It's really interesting how you can see someone for five days of the week, yet really have no idea of who they are as a person. Every day, I would see Kat Delacroix sitting in the back of the class, playing with her dark red hair. Eric McMillan sat in the row in front of her, always dusting off his letterman jacket as if the very air around it wasn't worthy of his presence.

And of course, there's Tanya Webster. While Mrs. Chung didn't like to outwardly express who her favourites were, I would be willing to bet that if she did have a favourite, it'd be Tanya. If I had a nickel for every single time she raised her hand in class, I would be a very rich man.

I had barely spoken five words to any of these people, yet here we were in the last 10 minutes of class, with only two small wooden desks laid side-by-side separating Tanya and I, from Kat and Eric.

We were waiting for further instructions from Mrs. Chung. Waiting, as the rest of the class finished moving into their groups. The array of sounds around us slowly becoming more quiet, as all eyes in the room eventually turned to the one who presided over us all.

"We finished our lesson early today, so I'm graciously giving you all a ten-minute window to work on your projects due this Thursday. Some of you have raised concerns about having more or less than four characters in your scene. You must work that out on your own, but remember, you are being judged as a group, not as an individual member of a group. Everyone gets the same mark, regardless of their role in the presentation," Mrs. Chung said. She ended her sentence by plopping down on her leather chair.

"Anyways, you must stay in your groups during this ten-minute window, but you and your group can use this time wisely by working on your projects, or you can goof off. It's your choice, but of course, every choice has consequences."

It didn't take long for the class to begin talking, with the slew of random conversations about the big game, American Idol, or whatever else was on TV last night circulating around the room like a huge whirlwind. The whirlwind only became more centralized as Kat and Eric began talking about something completely unrelated to the topic at hand.

I laid back in the chair that I was sitting in, yet it was not a chair of my own, with its cold, sterile surface feeling unnatural. But, my skin quickly adapted to the change, eventually finding comfort amongst the chair's alien exterior. My eyes began to flutter, having the effect of narrowing and blurring my field of vision.

It was only a split second before I was jolted awake.

"So, what are we going to do for this project," Tanya asked, tapping her pen on the notebook below her dainty fingers. She had already taken the liberty of writing down the date and the names of our group members in the far right corner of the page. Shifting my eyes toward the center, there was one word in big capital letters - BRAINSTORM.

"We still have, like what, a week to do this," Eric replied, as he seemed to flick some imaginary speck of dust off of his left shoulder.

"It's due on Thursday," Tanya replied.

"So? We'll start it on Wednesday," Kat said, looking up from the BlackBerry she was holding in her hands. To be fair, it was clear why they called her the hottest girl in school - she was a certified rocket. Despite the overcast skies looming through the window, her hair still managed to glisten and shine, flowing down elegantly to her shoulders. Of course, there were also two other reasons why most guys back then considered her very attractive.

"I think we should just get it done early. It'll take a long time to make the video as well, and I don't want to have to be stuck editing that at 3AM," Tanya replied.

"Look, Tanya," Eric began. He flashed a smile at her, revealing his teeth in the process. His teeth were as white as a sheet of paper, unnaturally standing out when compared to his lightly tanned skin. "Let's just present it in front of the class."

"So, are you guys all willing to memorize your lines then?"

And so the argument continued. For a few minutes, Tanya, Eric, and Kat kept talking about the project, and Tanya's excessive need to get the project done early was counter-balanced by Eric and Kat's need to procrastinate.

However, Tanya's argument for doing it early eventually won, probably due to the lack of good rebuttals from the other side. Or, they just got bored and decided to give in. To be completely honest, I'm really not sure which one it was exactly.

But, by the time the bell was about to ring, the plan was clear. Eric, Tanya, Kat, and I would meet that night at Tanya's house to film the scene that we had to complete. Tanya would edit the film, and by Thursday, we would be ready to present it to the class.

What my friends had told me about Tanya filled my mind as I walked towards her house later that evening. While part of me felt like they were absolutely right, another part of me held some doubt. It was almost as if my mind was locked in a war of how I should perceive her, despite the fact that I had no idea of who she really was as a person.

