"Do you think watching The Fall of the House of Usher is a total coincidence or an omen?" Nudge had to raise her voice to be heard over everyone else in the cafeteria.

The rest of Comm. Arts went by smoothly. Nothing out of the ordinary happened. Iggy kept on making snide commentary throughout the half of the movie that we got through, much to the exasperation of Mrs. Merrill. Eventually, she stopped reminding him to stay quiet, froze the screen, and went on her computer to do whatever. I think I saw Nicholas snicker once at something Iggy said, but I couldn't be sure since the room was so dark.

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"Well, like Nick moves in, and then we start the Edgar Allan Poe unit, and then we're watching a movie about a creepy premature burial…" Nudge drifted off, looking for our table among the sea of students.

"We were bound to go through the unit anyway," I said matter-of-factly.

"Yeah, but Nick's all like the 'Prince of Darkness', and Poe is the creep-master, and you're pretty good with his stuff," Nudge said, wiggling her fingers like they were the tentacles of a nightmarish monster.

"Actually, he's the horror-master," I corrected her.

"See, you even know that," Nudge proved her point.

"Hey! They took our table again!" Angel exclaimed, breaking Nudge's vague, strange conversation with me.

"What!" Nudge almost jumped up.

Angel pointed, and Nudge followed her finger to our now-occupied table. A group of jocks sat there, laughing their snot out and punching each other like fools. A few hornets flew around, too. The jocks' tables wouldn't be complete without those pesky paper creations.

Our other friends arrived in the cafeteria. We walked to meet each other. I could tell they weren't happy about our table-less state of affairs.

"So, where do you want to sit?" Nudge asked them.

If we kept on standing in the middle of the cafeteria for much longer, it would attract way too much attention. In fact, I could already feel the stares coming…

"Well, there's a table back there," one of our friends pointed at an empty, dejected table in the corner.

"Darn it! We have to go last now!" Nudge said when she saw where it was.

We sat down there anyway. There was nowhere else to go. Nudge was practically fuming as she took off her fedora and laid it on top of her green lunchbox like she always did before lunch. My stomach growled, which did not make things any better. I seemed to need a lot of food every day, and fast, too, or I got hungry.

"Why do they always have to go first?" Nudge spat vehemently. "They can deal with waiting just like the rest of us!"

Every day, the principals called a different table to go first to get their food. Today was supposed to be our turn. But then, the jocks that changed tables every day and terrorized the weaker ones of the student body just so they could go first every day took our spot, and now we had to go last.

It wasn't like there was a rule against changing tables. It's just that most people sat at the same table every day, so it becomes rude if you take someone else's table. I guess you could call it a hidden rule.

Nudge was still ranting. "They think they're so special because they can flaunt their mud-stained football jerseys in everyone's faces. They're not special at all! Just because they can play their stupid sports doesn't mean they can make the rest of us starve!"

"Nudge, we'll get it back tomorrow. They'll leave," Angel tried to calm her down.

"Yeah, but then we'll be last again! And they'll be off chasing some other nerds like us out, and they'll be first!" Nudge unzipped her lunchbox with fervor.

"We're not gonna starve. We're still gonna eat," Angel's attempts were futile. It was better to let Nudge blow all her steam off until she was empty.

"Darn football jocks." Nudge scowled. Well, she used a worse word, but I don't want to repeat it here.

Angel got quiet and opened up her book. She began to read. I rubbed my hands together under the table, trying to warm then up, while my stomach screamed at me to get food.

Nudge got out her lunch and she sighed. "Oh, not again. Mom, I've told you a million times that I hate turkey baloney."

I stole a peek at her sandwich. It was one single piece of the hated meat between two pieces of bread. There was nothing else. My, that's a small lunch.

"And now, I will attempt to make myself full on two pieces of bread," Nudge announced like she was a magician's assistant.

The thought reminded me of Iggy, and then Nicholas.

