"Hey, Megs!"

I turn around rather abruptly, my neck producing an unhealthy-sounding crack. I tense, my own self not really used to these kinds of confrontations when I stop my train of thoughts. I realize I'm overreacting. My face eases up in a smile as I see Chris hurtling towards me, his purple Jansport dangling off his right shoulder.

That sole thing makes him look so . . . cool. He looks so cool.

"Hey, Chris. I didn't know you walk to school." I beam at him, into which he replies with a toothy grin. He offers to carry my own bag but I turn him down. I just can't do that. I mean, who would do that?

"I live two blocks away." He gestures his free arm, pointing to a certain direction I suppose would be a route to his house.

"No way," I say playfully. "I live two blocks away, too. Well, this isn't something you see everyday."

Chris laughs. We walk down in a comfortable silence, kicking some random rocks and pebbles away occassionally. The misty scent of a recent rain lingers around us, my hand running around some dew-covered bushes. I brought a jacket in case today, my latest umbrella destroyed by some harsh storm a few weeks ago.

We finally reach the rusting gates of the school, and Chris of course, pushes it open for me. I thank him quietly, again looking if there are some girls looking at me. Now, there are some, whispering along with their friends and giving me suspicious glances. I look away almost immediately. And then a car honks behind us.

"O-ho-hoy . . . If it isn't our Megumi." Blake and Drake beam their flashy grins, swerving around us towards an empty parking lot. I give the back of their heads a blank look, watching as they shut close the doors of their blue Volvo. They now walk towards me and Chris, each of the twins giving a ruffle on my hair.

I subconsciously put a hand on my head. I flash them a quick glare before patting my hair down to its normal state.

"Megs, you look too cute when you glare. Please stop torturing us," I hear Gray's voice behind us and his loud footsteps echoing around the almost empty hallway. I sigh and give him a look.

"Really, Gray? Really?" I shake my head as the five of us continue walking, side by side. I stop when Gray snatches my satchel and let it slide up his own shoulder.

"Gray! Only I, Chris, can call Megumi 'Megs', and you lady -" Chris jabs a finger at my forehead "- How dare you let him carry your bag when I was the first one to -"

"Guys . . . Come on. Are you seriously having a fight over this?" I let out a frustrated sigh. I turn around and face them, but I am stopped when I see the snickers on their faces.

I actually make a hesitated step backward as they all continue to advance toward me, their arms suspended in the air in front of them and are pointed at me. And then their hands stop at my face, each giving me a pinch on the nose.

"Megumi . . . Why are they torturing you?" Vincent has come now, his hands in his pants' pockets and a green beanie placed atop his black hair. He gives me a high-five as he lines up with the other boys.

"Actually, Gray and Chris had a petty fight over our Megumi's bag. And then she stopped them, and then Chris gushed how cute she just looked, and then we had the same idea." The twins nod thoughtfully as they speak, their light red hair swaying as they do so.

"You guys are just messed up," I conclude. It appears our lockers are just near each other, and we all spend a minute racking our books and searching for some missed homework - well, the twins did - before heading to our respective classrooms. I reach for my planner and see that I have Biology first. Putting it back inside my satchel, I notify the others of my schedule and so they go their own classes. But Vincent starts catching up to me.

Hands in his pockets once again, he starts the conversation casually, "What's up?"

I snicker to myself. "Nothing's up. Not yet, anyway."

Lol, that sounded so wrong inside my head.

There is a pause as we walk silently towards the room. And then I hear Vincent's voice again. "Can I have your number?"

"What!" I actually choke on air as he looks at me, and I choke on air a bit more as I see a glimpse of his eyes. I don't know why I'm fangirling but, why the hell not? A part of his hair sided a bit and dark blue eyes greeted me under long eyelashes, gleaming with amusement.

"Ah . . . the question every girl falls into." He chuckles.

"Um . . . you know what? No comment." I raise my hands at him in surrender.

He looks at me again, his mouth wide open in a big grin. "Actually . . . this is for Biology. You know, if there's anything to do or what . . ." He shrugs.

"So, long story short, you want me to be, like, a personal alarm clock?" I clear the things slowly, creasing my eyebrows in the process.

"I wouldn't put it like that." He makes a sideway glance at me. "But yeah."

I laugh. I lightly punch him on the shoulder as I respond, "Sounds okay to me."

Walking in, most girls take a glance up to Vincent and subconsciously try and make him notice them. If I am being honest with myself, I know that if I hadn't been friends with Gray I would have been part of this population, silently fangirling and hoping Vincent would sit next to me. But the whole situation's different; I really don't feel anything besides budding friendship between me and Vincent. And I hope it'll stay that way.

Vincent looks gorgeous, like, in the most obvious way. Messy, unruly . . . every adjective that means 'disarranged' get along with his hair. As usual, it covers up his forehead and most of his eyes. He slings his backpack on the chair in front of him and leans back on his chair. He's looking up to the ceiling, his thin lips slightly parted in such a way that his jaw becomes sharply defined, and it makes the girls really hyperventilate right now.

I shake my head in amusement.

"Good morning, class," our teacher drawls, his voice slick with boredom as he sets his papers on his table and places his case underneath it. Are the teachers here always bored or something? I prop my elbow on my armchair and lean my chin on it, replying my greetings in monotone.

I am practically dozing off (Which is a bad thing so please, kids, never follow my footsteps), when I feel Vincent nudging my shoulder. I look at him, his face lit up in a grin, then he points something with his chin - Haha, that rhymed. Ahem, okay - and I follow his directions.

