.:Chapter 11:.

Coincidence? I think not.

Max sighed as her cell phone started to ring again.

She didn't have to look at it to know that it was Zack calling, he had called since he had left to go to his Dad's apartment and each time, she didn't have the nerve to answer the phone and talk to him. They saw each other in class, talked during study hall and lunch, and still made out as often as they did before, but there was a rift there that she wasn't sure he noticed. She couldn't stand the feeling of guilt that would rocket through her body each time she would look at him, knowing how he would react when she did tell him that she kissed Tapeworm. The guiltier she felt, the more she would push him away. And Zack being so understanding, something she really liked about him, made her feel worse. He listened and said it was ok if she ever broke plans—probably because he was so used to it from all of her activities—and he continued to say it was ok. The worst part was that she knew that he really did feel that way. He could be a bit unhygienic, loud, pushy, competitive, and selfish at times, but he was still sweet, compassionate, determined, and loyal and those qualities quickly outweighed the bad ones.

They had dated for so long that she knew him inside and out, but there were still many things that she couldn't tell him or didn't want to tell him. There were parts of her that he wasn't the slightest bit aware of. That's where Tapeworm came in, they had been best friends for years, as long a she could remember and he had been there for everything; the times they would play in the sandbox, they learned how to ride bikes together, she protected him from the neighborhood bullies, they celebrated birthdays together, went on vacations together, they were even each other's first kiss. They were eight years old and had only recently become aware of the opposite sex liking to do something that they had always thought was disgusting. Seeing their cousins with boyfriends and girlfriends, they always teased them, making kissing sounds and gagging whenever they saw a display of affection. It was Max that had been the first to wonder what kissing was like.

She had just been sitting in the middle of the driveway, pulling on some rollerblades, Tapeworm was sitting next to her, trying to force a helmet over his bushy head of hair, thinking about the movie she had seen with her parents the night before. The big kiss at the end seemed to be this momentous thing, even her mother cried. And she didn't get it. "What was so special about it?" She asked Tapeworm, after explaining the movie. "The whole thing could have been cleared up if the people had just talked to each other."

"Who knows," Tapeworm replied. He stuck out his tongue, grasping both buckles for the helmet and pulling down as hard as he could. He tilted his head back, trying to get his skin clear from the clasps. Just when he was about to snap it closed, it popped back up again, dropping his helmet to the ground in front of him. "Maybe it's an adult thing, my mom gets weepy at those sort of things, too." Letting out a sigh, Tapeworm picked up his helmet again.

Max pushed his hands out of the way and picked up his helmet. She spun it in her hands for a second then placed it on Tapeworm's head, placing a hand on top and firmly pushed down. "Ok, grab onto the buckles," she instructed. Tapeworm did as he was told and pulled them down by his cheek. "Go!" Using both of her hands, she pushed down on Tapeworm's helmet as he pulled on the buckles. She didn't stop pushing until she heard the sound of the buckles sliding together.

"Finally!" Tapeworm cheered. "Let's go." He started to get up, but stopped and dropped back to the ground when Max leaned in and gave him a quick peck on the lips. She was frowning when she pulled back. "What was that for?" Tapeworm tilted his head back, almost knocking off his helmet once more.

"I wanted to see what it was like," Max admitted. Her nose wrinkled. "I didn't feel anything."

Tapeworm's eyebrows twitched. "I liked it," he said.

"I liked it too, but I didn't really feel anything," Max explained. "My cousin told me that you're supposed to feel butterflies and see fireworks and stuff."

"Maybe we're not old enough." Tapeworm shrugged and got to his feet. "C'mon, let's go to the skate park!" He grabbed onto Max's hand and started to drag her down the street. Max pulled her hand away and skated next to him, racing him down the street.

