.:14:.

This is different than what happened to Zack

"Are you sure you want to do this?"

Cody lifted his gaze from the sheets of paper that sat in front of him. Then he narrowed his eyes towards Tapeworm, who sat across from him, gently tapping the straw of his soda to his lips. "It's easy for you to say," Cody snorted. "You've already got your college acceptance. MIT is going to be lucky to have you."

His voice held a bit of sarcasm, but also a tone of pride. He was happy for his best friend, having all his ducks in a row already. And he was telling the truth, MIT was lucky to have Tapeworm go to their school. The boy who was originally known for how many hot dogs he could eat in a sitting proved to be very complex as Cody to know him. Yes, he could be as much of a nerd and fixate on science and mathematical things as Cody could, but there was more to Tapeworm than people saw. He always loved basketball, despite not having been very coordinated at first, and had a healthy sense admiration for football—as well as the betting that became centered around it.

Cody realized, in that moment as the two sat in the library during study hall, that he was going to miss having his friend around. Tapeworm truly did understand him and that was hard to pas up. The feeling of knowing there was someone out there who experienced the same things and had the same interests…getting bullied probably pushed them closer together than any other friendship he had, if he were being honest.

Tapeworm was the one he could ramble on and on about the things that randomly popped into his head; what truly was the meaning of life, was there a possibility of a paradox that could end the life they knew, were aliens real or just a fabrication of the movie industry—that one Cody wasn't quite sure of, if he were being honest. He believed in ghosts when young and managed to grow out of it but there were many moments of unexplained chemicals and burns on those that claimed to be abducted. Cody found he believed things in hard fast truth with evidence.

And the evidence presently sitting in front of him was that he was going to either find his present conversation helpful or very, very, irritating. (With Tapeworm's innocently blunt personality, it could go either way).

"Well, I knew that," Tapeworm said with a roll of his eyes. He tapped his pencil against the table top, marring the darkened wood with each strike of the tip. Cody rolled his eyes as well, making Tapeworm chuckle. "I'm just saying, I think you're starting to go overboard with this whole Yale thing."

"I'm not going overboard."

Tapeworm lifted an eyebrow and before Cody could stop him, reached out and grabbed onto the papers that sat in front of him. Cody strained to get them back, and recoiled in pain when Tapeworm smacked him across the knuckles with his pencil. "Ouch!" With a pointed stare to his best friend, he started to rub the skin around his knuckles. "Do you know how many ways you can become poisoned by the graphite in pencils?"

"Two if you count me shoving it down your throat." Tapeworm grinned. Then he cleared his throat and leaned back in his seat, reading aloud. "Cody Martin's Personal Statement." Cody sighed heavily, his shoulders slumping. "Or as the rest of us know it as, 'why you should let me into your school'."

"Are you done?"

Tapeworm ignored him and continued. "There's only one reason why Yale, the best school in the North—"

"—It doesn't say that—"

"—Should take in me, Cody Martin. It's because you all would be stupid if you don't. The motto of the school already is Lux et Veritas, meaning 'Truth and Light' and the 'truth' is that I would be the best student in the history of your school and would enlighten anyone that wanted to learn from me. Plus, my mom's kind of poor so it'd be great for a news story and publicity for the college itself."

Cody lunged forward and grabbed onto the pages in Tapeworm's hands and yanked them back, smirking when Tapeworm winced and flapped his hands in the air, waving off the sting of the papercuts he'd received. "You know you're really starting to become as bad as Zack."

"I think you're actually thinking of Max," Tapeworm replied. He continued to inspect his palms, smiling a little at the mention of his girlfriend. "Zack's been pretty good lately. He's calmed down a lot, actually." He lifted his brows to regard Cody, whose eyes scanned over the large stack of papers. "Or haven't you noticed?"

"Noticed what?" Cody tried to deflect the question. It wasn't that he was getting tired of talking about Zack but…he couldn't help but let out a small sigh. "I mean, yeah, he's been doing better with school and everything. But this is Zack we're talking about. The moment he gets bored, he'll just go back to the way things always were."

"Where you're the one who always has to come to his rescue?"

"I didn't say that."

"You didn't have to." Tapeworm nodded to the papers in his hands. "I saw it in there." He made a low whistling sound, dropping his hands to rest against his stomach. "I think you went completely overboard with the personal statement as you always do, but you didn't write about yourself. You wrote about Zack."

Cody shifted his gaze away. He hadn't expected anyone but the school to read his personal statement, honestly. Not even Miss. Tutweiller or Principal Forgess or even the school guidance counselor—though he wasn't sure how much he believed someone with the name 'Mr. Blanket—had read it. They said they hadn't needed to. They knew Cody would get into any college he wanted due to with his grades alone. So, rather than writing his personal statement of getting into Yale about his grades, the committees he lead, the teams he was on…Cody wrote about Zack and what I meant to be a twin.

What it was like to have someone who was may as well be an extension of him. The thoughts and feelings Cody was afraid to have, Zack did and vice versa. They'd gone through so much together to truly understand what it was like to rely on each other. And knowing they were getting to the point they'd be split up and how terrified that made him…Cody wrote about it. Wrote about as much as he knew Yale was the best school for him, he was scared to start that journey without his brother by his side in some way. That it made him more than the guy who was good at everything academic and enjoyed everything a bit more on the feminine side.

