A/N:Hey all! I hope you enjoy this chapter as much as I enjoyed writing it!

I somehow got through the rest of that day without anyone else taking notice of me (thank gosh my staple wardrobe is hoodies). I go into school this morning ready for anything really, cause who knows how this is all going to play out. Out of habit of coming in early and coincidence of running into Jake again, my hair is looking even better than yesterday. He says this time he had more time to do what he wanted, which was once again removing my bangs from my face because I don't need to live today apparently, and giving me a sort of top do. I'm not very verse on the ways of hairstyling, but my hair looks amazing once again, and so I once again attempt to become invisible.

Thankfully, class starts without a hitch, and Ms. Coleman does not ask me why I have my hood up, nor does she make me take it off. Walking to class was a nightmare that I was not ready for. There aren't a lot of people at the school this early in the morning, and Jake just had to do such a fantastic job with my hair (bless him though, really), that I've been getting double takes, murmurs, and even a few gasps (probably of realization of who I am, which is nobody). I don't understand; all he did was comb it and put in some gel and clips here and there. Why was everyone acting like I was some totally different person?

Either way, the attention was unwanted from my end, so I put up my hood and went invisible again.

Until Ms. Coleman spoke up when class was almost done. "Okay everyone; I want to try something different today."

That couldn't be good. Different was not turning out to be good so far.

"Usually I'd just go over the upcoming assignment, but that's next week, and we'll be starting a new lesson. So for the rest of class today, please pair up amongst yourselves, and we'll play some games. In celebration of Twighlight High's upcoming match." The class began to hoot and holler, and I began to sweat through my hoodie. If it weren't already deathly apparent, I hate group assignments. I hate teaming up, working in pairs, or anything that required active communication with another individual. Especially when we had to pair ourselves. It just guaranteed exclusion.

So as expected, half the class tried to pair up with Axel, who at the moment was scribbling in his notebook. Once he looked up I hurriedly returned my eyes to my desk. This was the worst, I was going to end up the oddball out, and either sit here by myself writing in my journal or pairing up with Ms. Coleman.

"Kaiser, mind if I take your seat?"

I look up to see the girl who usually sits in front of me get up with a smile and her books as Axel Trenton replaces her. He immediately turns his chair around to face my desk and I immediately would like to die.

"Hey Bell, I hope you don't mind me partnering with you?" he says, his pearly whites on display in the famous Axel grin.

NEVER. "S-sure, that's fine." Except it's not fine, because I was planning on confessing to this beauty of a man not even five hours from now. I think about making eye contact, but that's as far as I get at actually doing so.

"So what game are we doing?" he asks. I don't even know, I don't have any recollection of Ms. Coleman saying anything.

"I am glad you asked Mr. Trenton," she says, seemingly coming out of nowhere. "We are playing word games. You two are doing rhyme schemes. One person says a word or sentence, and you go back and forth a bit before changing to another one."

"Thanks for the easy day Ms. Coleman," Axel says to her with his signature grin. Ah, he is so handsome. Why does he have to be so handsome in front of me?

"It's not as easy as it sounds." And with that, she left with a sly smile that could not mean any good.

I'm not sure where to go from here, so I just kind of awkwardly fiddle with the pages in my book. I'm tempted to pull out my journal, but I'd die before that journal made contact with anyone else's eyes but mine.

"Ready to start?" Axel asks.

"…I am ready to take part."

"Ooh, nice!" Axel compliments. I smile at my desk.

"It's…not so hard, once you've done it once or twice," I respond.

He doesn't say anything back, so I take a peek at him. My bangs are gone from my face (thanks Jake) and I am uncomfortable with life because now he can see the entirety of my face. Which he is currently staring at. And smiling so sweetly that I can't keep the red from entering my cheeks.

"You're really good at this," he says.

I instinctively try to pull at my hair, but forget that it's not in its usual protective barrier (I really don't like being stared at) and end up grabbing my hood instead, lowering it to just above my eyes. "I'm not as good as the miss." I point at Ms. Coleman, who is currently making rounds around the room.

I see his elbows on my desk, and his legs knock into mine. I sit back up a little so that we're not in contact. I was having a hard enough time with just his close proximity to me. I'm suddenly brought back to when we were at the Light Commons with everyone, and how close he was then too.

