Part I

Of Chocolate Milk and Antimatter

Holly was irresistibly thrilled about actually being able to attend a real high school. It was like a dream come true, practically, because her parents had always been so strict about her home schooling. Even her brother, who would be driving her, couldn't bring her down today. He was a junior and had also been allowed to attend Fairview High School, but he'd already made a name for himself and had friends and cliques and all the normal high school stuff. Holly, on the other hand, was a freshman and had to fend for herself. But the thought of being able to make new friends and join a clique of her own was exciting and new as nothing else, so she ignored the butterflies and slipped into her brother's car.

The day was nice, but slightly chilly as the September air whipped through her hair. Holly was ready to get started making new friends, and all but jumped from Eric's car when he pulled into the parking lot.

"Thanks, Eric!" Holly chirped.

She leaned over to kiss him, but he jumped quickly away, looking around hastily to make sure none of his friends had seen.

"Holly!" he complained.

Holly grinned widely. She didn't care that he was being antisocial because today was her day and there really was nothing that could bring her spirits down.

Fairview High School was your normal, run-of-the-mill establishment. It had one large building for senior and junior classes and an identical building for freshmen and sophomore classes. There was a smaller building specifically for the administration, which Eric had warned her to avoid at all costs. The gym, refectory, track, and swimming pool were somewhere in the back, but Holly didn't really care much.

She peered around with wide green eyes and barely heard Eric tell her to have a great first day.

Holly clutched her messenger bag and lunch tightly as she walked quickly into the underclassmen wing. Her brand new jeans and white t-shirt were crisp and clean and she absolutely adored the new sequined pink vest that her mother had bought her. Maybe, she bargained, her new outfit would help her make some friends.

The freshman had been told to pick up their schedules in the freshman dean's office, so that was where Holly headed. The hallway was crowded with new students, like herself, and returning sophomores who gushed to each other about their summers and class schedules.

~:*:~

Logan Blackwell was fairly certain that if he were to spend exactly sixteen minutes in the underclassmen wing showing around his group of freshmen that he would still have ten-and-a-half minutes to get to his first period class. After all, the upperclassmen wing was hardly a minute's walk across the quad and he was undeniably good at maneuvering through the crowded halls.

He leaned against the counter of the dean's secretary's desk with the other upperclassmen that shared in his pain, and stared down at the list of names in his hand. There were five new students that he had to guide around the building, which meant approximately twenty five questions. If Logan spent thirty seconds on each question, he'd be in good time to get to class.

"Hi! Do you know where I can get my schedule?"

Logan lowered the list in his hand and came face to face with a tiny blonde girl whose grin spread from ear to ear as she peered up at him. He pushed his glasses further up on his nose and pointed silently to a stack of papers at the right wall of the office.

"Thanks a bunch!"

He shuddered at the thought of having to spend twenty minutes with the bubbly freshman and hoped that she wasn't one of the students on his list.

Holly, on the other hand, felt like she'd just met heaven. She crossed her fingers, hoping against hope that the tall boy with the black hair and glasses would be her tour guide. His hooded blue eyes were cold and calculating, but she found them utterly irresistible and wouldn't be surprised if she found herself in love very, very soon.

At half-past eight, the dean came out of his office to welcome all the upperclassmen. He was a burly, intimidating man whose grimace-like smile had Holly sneaking quietly from the office to wait in the classroom next door where she'd been assigned.

Logan waited patiently for the dean to finish speaking, and pushed his glasses up on the bridge of his nose. At the corner of his eye, he noticed a pile of badly-stacked papers and turned to fix them.

"Blackwell, are you listening?"

Logan stopped in the poor attempt to satiate his OCD and faced the dean.

"Yes, sir, of course."

The older man glared at Logan who cowered slightly.

"Well, then, you should know that the rest of the group has gone to their assigned classrooms."

Logan blushed heavily and realized the dean was right. He was the only student left in the office. With that knowledge at hand, he plowed out into the hallway, stumbling over a sophomore on his way.