Turns out our teacher has been glaring at me.

I snap out of it and my body automatically jerks into a proper sitting position. "Oh my God," I say, my eyes darting from Vincent to our teacher. "I am so sorry."

"Miss . . . uh, Branigan. This is a warning. One more time and you'll be in Detention." And with that the teacher turns around and continues on sketching on the blackboard.

"So noted," I mutter. I hear Vincent snort beside me. I look at him and try to glare, but end up breaking into a grin.

"Okay . . . I know you all have been dying to hear this but," our teacher pauses, taking a sweep of the class and eyeing me in particular. "I'm going to provide you your partners for the whole semester."

"I call bullshit," Vincent whispers. "I'm not dying to meet my partner."

I snort quietly. "You kissing your mother with that mouth?"

Vincent looks at me, his face blank as if taken off guard. But of course it'll all end up with a big grin. Like Gray, Vincent has his eyes cutely crinkled when he's smiling, and, I'm going to say this again, I just had the ultimate privilege to see Vincent's eyes for the second time.

And I just feel stupid whenever I'm fangirling.

"Man," he sounds amused, his smile still apparent on his face. "I never knew you had it in you."

I laugh. But then I notice something. "Hey. How come you aren't accompanied with a book?"

"Didn't feel like it." He gives me another of his sideways glance. "Never thought you'd notice, though."

"Why wouldn't anyone notice that?"

"Just because." He now looks at me, a mysterious smirk on his lips. He adjusts his otherwise falling off beanie and places his attention to the teacher once more. I raise my eyebrows at him. Does he really have to be mysterious, like, all the time? My insides don't know how to react when he pulls that one side of him on me.

"Megumi . . . Branigan and," the teacher gives me a pointed look. And then he reverts his gaze to . . . "Vincent Chenery."

If we have sunglasses right now, we literally would have put them on at the same time. Of course this would happen. I mean, come on, who wouldn't expect this? Vincent, instead, looks at me . . . then he starts wriggling his eyebrows.

I give him a blank look. Then he starts wriggling his eyebrows more, and that's when I get it. "Okay. You know what? Just because we're partners doesn't mean you could go all Edward Cullen on me."

"Aww, what a killjoy," he chuckles. "Okay, but again, you surprised me there, Meggie. Never thought you'd get my antics."

"Did . . . hold up, hold up. Did you just call me 'Meggie'? Seriously?" Okay. I'll recompose myself now. I'd never been this loud before. Nor had been silly or anything. I mentally shrug. I guess I'm just enjoying Vincent's company. Once again, Vincent flashes an award-winning smile. "What if I call you 'Vince'? Or 'Vin'?"

Vincent creases his eyebrows, then crosses his arms. He huffs rather loudly and shakes his head as if clearing his brain or something, and I'd actually almost had my heart jump. He turns his head to me and opens his mouth, but he probably changed his mind because he closes it again. Finally, he says something. "Uh . . . Megumi, let's not go there. You can have all the privileges to call me just 'Vincent'. Okay? Just - Let's talk about something else."

I don't need to be told twice. I nod my head, but I ignore his last sentence and do not utter a single word. Of course he has a touchy thing with people calling him a nickname. Everyone does this. There just has to be someone in a group with this problem, and since he's the only one with a quite-long name, well, you know how it is . . .

Black and yellow, bla - okay, I'll shut up.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

"Guys, guess what happened on Biology?" Vincent sets his tray on our table, pulling his sweater's sleeves back before propping his elbows on the table. He gives everyone a look as if prompting the guys to really guess what happened.

"What?" Gray asks before taking off his glasses and wiping them with a cloth.

"I said 'guess,' didn't I?"

"Really, Vincent?" Chris shoots back, creasing his eyebrows as he leans back on his chair. Then he turns his gaze to my hair and starts braiding it once again. This time I'm too tired to fend him off so I continue eating my burger.

"Megumi's my partner." Vincent finally finishes, putting on his wide grin and looking at the guys' faces for some reactions. I, for one, don't find this reaction-worthy at all but the guys have surprised me.

"Aww, why didn't we have groupings in Spanish? At least our Megumi would be with us."

"Am I the only one who doesn't know if I have a subject with Megs?"

"Yeah, Chris. I have Philosophy with Megumi."

"This is stupid." I say, nodding to myself as I look at the guys. When they show that they have no intentions at all in agreeing with me, I hang my head low and continue sulking with my food.

"Why would this be stupid?" the twins ask together - of course - and because they're on either side of me, they take this time to lean forward and make me uncomfortable.

"Um, I don't know," I say in a small voice as I lean backward, almost making me fall off my chair before the two of them place a firm grip on the sides, pulling me back to the table effortlessly. I blink, my head slowly taking in what had just happened.

Minutes later we all have finished our food, the eating accompanied by laughs and jokes. As we pass, like, the centre of the whole building where there's a small clearing and an open garden, I see the sky outside getting dark, the clouds looking dangerously low. Great.

Fuck my umbrella.

Author's Notes: Okay, I have many things to say so let me enumerate them . . .

1) I made Dan Middleton (also-fùcking-known-as DanTDM) portray Vincent because, why the hell not. And admit it, he looks so cute in that picture on the side.

2) This update feels like crap but I want to update, like, SO BAD. I hope you guys still like it. :D

3) Please point out if there are mistakes. XD And guess what would happen next chappie.

You: What?

Me: I said guess, you little -

♥ ♪ The Mofo-Potato; Isabel ♪ ♥