A/N: Thank you for reading and reviewing! Hope you all had a splendid New Year's celebration :)

desiree rossouw1 – CH8: Yes, it is based on the movie, I'm trying to add a bit of my own flair to it, hoping I will succeed! Thanks for reading and reviewing!

Guest – CH8: Thank you for reading and reviewing!

TheLastShip – CH1/9: Thank you! I really appreciate the reviews and I'm glad it's keeping you excited. As much as I want to get to the end of the story to satisfy everyone (and myself), I also want to prolong it for as long as I can – after all, we didn't know the thoughts going through the characters' heads during the movie, which I'm trying to plot into my version a little, just to keep it more interesting.

Guest – CH9: Thank you, I hope that the new chapters will be as good and keep you coming back for more!

Guest – CH1: I had a lot of mixed feelings regarding your review, and after sleeping on it (a whole couple of nights), I think it is now safe to say that I do not fully agree with your review/opinion. My guess is that you also followed up with the CH9 review straight after, claiming Ashley as a pushover and that I'm not a good writer. I'm not too sure why you would claim that I'm not a good writer as good writing constitutes of more than just the storyline – good writing also concerns spelling and grammar and for English being my second language, I honestly (despite a whole lot of errors even I picked up) don't think your statement is fair. The storyline is based off a movie, so there is already a set outline for the characters. Though the idea is to rewrite the set outline into something different, I still needed to keep some familiarity to give the readers the feeling that they're reading what they've seen on the movie. Or something like that. Again, based on what I'm doing, I don't think your statement is fair. The chapters you've read so far is the mere beginning where there are still character building – and it will be like that throughout the story. Maybe the next chapters (having kept in mind your concern about Ashley being a pushover) will explain some things about the character's willingness to being easily manipulated. Oh, and the favoritism part… I cannot argue with you there, Spencer is my favorite character for this particular story, and the genre. She was also deliberately the main character in my other fic. But if you do decide to continue reading my fics (maybe to see if my writing improves), maybe there will be another story in the near future where my hero will be the much loved Ashley Davies. I always have one stronger character – it's my writing style.

Guest – CH1: Unfortunately due to technical difficulties I cannot see your review on either the mobile app or website; though on the e-mail notification I received, the review was : !

Though I have many (maybe witty, maybe sarcastic) comebacks for that, I'm assuming for all purposes that it was just a finger error. But thanks for reading anyway :)

Spencer

How To : Take care of a migraine

Oh no, no, no, no, no!

I hadn't counted on the rather tall, muscled girl to follow us out of the cinema. In fact, she was already outside by the time we got through the double doors.

Ashley immediately stepped between myself and the larger girl, her over protectiveness making my knees go weak. I loved this side of Ashley.

"Listen, I apologize for interrupting the movie back there, but we're leaving, so you can go back and enjoy it," I heard Ashley tell the girl.

"What's the point? Your girl with her big mouth already ruined it for me!" the girl exclaimed.

Despite taking a step back, Ashley was furious. "Don't you dare talk about her – "

My heart was pounding – it didn't look like either of them were going to bury this soon. I felt guilty for being the cause of all the drama.

"Ash, just let it go," I whispered when I saw the girl clenching her fists. "She'll kill you!"

"No, she owes you an apology, Spence." Ashley turned around to give me a small smile of assurance.

But when she turned back, the sly girl already had her fist out, and punched Ashley. Hard. So hard that she fell back into me and knocked us both to the ground.

I was momentarily stunned, and couldn't move. The girl disappeared, thank goodness, and I focused on Ashley, who had blacked out.

"Ash?"

I pulled her into my lap, my hands shaking as I carefully tilted her head, trying to assess the damage.

Relief washed over me as Ashley's eyes fluttered open seconds later.

"Are you okay?" I asked shakily. I wasn't sure what to do; would it be safe to move her? Would it be safe for her to walk? "Should I take you to hospital?"

Ashley surprised me by giving a dreamy smile. "Nah, I'm good." She sat up and rubbed the spot on her eyebrow where that crazy girl had punched her. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I – " It suddenly hit me. This was all my fault! "I'm so sorry."

I wasn't sure why she was still defending me. "No, don't you dare, you didn't throw that punch, Spencer!"

That wasn't going to make it any better. I was the reason behind it. I felt terrible for putting Ashley through all of this. I might have thought that she was arrogant and a tad bit too self-confident, but I was having a hard time trying to push her away. I was hardly succeeding – instead of her giving up on me, despite every trick I was trying to pull – she just seemed to want to spend more and more time with me. Like now.

"Let's go back to my place, I think you need a stiff drink, and I might need some ice."

By the time Ashley had convinced me to take a clean shot of Vodka, and I had Ashley medicated with her migraine tablets and her eye patched with ice, I felt much better. I couldn't really say the same for her – she appeared tired and tense as an obvious migraine had already settled.

I still felt terrible, but the alcohol had taken the edge off, and I was able to stay and look after the beautiful music producer who kept defending my honor. It was sweet of her.

