John comes to know about the various cliques in his new school, along with Sherlock Holmes.

I always wanted a cool teenager Mycroft, so that's what I did. After all, he's supposed to be "The Iceman"... Sorry for the lame joke.

Excuse my ignorance if I don't get some of the military terms correct. I had to google them out. My knowledge of military terminology is extremely poor and I'm happy to take any corrections.

It's not really true to the Mean Girls plot. I mean it is, but at the same time I took the liberty to change it accordingly so that it would fit more into the BBC Sherlock as well, like the first meeting between Cady and Aaron.

Also, I might have made John a little more dramatic than I intended to. Don't worry though, he's dramatic only when he meets Sherlock.

When the bell for the lunch rang, he joined Mycroft and Greg and proceeded toward the cafeteria.

"Now," Greg began in a preaching manner, "where you sit during the lunch is very important because you've got everyone in there."

"You've got freshmen, OTC preps, Asian nerds..." Mycroft carried on, digging into his bookbag for another textbook to bury his brains into

"Cool Asians-" interrupted Greg.

"Art freaks and Pokemon geeks-" said he, scowling distastefully as Greg showed John that particular table.

"Unfriendly black hotties-"

"Greg, that's racist!" Mycroft chastised, "And also, girls who eat their feelings-"

"Girls who don't eat anything-"

"Desperate wannabes-"

"The greatest people you will ever meet-"

"That's us, hello again! And the worst-"

"Beware of The Plastics." they ended together.

Lunchroom seemed like the rec room in military barracks his dad had once told him about. Like Greg said, you had everyone there, all ranks of soldiers mingling together yet separated by an unspoken clique rule.

"All right," John began carefully, "Um... you guys do understand that I'll forget this... information by today, don't you?"

"No. God no," Greg shook his head, "you are not allowed to do that!"

"Not at all," Mycroft agreed, biting absently into a pastry.

"My will be the Student Council President next year. I can tell you - My, stop it, you're on a diet!"

"God, Greg, so very gay to function!" Mycroft shook his head and looked at the pastry longingly, "You've been telling that to every new person we've been meeting-"

"Shut up, My!" Greg clapped him on his shoulder as if very proud of him, and then turned to John again, "So, yeah, like I was saying, My's gonna be the Student Council President next year. That's our senior year, by the way, but I guess you know that already."

John smiled politely. Of course he knew.

"It can be Jim as well," Mycroft said challengingly.

"Doesn't matter, My. You're the model student. Teachers love you. Jim just isn't president material."

Now John definitely felt out of place.

"Err - " he began, "I'll get some porridge for myself. I'll be right back."

They did not pay any attention to him as Greg continued to scold Mycroft on his diet like he was his mum, and Mycroft became surprisingly stubborn. John lifted his tray and proceeded to the front of the lunchroom.

"Hi! We're doing a lunchtime survey of new students," John turned around to see a pretty blonde girl with glasses, and with a blank notepad and pen in her hand, "Can you answer a few questions?"

John peeped into the blank notebook. Seemed like he was the first one, "Sure, be my guest."

"What's your name?"

"John. Watson."

"Is your cherry popped?"

His eyes narrowed, as he tried to contemplate what she meant, "Excuse me, my what?"

He could hear sniggers in the background.

"Okay, let's try this again. Would you like us to assign someone to help you pop your cherry?"

And before John could answer that he was allergic to cherries, there came a soft Irish drawl from behind him, "Is she bothering you?" He turned to find himself eye-to-eye with Jim Moriarty, the one person he was supposed to avoid. Nowhere as soft as his voice seemed to make him sound like, with dark and dangerous eyebrows set over a pair of menacing brown eyes, fast on his feet and intimidating even for his short stature. He gave him the sweetest smile in the universe before turning to the blonde girl.

"Oh come on now, Shania, don't be such a despo that you have to go for a pretend survey to get pretty boys to sleep with you! If he even wanted to, he would already have taken the hint, wouldn't he?"

The blonde girl cowered at his tone, as if acknowledging his supremacy. John watched the power play carefully before realising what Jim actually meant. "Sorry, what?" he was sure that he had misheard Jim.

"Do you want to have sex with her?" he asked him with an uninterested expression on his face, as if the answer should be obvious.

