What up Mups!
So a quick update for ya as we come up on Turkey day here in the US - for those of you NOT in the US. I've got some things to catch up on, so may take the week to work on those things and of course, Thanksgiving. We're coming to the end of this - it really was a big one shot that just...continued, however, once this is done, hopefully you'll get your 2 ball update as well as a new Mupp Adventure.
But before all that, here's your update!
Gonzo wasn’t unknown in love nor was he unlucky in love. He had an eye for ladies, there was no denying that, but he could at least say he had one great love in his life that, even now, he regretted ever losing. Maybe that was why watching two of his best friends’ relationship disintegrate hit his heart a little harder than anyone else, but he couldn’t help it.
He loved Kermit like the brother he never had and while his relationship with Piggy had started out with a one sided crush, she had grown into the sister he didn’t know he wanted or needed. He had been happy to step aside when it was clear the frog had eyes for the pig, even if he wouldn’t admit it for the longest time and it was clear as a pane of window glass that Piggy had gotten bit first and had been trying to get that frog to notice her.
So yeah, he was probably a little heartbroken that they had broken up for good this time.
But it didn’t mean he ever gave up hope that they’d get back together at some point.
And that seemed to be coming true within the last week. Since that night at the movies, Gonzo noticed that Kermit was spending less time with Denise and more time with Piggy; of course, Kermit always spent time with Piggy – he was the executive producer of the show and she was the star. It made sense they spent time together and yes, there was a fleeting – fleeting, mind you – thought that Gonzo entertained that maybe Kermit wasn’t completely over Piggy and Denise was just the convenient excuse to show them all that no, he certainly didn’t still have feelings for Piggy and look! He had totally moved on cause he was with this wonderful girlfriend.
So it was – not really – a surprise when he got a call a few days later from the frog asking if he could come over for a bit. Of course the writer didn’t mind, as the frog was his buddy and they didn’t spend nearly enough time together. Saturday morning, Gonzo invited his pal over for a nice home cooked breakfast, prepared ala the Great Gonzo; it wasn’t a big breakfast – pancakes and eggs, but it was a breakfast and he even threw in coffee.
“What’s up, Frog?” he asked, once the two had finished and were just sitting around the table, finishing their coffee.
“What makes you think anything’s up?” Kermit asked, bringing said cup to his lips.
“You wanted to come over on a Saturday,” Gonzo replied. “This is usually your time with Scooter, not that I don’t love the fact you dropped the boy wonder for me.” He ended that with a wink, a saucy wink.
Kermit rolled his eyes. “If at any time you’d like to have a talk, Gonzo,” he began. “All you have to do is call.”
The head writer started laughing, giving the frog an affectionate kick under the table. “Nice to have your support, Frog,” he said. “So honestly, what’s on your mind?”
Sighing, Kermit took another sip of coffee before he started. “Gonzo,” he said. “Have you ever been caught between a rock and a hard place?”
“Of course,” came the answer. “And once, that was a literal statement.”
“Of course it was.”
“So what’s your rock and what’s the hard place?”
“Piggy and Denise,” the frog stated, plainly. “And not always in that order.”
“From what I’ve heard, you don’t have a problem anymore.”
“Don’t I?”
“Denise broke up with you, didn’t she?” Gonzo asked.
“Well…” Kermit began, shrugging slightly. “The first time, yeah, she did.”
“The first time?”
Here, Kermit sighed, before standing up in order to get himself another cup of coffee. But he did proceed to tell Gonzo what had happened – a truncated overview of his talk with Piggy, his agonizing over what to do, before finally getting to his point – on how he met Denise at the Bat Bolt & Skull, just to put them on equal footing or rather to put her on equal footing, as he wouldn’t be influenced by anyone if they had been at Rowlf’s, and told her that Piggy was a part of his life, had been and always would be, and that he couldn’t imagine life without her.
The main attraction of course was whether or not Kermit felt the same way Denise did.
He had spent most of Thursday night trying to figure out what his feelings actually were and then the answer seemed clear. As gruesome and morbid as it was in hindsight, Kermit’s brain had suddenly substituted Denise for Piggy on that horrible flight, reversing the good outcome with the worst possible.
What would have happened if it had been Fozzie and Denise on that plane?
And what would have done if they hadn’t made it out alive?
Fozzie was easy – he would’ve been devastated. Losing Fozzie really would feel as though he had lost one of his brothers and he knew that would be a pain he would never likely get over.
