Tap, Tap, Tap,

Tap-Tap,

TapTapTapTapTap

Hunter's mechanical pencil tapped on the desk again and again. It was the only thing preventing him from laying his head on his desk, and falling asleep right then and there. English was the one class he was exceptionally good at, so what the teacher was explaining wasn't a mystery to him and was boring him out of his mind. His attention span was short sometimes and at this point had completely disappeared.

And so, off his mind drifted, and surprisingly the first thing it came to it was Emma.

She seemed like a very nice girl. As short a time as he'd known her, he'd already found that she was sweet, a little sassy, and very outspoken, what with the way she'd spoken to Zane and had the guts to tell him to back off first, followed by her friends.

Emma was just the kind of girl that Hunter would enjoy getting to know. And her attractiveness was a plus.

So, he decided he was going to get to know her better, one way or another. He made a plan to maybe get a few words in after class, before lunch and before they sat with the rest of the girls, because it would be awkward to speak one on one to her and ignore the others too. Not to mention it would be extremely rude of him.

He felt a small tingling sensation in his stomach, he was actually quite excited.

A pressure on his shoulder yanked him out of his thoughts.

" Uhm, can you cut it out?" A tanned, blonde girl about his age asked in a whisper. As he came back to reality, he had kind of hoping the blonde head of hair belonged to someone else, and was disappointed to see it wasn't.

Instead she was someone he immediately perceived as snobbish and annoying, though she hadn't said more than a sentence to him. She was wearing clothes that shouted EXPENSIVE right in his face, and the way she carried herself made her seem like she was made of money. He thought, 'Oh…one of those girls.'

" Depends on if you wanna ask nicely." Hunter said quietly back, sounding a little rude, though he hadn't meant it that way. He always had that sort of attitude reserved for those sorts of people. But she didn't seem to notice and instead smiled flirtatiously at him.

" Sorry." She replied, studying him obtrusively, like she had no intent of hiding the fact that she was checking him out. Hunter raised a brow in response. " Can you please stop tapping your pen?"

Hunter nodded and put his pen down, " Yeah, no problem." he replied, and turned back to the front of the classroom to escape her patronizing gaze.

It wasn't to say he didn't mind being checked out. It was quite flattering and he'd grown used to it. But there was something about the girl he didn't like, and he didn't want to give her the priviledge. Plus, her interruption was preventing him from thinking of well, a more attractive blonde.

" My name is Miriam, by the way." She said to his back.

" Erm, well nice to meet you."

Brrrrrrrrring!

Hunter practically jumped out of the seat as the bell rang, and sprinted for the door. After he'd finished speaking to the girl who sat behind him, he'd been counting the minutes until he could get out of class. He felt her eyes on him the entire time and it was both disturbing and annoying at the same time. Fortunately, he was polite enough not to call her out in front of the entire class. He wasn't that cruel.

Making it out of the classroom door, he tried to remember where Emma had went after they'd parted earlier that morning. Then he remembered she'd traveled up the stairs. Now the only trick would be trying to figure out which way she'd turned. He had no idea what the layout of the school looked like.

He quickly walked up the stairs, pushing through the crowds of talking teenagers and when he arrived at the last step he saw her. The tingling sensation returned to him as he smiled at her.

She was with the other two girls he'd seen earlier, Rikki and…well he didn't know the Brunettes name, because she hadn't yet told him, but he'd figure it out at lunch. Anyway, she was giggling about something, as were the other two, but it didn't look like the conversation was all that important. It was a perfect time to swiftly cut in.

Hunter took a deep breath in, gave himself a quick little pep talk, put one foot in front of the other and..bumped into someone. He looked down at whoever it was to apologize, but it wouldn't leave his throat after he realized who she was.

He sighed heavily. " Hello, Miriam."

" Hey, Hunter." Miriam said, as Hunter ventured to take a step back. She was standing ridiculously close to him and he didn't really like it.

Hunter looked behind her to see if Emma was still standing where he'd seen her before. He didn't want her to get away before-

" So, how are you warming up to the new school, eh?" Miriam asked, trying to initiate conversation with him, though it was obvious he didn't want anything to do with her. But maybe she didn't notice? If that was so, Hunter would have to be more blunt.

" It's only been one period, so I can't really tell ya much." Hunter said as he attempted to move slowly to the side, he was trying to slip past, and get closer to Emma, but Miriam was having none of it. She knew he was moving and moved also.

Looking past her again, he noticed all three girls look towards him. He began to smile, thinking it was him they were taking notice of, but none of them made eye contact. They talked amonst themselves as they looked, and Hunter turned to see what all the comotion was about.

He found their gaze settle on a curly haired boy, a little shorter than Hunter himself, who when took notice of the girls stares, smiled, but mainly at one person. Emma.

And she smiled back. Oh, no. Did she like the kid?

As the boy drifted closer, Hunter once again tried to move. He wanted to get there before he did.

Once again, he was stopped by Miriam.

Miriam giggled at what she perceived as a joke coming from him. " Very true." she smiled, " Anyway, I was having a party, the first Saturday of Spring Break. Did you want to come?"

" Erm, I don't know." Hunter replied, distracted. He tried to move again but was again deflected.

The boy drifted closer, and the girls began to smile again, and Emma cheeks began to gain a little color. Shit, she did like the kid. Hunter had some damn competition. He didn't like that. He didn't like that at all.

" I throw the best parties, ask anyone." Miriam added, sounding a bit desperate. Damn, how was he going to get her out of his way before his window to speak to Emma completely shut?

" Look, I might be busy, I don't know if I can."

" Come on, at least consider it." Miriam said, growing impatient with Hunter. She pushed against him, but Hunter still didn't tear his eyes off the scene in front of him.

Rikki and brunette said a few quiet words to Emma before casually walking away. Hunter knew that they were giving Emma alone time with the boy. Rikki and the brunette, unsuspicously, leaned against a row of lockers not to far away, and pretended to talk as the boy neared.

" Okay, Okay, fine. I'll go." Hunter said, his eyes flashing to Miriam briefly, and gave her a look that said, 'I GOT IT. LEAVE ME ALONE.'

" Right! Well, I'll give you my number tomorrow, and text all the other information." Miriam said excitedly as she trotted off.

Hunter moved quickly, and tried his best to move through the crowd of students preventing him from getting closer to Emma quicker. But he was too late. The boy had reached her before him.

Hunter stopped walking, and let the crowd split around him. He just looked at Emma, as she giggled at something the boy had said. The boy didn't look as particularly starstruck as Emma did, and it was somewhat good news, but he sort of wished the looks were reversed.

They walked off together, and as Emma and the boy passed Rikki and the brunette, they both gave her a thumbs up.

Hunter sighed, shook his head, and walked back to where Emma said his math class should be. He tried to hold his head up high though.

Hunter wasn't one to give up easily, and who was to say anything would happen between those two? If anyone were going to prevent it, it was going to be Hunter.

He was determined.

A/N: This is just a short one. I planned it to be longer, but I thought this was a good place to end. More will be coming later on in the week, as I have school work and other things to do.

If you enjoyed this chapter, please leave a REVIEW.

Thanks!

Taylor(: