Disclaimer: Epic Fail. Epic, massive, complete and utter FAIL. Alfie had no idea what he was looking for, so we ended up getting someone's résumé instead of the House of Anubis papers! Alfie had to go on the mission solo because Jerome got sick (nothing major, he'll be fine by the end of the week) and couldn't sneak around to get the papers. Patricia performed the best distraction I've ever seen –okay, the only real distraction I've ever seen. And my job was super easy because no one came near the record-hall. But Alfie grabbed the wrong papers! ARGH! I still don't own House of Anubis, but until we fire Alfie, enjoy Chapter fourteen: Dealing With Life.

Chapter fourteen: Dealing With Life

The next morning, I got up, got ready for school, and made my way down the stairs. It had been a hectic weekend, even for me. I had told both Fabian and Amber about my condition, Amber thought Fabian and I were dating, and Aria was getting even more annoying.

Oh joy.

Speaking of Joy, she was already at the table when I got there; everyone was. Though when I took a closer look I noticed Patricia was missing. Where was she? The redhead was never late for breakfast.

A few minutes after I sat down, Patricia walked in and locked eyes with Joy. She sat down and piled some food onto her plate before she spoke. What she said had me so stunned I almost fell out of my seat.

"Nina and Fabian are going out on a date Wednesday," she said smugly.

Naturally, this caused a little chaos.

Joy glared at me with such hatred that I was surprised I didn't die right there. Alfie shot Fabian and thumbs-up and hi-fived Jerome. Mick and Mara just looked confused, like they weren't sure why anyone cared. Amber was grinning like she knew it would happen all along. And Fabian and I both looked horrified.

"What?!" Joy shrieked, breaking the silence.

Amber smirked at her. "Yay, Fabina!"

I shook my head violently. "No, no, no, no, it's not a date. It's just, ah, well, um . . . Fabian can you help me out here?" I almost whispered the last part.

Fabian looked around and, after mouthing an apology to me, went ahead with his explanation. "Yeah, we're going out. It's none of your business, guys."

Oh, I was gonna kill him.

As the room finally quieted down, I got up and started walking out the door. I was getting a head start to school. Maybe I could see if the drama teacher, Mr. Winkler, would let me do some extra work in the afternoons so I could be somewhere else instead of the attic. Victor still wouldn't let me up there.

Unfortunately, Mr. Winkler wasn't in the class room when I got there. Drat, I had really hoped I hide out here after school. I mean, I'd still be helping, it's just I wanted a place to hide after everyone was back at Anubis. Just as I was leaving, who should walk through the door but Mr. Winkler?

"Oh, hello Nina," he greeted, seeing me there. "What are you doing at school so early?"

"I was wondering if there was anything I could help out with in the afternoons. After school, I mean. I could work around the drama room, straightening things or working on set pieces or something," I offered, mentally crossing my fingers. Aria walked in and shot me a thumbs-up.

Mr. Winkler considered it. "Well, I suppose you could work around the drama room after school, but I wouldn't be here to supervise. You'd be alone."

I shrugged. "Being alone isn't a problem. I was just wondering if I could do some extra work."

"I just have one question," he said. "Why do you want to do extra work?"

I hadn't expected this, so I had to come up with a decent lie pretty quick. "Um, I just want to help. You know, drama being my favorite class and all."

He smiled slightly before saying "If you really want to, then it's no problem for you to work in the drama room after school. I'll clear it with Mr. Sweet at lunch. Now shouldn't you get to class?"

I grinned slightly as I started to walk away. "Thank you!" I called back.

This was going to work out perfectly. I had found my new hiding place, and now all I had to do was make sure I was working in the drama room Wednesday night so Fabian could take back what he said about our 'date'. Gah, the residents of Anubis House thought we were actually going on a date. It wasn't that I didn't think Fabian was a good guy or anything, but I knew that he really thought I was nuts and was just trying to be nice.

I knew it wasn't fair of me to think things like that, but it was what I believed. No one really thought much of me. I made my way to my first class and took my seat a few minutes before the bell rang. As the bell rang, everyone else came in and sat down, facing the whiteboard in preparation for the class.

