“Willis and I broke up.”

My eyes bulged and I nearly choked on the spoonful of chicken noodle soup I was about to swallow. It scalded my mouth and I quickly swallowed, my eyes tearing up. “What?” I finally choked out.

Casey sat across from me, looking abnormally calm after the sentence she had just uttered. She half-smiled at me. “He kind of got angry with me after I ditched him at the fair the other night…”

I looked at her in horror. “What? But you didn’t ditch. You were kidnapped!”

“I couldn’t exactly tell him that, could I?” Casey responded, smiling wryly.

Immediately I felt guilty. Casey couldn’t tell anyone about the gang, so she couldn’t explain the truth to Willis. “Oh, Casey. I’m so sorry. This is all my fault—”

“Don’t worry about it,” Casey cut me off, shaking her head. “It’s not your fault.”

“Yes it is,” I muttered glumly. “You and Willis were together for so long…”

Casey shrugged. “Maybe too long. For the last few weeks it felt like we were more like friends than boyfriend and girlfriend. Willis thought so too, so I guess this is for the good.”

“I’m sorry, Case,” I apologized again, frowning at her. Even if she seemed okay on the outside, I knew Casey better than that. “You’ll find someone new…”

Casey rolled her eyes. “Sure, but not for a few months. I’d like to stay single for awhile.”

“Being single is fun,” I told her energetically. “You get to fuss over cute guys without feeling guilty!”

Casey smirked. “Yeah, well now I can’t do that with my best friend, can I?”

I blinked at her in surprise. “Huh?”

“You didn’t reply to any of my texts last night, and you’re in a frighteningly good mood. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what happened after Lance and I left the other night.”

My cheeks blazed. “N-nothing happened!”

“You can’t lie to me, Holly,” Casey responded with a cheeky grin.

Now that’s something I haven’t heard before, I thought sarcastically. A smile spread across my lips. “You can’t tell anyone, Casey.”

Casey held up her hands. “Holly, I never tell secrets.”

Which was completely true. I gestured for her to come closer, and she leaned over the table, bringing her head as close to mine as possible. Closing the space between us, I brought my head to her ear and uttered two simple words. “We’re together.”

Casey let out an excited squeal, pulling away from me, her eyes as wide as saucers. “Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

“Oh my god! That’s awesome!” she gushed. “I knew it was going to happen! I told you!”

I laughed at her excitement. “You did.”

“It’s about time,” a voice commented from above me.

Casey’s eyes snapped to Lance, who was standing above me, frowning. I rolled my eyes at him.

“You can’t tell anyone,” Casey told Lance, giving him a serious look. “This is really important.”

Lance held up his hands. “I’m not going to tell a soul. But Casey, Willis just told me that you guys broke up.”

“That’s because we did.”

“Are you okay?” Lance asked, giving Casey a concerned look.

Casey waved her hand. “Don’t worry about me. It was going to happen anyway. Besides, as our relationship ended, a better one started. Officially, at least.”

“Well, we aren’t really official,” I muttered, stirring my soup. “It’s a secret, remember?”

Casey grinned at me. “More than one person knows, so technically it is official. Ah, a forbidden romance. How romantic.”

Lance snorted. “You mean creepy.”

I slammed my elbow into his stomach. “It’s not creepy!” Lance groaned, taking a few steps away from me.

“Yeah! Holly and you-know-who are only four year apart. My parents are ten years apart,” Casey defended.

Lance frowned, still rubbing his stomach. “I was kidding, jeez.” He took a seat next to me, stealing the crackers that had come with my soup. “So Shawn’s in jail for a long time, huh?”

“No,” Casey responded before I could. Lance and I stared at her in surprise. She gave us the are-you-stupid look. “Every man is innocent until proven guilty. He’s got a trial this weekend. Don’t you have to go to it Lance?”

Lance shrugged. “Well yeah. But he’s in jail right now, so that’s all that matters...”

“What matters is that we don’t have to deal with the gang situation again. Ever,” I corrected confidently.

Casey, Lance, and I stared at each other for a moment. Lance and Casey looked relieved, small smiles slowly crossing their faces. It was hard to believe. Shawn was gone.

“December’s going to be a good month,” Lance decided, grinning.

Casey nodded in agreement. “A very good month. Full of love, eh, Holly?”

I blushed, ducking my head. “Maybe,” I murmured bashfully. “Or a month of flirting, for the single people.”

Casey and Lance exchanged grins. “Sounds good.”

Sighing contently, I dipped my spoon back into my soup. Just as I poured the spoonful into my mouth, the bell rang. Lance immediately stood up, glancing at me with amused eyes. “Better hurry.”