"I get really ticked off if I'm not full, and you give me this?" Nudge held up her sandwich and flapped it around. It flopped down despondently and vomited the piece of meat out. The pink slice of turkey landed on the table with a sticky, slurping sound.

Maybe Nudge was right. Maybe Nicholas and the Poe unit really will bring us our demise. But then, why do I find myself drawn to him and his mysteries?

Oh snap. I've admitted it. This is bad.

Focus, Max. Don't let yourself get sidetracked by a boy, even if he has that adorable crooked smile.

No, no, no. Mental-slap, mental-slap, mental-slap.

Don't think that. Focus, focus, focus.

"Max, are you okay?" Angel startled me out of my inner thoughts.

I jumped. "Huh? Oh, yeah. I'm fine."

"Because you were just slapping your forehead a few seconds ago," Nudge said with concern.

"I was?" Clearly, my mind can't make the distinction between totally mental and the physical world.

"Uh huh," Angel and Nudge said in sync. They nodded their heads slowly, like if they did anything too drastic, then I would pitch myself off the side of a cliff.

"Oh. That… I was just tied up in some of my own thoughts," I said with a smile.

Please, don't ask what I was thinking about. Please, please, please.

"What kind of thoughts?" Angel asked, always the curious one.

Really, is it too much to grant a girl a simple wish like that?

"It's about Nicholas, isn't it?" Nudge grinned, her disgusting lunch all but forgotten amidst my juicy gossip. She still had to emphasize his name.

"What's about me?" Nicholas said from behind us.

Oh god. Why does he have to keep showing up like this? Without warning of any kind? Nicholas: the great disappearing magician.

"Hi, can we sit here? We came in kind of late, and we don't know anyone else," Lissa explained, a huge smile plastered to her face.

"Sure! You're welcome any time!" Nudge exclaimed happily, keeping one eye on me and the other on the threesome. She is really going to keep on playing matchmaker, isn't she?

"Thanks. We appreciate that. I'm Lissa, and this is Iggy and Nick," she introduced herself to us.

Nudge shot me a look that was too conspicuous, so I shot her one back to tell her to quit. She raised her eyebrows and moved her eyes in Nicholas' direction. I locked eyes with her and made my expression as stern as possible.

Angel decided to join in and looked from one to the other. Her eyes smiled when she caught on to what Nudge was trying to say to me, and she nodded faintly. I narrowed my eyes like, "Don't even think about it." Angel and Nudge rolled their eyes and darted their eyes quickly three times to Nicholas.

Our other friends stared at us curiously. Some cocked an eyebrow.

I glanced at Nicholas, making Nudge and Angel follow my gaze. I was trying to tell them to quit being rude and put an end to this entire silent eye war thing that we had going. They snickered and darted their eyes again. Sooner or later, Lissa, Iggy, or Nicholas was going to notice what we were doing.

"What are you guys doing?" Iggy looked from one to the other, temporarily stopping our silent war.

"Nothing," Angel said innocently. "You can sit down."

"Thanks," Lissa said again.

Iggy made a face like, "Weirdoes…"

Nicholas stepped over the seat to get in. He was sitting right next to me.

Angel and Nudge's eyes widened like, "Oh my gosh! He voluntarily sat by you! This is huge!"

I rolled my eyes again, trying to tell them that it was no big deal, but they giggled anyway.

"Is anyone gonna tell me what's going on?" Iggy said.

All he got in response were more giggles.

I looked at Nicholas' books. He still had his little brown book with him. He wasn't clutching it like his life depended on it, though. That was an improvement.

I didn't talk to him. All I wanted to ask about was his book, and he had already made it plenty clear that he wasn't going to be talking about that anytime soon. I also wanted to ask him why he had lied to me, but I knew he would just cover up one lie with another, so I didn't bother.

Nudge and Angel were about to burst, trying to tell me with glances to talk to him, but I ignored their pleas. Angel bumped my leg under the table. I rolled my eyes again.

