Author: fraidy bat

Rating: T

Pairings: Olivia/Viola, Viola/Duke, Sebastian/Yvonne implied

Summary: 98 percent of the time still leaves two percent in which anything can happen. A sequel to He's Not You. Viola POV.

Disclaimer: I do not own anything from She's the Man. None of it belongs to me.

Notes: I am really sorry this took so long. I promise I didn't forget about this. I've been very busy lately, plus I needed more time than usual to get this part right. I hope you like it (and I hope someone is still reading this). Also, I am surprised that only one person (kudos to StrugglingHero) noticed the little thing about Viola and Kia that I threw in the last one. I guess everybody was distracted by all the goings on with Olivia, so that's fair. :D Oh, and sorry about any typos still hanging in there. I tend to write at, like, 3 AM when my proof-reading skills are at a low.

Chapter 6

My brother had walked in on me making out with someone before. There were several times when Sebastian barged into my room when I was with Justin, and there were plenty of moments when Duke and I thought Sebastian would be out of the dorm room for hours, but were unfortunately mistaken. At least Sebastian never caught me and Duke doing anything…horizontal. Regardless, I'm used to my brother interrupting my various romantic entanglements. It's just his way.

Never in my life did I think that Sebastian would ever walk in on me and another girl. The fact that the girl would be Olivia Lennox was another thing I was unprepared for. Yet here we were, the three of us, and Sebastian staring at Olivia and me, having just caught us with our arms around each other in a very compromising position. My brother, my brother's ex-girlfriend, and me. Everything, even the air in the room, seemed to stop moving.

By the time it registered with me that Sebastian was actually smiling (not a big smile, but still), he was backing out of the room.

"Uh…okay. I'll just tell Mom to hold off on the cake for a couple minutes," he said as casually as possible. Before stepping all the way into the hall, his face became more serious, and he looked pointedly at me. "Duke doesn't want to blow out his candles without you, Vi."

He silently closed the door, leaving Olivia and me alone in the room with his last words in our ears and the evidence of what we had just done still burning on our lips and all over our bodies.

I put a hand over my mouth and turned away from Olivia so that I was facing the door. I started shaking again, and the thought of Duke waiting for me out there so we could sing happy birthday to him made me feel nauseated. I just cheated on my boyfriend. I cheated on my boyfriend with Olivia, of all people. Duke trusted me and loved me, and I very nearly got seriously hot and heavy with our mutual friend, the girl he used to crush on, the girl who used to date his roommate. It was ironic, really. Duke mistakenly believed I had betrayed him with Olivia once before when he thought I was Sebastian, and now that I was Viola (and Duke's girlfriend), I actually had betrayed him with Olivia.

And I wanted to do it again. Even though I wasn't looking at her, I could feel Olivia watching me, waiting to see what I would do. A large part of me wanted to chuck Duke out the window completely, wrap myself around Olivia, and kiss her until I passed out or died from lack of oxygen. I was still too shocked and scared to know if what I was feeling was as serious as the love Olivia obviously felt for me, but I knew at a very basic level that I needed her and wanted her and cared about her very much.

But Duke was waiting for me outside that room. Beyond the door I was staring at was the real world, the one in which I was Duke's girlfriend, the one where I could very easily break Duke's heart into a billion pieces if I did what I so badly wanted to do. My face began to burn, and Olivia made a small, throat-clearing noise behind me. I knew I had to turn around, look at her face, deal with this—but I wasn't sure I could.

"Viola," she said in a quiet voice.

With an inhuman effort, I turned to face her and let my hand fall away from my face. She was looking right at me, and though I half expected her to be crying again, her eyes were dry. There was something hard, almost cold in them too, like she was steeling herself for something.

It's funny. The situation was incredibly complicated, and anybody looking at the knotted mess would think that all of my possible choices were difficult and full of grey areas, but I looked at Olivia's eyes and I knew. My choices were very simple. Be with Duke and break Olivia's heart, or be with Olivia and break Duke's heart. They weren't great choices, but they were clear. In the face of all that clarity, I panicked. I'm not ready for this.

"Olivia, I…" I swallowed and tore my eyes away from hers. "I'm sorry—"

"Don't," she interrupted forcefully, and I detected more than a hint of anger in her voice. "Don't say it."

"What—"

"Don't say that this was a mistake, or that you were confused. Don't tell me you want to forget this ever happened." She began moving toward the door, and I didn't stop her. When she had one hand on the doorknob, she stopped. She spoke again, more gently now. "I get that this is Duke's party, and he's waiting for you. I know you're scared. I am too. I didn't plan for this to happen, and I know you didn't either. But it did happen, and I need you to tell me that it means something, Viola."