Holly was just getting to know a couple of students in her group before their guide appeared. She'd already made nice with a brunette girl whose name was Gabby and her twin brother Nick, when the door flew open and the boy with the glasses and black hair stumbled into the room.

One look around and Logan had to suppress an urge to groan. The perky blonde from before was standing near the back of the room talking animatedly with two other freshmen. When he entered, however, she stopped speaking and turned to stare wide-eyed in his direction.

There was a momentary pause, in which Logan looked stubbornly back at her, until he realized he still had a job to do. He cleared his throat and waited until five sets of eyes settled on him.

"Hello, everyone," he said. "My name is Logan Blackwell and I'm a junior here at Fairview. Let's begin by introducing ourselves to one another, shall we?"

Holly was fairly enamored at the way Logan—what a dreamy name!—spoke so properly and sophisticatedly. He held himself up with confidence, although he had distinctly blushed upon seeing her staring at him.

And to think, he was a junior! Maybe Eric knew him? She would have to ask her brother later on and find out.

"Um, Holly Michaelson?"

Holly grinned and replied happily, "That's me! I'm here."

Logan cringed and continued down the list, the other students proving much calmer than Holly. Her huge smile stayed firmly in place the whole time as he explained about lunches being mixed between grade levels and the times between classes.

"So, ninth graders have a twenty-minute break between second and third period, and then between sixth and seventh period. You are allowed only three tardies per class after which you will receive detention as the teacher sees fit. There is a grace period for the first week as students get settled with their schedules. Any questions?"

Predictably, the blonde girl—Holly—raised her hand and waited patiently for Logan to acknowledge her.

"Yes?"

"How long are lunches?"

He replied with the appropriate response, but Holly was not to be quelled with the monosyllabic replies.

"What kind of extra curricular activities are there? Oh! Is there a cheerleading squad? When are tryouts? Can freshmen try out?" she gushed.

Logan refrained from rolling his eyes and answered as patiently as his rising temper would allow. He was getting behind schedule and that really wouldn't do. He gave her a brief reply about seeing the cheerleaders themselves for information.

When finished answering her questions, Logan prevented her from asking any more by declaring, "Let's get started. I will answer the rest of your questions on the way."

Holly's smile did not fade a fraction at his blatant blowing-off. She loved the sound of his deep voice and continued pestering him with questions along the tour just to hear it. It was eventually time for everyone to find their respective homerooms, and Holly sadly bid Logan goodbye.

Logan was not so disappointed and smiled for the first time that morning as he waved a farewell.

~:*:~

The beginning of the day passed in a blur for Holly. Lunch was soon upon her and she was determined to make some new friends. She and Gabby shared a couple of before-lunch classes, but it seemed they did not have the same lunch as Holly peered around at the large room full of chattering students.

She spied the upperclassmen cheerleaders near the doors to one of the patios and grinned excitedly. Well, there was no better place to start than those she belonged with.

On the way, Holly spied her brother sitting with the junior jocks a couple of tables away from the cheerleaders and tried in vain to get his attention. All that she succeeded in doing was to knock someone's milk onto her white shirt as she attempted to wave at Eric. Holly's eyes widened and her cheeks tinged with red, but she apologized quietly to the boy whose milk she had spilled and opened her lunch bag to dig out a napkin.

Disregarding the minor mishap, she continued forward toward the cheerleaders, her biggest, most luminous smile firmly in place.

None of the busty blonde girls seemed to notice the freshman who had come to stand beside their table. In fact, they began talking louder and more obnoxiously when Holly stopped beside them.

"Um, excuse me?" Holly said, tapping one of the girls on the shoulder. The girl turned with a cold smirk on her perfect lips. "Hi, I'm Holly Michaelson!"

"Oh, hi, I'm tired of freshman crowding up our halls but there doesn't seem to be a solution for that," the girl snapped.

Holly's smile did not waver as more and more of the cheerleaders turned to stare at her. Their eyes dropped immediately to her pink sequined vest and the chocolate milk stain on her white shirt. She blushed again at the attention.

