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"…So I said to the President, 'If you stop playing the saxophone, maybe Americans can go 439 days in space.' " The crowd laughed. "But seriously folks, we have a great set of guests lined up for you tonight. The lovely Julia Roberts is here." Applause was heard, and Wilson switched off the TV. Becca had been asleep on his shoulder for hours. He had stayed put because, not only was he watching TV, but he was afraid to move her. She hadn't been sleeping well for the past few days, and he wanted her to get all the sleep she could possibly get.

It was a quarter to one now, and they both had school the next day. He gently got up and propped her head with his hands. She stirred a bit but did not awaken. Wilson gingerly scooped Becca up in his arms and, careful not to fall over, carried her over the threshold and onto their bed. He slipped her into the sheets – the same sheets he had turned down hours before in hopes that she would nap – and got in on the other side. She settled right in and didn't even notice she had been moved.

"I love you sweetie," he whispered and rolled over to go to sleep.

The next morning, Wilson shut off the alarm quickly. She hadn't heard it and he dressed and got ready for school by himself. He wanted to wake her up at the last possible second needed so she could make up on some missed sleep. At 6:50, though, it was definitely time for her to get up.

He nudged her lightly. "Becks, time to get up."

She rubbed her eyes and rolled her head a bit. "What time is it?" she mumbled.

"Ten of seven. Get up."

"Oh jeez," she said. She reached for Wilson's hand, eyes still closed, and used him to support her as she stood. Wilson kissed her and she disappeared into the hallway for the bathroom.

Ten minutes later, she came out and walked back into the room. She went into the closet and pulled out her uniform dress shirt and plaid skirt, followed by her knee highs and underwear from the drawer. She started to dress when she noticed Wilson was staring.

"Aren't you going to have breakfast?"

"Nope. I want to watch you get dressed instead."

She wasn't following him. "Why?"

"Because it's sexy."

She laughed. "Perv."

She put on her schoolgirl attire, brushed her hair, and was ready to leave five minutes later. She didn't have breakfast either, but that was only because she was running late and not feeling well. Becca drove Wilson to his school and dropped him off first. Although his school started a half an hour after hers, she often reminded him that either he was there early or she'd be late every day. Two months later, he was barely grasping the concept.

Becca dropped Wilson off in the back part of the school and because it was so early, no one was around at all. Only a few students and teachers had arrived at that time. Becca looked at her watch as she pulled into the school parking lot. She had an extra two minutes to spare. Instead of dropping him off by the gym doors, Becca pulled into a parking spot.

"What are you doing? You're going to be late."

"No I'm not. I have two minutes. Now be quiet and kiss me."

They made out for three minutes and then Becca pushed him out the door, cursing her wanton ways for making her late once again. She drove a tad faster than normal, sped through a yellow light, and ran through the hallways, but she made it to her homeroom on time. Mrs. Preston, her first period English and homeroom teacher, glared at her as she rushed through the door just preceding the bell.

"You're making this a habit Miss Tanny. You know a morning tardy is worth two demerits, three if I was in a particularly bad mood."

"Yes, Ma'am, but I'm not late."

Mrs. Preston's face turned even sourer. "Not yet."

Becca talked with a few of her friends until the morning announcements came on. All was to be silent when the announcements sounded. French club, band practice, softball tryouts – Becca could have cared less. She wished that she cared, even a little, but she didn't. Since she was twelve she was more interested in boys than she was with extracurriculars.

The girl from behind tapped Becca's shoulders as soon as the announcements ended. "Did you ever go out with Donny Furslak?" The other girls always came to Becca when it came to relationship advice, even more so when it came to sex. They knew she was the expert.

"Yeah." She paused. "Isn't he in college now? USC?"

"UCLA, but yes. I spent last night with him in his dorm, and then he took me to his parent's house for breakfast this morning."

"Good for you." Becca tried to sound as warm as possible and went to turn around, only to have the girl tap her again.

"I'm not done. His younger brother is a junior at SCBA. We dropped him off this morning before Donny dropped me off here- his brother doesn't have his license yet, failed his driving test twice."

"OK."

"I saw you making out in the parking lot with some guy there." Becca's face turned white. "Who was he? He was cute."

It took her a second to come up with a calm and collected answer, but she did it. "One of my conquests. You spent the night with Donny, I spent the night with him."

The girl laughed. "You're so bad!"

Becca smiled politely and turned back around for good, only to find Mrs. Preston staring directly at her.

"Are you ready for me to start class now, Miss Tanny? I'd like to discuss Orwell's Animal Farm. You did read that for today, didn't you?"

Becca silently cursed herself. She knew when she got up this morning that she had forgotten to do something. She hadn't even read a single page of it. "Yes." There was no way she could give Mrs. Preston the benefit of public humiliation.

"Good. Then you won't mind if we have a pop quiz, will you?"

