Ruthie whirled on Elliott as soon as her door was closed.

"What in the holy fuck do you think you're doing?" she hissed. She advanced on him in what could only be described as a feline stalk as he stood in the middle of her room, holding the plate of fruit, crackers, and cheese.

"I accepted your father's very cordial invitation to stay for dinner," Elliott answered with his signature smirk as he looked around for a place to put the plate.

"You invited yourself, you mean," Ruthie accused. "And you invited yourself to swim, too," she added. "My dad didn't say anything about that, and neither did I," she reminded him.

"I know, but the pool looked so inviting," Elliott explained, finally deciding to set the plate down on the bed. "Not many people in England have a private pool right on their property, you know? Especially in London."

"I--want--you--out--of--here!" Ruthie said, just barely able to control her temper and her voice. "I invited you into my home, and you insulted me to my face."

"Better than doing it behind your back, wouldn't you agree?" Elliott said, quite reasonably, he thought. "And I don't think what I said was necessarily an insult. I just told you a hard truth about yourself, that probably no one's had the nerve to tell you, because they were too busy kissing your arse, you know? It's good to be honest from the go, don't you think? Keeps things out in the open?

"Tell you what," he continued, sitting on her bed, next to the plate, "why don't we tell each other something we don't like about each other physically this time? Like you can tell me that I'm so skinny I look like I wandered out of Auschwitz or something, though that might be offensive to actual holocaust survivors or their descendants or to Jewish people or whatever, I don't know. And I could tell you that your bum is too big?"

"What?"

"Oh fuck, have I gone and put my foot in it again? Shit, I'm--"

Get out. Get out. GET OUT! Getoutgetoutgetout!"

🔥💥⚡️💥⚡️💥⚡️💥🔥

"Whoa, hello, Elliott, is it?" Todd looked up with a smile from his laptop.

"Yes, Mr. Barakat, sorry to disturb you," Elliott said as he descended the last few stairs and headed to the front door.

"First, please just call me Todd, and second, it's not a disruption, I haven't even started yet, just surfing social media before I get down to it," he admitted with a laugh.

"Thank you, Todd," Elliott said as he reached the door.

"Leaving so soon?"

"Yeah, I remembered a couple of things I have to get done for my grandparents this afternoon."

"I see. Well, nice to meet you, and I hope we'll see more of you throughout the school year. Ruthie's been a little out of sorts over this whole Brett and Amelia thing, so it's nice that she has her friends around her, you know?" Todd smiled at Elliott before looking back at his laptop.

"Right," Elliott said. "She's a nice girl, and what they did was really awful. See you later, sir."

Upstairs, Ruthie moodily finished up the food on the plate as she thought about the horrible boy who'd just left.

How dare he come into her house and start analyzing her, calling her names?

She moved the plate to the floor, grabbed her school books, and started on her homework, but put it aside after less than an hour.

A hypocrite? Her? And she had a big bum?
She got up and tried to look at her butt in the mirror, but gave up after a few minutes.

She grabbed her phone and sent Gordon a text.

Am I a hypocrite?

Who is this?

Very funny.

Well, it *says* it's Ruthie, but it can't be, because she would never question or doubt herself, you see? Ruthie Grimaldi is brimming with self-confidence.

Jesus H Christ, Gordo, just text me when you're ready to talk, okay? When you're finished attempting to be clever, or whatever the fuck it is you think you're being? I'll just talk to Pepsi until you're over yourself.

Okay, okay, wow, what crawled up your butt and died?

A very rude Englishman.

What? That Elliott guy? What happened???

Stop, Gordo, no need to get all multiple question mark-y on me, I'm fine, he was just so snarky and rude.

And he called you a hypocrite???

Please stop with all the question marks, for real, it makes me imagine you at your house having a coronary because you're all curious, lol.

So what happened?

God! Gordon! NOTHING HAPPENED! I'm just asking if you think I'm a hypocrite.

Okay. In all seriousness? No more than the rest of us, I guess. No one can help being a *little* bit of an ass sometimes, and by ass I mean hypocrite. Everyone is at least three people, Ruthie; I know I am, look: I am the me I try not to be, the me I wish I were, and the me I really am. We all are. Even you, beautiful Ruthie. Okay?

Okay, Gordo. I love you. 💜

I know. ❤️

🍉🍔🍷🍔🍷🍔🍉

"You guys?"

Her dads turned to look at her in the pleasant darkness of the backyard patio. It had cooled down to a pleasant high seventies, and the mosquitoes were staying away, so they were eating their barbecued burgers outside. It was another of Ruthie's treasured memories.

"Do you think I'm a hypocrite?"

She took a quick drink to cover her embarrassment, and didn't see the quick look that passed between her parents. They knew something had been bothering her all afternoon and evening, and figured that this must be it.

"How so, Rosebud?" Pop asked, leaning back in his chair.

