Bob was on fire tonight. 

She grabbed Shark-O-Mania by the dorsal fin and hauled him upright, then set him up for a fisherman's suplex. Only instead of slamming him straightaway, she lifted the burly wrestler and flexed both arms, especially the one lassoed around his neck. He began gasping and wriggling in her clutches, like a caught fish dangling from a hook.

Seated beside an annoyingly enthusiastic Lars, Kevin smiled at the action in the ring. In a town rife with goody-goodies and literal world-saving heroes, he found Bob's sense of humor refreshingly mean. First, she had traded her usual baseball getup for a sequin leotard, mask and boots - so that she resembled a cross between a mermaid and a luchador - and now she was looking to end the match with a fisherman's suplex. He wondered if Shark-O even knew he was being mocked.

Kevin wanted Bob for a tag-team partner. She was the most loathed heel in Beach City Underground Wrestling since the infamous Purple Puma. Not only was she unstoppable in the ring, she was the coolest, sexiest and most popular wrestler in the league.

In that offbeat way of hers, Bob turned the fisherman's suplex into a standing - or, rather, a [i]walking[/i] - guillotine choke. She sauntered about the ring with Shark-O in tow, a devious glint in her eyes as she made certain everyone got a good, long look at her new toy. At first the attention made Shark-O redden behind his mask. Then he shuddered against Bob and went semi-limp, his tongue drooping out as humiliation took a backseat to breathlessness.

Bob stopped swaggering. She splayed her stance, planted both feet and lowered her hips, arms gleaming wetly as they coiled tighter around Shark-O's neck and leg. She didn't normally sweat - being an inorganic, sapient rock and all - but she did so now, for the crowd, by periodically drizzling herself with water from her wings. The wetness created a sheen that made her muscles look harder and shinier, an effect that had the crowd drooling over her lurid, blue-skinned body.

Shark-O was drooling over her as well, both literally and figuratively, his trunks tented as saliva dripped off his stuck-out tongue. He only pretended to struggle. Truthfully, he was done believing he could escape, and used his eel-like wriggles as a thinly veiled excuse to rub up against Bob. He fondled her biceps and triceps, and even groped the forearm that was driving full-force into his windpipe. His touches made Bob breathe harder and faster, which she attempted to mask with innocent grunts of exertion.

Nobody in the crowd bought her act, least of all Kevin. 

"Attagirl, Bobbie!" Lars shouted beside Kevin, standing now, and waving a picket-style sign that read [i]NO PROB, BOB![/i] in bold blue letters. "Throttle him! Put that poser in his place!" He was practically frothing at the mouth.

Kevin loved it. Ever since Lars had returned from space, with his pink skin and his scar and his admittedly gorgeous hairdo, Kevin had found his new stand-up-guy schtick nauseating. But here, in this squalid gymnasium-turned-coliseum, he reverted back to his old nasty self. They all did. You couldn't attend a BCUW after-hours match without devolving into a crueler, baser version of yourself. 

Meanwhile, back in the ring, Shark-O found a glistening shoulder to tap on. Bob ignored his submission. Her eyelids shut while her hips rock forward, and she made faces and noises usually reserved for the bedroom.

Although Bob's mean streak was no secret, she never cheated. Even now, as she ignored Shark-O's tap out. They had agreed to a pins-only match, which meant neither a submission or a KO could end the fight. Only a pin. And since tap outs didn't count, Bob was free to go on throttling Shark-O for as long as she pleased.

She was still working him over when his tag-team partner, the even larger and more imposing Sea Wasp, decided he had seen enough. He cleared the top rope in a single bound, then sprinted at Bob from behind and delivered a lariat to the base of her skull. The blow sent her pitching forward, and she KO'ed Shark-O with a inadvertent bodyslam.

"Boooooo!" Lars shouted. "Come on, ref! You gonna let that fly!" He was one of the few fans who openly cheered for Bob. 

The crowd, however, cheered for Sea Wasp and his daring rescue. Bob quickly regained her feet, and the two clashed in the middle of the ring. 

