For a moment, I thought I'd forgotten to bring Madame Bovary today, and that alone was enough to send a little shiver up my chest. Then, I fumbled around in my backpack, trying to look as innocent as I could (which wasn't very innocent, considering that my head was half above the desk in the middle of the lecture and that I probably had a weird grimace-smirk on my face), and eureka. I felt its familiar worn cover and that one page that always stuck out.

That was good. Now I had a headache from leaning over for so long.

I straightened up. My head throbbed a little. I hoped the wince on my face wasn't too apparent.

Apparently, it really was apparent, because Olivia shot me a sideways glance, raising an eyebrow. "You okay?" she mouthed.

I fiddled with my notebook (I'd lost track of my pages in the midst of my search), flipping over to the right topic, before responding to her. I mouthed back, "Peachy keen, thank you."

She didn't seem to understand my response, so I shook my head and shot her a quick smile, bending back over my notebook. I glanced up at Madame Cartier, who was going on about the new vocabulary. Oh goodness. She was going to make us do interactive partner work any time soon. My handwriting turned from barely legible scrawling to a mess of swirls.

Ah, I was going to totally fail this next vocab quiz.

But really, I did my own sort of tutor (whom I could bribe into helping me), so I could worry about that later. For now, I had a poem due in about three hours, and I'd gotten about three lines down.

Ms. Jacobs, the creative writing teacher (who also taught Luc, according to Josh, to Luc's embarrassment), had a notion in her head that everyone on The Aquiline's editorial team had to contribute something themselves to "get in the spirit of creativity". And since I was co-editor-in-chief, it was especially important for me to get something in.

She hadn't listened to any of my protests about my non-existent creative talents, to say the least. And Lila, who was the other editor-in-chief (who really hadn't done anything to help me), had already submitted her entry—I got no backup from that position.

I bit the top of my pencil, feigning intense interest in the vocab words for household ornaments, and tried very hard not to fall asleep. (It probably was a bad thing when I was falling asleep from my own poem.)

Olivia jabbed my right arm with her finger. "Hey," she whispered, "we're gonna do partner interaction soon."

"Right." I dropped my pencil and rubbed my eyes. Hopefully, Olivia would rat me out for working on an English related project during French class...

Olivia scooted a little closer to me so we could share the textbook. "Are your contacts bothering you or something?"

I put my pencil case on top of the three lines that I'd written so far in a poor attempt to look like I was actually interested in French class. "Kinda." It wasn't really a lie—I was still adjusting to them (I still tried to push up my contacts once every few hours, but I was getting better at not doing that—I had a reputation to keep up, after all). I gave her a flat smile with just my lips.

She caught me though, and took my pencil case off the paper. There was a buzz of French (and mostly English, but Madame Cartier didn't need to know that) all around us, so Olivia wasn't afraid to talk. "The river flows through a haunted valley tonight / Full of will-o'-the-whisps that follow us every day." She raised an eyebrow at me. "I thought this was the literary crap that you hated."

"Ugh, I dunno." I brushed some bangs, which had fallen in front of my eyes, behind my ear. "I'm supposed to turn in a poem to Ms. Jacobs after school."

Olivia put the pencil case back in my hand. "I hope she won't say anything if your poem is worse than all the rest."

"Hey!" I whacked her head with my pencil case.

"Ms. Burke!" Madame Cartier's voice called, effectively cutting through everyone's conversations. The classroom fell silent. Uh oh.

I sat stiffly upright in my seat, slipping my pencil case into my backpack under the desk. "Yes, ma'am?" I answered slowly, my voice cracking slightly. There were a couple of titters in the background. I wanted to send them all a dirty look, but I'd better not get myself into any more hot water.

Madame Cartier strode right in front of my desk, her high heels clattering. She was terrifying. How did a woman of her age (sixty or older) manage to walk in such death traps? I wasn't sure if I was more afraid of that capability or the fact that she looked furious enough to murder me, cut me into several pieces, and distribute those pieces to all my loved ones (including Olivia, who was just staring at me with a smirk at this point).

"Did I see you...assault Ms. Sargent with your trousse?" I really wanted to laugh at her insertion of a French word in the middle of an English sentence (probably because she couldn't remember how to say it in English), but honestly, I was too afraid for my academic misdemeanor records right now.

"It was, uh, a slight of hand, Madame." I bit my lip and shot another side glance at Olivia, who was snickering behind her hand. Ugh, why didn't the damn French teacher look at her? "This will never happen again, I assure you. Please do excuse me."

The evil French teacher raised her eyebrows at me and walked away, not before muttering something along the lines of "to see the behavior of five-year-olds on the playground in my class".

Once she was out of earshot (also helped by the fact that everyone picked up their work again, not before sending me evil snickers), I looked back to Olivia furiously, tempted to hit her again. But then, I realized that Madame Cartier would send me to the dean's office and then—bam. All my efforts toward attending college (all those moments of pulling all-nighters, stress meltdowns, and performing well on exams) would go down the drain.

So I held myself in, took a deep breath while closing my eyes (and hearing Olivia try hard, and unsuccessfully, not to laugh out loud at me), and said, "You are such a little bitch."

This time, Olivia didn't bother trying to hide her outburst.

↔

At lunchtime, I complained about everything to Lila, who looked like she wasn't listening to me half the time (but rather paying attention to the freshmen's antics halfway across the cafeteria, which a huge blow to my ego—since when was I subordinate to those brats?). The other half, she looked exactly like Olivia during the class—like she was going to unabashedly make fun of me, all while laughing hysterically.