"Why do you have your hood up?" he asks. I start to panic a little, since I had no prepared answer to that, and decide to avoid the question entirely.

"Um, I think it's my turn?" I say quietly.

"Oh right, we're supposed to take turns. Okay, hit me. But go easy, I'm not as good as I make myself sound."

I snort a little, and finally decide to stop having this prolonged staring contest with the top of my desk. I want Axel to like me, and that's not going to happen if I keep acting this way. So I bring my own blue eyes to meet his emerald ones. "Okay."

"Pay," he responds. I didn't mean to start with 'okay', but that's fine I guess.

"Day."

"Obey," he says, with a little bit of husk. I don't know if that was intentional, but it sure was doing numbers on me. But I've already decided that no matter how red my face gets, I will not look back down.

"Disarray."

"Sashay." He snaps his fingers, and I have to hold back a giggle.

"No way."

"Hey," he says, pointing at me. "That's two words."

"Sorry," I respond, but I'm still smiling.

"My turn then," he says, leaning back. "Small."

"Tall," I respond.

"Call."

"Ball."

He pauses before saying, "New word. Surprise."

"…enterprise." That one took me a second.

"Apologize."

"Materialize."

He pauses again. Makes sense though, these words are kind of hard. "Lie," he finally says.

"I don't think…lie, rhymes," I say. I hated to correct him, but I'm an English nerd. (Hayner calls me a grammar nazi, but that's because his use of the English language is a true atrocity, and I feel the need to correct.)

"Doesn't it though? It sounds like it," he argues. He looks fairly serious about this so I take a minute to try and see if it rhymes in my head. Ms. Coleman walks over while I am analyzing this.

"I don't hear a lot of talking happening here."

"We're trying to see if the word lie rhymes," Axel explains to her.

"With what?"

"Uh, we've said apologize, materialize, enterprise…" I offer.

"The first word was surprise," Axel points out.

"Hmm…" After a few seconds of thinking, she looks at both of us. "I believe that there can be creative license with rhyming at times. This may be one of them." With that, she walks away again, telling us to continue.

"Well, there you have it, from the teacher herself," he says.

"Alright, well, 'creative license' doesn't always mean 'correct'," I argue. Since I can do that now. You know, argue with Axel. The texting every night has been helping with overcoming that wall.

"Hey, sometimes you gotta take a chance." Axel leans a little lower on the table, never breaking eye contact. I'm too mesmerized to even think about averting my gaze.

"…under the circumstance."

His eyes widen before he laughs, more to himself than anything. "Roxas, you are amazing, did you know that?"

My stomach starts doing flip flops and my minds a buzz. Does he really think that I'm amazing? Me? "Um…it's my turn I think," I say while fiddling with my pen.

Suddenly his hand is on mine, and I sharply suck in air. He slowly takes the pen away from me and points it at me. "Don't avoid the question."

What does he want me to do, agree with him? I know that I should have more confidence in myself, but it's just hard for me to see my good points when all of my bad points are so glaringly obvious. Dad says it's something that will take time for me to grow, but if I am really planning on trying to date Axel Trenton, let alone confessing at all, I don't have the luxury to wait for the confidence to settle in. "Uh-"

"Alright students, that's all for today. See you all Monday. Good luck with the game."

"Thanks Ms. C!" respond many people in the room. I look at Axel, and he's still looking at me, as if still expecting an answer.

I cannot fathom what to say, so I just get up and shove my notebook in my messenger bag. "Sorry." I'm not even quite sure what I am apologizing for, but it seems appropriate.

"Nothing to be sorry for Bell," he says, quickly getting his things. "I gotta dash, we're practicing before the rally."

"Isn't the pep rally meant to be practice?" I ask.

"That's more of a staged practice, to get morale up. But we have an actual practice before it." He chuckles a bit. "It helps to get nice and dirt covered for the pep rally, makes it more authentic."

Axel covered in dirt and sweat is not an image that I should be processing right now, but I am, and I am red. Maybe he'll just think "blushing like a schoolgirl" is my standard. "Well um…good luck Axel."

He smiles and I instinctively look down, but force myself to look back at him, making me a little dizzy from the rapid eye movement.

"Are you going to the rally?" he asks.

I think about the lessons Olette has told me about not coming off too desperate and "playing hard to get", whatever the hell that meant.

