I could offer you an explanation for my absence, but I guess the short explanation is "not dead." SHERLOCK QUOTES ASIDE, IM BACK FROM HIATUS! HAPPY NEW YEAR! To those who've never read my stories I say welcome! And really? You've never read my...? (I'm joking) TO MY OLD READERS, I SAY WELCOME BACK! Now, let's begin!

disclaimer: sadly I do not own the characters they are owned by the wonderful Cassandra Clare! ❤️

British GCSE exams— not that anyone really knows what they stand for— are a thing created by Satan designed to bore you, intimidate you and, quite frankly, be the death of you.

And it was no different for the students of St Raziel's Roman-Catholic specialist Arts Academy— however prestigious the title.

All the children aged 15-16 in the school were certainly not exempt from the rule. They would be just a few of thousands of innocent, procrastinating children forced to sit down at a desk and write a completely bullshitted essay on a topic they'd truthfully only revised the night before.

The school was aware of this, of course. Henceforth their "revolutionary" idea to implement an after school revision timetable into their extra-curricular activities timetable.

But of course, many of the children didn't bother attending. Why should they? They'd served their six hours of time in the grammar-slammer. Now freed from imprisonment, they had more important things to worry about: like the price of Freddo's, or the ever-rising height of Simon Cowell's trousers.

But there were few that dared to brave the hour of extra work.

And among these few: were James Carstairs and William Herondale.

"I don't even know why they're here" Tessa Gray, a smart, quick-witted girl with steel grey eyes whispered to her friend from behind a "Tale of Two Cities" textbook. Having received no response from her friend, she boldly spoke again. "Sophie" she hissed, looking wide-eyed at her friend.

Slowly, and deliberately, the other girl lifted her head, her hair straightening from its pooled mass on the table that had circled around her head like some form of protective circle. Tucking a particularly rebellious, unruly strand behind her ear, she finally said to her friend, "what?", annoyance visible in her hazel eyes.

"Those two." Tessa replied, flicking her eyes over school's library, resting on the place where two boys were sat the table next to them: one earnestly writing notes onto paper, and another using his friend's work to make paper aeroplanes.

Sophie didn't seem particularly fazed. "Maybe," she muttered, looking back to Tessa, "one of them is just a regular teenager trying to actually do some decent revision without their impossibly smart and somewhat arrogant mate interrupting them every three–" she broke off as she was hit by a paper aeroplane— "seconds." She finished, not bothering to confront her attacker.

And with good reason. Somewhat stereotypically, the boy who had made the air assault was of course "Mr Popular: the Absolute LAD of St Raziel's", whereas Sophie wasn't necessarily unpopular, but definitely someone who preferred to stay under the radar.

The grey eyed girl, however, had a lot more confidence than her friend. "I'm not arrogant!" She objected to her friend as she stood up, unfolding the paper aeroplane. "Herondale!" She called, holding up the paper aeroplane. Both boys looked up from the table. "This yours?" She waved the paper around.

Just as Will opened his mouth to respond, however, he was interrupted.

"Shame." Tessa said, before the room was filled with the sound of paper tearing, as she ripped the paper in half once, twice, and three times.

So naturally, she was quite taken aback when a smirk crept up onto Will's face and his friend began flicking back several pages his own textbook. "Actually, it was Jem's." He told her smoothly through what was now a bold grin.

"Jem," Tessa mimicked in what even her friend would admit to be a terrible Welsh accent, "isn't someone I can imagine wasting their time making paper aeroplanes."

"Arrogant," Sophie tutted to her friend, returning her attention back to her work.

"But he is someone you can imagine wasting their time making revision notes, now isn't he?" Will said, the grin wiping off his face. "Yeah sure that was my aeroplane, but you'd have noticed it was his handwriting if you'd have even glanced at the page before shredding it."

Tessa could feel her cheeks heating. Jem was almost never in classes, and although being incredibly intelligent, his absence was often what caused his grades to plummet.

Or they would, if he didn't revise every night. He hadn't told anyone of course, but everyone in the year knew of his otherworldly motivation. And it was something he was entirely embarrassed about.

Which, naturally, made her Tessa feel awful. She liked Jem. He was kind and sincere, and just yesterday he'd leant her his revision book during French simply because she'd lost hers, and was on her last warning with forgetting her equipment— meaning she was on her way to a detention. She had been venting her worries to Bridget, who sits next to her, when a book had slid in front of her from the silver-eyed boy opposite, who'd then informed the teacher he had forgotten his own.

She'd have been murdered by her parents for that detention.

And now here she was, destroying the work of the boy who'd taken the fall for her.

"Jem, oh my gosh. I'm really sorry, I–"

"Karma's a bitch." The Welsh boy said simply, tossing chewing gum into his mouth, his startlingly blue eyes locked with Tessa's.

"Will..." His friend apprehended him, flicking another page of the book with a slight frown on his face, "please, don't."

Will immediately seemed to sense the problem. Lowering his tone, he began to reassure his friend. "Jem, seriously I'll help. What're you revising? English? It's easy. You shouldn't even really revise that–" Jem gave him a stony look. "Fair point, that's like you telling me not to revise maths."

Sophie reached up and yanked her friend back down to her seat, shoving a book under Tessa's nose.

"Look, English is great. You just get to write a bunch of crap and then make up some bullshit explanation for it. Just be like 'And, I shit you not, Sydney Carton chose this because'—"

"You're not meant to use 'I' statements in formal essays." Jem sighed, but a smile quirked up on his features anyway.

"One shits you not?" The blue eyed boy suggested.

Tessa snorted into her writing, her guilt ebbing away.

"This author shits you not?" Will proposed again, tapping his pen on the desk as he did so.

"It's best to avoid the avoid the general 'you' if you're trying to be formal." Sophie finally spoke up, turning around so she could see Will and Jem.

Like Tessa, Sophie also liked Jem. The two had grown up in the same foster home due to the premature death of Jem's parents, and the unfit family Sophie had previously lived with. Although both now adopted and looked after by separate families (Jem by Will's parents and Sophie by the Headmistress of the school; Mrs Branwell) the two were still close.

"Alright." Will sighed, surprised at Sophie's comment, but going along with it anyway. "'One would not be considered shitted', final answer. You cannot get more formal and professional than that."

All four of them burst out laughing.

"Gosh Will, no wonder you get A's." Jem commented, just as the clock ticked to 5 o'clock and a teacher entered the room to inform the revision class was over.

"See y'all later." Will said with a casual wave as he left the library. Jem was about to follow, before Tessa called him back.

"Jem, I really am sorry—" she began.

"Oh, don't worry about it, Tessa!" Jem told her with a genuine smile. "If you hadn't have ripped up my work, none of us would have received any of Will's oh-so-helpful knowledge." There was a slight pause before he added, "good luck in your exams by the way, both of you!"

"Oh I don't need luck, I have something much better." The girl with the hazel eyes replied.

"The gift of Will's knowledge?" Tessa suggested.

"Exactly."

As a New Years present to me how about y'all say a little hello in the reviews? if any of you mention Adele in this greeting I will find you and skiinnnn you. Now, it's been a while since I've written anything and I wanted to start off small so I hope this was good enough!

see you all soon! Xx

— SilverCarstairs.