“Don’t be late for Mr. Heywood,” Casey teased, causing me to choke again.

I thumped my hand on the table, once again having the soup scald my throat and bring tears to my eyes. Casey was going to end up killing me one day. She laughed before also pushing away form the table, joining Lance, and then following him towards the throng of students leaving the cafeteria. I quickly grabbed my tray and hurried to the front of the room, handing off my tray to the lunch lady. She gave me a knowing smile, as if she knew I was going to be late.

Twirling on my heel, I hurried towards the exit. I only got three feet before someone ran into me. A groan of frustration left my mouth and I looked up to glare at the person. James was looking at me in surprise.

“Holly?”

“Hey,” I greeted, stepping around him. “Better hurry, or you’ll be late.”

“You’re going to be late anyway,” he informed me, handing his tray to the lunch lady.

“I know.”

He grinned at me. “There’s strength in numbers.”

The bell rang ten seconds before we entered the classroom. Mr. Heywood was in the middle of a sentence. He paused, glancing at us with a frown. Before he could scold us, James spoke up. “Sorry, my locker was jammed. Holly helped me.”

Mr. Heywood raised an eyebrow at me. Immediately images of us necking on the couch two nights before filled my head, causing a blush to spread across my face. My head shot down and I focused on a tile on the floor.

“Well, take a seat.”

“Yes, sir!” James chirped, pushing me forwards.

I stumbled to my desk, unable to look back up at Mr. Heywood. Someone snorted from the back, and I didn’t have to look to know it was Lance.

“As I was saying, now that the rats are done we’ll be having a test on the anatomy unit on Friday.”

A groan swept throughout the class, and a few people muttered complaints. I kept my eyes on my desk, focusing intently on the word diploid someone had etched into the wood.

“We don’t meet for class tomorrow and there’s no school on Friday, so the test will be on Thursday. Today and Wednesday will be review,” Mr. Heywood continued, sounding slightly amused. Suddenly a hand appeared on my desk. “Would you guys like to go over things on the bored, and start the review packet?

Starting working on the review packet was the unanimous agreement. Mr. Heywood emitted a low, alluring chuckle. “I’ll go get them,” he told the class, retracting his hand from my desk. After a few moments I looked up, watching as he disappeared into the supply room.

The classroom was quickly filled with the sounds of desks and chairs scraping against the floor as people moved to sit with their friends. Someone pushed a desk against mine and I turned to see Lance slumping into it. He yawned, stretching his arms.

“So,” he started casually. “You know how I have court Friday?”

I gave him a pitying look. “Yep.”

“Um, I was wondering, and you don’t have to, but if you want to come with me,” he continued, giving me a sheepish look. “Some moral support would be nice.”

I gave him a wary look. “But Shawn…”

“Yeah, I know it’s Shawn, but he can’t do anything because we’re in the court,” Lance said quickly, stopping me before I could protest. “Please, Holly? Even if he does try something, there’s cops everywhere, and that will just add to his penalty. You’ll be completely safe.”

Lance gave me the puppy dog look, and I felt myself resigning. I sighed. “I’m sitting in the back.”

“You can sit wherever you like!” Lance cried, a little too loudly. People gave us curious looks. I waved them off.

“So, you want to work with me on the review packet?” I asked, trying to change the subject.

Lance frowned, slumping onto his desk. “I hate review packets,” he muttered, running a hand through his blonde hair. “They’re so time consuming.”

I rolled my eyes at him. “Stop complaining, review packets are easy.”

“That’s the spirit, Ms. Evers.”

My head snapped up involuntarily and my eyes landed on Mr. Heywood, who was smirking down at me. His eyes twinkled in amusement as I gaped at him, trying to form a coherent thought. Suddenly there was a pain in my ribs and I winced, turning to glare at Lance.

“You were gawking,” he told me, sharing the same expression as Mr. Heywood.

Now I blushed, unable to look back up at Mr. Heywood. “I— I wasn’t gawking…”

Mr. Heywood chuckled, but I still refused to look up at him. “We’ll need the C.O.W for this activity, so I need a volunteer to come with me to go get it.”

A few people said they’d go, but I knew whom Mr. Heywood was going to choose before he even said it.

“Jessica, you wanna help?”

I sighed, pushing myself up from my desk. I knew it— wait. I froze in my movements. Jessica? My eyes snapped to Mr. Heywood, who was smiling at Jessica. I turned to her, watching as she started to get up from her seat with an excited expression on her face.

Without thinking, I shot up in my seat, throwing my hand in the air. “Mr. Heywood, I have to, um, go to the bathroom anyway, so I can just go with you to make it easier.”

