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Disclaimer: Don't own Danny Phantom or the stuff (yeah... stuff) mentioned in this chapter.

Chapter Four
Exploring The School

Against all reason, we ended up right in front of Mr. Lancer's office. And by office I mean the main classroom in the English wing. Since the man taught so many subjects it was creepy, he got the biggest class in the wing.

I'd changed out of my shorts - with newly not-so-awkward-with-the-word-boobs-anymore-Danny out of the locker room - into ones much more sensible and comfortable. There were no large sizes in the basket, unfortunately, so the most suitable ones reached about my mid-thighs, and were hugging my butt too tightly for my liking. It was either those or the Paulina shorts, so I went with what I had.

Light leaked in from all the windows, casting a bright yet forlorn look to the atmosphere. The school was dead silent - which was just plain weird, since I hadn't seen it this silent since ever. The only sound was our shoes scraping against the linoleum as we pushed open the door to Lancer's office and entered.

Danny whistled out as he closed the door behind him. "The room looks so much bigger with Lancer not in it."

I turned to give him a look. "That wasn't very nice."

He shrugged, giving me a look that said 'well, I'm not very nice'. We made our way into the room, and the first place we targeted was the desk. "Now, young grasshopper," he said, deepening his voice and speaking with a slight hoarseness, "let the master teach you the proper ways to trash someone's office without getting busted."

I had to raise an eyebrow at that. "We're going to be in the school alone for days, and there are no other suspects than us, and you think playing it safe is necessary?"

He shrugged. "That way it's fun."

"Oh come on," I pushed him aside playfully with my shoulder and opened the drawer. I started rummaging through it, hoping I would find anything interesting we can use to leave our mark yet not be detected, like Danny wanted.

"All that's in here," I said as I rifled through the papers, "are random notes and papers and"- upon examining some random cutouts from copybooks- "confiscated notes."

"Give me!" He snatched the notes I was holding out of my hands, a jittery look on his face. Really, he looked like a child who just received a cookie.

"This is ours," he said with raised eyebrows. "Look, that's my handwriting."

I took the notes from him and looked at them; he was right, it was our notes. Thankfully we took to not discussing ghost stuff using notes that can be easily looked at later by a teacher or a janitor or a stray student, so the only things on the paper were random phrases like 'I'M BORED' - I remember Danny wrote that - and 'Can we throw spitballs at Lancer's head and see who he blames first?' - I remember that one clearly because, not only had we gotten caught, but Mr. Lancer saw the note and gave us all detention (even me, who'd clearly wrote underneath it how bad an idea it was) - and 'Wipe the drool off your face, Daniel, it's almost as bad as losing your pants' - without guessing, that one was me.

Once I was done reading some of them, I started folding them up and stuffing them into the hem of the shorts since it had no pockets.

"What are you doing?" Danny asked questioningly, looking up from the desk drawers to what I was doing.

"Collecting memories," I explained briefly.

We rummaged through anything we can find - the small closet in the corner, the other drawers in his desk, literally everywhere, but the class was just like Lancer - boring and full of old English quotes.

"Okay, I have an idea," Danny popped up as I was looking through the massive book collection he'd thrown in the small closet. "We spray paint the words, 'Lancer is a loser' on the walls."

"With what spray paint?" I asked sarcastically, dusting my hands together and closing the closet, having found nothing there. He seemed to remember, and his expression turned dejected. "This man is good," he finally said as he started searching through the desk one more time. "He doesn't keep any personal things in here other than his stupid books and some pictures of himself and his sister. I mean, come on, what teacher-" he cut himself off mid-sentence to frown. When I asked him what was wrong, he replied with a confused look on his face, "There's like another compartment here."

I went over to him and found out what he was talking about. There, underneath all the wads of paper, was a black wooden square that would be mistaken for the end of the desk had it not been for its uneven edges - it was so obvious, yet at the same time, it wasn't. Damn that Mr. Lancer, he really was good.

Danny wriggled the square thing free until he removed it and the papers on top of it onto the desk table.

"No," he said as we both gaped, "freaking," he made to grab the contents, "way."
It wasn't Playboy, but it was close.

Mr. Lancer was reading the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy.

"This can't be real," Danny said as he stared at the three paperbacks. "Don't pinch me."

"Come on, they're not so… bad," I tried to shrug it off, but aside from all the porn in it, it was just a cheesy cheese novel. With lots of sex. That obviously guys would not be interested in - the lovey dovey stuff, and even if they do buy it for the porn, it wasn't as out there as others that weren't so popular and so were all about what they wanted. Still. Guys having these books was one thing. Mr. Lancer, though…

"Not so bad?" Danny had the widest grin on his face that you'd think he'd just discovered the cure to cancer in the compartment, not some books. "Sam, I heard these were major chick flick pornos."

"Lancer is a single man," I tried defending our poor English teacher, "maybe he just has… needs."

Oh my God. Did I really just say that?