"Is there something we can do for you?" the girl asked, speaking slowly as though Holly might not understand her.

"Or better yet, is there somewhere we can direct you? Like, maybe the dumpster so you can get rid of that hideous pink vest?" another inquired coldly.

Holly's eyes widened and immediately dropped to her vest. She unconsciously fingered the sequins and willed herself not to cry.

"Go home, freshman. Come back when you've learned to stop letting your mother dress you," one of the girls on the other side of the table drawled.

"Yeah, come back when you've learned how to drink milk like a high schooler instead of a two-year-old."

With these pompous declarations, the varsity cheerleaders turned back to their meals and began to ignore Holly once more.

Holly couldn't believe what had just happened. She realized some of the other tables around her were staring at her and decided to get out of there. She took to a run and sprinted out into the quad, trying to get as far away from those people as she possibly could. It angered her that they had been so mean without provocation, but she was angrier at the fact that tears were now streaming down her cheeks.

Logan Blackwell, unlike the three hundred some odd students in the cafeteria at that moment, was making his way toward the library which was on the other side of campus. His nose was buried in a book about antimatter, and he chewed idly on an apple as he walked. Therefore, so many things were occupying Logan's mind that he didn't notice the distraught blonde girl running in his direction until she had accidentally hurled herself at him.

The pair landed in a heap on the gravel of the sidewalk and Logan's apple flew from his hand and toward the fountain in the middle of the quad. Something began soaking his shirt so he pulled his glasses from where they lay near his chin and peered up at the thing that had mauled him. It was the blonde girl from that morning and she seemed to be bawling her eyes out. Despite his surprise, Logan groaned at the pain her elbow was causing to his stomach and carefully moved it away.

"I-I'm so—" Holly hiccupped, "s-sorry!"

Even cold-hearted and completely study-oriented Logan Blackwell melted at the sight of the upset girl. He smiled softly and patted her arm.

"It's quite alright," he assured.

Holly, who had been so busy thinking about the cheerleaders, had not realized that the person she'd run into was Logan Blackwell. Now, she looked down at him and, noticing that she was quite frankly straddling his waist, blushed heavily.

"Are you alright?!" she exclaimed suddenly as it occurred to her that she'd basically just run the poor boy down.

Logan nodded solemnly and gathered his ripped book from where it lay beside them. That, more than anything else, upset him and he frowned at the spineless pieces. Holly removed herself from her position in his lap and waited for him to stand up. In the meantime, she pulled a compact from her purse to begin cleaning up her face now that she'd stopped crying. The sight within the tiny mirror was worthy of a part in a horror movie and she grimaced at the mascara and eyeliner running down her cheeks.

Logan took up his backpack and led the girl over to one of the benches in the quad. They sat down awkwardly, Logan staring morosely at his book and Holly looking sadly at her ruined makeup.

"A-Are you alright? What happened?" Logan asked her a moment later, at last setting the broken book beside him on the bench.

Holly shut her compact and sighed. How could she explain this without making herself sound like a fool? Of course she'd already accepted the validity of the cheerleaders' jabs and wanted nothing more than to change her clothes. They were right: she was just a freshman who had no right to bother them like she had. How naïve of her to think that they would want anything to do with a lowly underclassman.

"Well, I attempted to talk to the cheerleaders, like you told me to…" she began and went on to tell him what had happened in the cafeteria.

Logan felt an overwhelming guilt take over him as he listened to Holly's story. His impatience that morning had caused her to face some of the meanest people in the school, and she'd essentially been led to tears by his advice.

When Holly finished recounting the tale, Logan dropped his head in frustration.

"I'm sorry. I know how awful they can be and shouldn't have told you to talk to them. It's my fault," he lamented.

Holly's eyes widened and she began shaking her head vehemently even though he was looking at the ground. She placed a hand on his knee unconsciously.

"Oh, no! Of course it's not your fault. I shouldn't go around bothering people like that, it's a bad habit," she explained. "Actually, my brother Eric tells me I need to start minding my own business before I get in trouble. He's right, I suppose. So are the cheerleaders."

