The tense atmosphere seemed to follow the girls to their next Math's class together. Nalini marched to her usual seat in the front while Lola and Hanna sat in the middle where they were not likely to catch the teacher's attention.
Damien and Tyrone walked in together and headed to the back where they usually sat. He smiled at the girls but their previous conversation made it impossible for Lola to smile back. She looked down at her book and then up at Nalini.
Her friend had given the same reaction, barely acknowledging Damien's presence. Out of curiosity Lola turned sideways to sneak a peak at him and sure enough he was frowning at them in confusion.
She pretended not to notice which was easy because Eva and her friends suddenly marched in. Eva's eyes immediately fell on the seat next to Nalini and she sat down next to her arch nemesis.
"So I see you've made new friends," She spoke to Nalini in a low voice and Lola had to strain her ears to listen in.
"I've always been a friendly person," Nalini countered without looking up from her book. That seemed to anger the queen bee even more.
Eva reached forward and grabbed Nalini's book. "Damien is off limits, everyone seems to know that except you."
Lola bit her lip. She knew this was going to happen and she was praying that Nalini would back down for once in her life.
"Excuse me, he's gone out with practically the entire grade after dating you. And most of them have been your friends," Nalini whispered back ferociously.
"That's only because I allowed it," Eva snapped.
"Well too bad. You're not my mother. I don't need your permission to do anything," Nalini said and then she snatched her book back.
"You will regret this," Eva warned and Lola could have sworn she saw her body tremble with rage.
Their teacher walked in just as Lola cast a nervous glance at Hanna, who had been watching Nalini's heated exchange with Eva as well.
Mrs. Harriot began explaining about computing and compounding limits and it came to a point where Lola's mind drew a blank. She began day dreaming, mostly about her conversation with her friends.
It disturbed her more than she had realized. Was the way Julian had been acting with her all in her head? Why did he interrupt her potential kiss with Tyler? Why did he say those words to her in the woods?
Lola shifted uncomfortably, could it be that he was just using her like her friends thought? She couldn't deny that Julian had never paid any attention to her until this incident. They had been close as kids but after he came back all hot and indifferent they'd barely spoke a word to each other.
Lola didn't want to believe it because the thought of Julian using her was just too painful.
Her friends were right. There was a chance that these boys were being nice to them just for the sake of it and Lola needed to protect herself.
She needed to protect her heart and that meant not thinking too much about Julian's actions or his words. She was just going to help him out and once this was all over she would forget about him and maybe things would go back to normal.
Lola nodded to herself, her newfound resolve giving her the clarity she needed.
Tyler was the one she had liked until now. Julian and his annoyingly gorgeous eyes was just a distraction.
Lola snapped back to reality when she realized Mrs. Harriot had stopped teaching and was looking at Eva and Nalini, her face filled with exasperation.
The class was silent and all Lola could hear was Nalini and Eva bickering about a bunch of names she was unfamiliar with.
"Everyone knows Copernicus was the one who discovered the Sun was the center of the solar system, not Earth," Eva berated.
"No, it was Galileo. He charted it long before," Nalini responded with equal fervor.
"He only came after Copernicus."
"Looks like someone needs to brush up on her astronomy," Nalini teased.
Lola didn't even know they had the subject in school. She looked at Hanna who was watching these two girls argue over something no one else seemed to get. The entire class had zoned out, used to their usual bickering, except Mrs. Harriot who looked like she was going to pull out her hair.
"Girls, this is a Math's class not Physics or Astronomy," She said in a withered voice.
"But we are talking about Mathematicians so it is related Mrs. Harriot," Eva replied innocently.
"I think you two should just get a room," Tyrone bellowed from the back and Nalini whipped around to glare at him.
Eva on the other hand turned red and fell silent. Mrs. Harriot used this opportunity to continue her lesson but soon the bell rang signalling the class was over.
"Why do you always have to fight with her?" Lola asked Nalini for the hundredth time as they walked out of class.
"I don't know. I find it kind of fun," Nalini said as she held up her books to her chin, trying to balance them.
Lola helped her ease the load by taking a few from her. "It would be nice if you dialed back for awhile, the last thing we need is to attract more unwanted attention to ourselves."
Nalini leaned against a locker and stared at her friend thoughtfully. "I suppose you're right. I'll try to be nicer to her."