Each step onto the granite tiles between the sidewalk and her front porch felt like an eternity. It was as if her tiles were covered in quicksand, each step toward her porch becoming more and more agonizing to move through. Eventually, after struggling to reach the front steps, I rang the doorbell.

Ding-dong.

No one answered.

Ding-dong. Ding-dong. Ding-dong.

After the fourth ring, a middle-aged lady opened the door. She was quite a short woman, around the same height as your grandmother. Her curly hair made her seem taller than she actually was, so she was actually likely a bit shorter.

As I introduced myself, she was smiling, putting me a bit at ease. I couldn't help it and began to smile as well.

"Ah, you must be here for the project," she exclaimed. Ushering me inside, she immediately took away my umbrella, droplets of water falling onto the red carpet underneath my feet.

"I'll call Tanya for you," she said as she walked towards a spiraling wooden staircase located only a few meters away from where we were currently standing. It wasn't long before Tanya came down, and ushered me to her room upstairs.

Even to this day, every time that I go to a room that isn't mine, I get this odd feeling - a feeling of foreignness.

At the point where we're at in the story, I had lived in my room for months already and had it set exactly the way I liked it.

My computer occupying the northwest corner of the room, my bed occupying the northeast corner. While there was no particular pattern or order to how I placed my posters on the wall, any shift in the way my posters were laid out would be maddening to deal with.

Usually, a pile of dirty clothes laid on top of a chair in the southeast corner of my room, but I had become so accustomed to it, that not seeing it in a room felt weird.

Of course, my bed was a complete mess. My mother was always telling me to make my bed, as I'm sure your mother will tell you to do as well. Back then, I saw the exercise as futile since I was going to sleep in it anyways. Besides, I figured that I had things I would rather be doing than fixing my Star Wars sheets.

But, Tanya apparently didn't. The edge of her pillow lined up perfectly with the edge of her bed, with the sheets on top of her mattress were clear of all wrinkles and creases.

Even Tanya's posters were all symmetrical, assorted by size and colour! The worst part of it all was that the room was entirely spotless - I couldn't even detect one tiny speck of dust on any of her furniture.

"Here, sit," Tanya said suddenly, as she rested her hands on the back of a wooden chair located next to a table in the centre of the room. Her frizzy hair shone from the lightbulb she was standing over.

"I have carrots if you want carrots," Tanya said, pointing to a green bowl on the small round table in front of her.

I always thought carrots were an odd choice of a snack for one to offer their guests. Sure, they're healthy and it's important to eat them, but it just seems like a plate of cookies or cake would have been so much better.

"No thanks," I replied.

"Suit yourself," Tanya said while she grabbed a small carrot from the bowl. "Anyways, I don't think the others are coming, so do you just want to get started on it now?"

"Yeah, fair enough. I brought my book."

Looking towards my left, I saw a narrow, yet tall bookshelf. While the sides were covered in wood, the front was just one giant pile of glass covering the bookshelf from end to end. The shelf had books I had heard of, like the Harry Potter series, to books that were completely foreign to me at the time, like Gallant Waif.

"That bookshelf over there is basically my life, I love to read so it's the top percentile of my favourite books," Tanya said, revealing her wide smile. "Anyways, we should really get the project started."

Tanya reached for her Romeo and Juliet book, shifting it in her hand until her palm rested nicely on the spine.

"Yep, what page?" I asked.

"It's Act III, Scene III, so page 141," she replied, flipping to the start of the scene.

"There's three characters in this one, so who's going to play who?"

"I can play two characters. So I'll be Romeo and the Friar."

"Oh come on, that's no fair. Why do I get to be the nurse?"

Raising her eyebrows, Tanya paused for a few seconds before responding. "First of all, the nurse is a total badass so I don't see why you're complaining. Second, she has the least amount of lines. But fine. You can choose who you want to be."

I contemplated the possibility of acting as a nurse. But, the fifteen-year-old me didn't want to face the embarrassment that I thought would come out of that. "Fine, I will choose."

Looking through the first three pages of the scene, it seemed as though Romeo had the most lines. So, the choice was easy. "I'll choose Friar Lawrence."