Logan's head snapped up and he looked at Holly beside him. She seemed so different than the perky, upbeat girl from that morning and he was almost annoyed at her sobriety. Those cheerleaders really needed to learn a thing or two about manners.

"You're fine the way you are, okay?" he said.

"You really think so?"

Logan blushed but nodded. He took her hand from where it rested on his knee and held onto it for a moment.

"Yes, of course. The cheerleaders are just egotistical narcissists who need a constant supply of sycophantic followers to make them feel better about themselves. They haven't got half the personality you have," he told her.

It was Holly's turn to blush. She leaned over, quickly so that she wouldn't chicken out, and pecked him on the cheek. Logan's glasses slipped to the edge of his nose as he turned bright red. He pushed them back up.

"Well, I'd better go find something to change into," Holly said a moment later.

Logan nodded numbly and gathered up his stuff. He smiled weakly at her, and then turned and began back toward the library again.

~:*:~

Needless to say, Holly's brother had seen the events of the cafeteria and addressed her about it later that day when they sat down in his car.

"What were you thinking? Haven't I told you countless times about impressing yourself on people you don't know? Those girls could have ripped you apart," Eric groaned.

Holly frowned and turned toward the window, staring blankly at the parking lot as it blurred by. She spotted one of the cheerleaders making out with her boyfriend and faced the front again.

"I know. It was stupid," she muttered.

Eric sighed heavily and reached over to ruffle her hair.

"If you wanted to know about cheerleading, you should have gone to see the sponsor," he explained calmly.

Holly nodded without much enthusiasm but remained silent. The rest of her day had been substantially less interesting, although Gabby and Nick were both in some of her afternoon classes. She'd done her best to cover up the milk stains, and had been more than grateful when Gabby allowed her to borrow a shirt.

Holly's thoughts had mostly been occupied by the nerdy junior who'd helped her out and his words kept replaying themselves in her head. His blue eyes were the last thing she thought about that night before she went to bed.

~:*:~

Logan arrived at school early the next day, wanting to study a little bit for the reading test he had in English over the summer reading assignment. He parked his motorcycle near the upperclassmen building, and went straight up to his English class.

The teacher hadn't arrived yet, but Logan went into the room and made his way over to the center desk in the first row. He sat down and began pulling things out of his backpack before he noticed something had been placed on the desk.

It was a wrapped package around which someone had tied a bow. Logan stared at it a moment, trying to figure out what was happening and then plucked off the note that had been attached to the bow.

Thanks.

The handwriting on the small piece of cardstock was bubbly and neat, and Logan had a fair idea of who had given him the gift. He went about unwrapping the package and discovered a brand new, rip-free copy of the book on antimatter he'd been reading the previous day laying amongst the wrapping paper.

Logan smirked a little and then opened up the book and began where he'd left off. Some things were just a little more important than English.

~:*:~

Holly had been doubly nervous about returning to school that day. While she'd managed to convince Eric to take her to the bookstore the night before, it had been difficult to figure out where Logan's first class was. When she had finally managed it, it was another thing entirely that he might already be in class; after all, he seemed like the type. But he hadn't been, and Holly's plan had gone off without a hitch. Now, it was just a matter of waiting.

She did her best the entire day to make friends her own age as her experience with the cheerleaders had been just short of scarring. It wasn't until lunch that she actually encountered Logan again. His nose was buried deep within the new book, so Holly took it upon herself to steer clear of his path of walking.

She coughed slightly when he passed the bench on which she was seated but that didn't seem to be enough to garner his attention.

"Humph," Holly said, and frowned. She'd been sitting right in his line of vision!

Logan's head was occupied by thoughts of outer space and black hole-causing antimatter, but when he heard Holly's sigh of indignation, he lowered the book and. looked around. The little blonde girl was sitting on the same bench they'd sat on the day before, but this time she had her legs crossed Indian-style upon it and had laid her lunch out in front of her.

"Oh, hi," he said, and blushed a little bit.

Holly grinned broadly and waved.

"Hi!"

At least she was back to normal, Logan thought. He stuffed the book into his backpack and approached her bench.

"So, uh, thank you for the book. I was actually very upset about my other copy being ruined yesterday," he said, and scratched the back of his neck sheepishly.

Holly giggled a little bit.

"I noticed that… and I felt so bad about it, I had my brother drive me to the bookstore after school to get a new copy. Who knew there are so many different books about antimatter?" she rambled.

Logan smirked slightly. Holly didn't seem like the type to be reading books about antimatter, he decided, so her remark didn't really surprise him.

"Well, thank you."

"Mmhmm. Why don't you sit down?" Holly offered.

Logan shrugged and took a seat beside her. She picked up half of her ham and cheese sandwich—courtesy of her mother—and held it up to him.

"No, thanks. I don't usually eat lunch," he replied.

Holly shrugged and took a bite from the sandwich.

"Say, do you know my brother? His name's Eric Michaelson," Holly asked him after she'd finished chewing.

"Yes, I do. He's in a couple of my classes, in fact. I wouldn't have presumed you were siblings, though. You're not much alike at all," Logan said.

They continued on in this manner for a while, asking questions and talking a little. Logan's book lay forgotten in his backpack, but Holly kept most of her attention on her lunch. Cute boy or not, food was very important.

The bell rang soon enough and both were surprised at how quickly lunch had passed. They split up for class and didn't meet again until the next day.

~:*:~

Holly was seated on the same bench, in the same fashion, as the previous day. The sun was beating down on her from above, but she was waiting for Logan to walk through the quad. He'd mentioned he always picked up an apple from the refectory and then made his way across campus to the library.

So there she waited, and like clockwork he arrived. There was no book in his hands this time—only an apple and a paper bag. He was ready for her presence and came right up in front of her.

"Here," Logan said, and shoved the bag in Holly's face.

She jumped back a little, but took the bag on the faith that he wouldn't trick her with worms or something. Therefore, when she peered inside, she found two harmless chocolate chip cookies and a lollipop.

Holly grinned broadly and gestured for Logan to sit down, which she noticed he never did without being invited to.

"Thanks!"

They were quiet for a long time while Holly munched away on a bag of chips. Logan peered out over the quad, which was more or less empty, and toward the refectory a little ways off.

"Why do you always go to the library?" Holly asked him.

Logan pushed his glasses up and gave her a sidelong glance.

"It's much too loud in the refectory," he told her. "I like the peace of the library."

Holly thought about his explanation for a while, wondering whether or not she agreed. Subconsciously she knew she did. Why else had she spend three days in a row outside in the quad talking to him when she could have been in the refectory with her friends? It really was too loud in there, she decided.

"I guess I see where you're coming from."

Logan shrugged.

"It's just my preference. You don't have to agree with it," he said. "Why don't you sit in there to eat with your friends?"

"It's much too loud in the refectory," Holly replied somberly, but couldn't hold her laugh for very long.

Logan smirked at her antics and relaxed a little bit.

For the rest of lunch, they held a steady flow of conversation until the bell rang to dismiss them for class. Holly and Logan bid each other a quick goodbye and split up.

~:*:~

This pattern of lunch in the quad repeated itself each day and Holly found she wouldn't have liked to spend her lunches with anyone else. Logan, once a person managed to get through his walls and past his temper issues, was quite sweet and very cute.

And Logan found that he rather liked spending his lunches with Holly instead of in the library. She actually had the ability to speak back to him, unlike the laptop he spent most of his time in front of.

He'd decided that it had been such a long time since he'd had any sort of a substantial conversation with anyone at Fairview that it felt good to talk to Holly. She was as pure as they came and some of her ignorance was endearing, even. No doubt she was cute, though admittedly a little slow, and had some lovable quirks. Logan shook his head and focused on the conversation. He'd been more than annoyed with her on the first day of school, so who was to say he wouldn't get annoyed again later?