The fight ebbed back and forth until it didn't - until Bob paralyzed her opponent with a gut-shot that landed like a stun gun jolt. From there she began toying with Sea Wasp. She focused on his midsection, punishing it with a barrage of hooks and uppercuts, knee strikes and roundhouse kicks, until finally she Irish Whipped him into a corner and cratered his belly with a shoulder ram.

The corner post rattled in tandem with his spine. Bob backpedaled and let him flop onto the canvas, earning a fresh round of boos from the crowd. 

Straddling her plaything's back now, she cinched in a hammerlock and wrenched and wrenched until Sea Wasp screamed for her. Then, grinning with that languid cruelty of hers, she inclined her head and whispered something in her opponent's ear. 

Kevin found himself at the edge of his seat, literally, his whole body leaning forward as he strained to make out Bob's private message. Was she taunting Sea Wasp? Flirting with him? Kevin couldn't tell by reading her lips or body language, nor did the answer present itself in the side-to-side shake of Sea Wasp's head.

Bob whispered something else. Then, in a blur of movement, she transitioned from the hammerlock to an armbar. Lying on her back now, she hugged a bulky arm to her chest and elevated her hips.

Sea Wasp didn't react until her pelvis was high above the mat. A rush of pain and fear granted him a second wind, and he broke into a frantic scramble for freedom. He got nowhere. The harder he bucked and thrashed, the harder Bob wrenched on his arm, until it seemed she might rip it clean out of the socket.

Kevin loved every second of it. He could have watched Bob pant and strain and pretend-sweat all night long.

In the throes of his scramble, Sea Wasp managed to regain his feet and stack Bob, so that she was upside down while still clinging to his arm. This technically counted as a pin, since both her shoulders were down. The referee began counting.

"One... Two... Three..."

Annoyed, Bob made certain her counterattack was especially ruthless. Without breaking the armbar, she hooked a toned leg around the front of Sea Wasp's neck, pinching it between her hamstring and calf. He made a pleading noise in the back of his throat, and his Adam's apple bobbed in the hollow of her bent knee.

The count reached "Four... Five... Six..."

Bob curled her leg, flexed her hamstring and calf. 

"Seven... Eight... Ni---"

Sea Wasp croaked like a dying frog, and the count stopped abruptly as he collapsed and face-planted on the canvas. Seizing on his moment of weakness - and utterly aroused by it - Bob grabbed her own instep and cranked it toward her butt. The one-legged chokehold tightened, wringing another, raspier croak from her prey. At the same time, she tucked the bulky arm beneath her own, securing the wrist in her armpit, then palmed her belly and deepened the arch in her spine.

Bob grinned lewdly as she hyperextended his elbow, squashed and throttled his neck. He tapped on her outer thigh; she purred like a cat getting a belly rub. Then she muttered something again - something only Sea Wasp could hear. When he failed to respond, she muscled him onto his side and sat upright on his temple, all without breaking the two-pronged hold. 

Lars, sitting again, elbowed Kevin in the ribs. "Whaddya you think she keeps telling him?"

Kevin could only imagine.

"I bet it's insanely hot. This Sea Wasp guy really lucked out."

"Shut it, bro," said Kevin. "I'm trying to watch the match."

Bob made a slight adjustment to the hold. She wedged Sea Wasp's nose and mouth into the bend of her knee, smothering his breath, then drove her weight downward and reclined on his head. Kevin thought she looked especially dominant now. Glistening all over with phony sweat, she pushed her pelvis into the bulky arm and let her shoulders rock backwards. Soon her head followed suit, her face upturned as she shut her eyes and nibbled her bottom lip.

Sea Wasp bellowed into the hollow of a blue knee. Something about the utterance caught Bob's attention. Leering down at him, she repeated whatever message she had muttered before. He tried to nod in response but couldn't.

Fresh urgency animated Bob's movements. She broke the duel-pronged hold, bolted upright and dragged Sea Wasp back to his feet - only to power him back to the mat with another fisherman's suplex. The impact dashed whatever remained of his will, like a ship skewered on jagged rocks as it ran aground.

A simple bridge into a pin would have sufficed, but Bob wanted more. She tumbled him into a needlessly tight small package, as if fearful that, in his exhausted and senseless state, he might somehow wriggle free of her grasp. She counted along with the ref, silently, dreamily, mouthing the numbers like they were lyrics to a pop song she could only partially remember.

