Around 11 PM, Olivia and Annaleigh decided to leave the party. It hadn't been particularly exciting; in fact, it had actually been rather lame. There hadn't been enough drama, which Annaleigh claimed was the key component of any high school 'shindig'. (Neither of them said anything about the boy that Annaleigh had chewed out after spilling his drink on Olivia, or about the boy that had wrongly told them that girls couldn't be nerds.)

Annaleigh drove Olivia home and decided to spend the night. As it turned out, Annaleigh always kept a change of clothes in the trunk of the car. They had a fun night, discussing what they'd both already read of their assigned book for English, as well as discussing the Beacon Hills High gossip. None of the gossip was particularly relevant to Olivia, but it was all interesting anyway. There was just something about gossip that helped her unwind. Well, as long as it wasn't about her. But gossip about other people? That was totally fair game. Olivia didn't see herself as much of a gossiper, and she didn't really see anything wrong with indulging in it every now and then. And it sure was nice to have a female friend again. She hadn't had one of those since Naomi.

"So I heard some girls in the bathroom talking about your brother," Annaleigh said as she dug through Olivia's box of nail polish. Olivia, who was in the middle of painting her nails with a plum-colored polish, hummed in acknowledgement. "They were saying that he was really hot. Apparently his butt is 'to die for!'"

Olivia snorted at Annaleigh's impression. "I used to hear that a lot at Devenford. Straight girls love lacrosse boys. It's a fact."

Annaleigh raised an eyebrow. "Are you included in that group? Any lacrosse boy ever caught your eye?"

Flushing, Olivia started to paint her toes so she wouldn't have to look at her friend. "I mean, I guess. I used to have to go to practices with Liam. Lacrosse boys are big fans of running around with their shirts off. At least, they are at Devenford."

"But I'm guessing there's more to your blush than that," Annaleigh prodded.

"So, you're not wrong...but I don't really want to talk about it right now," Olivia said, sighing, "Is that okay?"

Smiling softly, Annaleigh nodded. "Of course. I get it. Boys can be dumb. I'm here when you're ready to open up, okay?"

Olivia looked up at the other girl, smiling softly as well. "Thanks."

The Monday after the party, Olivia found herself standing at her locker, reviewing her homework. She wasn't too sure about her answers for her math assignment. Neither Dunbar was particularly good at the subject, so asking Liam hadn't been an option, especially since she hadn't seen him all weekend. He'd been absent at the party, and as far as she knew, he hadn't come home after. She made the assumption that he decided to spend the weekend at Mason's, a common occurrence. Neither of them had been on the bus that morning, so she guessed that Mrs. Hewitt was giving them a ride.

As she reconsidered her work on problem #7, Olivia felt a tap on her shoulder. She turned to find Lydia Martin standing behind her, a polite but strained smile on the redhead's face. Olivia hadn't spoken a word to the girl before, not even at Friday's party. So this was certainly not something she'd expected.

"Oh, um, hi Lydia," Olivia said hesitantly.

"You're Liam Dunbar's sister. Olivia, right?" Lydia asked, skipping the pleasantries.

"Yeah," Olivia answered, looking down at her shoes, "Look, if this is about those tweets from Friday night, I can explain..."

Lydia held her hand up, and Olivia closed her mouth immediately. "I don't care about any tweets. What I care about is what you can tell me about your brother."

"What do you want to know? Why do you want to know anything about a freshman? I mean, I know he's on the lacrosse team and I know you're like eerily invested in the team because I've heard things and..."

"Freshman - stop talking," Lydia snapped and Olivia did exactly that. She really needed to work on the whole babbling thing. "I want to know if I have to worry about him hurting my friends."

Olivia cocked her head, her face adopting an inquisitive look. "What do you mean?"

"Scott's decided to...take Liam under his wing, so to speak," Lydia explained, crossing her arms, "I need to know if he's going to cause Scott problems."

"He shouldn't, I don't think. My brother's awesome," Olivia replied awkwardly, "As long as you don't get him too angry. He has some...issues with that." She scowled. "But I'm sure you've heard the rumors about all of that."

Lydia smiled wryly. "Oh yes, I've heard. Thank you." As quickly as she arrived, the queen of Beacon Hills High left, leaving a perplexed Olivia in her wake. "And you got that problem wrong! The answer is 9x-5!"

