A/N: He, everybody! So, SO sorry for taking so incredibly long to update. I'm a jerk, okay? (Actually, I've had school crap- by the way, I agree with Hamilton in that math is evil- but no excuses. I'm a big, fat jerk.) But here, I've finally finished the next chapter, so here you go. Hopefully, it's good enough to make up for my awful procrastination.

By the way, in case you haven't figured it out by now, I do not own the 39 Clues, Hamilton, Sinead, or anything else related to that. Although I wish I owned Dan. He'd be like another little brother! (But I'd probably scare him, poor Dan.)

Anyway, ENJOY! :)

Hamilton's sisters had to be the two nosiest people in the entire universe.

And that was barely an exaggeration. (All right, so that Mary-Anne girl from school was worse, but besides her… they were definitely the nosiest. At least, they were today.)

The second Hamilton walked through the front door, he was ambushed by Madison and Reagan, who were pushing and showing and elbowing each other in the effort to get to him first. In the end, they reached him at the same time.

"Hey, Ham!" they chorused. Their heads whipped around to face each other. "Jinx! You owe me a soda!… No, you owe me a soda!… No, you!… You!… No, you!"

Suddenly, they remembered: they had been about to question their brother.

"So," said Reagan, "Why have you been getting home so late the last two days?"

"Got a secret girlfriend or something?" added Madison with a mischievous grin.

Hamilton shook his head. "No! No way!"

The twins looked at each other, then back at their brother. "Then what's going on?… Jinx!"

"Nothing," he muttered.

"You sure?" asked Madison.

"Yeah."

"Positive?" Reagan put in.

"Yeah."

"Sure you're posi…?" they began.

Hamilton glared at them. "I told you, nothing's going on! Now, I've gotta go do my homework!"

And he stormed away up the stairs to his bedroom, leaving Reagan and Madison to look at each other curiously.

Hamilton slammed and locked the door to his room, then took his math book out of his backpack and opened it up.

"Okay," he told himself. "I've got to get this. I've got to stay on the team. And I've got to prove to Sinead that I'm not an idiot." He cracked his knuckles and peered down at the book. "I'm gonna get this."

"Ugh, remind me never to become a teacher. I think I'd totally lose it."

Sinead pored over the enormous math book and heaved a long, deep sigh. The numbers and letters swam before her tired eyes- it seemed she had been staring at them for ages now.

"Hamilton Holt had better be grateful," she scowled. "I'm doing him a huge favor, spending my valuable time trying to help him!"

It was at that moment that her brothers, Ned and Ted, entered her room. (Although geniuses, if there was one concept that they never seemed to grasp, it was the concept of knocking.)

"What's this about Hamilton Holt?" asked Ned.

Sinead looked up from the book. "Oh, nothing. It's just my stupid new math teacher, Mr. Katswell. He's making me tutor that dumb bundle of muscle so he can pass math and stay on the football team."

"Oh," Ned said with a nod.

"You sound pretty stressed," added Ted. "Are you all right?"

Sinead scoffed. "Oh, of course I'm fine!" she snapped. "I absolutely love teaching that wonderful Hamilton! He's such a quick learner, what every teacher dreams of! And the fact that everyone at school's going to be under the impression that we're dating just makes it all so much better!"

Her brothers paused, unsure of what to say. "Sorry" probably wouldn't cut it, and encouragement might just make her angrier. So in the end, they just stayed silent.

"Don't you two have anything to say?" she glowered. "Never mind. Just get out of my room so I can think up tomorrow's lesson plan!"

Ted and Ned almost tripped over each other in their hurry to get out of the room. They loved their sister and all, but when she was in one of her moods… It was better to just stay out of her way.

Sinead sighed again and slumped down in front of the math book.

Now, let's see, maybe if I explain it to him this way…

She groaned. "Oh, who am I kidding? He's still not going to get it. It's been two whole days, and he still hasn't improved at all! He's never going to get it! Why did I agree to this?"

Sinead sat down in her seat in Mr. Katswell's fifth period math class, dropped her books down on the desk, flipped her auburn hair, and scowled up at the board.

I can't believe I'm thinking this, but I am really starting to hate math.

It was then that Hamilton entered the classroom, taking his seat near to hers. Sinead observed that he looked tired, with faint circles under his eyes as if he had stayed up late the previous night. His hair was a mess, as if he hadn't taken the time to fix it at all that morning, and his eyes were dull as he looked at her questioningly and asked…

"Why are you staring at me?"