[i]One...[/i], she said without speaking.

[i]Two...[/i]

[i]Three...[/i]

And on and on until ten. 
 

*******


Kevin's attraction to Bob was complicated. Unlike the girls he had lusted after in the past, she had more than a rocking body, a pretty face and a good head of hair. She was also strong and confident, and Kevin found her dry, offbeat sense of humor irresistible.

Also - and this was the most important thing to Kevin - she was cool. Effortlessly cool. And not in the way of his friends or even himself, but cool like Stevonnie. Like Sabina. All three girls had this in common: they walked through life as their truest and most unapologetic selves. They earnestly didn't care what other people thought of them.

In fact, now that he thought about it, he was only attracted to Bob because of Stevonnie. And Steven. Especially Steven. The little snot-nosed brat had changed him somehow, gotten in his head with all that Power of Friendship bullshit. And now look at him - he was falling for a girl because of her personality!

Presently, he found himself staring at Bob's lips as they closed around the neck of a straw. She was drinking a soda or a milkshake, and grinning at its sweetness in private bliss. The little tremor in her throat as she swallowed held Kevin transfixed.

"Quit being such a creeper and go talk to her," said Lars, from the passenger seat of Kevin's brand new cherry-red Lamborghini. They were parked near the edge of Makeout Bluff, which wasn't really a bluff at all, just a tallish hill that overlooked the beach. Bob was parked ahead of them, lounging on the hood of a dusty pickup truck she had found at some dump and carried up the hill with her bare hands.

"Seriously, bro, I'm starting to worry about you," Lars continued. "Since when does 'The Kevin' shy away from a pretty girl like, well, like I used to."

Yeah, emphasis on [i]used to[/i]. Ever since Lars got back from space or whatever, he had been turning heads all over town. And not just because of the pink skin and hair, or that sexy scar. It was his newfound confidence that people found so irresistible. He had grown up. Flown off into space a boy and returned a man.

"Shut it, Pinky," said Kevin. "Nobody's shying away from anything. I'm just... waiting for the right moment or whatever."

"Then can we at least wait at the bottom of the hill? At this distance, I'm starting to feel like your co-stalker."

"You are a garbage wingman."

"Well duh, there's not much I can do here in the car. Now, if we were to get out and walk over to..."

An engine rumbled beside them and idled, and a familiar voice came from a certain pizza-themed car.

"[i]Daaaaaang[/i], Pinky, you a dog for real tho! I ain't know you was out here gettin' around like that!"

Lars laughed and shook his head. He flashed a mildly embarrassed smile at Jenny.

Kevin, however, was not amused.

"Eww," he said, turning and leaning forward so Jenny could see his grossed-out expression. "Me and Lars are not here to makeout."

"Woah. Wait a sec, let me get this straight," said Sour Cream from the passenger seat. "So you guys drove all the way to Makeout Bluff to [i]not[/i] makeout? That's some next-level counterculture stuff right there. Far out."

"I dig it," said Buck. He sat facing Lars and Kevin in the backseat. 

"Shoot, I'm actually kinda disappointed now," said Jenny. "For a second there, I thought Beach City had a hot new power couple. Heeeeeeeey!"

"In addition to digging it," said Buck, "I also ship it."

"Yuck, no, stop, just stop it!" said Kevin. "I am not hooking up with Lars. I'm not even into guys like that. Which, like, doesn't mean I have a problem with LGBTQ people or whatever - if that's what you're thinking!"

"I wasn't thinking that," said Lars.

"Then why are you making that face?"

"What face?"

"That face! The one you make whenever I do something like... like... Ugghh, I can't with you right now. With any of you."

"Woah, guys. Time out," said Buck. "It appears Kevin has reached a pivotal crossroad on his path to emotional maturity, and could use some friends to help him navigate the unexpected and often overwhelming obstacles of budding adulthood."

"Amen to that, brother," said Sour Cream.

"I third that!" Jenny chimed in. "Lay it on us, Kevin. We're always down to help out our fellow Beach City natives."