And nothing had really happened after that between the two of them, they were still best friends and they still had that friendship, but she knew the sexual tension was there. It was hard to be a guy and a girl best friend without some sort of sexual tension. Their parents had even started to forbid them to share the same room the older they got and the more vacations they went on, when it was no big deal before. And, of course, there were the jokes that they were going to get married. She and Tapeworm had always laughed them off, now she wasn't sure what was going on between the two of them. They tried to go back to normal after their kiss, but she couldn't help but find herself looking over at him more often. He always would catch her gaze, it was so innocent before but now she knew that wasn't the case. And Tapeworm was smart, he had to know it too.

The phone finally stopped ringing.

Max brought her math book up, resting it against her legs. Her eyes moved over the geometry equations, making sense of the example before picking up her notebook to get started on her homework for that night. She had been through the first five problems when her phone buzzed again. She glanced at the screen to see that she had gotten a voicemail. No doubt it was from Zack, too. Letting out a groan, Max rubbed her face with both hands. Could this get any more frustrating? She sat up as there was a knock at the door, and it opened, revealing her mother.

"Sweetie, Christopher is here to see you," Mrs. Montgomery said kindly. Max sighed again. Of course things were going to get more frustrating, they always did. Her mother must have noticed the apprehension in her daughter's face for she hesitated. "Are you ok, sweetie? You look like you're going to be sick."

"Thanks Mom," Max said sarcastically. She twirled the end of her pigtail. "I'm fine." She jostled her textbook with her knees. "Just working on some math homework. You know me and math have never gotten along."

"What with the time that I tried to help you and we both ended up crying, I believe you," Mrs. Montgomery said. She laughed and turned to leave the room. "I'll get Christopher for you." When she was almost out the door, she turned around and pointed a firm finger at her daughter. "But he can't stay long."

"You don't have to worry about that, Mom," Max said flatly.

Mrs. Montgomery shot a curious look over her shoulder, then was replaced at the door with Tapeworm. He gave Max a short wave, hesitantly stepping into her room. "Hi."

"Hi," Max replied. Tapeworm stood with his hands in his pockets, eyes darting around the room, not staying on one spot for too long. Max shook her head. "You can sit down," she said, pointing to the end of her bed. Tapeworm shuffled over to her, stepping over the clothes, books, applications and empty plates of food. He sat down on the end of her bed, kicking off his shoes as he did so. "So, what's up?"

Tapeworm glanced at her out of the corner of his eye then encircled his long arms around his upraised knees. "You know what we need to talk about. We need to talk about you and me and Zack, now that he's back from his Dad's." Tapeworm bent his head, scratching at the side of his neck. "I heard you got a detention."

"Yeah," Max said slowly. The ticking of the second hand on her clock was the only thing to break the silence between them. "If I get another one I'm going to be benched at our next basketball game and I can't afford that."

"You didn't seem to fight it so much when you got the chance," Tapeworm remarked. Max stared at him. Did he really just say that? As she watched him, Tapeworm closed his eyes, the tightening of his jaw the only indication of his frustration. "I didn't mean that-"

"Yes, you did, but that's ok," Max reassured him. She reached out a hand to place it on his shoulder, or even his arm, but he pulled away from her, keeping his body as far away from hers as he could. "Tape, c'mon." Her phone buzzed again and before she could move, Tapeworm leaned over and swiped her phone off of the duvet. He glanced at the screen before giving her a pointed look. "For someone who likes her boyfriend so much, you're doing a good job of ignoring him."

"I don't know what to do!" Max snapped.

"Neither do I!" Tapeworm snapped back. "Jesus, I can't sit there and look at Zack's face knowing that I kissed his girlfriend. How do you think that makes me feel, I mean, he's one of my best friends and I betrayed him like this."

Max made a 'tsk' sound with her tongue. "Yeah, like everything's a bed of roses with me." She crossed her arms over her chest, scowling. "I worried so much about him cheating on me and then I do the same to him." She lowered her voice. "Not that he seemed to have any problem with that when we were broken up."

"You're still mad about that?" Tapeworm raised an eyebrow.

"How would you feel if you were dating someone, broke up because you didn't have enough time for them, and then found you that they slept with half of the dance team and made our with everyone else?" Max clenched her hands into fists. "It made me sick, especially considering how I wanted him back, right after we broke up, but he seemed to be having so much fun on his own." She shook her head. "I know he can be a flirt, but I never really let it bother me until then, now I can barely look at him with another girl and wonder if he's not sleeping with her behind my back."