"Lola, look who just exited the teacher's office," Hanna nodded at the school office doors and they saw Tyler walking out.
Lola thought about her mission, about how her mixed feelings for Julian were just distractions and Tyler was the real deal. She had to mentally reinforce it because her heart was uselessly confused.
"I'm going to ambush him," Lola said, her voice filled with conviction.
"You go girl," Her friends silently cheered for her as she marched towards him.
Lola pushed past the bustling crowds filling the hallways and ducked when someone threw their hand out to high five someone else. She reached an unsuspecting Tyler in a minute and he looked startled at her sudden appearance.
"Hey I missed you at lunch," Lola said, trying her best to sound casual about it.
Tyler scratched his head and smiled at her sheepishly. "Sorry I was busy. Didn't get a chance to eat anything either. You free now?"
Truth be told, Lola's free period had been in the morning and she had History now but she didn't know if she would ever get another opportunity like this again.
"Yup, I have a free period," She lied.
"Great, me too," His smile grew and he grabbed Lola's wrist. Her eyes widened as he dragged her back into the office. He pulled her past the administration office, walked through the teacher's lounge and then past numerous cubicles, all piled with stacks of papers.
Lola's heart skipped a beat, those belonged to their teachers and were most likely test papers or quizzes. Seeing how easily they had gotten this far without any deterrance, Lola was sure it would be no problem for Tyler to have access to these papers.
But did that make him a suspect in the leaked paper incident? Lola didn't want to even consider the possibility.
They reached a smaller lounge with a coffee maker sitting idly by the pantry and a small fridge next to it. Tyler pulled out a sandwich from the fridge and sat down on one of the sofa like chairs.
"You can sit too," He chuckled when he saw how nervous she looked. "Ask me those questions you prepared for you blog."
"Are we allowed to be here," She sat down hesitantly and looked at the entrance to the room, expecting a teacher to walk in at any moment or worse, the principal.
"This place was specifically prepared for students who help around with the administration, you know Oakwood High encourages students who are interested in office affairs," Tyler said, his eyes gleaming. It seemed like he was enjoying her discomfort.
"But how are students allowed to walk in and out of here when there are exam papers littered all over the teacher's tables. Aren't they afraid people might steal them or alter their grades?" She asked him.
"First of all there are cameras all over the place." He pointed at the upper left corner of the room and Lola saw a small camera overlooking the room. "And the papers you saw on the teacher's desks were all mostly quizzes. Important papers like our mid terms or SAT's are kept locked away. Only a select few teachers are allowed to handle them."
"Oh," Lola breathed out. "Are you the only one from our grade who comes through here?"
"Hardly," Tyler scoffed. "Jeanine the vice president, Max the class secretary and Red, the treasurer are among st the few that frequent the place like myself. Wait I thought this was an interview about me, Lola."
"Yes, yes," Lola shuffled around her books looking for the list of questions her friends had prepared.
She finally found the crumpled piece of paper and unfolded it quickly.
"Okay, here it goes. What made you run for student body president?"
"Well I've always been interested in politics and figured this was a good head start. It would look good on my college application as well," He said. He then walked over to the coffee machine and started making himself one. "You want one?"
Lola shook her head, she didn't know why but being here with him was making her nervous. Like she was going to get caught at any moment for skipping class. She looked around for her pen to write down his answer but couldn't find one.
She cursed internally realizing she had left her pencil box with Hanna before she rushed off to meet Tyler.
"Pen?" Tyler's voice jostled her thoughts and she saw him wave a pen in her face. He smirked when she took it from him silently and sat down in front of her. Their knees were almost touching and she tried her best not to get too distracted by his proximity.
She asked him a few more questions and he answered them smoothly, until the last one.
"Are you single?" Lola froze the moment the question left her lips and she wanted to hit herself for reading it without thinking. She also wanted to kill her friends right now.
"That depends," Tyler smiled, completely unfazed by her question. "Do your readers want to know or do you?"
"Umm, I..I'm sorry. That wasn't supposed to be in there," Lola reiterated.
"Let's go for ice cream today after school," He suggested and she stared at him in shock.
Was he asking her out on an ice cream date? It was what Lola had dreamed for years but then she remembered their meeting with Damien and Julian later.
"I can't today. What about tomorrow?" She suggested, her voice filled with hope.
"Tomorrow it is," His dark brown eyes sparkled making Lola's heart skip a beat.