Denise…wasn’t so easy.
Yes, if he had lost her in such a way, he would feel sadness of course, but would he feel the same thing when it had been Piggy?
The easy answer was…
No. No he wouldn’t.
Not knowing if Piggy had been alive or…he didn’t even want to imagine it. It had been hard enough when Piggy wasn’t in his life romantically; there had been time when they hadn’t even been in friendship territory, but not having Piggy in his life at all? Without the possibility of her ever gracing him with her presence?
No. No, he couldn’t do that. Ever.
Denise, though she was wonderful and he would certainly be saddened if anything ever happened to her, wouldn’t affect him as much as Piggy did; losing Denise would hurt, yes; losing Piggy would destroy him. Destroy him in the same way that Jim’s death had nearly destroyed him, but a thousand times worse.
He had gone to meet Denise with that in mind – he liked her, liked her well enough, could even love her on a platonic level, but Kermit was not in love with her.
Which brought him to a much bigger question –
What exactly were his feelings for Piggy?
Those questions were the main reason he was over at Gonzo’s. While he wouldn’t exactly go to the head writer for romantic advice, they did have something in common – deeper feelings for Piggy than they had ever expected. Gonzo, unlike Kermit, had never been afraid to admit that he had feelings for the diva, though it had been a while before the frog knew for sure that those feelings were a lot deeper than the crush the weirdo passed it off as.
And as someone who had been attracted to Piggy for the same reasons Kermit was, maybe he had some insight as what exactly was going on between them.
“So you broke up with her then?” Gonzo asked, trying to figure out how this whole thing worked out. “A second time?”
Nodding, Kermit came back to the table, coffee in hand. “I guess the first time wasn’t really a breakup,” he said, his face in a grimace. “Not to say Denise was happy at the end of dinner because she was not, but this time…this time I had to face facts.”
“Well,” the writer replied, shrugging. “I can tell you from experience that, really, the hardest thing in life is trying to love someone when you’re clearly in love with someone else.”
It was on the tip of his tongue for Kermit to deny the notion, deny the very fact that he would intentionally get involved with someone and still have feelings for someone else, but the realization hit him harder than he was expecting. “Is it that obvious?” he whispered.
“To anyone that knows you,” Gonzo stated, giving him a smile. “It was pretty clear when you started dating Denise; it was a huge flare signal when she and Fozzie got into that crash.”
“So what do I do?” the frog sighed. “I can’t lie, Gonzo. I do love her, still love her and I don’t think I’ve ever stopped or could ever stop loving her even if I tried. But we can’t go back to what we were before, that was just…”
“Kermit, you seem to think you two are the same crazy kids that came to this city in the first place,” the writer chastised. “We’re older and wiser, aren’t we?”
“Are we?” Kermit asked. “I’m not so sure.”
“It sounds like you’ve already made your decision,” Gonzo continued. “Cause it sounds like you’re unwilling to take the risk again because it didn’t work out the last time.”
“It was a disaster the last time.”
“You’re right,” the writer agreed. “That was a huge mess. I’m surprised you even had any happy times, with you both being so miserable and all. I know none of us understood how you lasted so long when it was totally cleared you both hated each other.”
“If there’s a point, Gonzo, please feel free to make it.”
“Certainly,” he replied. “I’ve been waiting decades for you to throw in the towel and now it’s my time to shine. I always said I’d be the better boyfriend and you know why? Because unlike you, I don’t let a little thing like attention stop me from showing the woman I love that I love her.”
“Yes,” Kermit deadpanned. “It’s why you’re so popular with the ladies now. Certainly kept your last girlfriend around.”
There was a line and regardless of the Muppet, it was usually crossed. Crossing lines was how Gonzo got decked by Rowlf all those years ago and it was going to be the reason he planned on decking the frog if he kept this up.
“You know, Piggy’s right,” he countered. “You really are a callous toad.”
“Insensitive was the word,” the frog corrected. “But you’re right, that was callous. I didn’t mean that, Gonzo. Lord knows if I had been a halfway decent boyfriend, I’d still have my last girlfriend. And the one before that. Piggy wasn’t the only one who let the ship sink.” Sighing, he again asked, “So what do I do?”
“Remember all the stuff you did before,” Gonzo replied. “And do the opposite.”
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Jim Henson Idea Man
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happened where Hook learned about all this, being mad with Emma, and then in what I don't entirely understand how being turned into a Dark One as well.
