It wasn't long until winter break started, only a few more exams to go before they were released back on the outside world, and Bloom was looking forward to home and getting to be with her mum and dad again. She especially missed Vanessa, it didn't seem to matter how old she got, sometimes all she wanted was to be cuddled by her mum and told that everything would be okay. She even longed to spend the day helping out at the flower shop, just being there and chatting with Vanessa and with the customers. She would feel home again once someone made that stupid joke about her name and the shop again.

Kiko was recovering well. The vet had been quick to arrive and had seen to his wound promptly, although it had actually looked worse than it was. The dog would have some scar tissue on his ribcage but his internals were fine and the burn was sorted out almost immediately, although Kiko would have to wear the cone of shame for the next two weeks so that he didn't lick the new skin there.

Bloom was trying to study outside in the courtyard that afternoon but the weather was too good and Kiko was using her sympathy to get a lot of games of catch. She would have stayed indoors, but Flora had pretty much taken over the entire apartment with her preparations for the Simulation Chamber. There had been a few days when it had been down for maintenance, and Bloom had been thanked by several of her classmates for giving them more time to study, but now it was up and running normally again and Flora's slot was fast approaching. She was freaking out a little, and her botanical experiments had spread from her desk to take up all of the space in the suite.

At first, Bloom had been in awe of all of the fantastic plants - one was some sort of mimic that had found its way into Stella's make-up drawer - but it was starting to become just too much. Creepers had started to sprout in Tecna's wardrobe and become territorial whenever she tried to get clothes out of it, and you couldn't turn around without bumping into something potted. The four of them had agreed that they needed to talk to Flora about dialling back her collections, or at least moving them somewhere else so that there was space for them all to live.

Bloom went back to staring at the page she was trying to study from. She had her highlighter ready to scrape over the important bits but so far she was struggling to remember which words she'd just read. She should probably put the cap back on the pen otherwise it was just going to dry out.

What she wanted to read about was the history of Domino. Ever since she had sensed that fire in the core of the planet during the simulation she had been fascinated with it. It was obviously because, as a fairy with fire magic, she felt a connection to the planet that had once been the home of the greatest source of magical fire in the universe. But she was having trouble with her research since she kept coming across a different dimension that was also supposed to have been the home of the Great Dragon and the source of the element. It was hard to tell what was counted as legend and what was actual history since Bloom didn't have much of an instinct for which magic was actually possible and which was outlandish.

She'd promised herself that she could have a wander around the library once she'd finished revising this chapter of her textbook, but the promise of her reward was too distracting to be an incentive.

This wasn't working. She needed a break and to come back to this later when she was refreshed. There was a bit of a culture of overachieving at this school, and having much of a day off during exam season was sacrilege to most students, but Bloom knew just who she could call on to blow off some steam and forget about school work.

Stella answered her phone lazily with a sigh.

"Is it time to talk to Flora already? I'm only half dressed."

"No, I wanted to go into Magix for a bit and wondered if you were up for coming with me?"

"Ooh, yes! That sounds amazing, we should get our nails done and then get some smoothies. I have some gossip to tell you too!"

Bloom meandered back up to the suite and waited for Stella to finish putting clothes on. The princess fussed over her make up more than usual so Bloom was assuming that the gossip she had been promised was about a boy. They both petted Kiko as they waited for the bus, and Stella fed him some pork crackling from the cafeteria on the ride into Magix.

They discussed the exams still ahead of them and Bloom was not surprised that her friend had taken a minimalist approach to revision, but as Stella reminded her, the princess had already taken most of this first year and had done her brushing up of the subjects during term time. Bloom waited until they were seated at adjacent manicurists' tables before bringing up what Stella had been wanting to tell her. Stella grinned.

"Okay, so, you know how Sky has been weirdly hot and cold with me since term started?"

"Yeah…"

"And you know how he's been unwilling to actually move from just dating to being together officially?"

"Yeah…"

"Well I've decided to broaden my horizons." Stella settled back in her chair, fingers still splayed so that the manicurist could buff her nails.

"What does that mean?"