"First of all, that was a lapse in your judgment," Lila said when she regained the calm in her countenance (I guessed that she'd received the message I was sending her through my best death glares that I practiced in the mirror for situations such as these). "So really, O didn't do anything—"

I threw up my hands. "That's the thing!" I looked around. Yeah, more than a couple people definitely saw that. And Luc did have the same lunch period as I did today. Subduing myself a little, I shifted in my seat and stared at Lila. "She didn't do a damn thing to help me salvage my academic record."

Lila coughed into her hand although I could still see the twinkle in her eye (I'd picked up that cue from her brother—when the twins were amused, they tended to have that sparkle). "You're really funny, Audrey."

"Funny isn't going to get me to college," I muttered petulantly. "My 'rents are getting on my case although I am getting better at French."

"And do I happen to know the person responsible for that?" Lila raised her eyebrows at me.

I flushed a little. "Maybe." It was a good thing that she still didn't know what had gone down between me and her brother on Tuesday at the mall. But she'd find out eventually and give me hell about it for the rest of my life, probably.

She wiggled those eyebrows. "I really do hope that you two aren't getting down and dirty about it."

I felt just a little bit more heat rush to my cheeks. Damn, she was getting pretty close. "You have nothing to worry about, L. There is absolutely nothing going on in anything and everything between the two of us, so—"

That definitely was not Olivia sitting down across from us.

The girls who shared our lunch table (they didn't really talk to us—it was more like we had a mutual toleration for each other) scooted down the table, looking just a little overwhelmed as they stared at the newest member of our lunch group.

Lila tried to smack him on the head with her juice box (unsuccessfully since her arm was shorter than she though and her juice box went flying behind him as soon as she reached for him). "Idiot! I thought I told you not to ever talk to me during the school day!"

Luc dodged her anyway (probably to make her feel a little better about her hell-raising episodes) and smirked, stealing her apple from her lunch tray. "Too bad, sis, because they keep bringing you up all over the place. Don't you think that annoys me too?"

Yeah, Lila had been acing quite a few competitions on behalf of Excelsior Prep, and it wasn't really a surprise to me that the teachers were talking all about her these days. Lila and Luc had this unspoken contest about how many more things each twin could win, whether it was in athletics or academics. It was just a good thing that they never competed against each other in any one event—that would definitely bring hell.

"Don't tell me you're jealous," Lila retorted, stealing her apple back.

I rolled my eyes at the two of them and pulled out my notebook from French class (with my extremely illegible notes and my three lines of very depressing and introspective poetry). "You two bring me endless amusement."

I felt Luc's eyes move to me, and I kept my eyes down. We'd been sending each other odd glances for the past few days after Tuesday, and I did not need Lila picking up on our vibe (not like she was really good at it—she was oblivious to everything, basically—but still, the twin connection was valid). Then, thankfully, his eyes left me, and he said casually, "Where's Olivia?"

"In the library, again." Lila had pulled out her Spanish notebook. I did vaguely remember her mentioning an upcoming assessment. "I don't know what the hell she's doing in there. I hope she didn't fall in love with the librarian."

I scrunched up my eyebrows. "That's nasty, L."

The librarian was a bald, sixty-year-old man with an extreme academic interest in all things classical, but especially in all things Latin. It was pretty terrifying to be around him, not because he was an imposing figure (God knew he needed to get rid of his potbelly), but because he wouldn't stop going about the aquilae (Latin for "eagles"). I mean, I knew and appreciated that the eagle was our school mascot, but seriously. I already had enough trouble trying to keep track of how to say "house" in French, let alone absorbing information about a language that I wasn't taking.

Luc shook his head with the rest of us. "Poor Olivia," he said gravely. Then, his mood switched. "It's so fucking annoying that you have my initials, sis."

That was random. I only smirked in amusement and shook my head as I spewed out some more poetic crap about the dark river that was weaving between mountain valleys and small, isolated towns (as I kept going on, I realized that I was basically describing the stereotypical fantasy world—and I didn't even like fantasy!).

The twins caught my vibe after a while. "What's that?" Luc said. He yanked my notebook from me (rude!), only smirking at me when he caught my murderous look. "Oh. The river flows through a haunted valley tonight—"

I yanked it back from him. "You're mean," I whined back. "I have to get this damn thing done by three today, and if you guys keep distracting me, Ms. Jacobs is gonna kill me." Then, I remembered my leverage. I wiggled my eyebrows at him. "I hear she's your favorite teacher."

"Woah, you take Creative Writing?" Lila stared at her brother, mouth agape. Then, she closed it and started snickering wildly, even more than she had been when she was listening to my high school woes. "You wussy."

Luc was tomato red now. "Shut up," he muttered. Then he turned his attention back to me. "Add some shit about a lone traveler climbing a mountain or something."

"Not bad of an idea, Lucien," I said. I met his eyes, golden and bright as they looked at me. I tore my eyes away from his. This was getting to be too much. Back on track, Audrey. Back on track. "A figure stands in the distance, waiting."

"If you started this thing last week, you wouldn't be in this position in the first place," Lila muttered under her breath.

I elbowed her. "Don't be a jackass. How about you help me, like how your brother is right now?" I glanced back up at Luc, who raised an amused eyebrow at his sister.

I still had plenty of questions to ask him, like what the hell he was doing here and when our next meeting was going to be. But for now (at least, for the next fifteen minutes of lunch—I actually wasn't running late, for once!), I was going to enjoy the company of my friends, whether or not they were annoying (and whether or not I had more feelings than I should for one of them).

This was what high school was about.

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Hey guys! So I know this upload is super late, but I did finish this thing early but forgot to upload it...sigh.

So—AOL and Luc get featured today! What do you think about Audrey's attempts to write poetry? (Her approach is basically mine. Literary crap about talking trees is boring.) Any other comments?

Love y'all!

Anne