"Why the hell are you in here, anyways? I thought you said you didn't have English with me." Emma was lounging in the desk of her first period class. She had the honor of sitting next to Killian's non-stop babbling about his day yesterday, acting as if Emma cared about that. Finally fed up, she interrupted him with the question she had yesterday after realizing that he had this class with her.

The brunet looked at her, a bushy eyebrow quirked. "Haven't you figured it out? I lied."

"Big surprise." Emma muttered under her breath, playing with one of her mechanical pencils.

Currently, they were listening to Mr. Booth continue with the classroom rules. Of course, most of the class had taken to doing their own thing as his voice seemed to drone on about not having your cell phones out during class and blah blah blah…

Emma was nearly falling asleep by then, finding her eyes drooping every so often. It was quite the struggle to stay awake, and by the looks of it, she hoped that she could. Curse her for staying up too late last night, but for the life of her, she just couldn't fall asleep. This day was going to be a long one.

"Em." The voice made the blonde jump slightly in her seat, then shoot daggers at the source.

"What?" She snapped, trying hard to ignore the chuckle coming from that arrogant ass and to keep herself from kicking said ass in the nuts.

Killian smirked. "How did it go with… her?"

"Her?" Emma repeated with confusion until it hit her. He was talking about her fourth period class and the woman who taught it.

"Oh. Uh, not too bad. I bet she hates me." The blonde shrugged nonchalantly and made chicken scratches with her pencil on the classroom rules paper, praying that he wouldn't pry too much and make her blurt out a confession.

"What'd you do?" He quirked a brow at her. "Day number one: Piss off the Evil Queen. Not a good idea."

"Pretty much. I'm a nuisance and I was also caught staring."

Killian smirked. "You too, huh?"

Emma looked at him, nearly having forgotten that he had taken a class with Ms. Mills before. It wasn't a surprise to her that he probably had been staring at the brunette teacher as well. And for some reason, something just bristled inside of her. She didn't want anyone else looking at the English teacher like that.

"What do you mean?" She gritted the words between her teeth.

"I couldn't believe it, either," he explained. "When everyone said she was a bitch, I assumed she was ugly and old or something. Usually those teachers are, but … She's not and she's hot."

"Yeah, thanks for warning me. Both you and Belle seemed to have left that little detail out."

"At least you don't have to worry about her hating you for no reason." The boy shrugged and smirked. "She gave me detention before and there was a reason."

"... why?" Emma was scared to ask. She was quite certain of what he did, upon the new revelations. Killian and his incapability to control the dangly parts attached to him.

"I touched the butt."

Emma nearly launched herself from her desk to strangle that boy sitting next to her. It took every fiber of her being to keep her muscles still. "You...touched her butt?" she growled softly, trying to keep herself as calm as possible.

"Have you seen her ass?"

"You're a pervert." Emma rolled her eyes and leaned back against her chair. "A fucking horny perv."

He smirked and waggled his eyebrows at her. "Isn't someone jealous?"

Emma's heart skipped a beat.

"Don't worry, there's enough Killian Jones to go around."

She sighed in relief. He was talking about himself. But what he had said made her glare at him, wishing his skin would burn underneath the heated stare. "You wish."

He opened his mouth to speak, but the bell interrupted him and Emma stood up to follow the rest of the class out the door. Thank the divines he didn't sit next to her in Mr. Spencer's class, or she'd be tempted to replace his eyes with his testicles and vice versa.

"I've read your assignments from yesterday and I must admit that I am impressed with what I saw." Ms. Mills smiled towards the class as she walked around the room with a stack of papers in her hand. "I've taken the liberty to make a note on each. You may take a few minutes to look them over before I continue with today's agenda."

She began to pass the papers back out to their owners; the pencil skirt that she wore today tightening every time she moved. Emma only knew this because she had been staring the entire time. It seemed as if her eyes were permanently glued to such forbidden territory and she certainly did hope that Ms. Mills wouldn't soon find out where her eyes usually were when her back was turned.

Quickly averting her gaze before the teacher could catch her staring, she took the time to drink up the classroom again. There were more open seats today for it appeared that the number of students had decreased. Perhaps they got scared about Ms. Mills' warning yesterday and decided to take her advice and visit with the counselor. Such a shame, Emma thought, they were missing out.

"Emma." She heard her name in the melody of Regina's voice and looked up to see a notebook being handed to her. She forgot about not ripping the pages out before she left.

In her embarrassment, she grinned sheepishly and took it, opening the cover so she could look at the first page. It wasn't until the final page that she saw red ink formed into cursive writing in the empty space below her own words. She read them carefully, smiling to herself.

"Despite your affinity to be known and somewhat disruptive, I found your skill to be surprisingly impressive. I cannot wait to see what you have to come up with in future assignments. Please, do keep up the good work and try your best. I see that you have a creative imagination. Use it wisely."

Emma read through the small brick of words again, her eyes catching a small bit of writing at the bottom in pencil. It was still the same cursive as the red writing. She wondered why the hell it had changed. With a shrug, she read the words, nearly chuckling aloud.