The teacher came in after the final bell rang. She taught the lesson, and when she was done we were allowed to talk for the last ten minutes of class. While everyone else talked, I stayed in my seat, scribbling something on a sheet of paper. It took me about two minutes to realize what I was doing. When I saw what I had written, I felt the blood drain from my face.

I was writing down a conversation between me and Aria.

When I read over it, I noticed that even my handwriting had changed slightly when I was writing as Aria. The conversation was similar to how we had talked before I refused to say anything else to her.

Hey A.

Nins! You're talking to me again?

Sort of, I guess. I've missed you.

I've missed you too. Omigosh, we have so much to talk about. What about your date with Fabes?

Ari, I'm not going on a date. You know that.

I don't care. If it looks like a duck and walks like a duck, then I'm gonna make it a duck!

Aria, you're not making any sense, like always.

Hey, you're the one not making any sense. You're the one writing this, after all.

That was the last thing I had written until I noticed what I had been doing. Only one thought was echoing through my mind at that point.

Oh. My. God.

I crumpled the paper up in my hand and stuffed it in the pocket of my jacket. Was I slipping? Was I losing the ground that I had fought to gain against my illness? I had practically had a conversation with Aria for the first time in three years. That had never happened before. When the bell rang for class to be over, I rushed to my next class, one of the only two I had with Fabian. For some reason, I wanted to ask him what he thought of this.

When I sat down beside him a few minutes later, Fabian looked up with a slight smile on his face. The smile died, though, when he saw the worried look on mine.

"What's wrong?" he asked. In response, I handed him the crumpled-up note I had written in my last class. After he read the whole thing, Fabian gazed at me with a soft look of understanding.

"Nina, it's okay," he said, handing the note back.

I shook my head. "No, it's not okay. I hadn't even known I was writing it!"

Before Fabian could say anything else, Mr. Sweet came in and started the science lesson. I paid attention to the lesson as best I could, something about animals and their environments, but it wasn't easy. I was a little preoccupied with what had happened in my last class. Why had that happened?

No, I knew exactly why it had happened. Stress affected my condition sometimes, so it was easy to assume that the stress from the last few days was causing me to freak a little more than usual. Yeah, that was it. It was just stress.

Once I had come to that conclusion, my mood was considerably lifted. I believed that this day was actually going to get better. That was a slight shock, but a good one. I was glad that I thought my day would get better. That was a rarity in my life.

Once I got back to Anubis House that afternoon, my automatic reaction was to go straight to the attic before I remembered: I was supposed to be in the drama room right now. I bolted back out the door, hearing people exclaim in surprise as I rushed past. Crap, crap, crap, I had completely forgotten about the whole drama-helping-thing.

When I got back to the school, I was completely out of breath and my ribs were aching, but I still made myself walk through the hallways until I got to the drama room. Mr. Winkler was just packing up his papers and such when I huffed and puffed my way inside.

"Sorry I'm –late," I managed to say through gasps for breath. "I forgot."

The teacher waved it off. "It's okay. There wasn't a specific time for your work or anything. So, could you try to pick up the dressing room? You don't have to get it all clean today, though."

By this point I had caught my breath, so I could answer in complete sentences. "Okay, Mr. Winkler. Um, where is the dressing room?"

He directed me to the dressing room and told me the lights went out at seven, so I had to be gone before then. I told him I'd be gone before five thirty, so there was no problem. After Mr. Winkler left, I made my way to the dressing room. When I opened the door, I stopped dead in my tracks.

This place was a mess. Costumes littered the floor, scarves were draped over everything, and hats were dotting the room. It was chaotic, and it would probably take forever to clean. I looked at the clock in the corner and saw it was only three thirty. I had two hours to tackle this mess. I was definitely in over my head.

Taking a deep breath, I started picking up the costumes. Thirty minutes later, I was given a huge surprise. Someone knocked on the door, scaring the crap out of me. I whipped my head around to see Fabian standing there, leaning against the doorframe with a small smile on his face.

"Hey," he said, walking over. "What did you do to get detention?"

