The Boulevard of Broken Hearts

Chapter 2

The mall was just as bright, loud, and most importantly, crowded as it was in Gumball's home dimension. The weekend mallgoers flooded the shiny, glistening lobby that expanded to an incomprehensibly vast distance, overpriced novelty shops perched in every nook and cranny ready to devour the cash of unsuspecting suburbians.

"No! Not the mall, Gumball!" Anais said in a tone that was probably meant to be an indignant scream, but came out as a shrill wheeze. Gumball had made sure to walk just fast enough to tire her out without her suspecting he was doing it on purpose. "I said grocery shopping! We need to go to the supermarket!"

"What's that, Anais?" Gumball said loudly, pretending not to hear. "It's so hard to hear in all this bustle!"

"I said..." Anais started, but all that came out next was a weak huff. She paused to catch her breath, holding her head and grimacing – and most importantly, closing her eyes.

Gumball took the opportunity to grab Darwin close to him, his big eyes bulging in surprise. "Keep Anais occupied," he hissed. "I'm trusting you on this one!"

"W-w-wait," Darwin stammered, flailing his arms. "What are you gonna–"

"The SUPERMARKET, Gumball!" The scream hit him with the force of a gale, streaking out his fur and pressing his ears flat against his head (and making them ring). The crowd froze to shoot them withering glares. Anais looked dutifully embarrassed, hunching down and flattening her ears against her body. Gumball may have gone partially deaf, but Anais was distracted and off-balance.

Just as planned.

"Woah!" Gumball shouted, pointing somewhere further ahead. He couldn't actually see anything through the crowd, but Anais didn't know that. "Is that the Awesome Store?!"

The passerby shrugged and moved on, but Anais' eyes grew wide. "Wait, that place you're always talking about? The one with all the cursed items?" She stepped forward, eyes glimmering with curiosity, everything else forgotten. "Maybe that's where I got the watch!"

Gumball couldn't suppress a grin. Hook, line, and sinker.

He charged forward suddenly, pushing his way through the surprised crowd. Gumball heard a surprised yelp and the patter of Anais' feet followed by Darwin's desperate scrabbling, but there was no way they could keep up with him. When he judged that he had enough distance, he dashed around a corner and hopefully out of sight. He saw glass double doors at the far end – lucky break! – and sprinted for them, ignoring the halfhearted grunts of adults telling him not to run. He burst into sunlight and fresh air – unpleasantly hot after the air-conditioned building, but he wouldn't let that get him down. He glanced behind him quickly, but if Anais was nowhere to be seen.

It was time for the real plan to begin.

He considered his options, playing over the conversation at the house over in his head. What did he know? The other him had used "we" when describing the breakup, so obviously Penny had broken up with him. That would make this... tricky, but not impossible. He and Penny were meant for each other, after all. He just had to apologize for whatever happened and she'd understand it was all just a big mistake. She'd fallen for him once, after all. He just had to do it again.

It would help if he knew exactly what had happened, but he realized this universe's Gumball hadn't been forthcoming with details. Penny had gotten mad at him before when he went too far with some wild scheme, so it was probably something like that... He kicked himself for not thinking to ask more at the time. Not that it really mattered, of course. He was always best when he improvised.

As he mulled it over, his feet took him almost on automatic to Penny's street. He had walked this route so many times before, but now his heart was seized with an apprehension he hadn't known since... well, since before he knew Penny loved him back.