Chapter 6:

Are We Falling in Love?

On the way home from school all Todd could think about was what happened that afternoon. He was so distracted by it; he forgot to complain to everyone about how terrible his day was like he usually did. Instead he went straight to the backyard with Astro trailing behind him and sat in the garden like he usually did when he needed to think.

He'd taken his notebook full of songs with him. The notebook had about twenty five songs in it, thirteen of them he found good enough to put on his album. Music had always been a passion of his and he was extremely happy when his father got him a record deal over the summer. But now that his parents had taken that away from him too, he had another reason to hate them.

Fianna had always fascinated him, that much wasn't anything new. There was just something about her that set her apart from everyone else. She had a mind of her own; she wasn't tied to a clique like everyone else. She was the only girl who didn't worship him and she wasn't afraid to tell him what a jerk he was. He still wasn't sure if that bothered him or not. Not to mention she was beautiful, that was always a plus.

He thought back on that afternoon how she had compared him to Kent McRyan. Kent was just a fictional person, just a personality made for him by the writer's of McRyan High. He'd never thought too deeply of how Kent was different from himself, personally he thought he was a better person than Kent. That is until she pointed some things out to him that day. She looked truly hurt by the way he always teased her. She said she wanted Todd to treat her more like Kent treated Danielle, at least that was what it seemed like. Fianna claimed to hate him and she always reminded him that she despised him because of how conceited he was. Now that he thought about it, maybe under all of those words what she really wanted was for Todd to treat her like a friend. That was what he wanted, to be her friend. But for some reason he couldn't put his pride aside and be nice to her.

Adele came outside and found him sitting in a chair with his dog resting on his feet. "Can I get you anything Mr. Ryan?"

"Huh?" Todd looked at her. He was too caught up in his thoughts to really care about ordering Adele around now. "Um, no just…take the rest of the day off."

Adele raised her eyebrows in utter shock. She wondered if it was a trick. "Are you sure?"

Todd nodded. "Yeah, I don't care; just get out of my face."

Adele walked away happily. She was probably the first of Todd's servants to ever be given the day off.

Once she left Todd began writing a song. Who knows, his debut CD might end up having fourteen tracks.

She steps to the groove
Her body in tune
She stops the whole room
She got to everybody
The red of her lips
So hard to resist
The curve to her hip
I gotta tell somebody

Todd dropped his pen and closed the book so hard the noise woke up Astro when he realized who he was writing about.

Fianna, Megan, and Sharidan had gone to Star Bucks immediately after school as they often did when they didn't have after school activities. To be honest Fianna didn't even want to go today, but Megan and Sharidan bugged her so much about it she just had to say yes.

They were sitting at a table with latte's in front of them and their math textbooks. None of them were paying attention to homework. Megan and Sharidan were still going on about how "amazing" Todd Ryan was and once again Fianna had no intention of listening.

She was lost in her own thoughts about him. She still couldn't believe he'd gone out of his way to apologize. Maybe he wasn't such a bad guy after all. He was a very talented musician and she respected that. Not to mention he was playing "1+1" to her. Of all the songs he chose that one. Or maybe he wasn't playing it to her. Maybe she was just imagining things. It was probably a coincidence.

He'd held her hand as well. She could still feel the warmth of his hand in hers and she felt like she never wanted to wash it again.

Why was she thinking these things? Todd was a rude, conceited, jerk, she couldn't think of him this way. She tried to push the thoughts away but she couldn't. She wanted to see him again. She wanted to be alone with him again like they'd been earlier that day. She wanted him to give her his undivided attention and only her.

Suddenly Sharidan threw a straw wrapped at her. "Hey, earth to Fianna."

"Why do you keep spacing out on us girl?" Megan asked.

Sharidan sipped her latte. "She'd probably still mad at Todd Ryan."

Megan rested her head in her hand. "You know he nearly kissed me today."

That got Fianna's attention. "He what?"

Megan smiled happily. "Yeah. It was so nice. We were the last ones in biology class and we were standing close and he nearly kissed me."

Sharidan rolled her eyes. "Lucky."

Fianna's face fell. "He really did that?"

"He sure did. Is something wrong?"

Fianna shook her head. "No, of course not." Maybe she had just been kidding herself. Why would Todd be interested in her?

The next day at school there was a morning assembly. After homeroom, all of the students were ordered into the gym to listen to the principal talk. Fianna was sitting with her friends. She was tempted to search for Todd. Despite what Megan said she couldn't stop thinking about him. She silently hoped he would sit next to her.

Meanwhile, Todd was walking into the gym with his hands in his pockets chewing his usual spearmint gum. He wasn't even trying to be discreet about it although he'd been warned countless times that gum chewing wasn't allowed. When he'd heard there would be an assembly, he thought it would be like at the studio for his show where all of the cast would co into the conference room, sit at a long table and read over their lines for a new script. This was completely different. All of the students in the whole school were crammed into the gym (which was pretty big but still didn't look like it would hold all 800 students).There wasn't even a table where all the important people sat! Just people scattered everywhere, only separated by grade level. He didn't appreciate this and already found it to be a waste of time. The only good thing that came from this was he got to get out of class and didn't have to listen to these idiot teacher's lecture about stuff he didn't care about.

Some guys were following him trying to carry on a conversation they'd been having before they got in the gym but Todd had stopped paying attention. He searched the gym and finally found the girl he was still mad he'd written a song for. Once he found her he headed towards her.

"Hey Todd, where are you going?" Cade asked.

"We sit over here," Dylan said pointing to the top of the bleachers. He and his friends always sat there because they were less likely to get caught texting at the top.

