Hey guys! It's my day off, so I decided to update while I had the chance! :) Dedication to SDS_dancer becuase I really love her book Tally Marks!

"Happy Birthday!" 

I fell back into Reed, my hand over my heart. He wrapped his arms around me to keep me upright and I could hear him breathing heavily in my ear, obviously having been scared as well.

"What the hell was that for?" Reed exclaimed.

Both my parents were laughing hysterically, nearly falling over each other as they did so. Now that my heart had calmed down slightly, I slowly looked around the kitchen, taking in the decorations and cake that sat on the counter.

"Reed, it's our birthday! We turn seventeen today!" I exclaimed, turning to my brother.

His eyes widened, and a grin spread across his face. "You're right! Happy birthday, Sis! How could I have forgotten your birthday? How could I have forgotten mine?"

I let out a laugh, shaking my head. "Who knows? I can't imagine anything that would make me forget something as important as my birthday or my twin brother. So, can we have cake now?"

I sat up in bed, wiping my bleary eyes. I raked my hair back from my face, pulling it off of the back of my neck and into a ponytail before letting it fall back down around my shoulders. I was going to have to tell Dr. Lemmings that I'd remembered something. I would have to tell Reed as well. I shook my head at myself at the memory and got up to get dressed.

Yesterday, my session with Dr. Lemmings had done nothing but frustrate me. I had barely remembered anything, and even when I had, it had been a strange snippet of something insignificant and senseless. She had reminded me over and over that this was natural, and that my memories weren't going to come back all at once; that I had actually made incredible progress already. I couldn't help but still feel a little annoyed, though. I just wanted my memories back.

I had just pulled my shirt over myself when there came a loud knocking at my bedroom door. Before I could even say anything, Ket came into my room.

"Sure, feel free to just barge in," I muttered sarcastically.

"Good," he began, completely ignoring my comment. "You're up. Finish getting ready and then meet Jose, Cris and I at the front door in ten minutes."

"Wait, what?" I questioned. "Why?"

He raised an eyebrow at me. "Uh, the Back-to-School Bash is today, remember?"

"Oh yeah, I remember hearing you guys talking about it but. . . what is it exactly?"

He shook his head at me. "Ro, Ro, Ro. . . the Back-to-School Bash is an event that I hold every year before school starts. I take a bunch of friends from to school to participate in some sort of fun activity like paintball, Capture The Flag, rock climbing. . ."

"So, what are you doing for the Bash this year?" I asked slowly, almost afraid of what the answer might be.

Ket grinned. "We're going Go-Karting. See you in. . . eight minutes now."

With that, he turned and was out of my room. I frowned at the back of his head for a moment before looking down at what I was wearing. I needed to change. He had said that a bunch of his friends would be coming, and I assumed that that meant people from my new school. As much as I wanted to say that I didn't care about the opinions of others, I would be lying if I did. What kind of teenager didn't want- on some level- to be liked? I just wanted to fit in and make a good first impression.

After changing, I went into the bathroom and put on some mascara before playing around with my hair for a good three minutes straight. Finally, I just decided to leave it hanging in waves around my shoulders. Then, I made my way downstairs to meet Cris, Josey, and Ket.

"That was nine minutes," Ket commented once I reached the front hall.

"Hi to you too. Yes, I'm doing well, thanks for asking," I responded sarcastically.

Josey let out a laugh, and Cris smirked over at Ket, but Ket just raised an eyebrow at me.

"We should have just left without you," he said.

"As if I would have let you leave without her," Cris scoffed.

"Alright, lets go, we are already three minutes behind schedule because of someone," Ket insisted, opening the front door.

Jose rolled his eyes at me behind Ket's back and I grinned as we all headed out to Ket's car. I hoped that Ket had told his parents where we were going.

Once we were all inside Ket's car and he had started it up, I wasn't surprised to find that there was no music playing. I was in the passenger seat while Josey and Cris were in the back. Ket was, obviously, driving.

"Why do you always turn the radio off?" I questioned.

Ket shrugged. "I don't like having music distract me while I'm driving."

"I think that's a complete and utter lie," Cris imputed. "I think that he just doesn't want us to know what kind of music he likes listening to. I think he's embarrassed."

Ket rolled his eyes. "I'm not embarrassed by my choice in music."

"Oh, well I think that-" I started.

Instead of finishing my sentence, though, my hand shot forward and hit the power button. Immediately, the radio turned on and registered and began playing the CD that Ket had in.

"This is classical piano music," I pointed out, completely dumbfounded.

It was definitely not what I had been expecting.

"You still listen to this? I thought you had given up on piano or something," Cris piped up.

"You played piano?" Josey asked.

"To answer your questions in order of appearance: no shit, Sherlock; yeah, I still listen to it all the time, but it kinda ruins my image when I pull my car up to school and Moonlight Sonata is pouring out the windows, so I only listen in private; and yeah, I played piano for years and I still do. I have a Yamaha in my room. Don't tell anyone about that if you value your life, by the way," Ket answered.

I was so awestruck that it took me a moment to realize that the 'no shit, Sherlock' had been directed at me. I frowned.