John looked uncomfortable for a moment. He hadn't realised that ''popping one's cherry'' meant that. Jim looked upon like him as if he were a complete virgin in such matters, which he obviously was. John replied with a polite, "No, thank you."

"See, that's settled. He's clearly not interested in you. Good afternoon, Shania," said he with a wicked smirk.

"Shut up," she hissed through her teeth, and then bit her tongue, clearly horrified that she had asked Jim Moriarty to 'shut up'.

"Good comeback," he sneered, "You should do stand-up."

The cheesy little blonde girl went off in another direction, clearly annoyed, and more than that, defeated. In her defence, she wasn't half-bad. But John just wasn't interested in women. He started to walk off in Greg and Mycroft's direction with a vague but polite 'thank you' to Jim and his group sitting in the exact centre of the lunchroom when he was arrested by Jim's cheerful voice.

"Wait. Sit down."

John tried not to frown at them in confusion to which Jim only replied, pushing a chair noisily in his direction with his feet, "Seriously. Sit down."

John obliged at the command, wondering what was so special in him that the most popular people had made him sit with them. He smiled at them.

"Why don't I know you?" Jim's tone was patronising, and feigning kindness, a detail John could obviously not tell, to whom Jim came across as helpful, almost as a saviour from a strange and uncomfortable situation during his first day in the lunchroom. But Mycroft didn't come across to him as an idiot, and he told him to be aware of the tricks that the Plastics could play, so he tried to stay on his guard like his new friends had advised him to.

"I'm new," he swallowed, and gave him a friendly smile, casting a glance at the rest of the Plastics sitting there who were watching him quite intently. The boy who Mycroft had named 'Philip Anderson' looked like he was trying to figure something out. He turned his attention back to Jim, "I just moved here from Afghanistan."

"Oh," the girl called Irene piped in. She was quite pretty, "I remember him. Ms. Richard, the math teacher, she turned you out of the class for eating, didn't she?"

"Did she now?" Jim started laughing, and although it was nice to hear him laughing pleasantly, it somehow sent shivers through John even though it was a normal August afternoon, "Oh God, that is hilarious! You actually ate in her class? Don't tell me it was something sugary."

John nodded his head nervously, "A small muffin, that's all, why what's wrong?"

All three of them giggled harder, "Nothing... except that she's on a no-sugar diet. Oh god, it is better than porn! You moved here from Afghanistan?"

"Yeah, I used to be home-schooled," John noticed how Jim did not bother introducing himself or his friends, as if he were sure that everyone knew about him, which was probably true because a newbie like himself did know about him.

"What?" It seemed like Jim was also the spokesperson of the Plastics.

"It's where you're taught at home-" John began, thinking that they were unfamiliar to the idea.

"No, I know what being home-schooled means, doofus!"

"So, you've never been to an actual school before?" asked Irene.

John shook his head, smiling at her...

Be nice to everyone... his father's voice wafted in.

Well, smiling nicely at her.

"Homeschooled? Really interesting," Jim seemed to be speaking to himself as he crossed his arms over his chest and cast an eye over John, as if inspecting him. The gaze felt more like an X-Ray to John, who tried not to shift in his chair uncomfortably.

"Thanks."

Irene smiled too, "But you're like, so DDG and, you know, you look like you go to gym all 365 days a year."

Before John could reply, Philip spoke, his eyes bright because he knew that bit of knowledge, "And 366 on a leap year."

"Thank you," although not having understood DDG, he tried not to offend him by smiling weirdly.

"So you agree." Irene looked like she had caught exactly what she wanted to hear.

"Sorry?"

"You think you're DDG?"

"Oh," that was such an awkward moment for him. He hadn't even understood what Irene had meant, "Um..."

"That's such a lovely jumper," Jim started right on cue to ease the tension, "Where'd you buy that?"

"Err- my grandma made it for me."

"It is adoooooorable, I must say," he said appraisingly.

"Thanks," John smiled, coming under the spell of Jim's charming persona.

"So sexy."

Jim turned to Irene with a disdainful scowl on his face, "Really, Irene? That's all you could come up with? Sexy? Jumpers are supposed to be adorable. Thank goodness you did not say 'fetch'. It's my thing!"

Irene clearly looked affronted at that.

"Can I ask you a question?" asked Philip.

"If it's not about some sex survey, then sure."

"If you're from Afghanistan... why are you white?"

"Oh my god, Phil! You can't just ask people why they're white!" Irene rolled her eyes at him dramatically.