Todd rolled his eyes. "Whatever. I'm sitting over here." He went towards Fianna and surprised her by sitting next to her. "Hey."

She looked at him and smiled. "Hi Todd."

"Wow, you're smiling at me. That's a first. We must be making progress."

She shrugged. "I can't hate you too much. You showed me you actually have a heart yesterday."

Fianna's friends noticed Todd sitting there and started giggling. "Hi Todd," Sharidan said giving him a flirtatious wave.

"Come sit here," Megan said pointing to the empty spot next to her.

"There's no room," he said as an excuse to stay where he was.

"Are you kidding me? There's plenty of space here."

"I need a lot of room. I don't like people breathing down my neck…or touching me."

Megan pouted seeing she lost her chance to sit by him.

Todd pulled his pack of gum out of his pocket. "You want one?" he asked Fianna.

She nodded and took one. "Thanks."

He put it back and looked out at the dying chaos. "So what is this dumb assembly about anyway?"

"The principal basically spends a half hour enforcing the rules and addressing issues. It's pretty boring. Feel free to go to sleep," Fianna explained.

"What's the point?"

Fianna shrugged. "Shorter classes? I don't really know."

"If you ask me, there should be only four hours of school and two classes a day. That's how it was when I was home schooled. Now it's just too long."

Fianna thought about that. "Fur hours of school huh? That's nice."

The assembly started and the students were ordered to be quiet. Most weren't quiet, they whispered quietly and texted and kissed when teachers weren't looking. Todd and Fianna were no exception. They whispered to each other almost the entire time hardly paying attention to what the principal was saying. Finally it was over and they were all released given the usual amount of time to get to class.

Todd and Fianna stood up and got off of the bleachers. "Come walk to class with me," he said.

She was surprised by the offer and didn't think he was serious. "Are you serious?"

"Yeah, unless you'd rather walk to class with your imaginary friend," he said with a smirk.

She put her hands on her hips and glared at him. "I do not have an imaginary friend. Keep it up and you'll only have yours to talk to."

He pushed her arm. "Very funny. For your information I haven't had an imaginary friend since I was like, seven."

Fianna kept her glare on her face but walked with him anyway with her arms crossed.

He turned to face her and tried to uncross her arms. "Uncross those arms girl before you suffocate yourself." He tried to pull them apart but she held them firmly in place. "C'mon Fianna, don't be so difficult all the time."

She uncrossed her arms and continued walking. "You're the one to talk." She didn't realize it but she almost hit a wall until he pulled her out of the way.

"Would it kill you to watch where you walk?" he said steadying her.

"Thanks," she said. She found herself looking into his deep brown eyes and his hands were on her shoulders.

He was stuck looking into her eyes for a moment and she was looking directly at him. As much as he wanted to look away he couldn't. It was like he was frozen. A blush spread across her face and he felt himself blushing as well which to him totally destroyed his dignity. "You have pretty eyes," he said.

She smiled. "Thanks."

"You know you can tell a lot about a person from looking into their eyes. Eyes are like windows to the soul."

"What can you tell about me?" she asked curiously wondering what he was getting at.

"That…you work hard. You stress yourself out trying to be perfect all the time. You don't trust people for whatever reason. Just like you don't trust me."

She looked at him for a moment surprised at how spot on he was, except for the last part. Why would he think she didn't trust him? Well, she never really gave him much of a reason to think otherwise. She'd always been harsh and she now knew she underestimated him a lot. "That's not true. I trust you."

He smirked. "Really?"

"Yeah I do," she said with a nod. Then she put her arms around his neck and gave him a hug to prove it.

Todd was surprised by it at first but he hugged her back tightly. After a few seconds they realized what they were doing and quickly let go embarrassed by it. "We should go to class."

"Right," she agreed. They continued walking down the hallway to their English class. She thought about what he said about eyes and also what she'd gathered about him since she'd known him. She knew there was something more behind that tough exterior of his. "You're not honest with yourself."

He looked at her. "What?" he asked confused.

"You said eyes are like windows into the soul. I looked into your eyes and I know you're not honest with yourself. You act tough around everyone but there's more about you and you hide it."

He stared at her for a moment then snorted. "You really think that's true?"

She nodded. "I know it's true. See what I mean? You're not honest with yourself and you know it."

Todd thought about what she said on the way to class. Sure there were some things in his life he tried his hardest to forget, but it wasn't like he wasn't being honest with himself, was it?

Fianna was walking down the hallway towards the exit of the school. Once outside she walked down the sidewalk and soon ran into Todd Ryan who was leaning up against the wall wearing his expensive sunglasses and chewing his gum.

When she got close he grabbed her arm and put her so close she was up against his chest looking up at him into his eyes which were covered. He lifted the sunglasses and rested them on top of his head and a smirk was on his face.

"You wanna know something?" he asked.

"What?"

He leaned close to her ear. "I love you."

She gasped when she heard those words. His lips trailed from her ear down her jaw and she felt his hot breath against her skin. He looked into her eyes again and they leaned towards each other for a sweet kiss…

RIIINGGGG!

Fianna sat up in bed to the sound of her alarm clock and turned it off. She lay back in bed thinking about hat dream. It had seemed so real, she could still feel his breath on her face and his hands on her hips. Why couldn't she have stayed asleep a little bit longer to feel his lips?

That was the first night she'd dreamt of Todd Ryan, and it wouldn't be the last.

So how'd you like this chapter? More are on the way!

The song was "My Baby" by Jesse Mccartney