Kelly had tried a few subtle phrases and suggestions while she and Arnold texted back and forth, just to see if he would pick up on her wanting to stay his girlfriend, and he ignored them. After an hour of trying, she started to ask him more direct things. She asked him to do things that usually only boyfriends and girlfriends do, and to her dismay, he flatly refused.

Kelly gripped her cell phone hard and did her best to hold onto her anger and not throw her phone across the room. He won't even let me try to give him a blowjob, even after all the times I let him go down on me! She thought in surprise.

She took in a deep breath through her nose and let it out through her mouth. She tried to plead and appeal to his sense of fair play and reciprocation, and he responded that he wasn't her boyfriend and she didn't have to do things like that with him anymore. She even flat out asked him to be her boyfriend, and he refused.

'We are friends and roommates.' Arnold typed. 'I was told that I don't have time for that relationship nonsense.'

'What? Explain that!' Kelly typed back and willed her anger into the phone.

'No girlfriend and boyfriend crap, no commitment garbage, and definitely no drama.' Arnold typed as he repeated the words Pam had said to him.

'ARNOLD!'

'Your father said we can't date, Kelly. We broke up. What else do you want me to say?'

'That you won't listen to my father!'

'He's right. I hurt you and will keep hurting you. I don't want to.' Arnold typed. 'Mom's back. I have to go.'

'Arnold! I'm talking to you!' Kelly typed and sent it... then her phone beeped. Message could not be sent. She read. “Goddammit!” She said loudly and then she heard running footsteps.

“Dear? Is something wrong?” Katheryn asked as she opened Kelly's bedroom door all the way. It had only been open a crack. “Do you need some more pain medication?”

Kelly looked at her mother's concerned face and sighed. “No, Mom. What I need is a new body.”

Katheryn sighed as well and came into the room, then carefully sat on the side of her daughter's bed. “Kelly, it's not your fault. Your body just has a quirk that makes it a bit more difficult to have sex.”

“Mom, it cost me my first serious boyfriend.” Kelly said. “What else is it going to cost me?”

“Kelly, dear.” Katheryn took her hand, pulled the phone out of it, and put the phone on the nightstand. “You need to rest and recover. You can worry about what to do about your love life when you're better.”

“Mom...” Kelly shook her head. “...never mind.”

Katheryn gave her daughter's hand a squeeze. “You're young. Everything that happens to you is a world changing event.”

Kelly squinted her eyes at her. “Don't make fun of me.”

Katheryn smiled. “I'm not. It's literally true.” She said. “Your whole world changed since this morning, hasn't it?”

Kelly opened her mouth to say it hadn't changed very much, then thought about everything that happened and how much her life had changed because of it.

“You see?” Katheryn said. “All the things that have happened has changed your world each time. Being Heather's friend? Your world changed. Not being her friend? Changed again. Dating Arnold? It changed. Meeting new friends? It changed again. Graduating high school? Completely changed it.”

“I get it.” Kelly let out another sigh. “Mom, I don't want my world to change from the last one.”

“You're too late, dear. It's already changed.” Katheryn said and stood up as she let her daughter's hand go. “You just have to decide what you want to do with the new one until it changes again.”

Kelly watched her mother smile sadly and slowly shut her door almost all the way.

*

“No, Arnold. Don't get up.” Annie said and brought in two bags of groceries. “The doctor said not to move too much for a couple of days.”

Arnold sat back down on the couch and watched as his mother made ten trips outside and back with bags of groceries. Luckily, most of the things she bought had long expiry dates, because she had forgotten that it was only going to be her living in the house for a week while Kelly recovered at home.

Annie hadn't had to carry in her own groceries all by herself in a long time, so she was quite slow about it. She didn't bother pre-sorting like Arnold did and emptied each bag as she opened it and put the things away. It took a while doing it like that, too. She was nowhere near as proficient as Arnold was, so she made a bit of a mess of it. She closed the last cupboard and stood up straight.

Am I so scared of living alone that I force myself to be terrible at things like this? Annie asked herself and shook her head. She left the kitchen and went to the living room. “Arnold, are you hungry?”

“Yes.” Arnold said.

“I'll make some sandwiches and be right back.” Annie said and quickly did so and went back to the living room after grabbing the second cold compress from the freezer. She exchanged it with the one Arnold had and then sat down on the chair beside the couch. They ate and Annie looked at Arnold reclining slightly on the couch.

Annie immediately became angry at Kevin. Not for hurting her boy, because that was a given and simmered in the back of her mind all the time. It was because with Arnold's face damaged, she wouldn't be able to sit on the couch and let him rest his head on her lap to watch television together. It was the little things that they couldn't do together that bothered her the most.