"So? It's a personal statement, it's personal." Cody took another cursory glance over his personal statement before biting the bullet and sticking it into the envelope ready to send to Yale. "And it's bound to get them to let me in."

"Like your entire transcript won't already do it," Tapeworm pointed out. He pressed a finger to his cheek. "And, last time I checked, you already sent in your application."

"Well, I don't think re-doing my personal statement is going to hurt at all. Better safe than sorry."

"Is that the same one you're going to be sending everywhere else?"

"Yeah."

"So you've finally thought about other schools you may want to go to?"

With that, a snort escaped Cody's lips. He couldn't help the air of smugness that came to his tone as he continued. "Let's be honest, Tape. I can get into whatever school I want." He ignored Tapeworm's 'don't be so sure' look. What was it with everyone telling him that he had to stop focusing so much on Yale? No one was telling Bailey that and Yale was her dream since…forever according to the stories Bailey told. They would go together and major in very similar, yet different majors. It was going to be fun, especially having someone he knew there with him. "It's just a formality for mom and dad to stop freaking out about tuition."

Tapeworm nodded as if he suddenly understood. "And all of this is to make sure you get the scholarships and everything."

"Not everyone can get a free-ride," Cody reminded him. "I want to make sure my mom and dad don't have to spend any if they have to. And, you know, there's only a percentage of scholarships that they give out to those they deem worthy."

"You think you've got room in that big brain of yours to worry about our basketball tournament?"

Cody grinned. He started to say something back then stopped, his gaze shifting to the side. His heart immediately started to race. The silent signal that something was worrying him, that something was making him afraid. There wasn't anything different around the library; people came and went as they got their work done. That was it. So what was making the hair on the back of his neck stand up as it had when he and Zack were looking for that ghost in the Tipton Hotel?"

"Are you okay? You sort of went pale, just now."

Cody turned his gaze back to Tapeworm and nodded mutely. It didn't take long for him to realize what made him so uncomfortable. Sadie. Again. She came into the library and sat at a nearby table, pulling her long red hair behind her shoulders and leaned over her notebook. She paid no attention to Cody or Tapeworm, but her proximity to them simply made him annoyed.

"What is it?"

"Sadie."

"What about her?"

Cody pressed his lips together. How pathetic was it? Sadie was making him uncomfortable. Alert the media. The boy that blushed nearly every time a girl came near him, the one who couldn't 'talk to the ladies' the way other guys could with ease, was uncomfortable with one of his classmates being around. And for what? Because she was around? How stupid. No matter how many times he managed to convince himself how silly it was, he couldn't help but feel annoyed.

Sadie lifted her head as if someone called her name. As she turned her head, slowly moving in their direction, Cody aligned himself behind Tapeworm. Since getting into shape to play basketball, Tapeworm had bulked up. He lifted weights and went running nearly every day, something that Cody didn't have time for. His shouldered broadened and arms became cut with muscle. The perfect cover for someone who was still thin.

With a heavy sigh, Cody leaned forward, resting his forehead against his hands. He was sure this was how Zack felt when Sadie was around towards the end of their relationship. At least he was more straightforward about it, Cody thought. "She's making me uncomfortable," he mumbled.

Tapeworm's face screwed up in confusion. "Why? What's she's doing?" Then he bobbed his head back and forth. "Well. I guess I get it. None of us have really talked to her since she tried to blackmail Zack."

And we had to threaten her to get that to stop, Cody thought. He couldn't help the wry smile that came to his face. It wasn't something he was proud about. "It's not that its…she's everywhere."

"We're in school."

"No. I mean…everywhere I look now, it's like she's there. When Zack and I were at my dad's place. When we were playing basketball in the park. Everywhere in the halls." He paused. "Okay, that part I can't really…okay, forget that." He waved his hand. "But this is starting to get weird. Statistically speaking 7.5 million people were stalked in one year—"

"—Stalked?"

"And 61 percent of those that were stalked were female and 44 percent were male, and those were from those they were romantically involved with."

"Okay, but—"

"—And 15 percent of women and 6 percent of men are going to be stalking victims during their lifetime."

Cody knew he was starting to sound hysterical. But that's what happened when he had information he was sitting on for too long. Since Sadie had arrived at their gym, at their father's gym, Cody wondered if there was anything else going on. There were too many coincidences for it to truly be a coincidence. He didn't believe in coincidences. His rational mind wouldn't let him. One night where he had too much time on his hands, Cody looked it up. And the results scared him.

Tapeworm started to say something else then looked up when the school bell rang, signaling them to go to their next class. "Honestly, Cody, I know you like to learn. But sometimes you really take it too far. It wouldn't be too strange if Sadie liked you, too. I mean, you are twins. But at least you now know she's not worth it."

"This is different than what happened to Zack," Cody called over the sound of his classmates gathering their things together to get to class on time. Still, he couldn't help but question if it were true. Cody grabbed his backpack and pulled it over his shoulders to leave the library. He kept his eyes straight ahead as he passed Sadie's table.

She didn't pay him any attention either. Only let out a low, 'darn it', under her breath when she knocked her notebook to the ground. Instinctively, Cody bent to retrieve it, then quickly backed away before he could touch the paper.

Written all over her notebook was his name.

A/N: Oh this is fun to write. Especially now that I have more time to do it. And I realized that I've nevr really showed Cody's and Tapeworm's friendship too much in any of our stories and they'd be the one who has the most in common. Please let me know what you think of this chapter and I'll update again soon.

Cheers,

-Riles