"You did not just say that."

So at that point, it was either me going down, or Lancer going down. And since he gave me a B once on what I thought was a perfectly fine term paper, it was definitely him who was going down.

"Yeah, I didn't," I told him as we turned back to the books. "The only thing that bothers me is that he hides them in the school. I mean, what if someone walks in on him…" I blushed. Danny and I were really close. But not that close. "You know."

He just shook his head, the grin still on his face, seemingly unaffected with what I was saying. "Who cares? What matters is what we can do with this…" he tapped his chin mockingly, a thoughtful expression on his face. "Do you think I can blackmail him with this and make him give me straight A's for the rest of the semester?"
I only looked up from the books to give him a look. "No, you cannot."

"But-"

I just raised both my eyebrows at him, challenging him to argue further. He snapped his mouth shut and said, dejectedly, "Okay fine. But I still think we can use this."
A thought occurred to me, and as a wide grin of my own spread across my face, I turned to Danny. He had the same look. To any outsider we would look like two evil villains planning our next crime.

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" he asked just to be sure.

"Oh," I smirked coyly, "this is gonna be good."

"Sam, I'm hungry."

How many times have I heard Danny ask that since this morning? Seven times. Seven independent, random times. I didn't know how he could've gotten so hungry so fast. I mean, for me, I could literally go days without eating, the only source of energy coming from an apple and some juice, due to my outrageous schedule - really, one time, my parents had accidentally booked me piano lessons, conversational French, violin, etiquette, a fashion course, and cooking lessons a few minutes from each other every day right after school. I lost more than ten pounds that week.

Danny and Tucker helped restore me again though, since they conjured up all the fattening foods that didn't contain meat that they could think of. Pizza. Ice cream. Sodas. Soy burgers. French fries. Anything that contained chocolate. Gained them right on the spot.

Anyway, back to the present. We'd gotten ourselves some food from the cafeteria - and I don't know how, but somehow he managed to convince me to let him make those eggs (but I'm pretty sure that infamous pout of him was involved).

I was about to sit down on a random table with my tray - this time I'd opted for some cheese sandwiches and an apple - when Danny said, "Can we eat someplace else?"

"This isn't a mall cafeteria, Danny, we don't exactly have a lot of options to choose from," I told him, yet I hadn't sat down either.

"I actually have an idea," he said, and suddenly, he started looking a little shy. "I want to show you something."

Confused, I followed him out of the cafeteria and down the hall. He was walking a few steps ahead of me, and from his speedy stride, I could tell he was excited. Was there a dark room full of Goth things in the school that I didn't know about?

"Where-"

"You'll see."

I scowled, hating the confusion and the expectancy I felt. Contrary to what my parents might believe, I hated surprises, ever since that 'amazing birthday party' my parents threw me when I was four or something. Three words: pink, frilly, dress.

Like a good girl, I stayed silent and followed him through the halls. He then stopped when we reached what looked like the gym's blue doors, but we were in the wrong hallway.

"A shortcut to the gym?" I asked.

He smiled mischievously. "Even better."

Balancing his tray using one hand, he pushed open the blue doors and we walked inside.

It wasn't a gym at all. It was a pool.

It was a basic rectangular pool, covering about 25 yards of the room. There were bleachers on the left side, just like the gym, except the floors were white tile, and there was a gigantic, conspicuous pool smack in the middle.

I blurted, "Our school has a pool?"

"Yep," Danny grinned. "Cool, right? Apparently, it's one of the school's best kept secrets - at least, according to Principal Ishiyama."

"What's the point of having a pool if it isn't being used?" I asked as we started taking a few more steps into the room until we were a few feet away from the edge of the pool.

He shrugged. "Don't know - all I know is that it's been here for a while and is fully functional, chlorinated and cleaned and all that."

Huh. Just when I thought our school couldn't get weirder.

"Maybe this is some kind of new development they're going to unveil by the end of this year or the start of next year or something," Danny mused. "But who cares. It's here now for our entertainment."

We sat down on the floor. Danny suggested we make this pool like our picnic spot, since we couldn't go outside. I agreed, but reminded him that we needed blankets next time.

We ate our lunch, making small conversation here and there. He told me that his parents had called him before he'd gone to sleep last night - I was already asleep by that time and was so out of it I hadn't even heard the phone ring - which made me feel a pang of hurt that none of my parents had even bothered to call to check up on me. I brushed that thought straight away though when I remembered what I was late for in the first place.

"Did you try and ask your parents to get the school to turn off the Ghost Shield?" I asked, since we were on the topic and since the question had been bothering me.
He gave me a look. "Tried? I practically started begging. I spun all the ridiculous theories I could come up with - one of them included The Lunch Lady in a tutu."

I laughed at the image. "Or how about Technus invading the computer lab to research porn?"

"Or Ember breaking into the school just so it would be known that she broke into the school."

