Recap: Russel and Feign aged into teens, Cid started learning the inventing trait, Russel met a teenage fairy at the park and proceeded to get grounded when he stayed out after curfew to talk to her.

Russel was not allowed to leave the house for any reason other than school. Every night, he found himself dreaming of Lena and her lovely wings. He couldn’t stand not being able to see her, so he started writing her letters and mailing them in secret. He originally intended for the letters to be completely platonic, but after awhile, he sent her romantic messages. There was just something about her snobbish personality, the scowls she gave him when he tried presenting her with a gift, and those wings… those gorgeous, green wings…

His letters must have charmed her after awhile, because she showed up on his doorstep unannounced one night.

“Lena!” he cried.

She put her hands on her hips. “Well? Are you going to let me in or what?”

He gently grabbed her shoulders and moved her away from the door. “Lena, I’m grounded, remember? I’m pretty sure that means I can’t have anybody over here.”

“What did you expect me to do? You’ve been sending me all these letters…” Lena reached into her pocket, pulling out a crumpled wad of pink pieces of paper. She sprinkled them onto the ground.

Russel smiled. Oh my gosh, she kept them all! he thought.

He raised an eyebrow and moved closer to her. “You know, Lena, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you.”

She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, I noticed.” She held up her hands, backing away a little. “Listen, Russel, that kiss didn’t mean anything. I just wanted to make out with somebody. You know how that is, right?”

Russel grabbed her hand. “I completely understand,” he said, his eyes fixated on the shimmer her wings produced. “You know, why don’t we just… go steady? I mean, that way, we can make out whenever you feel like it!”

Lena blinked a few times. She pondered his offer for a few moments. “But, I don’t feel anything for you,” she scoffed.

“No, I know! Actually, to be honest…” He took his hand back and shrugged. “…I think you’re kind of a snob. The thing is, I just can’t get over the fact that you’re a fairy — the only teenage fairy in this entire town, as far as I know!”

Lena crossed her arms. “Okay… so… you’re saying you want to date me, even though I don’t really care about you and you’re only attracted to my species?”

Russel nodded. “Exactly! Whaddaya say?”

Lena sighed. “Well, prom is coming up, and if I want to be queen, I should show up with a guy on my arm. Single girls never get crowned.” She shrugged. “Sure.”

Russel was beaming. He leaned forward and kissed her.

Feign wasn’t concerned with finding a girlfriend or even a prom date. He was having such a difficult time in school that he started to think he wasn’t even going to be able to go to prom. He just couldn’t pay attention in class; he was always daydreaming about where he would rather be and jotting down ideas for stories instead of notes for math. Doing homework felt like the biggest obstacle he would ever have to face.

He lost a lot of sleep trying to complete his work unbeknownst to the rest of the family.

One day, he decided to get some fresh air. He took a taxi to the park, hoping to clear his mind of all the stress caused by school.

A girl noticed him, waved to get his attention, and ran over to him. “Hey, Feign!” she greeted.

He gave her a confused look. “Hello?”

She laughed. “Oh, sorry, I’m Ursula. We’ve never actually talked before.” His expression didn’t change. She shook her head. “It’s okay, I sit in the back of class and don’t really speak up, so it’s no surprise to me that you have no clue who I am.”

Feign nodded once, his eyes shifting away from her and to the rest of the park.

“Actually,” she continued, “I’m happy I ran into you here. I was going to try to see if… um…” She started blushing. Feign tilted his head to the side, confused as to where she was going with this. A nervous laugh escaped her lips. “Okay, I’m just going to ask you. Would you like to go to prom with me?”

Feign scratched the back of his neck, an uncomfortable feeling crawling up his arm and nestling itself in his gut. “Oh, uh… I’m not sure I’ll even be able to go.”

Ursula’s eyes widened. “What? Why?”

“My grades. I’m failing almost every class.” Feign’s eyes drifted to his feet.

Ursula paused. “Oh…” She shook her head. “That’s okay! I’ve been doing pretty good grade-wise lately, maybe I can tutor you? We can get your grades up and then we can go to prom together! How’s that sound?”

“Really? You would do that for me?”