"Was that Lydia Martin?" asked an approaching Annaleigh. Olivia nodded. "What did she want?"

"Apparently my brother's become friends with Scott McCall? She wanted to know if she had to worry, I guess. And it seems that she's good at math, because she solved this problem for me." Olivia showed Annaleigh her math homework, and Annaleigh agreed with Lydia's solution.

"How long was she looking at it?" Annaleigh inquired.

"Maybe 30 seconds?" Olivia replied. Lydia couldn't have been standing behind her for very long.

"Okay. That's weird."

Olivia nodded. "I know, right?"

Annaleigh just shrugged before looping her arm around Olivia's. "Enough of this. Let's get to class. I want see what Ms Lincoln has to say about that poem we had to read. I personally think that it was a little too heavy-handed with metaphor, but I liked the part about..."

A few weeks after the weird conversation with Lydia, Annaleigh asked Olivia to pick up her sketchbook from the art room at lunch. She would have done it herself, but she had managed to get a lunch detention after being late to school for the third day in the row. Olivia was happy to oblige, considering she hadn't really made any more friends at school. She could sit with Liam, but Garrett and Violet had been getting on her nerves more and more as of late. They were always whispering and laughing and looking down their noses at her. There was no way she was getting through that without Annaleigh's help.

Olivia opened the art room door, only to find Lydia and Stiles' girlfriend. Lydia was sitting on a stool in front of an easel, her pencil poised over a large piece of blank white paper. Stiles' girlfriend, who Olivia had eventually learned was named Malia, had her head leaning over Lydia's left shoulder. She would almost say that Malia was draped over Lydia's form.

"Um...I'm sorry. I didn't mean to...interrupt or anything," Olivia said. Malia and Lydia turned to her, eyes wide in surprise. Olivia blushed, not used to attention being on her. "I'll just...go then."

"I better not hear any rumors about this, freshman," Lydia threatened, "Because you have no idea what you're seeing."

"Seeing?" Olivia tried to laugh but it came out awkward and forced. "I didn't see anything! I don't know what you're talking about!"

Lydia hummed thoughtfully, then nodded. "You're dismissed."

Nodding rapidly, Olivia turned quickly on her heels and left the room. Annaleigh's sketchbook would have to wait. She did not need to get on Lydia's bad side. Especially by outing whatever it was that Lydia was up to with her friend's girlfriend. Her plan was to stay as far away from drama as possible. And what she'd stumbled upon in the art room? That was probably going to be drama.

"Okay, I'm telling you, something is seriously wrong with your brother."

Olivia turned around to look at Mason, who was fiddling with the straps of his backpack. He had an intense frown on his face, an expression he didn't sport very often.

"So I don't get any sort of greeting anymore?" Olivia asked, almost annoyed at the interruption. She'd been working up the courage to talk to Alex from French class, the guy she'd been crushing on for the past week and a half. And Mason had just disrupted all of her progress. Even as she thought that, Alex closed his locker and walked away.

"I was going to go talk to him! Look what you did!" Olivia hissed, crossing her arms and giving Mason her full attention.

"Okay, Liv, I'm glad you're actually looking for a boyfriend for once," Mason ignored her huff of disapproval, "but this is serious. Liam's been hella spacey lately. Like, more so than usual. And I'm worried about the scrimmage."

"What are you talking about, Mason? He'll be fine. He probably won't even get any field time. He's a freshman." It was Olivia's personal opinion that Mason was way overreacting to a simple lacrosse game. Sure, she'd been concerned about tryouts, but she really didn't think Coach would start Liam tonight, even though he was probably one of the best players. Coach seemed like the kind of guy who really played up the importance of seniority.

"Did neither of you pay any attention to the announcements?" Mason looked extremely frustrated, like he was about to start pulling his hair out.

"I guess not, based on your tone. Can you please just tell me what you're going on about?" Olivia didn't often get irritated, but this conversation was certainly pushing her towards it.

"We're playing Devenford," Mason declared, and Olivia promptly dropped the books she was holding.

"Shit!" She and Mason scrambled to pick the books up. Thankfully, they were standing in front of her locker, so she was able to quickly stow them away.