Ruthie shrugged. "You know, just regular stuff. Like I'll say something, then go back on it and say something else later. Like I'll say I believe this, then later I'll do something that shows I believe the opposite?

"And do you think that people let me get away with it because, uh, because of, um, my looks?"

"Your looks?"

"Yeah. You, know, because I'm, uh, pretty? Because some people think I'm pretty?" she amended, obviously uncomfortable.

Again, her dads passed a look back and forth. This was a bit deeper than they'd anticipated.

"Well, honey, about the first thing, the truth is that most people are hypocritical at one time or another, probably without even realizing it," Pop said.

Ruthie nodded. "Gordon said that exact same thing."

"Well, that Gordon is a smart guy," Pop said with a smile. "The idea is to try not to be too harsh or judgmental about too many things, then you won't sound hypocritical, you know? If you come down hard with an opinion about everything, you're going to end up crossing yourself, it's unavoidable, unless you use an outside source as your guide.

"And some people do that, like with the Bible or the Quran? And if that's how you choose to live your life, and you can do it, well, that's your choice, I suppose, and it's nice that you have a a written tome to guide you," Pop continued.

"We don't have that, and we chose not to raise you like that," Dad took over. "So we kind of have to wing it, right?"

Ruthie nodded.

"So it's not surprising, I guess, that you might get tripped up sometimes, and go back on something you've said, but I think that's okay, as long as you acknowledge it, apologize, and try not to do it again?

"What I'm curious about," Dad went on, "is that second thing you asked about, the part about people giving you a pass because they think you're pretty. Where did that come from?" He leaned over and stroked Ruthie's hair. He then plucked a lavender crepe myrtle blossom from her curls.

Ruthie shrugged. "Just something someone said."

Pop took a deep breath. "First of all, beauty is kind of arbitrary, in that it is in the eye of the beholder. Not everyone agrees on who's pretty and who's not."

"But Phil, that's kind of a lie," Dad objected. "If society didn't have a pretty uniform opinion on what beauty consisted of, we wouldn't have models, and movie stars, and a most beautiful people list, and popular people at school and all that."

"Dad's right, Pop," Ruthie agreed immediately. "Everyone knows that Taylor Swift is considered one of the most beautiful singers in the world, just like everyone knows Ed Sheeran got teased for being homely when he was in school."

Pop nodded after a minute. "Yeah, okay, but there is also a personal component, you have to agree to that, also, right? Otherwise no one would think anyone was beautiful except people who were on these lists."

He looked at Ruthie, who was finishing her salad. "You've said yourself that you think Ed Sheeran is 'beautiful,' Ruthie, right? How is that possible? How can some people see him as homely, and others, like you, think he's beautiful?"

Ruthie considered. "Because of his music? If Ed Sheeran were a dolphin hunter, or a child molester, I don't think I'd think he were beautiful, you know?"

"Okay, but now we're getting into murky water," Pop interposed. "Now we're getting into what people are like, their personalities, not just looks. That's a whole different kettle of fish, right?"

Reluctantly, Ruthie nodded.

"Well, someone said that I was kind of a hypocrite, but people let it slide because I was pretty," she said, looking between her parents to see the effect of her words.

They looked back at her, lips pursed, brows drawn, thinking about what she'd said.

"I'm going to admit, you guys, that wasn't exactly the response I was hoping for," Ruthie said with a laugh.

"Oh?" Pop asked. "What were you hoping for?"

"What? You? Ruthie, never, ever, could you be considered a hypocrite, and of course no one would treat you differently because you're pretty," Ruthie said, trying to imitate her fathers' voices.

Her dads laughed.

"Would you rather hear that people thought you were ugly, honey?" Dad asked. "I mean, honestly, you were a beautiful baby, and those words? 'Cute, pretty, doll, gorgeous,' those were the first words you learned, because you were beautiful, and you have been, all your life, you know that, right?"

Again, Ruthie nodded. "I guess I just never thought about it before," she admitted. "It was always just a part of who I was, like having these blue-ish, grayish, eyes, or this crazy hair, these freckles or whatever.

"I'm glad people think I'm pretty, in the same way I'm glad people think I'm smart," she admitted to her dads. "But it wasn't very fun to be called a hypocrite."

She rose and kissed her parents.

"I'm beat, you guys, I'm going to bed," she said. "Hopefully tomorrow won't kick my ass like today did."

She cleared the table, which only involved gathering the paper table cloth and folding up everything in it while her dads held their wine glasses out of the way.

"Good night, Notorious RBG," they called.

"Seems like that English boy really got under her skin," Todd said to Phil when they were alone.

"Seems like," Phil agreed. "I don't think that's a bad thing, either. Living in this town has kind of been like sleeping for her, you know? It's about time she woke up." He looked over at the man who'd been his partner these past twenty-five years.

"You coming up to bed?"

Todd nodded, giving Phil a smile. "Gimme a minute, I'll be right up," he said.