Title: song by Fall Out Boy.

Sugar We're Going Down

When she first woke up Nicole was confused as to where she was or how she got there, it just definitely wasn't her bed. For one the bed was lumpy and something was sticking awkwardly out of her ribs. Then she realised not only where she was but also that she had fallen asleep on the couch and the rib-digging thing was her old teddy bear, what was his name again? Oh she couldn't remember, but another thing she noticed was that she was being watched. Lily had been perched on the coffee table silently observing the way Nicole looked so peaceful while sleeping. Nicole's intense gaze shook her out of her reverie.

"You were 5 when I got you that, you named him Guppy remember?" Lily watched as Nicole looked lovingly towards the long forgotten teddy that she clutched so hard on that day.

"Yeah I remember, Grampy and uncle Noel's funeral. Couldn't you have helped me pick out a better name, one that at least made sense?" Nicole looked up and for the slightest moment felt like that innocent child again, but she hadn't been her in a long, long time.

"It made sense to you. That was a hard day on all of us, especially you. You were so young…Anyway how did you sleep?" Not liking where the conversation was heading, Lily quickly changed the subject.

"Not great." Nicole got up and stretched, she needed to stop going down memory lane or she'll cave and that couldn't happen.

"Yes, well next time sleep upstairs, Lily law." Lily stated and stalked off towards the kitchen. Nicole stood shocked for a moment, what had just happened? But then she remembered this was why her mum hated Lily so much. She was controlling and slightly manipulative, must run in the family.

"Don't give me that 'Lily law' bull you pulled with my mother because you aren't her and I don't take too kindly to orders." Nicole raised her voice, where the hell did she get off talking to her like that; she had only met the woman once.

"Sit down and eat some breakfast, you must be starving after you missed dinner." Lily purposefully ignored what her granddaughter had said because she knew sooner or later she would abide by the rules set in the Franklin household. Nicole huffed but eventually gave in and sat down.

"Ewww, what is this stuff?" Nicole whined examining the gloop in front of her.

"Porridge, now eat up you're gonna need your strength today" Lily tried to suppress a smirk as Nicole's face adopted a rather confused look while dishing herself some 'gloop', "You'll be helping me out at the summer fate."

Nicole stood and began ranting, "What do you mean helping you out? I never agreed to help you, and what kind of place actually does summer fates, aren't they like for hillbillies or something?" Lily just carried on eating her porridge as if nothing were amiss. Nicole went to leave but Lily's voice stopped her,

"Wash your dishes"

"Was that an order or a request" Nicole asked, irritation clear in her voice.

"You finished, so wash your dishes" Lily smiled as Nicole let out an aggravated squeal and started washing her dishes.

Nicole took one look at the school and knew she wasn't going to enjoy this holiday one bit. If these were the schools than what would the rest of the town be like. The laughable thing was that this so called school was a private one.

"If this is what you call private education I'd hate to see a public one!" Nicole laughed at her own attempt at a joke.

Lily shook her head and manoeuvred Nicole to the field where the stalls would be set up. This was going to be a long day.

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Setting up the fate hadn't been as drastic as Nicole had first assumed. She had plenty of help from lots of cute boys, a few not so cute ones too but hey, beggars can't be choosers.

People had just started arriving when Nicole spotted Geoff hanging by himself.

"Hey, Geoff right?" Nicole asked as she walked over to him.

"Oh…um yes hi Nicole." He gazed around nervously not knowing what to do.

"You looking for someone gorgeous?" Nicole asked leaning in to speak in his ear. She didn't notice someone come up behind her until they repeatedly tapped on her shoulder.

"What?" Nicole asked with annoyance.

"That's my boyfriend your with" Some girl stated with a floral, just under the knee dress on. It looked like something you'd wear to church.

"Oh I'm sorry, I didn't know it was a crime to talk to a boy," Nicole just glared at this sorry excuse for a girl.

"Look, I know you're not from round here, so let me tell you a few things; it's a small town as you might have guessed so word gets around pretty fast and I've heard some interesting things about you already, so I'd be careful if I were you." This church girl tried and failed an evil smirk.

"And just so you know, I don't scare too easily" Nicole whispered just loud enough for her to hear, she turned to Geoff, winked and then walked off.

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By about 2 o'clock everyone had heard about her from that chick now identified as Christie and were ignoring her, even Geoff. Towards the end she started getting fed up, wanting to go home, crawl under the duvet and not come out until the end of summer. She had meant what she said to Christie about not scaring easily, she thrived off controversy and upheaval but lately she has been getting tired of being the 'wild one', she just wanted to be accepted for who she was for once and not pretend to be something she wasn't. Plus she hadn't seen Aden at all which made it worse.

