AN: Hey everyone! Thanks for the reviews! I know the Zac thing might have been a bit weird, seeing as I didn't include him in the first chapter. But I was kind of confused on what to write and I just started writing and pretty soon I wound up making up Zac (so no, he is of course not an actual character and probably the closest I'll ever get to owning the show would be making up my own characters…but he will be connected to another character which you will learn in this chapter), who should have been mentioned in the first chapter but wasn't.

Anyways, thanks so much for the reviews-and very sorry about the long update! School is driving me insane!

R&R and please, no flames!

Lotsa love, degrassichick

-x-

Chapter 3

-x-

Emma showed up on Jay's doorstep around twelve the next afternoon, ringing the doorbell and resting her hands in her pockets.

The door swung open moments later and Jay appeared.

"Hey." She stated with a slight smile.

Jay nodded in acknowledgement, "Hey, come on in. I'll go get Danni."

Emma nodded and stepped inside, wrapping her arms around herself.

Jay glanced at the shivering girl confusingly, "Cold?"

Emma rolled her eyes, "No, I'm suffocating, what do you think?"

Jay rolled his eyes right back at her before hollering up the stairs, "Danni! Emma's here!"

Danni was trampling down the stairs seconds later, "Emma!" she squealed and threw herself at her.

Emma laughed and hugged her, "Hey…ready to go?"

Danni nodded, "More than ready." She stated happily before walking towards the coat closet and tugging down a white coat, pulling it on over her pink tee shirt.

"So what are your plans for the day, Jay?" Emma asked, turning towards him.

Jay shrugged, "Nothing much."

"You should come with us!" Danni suggested cheerfully.

Emma shot a look at Danni but the girl didn't notice.

Jay shook his head, "No I don't-"

"Jay-Jay, please?" Danni asked, a sad look spreading in her blue eyes.

Jay shook his head at her, "Don't give me the puppy dog look, Danielle."

"Please?" her blue eyes twinkled sadly.

Jay let out a groan, "Why do you do this?"

"Are you going to go?" Danni asked pleadingly.

"Are you going to keep badgering me if I don't?" Jay fired back.

Danni grinned and nodded.

Jay groaned, "Fine, I'll go. Okay?"

Danni smiled and hugged him, "Thanks!"

Emma sighed, "Great…" she muttered bitterly as Jay pulled on his coat before the three walked out of the house.

-x-

"I like this." Danni proclaimed, throwing a sparkly lavender scarf around her neck.

"Dan, you've liked just about everything we've seen in this mall." Jay grumbled.

Emma shot him a look, "Must you be so bluntly rude?"

Jay rolled his eyes, "Well excuse me, Lady Sassafras."

Emma rolled her eyes right back towards him before glancing forward to Danni, who was now grinning perkily at a glass cabinet full of Swarovski crystal bracelets, "I have a feeling she'll be one high maintenance girl when she's older."

Jay scoffed, "What was your first clue?" he asked before walking towards her, "None of that, Dan." He stated, "Let's head down to a place where they actually sell a necklace for under fifty dollars." He stated, pulling the shiny gold necklace off of his sister's neck as well as the Chenille scarf.

Emma couldn't help but smile slightly as the three walked out of the store together.

-x-

"What should I get your parents?" Emma asked, eyeing through the racks of jewelry at Gel, a department store at the mall.

Jay shrugged, "You were going to get them a gift?"

Emma stared at him stupidly, "Of course, it's Christmas. What do you expect?"

"Well I hate to be my bluntly rude self, but I doubt they'll get you anything." Jay stated, mocking her.

Emma rolled her eyes, "Well it's still nice to think of people."

"So that means you're going to get me a gift?" Jay asked with a cocked smirk on his face.

Emma cringed before turning towards him, "I guess so."

-

The trio stepped out of the mall with arm loads of gifts, Emma had gotten a gift for each of her friends, one for Danni, and one for Mr. and Mrs. Hogart, the only person she had not bought anything for was Jay, she figured he would be far too hard to shop for and she would just tackle the subject of his gift later.

"Can we go get ice cream?" Danni asked excitedly as the clambered in the Civic.

Jay looked outside as he shut his car door, snow flurries were falling around them, "It's December." He noted.

Danni nodded, "So can we?"

"Danni, this isn't exactly…ice cream…weather." Emma stated, still shivering from being outside.

Jay eyed her pathetically as she wrapped her arms around herself in the passenger seat next to him.

"How about hot chocolate?" Jay asked.

Danni sighed and slunk back against the seat, "Fine." She grumbled under her breath.

Jay laughed despite himself and pulled out of the parking lot.

Midway down the road, he heard chattering.

He glanced over towards Emma and saw her chin shaking.

"You cold, Green Peace?"

Emma turned towards him, "W-what was your f-first c-c-clue?"

Jay rolled his eyes before staring down at the coat he was wearing, he wasn't that cold. He could easily give his up towards her.

Except for the fact that she was Emma "Green Peace" Nelson, and that fact made him very greedy.

Jay glanced back towards Danni, who was laying in the backseat fast asleep.

"Do you think if we don't go get hot chocolate that she'll notice?" he asked in a near whisper.

Emma let out a slight laugh, "I don't think so."

Jay smirked, "Good, because I'm not in the hot chocolate mood." He stated before turning towards the street that would lead them towards his neighborhood.

-x-

"C'mon, Sweets," Jay stated, pushing down the front passenger seat and scooping his little sister in his arms, "will you pull back up the seat?" he asked Emma as he walked towards the porch.