They were about a month-and-a-half into school before anything truly interesting happened. Holly had long since given up denying she had a crush on the boy who was quickly becoming one of her best friends, and had been trying to work up the courage to make a move.

They were seated in the quad as always, but this time Holly did not have a lunch in front of her. She'd been too nervous that morning to remember about grabbing it from the kitchen counter at home.

Logan was immersed in a book about twentieth century scientific theories and Holly had given up trying to start a conversation. The boy was as lost to the world as a corpse and there was really nothing she could do about it.

"Logan?—Logan?"

When he didn't move from his position beside her, Holly sighed loudly and stared down at the concrete near their feet.

"So, I think I've fallen irrevocably in love with my English teacher. We're eloping tomorrow," she tried, hoping the offhanded comment would gain his attention.

It didn't. Logan simply sat there like a rock and concentrated on his book. Well, Holly supposed, desperate times called for desperate measures.

She uncrossed her legs and stood up right in front of him.

"Logan!" she exclaimed, snatching the book right out of his hands before he could react.

Logan's eyes snapped up to meet hers when he realized what she'd just done. He wasn't angry, per se, just a little peeved, and raised an eyebrow to ask what Holly thought she was doing.

"You are so impossible!" she continued, frustrated.

"What?" he asked. "What is it?"

"This!"

And she leaned up, because even though he sat on the bench and she stood in front of him, Logan was still taller than she was. Her lips connected with his for half a second before Holly pulled abruptly away and turned away from him.

Logan's cheeks flooded in a blush and he sat there dumbfounded because he wasn't really sure how to respond to her actions. Pushing up his glasses, he cleared his throat. It had been a very long time since he'd kissed a girl, so the event took him by surprise.

Holly refused to look at him. What had she been thinking?! A moment of frustration for a lifetime of embarrassment didn't seem like a fair enough trade. Logan hadn't even reacted to the kiss, which could only mean bad things.

"H-Holly?" he said softly a few moments later.

Holly shook her head. "No."

"Holly, come on," he pleaded. "Talk to me."

She turned slowly because Logan sounded so pathetic, but her gaze stayed glued to the concrete. The confession was something she wanted to be over with, if only to have his rejection and be done with it.

"I-I like you, Logan," she mumbled.

Logan rolled his eyes—not to be mean, but amused that she would first state the obvious. Why else would she lay one on him?

"How long?" he asked.

"Since I asked you where I could find my schedule on the first day of school," she said quietly.

Logan was shocked, to say the least. She'd liked him for that long and had never said a word about it? He didn't know how to take the news.

"W-Wow. That long, huh?" he asked.

"Yeah," she replied. There was a pause, and then Holly decided just to get it over with. "So… You want to hang out sometime? I-I mean, you know, outside of school?"

She risked a peak at him and found that he was staring at her in surprise. She dropped her eyes to the ground and waited for a subtle rebuff.

"Uh," Logan began, shocked. "I… suppose that would be alright. Is Friday night okay?"

Holly's head shot up and she stared at him in awe. He had said yes?

His answer was scandalous even to Logan. What possessed him to agree? Sure, Holly was sweet and pretty, but that didn't warrant a date! Not to mention, she was only a freshman. Freshmen were always so hyper and immature. And Holly talked too much, rambling on and on more often than not. She was too short for him and way too perky. He didn't even understand how it would work or why he'd said yes.

"Friday… sounds great!" Holly replied. "Pick me up at seven. I'll give you my address tomorrow."

"It's a date," he mumbled.

Logan gave her a short hug right then as the bell rang and they parted ways. He scratched the back of his neck, thinking about what he'd gotten himself into.

A/N: Well, this WAS a two-shot, but I've put the two parts together and made it a one-shot. I hope you like it! Leave a review. I can write Logan and Holly's date if you'd like, and make it a companion piece. Just let me know! =]]]]]

LondonLi:I think that's what's going to end up happening, lol. But I'm glad you liked the first part. Thanks for reviewing!!

anon, a mouse: Thanks for reviewing!! Here's the second part.

The rest of the review replies were done through email, so please be sure to check your inboxes!! =]