A/N Hello! Welcome to my story! It's been about 3 years since I wrote the first 8 chapters. I am now going back and trying to finish it, hoping that publishing it will inspire me to actually work on it. Sorry, the first chapter is pretty bad, so bear with me! It will get good soon. This is a very, very, loose interpretation of Beauty and the Beast. Enjoy!

Chapter 1

When I thought of Christmas, I tried to remember childhood. Even though it wasn't that long ago, it seemed like such a distant memory. I remembered decorating the tree with my mother, with the aroma of freshly baked cookies capturing the house. I remembered sneaking into my parent's closet with my brother, trying to find our presents. Then I remembered the days after Christmas, and feeling disappointed after two months of anticipation leading to a few pairs of socks and a bottle of shampoo. I was in the awkward age of late teens, when I didn't really have anything that I was excited about getting. I didn't make wishlists anymore, so my parents just got me a bunch of everyday staples that I would eventually need. Christmas just didn't seem worth it anymore. But in that moment, standing in Adam's doorway and looking around at all the townhouses extravagantly decorated with twinkling lights, there was a warmth that I hadn't felt since I was a child. I waited a moment to absorb the nostalgic opulence, then walked in with a gift in one hand and a batch of brownies in the other.

There were about fifteen people in the living room, playing some video game. I put down my present for the gift exchange we would do later, and watched the action. Adam and Larry, my ex boyfriend, were playing some virtual sword fighting game. They each held a controller in their hand that looked like a TV remote control with a light-up sphere on the end. The light on the end changed colors, sometimes being white, and other times glowing red. I figured that whenever the character was hit, their light turned red.

They looked kinda silly, swinging around their controllers randomly. I noticed that Larry's controller was glowing red much more than Adam's, and he didn't look happy about that. Soon, the fight was over and Adam yelled in victory.

"You're just too good at this," Larry said with a snarl. "I don't have one of these I can practice on everyday." If there was one thing Larry hated, it was losing. That's actually why we broke up, or why he broke up with me.

For those of you who have never experienced the alternate universe that is high school band, you have not truly lived. which might be a good thing. Most people think we were just awkward geeks, and to be honest, most of us were. However there were about fifteen exceptions, those being the fifteen people in that room. Sort of.

One of the most important things in band to realize quickly is that it is always a competition. In band, we are ranked by chairs, the best being first chair and the worst being last chair. At the end of every semester we have to play for our band director so that he can rank us. Chairs are everything, and you may think that you only have to worry about them twice a year, but you never get a day off. If you want to, you can challenge the person in the chair ahead of you and tryout again to steal their chair. If you show any sign of weakness, you will be attacked.

For example, sophomore year I got my wisdom teeth pulled over fall break. I made the mistake of sharing this information with Annie, my best friend. She was a flute, and I was a trumpet, so I didn't think it would have consequences. The different sections are like different countries and people stick mostly to their section. However, another thing that needs to be realized immediately is that your private life is not your own: it belongs to the entire band. There is no privacy and there are no secrets. My news spread quickly to the trumpet section, and they realized I would not be able to play at my best ability with my mouth in that condition. I was challenged viciously the day we got back from break and dropped down three chairs. I was not the only one with a story like this.

This is why intrasectional relationships never work. For the longest time, I was first chair and Larry was second, and eventually he just couldn't take it anymore and broke up with me. I was pretty annoyed, but it was probably for the best. I remained first chair, but it wasn't because of a lack of challenging from Larry.

"Who's gonna lose to me next?" Adam asked. There were no immediate answers.

"John?" Larry volunteered. John shook his head.

"I think I've lost enough today"

"You might win," Adam added. "You never know." John didn't look optimistic.

"Yeah, I do," John responded. "What about you, Belle. You haven't gone yet."

"Oh, I just got here though," I responded. "I haven't gotten to see you lose yet."

"Come on," Annie said. "We've all lost already, it's your turn now." I gave her a look, sarcastically thanking her. I reluctantly walked to the center of the living room. I might want to mention that I did have a small crush on Adam. He was a saxophone, so he was fair game. I couldn't act on this though, because like I said, band members do not get a truly private private life. This also means that if he felt the same way, I would know. And I haven't heard anything, meaning that I have about a zero percent chance. We've had our moments, but he just seemed reluctant. Probably just because of the band relationship horror stories. Or at least, that's what I told myself.

I got up and grabbed the controller and prepared for a devastating loss. It was a known fact that I was terrible at video games, so everyone knew this would be an easy victory for Adam "What exactly am I supposed to do?"

