Elizabeth Eulberg: The Lonely Hearts Club

"Does it even matter?" he replied as he leaned his head against the wall.

"Yes, it does, if it's important to you."

"Well, I can't have it, so what's the point?"

This was such a different side to Ryan — he was so vulnerable. It made me like him even more. I reached out and held his hand again. "Ryan, you're an amazing person and you do deserve whatever you want."

He looked down at my hand in his. "I'm not stupid, so I'm willing to settle."

I was confused; I had no idea what he was talking about. He reached out his free hand and cupped my chin. "I know things have been weird, but can we please have things go back to normal between us?"

I didn't know if that was even possible. What was normal anymore?

I nodded. "I'm really sorry for everything. Rosanna was just..."

"I know," he said as he put his hand back down and took his other hand away from mine. I had the urge to grab it again, but resisted.

"Well." I hit him on the knee. "Leave it to you. You come in here with your sister and you end up making me feel better."

"Yeah, well, leave it to Mr. Perfect…"

I laughed. "Hardly. Don't forget I overheard you singing at the concert and you, mister, have a little problem with pitch. I say you're far from perfect."

He shook his head and we sat in silence. I started to hum along to the Muzak playing in the background.

"Oh my God," I said.

Ryan looked up. "What's wrong?"

I shook my head, "Nothing, it's just…" I went over to the front desk and turned up the volume, "Seems to be appropriate, don't you think?" I started to sing along to the music playing.

Won't you please, please help me.

"You have no idea." He breathed what appeared to be a sigh of relief.

Dad came out a few minutes later, holding Katie's hand. Her mouth looked a lot better, besides the gauze that Dad affixed to help slow the bleeding. Ryan jumped out of his chair and was on his knees hugging her.

"Dr. Bloom, thank you so much. I'm so sorry for having to call you at home — I just didn't know what to do."

My dad shook Ryan's hand. "No worries — you did the right thing."

Katie came over to me and extended Abbey in her small arms, I bent down. "You know, I think you might need Abbey more than me."

Her face lit up and she ran over to Ryan and grabbed his leg.

"Well," he said, "I guess we should go. Thanks again, Dr. Bloom."

He walked over to me, saying "Thanks, Penny" as he gave me a hug. Then he leaned down and kissed me on the cheek.

I saw the surprised look on my dad's face. As we let them out the front door, he looked at me. "So.. that Ryan. Great guy, huh?"

You have no idea, I thought.

With a Little Help From My Friends

"I get by with a little help from my friends…"

USUALLY AFTER A BREAK, I dreaded going back to school. But I couldn't wait to see Ryan, to see if things were really okay between us.

We fell quickly back in place, and I practically ran to my locker between classes. Instead of dread, I started to look forward to my between-class teasing session. Usually I told him how many ways he wasn't perfect, and he commented on the unfortunate shape of my head from my bunk bed trauma.

"Come to think of it, I never see you wear hats — is that because of the, you know, accident" He tugged on my scarf as I was buttoning up my wool coat.

"Gee, let me think. I've never seen you play a musical instrument — is that maybe because you're completely inept at anything related to music?"

I wrapped my scarf around my neck so it smacked him in the head every time it circled around.

"Oh, excuse me."

"Penny!" I heard someone cry from across the hall. I saw Jen running toward me, with Tracy following quickly behind her.

This couldn't be good.

Tracy broke the news. "Principal Braddock told her that we can't have the karaoke night in the gymnasium anymore."

"What?" I screamed. "It's four days away!"

Jen took a deep breath, "He said that he feels it's turned into a Lonely Hearts Club event and that it can't be on school grounds!"

"That doesn't make any sense!" I protested, "We're raising money for the basketball team. We're just helping because you're our friend. Everybody's invited."

Jen put her head in her hands. "I just don't know what we're going to do. We've all worked so hard."

Tracy sat down and put her hand around Jen's shaking body. "It's okay, we'll just have to postpone it until…"

"The hell we are!" I proclaimed. Both Tracy and Jen looked up at me in shock. "We're going to have this party and raise so much flippin' money that the basketball team is going to have the best uniforms in the school's history."

Tracy looked at me like I had gone insane. "But, Pen, we can't use the school."

"Then we'll find somewhere else to have it. I am so sick of all the drama. Seriously, what's the point of having the Club if we can't find a way to overcome these little obstacles?"

"But all of the flyers have been put up… " Jen argued.

"So we'll make new ones. Screw Principal Braddock — let's show him how much power we really have," Now even I was a little surprised by myself. "Let's go to my house — we've got some phone calls to make."

In less than an hour, all thirty members of the Lonely Hearts Club were at my house, ready to step into action. My parents had ordered pizza for the group as we analyzed our options.

"I still say all the parents need to get together and talk to Braddock," Dad said, opening up a pizza box and helping himself to another slice.

I shook my head. "No, we need to do this on our own and show him that we can stand on our own two feet. We can handle whatever he's going to throw at us."

Dad nodded while he chewed, looking around the room, clearly happy to be in the middle of all the excitement.

"All right, here's the deal," Eileen Vodak said as she came into the basement. "My uncle will let us use the event space at the Bowlarama for free, but since it's a Saturday night and he'll have to turn away paying customers, he asks that we don't bring in any food but have people buy sodas and snacks. Or, if we give him $5 a person, they will cater the event for us with soda and chips and stuff"

"But that's going to cut into the profit," Jen replied as she sat nervously on the floor.

"Exactly how many people are you expecting?" Dad asked.

Jen picked at her uneaten slice of pepperoni, "I have no idea — fifty?"

"But fifty hardly covers the Club and the basketball team," Diane reminded us.

"Wow, you're right. I guess a hundred or a hundred and fifty." Jen started writing figures down in her notepad.

Dad looked over Jen's shoulder at her writing. "Come to think of it, Jen, I don't think the Bloom Dental Office has made a donation to the team this year. How about this — you guys pull this off and I'll pay for the refreshments?"

Jen looked up at my dad with her big blue eyes, and for the first time all night she smiled. "Dr. Bloom, thank you so much." She got up and threw her arms around him. "I promise to start flossing every day!"

Dad laughed. "Well, that's just great."

I think that might have made his day more than saving the basketball team.

"Okay." Jen nervously bit her lip. "I guess all we need to do now is to let everybody know about the location change. We've got flyers… I guess that will be enough." She didn't seem convinced.

"We should make an announcement over the PA system," Tracy said, drawing a microphone on poster board. "Like Braddock would ever let that happen. I just wish I could find a way to get in there and do it."

"You can't," Diane told her.

"Well, I know that. I was just joking," Tracy responded.