Lily had heard the rumours going around about Nicole and she couldn't help but wonder why she would just accept that without a care. She may not have been in Nicole's life a whole lot but she did know that she had her dad's competitive streak and he never would back down, so it got Lily wondering why she wasn't fighting back. It was a mystery and it would have to stay that way because they definitely weren't close enough for Lily to probe into Nicole's life, not through the lack of trying though.

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Natalie had been enjoying her time so far without having to worry about what Nicole was up to. She was such a problem child and Natalie didn't know why, she thought she had been a good mother, nothing like her own. But Nicole still turned out bad; maybe she didn't know what she was doing after all.

"Mrs Dean your card." The sales clerk had obviously been trying to get her attention for a while because a queue had formed behind her.

"Thank you" Natalie replied and walked out of Bendals with her many bags. Now Nicole wasn't there she could spend more time with her husband.

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"I got you a job" Lily stated over breakfast the next morning.

"You did what?" Nicole shouted, what the hell did she want a job for?

"When you live in this house, you will work, Lily law" She replied.

Nicole let out a scream and stormed upstairs.

"Be ready in 10 minutes, I'll walk you down." Lily shouted up after her. "She is going to learn some life lessons in this house whether she likes it or not" Lily muttered under her breath and walked into the kitchen.

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Flagstaff had everything you would need to survive, but not much more. They had a mall and a movie theatre but that's about it. The closest place for anything remotely close to LA was Phoenix, and despite it being the biggest state in Arizona, that was still pushing it. Nicole had never lived in a place where everyone was so close they were practically living in each other's pockets. While walking Lily had greeted and chatted with almost every person they saw. She had introduced Nicole and they had politely said hello, but all the while giving her disdainful looks. She couldn't stand the way they thought so highly of themselves when they were just lowly, country folk. As they came to a street corner Lily stopped and pointed to a relative sized building,

"That's the doctors surgery where you will be working, starting today." Lily told Nicole watching for her reaction.

"How long for?" Nicole asked, watching the place with a disgusted look.

"Every Monday, Tuesday and Thursday until you leave." Lily replied, liking the fact that Nicole was not playing up as much as she thought she would. They said goodbye and Lily watched as Nicole walked towards the surgery, head held high among all the stares and whispers.

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"Hello, may I help you?" The woman at the desk asked when Nicole walked in.

"Hi, my name is Nicole Franklin…"Nicole started,

"Oh yes Lily's Granddaughter! Welcome, I'm Penny, the receptionist. Could you just mind the desk a second?" Penny asked smiling brightly.

"Sure" Nicole replied walking behind the desk. The room was quite dull in colour but the furniture more than made up for it. The couches were a violet colour as were the curtains that adorned the windows. The wood flooring was a dark, wine like colour and the walls were covered in colourful paintings and posters. It felt homely and inviting.

"Ok, now this is Dr. Jeffries. He is our main doctor and he will be looking after the place while I am away. Now your job will be to mind the desk and help Dr. Jeffries, kind of like a nurse would." Penny told Nicole, with Dr. Jeffries stood next to her.

"Hi" Nicole said to him, "I'm Nicole."

"Hello, Im Dr Jeffries, and this," He said pointing to a man walking into the surgery, "Is my son, Aden, this is Nicole" He beckoned Aden over and they shook hands.

"Nice to see you again." Aden smirked down at her.

"Yeah it is." Nicole returned her smirk and turned to face Penny. "So you're not going to be here?"

"No, so you'll be doing my job," Penny smiled at her, "Take care of them." With that she walked out leaving Nicole to figure out what to do.

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The day went by quite fast for Nicole and before she knew it, it was time to go home.

"So how has your first day been?" Aden appeared behind her.

"It's actually been ok thanks. So what exactly do you do here?" Nicole asked with genuine interest.

"I just help my dad, entertain the patients, that kind of thing." Aden replied. Nicole just nodded and turned to the desk to grab her things. She could feel him watching her and for some reason it made her feel vulnerable.

"How are you getting home?" Aden wondered aloud.

"Walking, it's not too far from here." Nicole replied turning back to face him.

"Well let me walk you back, it's not safe for a lady to walk alone." Aden said, ever courteous.

"Sure, just let me tell your dad I'm leaving." Nicole wandered off smiling.

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They walked in silence for a while, not knowing what to say.

"I heard what everyone is saying about you." Aden said after a long silence.

"Oh really? So how come you're still here? I mean you wouldn't want to ruin your reputation by hanging out with someone as 'wild' as me" Nicole challenged.

"I was actually going to say the same thing to you." Aden replied.

"What?" Nicole was honestly shocked. She thought he was like Geoff, in fact she thought everyone round here was like Geoff. She never really thought that anyone in Flagstaff would be as troubled as her. Wasn't it all pony's and friendliness? Maybe she had this town completely wrong.

