When they got to Sebastian's table with their food, Edward and the other basketball team members were already seated and eating their lunch. Adelynn was sitting at Edward's left side, and there were two other vacant seats on his right.

Rena gulped as she contemplated sitting on the chair directly adjacent to her crush.

"Oh, hey, Serena!" Adelynn said, perking up when she noticed Rena and Sebastian approaching them. "It's nice to see you again."

"H-hi, Adelynn." Rena smiled at her.

"Hey, guys," Sebastian said, pulling out the chair beside Edward. "Everyone, this is Serena. I invited her to sit with us today."

"Hi," she said lamely, giving them a very brief wave.

"Hi," most of them said, giving her a polite smile before returning to their lunches.

Rena pulled out the other chair but stopped when she realized Sebastian was giving her an expectant look. He nodded at the chair he had just pulled out.

Her stomach flipped.

Am I supposed to sit there? Did he just pull out that chair for me so I could sit next to Edward?

Smiling at him hesitantly, she sat down in that chair as Sebastian moved to sit in the other one. The moment she was seated, her eyes strayed to Edward's face.

He was attacking a croissant with great gusto, and she watched him pause to lick off the crumbs at the corners of his mouth with great fascination.

Her nerves fluttered as she scrambled to greet him once he seemed to notice she was staring.

"H-hi, Ed," she said.

"Hi," he mumbled.

Her heart sank as she realized she had no idea what to talk about with him. Why had she ever thought it was a good idea to accept Sebastian's lunch invitation?

As she sat there, trying to rack her brain for good conversation topics, Sebastian said, "So, what's that—what's Alyssa down with?"

"She thinks it m-might be food poisoning," Rena answered, relieved to have a slight diversion for her thoughts. "She probably ate something wrong yesterday."

"She's sick?"

Rena's head snapped around at the sound of Edward's voice. He was finally looking at her. Her heart thumped at the sight of his blue eye focused on her.

"Y-yeah," she said.

Hope blossomed in her chest—he didn't look particularly concerned or curious, but at least he bothered to ask. She was about to ask him if he wanted to go with her after school to visit Aly when she remembered that she had detention.

"I was planning to go to her house after school," she said. "I have detention now, though."

"Detention?" Edward blinked.

"I got caught using my phone in class," she explained. "So now I can't go..."

"I can bring Alyssa's notes for her, if you want," Sebastian said.

Rena stared at him in surprise, and he abruptly turned back to his food, as though flustered by the attention.

"But you—" hate Aly, she was about to say, before breaking off mid-sentence as she thought the better of it.

After all, he was offering to bring her best friend the notes on her behalf. There was no need for her to remind him of the bad blood between the two of them.

"If you want," Sebastian repeated, raising his head and giving her a steady gaze.

There was something intense about the way his eyes trained on hers, as if somehow, she was the only person that existed in the cafeteria in that moment. Strangely, Rena felt herself gulp as she nodded.

"T-thanks, Seb. That would be g-great."

He shot her a gentle smile. "You're welcome. I'll meet you at your locker after school to get the handouts from you."

"Okay," she said, returning the smile.

She hoped that Aly would at least be courteous about it when Sebastian showed up on her doorstep later.

When she turned back to Edward, he was already back to eating his lunch, apparently having lost interest in their conversation. As she rearranged the cherry tomatoes in her salad to form a smiley face, Rena desperately tried to think of something else to strike up a conversation with him.

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"Thanks, guys," Rena said as she took the rest of the handouts from Samantha and Naomi.

"It's no problem," Naomi insisted. "Aly's our friend, too!"

"Alright," Samantha said, zipping up her backpack, "I better get going. See you guys tomorrow!"

"I have to go too," Naomi said. "Bye!"

Rena leaned against her locker as she watched her friends leave for their after-school activities.

"Sorry, have you been waiting long?" a voice from behind her said.

She started as her heart nearly leaped out of her chest. It was Sebastian, and he stared at her with open concern on his face.

"Are you okay? I didn't mean to scare you," he said.

"I'm f-fine," she reassured him, nodding vigorously. "It's okay!"

"Our teacher didn't get to cover everything he wanted to, so he ended up holding us back for a couple more minutes," he said, rolling his eyes.

"Y-you're here now, though," she said with a tiny smile. "You d-didn't have to offer to help me, too, so thank you."

"Hey, you don't have to stand on courtesy," he said, taking the notes she handed him. "I'm happy to help you. We're friends, aren't we?"

Yeah, but you aren't Aly's friend.

"Y-yeah," she said. "Of course."

"Well," he said, shrugging, "I hope she doesn't use me as cannonball fodder to launch me out of her estate when she sees me later."

A traitorous laugh spilled from her lips at the ridiculous image he'd painted in her mind. "She would probably be lying in bed. She wouldn't have the energy to d-do that!"

He grinned at her. "I don't know, she's always seemed so hardy to me. It's weird thinking that she's ill."