When they finished eating, Annie stood up and walked over to him and gave him a kiss that was half on the cheek and half on the lips. That bothered her as well, so she held it for a few seconds.

“I love you, Arnold.” Annie said.

“I love you too, Mom.” Arnold said.

Annie took the empty plate and went back to the kitchen, rinsed it off, then went back to the living room. She sat down on the chair again and tried to watch television. Her eyes kept drifting away and she looked at Arnold. He almost looked forlorn as he sat there all alone on the couch. She knew she was projecting her own interpretation of what he was feeling onto him; but, she couldn't help it and sympathized with his predicament.

Annie believed that the worst part about the whole thing was that he had hurt Kelly. Her son hadn't had to deal with the emotions of hurting someone before and she wasn't sure how she could talk to him about it. If she came right out and said something, she was sure that he would tell her that he was fine. She knew he wasn't, especially after what he said in the waiting room at the hospital to Kelly.

He said he wasn't okay because he loved her and couldn't make love to her. Annie thought and fought her own emotional reaction. She felt so bad for him that this had to happen, and she was sure that there wasn't anything she could do to make him okay with it. Only making love to Kelly would fix what's wrong and that's not going to happen. She thought. Arnold said he doesn't want to hurt her anymore.

Annie sighed and kept watching television. Her hand slowly rubbed the chair arm, as if it was Arnold's chest, and she didn't even realize she was doing it.

The afternoon passed and she made supper, making sure that it was easily chewed, so Arnold wouldn't have any trouble eating it. After that, there wasn't really much left for them to do except watch television, so that's what they did for the rest of the evening.

When it was time to go to bed, Arnold said that he would stay on the couch. Annie thought that he didn't want to go upstairs and use the bed that he and Kelly had tried to use together, and she gave him a very gentle hug and another kiss. She wasn't sure how she was going to ease his trauma over the bed, either. Just buying a new bed wouldn't help, because it was still a bed and would still be in his room.

“I'll grab a thicker blanket and another pillow for you.” Annie said and quickly did so from the upstairs closet and helped Arnold recline a little more. She replaced his cold compress and looked at his face. “I can't tell if the swelling's gone down or not.”

“Me, either.” Arnold said.

“I'll be down during the night to check on you and to replace the compress.” Annie said.

“Thank you.” Arnold said and puckered his lips a little bit, since that was all he could manage.

Annie took the hint though and gave him a quick kiss that was half on his lips and half on his cheek. “Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.” Arnold said.

*

Detective Tanner was not a happy woman. She looked at her now completely empty white board in her living room and cursed silently. IA had 'visited' her home and had taken every piece of evidence that she had gathered on Arnold. All the photos, witness statements, and copies of the case files she believed or suspected that Arnold was involved in.

The IA agents didn't see it the same way that she did, though. She saw it as incriminating the young man and established his extensive criminal history. They saw it as incriminating her, because it established her obsession with Arnold and how extensively she had researched him without police approval. She tried to explain that it was independent research and the two IA agents almost laughed in her face.

As it was, she now had no official power to do anything. She knew it would take them a while to go through everything, though. Which meant that she had quite some time before she was called in for a hearing about her conduct. She smiled and sat down on her couch. She had memorized everything she had gathered and she knew she could justify everything she did.

Even this latest incident with Arnold's assault. She had only stepped in when she believed there was a danger of someone being seriously hurt... and Kevin was. Again. Arnold's vicious forearm beating had messed Kevin's face up badly in only a couple of seconds and it had knocked him out.

He must have a glass jaw. Detective Tanner thought without making the connection that Arnold hit very hard.

In any case, she hadn't told Kevin any privileged information or divulged any case restricted secrets. All she did was tell him her suspicions and let him draw his own conclusions. So, even if he told them everything, which she sincerely doubted, it wasn't as bad as the chief made it out to be.

She also knew that Internal Affairs was grasping at straws when they said they were going to investigate all of her other cases for questionable behavior on her part. She had been well above standards in everything else she had ever done, because she was a woman and nothing less than the best was acceptable, as far as she was concerned.

Detective Tanner spent years proving that she was better than everyone else, just to maintain the same level of status as the other detectives. It wasn't until she had stumbled across Arnold that her personal feelings had started to interfere with her work ethic. She wasn't sure why he had her mind ringing alarm bells, just that he did and she knew for a fact that she had to prove he was doing something criminal.

Now she had the next few months off while they wasted their time investigating her, when they should have been investigating Arnold like she was. She wasn't sure how she could keep her own investigation going and not attract attention, so she accepted that she would have to back off for a while. That irked her; but, there was nothing else to be done about it.

Detective Tanner would bide her time and wait patiently for an opportunity that she knew was coming. She hoped that Arnold would screw up soon and she would be there to pounce on him. She would point to him and say, 'Aha! I told you!', and everyone would have to admit that she was right. She laid back on her couch and closed her eyes as she replayed that fantasy in her head.

