How Keith Met Helena (from Uri’s Twitter)
I got a question about something I'd left on the table thinking I might draw a comic for it someday, so I wrote this out. This is the story behind the mention in TBM's bonus room that "Keith became a detective to woo Helena." Ah, the vigor of youth!
——
In college, Keith (age 21) was walking home after drinking with a friend one night, and bumped into a drunk, who picked a fight with him. Keith was annoyed, so he punched his lights out, and the drunk fainted. Just as he thought "Oh crap" and prepared to run, he noticed Helena (age 17) was there watching.
He didn't want to be reported, so he wondered how to play it off, but oddly enough, Helena thanked him. It turned out that before the drunk bumped into Keith, he'd also picked a fight with Helena.
As Helena was about to call the police to turn the drunk in to them, Keith promptly bragged that he was a newbie cop and had punched the drunk to protect her, so no need to report a thing! (He was drunk, so he wanted to get home and sleep already, and wasn't keen on being questioned by the cops.)
Giving her only his name, Keith went back home.
The next day, while Keith was talking with a friend at a cafe, his friend asked him why he looked so down.
Keith had met a really cute girl last night, and sure, he'd been drunk, but he regretted leaving her without even giving her any contact info.
"What kind of girl was she?", the friend asked, and as Keith pointed to say "A girl like that," he realized that girl WAS Helena. By coincidence, she was working at the cafe.
Seeing it as his chance, Keith called for Helena, but she was angry. She told him that she'd gone to the police station earlier today to say her thanks to a detective named Keith who helped her, but they drove her away saying there wasn't anybody by that name.
Keith panicked at being called out as a liar, so he piled on another lie by saying that he wasn't actually a detective yet, he was in a police academy, sorry for showing off!
Helena accepted this, and told him "I'm sure someone so dedicated to justice will be a wonderful detective!"
And so Keith dropped out of college to go to police academy.
His friends and teachers mocked the heck out of him, but though it was love at first sight, he wanted to really make Helena fall head over heels for him. Plus, he didn't have much of a plan after college and figured he'd just end up in some desk job, so he felt like being adventurous.
The story continues with things like "Helena actually had a boyfriend already," but that'll be for another time.