A little while later, the two of them make it to the food court.
"Is there anything special you want?" Clyde asks.
"Um...probably just a vanilla fro-yo," Lucy whispers.
"Any toppings?" Clyde wonders.
"Just chocolate sauce," Lucy replies.
"Ok then. I'll get us some and you find a table," Clyde instructed.
"Alright," Lucy answers.
While Clyde heads to the fro-yo place, Lucy walks around the food court and looks around for a table they could sit at. She wanted to find a place that didn't have a ton of people surrounding it. When she finally finds a table she thinks will suit them, she sits down. Luckily, it was just a few feet away from the fro-yo place.
A few minutes later, Clyde has gotten a vanilla fro-yo with chocolate sauce for Lucy and a vanilla fro-yo with strawberry and caramel sauce for himself. After exiting the fro-yo place with his and Lucy's desserts in each hand, Clyde was able to spot Lucy right away and approaches her.
"Here you go," Clyde says as he slid Lucy's fro-yo towards her.
"Thank you," Lucy thanks him.
Once Clyde sat down with his own fro-yo in front of him, his phone rings and vibrates for the second time, with the first time occuring while in the store.
"Hold on," He tells Lucy.
Clyde removes his phone from his pocket, "Hello?" He answers.
"Hi dads. Sorry I didn't answer, I was getting me and Lucy some fro-yo. Frozen yogurt. Don't worry, I will not get a brain freeze. Yes, I know that if I do, I should not hit my forehead..."
While Clyde still had his phone next to his ear, he looked at Lucy and pointed to his phone while making the crazy gesture. Lucy gave a tiny grin as a result.
"It only cost $8.50. Because I got Lucy one too. Ok, I promise I'll answer next time you call. I love you too. Bye," Clyde finally hangs up.
He turns to Lucy, "Sorry about that," Clyde apologizes.
"It's fine," Lucy answers.
"Ok, so I wanted to tell you that I've been thinking about something that Dr. Lopez taught me. She says that talking to someone about any problems you have can really help," Clyde began.
"With that said, why don't you talk to me about Rocky. It'll help you not to miss him so much. Trust me, Dr. Lopez knows what she's talking about," Clyde suggested as he started eating some of his fro-yo.
"What specifically do you want to know?" Lucy wonders.
"I dunno. Your backstory? How he makes you feel? That kind of stuff," Clyde shrugs.
"Let's see," Lucy began, "For starters, when I first laid eyes on him, I was blown away by how cute he was. I tried to socialize with him, namely showing him my fake blood, but unfortunately that didn't go so well."
Lucy paused for a moment to take a couple bites of her fro-yo. After a few seconds of indulging in her frozen treat, she decides to continue.
"Lincoln told me that Rocky's regular and normal. I took that to mean that I had to change my appearance and behavior in order for him to like me, which my sisters were all too eager to do. Lori decided to take the two of us on a double date with her and Bobby. Things didn't go well on the date, so I came to the conclusion that Rocky didn't like me period," Lucy continued.
Once again she stopped to eat some more fro-yo. "Then what happened?" Clyde wondered.
Lucy proceeded to continue her and Rocky's backstory, "The next day, Rocky and I had a better conversation. I told him that I'm going to be myself, and he was actually happy about that. He said that he actually does like me but he was too nervous to talk to me at first because he thought I was too cool for him."
"I bet that made you feel better about yourself," Clyde assumes.
"Yes it did," Lucy answers, "Two weeks after that, we went to our first dance with Lincoln and Ronnie Anne..."
"Sorry to interrupt, but was it the Spring is in the Air dance?" Clyde interrupted.
"Yes," Lucy proceeded, "Anyway, he looked so handsome in his green shirt, green tie, and black suit..."
Lucy could feel her cheeks growing red and hot, "Sorry about that," She whispers.
"Not at all," Clyde says.
"At the dance I had a, for lack of a better word, magical night with him. We danced together, we took a photo together, which I still have, and we even stared at the moon together. Sigh, then came one of the best moments of my life: we kissed," Lucy sighed in a lovestruck tone.
"So, you kissed him, eh?" Clyde replies in a somewhat teasing tone.
"Sigh, yes. It was such a wonderful feeling, especially since it was both our first kiss," Lucy sighed.
"Whenever you're around him, how does he make you feel?" Clyde questioned.
"He makes me feel a lot of things," Lucy explains, "He makes me feel happy and beautiful, which might be how Lori feels when she's around Bobby. But I think it goes beyond that. He makes me feel...important. That I matter as a human being."
"Oh? Tell me more," Clyde begs.
"He's so accepting of everything I do, even if it comes across as weird to everyone else. When he said that he likes me for me, my self-esteem suddenly increased and I had this feeling that I'm respected by someone. What's more is that he's romantically interested in me. These feelings might still be there if he was just a friend, but the fact that he's my boyfriend, meaning a boy that's romantically inclined towards me just makes these feelings all the stronger," Lucy says.
After that very long explanation about how much Rocky means to her, she went back to eating her fro-yo in silence.
"Wow, I had no idea he was so special to you," Clyde comments.
Lucy does not answer him. Instead she keeps eating her fro-yo. She's starting to miss Rocky again.
Clyde takes notice of this and starts to ask, "Do you truly miss him? How much?"
Lucy looks up at Clyde, "I do miss him, a lot actually. The funny thing is that I probably wouldn't miss him so much if he wasn't gone for so long. He's only been gone for four days and I still have ten more to go," She mumbled.
"After hearing your story, I can understand perfectly why you would feel lonely. I remember that Lincoln also felt pretty lonely when Ronnie Anne and Bobby left," Clyde acknowledged.
"That's what Lori said," Lucy replied.
"At least Rocky will be back. It could be worse, he could be gone forever," Clyde points out.
Lucy immediately takes her eyes off of Clyde and eats some of her fro-yo and eats some more of her fro-yo, which is almost gone at this point. As she watches her eat while staring down, Clyde wonders if he was being insensitive with what he said. Fearing that he was, he ate his own fro-yo.
While the two kids silently ate their frozen treats, Lucy processed what Clyde said about how she should be grateful that Rocky won't be gone forever. Even though it wasn't something she entirely wanted to hear, she did realize that her beloved definitely will come back and she can see him again. She can't wait for that day.
A few minutes later, the two of them looked each other in the eyes again.
"You know, you're right. Even though it'll be a while before he comes home, he will be back and we can be together," Lucy says in relief.
She reaches across the table and grabs Clyde's hand, briefly catching him off guard.
"Thank you for doing this Clyde. My siblings just tried to cheer me up but didn't really take the time to talk to me and listen to me. This was actually a lot more helpful than I give it credit for," Lucy says gratefully.
Clyde smiles at her, "Of course Lucy. And like I said, this was mostly Dr. Lopez's doing, so we really have her to thank," He says.
Lucy gives a nervous little frown, "If this isn't too much to ask, do you think we can hang out like this again? This actually might help me get through the two weeks," She wonders.
Clyde was a little surprised by her request. Then again, she did say that this time with him helped a lot. Not just that, he quite enjoyed this time, even more than he thought he would. So he decides to oblige.
"Of course Lucy. If this will really help you, then I'd be more than willing to continue doing this," Clyde replied with a smile.
(A/N: Lucy talking about going to a dance with Rocky is referencing a previous fanfiction that I wrote called "A Lucky Dance".)