The miniature amusement park was called JoJo's Amusement Park. It had indoor and outdoor mini-golf, an arcade, rides, laser tag, and food. Sophia and Tim played a few rounds of indoor minigolf. Both did poorly but enjoyed themselves anyway. For a time they seemed able to push aside the rain clouds that had seemed to cover their morning. After playing some minigolf they stopped for some snacks, then went outside to ride some of the rides--huge slides that you went down with mats, a miniature roller coaster, a ferris wheel, and whatever else there was to be offered. When they grew too cold they went back inside to play in the arcade. You could win tickets from the games and use them to get prizes. Most of the prizes were kid stuff, but the games were still fun to play. Sophia was currently playing an old fashioned arcade shooter game with the plastic gun used as a controller. Tim stood to the side, just watching for this round.

"Well, well, well, if it isn't Sophia," a girl's voice came from behind the pair.

Upon hearing the familiar voice Sophia froze up. She forgot to shoot at the monster lunging at her and the thing killed her character. A few people behind her laughed. Sophia turned and saw a group of four. One girl who was extremely pretty, and three guys of varying build. The girl was named Evelyn, the well built guy with his arm around her waist was David, and the other two were Greg and Paul. All four of them wore some sort of shirt or accessory from a video game or popular movie like Star Wars. All of them were nerds, in their own right, but Sophia certainly did not get along with them.

"Hello, Evelyn, David, Greg, Paul," Sophia said, her voice completely flat. Her face was expressionless but her stance was defensive.

Instead of a greeting Evelyn said, "Lame as always, aren't you, Sophia? And you call yourself a gamer."

"You don't have to be good to be a gamer," Sophia retorted, her tone still flat. "You just have to enjoy it."

"Whatever," Evelyn scoffed. "Not like you're good at anything anyway."

David, Evelyn's boyfriend, added, "Perhaps not, but it was still fun using her." He gave a nasty grin and Sophia's face paled. Then David turned his attention to Tim and asked, "You her boyfriend? Sophia's not much to look at, so you better get what you can out of her."

That was the last straw. Sophia couldn't handle any more and felt like her heart had just been torn in two all over again. Tears spilled down her face she grabbed Tim's hand and drug him from the building as hyena-like laughter followed them. "We're going home," she said gruffly as they made it to her car and climbed in. On the trip back Sophia kept sniffling, tried not to keep crying, wiped her face with the sleeve of her jacket.

Finally they were back in her apartment and she miserably collapsed onto the floor in front of the couch with her legs drawn up to her chest, her arms wrapped around her legs, and her face buried in them. "Sorry, Tim," she mumbled numbly. "Just give me a minute..."