It was Thursday morning when Jeremy crept out of his bed and without having a breakfast he quickly left for school, way earlier than his usual last minute race to the class.

It was only a few hours since the Salvatore household returned back to the boarding house and last thing the boy wanted was to spend more time in Damon's and Stefan's company.

He drove into the school grounds and parked his car in his favorite spot, right next to the entrance. His eyes widened as he glued his face on the windshield, to make sure that his eyes were not playing a dirty trick on him.

He saw Kylie sitting on a bench near the stoner pit, though she was not alone. Next to her was a guy Jeremy recognized to be her lab partner, that punk Dylan.

The boy hurriedly got out of the car and with a stable, 'I'm-totally-cool-with-this' pace, he marched across the parking lot and over to his friend and the other guy that he now wanted to shoot down with his crossbow.

"Hi" he said interrupting something that Dylan was saying, while forcing a polite smile on his face.

"Oh my god!" Kylie pressed her hand against her mouth in shock and trapped the boy in a bear hug. "Why didn't you tell me you were coming today?" she playfully stroked him on the shoulder.

"Surprise" said Jeremy grinning at her, while discreetly turning his back to the other boy.

"Well you're lucky" stated Kylie, her hands still wrapped around Jeremy as though she was afraid to let go, "I was about to skip school for today, Dylan—" she looked over Jeremy's shoulder at Dylan who got up to his feet, "—knows this great place, it used to be a small theater before the civil war"

"Yeah, I know that place" Jeremy turned around after he decided he couldn't keep ignoring Dylan, despite how much he might have wanted to. "I'm sorry, I didn't want to ruin your plans" he said with a satisfied grin that only Dylan could see.

"Maybe another time" Dylan raised his eyebrows in challenge.

"Maybe" Jeremy repeated kindly, though his eyes were burning in an 'over-my-dead-body' sort of way.

"That's great, maybe we could go all together sometime" said Kylie, having no clue why both of her friends sounded like they've been hit by a track.

"Maybe" the two boys said in one voice, staring at each other unblinkingly.

Kylie hugged Dylan goodbye, seized Jeremy from the upper arm and dragged him a little farther, where they were out of Dylan's earshot.

"How was your trip?" she asked in a testy voice.

"Well," Jeremy took a second to think, "I'm grounded for the rest of my life and we didn't exactly get the stone back, but I think we have decent leads as to where is it" stopping for a single deep breath, Jeremy forgot everything about Dylan and his pathetic attempts to get closer to Kylie and focused into all the details of the trip, confiding to the girl his ideas and theories.

"What is wrong with you?!" Kylie poked him twice with her finger right after Jeremy mentioned the incident in the river. "You could have died" she screamed looking almost as mad as Damon.

"But I didn't…" Jeremy retorted innocently and hurried to change the subject, "so I called Kol, he said he'll help us to identify the coffin"

"How?" Kylie raised her eyebrows, "You said it's in Atlanta"

"It would be, if Damon didn't compel some guy to bring it back to Mystic Falls. I accidently overheard him and Stefan talking about it" said Jeremy proudly, "so chances are it's in the Mikaelson household as we speak. I already gave the hands up to Kol; he'll keep an eye for it"

"You're fast" Kylie admired in an awed voice.

Jeremy smirked self-satisfyingly and was about to open his mouth to keep talking about his brilliantness, when Kylie cut him off. "I just hope it will be fast, I have to meet Dylan tomorrow at eight. He challenged me to a game of pool" she announced, watching Jeremy's color fade right off his face.

'A date?' he wanted to ask but held his words, as though by not saying them it would make the situation less real. Instead he recovered right away, straightened up and said in his most indifferent voice, "Actually, I was thinking maybe you would like to go to the movies with me tomorrow, catch up with the 'mortal instruments'" he spoke the magic words.

It was Kylie's turn to be shocked. Her eyes widened and her jar fell open, but she didn't say anything for a while. "You're not joking?" she asked in a very constrained voice, putting all her self-restrain to keep her from shrieking.

"No, I'm not joking. Vampires and dead bodies can wait" said Jeremy with a shrug, surprised as to how fast she forgot about Dylan.

"Aren't you grounded?" Kylie continued in the same 'I-don't-want-to-have-false-hope' sort of voice.