The color rose to Sinead's cheeks. Was I really staring at him? Great, now he's going to get the wrong idea.

"I wasn't staring at you," she said scornfully. "I was just thinking…. About math."

"Math," Hamilton repeated. He spoke the word as if it were the name of some dreaded, incurable disease.

Tiffani Perkins, the fake blonde sitting next to Sinead, turned towards them. "OMG, I heard from Mary-Anne that you two are going out!"

"What?" Hamilton gawked.

Sinead groaned. Oh, no, not this again…

"Yeah," Tiffani continued. "She said you two've been, like, hanging out after school the last couple days. Anyway, I just wanted to tell you you're totally cute together!"

She turned back around, oblivious to the reddening of the non-couple's faces. Hamilton and Sinead were silent for nearly a minute. At last, the latter spoke.

"See? I told you they were talking about us."

Hamilton nodded. "How should we prove them wrong?"

"Mary-Anne believes what she wants to believe. Trust me, I've learned that already," Sinead said. "I guess we might as well just keep doing what we're doing."

"All right, class," Mr. Katswell droned from the front of the room. "Let's pick up on page 269.…"

Sinead looked back at her book and flipped to the correct page.

Yep. I really am starting to hate math.

Sinead sat down across from Hamilton at her dining room table and cracked open the math book.

"So, I guess you understood today's lesson pretty well."

Hamilton cocked his head. "Huh?"

"Well, you didn't ask any questions," she said, "So I figured you understood it."

"So now, I'm supposed to ask questions?" he said. "Nuh-uh. No. That'll only make Mr. Katswell pay even more attention to me. He'll call me out in front of everybody and make we work problems on the board until I've got it- and trust me, I won't get it."

Sinead raised her eyebrows. "Well, you're definitely not going to get it if you've already convinced yourself that you can't because you're an idiot."

"Hey," he said, "I never said I was an idiot."

"Oh. Whoops, that was me."

"Well, you're really encouraging."

"I know."

Hamilton frowned at her. "Come on, let's just get to studying already. I want to get it over with."

"Fine. Then we'll just 'get it over with.'" Sinead said, "But don't expect to learn anything with that attitude."

"You're saying I have an attitude? Have you looked in a mirror lately?"

"Yes, I have! But I can tell you haven't- your hair's a mess!"

Hamilton ran a hand through his blonde hair, attempting to smooth it down. "Well, excuse me, princess! We can't all be as perfect as you think you are!"

"Excuse me?"

"Why don't you get the log out of your own eye before you start trying to get the speck out of somebody else's? Before you point out stupid stuff about me, you should work on not being such a stuck-up jerk!"

Sinead stared at him for a moment, inwardly seething. Finally, she spoke. "Get out of my house, Holt. Now."

"Fine," said Hamilton, and he did.

Sinead sighed, shaking her head. He is such a creep! How dare he…? Oh, why did I say that? I should have just ignored it and gone on, but no, I had to blow up on him. Now, I do feel like a jerk….

The two arrived in Mr. Katswell's classroom at about the same time the next morning. Hardly looking at each other, they sat down in their seats and took out their books.

"Hamilton," she greeted spitefully.

"Sinead," he said in the same tone.

No more words were lost between the two, and class began. Mr. Katswell started on a new lesson about inequalities and was soon working example problems on the whiteboard.

Hamilton stared up at the second problem in confusion. Slowly, he raised his hand.

The teacher looked at his, a bit surprised. "Yes, Mr. Holt?"

"Um," he began hesitantly, "Why did the 'greater than' sign flip?"

Mr. Katswell gestured at the problem he had worked. "Well, you see, we had to divide both sides by negative three, and when you divide by a negative number, the inequality sign flips…."

As he continued on with his explanation, Sinead caught Hamilton's attention. She was looking over at him, a slight smile playing across her face.

He actually listened to my advice about asking questions, she thought. Hmmm, maybe we could make this work….

And Hamilton smiled back.

A/N: Okay, hopefully you all liked this, but if there's something you think is wrong with it, feel free to tell me. I accept CONSTRUCTIVE criticism. (Of course, if you honestly think it's great, feel free to tell me that, too... Oh, and you can also tell me if you know where I can buy some red snapper to send to Saladin! Mrrrp! XD)

Th-th-th-th-that's all for now, folks!

~Lily