to the side so her face was visible now, looking up at him, "she stopped by today to borrow my sewing machine and she told me how she and all her peers just exist in the shadow of their former selves. How all women eventually lose who they were, lose their hobbies and interest, and just...are nothing but mothers."

"Yeah well, my mother might not be the best voice of reason when it comes to how women turn out. After all, she she bought into the whole spandex exercise tape fad of the 80s, so," Wyatt said, "Anyone who fell for that automatically loses their credibility in my eyes."

Scarlett sat up and pulled her knees to her chest, sniffling, smiling at him.

"What did you bring for dinner?"

"Thai food, and I brought you a box of eclairs," Wyatt said softly, kissing her nose.

"The kids are asleep," Scarlett said, "Do you wanna eat down here and talk about our respective days?"

"That sounds disgustingly wholesome," Wyatt said, chuckling, "I would love to do that."

So Wyatt and Scarlett bloom ate their dinner, and their desserts, and they talked about their day. Scarlett told Wyatt all about his mothers visit, about how she and Evan eventually read some storybooks when he was feeling better, and Wyatt told her about his day at work, which was fairly uneventful. But he didn't tell her about Celia. For whatever reason, a reason even he himself couldn't fathom, that was something he wanted to keep to himself.

And Celia, that night, was reading her son his favorite bedtime story. Once he fell asleep, she turned on his motion lamp that threw lighted silhouettes of dinosaurs on the walls of his bedroom. She kissed his head and then headed to her own bedroom. She got into her pajamas and climbed into her bed, picking up a book from her nightstand and flipping to her bookmarked section. But she couldn't read. She found herself increasingly distracted by the idea of working with Wyatt.

No, she thought, no.

The last thing she needed to complicate her life was romance with a married man.

She'd worry about that another day.

Wyatt Bloom was standing downstairs, leaning against the rail, picking at his tie as their babysitter, Gracie, stood beside him. He sighed and let go of his tie before looking at Gracie.

"What do you think of this tie?" he asked, "Does this say 'casual' or 'competitive'? I wanna come across as friendly, approachable, not intimidating."

"Please, like you've ever been intimidating," Scarlett shouted down from the bathroom, making Wyatt and Gracie laugh.

"I think it's nice," Gracie said, shrugging, "It's very colorful. I don't think it says approachable or intimidating, I think it just says....fun."

"I'll take fun, people like fun," Wyatt said, running his hand up his neck into his scruffy short dirty blonde hair; he checked his watch and snapped his fingers, "Come on woman, we're gonna be late! I realize we're going back to highschool, but that doesn't mean you have to put as much effort into your appearance as you used to!"

"Screw you!" Scarlett shouted down again.

"Did you and Mrs. Bloom meet in high school?" Gracie asked, and Wyatt nodded.

"Oh yeah, we've been together for a long time," Wyatt said, "I remember the first time I saw her face."

                                                                                            ***

In fact, the first time Wyatt Bloom saw Scarlett Demure's face, it was in the nurses office. Wyatt was on the baseball team and had pulled his shoulder, while Scarlett, being a cheerleader, had fallen off the top of the pyramid and onto her nose on the ground. As Wyatt entered, he was instantly taken aback by the beautiful blonde sitting in a chair, holding an ice pack to her nose. He took a seat beside her, groaning as he shifted to relieve tension in his muscle.

"What happened to you?" he asked, making her shake her head.

"Carla Mikoni can't hold anything over her head, that's what," Scarlett said.

"Not surprised, she's so thin she makes anorexia jealous," Wyatt said, making Scarlett laugh and immediately apologize for laughing, which made Wyatt smirk; he added, "That was in poor taste, sorry. Still, something wrong with that girl. She's like a bird."

"You should hear her talk," Scarlett said.

"No thank you," Wyatt replied.

"What about you? What're you in for?" Scarlett asked.

"I pulled my shoulder pitching," Wyatt said, "But it'll be fine. I just need to sit a few days out. Let me see your nose."

Scarlett hesitated, then reluctantly pulled the ice pack away, showing off her nose, which really looked okay except for the stained blood. Wyatt shrugged and leaned back into his seat.

"I think you look fine," he said, "But I'd love to see you with a good nose to really make a proper comparison."

And that was all it took to make Scarlett love him. For some people, sometimes it really was that simple.

                                                                                           ***

Sitting in the car, driving towards the high school, Wyatt tapped his fingers on the steering wheel while Scarlett primped at her hair in the rearview mirror. He scoffed as he turned to see this behavior, laughing a little, which made her grimace.

"Don't even judge, buddy. You have no idea how seriously women take these sorts of reunions. It's all about the looks department. Nobody cares how well a woman has done in the business world, alright? If she isn't moderately attractive still, then she's lost all her credibility."

"Wait, what...you're telling me you have credibility?" Wyatt asked, "I am shocked! Why wasn't I made aware of this?"

She laughed and slapped his arm.

"More credibility than you these days," she said.

"Can't argue with that," he replied, before adding, "...so who do you think is gonna be at this thing? You think everyone's gonna be there? I can't really imagine there being a lot of people I'm looking forward to seeing that I didn't bother staying in touch with."

"I'm sure there's some folks we'll be happy to see, like Robbie," Scarlett said, "Remember Robbie? He was the only male cheerleader in the whole group. I've always wondered what he got up to, and I always regretted never staying in touch with him."

"God, I'd forgotten about Robbie, honestly," Wyatt said, "That would be fun."

Honestly, Wyatt hadn't really been all that interested in returning to the high school. He'd long since moved on, and had grown somewhat ashamed of who he'd once been, and how he'd treated certain people while he'd been there. He was worried returning might bring some of that person back, and that genuinely frightened him. But Scarlett was excited to go, and she wouldn't go without him, so he did it as a favor to his wife. She was his best friend, after all.

He'd do anything to make her happy.

                                                                                             ***

Rachel Minnow sat in her car in the school parking lot, staring ahead at the auditorium, wanting go turn and run instead of getting out and going inside. She didn't want to be here, but she desperately wanted to see someone, and this was the only way she could do so without feeling like an outright stalker. She checked her lipstick one more time in the mirror before getting out of the car and heading towards the building.

The music was already too loud, and she wasn't even inside yet. She was starting to wish she'd brought a pair of earplugs or headphones, but somehow that would seem rude, even though that sort of behavior was totally normal as teenagers when they went here. Go figure. She cleared her throat as she approached the door and pushed it open, the light inside blinding her as she stepped over the threshold and into the room. Just like high school, nobody turned to look when she entered, and she was grateful for that.

She walked in, somewhat stumbling in her heels, looking all around for the person she was hoping to see. As she pushed some errant strands of hair out of her face, she suddenly bumped into a tall, lanky man, who turned to look at her.

"Oh, I'm so sorry," Rachel said, "I didn't make you spill your drink did I?"

"Rachel?" the man asked, smiling, "It's me, Oliver Brighton, remember?"

"...I...no, I'm sorry, I don't remember," Rachel said, chewing her lip, "I'm sorry."

"Eh, it's fine, it's been a long time," Oliver said, adjusting his small glasses and lifting up his drink, sipping it, "didn't expect to see you, honestly."

"Really? Why's that?"

"I don't know," Oliver said, shrugging, "You were always sort of a loner, just didn't expect you to show up for a major social function filled with people who treated you poorly. But, then again, I'm here, and I was treated worse than you, so."

Rachel nodded, pulling at her hair as she looked around for the one person she was here to see. For all she cared, Oliver could be talking to the wall, because she was barely registering anything coming out of his mouth. She started to move through the crowd again, Oliver keeping up pace with her.

"Actually, I remember we were in home ec together, and we were teamed up once to make a set of curtains," Oliver said, "Do you...do you remember that?"

Rachel stopped, and then turned, looking at him.

"Actually I do, yeah," she said, "I still have those. They're hanging over my window in my apartment."

"Really? That's awesome to hear!" Oliver said, sounding genuinely thrilled.

"Oliver?" Rachel asked, "Do you know if Sun Rai is here? Have you seen her anywhere?"