"Yeah, but I don't think they know how that works" said Jeremy thoughtfully, "they say it all the time, I act like I care and then they forget all about it"

Kylie could barely control her excitement. She was begging Jeremy to go to the movies ever since they met, but somehow vampires, stones and journals were always more important.

"It's a date then!" she said giving him a quick kiss on the cheek and ran through the entrance, as the school bell rang, announcing the beginning of another school day.

Through the next seven hours Jeremy felt like a caged animal. He completely flunked his math test and in attempt to avoid Kylie, he spend the rest of the day hiding in the boys bathroom, putting everybody under the impression he was smoking weed again.

When the moment of his freedom finally came, he burst out of his classroom before anybody else had the chance to move and drove straight back home. He was in such hurry he almost got a speeding ticket, but he actually managed to outran the police car that was after him.

"Where is Damon? I need Damon" he almost shouted in Stefan's face the moment he ran inside the living room, searching for Damon.

"He is in the Study" Stefan replied puzzled and before Jeremy could run off again; he seized him from the back of his sweater and pulled him a couple steps backwards. "How did you do on your test?"

"What?" Jeremy barked at him, looking at Stefan as though he was completely insane. "How do you even know about my test?" he stopped struggling for a second against Stefan's grip.

"I have your schedule" Stefan stated out the obvious.

"That's not creepy at all…" Jeremy muttered in a sing-song voice, slapping Stefan's hand off of him, but the man still refused to let go.

"So?" Stefan prompted him, "how did you do?"

Jeremy rolled his eyes and knowing from previous conversations of this sort that the sooner he would answer, the sooner he could go find Damon, he decided to get this over with. "I got a C" he said in a dulcet tone.

Stefan sighed darkly as Jeremy expected him to, though remarkably fast that grief and disappointment transformed into anger and determination, "I don't understand" he said sternly, "the kids who get all the A's are what? Smarter than you?"

Though Jeremy technically knew that this was meant to be a rhetorical question, he felt a sudden need to answer.

"Grades have nothing to do with intelligence" he retorted and added matter-of-factly, "Kylie got a C as well"

"I don't care what others do!" Stefan shouted, slightly shaking him, "I care what you do"

"But…you just compered me to…you know, whatever, never mind" he was about to set off toward the study, since Stefan had finally freed him from his grip, but the person he was so fervent to find had just entered the living room and was now pouring himself a glass of bourbon.

"I need to speak to you!" he went over to Damon and followed him to the couch.

"If it's about Atlanta—" Damon started threateningly.

"Atlanta? Who cares about Atlanta?" he shook his head dismissively, "It's about Kylie"

Damon raised his eyebrows, merely taken aback, "I'm listening" he said without really looking at the boy, "did she say 'I love you' again?"

"No" Jeremy intoned, "but I may or may have not asked her on a date…"

Damon rounded on him, clearly amused, "did you?"

"That's the problem, I'm not sure" the boy flopped down into an armchair, hiding his eyes with his hand.

"You're not sure?" Stefan repeated disbelievingly, "how can you not be sure?"

"I asked if she wanted to go to see a movie with me tomorrow" Jeremy started in an unnaturally quiet voice, "and she said yes"

"So far so good" Stefan commented, leaning over the back of Jeremy's chair.

Jeremy shook his head miserably and added, "and then she said: 'it's a date'" he imitated Kylie's cheery voice.

"It's a date" both Salvatore brothers confirmed in sync.

Jeremy let a roar of frustration and covered his entire face with a pillow from the couch. "I'm such an idiot!"

"You are such a girl" Damon corrected him, "it's a date with a cute blond who is dumb enough to like you, what could possibly be your problem?"

"I don't want to be her boyfriend; I want to be her friend who happens to be—"

"—Gay?" Damon cut him off.

"No, but—"

"Why did you ask her out in the first place?" Jeremy got interrupted again, this time by Stefan.

Knowing the teasing that would follow if he dared to even mention Dylan's name, Jeremy just shifted his shoulders and launched himself off of his seat. "Thank you for the help" he said sarcastically and strolled out of the living room before somebody could ask another question he didn't want to answer.

Trying to push Kylie and their date right off his mind, Jeremy decided to focus on the stone and the coffin and come up with unreasonable theories, until he had any real news.

On Friday he was supposed to meet Kol after school, after he supposedly spend the last couple of days examining the coffin that was now at the Mikaelson mansion, but instead, Kol showed up at his high school, during lunch time.

He approached Jeremy from behind and sat on his table, right between Jeremy and Kylie.