Meanwhile, Jim looked at his two best friends, as if conversing via telepathy, "Could you excuse us for a few moments?" John nodded, mouthing 'okay' to them.

The group huddled together, as if discussing nuclear policy. John took his chance and shot an apologetic look in Greg and Mycroft's direction. They were clearly horrified. He could almost hear a silent duet of 'What are you doing?' from them.

I don't know, he mouthed to them, before turning his attention back to Jim and his group. The three of them had sweet grins on their faces. John smiled too, feeling overwhelmed at the abundance of goodness and friendship on the first day. Maybe his first day wasn't that bad after all.

Okay John," Jim started slowly, "Let me just tell you that we don't do this very often, so this is like massive."

"We," Irene continued, "want to invite you to have lunch with us every day for the rest of the week."

"Oh, I-" he stole an involuntary glance at his friends, who were watching with rapt attention, "don't know..." After all, it was only for a week. "Sure, I guess."

"Charming," Jim beamed at him, speaking in the same patronising tone, "See ya tomorrow, Johnny boy! I'm going to make it my personal responsibility that by the end of the year, you're schnuckered in the awesomeness of Westhaven High," They left the table, waving at him. John waved back, smiling happily. Jim was so nice.

He could hear Irene whining after Jim, " 'Schnuckered' was my thing!"

John wondered what schnuckered meant. He heard Jim's trailing voice, "No, it suits me better, it's my thing now."

"What in Jesus' name was that?"

Greg and Mycroft had dragged John over to boys' lavatory just as all the cafeteria had been deserted, and they were conversing in hushed voices, keeping eyes out for any sign of the Plastics.

"They invited me over to their table," John said simply, "for lunch."

Their eyes grew wide with surprise. "Really?" apparently Greg couldn't believe his ears, "I didn't know that they could be interested in another human being."

Mycroft did not say anything. He had a triumphant smile on his face, "Tell me you said yes."

John looked at him, surprised. "I thought you said that they were... I don't know, toxic or something?"

Mycroft suppressed a laugh at that, "Did you say yes?"

"Umm... yeah. What is it? Have I done something wrong?" John asked quickly, afraid to have offended his new friends.

Mycroft's hundred watt smile just grew a million times brighter, "The best thing in your entire life. Now listen to me very carefully. I think you should do this."

"Do... what?"

Greg patted him on his shoulder, "Nothing much. Just sit with them at lunch-"

"-And tell us everything that Jim Moriarty says. Although, I think he's clever enough to avoid talking about, shall we say, unpleasant things in front of you-"

"You've gotta win his trust, or at least that of Anderson or Irene Adler's."

"Good thinking, Gregory-"

"Whoa whoa, hold on," John frowned at the espionage mission he was being sent on by his friends on the first day of his school, "I hate to tell you, but Jim seems okay. Nice, actually-"

"James Moriarty is NOT nice! He ruined my life! Are we clear on that?" Greg almost shouted. John looked at him, a bit spooked.

"Let's look at it this way," Mycroft wrapped a placating arm around Greg's shoulders as he led them outside the washroom, "You remember Snow White, John? Right, the evil queen in there, she's evil. But Jim Moriarty is not just evil. He's wicked."

John could not really comprehend the difference. They were supposed to be synonyms, right? But he wasn't going to argue with Mycroft Holmes, not when he was the state champion in debating and five times consecutive winner of Debating Matters UK.

"Yeah, My's right. He is the male version of a scum-sucking, selfish, back-stabbing bitch."

But John didn't quite take his words seriously, "Yeah right. I'll meet you in English, Greg. Bye both of you."

"Will you at least sit with them?!"

"What do I even talk about?" John protested, "I have no idea how things are supposed to work here!"

"Paris Fashion week?" Greg suggested, "Jim's into designer clothing and stuff." 'As am I' remained unspoken.

"Dieting and yoga?" Mycroft suggested, quite matter-of-factly, "Irene's worried sick about her weight all the time." And 'As am I' remained unspoken again.

John shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly, "Okay. Anyway, I've already said yes, haven't I? Look, I've got Chemistry now. It's not really my forte, so... please?"

Mycroft smiled reassuringly and sauntered off with Greg out of the lavatory. John watched them with an unsaid apology in his mouth as their paths forked.