We went on like that for a while, spinning theories on why specific ghosts would break into the school in a storm like this.

"Oh my God, how about Johnny?" I said, a mental image forming in my head. "He could bring all the human girls he cheats with on Kitty here because, really, why in the world would she look for him in a school? She'd never know anything."

"Poor Shadow," Danny shook his head, and then we started laughing.

After coming up with some more stories, I brought out the notes in the hem of my shorts and we started reading them and reminiscing about the good ol' times. We started commenting about everything and remembering the moment we'd passed it and how we'd gotten caught and Lancer's face when he'd read Tucker's spitball thing. We kept laughing like there was no tomorrow.

I didn't know what I was worried of. I mean, yeah, sure, I was missing a lot of things that I was going to be in a lot of trouble for when we get back home, but this was fun. I mean, we didn't have the nagging prodding of ghosts and school and homework and parents or any of those annoying worries in our minds, because, really, we had no choice but to be free for a while. So hanging out with Danny, just the two of us, in a stress-free environment: it was nice.

We quieted down, finished with our laughing. Our food had been finished a while ago, so we just sat there in comfortable silence for a while (I know, I didn't add un at the beginning of comfortable. That's how good it was). After a few moments, Danny got up, and held his hand out to me. I thought nothing at the gesture, and grabbed onto his hand as he helped pull me up and-

-and throw me right into the pool.

I only had about one second to gasp before I hit the freezing water. I hit the surface, and from the shock, swam in a frenzy to get back out of the water and to breathe air. Once I broke the surface, I angrily shoved away the hair that had gotten onto my face to glare at the halfa, who was laughing. "Danny Fenton!"

He didn't retort, he just simply took off his shirt - don't stare don't stare don't stare - and jumped into the water, cannonball form.

Even though I was already wet, I instinctively turned away and held my hands in front of me protectively when he hit the water. Once he submerged, I turned back to him, forcing everything I had in the glare I was shooting him. "I hate you."

"I'm too busy being highly amused to care," he grinned, splashing his head around to get his hair off his eyes. Unlike any normal person, I thought wryly.

"Danny, this is just too much water in one day," I shook my head at him, but was secretly enjoying the way the water felt around me and the sensation of floating around and swimming and being wet. I hadn't gone swimming in so long I was surprised I still remembered how to.

"What?" he flashed me a challenging look. "Scared of the scary water, Sammy?"

However he'd wanted me to react, it worked, because I narrowed my eyes at him, and said, "Oh, you're going to get it now, Fenton."

So that is how, Danny and I started splashing each other mercilessly - even if, again, we were already wet - laughing and swimming around. It was so much fun that it made talking seem like a waste of time.

Kinda think of it, I'd never gone swimming with Danny before - except there were those few times where we'd gone to the pool as kids during the summer - and in that moment, I mentally scolded myself for not doing so.

There came an opening, where I'd just splashed him and he was still turned away, to which I'd swam towards him before he could turn back around and caught him by the neck.

I flung his head down the water, and pulled it up again after a few seconds. "Give up?" I asked.

He gave me a coy smile. "Never."

His arms circled my waist and he pulled me down. He'd apparently already forgotten that I'd already had my grip on him, so I used it to pull him down with me.
At first, we were just fighting in each other's arms, trying to escape each other's grips, but then we stilled.

I could hear nothing but that slight hollow sound you hear in your ears when you were under water. My vision was only slightly blurry, but I saw Danny perfectly in front of me. Only a few inches away, his lips slightly parted as a few small bubbles escaped. His hands remained on my waist, and despite the coldness of the water and my t-shirt, my skin burned where his hands rested. His eyes, on the other hand, froze me over - the blue in his eyes was brought out by the contrast of the blue water surrounding us so that his eyes sparkled.

I've never felt such a strong desire to kiss him before, but in that moment, it washed over me, drenching me as if it was the water around me. I wanted his lips on mine, scorching and warm against the cold. I wanted his touch to spread further than just my waist. I wanted him.

Unfortunately, my lungs had other plans.

Due to the stupid thing called oxygen, we broke the surface of the water, inhaling deeply since we'd been under for quite some time. The spell broken, his hands left my waist, and mine left his neck, and an awkward tension settled over us.

Stupid oxygen.

"Well," he cleared his throat, trying to clear some of the awkwardness in the air. "I don't know about you, but a shower sounds really good right now."

"Agreed," I nodded, and we both started swimming towards the edge. The tension was still there, but now that we weren't touching, it was a little better. The tension, I mean - definitely not the overwhelming desire to kiss him. That was still there.

We got out of the pool easily, careful not to slip on the floor. If I thought we'd been drenched before, I was wrong. Right now, we were drenched and cold.
I turned to glare at him again. "I still hate you."

He just grinned. "I knew you'd like it."

He had no idea just how much I did.

A/N: Ah. Fluffy fluff. My favorite kind of fluff xD. Anyway, what did you think of this one?

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