"I'll have to, uh…check my schedule?" I respond. That's something someone not desperate would say, yes? But I am desperate, so what am I doing? And what "schedule"? My schedule consisted of going to class, going home, and writing in my journal. Though most recently I've been hanging out after school and texting a whole bunch. You know, actually being a teenager.

"Well, I hope you can squeeze me in." And with that, he literally runs out of the room. He's sure in a hurry for someone who's allowed to skip class for soccer.

I slink out of the room, feeling just as sick and nervous as I felt when I first walked into school this morning.

"Roxy!"

The only people who call me that deplorable nickname are Cloud and…

"Olette, hey."

She bounds over to me and grabs my sweater sleeve. "So! Are you ready for today?"

"You seem much more excited for this than I am."

"If you're not excited, then how are you feeling?" she asks.

"Like I'm going to throw-up the nothing I had for breakfast."

"Wait, wait, come with me for a sec." Next thing I know I'm being dragged into a girl's restroom down the hall.

"Um. Olette."

"Its fine," she shushes me. "First of all, here." She hands me a cocoa Rice Krispy treat.

"So not only do you want me to stand in the girl's bathroom," which was making me not as uncomfortable as I should be, "you also want me to eat in a bathroom."

"Listen, barely anyone uses this bathroom, I'm sure no one would mind, and you need to eat! You'll be a mess if you don't!"

"I'm already a mess!" I say, tearing open the bar and devouring it. "I mwhean, mvaf iv he wenecns mu?"

"Roxy, I can't understand you at all. Chew and swallow, chew and swallow."

I take a big gulp and frantically look Olette in the face. "What if he rejects me?!"

"Then life goes on," she responds. I nibble on my bar while Olette rubs my back. "Listen, I know rejection sucks, but it's something we all have to face."

My appetite has left me again, and I try hard to keep the cocoa and marshmallow down. "What if…" I whisper. "What if he never wants to talk to me again?"

"Roxy!" Olette slaps my cheeks together, smooshing my face.

"Ow…myah?"

"You know Axel, right? Is Axel the kind of person that would stop associating with someone just cause he may not return their feelings?"

I am brought back to my conversation with Jake yesterday. I know Axel. I've been watching him since I came to this school. He's as much of an amazing person as he was the time he helped Olette deal with the cheer squad to the fated day I bumped into him after English class. He was my hero. He was my heart.

"I know, I know. I know Axel…deep in my heart I know he won't just stop talking to me. It's why I love him so much, he knows how to take things with grace, and he's not set-off by my perpetual awkwardness. But I'm scared Olette. I'm scared that…I'll never be good enough." I finally confess everything. What's been eating at me since the day I wrote that letter.

Despite how quickly Olette pulls me in for a hug, it is gentle and strong. "Roxas. You are an amazing individual. You are funny, talented, sarcastic in the best of ways, and have the biggest heart I know. I love you. Pence loves you. Hayner obviously loves you, he's been friends with you since you guys were in diapers." I chuckle a bit, cause that's not far off from the truth. She pulls back to look me in the eyes, the sweetest of Olette smiles on her face. "You've met the soccer team and they love you. Jake does at the least, he doesn't stop texting me about it." That gets a laugh out of me. Jake really was great. "You're cute as hell, even if you don't wanna admit it." She pulls down my hood, and I let her. "We've got your back on this. Whether it goes south, or not. Just like you had mine."

I grab her hands that are back on the sides of my face. "Thank you Olette. Thank you."

"Anytime my dear," she smiles. "Now come! We've both got class. Then it's only a matter of time until you're not single anymore," she squeals, still as optimistic as ever about my impending confession.

The butterflies are back full force, but I don't feel as nauseous as before. That's a good sign right? We leave the girls room just as a few girls enter, who don't bat an eye about a guy just exiting the ladies room. Huh. Guess they really didn't care.

"I'll have to run if I don't wanna be late, my class is on the other side of the building. But I'll meet with you during lunch!" She presumes that I'm going to skip my study hall again to attend her, Hayner and Pence's lunch period. She presumes right.

"Bye," I say, not only to Olette, but to my hood as well. Because I'm not putting it back up until I confess to Axel Trenton.

Look forward to the next chapter~

(Which should be coming very soon, because shit is about to get real)