John, another saxophone player who was dating Ruby, a trumpet player, explained, "Just swing it around and try not to hit anyone in the face, well, except for Adam's character, of course." When he told me not to hit anyone in the face, he looked at Annie, who responded by smiling and giving an apologetic look, making me wonder what happened before I showed up.

"Are you ready for this?" he asked excitedly.

"Not really," I responded, but he started the game anyway. I wasn't exactly sure the best way to go about the game, so I just randomly swung the controller back and forth. I saw my light glowing red quite a bit, but didn't look at the screen. I was concentrating on not hitting anyone in the face like John warned. I noticed that Adam was giving more strategic, concentrated blows to my character, and I considered doing the same, but I didn't want to lose by too much, and I felt that if I actually tried, I would for sure. A few seconds later, the match was over.

"How did Belle win?" Sara, another trumpet player asked.

"I won?" I said in disbelief, then looked at the screen and saw my character standing victoriously.

"Are you sure you have the right controllers?" John asked.

"Hey," I started, "I am obviously a master at this game."

"You may have beaten me once, but you won't do it again," Adam said jokingly. My eyes met his, and silently said it's on.

"Oh really?" I looked back to the screen to see round two starting. I mimicked my earlier strategy of randomly swing the sword back and forth as fast as possible. I probably looked ridiculous, but I figured that was expected of me. It served me well once, and could do it again. I didn't really think about what I was doing and just moved. A few seconds in, I did almost hit Ruby in the face. Oops.

I kept going. Adam is used to fighting people who somewhat know what they are doing and have a logical strategy. I didn't know what I was doing, so I almost had an advantage, however paradoxical that sounds. I looked up at the screen to see who was winning, but I didn't know how to interpret it. However, seconds later, the game ended, showing that I did somehow win. I mimicked the pose of my character, or at least tried to.

"How is Belle better than all of us?" Gully asked.

"She's not better than all of us, just Adam," John added. The room nodded in agreement.

"It's nice to finally have a worthy opponent," Adam said. The other occupants of the room seemed slightly offended, but from what I was hearing, they didn't have the right to be. I felt pretty good about my victory. I'm sure that no one saw it as a real victory because I wasn't really doing anything. But then again, I didn't even see it as a real victory.

"I wouldn't call myself that."

"Oh well," Dan, another saxophone player, chimed in from the kitchen. "Let's eat." No one argued with that proposal. He and Adam had been cooking since that morning because they didn't have exams. It was the last week of school, so most people had half days where students took two of their exams each day. However, those who had electives that didn't require an exam or a teacher that did not want to show up could leave early or come late, depending on what exam they actually had to come for, if they had one. Dan and Adam luckily didn't have to take either of their exams that day. The day after would be the last exam, but there was only one, and most of us didn't have to take it. I sadly did and was not looking forward to it.

We ate spaghetti and meatballs. Adam was very Italian and made everything from scratch, so it was absolutely delicious. Since there were so many of us, we ate at three different tables stuffed into the small hallway connecting the front door to the living room. It was somewhat cramped, but that just made it interesting. Gully was one of the slowest eaters I had ever met, so we were all finished when he was barely halfway through. Because we were so close, Dan from a different table could reach over and steal one of his meatballs. Gully was not happy with this, but we made him continue to eat instead of arguing so we could move on to the next activity in a timely manner.

With some help from the others, Gully finished his food, and in the next few minutes and we started the gift exchange. We had to do a Dirty Santa gift exchange, where everyone randomly picked a crumpled piece of paper with a number on it, then either picked a wrapped gift from the pile or stole an already opened one in order of the number they drew.

While Adam was writing down numbers on strips of paper to be crumpled up and put in a hat, the rest of us moved the presents to a pile in the center of the living room. Dan was shaking each of them.

"Be careful with that one," John said as Dan picked up one of the presents. "It's very, very breakable." Dan moved it to the pile without shaking it. Dan laughed a bit, like he knew what it was, making me slightly curious.

Since the party was planned a little last minute, only nine of us brought presents. "I bet I'm gonna get number one," Dan bragged. The person who receives number one gets to choose from all the open presents once all of them are opened, making it the best number to get. We all drew numbers, and I got number five.

"What did you get," Rachel, a clarinet player asked.

"I got nine," Ruby said, seeming a little sad.

"Why are you disappointed?" I asked. "That's like the best number to get."

"It is? I thought it wasn't."

"Do you want to switch?" Rachel asked. "I got number 2."

"Sure!"