"So why don't you just tell him?" Tapeworm insisted.

"Yeah, that'll come up just as easily as telling him about us," Max said condescendingly.

She brought her head down to her hands and pressed the hells of her palms against her eyes. She needed to think, to work through it all. She had expected something like this to come up in their relationship at some point, not that she'd be the one to do it. While she dated him, she watched girls flirt relentlessly with her boyfriend and it didn't help that he was known as the player of the school as they had been growing up. No one had been as surprised as she was when Zack had asked her out and she said yes. She liked him, sure, but she never thought he would have been serious when he asked her to the movies, or that he would have become committed to her so quickly. If another girl flirted with him, he would be polite, but remind them that he was taken. Maybe that was their problem, their relationship moved so fast, before she knew it, they had gone from kissing to making out to having sex.

Their first time had been awkward and scary but he had been gentle and patient and they managed to laugh about it afterwards. Their relationship had gotten better since then, their moments to themselves—even if it was at Cody's expense—was exciting as they had been sneaking around, but then Max found herself craving something more. They didn't talk as much as used to, even about nothing, it was just a 'hi, how are you, how was your day, do you have any homework' and then at some point time wasted away as they were caught up with each other's company. It was fun at first, but now it was…lackluster to say the least.

"Do you think we should?" Tapeworm pressed. Clearly he wanted to talk about it more than she did, he wasn't getting her hints to change the subject. "Actually…is there an us?" He ran a hand through his hair, speaking quickly so he could get all of the words out before Max could answer. "I mean, the last thing I want to do is steal my best friend's girlfriend, but still…I can't help but think that there's something there and I wouldn't want to waste the opportunity."

"Chris, calm down," Max said gently. She started to unbraid and braid her hair over and over again, almost like she was on autopilot. "Don't have a heart attack. Look, Zack and I…we've had our problems…and we've been going out since we were fourteen. People grow up…they grow apart…" she gave a sarcastic laugh. "Wow, I sound really heartless right now." She shook her head. "I don't want to hurt him as much as you do, so…"

"So?" Tapeworm prompted.

Max chewed her bottom lip. "Maybe we should…try to distance ourselves from each other while I try to talk to Zack. Just so…things don't get even more strained? I don't know, things are just so confusing right now."

"Don't worry, I understand," Tapeworm said. He slid off of her bed and grabbed his shoes. He stuck his feet in them and turned to leave, turned back to Max, then changed his mind, going to the door. "I'll see you later, Max."

"See you, Tape," Max returned, just as quietly. She watched him close the door behind her then tossed his textbook aside. Turning onto her side, she reached up and grabbed onto her pillow and pulled it over her head. Even if she couldn't completely block herself from the world, being able to do so for a few minutes wouldn't hurt.

"So what are your guys' plans for Thanksgiving?" Bailey shoved her lunch tray away from her, picking up a cup of chocolate pudding. "My parents were thinking of going back to Kettlecorn to see the family we left there." She shrugged. "But I think that might be too depressing. Mom says we may just fly them all out here."

"I'm sure everything will turn out ok, Bailey," Cody said helpfully. He bobbed his head back and forth. "The turnaround time for a farm can be very tricky. I mean, it could be bankrupt now, but you never know when the next demand for fresh corn and vegetables will come back."

"It wasn't that," Bailey protested. "It was everything else that broke down around the farm, it kept eating up the money that we were making." As resilient as ever, Bailey still managed to smile. "But I'm going to be sure that everyone has a good time in Boston when they get here."

"Maybe we can come over," Zack spoke up. He stirred his plate of macaroni, staring at the yellow sludge on his plate. "Cody and I'll probably be watching Mom and Dad bicker over every slight thing before Dad goes out and tries to get some cool stuff while Black Friday shopping." He pushed his hair out of his face. "But he did bring us one time, and it was totally cool."

Cody laughed. "Yeah, the one time that we were able to bite someone's ankles without getting in trouble for it."

"Good times," Zack agreed with a smile and a nod.

Patrick, who was sitting across from him, pouted. "That's not fair," he protested and nudged Noah on the arm. "The last time Noah and I tried that, we got grounded for two weeks."

"That's because you were trying to bite the mailman," Rhuben reminded them.

"He always looks at us funny," Noah protested.

Zack smiled and shook his head. Their stories always seemed to be as crazy and entertaining as his and Cody's were. They hadn't even heard most of what had been going on while they were living with their grandmother or just moving around the states, as their mother tried to find a place to settle down with her career. The one that usually came to mind was an incident that involved a toaster, peanut butter, and a lot of firemen. Who knew that two unsupervised kids just trying to make toast could cause so much trouble? Him and Cody together were bad, add in the Jacksons it was worse, add in Crystal and her brother, and you had absolutely nothing but ultimate chaos.

"And if that didn't answer your question, we're going back to Australia for Thanksgiving," Riley said. She brushed a pigtail over her ears and brought up a knee to rest on the end of her seat. "Besides, we don't particularly celebrate the holiday anyway."

"And I still think you all are crazy for not celebrating it," Crystal remarked. "I mean, hello, as much food as you can eat just for dinner?"

"That's just called food with us," Riley remarked. She then laughed, pushing back her chair until she was resting on the two back legs, rocking back and forth. "And you're only saying that because you're partially Canadian and you get two Thanksgivings, one for Canada and one for the US."

"No need to be jealous," Crystal teased.

"Jealous of what?" Riley pointed at her cousin with a fork. "While you lot are here suffering in the cold, we're going to be at the beach all day every day." Rhuben, Patrick, and Noah let out cheers of encouragement and the four leaned over the table, giving each other a high-five.

"Great, since I can't be there, be sure to take lots of pictures," Zack said. A smarmy smile tugged at his lips. "I want to see if all of the girls in Australia really are as good looking as you two."

"Thanks, I think," Rhuben said. She looked down at her plate and scowled at the food that was sitting on her plate. "Does anyone else think it's time that we get some new food around here? I'm tired of having to go hungry every day." Zack looked over at her as she pushed her tray away from her. Noah gave her a disapproving glance and she shrugged instead, reaching into her backpack and pulling out a package of Reese's peanut butter cups. She opened them and cut them into halves before popping one into her mouth, leaning forward to listen to what Cody was saying.

What was that about? Zack didn't blame her for not eating the food. He wasn't one that usually, enjoyed it that much, but there were some upsides to it every now and then. The chili, burgers, and chicken were really good, it was everything else that made it have the bad reputation. Besides, on your diet, you can't afford to eat a lot anyway. Zack continued to stir his macaroni as he thought about his meal plan. He had one bowl of cereal and a banana with orange juice, and managed to get an hour in for a workout, focusing specifically on cardio. So that was shedding some water weigh there, soon he'd start to actually lose the weight and gain the muscle that he wanted. So maybe it was a good thing that lunch was so bad, anything that would keep his mind off of eating the stuff knowing that he was going to have what they called a 'hard practice' later that afternoon. It was better to do it on an empty stomach, that way if you were going to throw up, it was just going to be water.

"This is seriously the quietest I've ever heard you, like, ever, mate," Riley said, grabbing his attention. She was looking directly at him, causing him to look away. "You couldn't even do it when Carey tried to bribe you twenty dollars to be quiet for an hour."

Zack shrugged, sitting up straight. "Just thinking," he replied.

"Don't hurt yourself," she remarked.

"Thanks." Zack gave her a sarcastic smile. He then snapped his fingers. "That reminds me, you know that guitar you were asking for Dad says that he'd sell it."

Riley's eyes lit up. He loved it whenever he was able to do it, which wasn't that often. Even when she was in a bad mood or clearly didn't want anyone to talk to her, he tried his hardest to get her to smile or to even laugh if he did something silly. But seeing her eyes light up was one of the tougher things to manage and he did his best to do so. "Really? Ace! How much was it?"