She smiled. “Technically, I’d be doing it for me so I can get a prom date, but sure! We can go sit over there and I’ll give you a couple test-taking techniques I use to calm myself down!”

The two of them walked to the soccer goal and sat underneath it. Feign took out his most recent homework and Ursula started looking over it. They spent the entire day together, going over lessons Feign hadn’t understood and memorizing English terms. They had been studying for so long that they thought playing soccer would be a fun way to end the night, but as soon as they started kicking the ball around, it began to hail.

Feign whipped out his umbrella and ran to Ursula. She was trying to shield herself from the hail with her hands, laughing in the process. “Isn’t that great,” she mumbled.

Feign offered to give her his umbrella but she refused, pointing to a house nearby and telling him it was hers. He felt himself grinning. “Hey, I really appreciate what you did for me today,” he said.

“It’s no big deal! We can study like that after school or during lunch everyday! We’ll get those grades up!”

Feign set his umbrella down for a moment and gave Ursula a hug to thank her. She sighed happily, leaning into the hug as much as she could. She waved goodbye as she ran down the street to her house. Feign hailed himself a taxi and headed home, blissfully unaware Ursula clearly had feelings for him.

As for the rest of the family, Fantine had just mastered her painting skill. Her artwork was now being sold at a very high price and she realized registering as a self-employed painter would bring in an even bigger income. She quit her photography job and traveled to City Hall to become a painter.

Waffles’s hunting skill had reached Eight. He had almost perfected it, but actually going outside to find his prey started paling in comparison to–

–happening upon stray animals that wandered in when the door was open. Waffles loved having his prey just walk into the house on their own so he could eat them, which ultimately made him lazy enough to forget the motivation to perfect his hunting ability.

Cid’s gardening skill was improving insanely fast, as was the garden itself. He would venture into town to sell his produce at the grocery store and then purchase recipe books from the bookstore to bring back home and experiment with.

When prom night rolled around, Lena and Ursula arrived at the house early. Luckily, Russel had spent days cleaning the house and Irwin ended his sentence right before prom, allowing him to actually go. In Feign’s case, Ursula’s constant tutoring paved the way for him to land C’s instead of F’s in his classes, making him eligible for the dance.

The girls wandered into Cid’s garden while they waited for their dates to get ready. Lena popped open an umbrella, insisting it was going to rain soon. Ursula ran over to Cid and smiled, holding out her arms to hug him. “So, this is the infamous Cid!” she cried, forcing herself upon him.

He pulled away from her hug. “You must be… Lena?” he guessed.

Lena huffed. “No, that would be me.” she yelled.

Cid blinked a few times. He turned his attention back to Ursula. “Okay, then, Ursula. Nice to finally meet you.” He shook her hand.

She started rubbing her arms, feeling the cold air start to settle in. “You too!” She glanced at Lena, who was silently criticizing Cid’s gardening work, then lowered her head. “Hey, Cid?” she whispered, “Just between you and me, do you think Feign is interested in me? Like, romantically?”

Cid held his breath. He had heard the way Feign talked about Ursula — it was utterly platonic. He had absolutely zero interest in her romantically, but Cid wasn’t exactly sure why. He debated on whether or not to break the news to Ursula.

Luckily, before he had to answer, Fantine exited the house with her sons on either side of her.

Since the Thrones family didn’t own a car, Lena drove all four teenagers to the school. She practically bolted into the school, yanking Russel by the arm to the picture set-up. Ursula shyly tried to hook her arm in Feign’s, but he didn’t pick up the hint and they entered prom side-by-side, without touching.

During prom itself, Russel danced with a group of buddies from one of his classes. He basically forgot he had a date. He tried to spike the punch bowl so as to amp the partying attitude of his classmates, but one of his teachers caught him. He snickered to himself and wandered back onto the dance floor. Lena was appalled by his behavior and punched him in the arm.

“Ow!” he screeched.

She pointed to the stage. “Do you see that stage up there?” she hissed. Russel nodded. “That is where I want to be by the end of the night. I want to be the prom queen. Now, do you think anyone is going to vote for me if they see my date acting stupid?! You need to settle yourself down!”

“Lena, it’s prom! Prom was practically invented for teenagers to act stupid.”

