Spoilers: After Caitlin and Eric passed out fliers about his neighbor's land poisoning

Disclaimer: I own none of these characters. They are the property of Nickelodeon.

1 Chapter One

"Caitlin!" Eric shouted down the school corridor. "Hey, I just want to thank you for helping with the flyers again."

They stopped in the middle of the hallway. Eric was out of breath. He hadn't felt like he was worth anything since talking with his father about what happened with the cattle. But then Caitlin came up with this great idea, and it worked. One of her ideas actually worked.

She smiled and nodded. "Look, I just wanted to help in any way I could. And I could help by taking pictures. It's what I'm good at!"

"Yeah," he agreed. "I can't believe that the Mayor finally agreed to hear us out and is cleaning it up."

They began to walk down the hallway.

Caitlin's face turned serious for a moment. "Eric?"

"Yeah," he smiled.

"Um, has your dad gotten back yet?"

Eric's face also turned serious. "Yeah. He got back a couple of days ago." They stopped in front of their Chem class.

"Well…" her voice trailed.

"He's still freaked out about it all. I mean, he's still mad at me." Eric ran his hand through his hair. "But he's heard of what we did with the flyers and everything and he's not as mad. I could've sworn he was ready to kill me when I told him over the phone."

The bell rang signalling the start of the next class.

Eric motioned with his head into the classroom. "We'd better get going. I can't have to make up another detention."

"Well, it wouldn't have happened if you hadn't stuck that frog on my head."

"What can I say, I love the animals!" he laughed.

***

Caitlin sat through Chem 20 relieved to hear that Eric's dad wasn't as mad at him as she knew he might be. In some way, she felt responsible for it. Not that she was to blame or anything like that, but as Eric's friend? 'Where did that come from?' she thought to herself.

Eric was definitely never considered a friend! She'd hated him with a passion. He was sooo idiotic and immature sometimes. But lately she seemed to be able to stand him a little more. Eric seemed a little more human to her these days.

The class bell rang waking Caitlin out of her thoughts. 'Yes! School's out!' She'd been waiting for the day's end from the start of school. Caitlin headed towards her locker. She had planning to ride Bandit and take a few shots down by the river. Caitlin had been slowly building her portfolio of pictures. Hopefully, Caitlin would have enough to take a GenX street magazine that she'd seen passed out lately.

"Caitlin!" a familiar voice called out to her, sending a shiver down her spine.

Turning around, she found herself face to face with Will. His eyes could make her knees turn to butter.

"Yeah?" she said non-chalantly.

"Hey," he smiled crookedly, "I was thinking you'd like to go riding with me after school."

'Yes!' she wanted to scream. "Uh, sure," she replied. 'That's it. Keep it cool.'

He smiled that heart-warming smile and said smoothly, "Great! I'll meet you in front of the ranch?"

"Sure." Caitlin turned to grab her stuff from her locker and smiled to herself.

***

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