Shelley sighed from her desk in the back of the classroom. Two months ago when she had gotten over her ridiculous crush on the ungettable and ultimately complete jerk that was Melvin Moody she had promised to never do that again. She was never going to go insane over a guy she had no chance with, period, end of story.

That had lasted for about two seconds.

Not that she blamed herself. I mean who would have suspected that the once closed off, and slightly frightening Ricky Linderman, would actually turn out to be the vulnerable, angst filled, gorgeous hunk of a hero that was sitting diagonally from her at this very moment.

Sitting and chatting with a very blonde Carly Turlington. Well she was talking; he was staring at her boobs, which she was very obviously flashing as she bent over to talk.

And that was her problem, because her boobs did not look anything like Carly Turlington's. Hers, were okay, but they weren't, like anything spectacular. They couldn't single handedly, or should she say single breastedly capture a guy's attention.

She couldn't entirely blame herself for going back on her promise. After all, when she started feeling like this for Ricky, he was not being swarmed by girls like Carly. In fact, except for their small group of mis-fit friends, he was completely asocial. Then he had beaten that guy Mike up and forget it, he had become the #1 get for the most popular girls in school.

Not that he had ditched the group, he would never do that. He still ate with Cliff and all of them everyday, he was just accompanied by his girlfriend of the day, or a few of his girlfriends of the day. It made it impossible to stay away from him, and at the time, made her completely invisible to him. It was a no win situation for her. She might as well give up.

Sighing again, she returned to the assignment and forced herself to ignore everything else.

Damn this girl was annoying. I mean seriously, not a single interesting sentence had come out of her mouth in the nearly 15 minutes she was talking. And she has talked the entire time, he frankly wondered how she was getting enough air to her brain…on second thought that was probably a really dumb question.

Since she was there and she didn't appear to be leaving anytime soon, he took the opportunity to ogle her chest. I mean come on, he was a teenage boy and this girl was practically shoving her perfect DD breasts in his face. Who would refuse an invitation like that?

But after a while even that got old. The talking became more like shrill yelling and all he wanted was to get away.

Two months ago, when he and Cliff had taken on Mike and Melvin he'd quickly found himself surrounded by girls only to eager to gets their claws into "hunky Ricky." For a while it had been fun, after a year of ignoring everyone he found himself with dozens of dates, a different girl everyday.

But the girls were getting to be more of an irritation that anything else. In fact, he really preferred hanging out with Cliff and Shelley and the gang.

Shelley. He snuck a look back at her, studying her profile as she bent over her work, writing furiously. He'd kind of been disappointed that while tons of girls flirted with him everyday, Shelley seemed to clam up around him. He actually thought she might not like him at all. Around Cliff and the others she was a chatterbox, moving from one subject to another with speed and efficiency. But unlike the girl currently sitting in front of him Shelley was actually interesting, and even though she loved to talk, she had no problem listening. In fact most of the boys unloaded their problems on her shoulders, grateful for her words of advice.

Except him. He seemed unable to get up the nerve to talk to her. And the few times he made the attempt she went out of her way to avoid being alone with him. If it wasn't for the few times he'd caught her staring at him when she thought he wasn't looking he might have given up all hope.

Suddenly the teacher's voice broke through his thoughts, "Okay class, you can finish the rest of your assignment for homework. Right now, I'd like you to work on your interview skills." She paused as she handed out papers, "Pick a partner and take turns asking them the questions on the sheet. You'll use these sheets to write a short biography on your partner."

Ricky stiffened as Carly turned toward him with her sheet when the teacher's voice rang out, "Carly, I think you and Ricky know plenty about each other since you've been talking for half the class. Why don't you partner with Matthew and Ricky, you can be Shelley's partner."

Ricky forced his face to remain impassive as he switched seats with Matthew and then pulled the chair so he and Shelley sat face to face.

"Hi."

Shelley blushed on every body part that was visible to his eyes and he couldn't stop his smirk as she finally managed to say "Hi," in return.

"So what's your full name?"

"Huh?" Shelley asked, her blush going nowhere. His face widened in a real smile, "For the interview, the first question is what is your full name?"

"Oh," she said, "Shelley Marie Danes."

"That's pretty."

"What's yours?"

"Richard Linderman."

"You don't have a middle name?"

"My mother thinks their pointless. Favorite color?"

"Yellow."

"You never wear yellow," he says before he can stop himself.

"My mother thinks I look terrible in it." He silently thanks anyone who is listening that she didn't realize he'd just confessed to paying attention to what colors she wears. "What's yours?

"Green. Favorite thing you own."

"The blanket my parents covered me in when I came home from the hospital. My grandmother knitted it for me. What about you?"

"A G.I. Joe. It was my brother's favorite toy." His face dropped in grief.

Shelley's face softened in sympathy, "What was he like, your brother?"

"Is that on the questionnaire?" Ricky all but snarled at her.

Shelley's eyes widened and filled, "No, sorry, uh what's your uh, favorite food?"

He cursed out loud, not at her, but at himself. Everything had been going great and now he'd scared her. "Look, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to snap at you. I just,…don't like talking about my brother, or I guess I'm just not used to it. It's only been a few months since I've actually talked about how he died and….listen I just don't want to talk about it."

Shelley's eyes returned to normal size and she gave him a small smile, "It's okay, when my grandmother died, I couldn't talk about her for a long time. I know it's not the same, but if you ever do want to talk about it, I'm a pretty good listener. And not just about your brother, but other stuff too."

Ricky, despite the awkwardness of the topic, felt elated. She was giving him an invitation that he thought he'd never get. Clearly, she didn't hate him; maybe she even liked him, just a little bit. Before he could stop himself he reached over and put his hand over hers, shocked by how tiny it felt surrounded by his huge meaty paw. He saw her start in shock and then the blush was back, deeper then before. Suddenly the air around him felt very thick.

"So," he asked, "What's next?"