A week had passed since that life-changing first day of school. Raymond knew that in order for his “date” with destiny to be successful and woo over the illustrious Miss Interpretation he had to keep up a good relationship with her. And fortunately for him everything was going just fine. Or at least it was until IT happened.

Raymond’s 13-year old little brother Max was sitting home one day when Raymond came home, looking like he had just opened Pandora’s box. He was pacing around the front entryway, shaking. He was also bobbing his head up and down with his eyes wide open, rarely ever blinking. Max wondered could have caused his brother to behave like this.

Max asked, “Raymond what’s wrong?”

Raymond stopped dead in his tracks, though he was still shaking.

Raymond said in a cringy voice, “N-nothing’s w-wrong.”

“Come on Raymond, something must to have happened to make you behave so strangely like this.”

“I’m telling you, nothing happened!”

“Raymond, please spill the beans.”

“Ok, I’ll tell you what happened. Do you remember that Miss Interpretation girl I told you about earlier?”

“Oh, that girl you’ve known for a week and still don’t know her name?”

“Yes! That girl!”

“Well, what happened?”

“Well you see, today s-she…. Ak! I don’t want to say it. I don’t want you to feel frustrated because of what happened.”

Raymond paused his speech and backed away.

Max responded, “Raymond, what did she do?”

“Well, y-you s-see… today me and her were both about to walk into class and s-she… she…. oh no, I can’t say it!”

Max thought to himself, Is making people feel frustrated a talent of his?

“Please Raymond tell me, what happened!?”

“Ok, I’ll spill the beans. This morning me and her saw each other when we were about to walk into class and she said to me, ‘How are you?’. Now that I know that she cares about my well-being, I’m certain that she has a special place in her heart just for me! Ever since what happend this morning, I’ve been thinking about how special our little exchange was and it’s been making me jittery with excitement! Before today my relationship with her was going just fine, but now it's going splendidly! Sorry if this news makes you frustrated with jealousy, but you wanted to know the truth and the truth hurts. Oh, and I even got to hold the door open for her!”

Max felt both a great sense of relief and a grave sense of disappointment towards his older brother.

“And I bet the next thing you’re going to tell me is that when she walked into the classroom she basically blew you a kiss by saying ‘thank you’ and calling you by your first name. Am I right Prince charming?”

“Oh yes! When she entered the classroom she said, ‘Thank you, Raymond’. It was as if Cupid had just fired an arrow into the both of us!”

Max wanted to shoot himself.

“I’m sorry to break it to you bro, but girls say basic greetings like ‘how are you?’ to me all the time. It’s really not something to get so worked up about.”

Raymond clenched his fists and had an expression of anger on his face.

“Well you see, what she said to me was an adult-greeting. They’re far more meaningful than your childish kiddy greetings. You’ll understand it when you’re older kiddo!”

“If you say so….”

Raymond then left for his daily dating practice. Raymond knew that in order to show Miss Interpretation the full brunt of his outstanding personality, he needed to do some training. So, like a Buddhist monk, Raymond meditated in the mountains so he could hone his mind. And by “mountains” I really mean “mountains of trash” because Raymond practiced in his room which was so dirty that in order to get from one end of it to the other, he had to trudge through a swamp of dirty clothes, dirty dishes, used cups, papers, books, old video game boxes, and used tissues. After some “adventuring” Raymond reached the desk which was located at the other end of his room. Once there, he did his daily meditation. And by “meditation” I mean he would have a mock conversation in his head of how he thought his “date” with Miss Interpretation would go. And during these meditations, he would use his plushie of Sonic the Hedgehog as a training dummy to project Miss Interpretation onto. Yes, I shit you not. For the past week, Raymond had been coming home from school and everyday he’d sit down in front of his plushie of Sonic the Hedgehog and pretend to have a date with it. However today was special, as Raymond felt he needed to take the next step in his “training”, and have a verbal conversation with his Sonic plushie. He soon started his “training”.

“Hey girl, you see that menu over there? You can order anything you like. The bill’s on me.”

There was no response.

“Hey, I’m talking to you ya know!”

There was no response.

“Oh, I see. You must be speechless because of how much of a nice and charismatic guy I am. Be sure to tell me if you think otherwise though.”

There was no response.

Raymond turned around, struck a victory pose, and started autistically screeching, “OH HELL YEA! I’M GOING TO DO THIS! I’M GOING TO WIN! SOMEONE BETTER GET A LIFEGUARD BECAUSE I’M ABOUT TO DROWN IN PUSSY!”

Of course, Raymond knew a Sonic plushie couldn’t respond, but that didn’t matter very much to him. He loved the fantasy of his plan working and Miss Interpretation falling for him. Even if he had to do it through, you know, a fucking plushie of Sonic the Motherfucking Hedgehog, his imagination gave him so much pleasure he just couldn’t help but feel excited. He didn’t care if it wasn’t real. He didn’t care that it was just a Sonic plushie. He just wanted the feeling of Miss interpretation loving him. Even if it was fake.

Raymond soon turned around and faced his Sonic plushie, “I bet you’re so impressed with my words that you’re about to propose to me right now. If any of what I just said was untrue, be sure to speak up now!”

The Sonic plushie responded, “Ew gross. Sonic Says that an adult who dates a Sonic plushie is no adult at all.”

“What the fu-”

But then Raymond realised that the voice he heard was just Max, who must have heard his earlier outburst and decided to stop by. Raymond turned around and saw Max standing in the doorway.

Raymond said, “Please leave my room Max. I have things to do.”

“Ok, I’ll leave soon,” Max replied, “but I must say you’re starting to come off as a total manchild.”

“I’m no manchild, and I said leave.”

“Ok, I’ll go once you answer this question. You see, back on that first day of school you said that Miss Interpretation held hands with you, and that it called for a ‘Special celebration’. So that got me thinking, what did you do with the hand Miss Interpretation touched?”

Raymond froze and his face turned white as if he had just seen a ghost.

Max went on to say, “Did you commit an adult-scandalous act?”

“Oh yes! I committed the ever so scandalous act of an adult-handwashing to get all those icky germs off!”

“More like you committed the ever so scandalous act of self-adultery.”

“Heh heh heh you kids and your ever so vibrant imagination that is far more adult than it ever should be.”

Apparently having a dirty mind is something that runs in the family.