"Only you would stop doing something that you used to love to do because you were worried that it would ruin your image. I mean, really? People love you so much that I bet you they would all start taking piano lessons just so they could be more like you if they found out," Cris laughed, rolling her eyes.

Josey shrugged, nodding. "Actually, they probably would. Plus, girls totally dig a guy who can play instruments and like classical music. Were you any good?"

"He was incredible from what I remember," Cris answered for him.

Ket shrugged but said nothing. I leaned over and smacked him in the arm, but not too hard because I didn't want to send us all veering off the road.

Ket looked sharply over to me. "What was that for?"

"You said 'no shit, Sherlock' to me. That was rude," I huffed.

Ket slowly raised an eyebrow. "Wow. Good reaction time there."

"Shut up, Mozart," I muttered, crossing my arms over my chest.

Ket's mouth pulled up into a smirk. "We're here."

Completely forgetting about being mad, I uncrossed my arms and turned to look at the building we had parked in front of. It was a small building, but the fences around the racing track in its backyard were large.

"Let's go!" Josey cried, sounding like a six year old.

The rest of us all piled out of the car, Ket turning the CD off again before doing so. Once we got inside, I could see that there were already several people waiting at the front desk.

"Hey guys!" Ket called out to them as our group met theirs.

My eyes ran over each of them and I rolled my lip into my mouth as nervousness set in. All of the people here were pretty people. They looked like the type of people who were used to getting what they wanted and being the heads of the school. They were all gorgeous and they knew it. I could tell just in the things they wore, the confident way the guys held their shoulders and the elegant way that the girls flipped their hair over theirs.

"Ket," one of the guys grinned, clasping his hand and pulling him in for a guy-hug.

I unconsciously moved closer to Josey and Cris, already feeling uncomfortable even though no one in the other group had noticed me yet.

"These are his friends from school?" I whispered in horror.

"Well, not exactly," Josey replied. "You see, Ket has a pretty good reputation at the school and he holds a relatively high position in the status quo, but in order to stay there, he has to keep the rest of the 'popular kids' happy. Otherwise, they would all view Ket as competition because he is honestly more popular than some of them, even though they're the 'official popular group'."

"So, he has to play nice so that the other popular kids don't try to overthrow him?" I summed up. "Popularity is stupid. I wonder if this kind of thing happened at my old school. . ."

"Well, well, well. Who's the babe?" the guy who had first greeted Ket asked, his eyes raking over me.

I took another step back, almost ramming right into Josey.

Ket smirked and stepped closer to me. "Her name is Ro, and I would suggest that you stop looking at her like she's a piece of meat before I'm forced to break your face."

My eyebrows shot up and I turned to look at him, but he was busy glaring at the guy he had spoken to while the guy glared right back. For a moment, the space was filled with nothing but tense silence. Then, the guy broke eye contact with Ket and let out a chuckle.

"Of course. Ket, you're completely right," he agreed before turning to me. "I'm really sorry for acting so rude, Ro. It's very nice to meet such a beautiful girl as yourself. My name is Jackson."

I just stared at him. He didn't seem fazed.

"So, what school do you go to?" he questioned, taking a step forward.

I leaned back into Josey. His sudden personality change wasn't fooling me. He still had a hungry, dangerous glint in his eyes.

"I-I don't know," I responded honestly.

"How can you not know?" Jackson laughed. "Are you feeling alright, Sweetheart?"

"I don't know the name of the school Ket, Josey and Cris go to. Whatever it is, that's where I'm going," I defended.

"So, I'll be seeing you at school then? I go to the same school as the three of them," he explained as if I didn't already know. "It's called Daniel Brooks Academy, by the way. It's a very prestigious school."

"Cute story, Jacks," Cris cut in, taking a step forward. "Now why don't you screw off and stop interrogating my best friend."

Jackson gave her an amused grin.

"I thought that Ket was your best friend, Ginger Snap?" he said innocently.

"Ro is my best girl friend," Cris explained with a shrug.

"Alright, well, as fun as all of this has been, why don't we go and race now, huh?" Ket suggested, his jaw set in a hard line even though he was smiling.

Several people from Jackson's group immediately agreed with Ket.

"Sounds good to me. By the way, the owner says that because there's so many of us, we have to pair up," Jackson informed us.

"Oh, I'll be partners with-" I began.

"I call Cris," Josey cut me off.

I frowned at Josey, but he was grinning happily as he stood beside Cris. I looked over to Ket, but he was just smirking at Josey, as if he knew something that I didn't.

"I'll go with Ro," Jackson grinned, coming over to me.

"Actually," Ket interrupted him. "I have to go with Ro. It's not safe for an amnesia patient to go with someone who doesn't know or understand her condition and medical history."

I bit my tongue to stop myself from pointing out that there was no truth in what he was saying.

"She's an amnesia patient?" Jackson questioned, his eyes going wide.

"Yep," Ket replied simply. "Now if you'll excuse us. . ."

With that, he grabbed my arm and started walking me away from Jackson.

"That was a complete lie," I pointed out to Ket.

"Oh, I'm sorry, did you want me to go back and tell the truth so that you can go with Jackson?" he asked.

"No!" I exclaimed.

He smirked. "Good. Then just shut up and be thankful."

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Yay! Longer Chapter for anyone who is actually reading this....

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