“I don’t care. Calm yourself and come dance with me.” She pulled him away from his friends as soon as a slow song came on and made him dance with her.

Feign and Ursula were standing against the wall most of the night. Ursula tried to lead him out onto the dance floor a few times, but it was almost as if he wasn’t paying any attention. He was off in his own world.

Eventually, she stood directly in front of him and lifted his chin up. “Feign, let’s go have some fun! We’ve been avoiding dancing all night!”

He scratched the back of his neck. “Well, it’s just that, I don’t really know how to dance.” He pointed to Russel, who was agonizing over a way to ditch Lena and get back to his friends. “Russel is the party animal, he’s the dancer.”

Ursula tapped her chin and started thinking. She snapped her fingers. “Well, you know the chicken dance, don’t you?”

“Oh, oh no, I’m not–“

“Come on!” She grabbed his tie and gently tugged on it until she led him to the center of the room. A fast song started playing and Ursula made wings for herself and started flapping them. Feign awkwardly watched her for awhile before deciding to join in. Ursula’s smile filled her whole face as Feign slowly got more and more into it. Before long, a circle had formed around the two of them and people were clapping and joining in themselves.

When the song ended, Ursula flung her arms around Feign’s neck. He laughed. “Okay, that was fun,” he admitted.

Votes were cast for king and queen and the principal approached the stage to announce the winners. He cleared his throat, tapped the microphone a few times, then spoke. “This year’s king and queen of prom are…”

Lena was squeezing Russel’s arm so tightly that they were turning red.

“…Lena and Feign!”

Feign’s eyes widened. Lena shrieked in excitement and pushed classmates down as she floated up to accept her crown. Ursula gently pushed Feign to the stairs so that he could accept the crown himself. He was absolutely beside himself. How was he voted king? Especially over his brother, who had his own little group of loyal friends?

Ultimately, it didn’t matter how it happened. Feign was elated. Lena was so happy she started crying. Russel rolled his eyes and crossed his arms, noticing Ursula in his peripherals. He walked over to her. She had a sad look on her face. “I voted for you,” he said.

Ursula shook her head. “No, it’s not that…” She sighed briefly, her eyes watering a little. “I’m just coming to terms with the fact Feign isn’t interested in me.”

Russel gulped. “Oh…” He didn’t say anything else and just continued clapping for the winners.

The night ended too quickly for the twins’ liking and Lena drove everyone home. The boys proudly displayed their prom pictures, and in Feign’s case, the crown.

Thankfully, Cid had put a bunch of leftovers from his experimental cooking in the fridge, so Russel and Feign snatched some up and started chowing down. Everyone else was asleep in the house, save for Waffles, who planted himself underneath the table so he could eat whatever crumbs fell onto the floor.

Russel turned to Feign. “Hey, so, what’s the deal with you and Ursula?” he said, his mouth full of hamburger.

Feign shrugged. “Nothing, why?”

“I think she likes you, bro.”

“What?” Feign dropped his fork, causing Waffles to run into the other room.

Russel nodded. “Yeah. She seemed pretty upset you didn’t flirt with her at all tonight.” He stared at his twin for awhile, waiting for a response. Finally, he scooted his chair closer to him and pointed a finger directly in front of him. “Why don’t you like her?”

Feign sighed, pushing his plate away from him. “It’s just… I’m quiet. I think a lot. I spend most of my time in front of a computer screen making up stories about people that don’t exist.” He pushed Russel’s finger away from him. “Ursula is chipper and full of energy. I need someone more like me… someone who would rather spend a Friday night sharing thoughts about the world than going out to eat. She just isn’t my type, I guess.”

Russel put his hands behind his head and propped his feet up on the table. “I’ll take the girl who wants to go dancing!” he stated, laughing and balancing his chair on its back two legs.

The boys finished their meals and ventured off to bed, dreaming about how prom went and what their futures held. When Feign woke up completely, it was early in the morning and everyone was still asleep. He crept to the room where the computer resided and opened up a new document. He took a deep breath before allowing his hands to type the words that had been festering inside his head since he met Ursula.

He titled his story Unrequited Love, saving it to a folder meant only for the stories he felt would be good enough to publish one day.