Sorry for the league of absence. Well, actually, it hasn't been that long, so… NEVERMIND!

Ch. 11:

Max POV

Of all the luck, I got stuck with Fang as a partner. This was just awful. No, worse than awful. I could barely resist screaming at him all day that I was Lost when he was standing 50 meters away from me, and now, well, now he was sitting right next to me discussing his opinions on the Revolutionary War.

"Miss Ride?" I looked up at Mrs. Craig, who was glaring down at me. Why that lady had some grudge against me, the world may never know. "Uh... yes?" I replied unsurely.

Her glare intensified. "Would you care to tell me which part of the Revolutionary War you and your partner were discussing just now."

"Paul Revere's Ride and the minutemen's impact on the Revolutionary War." I replied, not skipping a beat. Frowning, she walked away and I breathed a sigh of relief.

"We were actually discussing the Battle of Yorktown, you know?" Fang's deep voice interrupted my internal victory dance. Yeah. I do have those. Why don't you?

"No. We weren't discussing. You were spewing random facts about it like the valedictorian you know you're going to be, and I was zoning out while day-dreaming about… chocolate." In this case, chocolate is equal to Fang, I guess.

Fang raised an eyebrow. "I heard you were my competition for valedictorian, actually."

I could feel my own eyes widening. "Where did you hear that?" I shrieked, causing some of the class to turn in our direction. I glared at them, successfully keeping their nosy and prying eyes away from my conversation.

"Guidance counselor." Fang shrugged. "He's supposed to give you guidance, but all he does is rant about either his life or other people's problems. He said you were, and I quote, 'A very intelligent girl with the chance to earn valedictorian, but may be going down the wrong path in life.'"

"He said that?" I growled. I always knew guidance counselors were evil. "Think there is any way I could get him fired?"

Fang emitted a low chuckle. "Doubt it."

"Well… what are we doing our project on?" I asked finally. "Paul Revere and the minutemen or the Battle of Yorktown?"

"Whatever you want." Fang shot me a small smile.

I swear I almost fainted. I must be catching the flu.

Fang POV

As the bell rang and I walked outside, I questioned to myself why I was being just so nice to Maximum Ride. Sure, she had proven to be a fairly decent project partner (She hadn't jumped me yet, unlike several of the other girls in the school probably would've.), but it wasn't a tendency of mine to be very… sociable.

She actually hadn't ripped my head off yet, which surprised me to no end. She had done her fair share of the workload. She had even gotten Mrs. Craig off her back, which wasn't exactly easy to do. All in all, Maximum Ride had proved to be surprising. She had also proved not to be as much of a hard ass as everyone else says.

Thinking about it, Max wasn't anything like anyone else had described her to me. Sure she was able to beat to a pulp if she tried, or she isn't afraid to go on instinct (the milk proved that), but she wasn't some primal beast as everyone thought.

For some reason, I found a sort of fun in riling her up with things like Mr. Frank and the valedictorian incident, but I also found fun in the confused expression I saw on her face every time I smiled at her. It wasn't the definite swooning of my fan club, but more like a… an amusement. She seemed genuinely confused at my smiling at her. Truthfully, I felt the exactly the same way.

It made no sense. Why was I acting this way to Maximum Ride of all people? Yet, I still felt quite happy at the fact that she had agreed to meet with me tomorrow at my house – well, she had referred to it as 'Angel's house', I still can't believe she's friends with Angel – to start on the project.

But back to my main question: Why was I acting this way to Max?

"Fang?" My father asked gruffly as I walked through the familiar threshold of my house's front door.

"Yeah, dad?"

"Congratulations." He smiled at me happily, showing a sort of pride he almost never displayed.

"… Yes?" I asked hesitantly, not sure what had riled up this good mood. For all I know, I could be misreading his expression. It could actually be hunger on his face, not pride.

"USC's taken quite an interest in you, son. They're going to send someone to go watch your next game in a month. If you do well enough, well, let's just say you've got a very high chance at a scholarship." He beamed at me, his teeth almost blinding me. I was taken aback. My dad never smiled – I had most likely gotten my nonsocial tendencies from his side of the family.

"That's… that's great." I attempted to match his smile, but failed miserably.

"What is it, son?" He asked, noticing my lack of enthusiasm.

"Nothing." I forced a believable smile on my face. "Its great, dad. USC. The dream. Soon enough, I'll be there."

"That you will be."

Happy enough with his job of delivering this great news, my father took that moment to walk out of the room. I stared blankly at the wall, dropping the awful cheesy smile. Honestly, it was bad enough that I could belong as one of those smiling faces on the college brochures I had viewed.

Suddenly, I felt a pang inside me. I knew that if I went out to USC, I would miss everything. Miss everything about high school, that is. I'd miss messaging Lost long in to the hours of the night. I'd miss hanging out at Starbucks and finishing my essays. I'd miss attempting to play with Gazzy, but in the end getting part of my hair singed off. Hell, I'd probably even miss hanging out with the Dynamic Duo of Stupidity, Dylan and Sam.

I closed my eyes as I subconsciously walked to my own room. I collapsed on my bed and sighed deeply. Out of all the people, I got stuck with the dad who had planned my life out for me without even a bit of my own opinion.

But right now, I was very unsure of one fact.

Whether or not I'd be able to defy him in the end.

How was that? Huh? Huh? Anyway…

Um… donkeys. Yeah. Well, I best be going now. My dad says he urgently needs the computer.

~Cake.