"I ran into one of the exchange students my school back home had with Magix earlier this week and we've been texting ever since, he's called Daniel and he has the most incredible hair, and he wants to know if I'm free to go get some coffee." Stella was beaming but Bloom was confused; she hadn't thought that her friend was losing interest in Sky, so the fact she wanted to see someone else was blindsiding her.

"So, you're not going to be dating Sky any more?" Bloom had visions of not being able to see Brandon anymore out of sheer awkwardness.

"No, I'm going to be dating both of them." Stella seemed to think this solution should have been obvious. "It'll be a wake up call to Sky that I'm not one to be messed around with and he needs to tell me what he wants."

"And if it isn't?"

"Then I have both to keep me company and, who knows, maybe I'll like Daniel better in the long run and he'll be my boyfriend." Stella paused. "I know what you're thinking but it's not like I'm cheating on anyone; Daniel knows about Sky and Sky will know about Daniel just as soon as he's not too busy to see me in person."

"I didn't think you'd cheat on anyone," Bloom said quietly, not sure how Stella could have such personal conversations with people they didn't know obviously listening.

She gave an uncomfortable smile to her manicurist when she was instructed to put her nails under the UV lamp. The nail artists didn't seem to mind what was going on though, and instead cleared up her bench and pretended not to hear anything. "I just thought that you really liked Sky."

"I dooo," Stella drew out the last syllable like a child would. "But I can't do anything if he doesn't want what I want. So I either need to get through to him or I need to move on." That was surprisingly mature of her, Bloom thought.

"Okay, well… is there anything you want me to say to Brandon?"

"Hmm, no, not unless he brings it up. I don't want Sky to think I'm being desperate."

Stella was in a good enough mood that she insisted on paying for both of their nails before Bloom could even get her purse out of her bag. She wasn't going to complain about having a princess cover her bill; she always felt a little guilty when she spent her money on things like this. The terms and conditions of her maintenance grant didn't prohibit this kind of service, but she always felt like she should be saving it for textbooks and school outings.

Bloom always felt slightly out of place in Stella's favourite smoothie bar. It was one of those places that just seemed too cool for her to be in; she always imagined that Mitzie could be just around the corner, criticising the choice of music playing on the old fashion jukebox. But Stella loved the atmosphere here, the range of the smoothie menu, the little tapas that came with them, and Bloom had to concede that the servers here were the best looking of all food spots in Magix.

They took up a little round bar table in the corner, sitting in precariously tall seats to match it, and Stella casually flicked through the menu, deciding whether she was hungry enough to get food here too.

"Do you wanna eat? If so I'll just get the sharing platter and have what you don't want," she decided. Bloom had spent enough time out with Stella to know that that was code for Stella wanting to devour about two thirds of it but not wanting to feel like she was eating a lot.

"Sure, I'd like a tropical smoothie," she said. "Will you order?"

"There's a really cute bartender up there whose number you could definitely get," Stella teased. "Nah, it's okay, I know you don't like ordering. Besides, I know you're still into Brandon, back in a sec."

Bloom watched her saunter up to the counter and lean over it to talk to the guy by the juicer. She seemed happy and relaxed, making conversation before she put in their order, laughing at some witty comment he'd probably made. It blew Bloom's mind that someone could be that confident with strangers, able to make amusing small talk without worrying about getting in the way. It was just another reminder that her best friend had grown up in a very different environment to her. She was a princess after all.

There was a buzz and Bloom realised that Stella had left her phone on the table. Without meaning to, Bloom read the message that had just come through. It was from Daniel, a little red heart after his name, which she noted was a step down from the two pink hearts next to Sky's.

Just got into Magix, there's a good bar singer at Maralga's. Want to join me, babe?

She handed the phone back to Stella when she returned from the bar.

"Sorry, she said. "I didn't mean to read it."

Stella shrugged and opened the message, pausing to read it and smile, then looking up guiltily. It took Bloom a moment or two to realise what was prompting this reaction.

"It's okay, you can go see him. I'll be fine here, you've already ordered for me."

"Thanks!" Stella reached over to squeeze her shoulders. "You're just the best friend. I've already paid so just invite someone to come join you." She grabbed her phone, purse and coat and took off out of the smoothie bar. Whoever this Daniel was, he must have very good hair.