"Where is he?" Olivia asked, looking frantic. But her question was answered soon enough, as Liam came storming past the two of them. Olivia slammed her locker shut, and she and Mason started to follow her irate twin.

"Liam, stop!" Olivia hissed, trying to grab his arm discreetly. She didn't really feel like making a scene. Mason, however, did not share her inhibitions.

"Liam, wait. What, no, no, no. Liam," Mason called from behind her. He was too slow to do any good. Olivia latched onto her brother's arm and tried to pull him back into the school. But he shook her off easily.

"Liam!" Olivia and Mason anxiously chorused as the Devenford Prep team bus came into sight. But the lacrosse player was not to be discouraged.

"Brett!" Liam yelled as one Brett Talbot, star of Devenford's team, stepped off the bus. He looked towards the three Beacon Hills freshmen, a scowl on his face.

Liam walked quickly towards his old teammates, Mason and Olivia close behind him. A crowd was gathering around the area, and in the back of her mind, Olivia thought that this was just going to fuel more rumors about the Dunbars' departure from Devenford.

"Ah, here we go," sighed a defeated Mason. Silently, Olivia agreed with him. This was not going to have a pretty ending.

Liam was wearing his rage face as he walked to stand in front of Brett and the rest of the team. It didn't seem to intimidate Brett at all, which made sense, since he had a good nine inches on Liam.

"I just wanted to say..." Liam paused, and Olivia was pretty sure that you could cut the tension with a knife, "Have a good game." He finished his statement by sticking out his hand for a handshake, and Olivia was almost proud of him. Brett and the Devenford team didn't seem to share her feelings, considering the fact that they started laughing. Brett was grinning unpleasantly, and Olivia felt a strong urge to punch him. She fought to suppress that feeling. This wasn't her fight.

"That's cute, Liam. Is that what they told you to say in Anger Management? Apologize, and everything's fine?" Brett replied, and Olivia saw Liam's left hand slowly curling into a fist. She couldn't blame him. Brett was being a complete tool.

"Please don't punch him," she muttered under her breath, knowing there was no way her brother could hear her. But she still put her wish out into the universe. Maybe something out there could stop him.

"You demolished Coach's car," Brett added on, because of course this giant of a boy couldn't be quiet.

"I paid for it," Liam said through gritted teeth.

"This is going very badly," Mason whispered to Olivia, and she nodded, not looking away from the scene before her.

"Yeah, you're going to pay for it. We're gonna break you in half out there. And it's gonna be all your fault." It was like Brett was asking to be hit, Olivia decided. He probably was, just so he could sue Liam for damages and ruin her twin's life even more.

Thankfully, the universe finally decided to operate on Olivia's behalf. Except the universe's chosen agents were Scott and Stiles, who Olivia was less than pleased to see near her brother. He'd healed up nicely in the past two weeks, but she still didn't like the two juniors.

"Woah, woah, woah, let's go," Scott declared as he latched onto Liam. The crooked-jawed lacrosse player started to drag her twin back as Stiles interceded with Brett.

"Hey, what's going on, prep students?" Stiles asked rhetorically, "Welcome to our little public high school. How you doing?" He stuck his hand out for Brett to shake, and the taller boy rolled his eyes. "Stiles. That's a firm handshake you got there," the junior joked, returning his hand to his side. "Uh, we're very excited about the scrimmage tonight. Uh, but let's keep it clean, all right? No rough stuff out there. All right, see you on the field." Apparently finished, Stiles turned back to Liam and Scott, waving his hands above his head as he declared, "Go."

Mason stopped staring at Brett long enough to watch the three lacrosse players leave in a hurry. But Olivia spent the entire time glaring daggers at her brother's former teammate. After a quick exchange with the rest of the Devenford team, Brett finally seemed to realize that she was standing there. His eyes lit up a bit, and he was smirking as he approached her.

"Hey, Olivia. How's it going?" he inquired, body relaxed as he looked her up and down.

"Brett," Olivia replied stiffly, biting her lip and staring over his shoulder. She wouldn't give him the pleasure of meeting his eyes.

"You're not going to talk to me?" She would almost say that Brett was whining if she didn't know better. Brett didn't care about her or anything she did. He just wanted to save face in front of his friends.