"What?" I said in surprise. I hadn't gotten detention.

Fabian tried again. "When people get detention, they're made to clean the dressing room. I can't figure out why you got detention."

I rolled my eyes as I threw a scarf into the box I'd been tossing them into. "I don't have detention, Fabian. I asked to do this. Victor banned me from the attic, so school was my next best hiding place."

That seemed to make a small amount of sense to him, because after I finished speaking, Fabian decided he was going to help out. I showed him how I'd been organizing everything so far, and he caught on pretty quickly. But our cleaning slowly turned to messing around when I found a feather boa and threw it around Fabian's neck.

"Perfect," I said, ending in a giggle. Fabian should never wear a pink feather boa. Ever. He, of course, retaliated by placing the most ridiculous neon sombrero on my head. Instead of cleaning for the rest of the afternoon, we ended up playing around with the costumes in the drama room. Somehow, by the time we left, Fabian was a cross between a pirate and a cop, while I looked like some sort of strange cat-queen-thing.

We were laughing so hard at each other and ourselves that we didn't even notice that we were still wearing the ridiculous costumes when we left the dressing room. We walked back to Anubis House together, still chuckling about everything that'd happened. But when we opened the door and stepped inside, we were greeted by Amber holding up a camera and snapping a picture of us.

"Yay, the first ever Fabina photo!" she cried happily. Then she really looked at us. "What are you wearing?"

I looked over at Fabian to see he still had an eye patch on and a cop hat. I looked at myself and realized I was still wearing cat ears, a feather boa –the same one I'd put on Fabian earlier –and a tiara. When Fabian also realized how ridiculous we looked, he started laughing again. I joined in, and soon even Amber was laughing. I took my boa and draped it over the blonde, making her laugh harder.

Once we were all recovered, Fabian and I ditched the costumes, gathering them up and stuffing them in my messenger bag, which was still hanging on my shoulder. We walked into the common room, where most everyone else was sitting. They looked at us like we were nuts, but before any of us could ask what was wrong, Jerome spoke up.

"Were there hyenas out there or did we miss something?"

Amber, strangely enough, was the one to answer. "Somehow Nina and Fabian got a hold of some of the drama room costumes, and they looked so funny! Here, I've got a picture."

And before either Fabian or I could protest, Amber promptly hit a few buttons on her camera and showed everyone –meaning Jerome, Mara and Alfie –the picture of Fabian and me. Everyone laughed when they saw the picture. Once everyone had seen it, I snatched the camera away from Amber and looked at the photo myself.

Okay, it was hilarious. Fabian looked ridiculous and I had to admit that I did too. He had a stupid police hat placed askew on his head and an eye patch over his right eye. I had a sparkly, plastic, silver tiara on my head along with a pair of fuzzy black cat ears. Around my neck was a feathery and sparkly boa. But while I was looking at the camera with a lighthearted glimmer in my eyes, Fabian was looking at me with carefree delight. Wow, I might actually ask Amber if she'd print it out for me.

What was I thinking? Yeah, I thought Fabian was a good guy and a great friend, but I didn't think any more of him. Did I? I actually wasn't sure at this point. But what I did know was that he didn't really like me. He might think he did, but I knew better. Eventually he'd realize that he just pitied me and would leave me in the dust, and I wasn't ready for that.

I had been dropped –not literally, but it might as well have been –once before by my old friends and it had taken me years to get over it. I wouldn't allow myself to go through that same pain again. But for now I'd forget about that and try to accept the fact that I had friends. It would be a nice change for me to have friends again.

Okay, so now Nina has accepted that she has friends! Finally, right? Nina is thinking that she might like Fabian, so there's some more Fabina for you. And Nina was writing a conversation between her and Aria! *gasp* Do you agree that it's just stress, or do you think it's something else? Oh, random note: I have decided that this fanfic has an official theme song! Have you guys heard Clarity? That's the song I chose for this fic. I think it fits perfectly. What do you think? Next chapter Nina and Fabian go on a 'date' and there's an exuberant Amber. Thanks for reading!

~C