Kevin stared blankly at the car full of teens, then leaned back in his seat, shut his eyes and sighed in frustration. He felt... touched. For as long as he had known these kids, and Lars, he'd been nothing but a pain in their asses. He had talked down to them, insulted them to their faces, mocked everything from their looks to their entire worldview. And yet here they were anyway, ready and willing to help lift him out of this funk.

"Hey, don't freak out over it, man. They were only teasing about us being a couple." Lars placed a gentle hand on Kevin's shoulder. "But listen, the Suspects here are the coolest kids in Beach City. If they can't help you with your girl troubles, nobody can."

"Mmmm-hmmm. He ain't lyin'," said Jenny. "We really are the coolest kids in Beach City."

"The truth isn't always modest," Buck added, earning a "Right on!" and a high-five from Sour Cream.

Damnit, now Kevin was starting to get all choked up. Doing his best to still the tremor in his voice, he said, "Thanks guys. As for my girl trouble, well, yeah, it's a thing. I have a crush on this total knockout, but I'm not sure how to talk to her..."


*******


Bob let out her adorable snorting laugh - right smack in Kevin's face. 

"Pfft, get real, jerk-face. As if I'd ever want some skinny human for a tag-team partner."

No girl had ever talked to Kevin like that before. The sting of rejection pricked him like a scorpion's tail, leaving him nauseated, twitchy, lightheaded. His palms began sweating and his trachea forgot how to draw in air. His mouth opened but no words came out, only a croak that sounded like a man too parched to ask for a drink. 

He tugged at his collar in a panic, then at last found the courage - or perhaps just the opposite - to retreat back to his car.

"Wait!" he heard Bob call from behind, her voice shocking him into greater haste. He became painfully aware of his own gait. He wasn't walking right, wasn't swaggering like his usual breezy self. His arms were too stiff, shoulders too hunched, head bowed too low.

Damnit, rejection really freaking sucked! Was this how he had been making people feel, when he told them they were ugly or stupid or lame?

Shame enlivened the initial scorpion-sting of rejection. Fresh venom gushed through his system, and his legs became heavy and awkward as he hastened to a trot. He stumbled over his own clumsy feet, tripped and went pitching forward.

During the fall, all he could think about was Bob's eyes on the back of his head. He wanted to die, to keep falling until his head split open on some random jagged stone.

Only he didn't die, didn't open his skull, didn't even fall. Instead, he felt something cool and wet seize his arm and jerk him upright. Looking over his shoulder, he found Bob kneeling on the hood of the pickup truck, one wing flared and stretched into the liquid rope that had caught his arm.

"Wait, crap, wait," she was saying. Rather than come to Kevin, she used the wing to pluck him off the ground and carry him back to the truck. His breath caught as his feet left the ground. For reasons he failed to understand, he found this sudden weightlessness, and the lack of control over his own body, at once frightening and exhilarating.

"I'm so sorry." Placing him back on the ground, she tried to dust off his shoulder with her wing, but just ended up wetting his shirt. "I didn't mean to call you a jerk-face. It's just, my friend does this thing where she calls people clods, but in a charming way, and nobody ever gets mad when she... uh, er, nevermind. I should probably stop talking now."

She did... but then remembered something and palmed her face in self-exasperation.

"Except, shoot, I haven't told you my name yet." Flustered, she jerked one of those beautiful blue hands toward him. "Hi, I'm Lapis Lazuli. I probably should've opened with that."

And just like that Kevin was back in the game. Damn he was good! Even when he didn't have it, he totally had it. He had been freaking out for no reason; he just needed to relax and remember who he was.

"And I'm impressed, which doesn't happen very often," he said, slipping back into the comfort of his old reptilian skin. "You should be real proud of yourself, babe."

A puzzled look came over Bob. "Um... okay."

"So it's Lapis Lazuli, is it? Weird. I thought your name was Bob."

"Oh, that's just a stage name. There's a whole backstory, I won't get into it now." She paused awkwardly. "So, were you gonna tell me your name or...?"

"I'm surprised you don't already know it. The name's Kevin, maybe you've heard of me. I'm kind of a big deal."