“Desperate,” Lance coughed quietly.

I shot him a glare before turning to Mr. Heywood, who had a satisfied smirk on his face. That’s when I realized he did that on purpose. My jaw dropped and I opened my mouth to take back what I’d said, but he cut me off.

“That works,” Mr. Heywood said, his normal, polite smile returning. “Jessica, maybe you could return it after class.”

I didn’t have to turn to know she looked disappointed. “Sure,” she responded glumly.

“Lance, will you hand out the packets?”

Lance nodded, taking a pile of papers from Mr. Heywood. “Sure thing.”

Mr. Heywood smiled. “Alright. Let’s go, Ms. Evers.”

Shooting a glare at the back of Mr. Heywood’s head, I followed him out of the classroom, and into the empty science wing hallway. As we walked through the quiet hall, Mr. Heywood started whistling. I trailed behind him, my eyes on the floor, keeping a safe distance between us. Images of us kissing kept coming into my mind, causing my face to grow hot. What was Mr. Heywood thinking right now? About the other night?

Suddenly I ran into something hard, causing me to fall a few steps back. I rubbed my nose, looking up to see Mr. Heywood grinning at me in amusement. “You okay?”

“I’m fine,” I muttered, dropping my gaze.

“Really? Your face is a little red, are you feeling okay?”

I glared at him, blushing deeper. “I’m fine!”

He emitted a low chuckle. “What were you thinking about?”

“N-nothing,” I stuttered, going to brush by him. He chuckled again, purposely stepping in front of me so I bumped into him. I grounded my teeth. He took pleasure in teasing me, and was shameless about it.

“You know Holly, you should probably stop blushing every time I look at you in class,” Mr. Heywood advised, holding the door that led to the stairwell open for me. “Someone’s going to think you have a crush.”

I glanced at him with a frown. “It’s not my fault. Stop looking at me.”

Mr. Heywood snorted. “I can’t do the impossible.”

A smile slowly made its way onto my face. Whether or not he meant that as a compliment, it still made my stomach flutter. Mr. Heywood glanced at me, his grey eyes looking amused again. Suddenly I had the urge to grab his swinging hand, but I resisted it. We were in school. We weren’t a couple. We were student, and teacher.

“What’s wrong?” Mr. Heywood asked unexpectedly, stopping half way down the stairwell. With me on the step above him, we were almost the same height.

I cocked my head. “What do you mean?”

“Your expression just dropped,” he told me with a frown. “What are you thinking?”

“Um, nothing really,” I told him, blushing slightly. Would he think I was being childish because I was disappointed about our lack of interaction? We both knew in school we couldn’t be together.

Mr. Heywood raised an eyebrow. “Tell me.”

“The test is worrying me,” I murmured bashfully, down casting my eyes.

“Holly, you can’t lie to me.”

I pursed my lips, looking back at Mr. Heywood. My eyes widened in surprise when I realized how close we were. His face was merely inches away from my own. Concern was etched into his eyes, causing my heart to skip a beat. I chewed on my bottom lip, hesitating for a moment. Mr. Heywood gave me an impatient look. I sighed.

“I know it’s stupid,” I started, playing the bottom of my shirt, “but it’s just…”

“Just?”

“I don’t like that we have to act like student and teacher instead of… you know,” I admitted, feeling my face heat up. “It’s weird. We have to act like we’re almost complete strangers. It’s a little, um, lonely.”

Mr. Heywood’s face dropped a little bit. Immediately I regretted admitting what I was thinking about. “Sorry, just forget—”

Mr. Heywood suddenly leaned forwards and quickly pressed his lips against mine. My eyes widened in surprise, and he quickly pulled away, glancing behind him. I raised a hand to my lips, looking at him curiously.

“Holly, I understand what you’re saying,” Mr. Heywood told me, putting a hand on my shoulder. “But I know that you know what comes with us being… you know.” He lowered his voice slightly, gazing at the door again.

I nodded my head quickly. “I know. It’s just going to take awhile to get used to.”

Mr. Heywood gave me a small smile. “Same here. Especially because while you have a reason to look at me during the whole class period, I can’t spend it looking at you, otherwise someone will think something.”

With that, he turned and started down the stairs again. I blanked, staring at his back in surprise. A blush blossomed on my cheeks again and I hurried to catch up to him, catching the back of his shirt. “Thank you, Mr. Heywood.”

“Chris,” he corrected me, glancing over his shoulder. “Mr. Heywood in class, and only in class.”

“Right.”

When we arrived at the library, Mr. Heywood went in to get the C.O.W while I waited by the entrance, rocking on the balls of my feet. He appeared moments later, lugging the large cart of laptops. I quickly hurried forwards to help him push it.