"...no, can't say that I have, sorry," Oliver said, sounding dejected, adding, "but I can help you look for her if you'd like."

"That's okay, I'll do fine on my own. It was nice seeing you," Rachel said, now slinking away into the crowd, leaving Oliver to stand alone. As she made her way to one of the many refreshments tables, she bumped elbows with another woman standing there, and immediately recognized the charm bracelet dangling from her wrist. Rachel groaned and mumbled, "oh no" under her breath as the woman turned towards her.

"Rachel!" she said, grabbing and hugging her firmly.

"Hello Kelly," Rachel managed to say back, trying not to feel embarrassed.

                                                                                                ***

Calvin Klepper was sitting in on a small stairway right outside of the school near the backdoor of the auditorium, trying to escape the noise and commotion. He sighed and stroked his short beard, wishing he could be home right now. He pulled his wallet out and flipped it open, letting the pictures hang down like an accordian. He smiled faintly, and suddenly felt tears rolling down his face. He wiped them away swiftly with his sleeve, before collapsing his wallet again and stuffing it back into his coat pocket.

Just then he saw a pair of headlights pull into the parking lot, and watched as a nice car parked, and two adults stepped out. He instantly recognized Wyatt Bloom's voice, despite not having heard it in so many years. He could hear the woman, whom he recognized just as quickly as being Scarlett, laugh loudly, and watched as the two of them headed for the auditorium. He shook his head and continued to drink from his thermos full of coffee.

The last person he'd want to see would be Wyatt Bloom.

                                                                                                  ***

Rachel couldn't stand being squeezed this tightly, and struggled to pull away from Kelly Schuester's grip. After she finally managed to wriggle away, she stepped back and, politely, patted Kelly on the shoulder like an awkward family reunion with someone you hadn't seen since you were a baby.

"It's so good to see you!" Kelly said.

Kelly, from the looks of things, hadn't changed. She still somehow had braces, and her hair was still in braided pigtails. She looked exactly the same as she had when she and Rachel had been friends in school. Rachel had tried not to be so judgemental but it was hard, because here she was, thinking that Kelly apparently even still had her parents dress her, considering how awful her outfit was.

"Gee, you look exactly the same!" Kelly said, looking embarrassed now for having been so clingy.

"Uh, same to you," Rachel replied, trying to make her response not sound as harsh as she meant it to.

"I'm sorry, I was just...I was really hoping you'd show up, and until I saw you, I was doubting myself for even coming," Kelly said, "I mean, it's not like anyone else here is interested in seeing me, but I knew if you at least showed up, then it would've been worth it."

Okay, now Rachel felt bad. She actually hadn't even really not expected Kelly to be here, it was more that she'd completely forgotten about her altogether. Rachel quickly looked around for a way to escape from this torturous experience, only to spot the backdoor. She bit her lip and then looked back at Kelly, who was digging into her purse.

"You need to see this!" she said, "I brought it with just to show you!"

"Kelly, that's great, get it ready and I will be right back, okay?" Rachel said, quickly excusing herself towards the backdoor. As she pushed on the metal bar across the door, it lunged forward, letting her stumble out onto the small landing near the stone stair steps, only to find herself now next to Calvin, who was looking at her in surprise.

"It's hell in there, isn't it?" Calvin asked.

"It's weird," Rachel managed to say as she seated herself beside him and tossed her hair back, adding, "god, I didn't expect myself to get overwhelmed like this, but it's so painful to come back to such an awful place, full of such awful people who made awful memories for you but don't remember them themself. Somehow those formative moments for you were just another average day for them."

"Ran into an old friend?" Calvin asked, making her smirk.

"Yeah," she said, "and it's like, I feel bad, but...that's what high school is, right? You're friends because of the proximity, because nobody else will be friends with you, right? It's friendship based on survival and necessity, not genuine interest."

"Sure," Calvin said, "That's a fair assessment."

"Are you waiting for someone?" Rachel asked.

"Nah, I just don't wanna be in there," Calvin said, "You?"