"Not if you're going to keep harassing my brother," Olivia said as calmly as possible, flexing her fingers. She could almost hear the small sounds of them popping, and it helped soothe some of the anger she was feeling.

"I can't let him get away with messing up Coach's car," Brett said, as if that was some sort of explanation, as if that gave him some sort of pass.

"You know about his disorder. You know he can't help himself sometimes. And you know he apologized." She felt compelled to hiss the words. Brett thought he was so much better than everyone else. She had no idea what she had ever seen in him.

"Apologized? That's not enough for the team. We have to protect our own." Brett's furrowed brow was the only thing that conveyed how he felt about the Liam situation.

"He used to be 'one of your own'. I was, too," Olivia said softly.

"Liv, come on." Brett's voice became soft, too, and it almost seemed like he cared. Almost.

"Good luck with the scrimmage, Brett." Turning away, Olivia fought every urge in her body that told her to hit Brett. She wasn't Liam. She knew better than to act on her anger.

"You're cute when you're mad, Olivia!" Brett yelled as she walked away. The softness was gone, replaced by his usual cockiness.

"You're a dick when you're trying to invalidate my feelings, Talbot!" The sounds of his laughter followed her as she headed back into the school.

"You know him? More importantly, why don't I know him?" Mason inquired as they made their way to the locker rooms. It seemed like the most logical place for Scott and Stiles and Liam to be.

"Because he's a jerk, obviously," Olivia declared. She fought the urge to stamp her foot.

"Yeah, but he's a beautiful jerk," Mason sighed, and she glared at him.

"That 'beautiful jerk' just threatened your best friend," she reminded him. He nodded absently.

"And he looked good doing it."

"Annaleigh, are you coming to the lacrosse scrimmage?" asked Olivia as soon as her friend answered the phone. Annaleigh laughed at the abruptness.

"I wasn't planning on it. You know I'm not big on sports."

"Please come with me! I have to go make sure my brother doesn't kill anyone, and I would love some backup." Olivia hadn't been planning to go to the game, since she didn't think Liam would be playing. But after she'd seen Brett, she knew she had to go. She couldn't let Liam do this alone.

"Of course, it has nothing to do with the mysterious lax bro you're in love with."

"I'm not in love with him!"

"In love with, in lust with, what does it matter? Yes, I'll go with you. I hear that Kira Yukimura made the team. I'm all about that."

"Have you ever even met her?" As far as Olivia knew, they hadn't.

"No. But who am I to not support a strong woman sticking it to the man?"

"You're kind of weird, you know that, right?" Olivia asked her question while giggling, so she hoped that Annaleigh wasn't too offended by it.

"Of course I do. I'll see you at the game."

"Thank you! See you then!"

"I don't care if he's a foot taller than me," Liam said as he, Mason, Annaleigh and Olivia observed a shirtless Brett. "I think I can take him."

Mason snapped out of his trance long enough to give Liam an insincere response of "Yeah."

Liam looked back and forth between Brett and Mason, who was staring once more, and scowled. "What do you think you're doing?"

"What? Me?" Mason tried to sound innocent, but he wasn't fooling anyone. Well, anyone that was paying attention, as in Annaleigh. Olivia was also staring at Brett, but Liam hadn't noticed that yet. "Agreeing with you. I'm agreeable."

"You think he's hot, don't you?" Liam accused, causing Mason to adopt an affronted expression.

"No! No. Not at all. No way," Mason said, trying to defend himself but failing miserably. Giving up, he admitted, "Maybe. Yeah, maybe a little. But so does Olivia!"

That was enough to wake Olivia out of her trance, as her friends and brother focused on her. Annaleigh was smiling wickedly, Mason was smirking at his deflection, and Liam was practically growling. All together, the effect was very disconcerting.

"Hey! You already know that I think he's hot!" Olivia stated.

"Yeah, so? I also know you know he's an asshole!" Liam replied venomously. She just shrugged in response. There was nothing wrong with looking at an attractive boy. It wasn't like she was going to ask him out or anything.

"He wants to destroy me," Liam reminded his sister and his best friend, as if that would diminish Brett's good looks.