"No!" I chimed in. "Do not switch with her. That's a terrible deal." They switched anyway. Rachel seemed pretty pleased with herself, and Ruby seemed really confused. I just shook my head.

"Who has number one?" Adam asked, starting the exchange.

"I do," Dan said confidentially. He probably cheated somehow, but I didn't say anything.

"Pick the bag with the penguin!" John urged. That was the present that he told Dan not to shake.

"I think I'll take my chances," Dan responded, rolling his eyes. He looked at each of the presents, then grabbed mine. He carefully tore off the wrapping paper, then smiled and looked at me. "You got this just for me, didn't you."

I smiled and responded. "Maybe a little." He held up the gift unwrapped, a package of two half pound Reese's cups that more resembled pies than candy because of their size. I wasn't sure how he was supposed to eat them, but that wasn't my problem. Ruby, being number two now, walked up and stole the Reese's cups from Dan.

"Really?" he asked, exasperated. "You know I'm just going to steal those from you at the end." He walked over to the present pile and grabbed another, ignoring John, who was vigorously pointing at the bag with the penguin on it. He sat down and opened it, then held up a small, stuffed Santa hat. He pressed a button on the side, and the hat moved back and forth and played "Jingle Bells." He didn't seem as pleased as he was with my gift, but he would have a chance to change that later.

"Who's number three?" Adam asked. Annie stood up and walked to the pile.

"Annie, here's what you are going to do, ok," John said. "You're going to look at all of these presents, then look at that beautiful penguin on that beautiful bag, and you're going to pick it up."

"No thanks," she replied, then stole Dan's singing Santa hat. John looked disappointed.

.

"Really? That wasn't even a good gift!" Dan exclaimed, then picked up another present.

"Why don't you just steal the Reces's back?" Adam asked.

"Because I'm sure it will just be stolen from me again." He opened the present, and held something up. To be honest, I wasn't exactly sure what it was.

"What is it?" Rachel asked.

"It's a dinosaur bubble blower," he said somewhat confidently, like it took him a while to figure it out too. That made sense. It looked like a dinosaur on top with a tube of bubbles on the bottom. The bubbles shot out of the dinosaur's mouth. "Number four?"

"That's me," John said as he got up. I was surprised that he didn't take the penguin bag himself. He looked around the presents for a second, picked one up, then put it down and grabbed the dino bubble blower.

"Are you serious?! You're just doing this to aggravate me." There were laughs scattered across the room while he got up and picked up another present. He pulled a small box out of a bag filled with tissue paper. He opened the box and turned it upside down, causing hundreds of pennies to fall out onto the carpet. "Number five?"

I stood up. "If you steal my pennies, I will kill you."

"Don't worry, I have enough pennies." I walked over to the pile of presents. "I think I'll go with the penguin." John, Dan, and Ruby looked really pleased and laughed a little. I sat down and reached into the bag, somewhat scared to see what I got. I couldn't help but laugh as I pulled it out. It took me a second to come to terms with my present. Who would give this as a secret Santa gift? It was a goldfish: a live goldfish like you would get in a pet store. "What am I supposed to do with this?"

"I think you're supposed to put it in a fishbowl," John replied. Everyone laughed. I didn't think I had a fishbowl, so this fish would probably have a miserable life, if it lived past the party. "Number six?"

Larry got up and stole my fish. I was sad to lose my new friend, but happy it might have a better life. I considered stealing the pennies, but ended up opening another present. I got one of the bags and pulled out a small box that said "Hand Soap" on it.

"Open it," Annie instructed me. I opened the box to reveal a piece of soap that was shaped and colored like a hand. I was pretty pleased with this gift. It wasn't the best, but it was better than a box filled with pennies.

"Number seven?" I asked. Sara got up and also stole the fish, causing Larry to open another gift, revealing a copy of the constitution of the Confederate States of America. Adam got up right after, and opened another present revealing a small porcelain bunny.

"What is this?" He asked, closely examining the bunny.

"Press its back," Dan said. Adam did as he was instructed, and the bunny lit up. It was a night light, and probably plastic, not porcelain like I previously thought. "I found it in Walmart without a tag on it. The cashier said she didn't know what it was, but gave it to me for two dollars." Adam didn't seem too happy with his present.

"I can tell," Adam replied.

"I'm number nine." Rachel stole the Reese's from Ruby.

"Hey!" Ruby exclaimed. "Belle was right! You tricked me!"