He found Room C quite quickly and sat down at a nice spot. There was no one familiar in that class, so he just buried his face in his book till the rat-faced professor arrived.

The class was going well enough for John. He understood it. He was going to get all his A-levels. Nothing in the chemistry class could mess him up.

And that's when the bomb dropped.

Halfway through the class, he heard a curt nod at the door as he was working out the products of the Claisen Condensation. He looked up like the rest of the class and his heart stopped right away as it made half a beat. John couldn't speak, couldn't hear anything. All he could see that there was a boy clad in a simple light blue shirt and trousers standing at the doorstep of his Chemistry classroom. He was so engrossed in him that he even missed his name.

"Ah, Mr. _, finally graced us with your presence, have you?"

John, unfortunately missed his name as his body came in contact with a big yellow school bus.

John had had only two other crushes in his whole life. One was his great cousin's friend, Randy, in Australia. He was very hot, he had dark hair and green eyes, and he was a surfer. It was then that John thought something was wrong with him for liking a boy instead of a girl. The other was a reporter on some German news channel called Erik Hofmannsthal that John had just tripped upon while flicking through channels. Although he never learnt German, he sort of loved listening to Erik's voice...

But this one... Holy smokes! John looked away at once as he felt himself hyperventilating at the thought of just being in his line of sight.

"May I come in?" said he in a lazy drawl, like he was just performing a formality. His baritone voice was deep and rich. John conjured up a mental image of slapping himself for becoming so goddamned loopy. He did not even know his name. He had known him, no, only set his eyes upon him for like five seconds.

"No, I'm gonna have to ask you to stay out of the class, Mr. _".

John was, once again, too busy to deal with the feeling of not being able to see him for the rest of the class, so much busy that he missed his name again. He could have died of a heart attack when he saw the mischievous smirk across Sherlock Holmes' face. Unfortunately, the smirk was directed at the professor and not at him.

"Really, Mr. Saunders?

"Wow!" John exclaimed to himself, "Did he just answer his teacher back? That was allowed?"

"How was the divorce?" he asked smugly, "And the settlement? The alimony that you're going to pay her for the rest of your life? And she still gets you to keep that waste-of-space snobby boy of yours and to fix the plumb lines around her house just before the school hours? Hmm? Do I hear you saying 'please come in and take a seat in my lousy class', or do I hear myself spilling some more juicy secrets of yours?"

The class burst into laughter. Well, all of them except for John, who was still recovering from his collision with the school bus, and had miraculously survived. Mr. Saunders's face was red with embarrassment, too red for an adult, as he waved the insolent, rude boy towards a general direction of the class.

The boy looked around, surveying the room for the best place. John knew that, being a new student, or new "meat"according to Greg, the only place empty was beside himself. As much as he wanted that boy to come and sit beside him just so John could find an excuse to talk to him, he really needed to avoid the distraction-

Too late. The boy had spotted the empty seat next to him and promptly sat down beside John. And all desperate hopes of learning Chemistry were dashed.

He gave John no indication that he had even noticed him, except for a second where their eyes had locked. Thankfully, John found a moment to recover and return to his normal self. The boy beside him simply took out a notebook with black cover as he muttered to himself all the reactions that were done. He took a fresh page and started scribbling on it with a pen lying on John's side of the desk. His handwriting was striking, not very good, but legible and clear, with a gap of exactly one centimetre between the words. John could smell the expensive cologne on him. It made him aware just how close they were sitting together.

He was flawless.

John suppressed a shiver at that, at the warmth emanating from him and yet the cold disregard of his surroundings or his teacher.

That's when John realised that the boy was using his pen for writing. He checked if there was another in his bag, rather than taking the risk of talking to him and losing his head...

Nope. He hated his luck. And he cleared his throat, forming the words in his head.

"Hmm... Aldol, Birch, Cannizzaro, Claisen-" Sherlock muttered to himself.

"Sorry, but you're penning my use for writing."

The young man turned to him and glowered at him. At least, that's what it would have looked on any other person. John could finally see what a piercing gaze felt like.

"Sorry what?"

He winced, slapping himself mentally a few hundred times before speaking again, "I mean, you're using my pen for writing and it's the only one that I have."