“I now understand why they call this thing a C.O.W,” he told me as we pushed it out of the library. “They weigh just about as much. Turn left, we have to take the elevator,” he ordered.

A few students in the classrooms we passed gave us curious looks as we lugged the Computers On Wheels towards the elevator. A few students waved enthusiastically to Mr. Heywood. He returned their gestures with an award-winning smile— one of his polite, fake smiles.

“You’re still popular, huh,” I commented casually.

Mr. Heywood smirked. “Yep.”

“Do the students ever tell you anything exciting?” Never before had I realized how hard it was to make small talk with Mr. Heywood. A grimace crossed my face. I needed to work on that.

Mr. Heywood shrugged, checking over his shoulder quickly to make sure our path was still clear. “A girl confessed to me the other day.”

I nearly choked on my spit. “What?”

Mr. Heywood’s smirk grew wider and he raised an eyebrow. “Are you jealous? Trust me, it wasn’t even a sixth of how good yours was.”

“People confess to you?” I asked in shock.

“Oh yeah. All the time.”

“I didn’t realize girls…” I trailed off, blinking rapidly. Girls confessed to Mr. Heywood? Who? When? Why? I swallowed my questions, trying to stay calm. I was not going to be the obsessive girlfriend.

Mr. Heywood suddenly started laughing, bending his head down. He was laughing so loudly that Mr. Cyr, the history teacher, glared at him before shutting his door.

“Your face was priceless,” he finally said, grinning like an idiot. “Absolutely priceless!”

I glared at him, feeling my face heat up. “You were joking, weren’t you?”

Mr. Heywood nodded, putting a hand over his mouth to stop any more laughter from escaping. “Holly, you’re too cute.”

“You’re a jerk,” I stated, slamming the button to the elevator.

“I know.”

The elevator door opened, and together we moved the cow into the small compartment. I hit the button for the second floor, and the doors shut, leaving Mr. Heywood and I in silence. Suddenly Mr. Heywood was next to me, a playful smile on his face. I took a step away from him warily.

“Mr. Heywood, we’re in school,” I warned him.

He raised an eyebrow. “I know this?”

I frowned. Wasn’t he just about to kiss me?

“I heard Lance wants you to go to court with him on Friday,” Mr. Heywood commented, leaning against the elevator wall casually, crossing his arms. “What was he going in for again?”

A sigh escaped my lips. “Mr. Heywood, I’m sitting in the back.”

He scowled. “It’s still Shawn. You know what happened last time with Shawn?”

“You got hurt,” I pointed out before he could continue. “Nothing happened to me.”

“But something could.”

“We’ll be in a court room!”

“Holly, I’m worried about you,” Mr. Heywood told me flatly, giving me an exasperated look. “Sure, you’re in a courtroom. But it’s Shawn. You don’t know him like I do.”

I bit my lip. “I know… I just… Lance wants me to go, and I’ll be at the back. I won’t let Shawn see me.”

Mr. Heywood stared at me for a moment, looking annoyed. Then he sighed, running a hand through his hair. “Fine. Go.”

“Mr. Heywood…”

Mr. Heywood shook his head. “I’m not angry. I get that you want to help Lance. But if you’re going to court Friday, then I want you to come over on Thursday.”

I looked at him in surprise. “Huh?”

“Now that we’re together, I don’t have to think of stupid excuses for you to come over,” Mr. Heywood told me as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. “I wanted you to come over Friday, but if you want to go to court, come over Thursday.”

He wanted me to go over? I grinned at him, suddenly feeling one hundred times better. “I’ll definitely be over Thursday.”

_______________________________________

Another chapter done, another day almost over. It really takes forever to write. So, this story is coming to an end, soon, but not right now. I have one last huge thing I want to do (I could have ended it with this chapter, but a lot of people want it to go longer, so I'm adding something) and people if you actually read the author's notes you'd know a few helpful things. Like what I said about the sequel. I'm don't want to repeat it, but there is going to be a sequel. It really grinds my gears when people don't read the author's note, so if you read this, put a lessthan symbol and a three in your message at the end (a heart). That way I know who read this. Don't make it too obvious thought because then people will notice something is up.

The contest results are in! However, you can't copy-paste on Wattpad, so click the external link and it will take you to the quizilla thing I posted, which allows you to copy-paste, so you can read everyone's one shots :D The ones on Wattpad are in my library, but there are some on Quizilla too! So if you want see the results, open the external link! YOU REALLY WANT TO, EVEN IF YOU DIDN'T JOIN. Every single one shot is so incredible! Really! Go read some! :D