"Y-you're right. She rarely gets sick," Rena said, shaking her head. "The bacteria in the food must have been really strong."

"I should walk you to detention," he announced, tucking the handouts into his messenger bag. "It's not like Alyssa's going to be waiting eagerly for homework delivery."

He was right, but Rena was still startled by his sudden declaration.

"You d-don't have to," she said immediately, bringing her hands up in front of her to wave at him.

"I want to, though," he said. "Unless you don't want me to? I won't insist."

A shiver slid down her spine as his gaze lingered on her face. It was odd since it wasn't particularly cold in the hallway.

"I mean, it's not that I don't want you to," she tried to explain. It didn't quite matter to her either way. "Just ... I don't want you to waste time."

He shrugged. "It's fine. I'm not in a rush to go anywhere."

Well, that was that, then.

Rena almost dreaded the awkwardness that was certain to loom over them as they made their way towards the classrooms, but surprisingly it never came to pass.

Sebastian began a conversation topic almost as soon as they began walking again.

"So, Mr. Henderson was being really pissy today, wasn't he?"

"Yeah," she said, sighing at the memory again. "Even more than u-usual."

"Wasn't it because he got totally rejected by Miss Thompson yesterday?" he said in the most casual tone Rena had ever heard anyone relay hot gossip with.

"W-what?" she said, shocked.

Miss Thompson was her stern chemistry teacher who also happened to be quite young and attractive. Rena had no idea that Mr. Henderson was even remotely interested in dating whatsoever, let alone someone who was pretty popular among the male staff and even some of the students.

He had always seemed married to his job.

Raising an eyebrow, Sebastian said, "You mean you didn't know that? It was all the basketball team was talking about yesterday."

"W-why the basketball team?" Rena asked, feeling her eyes grow wider.

He shrugged. "She's one of the staff supervisors for our club."

"Oh. How did y-you find out?"

"Asher—one of the guys on the team—overheard him confessing to her when he was on the way to practice," he said, brushing aside a few strands of silver hair that had fallen into his eye. "He practically ran into the gym to tell us about it."

Rena wondered why she had never stumbled onto something so juicy in school.

"Did he hear everything?"

"Most of it," he said, grinning. "Mr. Henderson said a lot of cheesy things like how her beauty shone and made him realize there was more to life than just teaching. Apparently, he also found her fierce teaching style beautiful."

"Oh, wow," she said, really starting to warm up to the conversation they were having. "What did she say?"

Sebastian huffed out a laugh. "You won't believe this—I almost didn't, either—she said that she wasn't interested in dating and that even if she was, she had better options than someone like him."

Rena wasn't sure if her eyes could get any larger than they were at that moment.

"What?!" she exclaimed. "S-she really said that?"

"I know, right? She always seems so harsh in class, but I never expected that she would be this cold even to other teachers," he said, shaking his head.

"Then what did he say?" Rena said, finding herself eager to hear the rest of it.

Just as Sebastian opened his mouth to answer her, Mr. Hill, her English teacher, swept past them before pausing to look back at her.

"Oh, Serena. Are you here for detention? Stop dawdling and come on in—you're almost late," he said, placing a hand on the doorknob of the detention room Rena hadn't even noticed they had reached.

"Y-yes, Mr. Hill," she said, nodding hastily.

After giving her a curt nod, he opened the door and entered the room.

"I guess I have to g-go now," she said to Sebastian, almost crestfallen that she didn't get to listen to the end.

He eyed her for a second before saying, "I can tell you the rest of it tomorrow. Or I could tell you over text later."

Was her disappointment that obvious? Still, it managed to net her the full story, so she couldn't complain.

"T-that would be nice," she said, smiling hesitantly up at him. "Thanks for walking me here. And for offering to take Aly's notes to her. I-I really appreciate it!"

"No problem, Ren. Anything for you," he said, and the big smile that he afforded her somehow seemed to register differently in her brain.

Had he always smiled like that?

Despite the large smile on his face, his eyes were earnest and seemed to burn into hers.

Past images of a serious-looking Sebastian standing before her suddenly flashed across her mind. She had barely registered his confession when they were in the sixth grade, but now it suddenly resurfaced in her mind. She was convinced that part of the reason for it was how solemn his eyes were—she almost felt transfixed and rooted to the ground.

Her own grin faltered at the memory of how terribly awkward it had all ended. The months of avoiding him in their shared classes, the weeks of pretending she couldn't see him in the hallways whenever he waved at her, the days of Aly ranting about how inconsiderate he was when he was right in their vicinity—Rena suddenly found her lungs barely able to take in the air she was inhaling.

"S-see you!" she blurted out.

Feeling heat crawl into her cheeks from her ears, she spun around and ducked into the classroom. She missed the puzzled look on his face at her abrupt departure.

What am I doing?

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AN: MORE made up backstories about teachers AHAHAH definitely not canon-compliant but hey gotta get rena comfortable with sebby first. thanks for reading!