Bloom watched her friend leave before she considered who to call. Looking at her messages she could see that Musa and Tecna had taken the plant issue into their own hands and had convinced Flora to move down to the edge of the swamp where she could comfortably spread out until the exam. They were feeling bad about kicking her out of the dorm so they were bringing their study material with them and stay there with her.

That ruled the rest of the Winx out. She considered if there were any of her other classmates that she wanted to invite out for some free food, but it was a bit of a weird proposition and she didn't think she knew any of them well enough for this request. There was one person she did want to eat tapas with, but she was feeling shy about asking him.

Eventually, the anxiety about being sat here alone the whole time overtook the worry about asking Brandon to join her and she dialled his number. It started to ring and she rehearsed what she was going to say until he picked.

"Hey," he said, his voice sounding so upbeat that it completely threw her off her plan.

"Hey." Bloom wished that she wasn't coming across as giddy as she felt. "Um."

"Everything alright?"

"Er, yeah. Sort of." For god's sake, she needed to get out an actual sentence. "Are you busy at the moment?"

"Not really, no. Why?"

"Well, I was in Magix with Stella but she's had to run off and now I'm stuck with an order of food coming and no one to eat it with. I don't suppose you were planning on coming into the city anyway…?"

"I can be there in twenty minutes, is that quick enough?"

"Yeah," she said, her face breaking into a smile. "I think I could wait that long."

Bloom gave him the bar's address and they said their goodbyes. She put the phone down and stared at it for a while. Had she just asked him on a date? No, she hadn't. She hadn't said that it was. And, besides, they had hung out together like this before and neither of them had considered it a date. Although now she thought about it, she wasn't sure if they'd ever done anything quite like this, certainly he'd never immediately dropped what he was doing to come join her.

The waiter was surprised that Bloom was on her own when he came over with the smoothies, but she just smiled at him and he didn't say anything, leaving her to sip her tropical concoction until Brandon arrived. He'd clearly rushed to get there, his blonde hair tousled from the bike helmet he had under his arm, and his leather jacket zipped up against the wind chill.

"So," he said, taking the seat next to her rather than the one opposite. "What did Stella order?"

The food arrived not long after he did, and they ate together quietly for a few minutes. He was sitting alarmingly close to her and she could feel her face getting warm from the intense proximity, she needed to take regular sips of her smoothie to cool down.

"How's the studying going?" He asked after finishing a mouthful of nachos. "You should have aced the Simulation Chamber after all that happened." Bloom smiled, covering her mouth as she finished chewing. Brandon had been very worried when she told him what happened. He'd volunteered to help protest the grade if it wasn't a passing one, and his support meant a lot to her.

"I'm pretty confident with the exams I still have to take, but it's just getting so boring. I've been over this material so much and I don't know how much more I can do before I go crazy, and everyone else can't seem to contemplate doing anything else."

"Yeah, I heard Alfea's infamous for pushing students really hard during exam season," Brandon agreed. "But it's good to get a break when you need it."

"I mostly just want to do my own research about history. I always feel like I'm missing a load of context whenever I talk about current events or past experiences."

"What are you looking into at the moment?"

"Well, I was looking more at Domino after everything that happened in the chamber." She was being vague because she hadn't told anyone about what she had sensed at the core of the planet, that was something so personal she didn't want to share it with anyone else. "But I keep coming up against this claim that there's another planet that's the home of the Dragon and all magical fire."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, some books list it as Domino but some list it as Sparks, but I can't find much about Sparks on its own so I'm kind of lost," she said, trying to focus on the problem she was having in her research rather than how much she could feel his body heat radiating off him.

"Ah!" Brandon smiled. "I know what's happened."

"What?"

"So, Sparks is Domino. It's not talked about because the planet fell ages ago and when the descendants of the royal family then attempted to retake it, they renamed it."

Everything Bloom knew about the planet boiled down to: there had been three witches (known as the Ancestral Witches) that had attacked the dimension in an attempt to steal the Dragon's Flame from it. They had failed but destroyed the planet in the process, forcing the people living there to flee to the other worlds. More recently, about twenty years ago, a force led by their descendants went back to try and revive Domino but encountered deadly traps and curses placed upon it. There was no news of them ever having returned.