The whole class groaned, Becca included. She heard girls around her whispering about Cliff's Notes as Mrs. Preston started to hand the papers out. She wished she had been smart enough to think of that. Then maybe she might have a chance at passing this quiz. She took the paper from the girl in front of her and handed the extras behind her. Becca took a deep breath as she wrote her name and the date.

1. What did the pigs say when they were asked…

What? she thought. Since when can pigs talk? This was hopeless. Becca racked her brain to try and grab bits and pieces of what the book was about, at least what she thought it was about, and based her answers around that.

When class was over, Mrs. Preston called Becca up to her desk.

"You told me that you read the book Miss Tanny. But these answers…" she glanced down at Becca's papers. "When the pigs were asked about Sugarcandy Mountain, they certainly did not say they wanted to eat it."

"To be honest, Mrs. Preston, I didn't read any of the book. I'm sorry, and I'm sorry that I lied. I didn't want to degrade your classroom by admitting in front of the class that I did not do the work for today."

"Not only the work for today, Miss Tanny. This has been the assignment for the entire month, since Christmas actually. There is no possible excuse for having read none of it." She took out her red pen and wrote a big "F" on the top of Becca's paper. "This quiz is out of 100 points, and we are having an in-depth test on this material tomorrow, so good luck." Becca nodded and turned to leave. "And next time, Rebecca, read the book!"

Becca took a few deep breaths and walked briskly out of the classroom. She had to get to her locker before the bell rang in five minutes, probably three and a half now that Mrs. Preston held her back. Luckily, her locker was only at the end of the hallway and her second period class was not that far from it. With three tries on her lock that always liked to jam on her, Becca got it open. She pulled out the books she would need for the next two classes and slammed it, scampering down the hall just in time to make on time to her next class.

The day continued on like this until her lunch sixth period. Late start, late everything else Becca figured. Becca still wasn't that hungry by the time lunch came, so she only bought a bag of chips and water. She sat with her normal friends at the "popular" table full of anyone who was anyone in the sophomore class. The juniors sat in the table behind them, and they hated Becca. When she walked by them to get to her seat, they all quieted and stared at her.

"Getting a little fat Becca!" one of the particularly vicious and outspoken juniors yelled out.

Becca was so close to making her eat her words by saying that she was pregnant, but decided that wasn't the way to handle things. Becca just ate her lunch and made small talk with her friends about boys and annoying teachers until the bell rang. She had math and history classes next. Then she was done and could go home.

She walked into her math class with a friend and sat in her seat. She hated math, and she was so bad at it, but the teacher was a total fox so she didn't mind it. Mr. Berman was 23, just graduated from UC Davis, and had dreamy blue eyes. All the girls had major crushes on him. Little did the girls know that the school had brought him in on purpose. Geometry scores on standardized tests were way down, so they figured if the teacher was cute the girls might attempt to learn the subject.

"OK, let's get started. Yesterday we learned about cofunctions. What is the cofuntion theorem, Danielle?"

"The value of a trig function of an angle equals the value of the cofunction of the complement of the angle," she rattled off like it was nothing. Someone went home and meticulously studied the notes in hopes of impressing the teacher.

"Good. And what's the cofunction of sine, Becca?"

"Uh… cosine?"

"Correct."

Phew. Becca wasn't in the mood to be embarrassed in front of an entire class two periods in one day. That was more than a girl could take. Besides that, math always seemed so easy to everyone else. Becca felt dumb when she got the answers wrong. At least today she got asked an easy question. Hopefully, now he wouldn't call on her for the rest of the class and she could squeak by unnoticed. She had done the homework for the class, but not very well. She knew most of it was wrong, but she didn't care. Math was completely pointless to her.

History class, after Math, was uneventful. Mrs. Waverly lectured for the entire period on the constitution, since sophomore year was about early American history, and then the bell rang. She went out to her locker, got the books that she thought she might actually do the homework in, and went out to her car. The parking lot was extra full that day, so it took her an extra five minutes to get out of there. As she looked around at everyone else, she thought about where they were all going. Most likely home. She was probably one of the few who were running off to another school to pick up someone else.

Becca waited in the line of mothers expecting their sons to come out of the SCBA school building promptly at 2:30. It was a sea of vans and station wagons. The back doors opened and, one by one, the boys filed out. Wilson was among the front of the pack. He looked for Becca's car in her usually place and, finding it there, went to get in. She smiled a tired but genuine smile as he got in.

He kissed her lightly. "Hey honey."

"Hi," she said and sped off.

"How was your day?" he asked.

She shrugged. "The usual."

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A/N: This was supposed to be just an average day in the life of Becca, what she's dealing with, getting to know her better as a character in her own right and not just an extension of Wilson, that sort of thing. I kind of like it actually.

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Does Becca's day model yours? Review.

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