"I came for the very same reason others came. To see someone. But I haven't seen her yet, so, I don't know if she even showed up," Rachel said, sighing, tugging at her hair, playing with it absentmindedly, continuing, "besides, she wouldn't even know me, so really I'm no better than the awkward weirdos I'm trying to avoid."

"I've seen everyone arrive, I could tell you if she's here or not," Calvin said.

"Sun Rai? Do you remember Sun Rai? She was the Vietnamese girl who was, like, the only foreign student who attended here? She was mostly in honors classes, but she and I shared gym class, and she got to sit out cause her parents paid the gym teacher off, and I got to sit out cause of my asthma, so we talked a bit, but only during those classes."

"I think I do remember her, yeah," Calvin said, "I don't think she showed up. I would've seen her, being the only foreign person to attend here. Sorry."

"It's fine. It's my fault for being dumb enough to expect her to come back," Rachel said, sighing sadly, "I guess that's what I get for getting my hopes up."

"That's the spirit," Calvin said, patting her back, "never expect anything good, cause reality will come and snatch it away."

Calvin's attitude at least made Rachel feel a bit better, being rather cynical herself. Rachel didn't want to go back inside to Kelly, so she opted instead to stay out here with Calvin and just talk shit about their former classmates, because as she'd learned during her friendship with Kelly, misery loves company.

                                                                                                 ***

"What?" Scarlett asked, mouth agape, eyes wide at this news Oliver had just told them.

"Yeah," Oliver said, "Robbie died in a car accident a few weeks ago, I'm surprised you guys didn't see the news."

"Jesus," Wyatt said, pinching his forehead, "that's...that's tragic. I feel so bad. I was hoping he'd be here. I need a minute."

Wyatt walked off, trying to process this. He hadn't expected people his age to already be dead, especially not people he'd known. He'd known it was always a possibility, but he'd always just pushed the possibility out of his head. He walked calmly through the crowd, finally reaching a table where an African American woman was seated, rubbing her feet. Wyatt said at the same table, and casually glanced over at her.

"You okay?" she asked, "You need aspirin?"

"No, I'll...I'll be okay. You?" he asked, pointing at her feet.

"These shoes are killing me. I never get out, so I never wear any nice shoes," she said, "bad enough to have to pay for a babysitter, but now I gotta walk for hours in these stupid spiked death traps."

Wyatt chuckled and looked at the nametag sticker she had on her jacket.

"Celia Moss," he read, "Celia Moss...why's that name sound so familiar?"

"Because I'm responsible for shutting down BigDrip last year," Celia said.

"Riiiight! They dumped excess oil in nearby lakes to write it off as stolen, so not only defrauding the government but also endangering the environment, that was a big damn deal," Wyatt said, "Well good for you, those guys were scum."

"Thanks," Celia said, smiling faintly, "and yes, they really were."

"So you're a lawyer or something?" Wyatt asked.

"An environmental lawyer, yeah," Celia said.

"That's really cool."

The two of them looked back out at the crowd, dancing, chatting, enjoying themselves as if they were still in high school. Wyatt loosened his tie and leaned back in his chair, crossing his legs. Celia looked over at him and nodded.

"I like your tie," she said, "it's very fun, makes you very approachable."

Wyatt smiled again, almost blushing now.

"...I just learned a friend of mine died a few weeks ago," he said, "and it only reinforced the truth that I didn't wanna come back here. Most of these people were horrible when we were teenagers, and really they're no different as adults. They just aren't as open about it. Everyone has secrets. But...the fact that they're not as transparent is almost worse. At least when you're a teenager you almost take pride in your sleaze. You knew where everyone stood. Now I don't know who to trust, and frankly I don't feel like I'm that person anymore."

"I know what you mean," Celia said, strapping her shoes back on, "I don't feel like I relate to any of these people anymore either. I feel like just an ordinary, boring adult. Just another aging skeleton on a dying planet, clawing against the ever oncoming inevitable darkness."

"Jeez, Kafka," Wyatt said, "Save some edge for the rest of us."

Celia laughed loudly, throwing her head back, "I just...you know what I mean!" she said, "It's like...I feel like I matured, and these people didn't. I do what has to be done now because it's the right thing to do, not because it's what I want to do. I don't do it for my own selfish needs."

