"Welcome back, everyone," trilled Dan, my performance studies tutor, flourishing an arm around with his usual flamboyant demeanour as the remainder of the class trickled in.

"I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas. I assume everyone's feeling refreshed and raring to get going on your next piece?"

His question was met with a slight groan from half the reluctant attendees, disinterested silence from the other.

A cold hand reached around my face to cover my eyes, causing my whole body to tense as the image of the green eyes from the bus flashed into my mind. I instantly relaxed once I heard the familiar voice of Kris, one of the closest friends I'd made since starting at TAMM just three months ago, wishing me a Happy New Year.

Smiling, I turned to face him. With a small gasp, my mouth dropped open at his new, brightly bleached crop of hair, shining like a beacon against his caramel-coloured skin.

"New Year, new me," he laughed. Leaning over, he placed a quick kiss on my cheek before removing his vintage sheepskin coat and pulling a beaten-up manuscript book from his faded leather bag.

It couldn't be easy for Kris, being one of only two guys on a singing degree. But the fact he was one of the most outrageously confident people I'd ever met meant he was always firmly at the top of the tutors' favourites list.

"I can't believe they're throwing us straight into theory after this," Kris whispered, as Dan began the lesson. "Although, at least it means we'll get to be back with the boys..."

"Ugh, I can't think of anything worse," I hissed back. "A bunch of horny, unwashed guys? You're welcome to them."

"They're not unwashed, Abs, they're artistic," he smirked.

Rolling my eyes, I let out a quiet snort of laughter. Music theory had always been one of my strongest subjects, but - as one of the few mixed discipline classes on our course – it was normally crammed with guys from the guitar, bass and drums classes. Rather than try to learn anything, most of them seemed more interested in mingling with the singers.

Boys were the last thing on my mind, anyway. Going home over the Christmas break was supposed to be a chance for me and George to iron over the cracks that had started to deepen when I moved to London. The truth is, I think I'd already known for some time that they were too far gone to be filled in.

Leaning over to whisper to Kris, I had barely opened my mouth when Dan's voice caused me to jump in my seat.

"Abi, seeing as you have a lot to say this morning, perhaps you'd be so kind as to start us off?"

My stomach flipped at receiving a public put-down from the most notoriously firm but fair tutor on our course. Grabbing my sheet music from the floor, I rushed up to the stage as I shook thoughts of George from my mind.

"This is an original I've been working on, but it's not quite finished yet."

I mumbled into the microphone then, with a deep breath, I let my hands drift over the keys of the piano and allowed my voice to do what it knows how to do best.

Singing had always been the only time I felt truly free; completely at ease, as though there was no one else in the room. Dan seemed to spend the whole first semester telling me to open my eyes when I performed. But, the truth is, if I did that then it would all become too real. The words I wrote would no longer feel like private thoughts but raw and exposed. Opening my eyes would allow everyone to stare in and see what a mess I was deep down.

Shit, I'm in Dan's class right now, better look alive.

I blinked my eyelids open just as I reached the final line of what I had written so far and stared towards the back of the room, trying to avoid eye contact with the front row as Dan delivered his blunt yet positive feedback.

A figure lurking by the door to the auditorium shifted, catching my eye. It was hard to see clearly under the glare of the stage lights, but I was pretty sure that, in the darkness, stood the same light brown jacket and messy blonde hair of the stranger I nearly crushed to death on the bus that morning.

As the class politely applauded, I stepped down from the stage to head back to my seat. My legs still trembling, as they did after every public performance, I flopped down into my chair and was promptly yanked sideways into a giant bear hug from Kris.

"Abi, that was something else," he whispered. "You've got some deep shit going on inside that pretty head of yours."

With his arms wrapped tightly around mine and my chin jutting over his shoulder, I glanced towards the door, where the figure no longer lurked.

Filing out of the auditorium once Dan had freed us, I caught sight of my housemate, Charlotte, running through the doors of the main entrance. Waving over through the crowd, she grimaced in acknowledgement of the fact she had, typically, missed her first class back.

Shaking her shoulder-length blonde waves with her fingers as she approached, a shriek left her mouth instead of a normal greeting.

"Kris! Look at you, hot stuff!" she squealed, shooting her palms to her cheeks in shock at his new image. Looping her arm through his, she launched into a tirade of gossip; mainly revolving around the two guys she dated simultaneously while home for the holidays.

Tuning out from the topic I'd already been subjected to more than once since coming back from the Christmas break, I made my excuses.

"I'm going to grab a quick coffee before theory," I announced to two pairs of deaf ears, before slipping off to the vending machine.

The liquid was bitter and cheap, but it still hit the spot. Climbing the short staircase to my next classroom, I squinted to avoid the steam as I took another sip. Suddenly, I became aware of a presence blocking my route. Before I could even attempt to move out of the way, I collided headfirst into the tall figure. Almost in slow motion, I watched in horror as my drink tumbled downwards, straight down onto a recognisable pair of scuffed brown boots.

"Are you fucking kidding me?"

That same voice which I'd heard cursing once already that morning pierced through my stomach. Without wanting to look up and confirm my fears, I scrabbled around in my red leather satchel to dig out some old, scrunched up tissues that I knew were in there somewhere.

"I'm so, so sorry," I mumbled, tears of embarrassment threatening behind my eyes. Why the hell did I feel like crying? It was just an accident. It just had to be my shitty luck, though, that it was the second accident that morning involving the same person.

A rough, warm hand unexpectedly reached down under my jaw, gently tilting my face upwards to look straight into those same green eyes from the bus.

Dropping his fingers from my face, he brushed a speck of coffee from his sleeve. "It's okay, just leave it."

With the same, slightly pissed-off smile he'd given me on the bus, he turned to open the classroom door. Without looking around, he allowed it to swing closed behind him while I stood rooted to the spot, ignoring the stares of the few people still milling around.

It was him. Bus boy. Did he stalk me all the way to university?

No, that couldn't be it; he'd looked pretty certain about where he was headed. Straight into the theory class I was about to join.

Tentatively pushing open the door, I scanned the bustling room to find Kris and Charlotte already tucked away on two desks in the corner. Still chatting away to each other at one hundred miles an hour, there was no way I was going to be able to get a seat near them.

My eyes fell upon the only empty desk left in the packed classroom. Right at the back. Next to him. Looked as thought my little detour for caffeine had caused more problems than it was worth.

Biting my lip and taking a deep breath, I pulled out the empty chair, which thanked me by letting out an ear-piercing screech across the cheap, wooden floor. Slipping into the seat, I started to unpack my things. Along with my books, a handful of empty sweet wrappers, one striped sock, a tampon and - inexplicably - a plastic butter knife, all decided it was their moment to break free from the bottom of my bag and land on the desk.

All the while, I could feel those green eyes burning a hole in the left side of my head.

Turning to face him, I noticed a different smile painted across his lips. Rather than seeming annoyed, the tiny curl at the corner of his mouth suggested he found my haphazard arrival somewhat amusing.

"What are you going to do now, health and safety?" he whispered. "Stab me?"

"Look, I'm really sorry about the coffee," I whispered in response.

"No, you're golden," he replied. "I enjoy having my stuff ruined by strangers."

Shoving the uninvited items back into the chaos known as my bag, I turned to face the front of the class. Arranging, then rearranging, my books and pens on the desk, I tried to ignore the fact that the scrap of make-up I'd wearily slapped on that morning would be doing little to hide the heat creeping across my cheeks.

"Welcome back to all of you familiar faces," began Sally, our theory tutor.

"And a big hello to the new folks among us," she beamed, looking directly at bus boy next to me. "Noah, I believe?"

"Yep."

"Would you like to tell us a bit about yourself?"

"Nope."

"Okay," she continued, seemingly oblivious to his poor manners. "Perhaps you might like to at least let us know which instrument you play?"

"Everything," he shrugged. "Guitar mainly."

Sally clapped her hands together. "Wonderful! Guitarists, we have another one of your kind among us."

I liked Sally. She had a hard job trying to teach the fundamentals of musicianship to a bunch of wannabe rock stars. But she was one of those people who always try their very best to find a positive in everything.

"Right," she continued. "If you could all turn to the first page in your books, we're going to be doing some work on complex time signatures in jazz music. For this lesson, you'll need to join up with the person next to you. I'd like you to start by developing a basic motif between the two of you, using polyrhythmic times."

Exactly the kind of thing I would normally have been excited about, although the murmured groans that rumbled around the classroom suggested I was alone in that thought. The fact that there was only one desk to the side of me was also hampering my ability to get pumped up about polyrhythms. Looked like me and bus boy were going to be a team.

Swivelling round in my chair, I decided to try and wipe the morning's slate clean and start again.

I plastered on my best smile and began. "So, I'm Abi..."

He cut me off without even looking up from his phone. "Cool. Sorry, but I need to go."

Shoving his phone back into his jacket pocket with a frown, he slid out of his chair as Sally turned to write on the board. Silently, without even so much as an excuse or apology, he slipped away and out of the door.

Tutting to myself – but secretly relieved I would now be working alone – I shook my head as I began to carefully draw a series of music notes onto my manuscript paper.

There hadn't been anyone called Noah in our year during the first term. Not anyone that looked like him, anyway. Sally had said he was a 'new face', but that didn't make any sense. Why would anyone be joining a course that was already one term in? Maybe he'd transferred from another university? Or maybe he was kicked out of his last one for being so bloody rude?

Maybe you should just stop thinking about him and focus on your work.

As my attention fell back on the pen moving fluidly in my hand against the paper, I let out a quick gasp at the swirling four letters my subconscious had doodled across the black and white lines.

Shooting my eyes around to see if anyone was watching, I frantically scribbled through the name that I'd only just come to learn. Tearing the sheet from the pad with a loud cough, I scrunched it up and stuffed it into my satchel.

As far as I was concerned, he could just join all the other scraps of forgotten lyrics and discarded daydreams that lived in the bottom of my bag.