A Woman Scorned

Disclaimer: I own no one but Miss. Perfect

And breathe in deep let it out slow
Did you hear it's all my fault again
I know why no one else knows
why I'm here all alone again

-The Early November

"Dude, pay attention," Warren growled at his lab partner, who was currently staring out the window.

"Huh?" Will asked intelligently, snapping out of his daze and looking over at his friend.

If he were anyone else, Warren might have been tempted to bang his head on the table in front of him, but this was Warren, and he was more dignified, er, cool, than that. Warren could not afford to fail this class. He had only recently decided that it was worth it to pass in this school, and every assignment counted. Which is why it pissed him off that his partner was currently staring at his girlfriend.

"Maybe if you were paying attention," he slapped the tabletop to emphasize his point, re-attracting Will's attention and causing the boy to jump at the same time, "and not staring at your girlfriend, you'd know what we are supposed to be doing."

"Sorry," Will said, the smile on his face not leaving any doubt about the sincerity–or lack thereof–of his apology.

"Whatever, just try and pay attention."

It wasn't long before Will's attention wandered once again to the class standing outside the window. Warren ignored his friend this time, giving up hope of making him care more about the assignment and less about who it was standing outside the window.

Unfortunately, Warren wasn't the only one to notice Will's vacant expression and the direction of his gaze.

"Mr. Stronghold," Mr. Medulla said in his nasally voice, jerking Will's attention back to the classroom, "would you kindly tell me what is so interesting about the sidekick class that you simply cannot focus on the assignment?"

Will flushed bright red and started sputtering, nothing he was trying to say making much sense. Warren's lips quirked into his typical bad boy smirk. The one that lets everyone know he's amused.

Somehow, Mr. Medulla managed to extract an answer from the highly embarrasses Will, and warned him to pay attention from now on.

Will shook his head at Warren's smug look, "Shut up."

Warren let his hair loose and ran a hand through it with a weary sigh. He had just gotten off work and he knew he still had homework he had to do. The bell tinkled as he stepped out of the Paper Lantern, his jacket not very affective against the cold of late fall.

He spotted a familiar head of short reddish hair ahead of him at the bus stop, the same bus stop he was headed toward. He nearly turned around to find another, but remembered that there were none close, and he needed to get home. He leaned against the telephone pole near the stop, but far enough away that he could pretend not to have noticed Susie.

As fate would have it, he glanced over–surreptitiously, of course–he noticed that she had no jacket and was shivering. The soft side he never admitted to having–but had shown the night he listened to Layla talk incessantly about Will–but occasionally gave into made him toss her his jacket.

She caught it with a confused look on her face. "What's this for?"

"It's a jacket, you wear it," he said bluntly.

She gave him a look, the same one she had the other day in Nurse Spex office.

"I know what it is," she told him in annoyance, not putting it on. "But why did you give it to me?"

"You're cold," he said shortly, not liking that he was getting dragged into conversation. "Just put it on."

"What about you?" She still held the jacket, not moving to put it on.

"I'll be fine, now put the jacket on, or give it back."

Susie shrugged into it, rolling her eyes. An awkward silence fell over them as the bus pulled up. They climbed aboard, sitting apart, each hoping the distance would restore some kind of privacy that seemed to have been breached. Neither of them were ready to give up their secrets.

Warren's stop was first and he hurried off, trying to make a clean getaway, and forgetting his jacket, which Susie had halfway off by the time he was gone.

Warren unlocked the door to his house and stepped into the warmth that crept into his bones after the chill of the night. There had been some kind of strange connection with that girl that he didn't want to consider. He didn't really want to connect with anyone. The people he called his friends had forced themselves on him, enveloping him into their group.

As he sat down at the kitchen table to start his homework he realized two things: She still had his jacket, and she now knew where he lived.

A/N: Sorry this took awhile, but I've been busy and haven't been writing much. I'll try harder from now on, I promise... : )

Jenni K.