"Oh!" Sherlock kept it back on John's table and searched for another one in his own bag. He didn't have one. John felt a painful and a totally unreasonable pang of guilt at that. After a minute or two, John, unable to contain himself, blurted out, "It's okay, if you want to... use my pen-"

A small, half - smile, a departure from his blatant coldness, touched his lips, something that John seemed to stare at for more time than what was normal and appropriate, "Okay."

And all his notes were gone for the day.

John tried to make the most of the situation. He stared at the board, trying to at least memorise those reactions. But it was so hard to think. Especially where there was a criminally handsome young man sitting barely inches from you who had the power to cloud your thoughts. But it was not just the man, it was his aloofness which affected John so much. He had never met anyone like him.

If there was one thing that could bring John back to Earth, it was the mysterious man's rich voice, "It's... okay. I don't really need-"

"No, it's fine!" he smiled at him, trying to come across as friendly, just to cut through that veil of mysterious coldness, "I mean, it's completely okay."

Sherlock glanced up at Mr. Saunders, their chemistry teacher and then back at John, "If you want, I could lend you my notes after the class," he offered.

John's throat had become very dry all of a sudden. His luck was too good, "Sure, that'd be great... no," he tried not to shake his head and look like a dog drying itself after an unhygienic shower as he spoke quickly, covering up for his wrong choice of words, "God, I didn't mean great, I only meant that it's just fine - !"

His face softened very little as he nodded, "You're new here."

John's heart skipped a beat, "You know about me?"

"No. But I saw it. You're uncomfortable here. That, coupled by the visible tan line in your wrist and the Tower of London souvenir in your pencil pouch tells me that you've been abroad recently. I could have considered that you were on holiday to the tropics, but then why the Tower of London memento? Because you're new to London, obviously. Only tourists and first-timers buy that stuff, and keep it with themselves as well."

John's heart could have skipped all the beats. It was a mystery how he was still alive. "That was brilliant!"

His eyes narrowed, as if trying to judge whether John was being sarcastic, "You think so?"

John took a deep breath to stabilise himself, "Yes of course. And that divorce thing too. Did you figure that one out similarly too?"

Sherlock still hadn't recovered from his surprise, having not been used to it. "Absence of his wedding band. About the boy, that is because when he was shouting at me, I could see his phone ringing and the photo of a person flash on the screen which could only be that of his son. Divorce, and son calling continuously. Conclusion: father got son's custody. And a quick look at his trouser knee told me that he was undertaking plumbing work, something that was done before he came to school. The man has a housekeeper, she could have called a plumber. Therefore not at his house. Where else? Ex-wife. And not parents. Otherwise he would have called a plumber for them. What's different in the case of wife? He needs to win her back so that he doesn't have to incur the loss of at least five hundred a month. So, he's playing Mr. Good Husband to her."

"That... was amazing!" he finished, completely overwhelmed by the display of cold, dazzling brilliance. Screw his looks, there was just so much more than that, so much more to the coldness and the arrogance.

Another half-smile adorned the side of Sherlock's plush lips, "That's not something you get to hear every day."

John looked at him in clear confusion, "You're kidding! No one's told you that it was amazing before?"

Sherlock shrugged his shoulders, trying to come across as nonchalant, "I'm used to it anyway." John tried to wonder what he meant by that.

After that they sat in silence, listening to their teacher. John, with constantly wavering attention and tapping fingers on the desk, and Sherlock with arms crossed over his chest, legs stretched to their full length, and a bored expression on his face. John wanted to introduce himself, and ask him his name. He put his pen down, and prepared the words in his head... And then, bell rang and Sherlock cast a half-glance in John's direction and slipped out of there smoothly, becoming the first one to walk out of the classroom and leaving John utterly disappointed. He did not even know his name. He looked down at his black leather-bound notebook and remembered that he had to copy the notes down. He turned to that page. Everything was clear as crystal. It was written in precise handwriting and the notes were cold and crisp. But what caught John's attention were those initials.

Property of SH.

SH. Did he know those initials? No. He couldn't remember anything...

Sherlock Holmes. SH. Greg and Mycroft's words played in his head.

That was Mycroft's brother. That was Jim Moriarty's ex. From what John had understood in the lunch, the way he argued with Irene over 'fetch' and 'schnuckered', James Moriarty was possessive. Very possessive.

So... ex... that's a good thing, wasn't it? Being Ex?

Again, huge thanks to Guinevere81 for britpicking this chapter :)

Thank you all for those who are reading this! x