"You should have listened," I scolded her. She sighed and opened the last present, revealing a rather expensive looking box of chocolates. Dan stole back the Reese's cups, sticking Rachel with the box of pennies, now scattered on Adam's living room floor. She was not happy, but she deserved it.

"Now what?" Adam asked.

"Now that it's dark, we could play hide and seek," John suggested. This was another difference between normal teenagers and band teenagers. Normal teenagers probably classified a party as a bunch of people talking, listening to music, and hopefully getting drunk. Band teenagers just wanted to play hide and seek, and maybe a board game.

"I don't know if there's enough room for everyone to have a separate hiding place," Adam responded.

"We could play Sardines instead," I added. We all agreed and started to play. Most of us stayed downstairs, while the one person who was "it," went upstairs to hide. The first "it" would be Rachel. The objective was to find Rachel and hide with her. The last person to find her would be the next "it."

A few seconds later, after giving Rachel a chance to hide, we all ran upstairs looking for her. We turned off all the lights so it would be more difficult to find people. Luckily, I knew Rachel enough to guess where she would hide. I went to the room farthest away from the stairs which happened to be a home gym. There was a closet in one of the corners, and I went there, expecting to see her, and I did. We were both quiet to not attract more people, but there were limited places to hide, and within a minute, most people had found us and were all struggling to pack into the closet. John was the last person to find us, and became the next "it."

The rest of us went downstairs. Because of the large group of people in a small space, the running around, and the fact that the heater was on because it was winter, it was getting very hot. Everyone took off their sweaters or coats. I had on a green tank top, a dark green scarf, and a grey sweater. I took off the scarf and the sweater, instantly relieving me of the heat.

"Should I take off my sweater?" Annie asked me.

"Oh yeah. Definitely."

"But the back is sheer." She was wearing a blue striped tank top covered in a dark blue sweater.

"It'll be ok," I replied. "It's too dark. No one will notice. And its way too hot in here to keep it on." She saw my reasoning and took off her sweater, then we ran back upstairs. I wasn't exactly sure where Gully would hide, but probably somewhere in plain sight. I wouldn't be surprised if he was in the second living room that contained the staircase. I looked around the couch and the pool table, but he wasn't there. I went to the closest bedroom, but didn't immediately see him. At this point, several people would have already found him. I saw Adam in the room I was in holding his bunny light.

"I think that's cheating," I told him. I knew that he was most likely just putting away in his room, but I wanted to start a conversation while we were alone.

"Maybe," he replied. "But I'm probably going to lose anyway."

"Why?" I asked, moving closer into the room. "You know this house better than anyone else."

"Which only means I know the best hiding places, and those are the places I check first," he said, turning off the light. "The problem is no one else would think to hide in those places." It reminded me of that video game. Adam is the only one who actually knows what he is doing, but those who don't somehow have an advantage.

"Especially John," I joked. He laughed a little, moving closer towards me. Well, me and the door, but I can dream, can't I? "But I suppose standing here doesn't help either of our chances."

"That's a good point." We quickly headed out of the room. His hand lightly brushed mine as we moved. I knew it was a little foolish of me to take notice of this, but I couldn't help it. How was I supposed to concentrate on the game when I was preoccupied with the feeling of his soft hand on mine and his mysterious eyes almost gleaming in the darkness. I moved on to the next bedroom, and he went the other way. I was almost disappointed that he went the other way. A part of me wanted us to find John together so that we could stand in a crowded closet close together, where maybe our hands would have crossed paths again, but I needed to stop thinking like this. I knew we would never have anything together, but I let myself believe for some reason.

I was getting concerned because I didn't see anyone else in the next room or in the halls. I was pretty sure I lost that round. I went into the next room, a bathroom, and still didn't find anyone. I didn't see Adam in the halls, so I guessed he didn't lose. I went into the bedroom he walked into and found everyone. I lost, of course, so everyone else went downstairs again.

I wanted to hide in a place where it would take everyone a long time to find me. I went into the farthest bedroom from the stairs and hid underneath the bed. Once someone found me, they probably wouldn't fit under the bed, and we wouldn't stay hidden for long. I thought there should be some time before that, so I hid there anyway.

Annie, knowing me too well, and found me about a minute later and slid under the bed. "They're all very confused," she said quietly. I was about to reply, when someone walked in. I was pretty sure it was Adam by his shoes. The shoes looked around a little, then moved to the bed. I thought we were caught. There was no more room under the bed, so if he found us, the search was as good as over. I fully expected to see his hand lift the bed skirt, revealing our hiding spot, but that was the farthest thing from what actually happened.