Emma pushed back the seat before closing the car door and following him up the porch steps and into the house.

She closed the door behind herself, removing her scarf, coat, and gloves and hanging them back up on the coat rack before kicking off her shoes and watching as Jay carried his sister upstairs.

He's way sweeter with kids than I thought.

Yeah, it's even kind of cute.

Jay being cute? Never.

She walked towards the couch and sat down, rubbing her hands together and shivering.

"You must be seriously cold." Jay stated.

Emma turned towards him and nodded, "Is Danni in bed?"

Jay nodded, "Yep. Today must have worn her out or something." He stated and fell onto the couch beside her.

Emma slightly scooted away.

"Do you want a blanket or something?" Jay asked after a few moments of silence (unless you counted Emma's incessant shivering).

Emma nodded, her teeth clattering, "If you wouldn't mind…"

Jay hopped up from the couch and walked off down the hallway towards the door of the coat closet, swinging it open and grabbing a fleece blanket.

He walked back towards her and tossed it into her arms.

"Thanks." She murmured and wrapped it around herself.

Jay nodded, "Yeah." He stated and sat back down on the couch.

"You're pretty good with kids, you know." Emma stated softly.

Jay shrugged, "I'm just about all she's got."

Emma shot him a questioning look which gave Jay the signal to explain.

"Well, my parents are both lawyers, which puts them through a lot of business trips. I guess it started when I was about twelve, they used to stay around home but the cases got bigger and they had to go to other places for trials, they've been all over, Montreal, Quebec, Vancouver, even down to New York City and Los Angeles in the states. So since they were always gone, I was stuck with Danni, she pretty much sees me as a father figure."

Emma gulped, "Wow…your life is so much different than how I pictured."

"Let me guess," Jay stated, leaning back on the couch, tossing his arm over the top, "you suspected that I lived in a trailer court, with an alcoholic mom and that I stole my way through life."

Emma giggled embarrassingly; he had just described what she had pictured to a tee.

"I take it I was right?" Jay questioned.

Emma nodded and gulped, "Sorry, I don't mean to offend you-"

"Don't worry. A lot of people think that of me. The Civic actually belonged to my cousin Brett before he gave it to me; it was in pretty bad shape so I fixed it up. And I do steal occasionally, but it's not because I'm starving on the streets or anything."

"Then why do you do it?" Emma asked.

Jay didn't answer but simply changed the subject, "Well what's life like in the world of Emma Nelson?"

Emma sighed, "Actually not very much different than yours."

Jay cocked an eyebrow.

Emma smirked, "My parents are gone a lot too, but that's because Snake had cancer, and then Jack, my younger brother, started getting sick a lot, so they're always gone to hospitals and grandparents' houses and whatnot."

"And you don't go with?" Jay asked.

Emma shook her head, "Manny lives with us, so I usually just hang with her."

Jay nodded as if he understood.

"Danni looks up to you, you know." Emma stated.

Jay nodded, "Yeah, I know."

"Well if you know, then why do you do some of the things you do?"

"Like what?" Jay asked.

Emma rolled her eyes, "Like smoke, drink, shoplift, go to parties, deal drugs, hook up with girls in the ravine…"

"I don't do that last one anymore." Jay stated.

Emma gulped, thinking back to the night spent in the ravine, "That was pretty bad when that happened." Emma said.

"So you regret it?" Jay asked.

Emma nodded, "I probably regret every second of it."

Jay scoffed offensively, "Well thanks."

"Jay, you gave me an STD, how can I be totally okay with that?"

"Well you seemed pretty into me at the time, Nelson."

Emma rolled her eyes, "Yeah, well I wasn't."

Jay scoffed, "So you followed me around like a lost puppy because-"

"Just shut up, Jay." Emma stated just as her cell phone vibrated against her hip.

She picked it up; it read Zac on the caller ID.

"Hello?"

"Hey babes, long time no talk." Zac Rogers said into the phone.

Emma laughed, "Yeah, I'd have to agree to that. How've you been?"

"I've missed you." He stated.

Emma couldn't help but smile into the phone, "I've missed you too."

"So what are you up to, baby?" he asked softly.

"Babysitting." Emma stated, eying Jay who was watching her with confusion, as if trying to place who she was on the phone with.

"So I guess I called at a bad time?" Zac questioned.

Emma shook her head even though he couldn't see her, "No, not at all."

"But you're babysitting…" he stated confusingly.

"Well she's asleep right now." Emma replied.

"Oh." Zac said, "Well do you have to baby sit tomorrow?"

"No, I don't think so, why?" Emma questioned.

Zac laughed, "Must you be so persistent?"

"Of course." Emma replied with a giggle.

Jay rolled his eyes, it was apparent that she was on the phone with a boy.

"Well, I wanted to take you out for lunch maybe, what do you say?"

Emma grinned, "I say, pick me up at noon."

"Well you've got yourself a deal. See you then."

Emma laughed, "Okay, love you." She said happily.

"You too, bye." Zac stated and hung up.

Emma pressed the End button on her phone and smiled happily.

"Who was that?" Jay asked.

Emma eyed him as if he should know better than to ask, "Zac."

"Well that helps, who's Zac?"

She rolled her eyes, "My boyfriend, why do you care?"

Jay wondered the same thing, why did he care?

But he knew that for some bizarre reason, he did.

Because as soon as she said boyfriend, he felt as if he had swallowed a bowling ball.

-x-

Well there's Chapter 3…I (once again) am SO SORRY about the long update!

Hope you liked it!

R&R and please, no flames!

Lotsa love, degrassichick