"About a hundred fifty," Zack replied. He waved a hand. "But don't' worry about it, I already paid for it." He watched as Riley's eyes narrowed for a second and she closed her mouth, resting her chin in her hand. Then she noticed her cheeks starting to turn red and knew that he was in deep trouble. Shit. I try to do something nice and I screw it all up. Riley's face turning red, her whole face, was one of the sure signs that she was angry. At that moment, it was a light pink, showing that her annoyance was quickly turning into danger territory. He had to diffuse the situation fast. "Dude, it's no big deal."

"It is considering I can't accept it," she said through clenched teeth. She lowered her voice. "It's not my birthday and it's not a gift giving holiday, so I can't accept the guitar." She took a deep breath, the color in her face lessening, though she still had a clipped edge to her tone. "Why don't you take it, you used to play the guitar, or was at least learning how to." Zack was now confused. How did he go from doing something that he thought was nice, to almost being screamed at, to having the guitar shoved off on him? He didn't understand girls before, and he surely didn't understand them now. Especially not after Max having ignored him the entire night before and he hadn't seen her all day either. "Besides…" Riley shrugged. "I don't think Max would be too happy if you gave me something that expensive."

And that was it, staring him in the face. Though Zack had always been interested in Riley and anyone could see that—along with everyone seeing that she wasn't interested in him—when he and Max started to go out, she suddenly became even more conscious of the things she did around Zack or that he did around her, in case it upset her. She didn't spend a lot of time alone with Zack unless it had something to do with schoolwork or there was a good chance that someone else could come by, and their days of constant bickering started to dwindle. Though he was competitive and hated to lose, he liked to argue with her, knowing that he was getting an actual response of passion and what she really thought about something, rather than getting a response due to wanting to be left alone or just to be proven wrong—like Cody took pride in.

"Max doesn't care," he protested. I hope she doesn't, he thought. The two—along with Crystal, Rhuben, and Bailey—were still best friends since the two had started to go out. When did it start to be a problem, anyway?

Riley's right eyebrow rose. "You sure about that?" She pressed.

Zack opened his mouth to answer then, realizing he couldn't, closed it again. He then smiled flirtatiously at her. "How about this? You give me guitar lessons and I'll do something for you."

Riley slowly stopped rocking her chair, studying him. She crossed her arms over her chest and tilted her head to the side, allowing some of her hair, her red strand of hair especially, to fall into her face. Slowly, she lifted a finger and brushed the strand out of her eyes, all the while holding a steady gaze on him. "Like what?"

"Liiike…" Zack drummed his fingers on the tabletop as he thought about it. "Hmm." He sucked his lips into his mouth. "I can't say that I'd give you a kiss because you've slapped that idea out of me so many times I finally learned not to ask for it." Riley smirked at him, she couldn't even count the number of times she had punched or slapped him when they were younger for the times he tried—and the few times succeeded—in trying to kiss her. "Ummm, what else can I give you?"

"You can let me go through your closet so I can throw out all of that old skater stuff that you have," Riley commented. "I mean, it was cute when we were kids, but now you might want to update your wardrobe a little bit." He could tell from the flash in her eyes that she was just teasing him.

Zack snorted. "If you wanted me to take my clothes off so badly, all you had to do was ask."

"Whoa, I came into this conversation at the wrong time," Patrick said. He was looking over at Zack with a glare. Anyone that said that he wasn't overprotective of the females in his family was clearly lying. Anytime a guy would get close to one of them, he would immediately jump into his protective mode if Noah, Sydney, Christian, or Julius didn't get there first.

"Don't worry about it, dude," Zack reassured him as the bell rang.

"Yeah, comments like that are common from Zack," Cody added. He smirked over at his brother. "Hence the trail of girls that cry after him all the time."