Tanya's laugh was soft, almost like the tone of a soothing melody. Of all the things about Tanya, her laugh was definitely one of her strong suits. Her laugh felt as soothing to my ears as honey applied to a sore throat.

"You're going to regret that choice," she said, as she walked towards her closet.

I extended my arms out as she threw two articles of clothing towards me - a grey flat cap, and a white doublet.

"Here, put those on over your regular clothes," she said. "If we want to get an A+, we need to wear the clothing they did back in the Elizabethan era."

The white doublet resembled a long-sleeved collared shirt, but the collar extended outwards, with the fabric of the collar looking as if it was taken out of the bottom edge of a puffy wedding dress.

"Where'd you get this stuff? If you bought it, I'll pay you back," I replied, while twirling the grey flat cap on my index finder.

"No, don't worry about it. I found these at a thrift store, and yes, they are washed. There was literally a box of Renaissance stuff, and they sold it to me all for five bucks!" she exclaimed, as she left the room while holding the brown box.

A few minutes later, she arrived back, dressed in full Elizabethan fashion. Or, at the very least, the closest that a five-dollar box at the thrift store could offer.

"Alright, let's start this," she said, twirling around once in her puffy dress.

And so we did. Working through the scene, line by line, we recreated the entire thing until it was perfect. Since Tanya set up the tripod and camera so that it would only record from the chest up, it made it easy for me to hide my book in my lap and reference it.

The whole thing took a few hours to film, with a lot of the time being taken up as I flubbed my lines towards the end. And yes, I did end up regretting my choice as the Friar - I had no idea they were going to throw in a stealthy page long monologue near the end.

But overall, it was actually kind of fun, despite the fact that I couldn't even understand the majority of what was being said, or what I even was saying.

When the entire thing was over, I even gave in and indulged on a few carrots.

"Thanks for all the help, Malik. Since those other two assholes didn't come, you're all good in my books," Tanya said.

"No problem, thanks for doing all this." I pointed to the camera and the box of Shakespeare stuff in the back of the room. "If you hadn't, uh, been in our group, we would have probably all failed."

Tanya nodded. See, looking back at this moment, my first major mistake was what I said right after this. But, then again, maybe not. If I hadn't said what you're about to hear me say, the day would have just ended. I would have just left her home, clutching the handle of my umbrella in my right hand, trying to avoid the massive puddles on the sidewalk below. Life would have moved on as usual.

But that didn't happen, and instead of shutting up, I kept talking. "You know, working with you was a lot better than I expected."

"What do you mean?" Tanya asked, while raising her left eyebrow.

"Well, uh, I just mean that I really don't like Shakespeare and I don't like group projects, so it was, um, a nice surprise when everything went smoothly."

Tanya began to raise her voice. "Liar. You said working with me was better than you expected, not working on the project."

She paused for a few seconds, while sitting more upright in her chair. "Did you have a negative perception of me before you walked in?"

I stayed silent. I figured it would be better to do that rather than dig myself into an even deeper hole.

"There's my answer. So, who told you that I was a bad group project partner?" Tanya asked.

I paused as it took me a few seconds to formulate a halfway decent response. "Um, uh, you're making a lot of assumptions here. How do you know that I didn't have a negative view of you without talking to anybody?"

"I'm not stupid, Malik," Tanya said. As she begun to cross her arms, the tips of her dark brown fingers rested on the underside of her arms.

"Fine. I heard some stuff about how you, uh, weren't a good partner, from people that I'm not going to rat out. But, clearly they were wrong. I actually had fun and you were a good person to work with."

"You want to know why so many people say I'm a terrible person to work with? It's because they're all jerks."

"I don't think that's a fair judgement to make, I mean-"

"No, it is." Tears began to fill her brown eyes, as she placed her hands on her legs. "All throughout middle school and elementary school, I was bullied. They made fun of everything - from the way I dressed to my teeth, my skin colour, and even my hair. I did everything to try and change that. I straightened out my hair, got braces, begged my mom to start buying brand name clothes even though I knew we could barely afford them. But you know what, I did everything to change myself as a person, to change myself so that they would accept me. But, my efforts changed absolutely nothing."