"Can I get you anything?" I whispered after what seemed like hours, not wanting to startle her. We were both lying on our backs on her very comfortable bed, all the lights off. I wasn't intending to stay the night, but I just couldn't get myself to leave either. I wanted to make sure that she was going to be okay.

Ashley groaned "no" and shifted the ice pack on her eye slightly. My head now perched up on one arm as I turned onto my side, I could see her perfectly with the hint of moonlight shining through the sliding doors. My stomach was doing flip-flops when I realized just how beautiful she really was. In the haste of getting her settled, I haven't even registered that I'd gotten her down into boxer shorts, and just a simple tank top. The moonlight was glistening off her smooth skin, making it easy for my eyes to trace over every curve, from her feet all the way up to her face. Ashley's stomach was taut, and it took everything in me to refrain from dragging my fingers over her firm abs. Her breasts were perfect – even underneath clothing. Her neck was just right for her. Exposed beautifully for me to leave my mark on her, but I fought myself from becoming borderline psychotic. Even her clenched jaw was beautiful, so was her nose, and slightly furrowed brows. Her eyes were now closed, having previously stared at the roof – probably fighting the headache – and her mouth was curved slightly. I was sure it was a tiny smile breaking through what I could only imagine was a painful throbbing.

A wistful sigh escaped me as I watched her breathing slowing down until it was evident Ashley was in a deep slumber. My eyes finally roamed over to her alarm clock, my heart dropping when I realized it was time for me to go. I knew I wasn't going to be able to function at work in a couple of hours. With hardly three hours of sleep available, and endless thoughts about the brunette keeping my senses heightened, it was going to be a long day…

"I don't think I'm succeeding with this article, Chels."

I waited for my best friend to spin around in her chair and wheel over to me to pep talk me out of my somber mood.

"What are you talking about, Spence? Give me your notes," Chelsea demanded, moving even closer to my desk. If that was at all possible.

I reluctantly handed over my black notebook containing all the progress with Ashley Davies so far. It didn't feel like I'd accomplished much. For every stint I pulled to push her away, Ashley had surprised me by fighting to get even closer. I didn't understand it. How was it possible that the ridiculously hideous things Madison did to Michelle, wasn't working on Ashley? How much more instability was she going to take from me? From ruining that all-important Yanks game, to phoning her every night at 2AM to tell her how guilty I felt after eating tubs of ice cream, to stalking her SoundCloud account and creating my own, with both our names as my handle, and then favoriting all her songs, and finally, embarrassing her at work and ruining the movie and getting her into trouble with that mean bully; and she still wouldn't give up.

"I really thought after getting punched in the face she'd draw the line, but look at this." I grabbed my cell phone from my desk and scrolled to a text message Ashley had sent just mere minutes ago.

14:46PM – Ashley Davies: Stop feeling bad about last night. Thank you for looking after me. Care for a homemade dinner and couch tickets to the Yankees game at my place?

I watched as Chelsea's brows raised and then she burst out in laughter. It was amusing to watch, but not funny at all.

"I think she's got a thing for you, Spence!"

I'd feared as much, but until Chelsea said it out loud, I had tried to push that thought away as far as I possibly could.

"And what is she talking about – you taking care of her?" Chelsea added, rereading the text. I cringed under her stare.

A blush crept into my cheeks and I looked away. "Well, I felt bad after she got punched… so I stayed for a bit…"

Of course it wasn't enough for Chelsea. She wasn't going to drop this. "And?"

I sighed. "And nothing, okay? I iced her eye, and then stayed until she fell asleep, and left. Nothing happened, Chels."

I sensed a heart-to-heart talk about to happen, so I leaned back in my chair and just waited for Chelsea to speak her mind. I was secretly relieved that Madison had gone out to work on her article, or I'd never hear the end of it.

"Spence, you know you're just doing this for an article, right? I mean, after this, you're not planning to take things further with Ashley, are you?"

I snorted. "Of course not! Chels, if she reads this article I will never hear from her again. Besides, Ashley Davies is a pompous player. I don't know why she's not fazed by this. It just doesn't make sense."

"Maybe you're doing it all wrong. You keep returning to be the nice, loving, Spencer every time you've done something to push her away. You need to stop that. Be more relentless. And stop being such a softy!"

I felt frustrated by her words. Chelsea was right, but it was so difficult. Especially with Ashley being so exhilarating and breathtaking and… hot. I even found her very self-centered ego hot. Spencer Carlin, what have you gotten yourself into?

"Look, go have dinner at her place tonight. But you need to up your game, Spence. Or Paula will have your ass, and you're going to end up hurting yourself. Do you need some pointers? I could always ask Madison what else she did –"

"No! Oh, God, not a word about this to Madison, please Chelsea, I beg you!" Madison would just end up depressed again, and she'd just regained her confidence. Plus, I definitely didn't want to encourage them discussing this Ashley-thing, not while I was so unsure about it myself. Just a couple more days, then everything can go back to normal.

"Pull out the big guns tonight, Spencer, or else…"