"Right. I wanna be a better person than I was in high school, otherwise what's the point of aging? I wanna be, just...you know, like...someone who grows, someone who learns and changes. I wanna be normal and boring and ordinary. Just one of the everyday people."

Celia nodded, feeling herself warm up to him. Wyatt smiled at her, feeling shy now about conversing this freely with a stranger. He adjusted his tie, smoothing it out, looking down at his dress shoes.

"Anyway, sorry to get so philosophical," he said.

"It's fine. Probably the most enlightening conversation I'll have all night, so thank you," Celia said softly.

And then Scarlett appeared at the table. She and Celia greeted one another politely before Celia excused herself, and Scarlett dragged Wyatt back to the crowd, to listen to more inane banter about people he'd rather have forgotten.

                                                                                             ***

On the drive home later, he looked over at his wife, half asleep in the passenger seat, somewhat tipsy from having drank most of the night, and he smiled. He reached over with his free hand and squeezed one of her hands. When they pulled into the driveway, he carried her inside and, after putting her to bed, he drove the babysitter home. When he got home, he pulled out the senior yearbook and turned to his graduating class, running his index finger along the page until he came across Celia's picture, and he smiled. That was a friendship he'd like to have.

Rachel, on the other hand, had arrived home in worst shape than she'd been in when she'd left. She cried all the way home, so when she got back to her dingy studio apartment over the coffee shop she worked at, she wiped all her now running makeup off her face and then took a quick shower. She laid on the couch and turned the television on, but put it on mute. She pulled out a photo of Sun Rai she'd clipped from the school paper back in the day - Sun in a beautiful suit at a debate tournament - and felt like she wanted to throw up. She'd tried so hard to forget Sun Rai, but she never could. She loved her just as much now as she had back then.

Calvin also returned home to less than stellar feelings. His folks weren't up when he got in, which he was grateful for, but he did find his mom had left him some dinner. He reheated it and ate before heading out to the shed in the backyard and locking the door behind him after entering. Once inside, he pulled out his tools and started back to work on his project, occasionally glancing up at the photo pinned on a corkboard on the wall, featuring a beautiful woman and two cute little girls. He was doing this for them, and he wouldn't them down.

And Celia arrived back home to her son happy to see her, and she wasn't even annoyed he was still awake. If anything, she was grateful. She cherished any time she got to spend with him. She relieved her babysitter, and then the two of them ate ice cream in her large bed, watching cartoons until he finally fell asleep against her, and she would then carry him to his bed, tucking him in. She'd stroke his hair and kiss his forehead. At least something good had come from that marriage.

And Kelly got home, only to curl up with her dog on her couch, and eat popcorn most of the evening as she watched nature documentaries. All she'd wanted to do was reconnect with her best friend, and Rachel had spent most of her time outside with Calvin. Kelly tried not to take it too personally, but it was hard not to, especially when the last thing Rachel had said to Kelly in high school had been to leave her alone because she was so lame. Stuff like that still stung so many years later.

But while everyone else arrived home with quiet and uneventful feelings, Oliver's arrival at the house was anything but. His daughters were looking out their bedroom window when they saw him pull into the driveway, and they quickly rushed and piled stuffed animals under their blankets in their beds, before hiding in the closet, just like most nights. He never came in and checked to see if it was really them, which they were thankful for. They just knew that most of the time, unless it was time for them to work again, he would leave them alone.

As Oliver climbed into bed, clicking his bedside lamp off, his wife, lying on her side, asked a question in the meekest voice.

"Did you have a good time?" she asked.

"It was fine," he said, removing his glasses and putting them on the nightstand.

"That's good," she mumbled, waiting for him to drift off so she could get back up and continue coming up with a plan on how to get away from this house. Away from this man. Because truth was, the men who seemed the worst like Wyatt often grew to be the best, and the men who went out of their way to appear the best, like Oliver, were actually the monsters. Passing themselves off as your average neighbor, citizen, upstanding friend and family member. Someone you'd never expect. They didn't look like monsters.

They just looked like everyday people.