At this point, thin streams of tears were falling down her cheek, landing on her puffy dress below.

"In fact, it only became worse. I think that was the moment when I decided to focus on doing well in school. Ironically, the classroom was the only safe space away from my classmates. It was the only place where I could speak my mind, and with a teacher there, I didn't have to worry about the bullies' reaction. Every lunch period, while everyone would go out for recess, I would stay inside with the teacher, reading a book I had borrowed from the library."

She paused for a second, so I figured I would say something. "I'm sorry fo-"

Tanya interrupted me and continued, her voice becoming louder as she ranted on. "My grades were the only real validation that I got from life, the only validation that I got that meant that I was actually worth something. So, fuck me, right if I would do anything to protect those grades, anything to make sure that I would get an A+ on every project I did? Yes, that really makes me a terrible person."

She wiped away some of the tears that were falling down her cheek. "But now, even though I actually have friends in high school and those bullies leave me alone, the worst part about it is that my past still haunts me. I know it's not your fault, but it sucks to have people talk shit behind your back, even when you thought this whole middle school bullshit was over. First with a girl I really trusted telling everyone last year that I hadn't kissed a guy yet, and now with this."

If I  could have gone back in time to that moment, I probably would have said something a bit smoother, like "You haven't kissed a guy? Well, maybe I should change that."

Instead, what came out was, "Don't worry, I haven't kissed a girl either."

She rested her head on my shoulder, her frizzy hair feeling soft and fluffy, almost like a marshmallow, or a teddy bear. For a little while, we just sat there, like that, watching the rain outside drizzle down onto the pavement.

I really don't know how long we sat there, but I jolted out of my seat once I glanced at the clock. "Alright, I have to go now, my mom's going to kill me if I miss my curfew."

For a second, I looked into Tanya's eyes, and she looked into mine. "Alright," she said, turning her head away.

As I was about to touch the doorknob, Tanya tapped my shoulder. Swiveling around, I turned to face her.

"Actually, no, wait. I want to try something just before you leave," she said.

"And what would that be?" I asked.

Walking back to the table in the middle of the room, she threw my book towards me. "Act II, Scene II, line 36. Here, I'll start."

She began to recite the dialogue from the book, line by line. Impressively, she did this without holding a book in her hand.

"O Romeo, Romeo! Wherefore art thou Romeo? / Deny thy father and refuse thy name; / Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love, / And I'll no longer be a Capulet."

She cleared her throat and pointed her index finger towards my book.

"What's the point of this?" I asked.

"Just read it, please," she said.

"Right, um, shall I hear more, or shall I speak at this?"

"Come on, use more emotion with it! Shakespeare didn't write his plays for you to speak all monotone."

She continued to recite her lines, speaking them with such emotion and grace, it made my attempts at the entire thing seem lackluster and plain.

When her lines were done, I began to speak again, trying half-heartedly to imitate the Romeo in the movie adaptation. She looked directly into my eyes, and I looked directly into hers. As I recited my lines, she inched closer and closer towards me. "I take thee at thy word. / Call me but love, and I'll be new baptized. / Henceforth I will never be-"

I was interrupted by a pair of soft lips touching mine. Those few seconds felt like an eternity as time stopped. For those few seconds, I tried to savour the moment as much as possible, as metaphorical fireworks went off around us, the booming sound of them filling my small ears.

For that short period of time, it felt like nothing in the world up until that point was better than that moment. My hands around her waist, her arms around my neck - just us.

And well, I guess that sums it all up. That's how I got my first kiss.

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A/N: well, this turned out to be a longer chapter :) I know I was supposed to have this up by Monday, but, hopefully the length makes up for it slightly. Anyways, new chapters will now be up on Fridays at around 5PM EST.

While you can almost always expect a chapter on Friday, I will occasionally release two chapters in a week whenever I really feel like writing a lot.

Oh, and what do you guys think about the infamous Tanya Webster?

There's gonna be a lot of interesting stuff over the next few chapters (especially regarding her character), so stay tuned!