"Why Domino?" Bloom wanted to sort out the names before she started asking more in-depth questions. Sparks made sense as a name for a fire world, Domino's reasoning wasn't as clear.

"Because, at the time, the King said that if his dimension fell further, the whole of the magical dimension would follow."

"They went back, right? To try and save Domino."

"Yes, but the expedition failed. The last anyone ever heard of them was in the court at Eraklyon. Sky's father refused to honour an agreement made between the two kingdoms at Sparks' heyday and so the party left without his help."

"Damn, that's so sad."

"That's not even the worst part," he said, shaking his head. "They took their two kids with them."

"And no one came back?"

"No one came back."

Bloom stared at the smoothie in front of her. She didn't know why she was surprised that terrible things happened in the magical universe, just as they did on Earth, she had just assumed with the peace that Magix maintained and with how wonderful Alfea was that these things just didn't happen. And it was so recent, within a lifetime of her, and no one spoke about it.

"I didn't mean to bring the mood down," Brandon said, awkwardly rubbing the back of his neck. "Let's do something more light-hearted after we've finished this."

"What were you thinking?" Bloom asked, dipping a breadstick in garlic sauce.

"How about a movie? There are several good ones on at the moment and I'm in the mood to sit in the dark and not do very much." He smiled, and Bloom decided that they'd do whatever the hell he felt like.

"Yeah," she said. "I could see a movie."

The usher at the theatre laughed when he saw Brandon trying to smuggle Kiko in inside his jacket and just told them to make sure he stayed quiet and didn't make a mess. Despite it being a Saturday, the cinema was almost empty for the afternoon screening and they sat together with their popcorn watching a thriller about a magical spy. Some time after the previews, Bloom realised that his arm was round the back of her seat and she spent a good minute or two forcing herself to relax into it so that he didn't move it. He smelt like sandalwood and motor oil and she quickly lost track of the movie's plot. She wanted to stay in her seat with him forever, cuddled up close and heady with his scent.

They did have to leave after the credits though. Brandon put a hand on the small of her back to help her out of the cinema while she was holding Kiko's lead. She was all smiles all the way back, feeling relaxed and content as he chatted to her about his studies and the upcoming Red Fountain exhibition.

He got off the bus with her at Alfea and saw her to the gate, saying that he'd just catch the next bus to Red Fountain. Bloom watched Kiko enjoying his goodbye fussing and then Brandon stood up to be at the same level as her.

Suddenly, their faces were very close together. His lips were parted slightly and she had to resist the urge to wet hers as she looked. Was he about to kiss her? Did she want that? Honestly, yes. She wanted him to wrap his arms around her and press his mouth against her. Screw waiting a long time to make sure she was over Andy, she wanted Brandon now and she was sure of that.

Bloom had never been so aware of each inch of her body, from her fingers to the top of her head she was buzzing. The only thing she had ever wanted more than to kiss Brandon was to be a fairy and it looked like both were coming true. His lips were barely a few centimetres from her's, his eyes so intense that she had to flick her gaze to the side.

That was when she saw her. Musa had been walking towards the bus stop and was now attempting to hide behind the narrow bars of the Alfea gate. Bloom abruptly stepped back from Brandon; she was certain that a first kiss with him was not going to have spectators.

"Oh look," Bloom said weakly. "Musa's here." She waved and her friend slunk out to the bus stop, disappointed.

"Hi." Brandon sounded cold when he addressed Musa, who was looking sheepish.

"Hi, I was just coming back to fetch some stuff for Flora, she forgot a few bits for her plants…" Musa indicated the bag over her shoulder. "Don't let me interrupt…" She awkwardly shuffled to the covered area of the bus stop several feet away.

Bloom looked back at Brandon. He had stepped away and was looking past her, down the road. It looked like he'd lost the moment and Bloom stared at her shoes in bitter disappointment.

"I think that's my bus," he said, and tapped her arm goodbye. The touch shocked her and she jumped a little.

"Bye…" she said as he walked away to wait even further away from her than Musa was sitting. Her friend mouthed 'I'm sorry' at her and Bloom turned to walk back into the school, head down and hands in her pockets.