She waited for me to say or do something, but I felt frozen. Even if I had the ability to speak, it wouldn't have mattered. I didn't know what to say. She wanted me to choose, right then and there, and I was too afraid to make the decision that would break someone's heart.

So I said nothing. Olivia's shoulders sagged with a weariness that I wasn't used to seeing in her. She opened the door, sighing softly. Sounds of laughter and music immediately filled the guest room.

"Fine," she said in a barely audible voice. "I knew it was too good to be true. I don't know why I expected anything else from you anyway."

And then she was gone, and my brain came alive again, screaming NO, over and over. This couldn't be happening. Robotically, I walked through my mom's house until I found Duke. He was standing in the middle of a large clump of people in the dining room. He caught my eye, and his whole face lit up. He extended a long arm and pulled me closer to him. My mother came into the room, balancing a large cake with a frosting soccer ball on it and eighteen burning candles stuck in it. We sang, and I think I even heard my own voice singing with everyone else. We finished the song, and Duke blew out all the candles on his first try. Everybody cheered, and Duke leaned down and kissed me. I responded and smiled and hugged him back, like any good girlfriend would.

But what I really wanted was to find someplace to lie down and die. I know that sounds melodramatic, but that's how it felt. It seemed impossible that only ten minutes before, I was kissing Olivia and feeling so happy that I didn't know what to do with it. But that had happened in some fantasy world where there was only me and Olivia, and no Duke to consider. There wasn't a good solution here. No matter what I did, someone would be hurt. The same instincts that prompted me to kiss Olivia were now telling me to detach, to shut down, and not to think about it.

I got through the rest of the party that way. I smiled at the right times, laughed when I needed to, and stuck close to Duke. I wasn't looking for her, but Olivia seemed to have disappeared. So had Greg. Duke drove me back to my dorm, thanked me for the watch, and kissed me goodnight. I didn't think about the possibility that Duke might know something was wrong. I didn't think about what I was going to tell him. When I thought at all, it was only about Olivia and the way she had felt in my arms. And the hard look in her eyes. And the sad, exhausted way she left the room.

I thanked God for allowing me to have a single. At least I didn't have a roommate to try and explain things to. I was about to collapse on my bed and sleep for a week when I remembered that Wednesday was Valentine's Day. I was sure Duke would have something big planned. The most romantic day of the year, and I might be breaking up with him. And if I didn't break up with him, I would lose Olivia for good.

As this knowledge sank in, I felt my eyes start to burn. I was never much of crier, not even when I was little. So when I pressed my face into my pillow and cried so hard I could barely breathe, it was only for something like the sixth time in my entire life.

I didn't see her at all the next day. Not before school, not between classes, not at lunch, and not in Mr. McCoy's class. I was relieved, but it wasn't like her to skip a class. So, I felt even worse. Now I was causing her to cut classes, and soon her education would disintegrate, and it would be completely my fault. It was an idiotic and presumptuous thing for me to think, but I was already so distraught that I couldn't help it.

I took no notes during McCoy's lesson. I held the pen tightly, the tip hovering over the paper but never actually making contact. Greg was there, and in his usual seat. He glanced back at me a couple times, and I expected him to still be pissed at me, but his looks were always blank, empty of feeling. I honestly didn't care what he thought of me, anyway. The second I learned that Olivia didn't really like him, that she was only spending time with him to try and move on from me, most of my hatred for Greg subsided. I still didn't trust him with Olivia, but after Sunday night's events, I didn't know if I trusted me with her either.

It took me several seconds to realize that the bell had rung, and it was time to go. I slowly loaded my things into my backpack and shuffled out to the hall. I felt like a zombie all day. I'm sure people noticed, but I didn't care.

I felt a hand descend on my shoulder, a male hand, and unfamiliar. I turned to see who it was, and all the zombie sluggishness was blasted away by sheer surprise. Greg was standing there with a slight frown. What could he possibly want?

He cleared his throat and shoved his hands deep into his pockets. His eyes darted back and forth between my eyes and the floor.

"Look," he began gruffly. "Olivia didn't say much, but…"

I had the sudden ridiculous worry that he was challenging me for her hand, and at any moment he would take out his riding gloves and slap me across the face with them. There would be paces, pistols, seconds, everything. We would duel to the death over Olivia Lennox.

"I get it," he said curtly, yanking me out of my insane fantasy. "I get why you kicked my ass yesterday."

My eyes widened.

"Don't look so shocked," he said, smiling grimly. "I'm not braindead. And like I said, Olivia didn't say a lot, but…she said enough. And I just want to say…no hard feelings."