Zack's left eye twitched for a moment. "At least I have ones that cry after me. All of the ones you've broken up with had a party because you were so boring they couldn't wait to get away from you." He and Cody shared disgruntled looks, though they knew not to take it to heart. The amused smiles attested to that. Gathering their trays, they all stood up and went to toss their trash in the trash cans, moving out of the way as other students hurried to do the same and get to class on time.

"You didn't eat much," Rhuben remarked from Zack's side. "Food sucked that bad, huh? I mean, if you and Patrick won't eat it, there's got to be something wrong with it." She reached out and smacked her younger brother on the back of the head, and he turned around and grinned his lopsided grin at her, rubbing the spot. "But that's Peanut for you, he'll eat anything he can get his hands on."

"Yeah…" Zack looked down at his full tray. His macaroni only had one bite taken from it, his hamburger had gotten cold and the grease on top was starting to congeal, his fries were clumped together, and even the apple that he had been given looked like it had a sheen of grease on it. Otherwise, the only thing he had was water and the milk carton that he had grabbed. Chocolate Milk was a hot commodity at Cheevers High, he wasn't going to miss out on that. "You have to have a cast iron stomach to be able to actually digest this stuff." He looked down at his tray, feeling his stomach seize. "If it didn't take so long, I would make my own lunch every day."

"Just be sure that you actually eat of it," Rhuben said.

Zack stopped walking and looked at the back of her head as she managed to move a few steps in front of him. Even looking at the back of her head he could tell her, Riley, and Crystal apart, though they had been mistaken for triplets very easily. He mistook them at first, but then easily found how to tell them apart; Crystal was the one that was nice to him when they first met, she greeted him with a warm smile and a handshake while her cousins were a lot cooler. Rhuben was the one that was a peacemaker, always trying to get him and Cody to stop fighting and usually was the first one to take Cody's side in an argument. Then Riley was the quickest to get angry, but the most outgoing, even if the idea was stupid, you could usually talk her into going along with it, only for the fact that she found it entertaining. From a physical look, Crystal's face was slightly thinner and her eyes were a lighter shade of blue, Rhuben had a scar in her eyebrow and she had a mole on her chin, Riley had a scar on her lower right jaw and a light mole on her cheek.

Zack thought for a minute, wondering how to answer the question. First he wondered how she would have noticed if no one else did, and second thinking of a way to explain why he hadn't eaten much of lunch even if it did genuinely suck.

"Oh, I just ate a lot during breakfast today," he finally said. "Cody made a good breakfast and Mom and I inhaled it as fast as possible knowing how much of a commodity it's been lately."

Rhuben's lip curled up at the corner. "I don't doubt it. Especially the times that you would come to our suite just to eat, yeah?" She reached out and wrapped her arm around Zack's waist. She tilted her head back and looked at him seriously. "Makes me wonder if that was only supposed to be a one-time thing. " She removed her arm from his waist and slung her backpack up onto both shoulders.

"What does that mean?" Zack followed her.

"I'm just saying be careful, Zack, that's all," Rhuben said. She placed her hand on Zack's shoulder. "You can be a little annoying at times, but you're still my friend and I still care about you. Besides, who else am I going to suffer through history with?"

"I'm, surprisingly, good at history," Zack pointed out.

"I said suffer with," Rhuben repeated. "I didn't say that you were going to suffer too." She stuck her tongue out and flicked Zack on the end of his nose. He pushed her hand away, flicking her back. Rhuben hitched her backpack up her shoulder and looked him up and down. "Just don't do anything stupid," she said mysteriously.

"I won't," Zack said. "Promise."

And he wasn't doing anything stupid, really.

He was just getting into shape…

A/N: Hmm, I need to think of a side-plot to go along with this story that will bring in some more drama as the story goes on. I've got an idea, but I'm not sure how well it'll work out. Anyway, I hope you guys liked the chapter, first time doing a bit of Zack/Rhuben friendship so that was interesting to work with.

Do you think I'm balancing the older characters well around Zack's plot? Or is there anyone you want to see more of (I'm thinking Bailey since I haven't done her a lot yet) and then I'm bringing in Patrick, Noah, Sydney, and Aaron's parts soon.

Cheers,

-Riles