"What are you doing here?" Jeremy sighed, though a part of him was grateful that Kol broke the tense silence that was going since Kylie sat next to him

"First off, I should kill you for double-crossing me" said Kol pleasantly, though he looked fairly mad.

"Oh get over it" Jeremy scoffed, "you would have done the same"

Kol's eye twitched a little bit, however he didn't say anything.

"Did you find something?" asked Jeremy.

"Yes" Kol twisted his hands and pulled a paper out of his pocket, "here" he passed it over to Jeremy.

The boy set his sandwich on the table and took hold of the paper, "Alexandros" he read out loud, "who is Alexandros?"

"Alexander the Great?" asked Kylie mockingly.

"No, that's the name of the sorcerer that helped my mother create the stone. He was the one in that coffin" said Kol rather briskly.

"How can you tell?" asked Jeremy, looking again down in the paper.

"Well—" Kol took a bite off of Jeremy's sandwich, "I did put him in that coffin, soon after he made the stone…boy was he mad" he said dreamily.

"So now he is trying to resurrect himself with his stone?" asked Kylie, her face screwed up in concentration.

"Wouldn't surprise me, he was always one canny old man"

"Why did you kill him?" asked Jeremy, though he knew all too well that Kol and his family didn't exactly need a reason to kill somebody.

"Didn't you hear me?" Kol took another big bite from the sandwich, "he was a canny old man, always getting in the way, he had to go"

Kylie and Jeremy exchanged a look, but refused to make any comments.

"So," Kol clapped his hands and stood up "now we wait until the full moon, catch them on the act and kill everybody before Alexandros comes back for the reunion and…you know how that works"

"That will be one romantic night" said Jeremy sarcastically.

"As long as you two love birds don't screw up" Kol smiled pleasantly at the two of them before departing.

Jeremy sat in silence for a little while processing all the news Kol had just delivered, until he looked to his side and saw Kylie. His stomach twisted as he realized they were alone again.

"I got to go" he jumped on his feet and in attempt to sound less of a jerk he added, "I'll pick you up at eight" he kissed her softly on the top of her head and almost ran to the exit.

His original destination was the biology lab, since that was his next class but soon after he left the cafeteria he came face to face with Dylan. Jeremy went to move passed him but Dylan shoved him back a few paces.

"What's your problem?" said Jeremy defiantly, though he could guess the reason why he looked so pissed. Kylie must have already cancelled her date with him and he had probably figured why.

"What is your problem?" Dylan retorted, "I asked her first"

Jeremy raised his eyebrows at Dylan's tone, "she is not an object, if she wanted to go out with you, she would. Now if you excuse me" Jeremy made a second attempt to leave, but Dylan got in front of him.

"Dude, what do you want from me?" Jeremy started getting slightly irritated.

"I know who you are Gilbert, and you don't deserve a girl like her"

"You don't know me," Jeremy spat, but hurried to calm himself, "and I agree with you, I don't deserve her"

"Then call it off, you freak, you don't even want to be with her. If you did you wouldn't wait until I asked her to make a move" said Dylan, looking up at Jeremy as though he was the worst person on planet earth.

Jeremy didn't understand why those words bothered him as much as they did, especially since he himself acknowledged them to be the truth. He did ask Kylie out just because Dylan did it first and he most definitely was in fact a freak.

"Chicks like Kylie don't hang out with losers like you. Face it Gilbert, you will always be the stoner freak"

"Shut up" Jeremy warned him, his hands balled into fists.

Dylan shuddered mockingly, "Or what? What are you going to do? Tell your mommy? Oh wait, you don't have a mom…you're an orphan, aren't you Gilbert?" he sniggered.

It was that moment when Jeremy realized he had enough. He took a couple steps forward and was glad to see that Dylan did the same. They both had their fists at the ready and it was a matter of time until one of them would attack. Jeremy didn't want to be that person. Dylan was nowhere near as strong or fast and he didn't find it fair to be the one to start a fight but as long as Dylan tried to hit him he would gladly protect himself and in the process maybe manage to score a couple of good punches.

"You know what? You're not worthy of my time" Jeremy lowered his fists and turned his back on the boy.

"Are you chickening on me Gilbert? Didn't your father have enough time to make you a man?" he heard Dylan shout after him as well as a few groans from his fellow students that were now leaving the cafeteria and started filling up the corridor.