I must have looked shocked again, because he shook his head and kept smiling.

"If things were the other way around, and you were a guy—I would have done the same thing."

"Oh," was all that came out of my mouth.

He cleared his throat again and took a step back, getting ready to end the awkwardness. "I, uh, don't know what's happening with you—with you guys now, but…just don't hurt her. Okay?"

I nodded dumbly. He nodded back and moved further away from me.

"See ya 'round." Then he turned and trudged down the hall.

My feet took root in the floor, and I didn't move for a long time.

What goes around damn well comes around. Don't ever let anyone tell you that it isn't true.

Tuesday, the next day, I didn't see her. I didn't have any classes with her on Tuesdays or Thursdays, so it wasn't that surprising. But not seeing her anywhere in school was starting to worry me, and Duke dropping "subtle" hints about the impending Valentine's Day celebrations wasn't helping. I knew I had to do something soon, but Olivia's disappearance and Duke's enthusiasm for our romantic evening together made me retreat from reality even further.

Olivia was nowhere to be found during school on Wednesday either. Greg was in McCoy's class, but this time he didn't look at me or talk to me. Our business was finished, it seemed. As I made my way to the exit after the final bell released us from captivity, I expected Duke to come find me and walk me out, like always. When he didn't, I remembered that this was Valentine's Day, and Duke was probably off preparing for tonight.

I am so screwed.

I didn't know how I was going to get through a romantic evening with everything hanging over my head. I guess I hoped that when I arrived at the moment with Duke, that special Valentine's Day moment when 'I love you' is said and promises are exchanged, I would know what the right thing to do was. I would know which person to choose. I would know which heart to break.

Sunshine from outside was coming in through the front entrance of Illyria, and my legs mechanically carried me toward it. It was then that karma came full circle, and two hands closed around my right arm and tugged me hard into an empty classroom. I was pushed up against a wall, and the door shut with a sound thud. Olivia let go of my arm and took a few steps back to put some distance between us.

She looked me straight in the eye, unafraid. The last time I saw her, she had been crying, and her hair and clothes were kind of mussed from all the kissing and groping we did. Now, she was perfectly put together in a tank top and tight jeans. Her hair was pulled up in a flawless ponytail, and I caught the shimmer of cherry lip gloss on her mouth. I swallowed, my knees weakening. She looked good. I could see immediately that she had something to say, so there was no need for me to scramble for words.

Thank god.

"Don't worry, I'm not locking you in," she said evenly, eyes never leaving mine. "I need to say something, and then I'll let you go."

I nodded and waited.

"You probably noticed I wasn't in school the past few days." The corner of her mouth quirked up in a bitter half smile, and she finally looked away from me. "I wasn't doing so well. This whole thing has been really screwed up, but I'm sure you know that already.

"But I realized this morning that I can't let this run my life. At some point, I just have to get past it. I mean, I can't not go to school. And I don't want to cry ever, ever again. I can't even tell you how tired of crying I am." She paused shake her head in sad amusement at herself. "I know you have a lot to figure out, so I want to make this really clear for you."

She paused to catch my eye again, and there was no trace of the cold hardness there. Now, her eyes were bright with hope and determination.

"I want to be with you, Viola," she said without a trace of hesitation. "I need to be with you. And I think—I think you want to be with me, too. You might still be too afraid to admit it, but I know the kiss meant something to you. It definitely meant something to me. And that's why…"

Here she faltered, the first sign of how much sheer emotion was behind all the words. My heart began to ache inside me. She took a breath and started again.

"That's why I can't just be your friend anymore. Not after you kissed me like that. Not after I was so close to you. I could never go back to watching you be with someone else when I know that you feel this too," she said, moving closer to me. My heart threatened to beat right out of my chest. She dropped her voice to a near whisper. "I'm not trying to give you an ultimatum, but this is how it is. And I don't want you to rush into a decision. When you're ready, you'll either choose to stay with Duke, and I'll fade quietly out of your life…or you'll tell me that you want to be together because you need me the same way I need you."

She was awfully close now. I could smell her perfume, and practically taste her lips again.

"So take your time with your decision, Viola," she said, brushing my cheek with her fingertips. "I'm waiting for you."

Then she leaned in and kissed me softly on the lips, lingering for only a few seconds before she pulled back just enough so that our mouths were just barely touching.

"I love you," she whispered. And then she let go of me and walked out of the room, leaving me standing alone against the wall.

My knees buckled, and I slid slowly down the wall until I was sitting awkwardly on the floor. She loves me. She loves me.

It was simultaneously the best and worst moment of my whole life so far.