"I think you could take him," Mason said. Liam smiled and nodded. "And then you can give him to me."

Liam laughed and Olivia pouted. Of course her brother would be ultimately fine with his best friend dating his mortal enemy, but not her. No, Olivia had to follow a different set of rules. Not that she wanted to date Brett, now that she knew how terrible he was. But it would have been nice to have had his acceptance before it got Liam kicked out of school.

"No, no, just go out there and kick their smug prep school asses, man," Mason tacked on as his version of a pep talk. Liam agreed and the boys fist-bumped before Liam ran to join his team.

"So Liam doesn't want you to think Brett's hot?" Annaleigh inquired as the three remaining freshmen headed to the bleachers. They'd staked out their spot 45 minutes ago, some of the first people to arrive at the field.

"Yeah. I mean, Brett and I have a history, so it makes sense. But he doesn't need to be so protective all the time," Olivia muttered as she sat down on the blanket they had laid out. Annaleigh sat on her right side, Mason on her left, and both of them were extremely dialed into the conversation.

"You two have a history? No, really?" Mason drawled sarcastically. Annaleigh reached across Olivia to smack his leg, and he yelped. "Hey!"

"I may or may not have been the catalyst for Liam getting kicked out of Devenford," Olivia admitted sheepishly. Obviously this was news for her new friend, but apparently it was news to Mason as well.

"What did you do?"

"I met Brett at the first party of the school year, when he scared a bunch of creeps away from me. We talked and flirted and exchanged numbers. We texted for a while, and then he invited me to a lacrosse party. Liam wasn't going because he had to study for a test and our parents had grounded him.

"So we went to the party and we made out. But then he completely ignored me for the rest of the event. He even went so far as to flirt with the cheer captain right in front of me. I was so pissed, I ended up catching a ride home with someone else. Then, I guess he was talking about me in the locker room before practice the following Monday. Liam was pissed, especially since he didn't even know that Brett and I had gone to the party together. You know how irrational he gets, particularly when it comes to me.

"The two of them kept getting into fights, on and off the lacrosse field. Eventually, Liam got benched for the rest of the season because he was consistently the instigator, and because Brett has the Devenford staff wrapped around his finger. Liam was obviously furious, so he completely messed up the coach's car. And that's when he got kicked out. My parents said that I could stay at Devenford, because Liam didn't tell them why he was fighting with Brett. But I couldn't do that, since the whole thing was my fault. So now we're here."

Annaleigh and Mason listened intently to Olivia's story. When it was finished, they wrapped their arms around their friend, who was currently trying her best to not cry. She didn't like to think about how she was ultimately responsible for possibly ruining her chances at a good future. It was easier most of the time to blame Liam for it all. She knew that made her a terrible person, but she couldn't help it.

"So not only did Brett contribute to Liam getting kicked out, but he was also a dick to you?" Annaleigh asked, and Olivia nodded. "Do you want me to kick his ass? I don't care that's he's like a foot taller than me. I'll fight him."

Olivia laughed at that. "No, it's okay. I'm just hoping that our team wipes the floor with him tonight. That would definitely make Liam and I feel a lot better."

Violet waved at them at the bottom of the bleachers, and Olivia clammed up. She didn't want the other girl to know about her past. She didn't like her, and wouldn't put it past her to spread rumors about Olivia fraternizing with the enemy. (Okay, maybe she was being a little dramatic, but that would help her when she was on Broadway someday.)

Every time someone from Devenford (oftentimes Brett) touched Liam, Olivia felt uncharacteristically angry. Her brother might get seriously hurt tonight, all because of something she'd inadvertently started. In fact, a lot of Beacon Hills High players were getting mowed down by Devenford players. Scott and Stiles even had to keep Liam from getting into a fight on the field, which did not bode well.

Annaleigh cheered exceptionally loud when Kira made her first shot of the night, and booed the loudest when Coach benched her for not passing. "That's ridiculous! He's just mad because a girl did better than his boys!" she shouted, looking for all the world like she was going to go and fight Coach.

"Annaleigh, chill," Olivia said, laughing at her friend's antics, "He's the one that put her on the team. He obviously wants her to do well."

"He's probably regretting it. Typical patriarchal bullshit," Annaleigh muttered, and Olivia patted her on the shoulder.