"P.S. I especially enjoyed the part where you nearly lit your mother's pants on fire with a bottle rocket. At least no one was harmed."

Emma smiled wide in amusement at the words. She liked the brunette teacher even more.

When the blonde gazed up to see if anyone else was done, she noticed Ms. Mills standing at the front of the room with her eyes locked on Emma. A shiver eased its way down her spine as their eyes met briefly. The blonde could only offer a sheepish smile, unsure of how else to get out of that without squirming to the floor. That offered a small tug of the brunette teacher's lips before she stepped forward.

"Alright, if we're finished, I'll begin with today's lesson."

Emma sat through the rest of the class period, her mind on that note in her paper. She knew it was just a thing that teachers did. She didn't take it personally like she was more special than anyone else or anything, but it sure felt like it.

"She wrote a love note to you on your assignment?" Ruby laughed over the phone as Emma kicked her boots off.

It was the end of the day and Emma had decided to head straight home instead of worrying Mary Margaret again. She forgot her phone at the apartment and didn't want to make the poor brunette fret for her.

Again, though, she had made the mistake of talking to Belle about the note left on her paper from Ms. Mills. She should have known better that that damn bookworm would go and blab to Ruby, because it wasn't ten minutes after she got home and texted Ruby that she called instead of replying.

"I take it you spoke to Belle?"

"Yeah. So is it true? What did she say?"

"Calm down, Rubes. It wasn't a love note. She wrote a note regarding our writing skills at the end of the assignment. She just said that I was pretty good and she was impressed." Emma shrugged and collapsed onto her bed with a sigh. "I only told Belle because I was worried about the class before."

She could feel Ruby's smirk over the phone. "I'm sure that's not the only thing she'll be impressed by."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Emma huffed.

"Nothing. That means nothing."

Emma scowled at her phone and crossed her arms, letting the cellphone lay against her cheek. "You're insane if you think I'll ever be able to get to know her like that, fuck, Rubes. She's probably not even gay."

"You never know!" Ruby chirped.

"I'll hang up on you."

"No, you won't."

"No, I won't. But shut up about her." Emma sighed and rolled onto her side, staring blankly at the wall.

"Why?"

"Because. It's stupid and pointless. It'd be different if she was a student, you know? At least I'd have a chance."

"Jeez, Em, lighten up! Just spend some time with her or something. Didn't you say that you spent, like, half your lunch with her?"

Emma frowned and mentally kicked herself. She made the mistake of talking with Ruby later last night as the waitress had texted her sorry with a crying, frowny face. They had talked a bit more and she eventually squeezed more information out of her about Ms. Mills.

"That was to finish a paper and it was just yesterday. I can't just randomly stay in there. She'd think I'm a weirdo or something." The blonde shifted on the bed.

Ruby chuckled. "Wait until you get another paper, you doofus. Maybe then you can. I mean, like, how did it work last time?"

"It was supposed to have been done in class," she murmured. "I doubt the next ones would be like that, considering they'll probably be longer. I can't just stay in during lunch."

"Oh, come on, Em. Take it from the expert, here." Ruby smirked, and Emma could feel it through the way she spoke. "Make up an excuse, like, you can't do it at home or something. I'm sure she'd let you stay."

"Probably not. I doubt she wants me to disrupt her lunch."

"Holy fuck, Emma. Get your head in the fucking game!" Ruby snapped, then muttered a quick apology after a reprimanding voice shouted in the background.

"Having Granny troubles, I see." Emma chuckled.

"Shut up." There was some shuffling noise and a click before Ruby spoke again. "Alright, now. Listen to me, girl. I know it'd be weird, like, if you weren't working on it in class, right? And you just stay there and whip it out?"

"Yeah...?"

"Well, how if you 'accidentally' lose track of time or something or try to finish up your thoughts after the bell rings?" She continued.

"Okay?"

There was a long, irritated sigh. "And voila!"

"Look, Ruby, I appreciate your matchmaking help, but it's only been like, what, two days? I just have a crush on her, okay?"

"Okay." The word was drawn out as if Ruby didn't believe her.

"And, anyways, what's just sitting in there working on my papers going to do? Make it awkward and make me hungry."

"Take food with you. Make it habitual. Like, ask if you can just eat lunch in there or something. Make it less awkward, and maybe have yourself a break as you eat. Talk." Ruby suggested and Emma swore that she wasn't talking to her friend anymore.

"Huh… Well…" She clucked. "I don't know."

"It's just a suggestion. You could try it, or something. Hell, I'll even make you a lunch and you can pick it up in the morning. I've got some stuff that'll last until then."

"Shit. I'll try it. Once. Okay? I'll let you know the next time I have a paper." Emma sighed and shook her head. She couldn't believe she was getting herself into this.

"Good! I gotta go, 'cause Granny's gonna bust down the bathroom door if I don't get my ass out and work. So, talk to you later. Love you!"

"Yeah... Bye!" Emma chuckled and ended the call, leaving herself to her thoughts.