Emma chewed on her lip as she walked up to the school. She could hear the shouting from outside. But she'd purposely arrived late to avoid any possible conversations with anyone. Now she just had to find a seat and quietly slide in before anyone noticed her.

"Hey Blondie," Jay said as he came up beside her. "Are you here to watch the boyfriend play?"

"Yes, but what are you doing here?" Emma was confused as to why Jay would even bother to show up. He and Sean were on the outs and it wasn't like he was full of school spirit.

"I had nothing better to do today so I thought I'd take in a game. I do so love watching basketball," Jay said as he put his arm around Emma and propelled her towards the gym doors.

Emma rolled her eyes. "Nice try, Jay. Now what's the real reason?"

"I was bored and the cheerleaders wear short skirts. That's the only reason I would come to a game."

"That makes sense. Well, I'll see you later," Emma ducked out from under Jay's arm and hurried to the entrance of the gym.

"You're not going to sit with me?"

Emma turned around. "Considering that my boyfriend isn't very happy with you right now I don't think that would be a good idea."

"You don't seem like the type of girl who takes orders from anybody."

"I'm not going to do something that I know will deliberately piss off my boyfriend either. I hope you and Sean work out your differences but until then I don't think it's a good idea for us to be hanging out."

"I like you, Emma."

"You don't even know me."

"I know I like looking at you. The rest can come later," Jay said with a wink.

"You're incorrigible."

"I know. You'd better go in before your boyfriend thinks you ditched him for me."

"Later Jay," Emma said before walking into the building. She couldn't help but like Jay. She didn't trust him, not that she really even trusted Sean, but she thought he was a funny guy who was easy to get along with.

Emma sighed with relief when the game was over. She swore that basketball had to be the most boring sport ever. But the cheerleaders' show during the break was awesome. Paige and Manny got into a fight with another cheerleader and they had a screaming match right in the middle of the gym. Emma was pretty sure Paige was pissed about the cheerleader calling Paige a "low-grade ho". Manny stepped into defend her friend and pretty soon all the cheerleaders were screaming at each other. Teachers stepped in to break it up before any blood was drawn, unfortunately.

Emma went outside to wait for Sean by his car. They were going to go out with Paige and Manny to celebrate winning the game.

"I can't believe she had the nerve to call you that," Manny said as she and Paige walked out of the building and towards Sean's car.

"I know. Well I'm sorry if Spinner likes having sex with me. Maybe if she'd stop being such a virgin and just realize that sex is a natural part of life, he wouldn't cheat on her. Hi Emma."

Emma couldn't help but smile. She'd caught the last part of Paige's statement. Only Paige could go from bitch to friendly in a nanosecond.

"Did you like the game," Manny asked as she dropped her cheerleading bag on the ground.

"Sure, it was fun."

"Please," Paige said with an eye roll, "it was completely boring. The only reason people go to watch is because of the Spirit Squad."

"Well you guys gave them quite a show today," Emma agreed.

"It's not my fault that Darcy won't relax. Spin has needs, I have needs, and we need each other. She was the one who started it."

"And you were the one who finished it, right?" Sean came up behind Paige and put his hands on her shoulders. "Paige Michalchuk never backs down from a fight. Too bad I couldn't see it."

"I'm sure it'll be up on You Tube soon enough. I'll e-mail you when it's posted. Can we go now?" Paige pulled away from Sean and opened the back door of the car.

"Sure, just let me do something first." Sean went over to Emma and gave her a quick kiss. "Thanks for coming."

Emma felt herself start to blush. "You were really good."

"You're really cute when you blush." Sean leaned in for another kiss but was interrupted by the beeping of his car horn.

"Can we go," Paige yelled out the window, "because I'm starving."

"We'll do this later," Sean said before he opened the passenger door to let Emma slide in.

"I'm going to stop taking you places if this is going to be how you treat me," Sean told Paige when he got into the car.

"Well then your cool factor would decrease by like seventy-five percent. You'd be like Manny."

"Hey!"

"I was just a joke, Hon. Let's go eat. I vote for Chinese."

"Where are you taking us, Sean?" Manny groaned as they continued walking through downtown Toronto. They'd finished eating and then Sean said he had a great idea for a fun time but he wouldn't tell them where they were going.

"Yeah, Sean, just tell us. I'm tired of walking," Paige whined.

"You ate like a ton of sesame chicken so you do need the exercise," Manny said.

"You do too, Miss Regular Coke. That Coke you were sucking down like no tomorrow is way worse than my chicken and vegetables."

"Those chicken and vegetables had a ton of sauce on them. And I saw you chowing down on the chow mein noodles. Those things have a ton of fat."

"Give it a rest guys, we're here." Sean stopped in front of a building that had wild lights blinking all around it.

"The arcade," Paige said as she wrinkled here nose with disgust, "are you kidding?"

"I thought we could use a night of stupid fun."

"It'll be cool. We can talk the geeks into pay for our games," Manny said as she opened the door. "Come on, Paige, let's go."

Paige and Manny entered the arcade leaving Sean and Emma outside.

"Are you okay, Em?"

Emma looked at the building and she knew she couldn't go it. All the people and the loud noises would be too much for her to handle.

"It's getting kind of late, maybe we should head home."

"It's eight thirty, Em."

"Yeah, but I thought we could use some alone time."

Sean crossed his arms over his chest. "I like alone time but I don't think that's the reason you don't want to go in there."

"What do you think the reason could be," Emma asked, trying to keep the fear and the anger out of her voice.

"You tell me. I think it has something to do with that secret you've been hiding from all of us."

"Don't tell me we're back to that again." This time Emma couldn't keep the anger out of her voice. Why couldn't he just accept that there were certain things she couldn't tell him?

"You're my girlfriend, Emma, doesn't than mean we're supposed to be honest with each other?"

"We're not married, we're just dating. Total disclosure isn't something we need to do right now."

"How do think it makes me feel that you can't trust me?"

"I don't trust a lot of people. My past has a lot do to with that."

"And you won't tell my anything about that past."

"People start to act strange when they know the truth," Emma said quietly. She looked down at the ground and shook her head. "Maybe you won't be any different. I don't want to lose you."

"There's nothing that you can say to me that's going to change how I act around you or feel about you."

"Okay, you want to know so I'll tell you. I have a genetic defect that causes hearing loss. It's been getting worse as I get older. Right now I'm having problems in loud places because I can't differentiate voices. In the next ten years the doctors say that I'll be completely deaf. Now you know."

"Right and I'm still standing here with you. And my feelings about you haven't changed. You're still the same Emma you were five minutes ago. Nothing has changed."

I know, long time no update. I'm sorry. Hope people are still interested in this story. I'll try to be better about updating in the future.