After a whole morning of sitting in chairs, my backside was starting to hurt for real. The stiff plastic seats of the cafeteria tables didn't ameliorate the situation any, either. Along with a bruised backside, my stomach was growling so violently I thought it was going to go on strike if I didn't feed it sometime soon.

Don't strike me. I thought at it. Strike the football jocks. If they hadn't taken our table, you'd be full by now.

Nicholas, Iggy, and Lissa didn't talk to one another. Iggy was bouncing up and down in his seat. Lissa kept looking at me, which she thought I wasn't seeing, but that I actually did catch on to.

Suddenly, Nicholas spoke to me, again in such a quiet voice that none of my friends would hear. I thought about how weird they would think it was when they saw our lips moving, but no sounds that they could discern.

"You have World History next, right?" I no longer wondered how he knew my schedule, since he had the same one as me, but I did wonder how he got into the same elective classes as me – and the same Math class.

"Yeah. The teacher's pretty nice, if you get onto his good side, if that's what you're asking," I said.

"I could care less about the teacher," Nicholas scoffed. Then, he paused, at a loss for words. "I don't know how I should say this…"

"Say what?" I wondered if he was finally going to break the truth to me about everything that had been happening like he said to Iggy in Comm. Arts.

"I'm going to start from the beginning. What unit are you on?" he asked, suddenly all serious.

"The ancient Greeks and Romans?" I guessed because Mr. Colbert never told us the name of the unit until the day of the test. I just figured that's what we were doing right now, since most of the reading had been revolving around that.

"You know about the Oracle at Delphi, right?" he asked. Nicholas fidgeted a little; he was clearly nervous.

"Not much. We just started on it yesterday," I replied.

Nicholas turned back around to face the wall instead of me. He was closed off again. Great…

"Okay," he said.

"Is that it?" I asked, annoyed. He had my hopes worked up, and now he just bashed it down.

"Yep," Nicholas said.

I blew some air out of my nose. Nudge and Angel saw me. They must have seen me talking to Nicholas, as well. They looked at me strangely. Nudge had her bread halfway to her mouth.

"I want to ask you something," I said, changing the subject.

"Sure," he said, turning back around to face me.

"Do you also have beyond-average hearing or something, because we shouldn't be able to talk and hear each other at a volume this low? Like right now, my friends are thinking that we're total weirdoes because they can't hear a word of what we're saying, but they still see our mouths move," I said more than I should have.

"I should be asking you the same thing," Nicholas said, a ghost of a smile playing at the corners of his lips.

"Are you gonna answer me?" I was so tired of his vague answers and explanations.

"Okay, sure. You and me both have hearing like a bat's," he said in mock surrender.

I shook my head a little. My arms slid out a little bit, and my elbow touched his brown book. Instantly, a surge of power ran up my arm. I felt rejuvenated. The bruise on my backside even felt ten times better. I felt jolted. I even wasn't that hungry anymore. My eyes widened.

As soon as Nicholas saw what happened, he jerked his book away from me. The awesome, golden feeling that had filled me when the book was in contact with my skin disappeared again, but its effects stayed with me.

"I've told you. That's my diary. Do not touch it," Nicholas hissed at me.

"Alright. It was an accident. I'm sorry," I scooted away from him an inch and brought my arms closer, back to my side.

"Don't touch it," Nicholas repeated.

I knew that he was still lying to me about his book, and he had raised new questions as well during our conversation. I wasn't buying the fibs he fed to me to try to satiate my curiosity, and now I knew that his book was something special.

Something wonderfully special.

Me: Chill out, Nicholas.

Max: See, Nudge. I'm not the only one who calls him by his full name.

Nudge: OMG!

Me and Max: What?

Nudge: Ha ha ha! Now we have a love triangle!

Max: *glares at me

Me: No... It's not like that!

Nudge: Ha ha ha! Angel, join me in maniacal laughter!

Angel: Ha ha ha!

Me: Why'd I have to give them overly active romantic imaginations?

Max: So it's all your fault! I'm gonna get you some day!

Nicholas: ;)

Me: You're not helping! :(