Puzzlement turned to suspicion on Bob's face. "Oh, so you're Kevin. On second thought, maybe you should go after all."

This girl was starting to work his nerves. First she blew him off, then she literally dragged him back, and now she was blowing him off again. What the hell did she want from him?

Bob reclaimed her place on the truck's hood, her back leaning against the windshield. Her mood had visibly soured. As she lifted the milkshake straw back to her lips, Kevin took it upon himself to climb atop the hood and sit beside her.

Without her permission.

"That's funny," she said. "I don't remember saying you could sit here."

Kevin flashed his best shit-eating grin. "You didn't say I [i]couldn't[/i] sit here either. Now, how about you drop the playing-hard-to-get routine and snuggle up close to---"

The dumbass remark earned him a hard shove, and he went tumbling off the hood and into the dirt. The nerve of this bitch! He started to get up and give her a piece of his mind, but froze when Bob hopped down from the car and stood over him.

"Steven told me all about you," she said accusingly. "He said you like to use people. And you know what? I'm not too fond of people who like to use people."

"Whoa whoa whoa!" Kevin raised both arms as if to protect himself. "It wasn't like that, okay, I swear. Me and your pal Steven just got off on the wrong foot is all. And besides, he low-key started it by stringing me along. Maybe you haven't heard, but he's one half of the biggest cocktease in Beach City."

"Okay, you are [i]not[/i] allowed to talk about my friend like that. He's a kid, you creep, and so is Conny."

"Maybe. But that Stevonnie chick is all woman."

Kevin immediately regretted saying that.

Bob seized his shirt collar, picked him up and swung him back-first into the side of the truck. The sensation of being lifted and moved thrilled him all over again. Only this time the feeling was more intense: partially because Bob had laid her hands on him - in anger, sure, but still - and partially because he was about ten seconds from pissing himself with fright.

"Get off me, you crazy bitch!" He gave her a hard shove, which she answered with a harder shove back. Although it was more force than necessary, she leaned into him with her whole body, her outstretched arms bending so that she and Kevin met at the waist.

"Say that again," she growled. "Call me a bitch one more time. Go on, do it, see what happens."

A trace of a laugh crept into her voice - or so Kevin thought - and in that moment he was certain she wanted him to repeat the insult. She wanted the excuse. They tussled against the car for a spell, but no matter how hard Kevin shoved or thrashed, he couldn't escape the heavy press of Bob's body against his own.

Nor was he entirety sure he wanted to.

"Okay, I'm sorry, I'm sorry." He clung to Bob's wrists with trembling hands. They were so close he found himself hyperventilating in her face. "I didn't mean it. Any of it. You're not a bitch, and Stevonnie isn't a cocktease."

Bob said nothing in return. She was huffing and puffing too, her breath quickened by anger rather than fatigue. Or was it something else? Kevin wasn't sure. As close as they were, he nonetheless found her expression difficult to read. 

"Oh wow," he said in a hushed tone. "It's blue... just like the rest of you. I never noticed before."

Anger had cast a grim spell on Bob, but now Kevin's words seemed to break it.

"What is?" she said. "What's blue like the rest of me?"

"Your blush. It's really pretty."

Bob blushed harder.

"Lapis, wait! Stop! Please don't hurt my idiot friend!"

A visibly shaken Lars came running up behind Bob, startling her. She craned her neck to face him, looking over one shoulder, but her grip on Kevin's collar remained inflexible. Lars came to a stop beside her. 

"Oh for the love of---what did you say this time?!" he said to Kevin.

"Nothing she hasn't heard before."

The blue hands left Kevin's collar and found his throat. He gasped - abruptly terrified, abruptly ecstatic - and his shoes left the ground and kicked and kicked in the air. The grip on his throat tightened. His lungs burned and his pulse quickened, almost in perfect unison, as if the heat from the former had somehow accelerated the latter.

Peering down through bleary eyes, he noticed the steady heave that animated Bob's chest. Her blush deepened. Maybe it was just the lightheadedness, but Kevin thought she looked more turned on than angry.

Though, to be clear, she was definitely angry too.