It gave her a warm feeling to catch a bad guy that no one knew about and she drifted off to sleep with a smile on her face.

*

Kelly laid in bed and felt sore and uncomfortable between her legs. She tried again to text Arnold and received the same message about it not being delivered. She sighed and put her phone down.

I can't believe that he turned off his phone and left it off, just so he wouldn't have to talk to me. Kelly thought and looked at the time and sighed. She couldn't call the house line and she didn't want to bother Annie on her recently acquired outdated cell phone, either. She had gotten it cheap and the cell phone plan was ridiculously cheap.

Kelly worried about what to do for a while and fell asleep without resolving anything. She might have slept better if she had known that Arnold had simply forgotten to turn his cell phone back on.

*

Annie came down the stairs in the middle of the night and she wore a small t-shirt and a tiny pair of shorts. She stifled her yawn and went to the refrigerator and grabbed the cold compress from the freezer. She walked over to the living room and saw her son had rolled onto his side, which made his head hang partially off the couch. The compress he had was on the floor and he was deep asleep.

Annie smiled and shook her head at him, then carefully pushed him back onto his back and into a reclining position. You're lucky you rolled onto the good side of your face. She thought and gently stroked his head. My poor boy. She let out a soft sigh. I wish I could hold you in my arms and make everything better.

Arnold's breathing sped up slightly and his good eye opened a little bit.

“Go back to sleep, sweetie.” Annie whispered. “We can leave the cold compress off until the morning.”

“Kay.” Arnold mumbled and closed his eyes and went right back to sleep.

If only everything was that simple to deal with. Annie thought, gave him a kiss, then picked up the compress he had dropped. She wiped it off and took it to the kitchen and put both of them in the refrigerator freezer. She went up the stairs after checking on Arnold one more time, and went to bed.

The next morning, they were both still tired, so Annie stayed with him for an hour to make sure that he had at least some cold applied to his face, then she put it down. After that, she somehow squeezed onto the couch beside him and tucked herself under his arm, then they both went back to sleep.

It was the best nap that Annie had had in a long time. She woke up and felt comforted, even though she knew she was supposed to be the one comforting her son. She stirred and sat up to look at him, only to see him staring back at her with his unobstructed eye, fully awake, and she thought that maybe she had comforted him after all.

“I think your face looks a little better... or I'm getting used to seeing you like that.” Annie said. “I really hope I'm not getting used to it.”

“It'ss not ass pufffy.” Arnold said and opened his mouth and it mostly opened.

“That does work a little better.” Annie said and stood up. “I'll be right back with the other compress.” She said and took the warm one and replaced it with the cold one, then went back to the living room.

“Thankss.” Arnold said and rested it against the side of his face.

“I think we need to decide if you can go back to the college tonight.” Annie said.

“I havve work in the morning.” Arnold said.

Annie opened her mouth to say something, then closed it. I don't think I can tell him how difficult it's been for me as I try looking for work myself. She thought. My resume isn't even a single page long and no one looks at it when I pass it to them. I don't think they even read my job applications. “We can see how you're feeling tonight. If you can open that eye a little by then... and don't you dare force it... I'll let you go back to the college on the bus. If it doesn't, then you'll have to spend another day here. Does that sound fair?”

Arnold nodded.

“Okay. I'll do my best to help you and I'll keep the cold compresses coming.”

“Thank you.” Arnold said and puckered his lips. Annie chuckled and gave him a quick kiss. She got it mostly on his lips this time, too. They spent the rest of the day trying to heal him up as much as possible, ate good food, and waited patiently.

An hour before the bus was to arrive to take him to the college, Annie looked at his face and nodded. Arnold slowly opened his swollen eye a quarter of an inch, without straining or using his fingers to cheat.

“All right.” Annie said. She didn't try to hide the fact that she wanted him to stay another day; but, she quickly got his things ready and helped him dress, then switched out his compress for a cold one and put the warm one in his backpack. “Do the same thing we did last night with it. Keep it on until it's time to go to bed. If you wake up, apply the fresh one for an hour, then leave it until the morning.”

“Okay.” Arnold said. They climbed into the car and Annie drove him to the bus stop.

“Call me as soon as you get there and let me know you're okay.” Annie said and he nodded. “I won't call or bother you at work, so if anything else happens, we can talk in the evenings.”

Arnold nodded again and they sat there and waited for the bus. Annie had timed it well and only a few minutes later, it approached from down the street.

“Be safe.” Annie said and gave him a quick kiss. “I'll come to the college next weekend to see you.”

“Okay.” Arnold said and left the car with his backpack and his phone that was still turned off.