"You didn't think you were the only one did you?" Aden laughed at her scowl.

"No, I just didn't think anyone here would abandon one of their own, but hey I guess I got it wrong." She thought that Aden had seemed different after he gave her a lift to Lily's. She should really learn not to judge a book by its cover, or in this case multiple books by one cover.

"Anyway enough about that, lets talk about you. Like where are you from?" Aden skilfully steered the conversation away from him and onto her, obviously sensing it was her favourite topic.

"Well I was born in Sydney Australia." At his shocked look she smirked, "Ha, yeah shocker hey? But I grew up in LA after my mum met a guy. She's not with him anymore surprisingly but she's with an even richer guy, his names Ray. We now live in Beverly Hills." Nicole summed up her life in one paragraph. Aden was quiet again for a while, processing what she had told him. "What about you?"

"Well, I grew up in the San Fernando Valley, so not that far away from you. And then my mum died when I was 11 and my dad wasn't coping very well so he sent us to live with my Nan here in Flagstaff. Then a few years later he realised that he was wasting his life so he came to get us and found a place here and a job. So here I am." Nicole was shocked for, like the fourth time that day.

"Wow, I'm sorry." Nicole replied sincerely.

"It's ok, I'm over it." Aden said, staring ahead. Nicole looked up and realised they were on her street, had it really been that long?

"Well thanks for walking me home." Nicole started, realising they would be approaching Lily's house any moment.

"No problem…um Nicole, would you like to go out tonight?" Aden asked warily, "You know, I could show you round and stuff."

"Um, yeah sure I don't see why not." Nicole agreed, smiling.

"Great," He beamed, "Pick you up at 8?"

"Sure, and bring your car." Nicole winked and walked off.

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Watching her granddaughter's frantic movements around the house as she ranted about being late for her date made Lily smile. When Nicole had returned home and asked her, when actually told her she would be going out, Lily had been surprised. Last she heard, everyone had been ignoring her and spreading rumours. She didn't know who it was but she was waiting by the door ready to answer it before Nicole. Nicole, on the other hand wasn't concerned with who would be answering the door, she was more worried about what to wear. She actually liked Aden and wanted to make a good impression, especially considering she wasn't likely to make many friends here. She didn't have that many friends in Hollywood either, it wasn't that she was hated or even disliked like she was here, no it was more her fault. She never liked getting close to people, afraid that she would have to leave them. Plus then you couldn't have secrets, and how she loved secrets!

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Nervous was not even close to how Aden felt as he walked up the steps to the porch. He really liked Nicole and his track record with women wasn't exactly perfect. Stuff happened and it had made him wary. But wasn't everyone at some point in their life? He just had to face his fears, however that was easier said then done. So standing here at her door he was pondering turning around and heading home. "Come on Aden, you can do this! Just forget Josie and move on." He murmured and raised his hand to knock.

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"Could you answer that Grandma?" Nicole shouted down. Lily braced herself and answered the door with strange feeling in her stomach, was it worry? She hadn't felt that since Natalie had moved out, she had almost forgotten what it was like to have someone to look out for. The unsettling feeling increased with one look at who was behind the door. Of course her granddaughter would pick the most notorious boy in the town.

"Hello Mrs Franklin, is Nicole in?" Aden smiled politely; he always had hated the 'meet the parents' routine, although in this case it was meet the grandparent.

"Yes, she's just finishing getting ready. Come in please." Lily ushered the boy into her house. "Can I get you anything?"

"No thank you I'm fine." Aden heard a gasp and turned to see Nicole come down the stairs looking beautiful.

"You look just like your mother." Lily told her with tears gathering in the corners of her eyes. Nicole smiled and turned to Aden,

"You look stunning Nic, you really do." Aden was in awe.

"Thank you, shall we go?" Nicole asked. Aden took her arm and lead her out the door.

"Be home by twelve!" Lily called watching them walk away with a horrible feeling in the pit of her stomach.

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They drove around aimlessly for a while, just chatting and laughing and exploring the town, which didn't take long. And then they went to a pool hall near the mall.

"If everyone knows everyone around here, how did you get us alcohol, in a bar no less?" Nicole asked bewildered.

"Well, it helps when you know the owner. Also the cops are so laid back, as long as we don't cause trouble they turn a blind eye." Aden replied handing her a cosmopolitan. It also amazed Nicole that they sell cocktails in pool halls, but apparently it attracts more business. So who was she to complain?

"So missy, fancy a game of pool?" He asked her between sipping his beer.

"Sure, but get ready to be beaten by a girl!" She picked up a cue and pointed it at him, "Whoever pots one asks the other person a question, it could be like truth or dare but without the dares and it could help us get to know each other better."

"Your on" Aden replied. He arranged the balls and broke them. "Let the games begin!"