"Listen to me, Lapis." Lars spoke softly, his hand on Bob's shoulder. "Whatever he said just now, whatever he did, you need to let it go. It's not worth it."

Bob let out an exhausted sigh. She opened her fists and let Kevin drop to the ground. He landed in a heap at her sneakers, gasping and sniveling and massaging his sore throat. 

"That was not cool, Lapis. Not cool at all," said Lars. "If you wanna keep living on Earth with us humans, you need to check that temper."

Bob turned away, crossed her arms defensively. "If you'd heard what he said---"

"I hear what he says all the time," Lars cut in. "I've been hearing it since we started hanging out, and, yeah, it can get pretty gross at times. But that doesn't mean you can just strangle the guy!"

"What is this?" said Bob. "Are you and Kevin, like, besties now?"

"We definitely aren't," said Kevin.

Bob glared down at him. "You shut your mouth."

"Come shut it yourself, freak."

"Okay, let's all just take a breather." Lars stepped between Bob and Kevin. "Lapis, can I borrow you for a sec? We need to talk." He glanced down at Kevin. "And you - don't even think about going anywhere. We need to talk, too."

"What're you, my dad?" said Kevin.

Lars rolled his eyes. "Just stay put, man." He draped an arm across Bob's shoulders and led her a short distance away.

Kevin sat facing away from the truck. He banged the back of his head against the chassis. Damnit, he was such a freaking idiot! Bob had called to him after he fled, caught him after he tripped and fell, carried him to her side. She had been nothing but friendly to him... well, until he mentioned his name anyway. But even then, all he had to do was chill out and explain himself. Just talk to her like a normal person. Doing so might not have won her over, but it definitely wouldn't have led to him nearly getting throttled to death.

Still massaging his throat, he felt the bruises Bob had left on his skin. He thought of the first hickie Sabina ever gave him. He missed her all the time. He already missed Bob too, he realized with a pang of self-loathing. 

He sat there for a long time, thinking about the dozens of girls he had treated like garbage. Blinking away tears, he resolved to do better in the future.

He waited silently for Lars to come back. He hoped Bob would return with him, but doubted she would. 

And yet...

"Lars says I should apologize for choking you. So... sorry, I guess."

Kevin looked up to find Bob standing over him, her arm outstretched, hand open invitingly. He looked at her face, then her hand, then her face again.

"Well?" she asked.

Kevin took her hand in his own. She lifted him back to his feet, easily, and again he felt that familiar thrill. 

"I'm sorry." He couldn't help but laugh at himself. "I realize I've said that about twenty times in one night, but I'm sorry. For-real this time."

"I'm sure," she said dismissively. "Anyway, there's gonna be this big Battle Royal in two weeks, and you're gonna be there. In the ring. Got it?"

"Got it." Kevin had no idea where this was going, nor did he care at this point. He was just happy to hear Bob's voice again.

"I'll be there too," she went on. "No way are you gonna beat me, so you can just forget about that right now."

"I wasn't even thinking it, honest."

Bob continued as if he hadn't spoken. "But if you fight hard enough, you just might impress me. Do that, and we'll talk about you becoming my tag-team partner."

Kevin brightened. He couldn't believe his ears "Really? But what about all that stuff I said? What about---"

She jabbed his chest with a finger as hard as a screwdriver. "I said we'll talk about it. Don't go thinking this means you and me are cool, because we really, really aren't."

With that Bob turned away, picked up her truck and flew off into the night. 

Kevin touched his chest where the finger had jabbed it. He turned to Lars. "What did you say to her?"

"Not much. Just asked her to give you another chance."

"But... why?"

Lars blew out a heavy sigh. "Not long ago I was a jerk just like you. I didn't like who I was, so I went around insulting people and blaming them for my problems. I was a coward, a narcissist, a brat. I was a lot of things." Lars paused a moment, remembering. Then he said, "But I eventually got better. You know how?"

Kevin shook his head no.

"Because good people - people I didn't deserve to have in my life - helped me get better. They gave me a second chance. So that's what me and Lapis are doing: giving your sorry ass a second chance." Lars clapped a hand on his friend's shoulder. He gave it a comforting squeeze. "Don't blow it."

The two of them walked back to the Lamborghini.