By Your Side

Here's a riddle for you: Who hasauburn hair, wrote this story, and doesn't own Jimmy Neutron?

Answer: Me.

Go read.

Chapter 1

Jimmy's POV

"Um, and as you can see, it's highly advanced technology, but also fairly dangerous. If used on a human, they can go unconscious for up to 8 hours, but that isn't highly likely, as it's not quite finished yet, and as it's not to be used for such..."

I, Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius, was halfway through my show-and-tell, where I was currently showing off my newest invention.

I did a quick scan of the room as I talked and in one sweep, I could see that absolutely no one was listening. They were even less attentive than they normally would have been on a Friday afternoon such as this one.

I glanced to my right; Miss Fowl was... asleep? Sheen was simultaneously picking his nose and playing with one of his many Ultra lord action-figures under his desk. Carl was staring at the ceiling and humming a song that was probably either about llamas or... my mom.Gross. Libby was bobbing her head and mouthing the words to the song playing in the headphones that were obviously hidden under her braided black hair.

And then there was Cindy... ah Cindy. Cindy Vortex. I could barely look at her without the usual torrent of emotions welling up inside of me. Ever since we had gotten back from the island, I could no longer admit anything to myself other than the complete truth: I love her.

I love her so much, and yet I could not bring myself to tell her, because then things would change. In spite of myself, I love the competition we have, and our arguments, and if she shot me down, I would look stupid, and James Isaac Neutron hates looking stupid more than anything else. Yet, recently, things had changed.

We had only just gone to Mars to tap into the hydro-quantum energy source the Martians had, and I had admitted, in front of all our friends, that Cindy distracted me. I could remember my exact words, "I just think you're pretty smart...and smell nice... and you kinda distract me... sometimes..."

To my surprise, she had simply seemed... pleased, I remembered. And I felt like we had been almost flirting back and forth a lot lately, but I wasn't going to admit it, even to myself. So, just forget I said it.

As I continued my presentation, I was pondering to myself the situation that had happened the previous afternoon. Sheen and I were at the Candy Bar. Cindy's party was that coming Monday night, and she had been passing out invitations. Her actual birthday was on Tuesday.

I wasn't particularly shocked when Sheen got an invitation, as he was Libby's boyfriend, and Libby was Cindy's best friend, but I was a little surprised I didn't receive one, as the five of us had been through so much together. But who was I kidding?

I really loved Cindy, I supposed, but I'd never told her this. Plus, I could never tell whether or not she shared my feelings. I was a little disappointed that she hadn't invited me; I would have liked to go. It was fine, though... but I half hoped she wouldgive me an invitation some time in the next few days.

Plus, I had the perfect present...beyond perfect.

Cindy's POV

Neutron had stopped talking, I noticed. I stopped pretending not to listen, and looked up at the boy I secretly loved, and to my shock, he was looking right at me, seemingly lost in thought.

Our eyes locked, and Jimmy shook his head, as if shaking out of a trance. Then, someone (I think it was Butch) shot a rubber band at Jimmy, hitting him in the face. Neutron dropped his invention, and without uttering another word, or even finishing his show-and-tell, he picked it up, lowered his eyes, and shuffled dejectedly back to his desk.

I wasn't very happy with Butch for firing the rubber band at the time, but I would be ever so thankful for it later.

I squirmed slightly in my seat, bit my lip, and turned to talk to Jimmy, "That was..." I started.

"I know," he sighed, "terrible..."

"No... really good," I finished. I felt bad about inviting Sheen to my birthday party right in front of him. He had seemed hurt, so I decided maybe it was time to be nice... for now.

"Really?" Jimmy turned to face me.

I bit my lip again and nodded. Why did he make me so nervous? He smiled and I melted.

"Um, what was the invention called again?" I asked semi-sweetly.

"Oh, it's called the Electrostatic Force Inducer, for now. As soon as I work out all the bugs, I'll give it a final name. Um, listen, Vortex, I was thinking-" he opened his mouth to say something more when there was a loud squaaaawk from the front desk, and Miss Fowl slid off her desk, finally waking up.

I closed my eyes in annoyance at the interruption... he was obviously going to say something important. "I was thinking..." Jimmy was always thinking... I wondered what he was trying to say as I turned back to face the front, and Miss Fowl sprang up, seemingly unaware of her surroundings for a moment.

"Okay claaaasss," Miss Fowl warbled, "Now today, since it's the last day of school, we will have a final test on everything we've learned in sciiiiience this year..."

Eh. So, okay. I really wasn't sure I was going to post this story. I wrote it back in January, the first one I ever wrote, and I'm really not sure how much I like it... So basically, the posting of this story will be run by the reviewers. If you think I should continue, I will. If you don't, I'll be kinda sad but I will stop posting chapters. No blantant evil flaming though. That's just insensitive and would severely lower my self-esteem.

Anyways, this was just a set-up chapter. I'm pretty sure it gets better. Remember the details, though. They do come in handy to predicting the rest of the story.

Thanks, guys! Please R&R