Things came to a head when Liam collided with Brett, rolling over the other boy's back before falling to the ground. Everyone in the stands gasped, and the two boys started moaning loudly in pain. Both teams flooded the field, coaches yelling for people to stay away from the possibly injured players. Liam got up fairly quickly, but Brett wasn't so lucky. The Devenford star had to be carried off the field by a referee and an EMT.

"Do you think he's going to be okay?" Olivia asked, eyes wide in fear. She cared a little bit about Brett's well-being, but mostly she was concerned about how injuring him would affect Liam.

"Why do you care?" Violet said, her tone almost venomous. She stood up, and the other three students looked at her with confusion. "I have to go to the bathroom," she said, "I'll be right back." Mason nodded as she left, but Olivia was too focused on what was happening with her brother, and Annaleigh was busy texting someone.

"Do you think they're going to let Liam keep playing?" Olivia asked.

"Are they even going to finish the game?" Mason replied with his own question. They sat on the bleachers for another few minutes before a police deputy came out on to the field and announced that the game was canceled. Grumbling, the crowd began to pack up their stuff and head out to the parking lot.

"What do you think happened?" Mason asked, and Annaleigh spoke up for the first time in a while.

"According to Twitter, someone tried to murder Scott McCall in the locker rooms," she said, rather nonchalant about the whole thing.

"What?" Mason and Olivia chorused in shock, giving Annaleigh their full attention.

"Yeah, some girl was inside going to the bathroom when she heard the police bringing someone out of the locker room in handcuffs. Apparently the person tried to strangle him."

"Is he okay?"

"McCall's fine," Annaleigh answered eventually, after scrolling through her Twitter feed, "Not even a scratch on him, supposedly."

"What in the world?" Olivia said, surprised, "How do you almost get strangled and come out perfectly fine?"

"Man, I don't know. But can I take you home now?" Annaleigh asked, pocketing her phone, "I'm technically not even supposed to be here."

"Annaleigh, are you grounded again?" Olivia groaned. The girl in question nodded sheepishly. She often got grounded for all the trouble she got herself in. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"Like I was gonna miss a chance to hang out with you and scope out cute people?" Annaleigh raised her eyebrow, smirking. Sighing, Olivia pulled out her phone to check if Liam had texted her about needing a ride. Before the game, he'd said he would get a ride with someone from the team, but she wasn't sure if that had changed. But there was nothing from Liam, so she put her phone back in her purse.

"Yeah, we can go. Are you coming with us, Mase?"

"Nah. My mom's coming to get me. I'll see you on the bus tomorrow, Liv," he said, waving them off.

"Bye!" the two girls called as they walked to Annaleigh's car. The car ride was mostly quiet as they drove through the darkened streets of town. Annaleigh tapped her fingers against the steering wheel to the beat of whatever was on the radio. Meanwhile, Olivia was trolling Facebook and Twitter for any updates on the situation at the school.

They were almost to the Dunbar residence when Olivia let out a loud shriek, causing Annaleigh to slam on the breaks. "What the hell? Are you okay?"

"No! Violet was the girl that tried to kill Scott!"

"Wait, what are you talking about?" Annaleigh asked, maneuvering her car to the side of the road so she wouldn't block any traffic. When they were safely situated, Olivia showed her phone to her friend. The Beacon Hills Herald had already managed to get a small article out about the incident. Said article said that the police had already captured Violet, who was apparently one half of an assassin duo called 'The Orphans'. Garrett was supposed to be her partner, and he was still at large.

"So, what you're saying is that we've been hanging out with murderers for the past month?" Annaleigh asked with wide eyes. She generally tried to act like she didn't care about much, but her facade was nowhere to be seen right now. She looked fairly frantic, which was not helping Olivia's mood at all. She couldn't believe that she and her friends had been used to cover for murderous activities. What were her parents going to say? How was she going to explain this to them? Thankfully, she'd tried to stay away from the couple as much as possible. But Liam? Liam was going to be so screwed.

A/N: Okay, so I was gonna update tomorrow, but my one of my fave fics ("Just Say Yes" by MissUnderstoodXOXO) updated today, so I figured why not? Please leave a review, as it would mean so much to me!