"Me? Die? Didn't they tell you, Princess? I'm Robin Goodfellow."

(Robin Goodfellow; The Iron Fey by Julie Kagawa)

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"Taylor!"

I whirl around on the pavement to face Nicholas jogging towards me in a sweaty shirt and a dimpled smile on his face. It's after 6 in the morning and I'm outside, watching my cat do...nothing. "Oh, hi, wow. You look...cheerful. What's up?" I ask, eyeing him warily.

"What do you mean?"

"I don't really know anyone who's a morning person." Sam's not, and Alex is definitely not. She threatened to throw my cat out the window once when she got licked awake during one of our sleepovers.

He grins. "Ah. Well, I'm an all-hours-of-the-day person." His attention turns to my black cat, Lucky, still sitting on the grass and not doing anything. His eyes go wide. "Holy shit, Taylor! It's a cat!"

"Er--"

"Look at it!" He bends down to pet Lucky and she hisses at him. He has a giant smile on his face anyway. "It's a cat!"

"Yes, I know it's a cat. She's mine. Her name's Lucky."

His head whips to face me. "You named a black cat Lucky?"

I start to answer but he gets a strange look on his face. "Are you wearing contacts under your glasses?"

I freeze. Crap. I brought Lucky out here thinking I wouldn't run into anyone I knew and had completely forgotten about Nicholas; I was wearing my glasses, not my usual brown contacts. And that fully displayed the fact that one of my eyes was blue and one was brown. "Um, no. Why would I wear contacts under my glasses?"

"So then...those are your normal eyes?"

I turn away from him and pick up Lucky, who was finally up and walking around. "I'm gonna go inside and get ready for school--"

"No, Taylor, I wasn't...trying to insult you." Damn him and that impossible face of his. "I was just--surprised, that's all."

"Okay. See you at school," I say, averting my eyes and walking into the house.

When I come out a half hour later (with my contacts on, of course), Nicholas is standing a few paces away from my front door in new clothes and a beanie. "What are you doing here?"

"Can I walk with you?" I blink a few times but nod, because how exactly could I say no I don't want to in a nice way? We start walking and fall into quiet.

I should have made up an excuse not to walk with him. Now I'm stressing out trying to think of something to talk about, and I hate when that happens. Not to mention the way I completely spazzed out earlier about my eyes. Thankfully, he hasn't brought it up and pushed to talk about it. I glance at him from the corner of my eye, and there's still a hint of a smile on his face, so clearly I haven't bored him to death yet with my silence. "When'd you move here?" I ask.

"Just a few weeks ago."

"Why?

He winks at me. "Wouldn't you like to know." We go silent again for some time, mainly because I don't really know how to respond to that. I push my hair in front of my face to cover my scar; it's the middle of September and it's getting cold enough to bother it.

"You're really quiet, aren't you?"

"No. You're just really talkative," I say. Nicholas laughs and turns to me. "We need to be friends."

I blink at him. "What?"

"We need to be friends," he says, swiveling around to face me while walking backwards. How he does that without looking like a complete idiot is beyond me. "You're honest. I like that." He's smiling at me again, and to be completely honest, a smile like that this early in the morning is a little disarming.

"We literally met yesterday."

He rolls his eyes. "You keep bringing that up. How are you supposed to know me if you avoid talking to me because you don't know me?"

"Good point. Why'd you sit next to me yesterday, anyway?"

"Honestly? You looked like the smartest person in the room." He sticks his hand out. "Friends?"

"You just told me that you're only trying to be friends with me because I'm smart," I say dryly.

"Jesus, you're prickly--"

"I'm not prickly!"

"--but I meant that as a compliment. And no. Maybe that was the reason I sat next to you but it's not the reason I'm trying to be friends."

"Then what is it?"

"Do you seriously interrogate people before making friends with them? Just shake my hand and seal the friendship already." I laugh, but I take his hand and shake it. "Eh, sure. Why not." He brings his hand to his chest and makes a face. "You wound me, Taylor."

"You look ridiculous, Nicholas."

"Huh. Believe it or not, this is the first time I realized that "ridiculous" rhymes with "Nicholas"."

I snort in the most ladylike way I can. "No one's ever called you ridiculous before? Really?"

"If they have, they probably called me Nico. Why don't you call me Nico?"

"What do you wanna be called?"

He grins. "You can call me anytime."

I burst out laughing and so does he. "Oh my god, Nicholas, no. Just no." I feel a blush creep into my cheeks but stamp all those squishy feelings out. I can't help it. He literally looks like Will freakin' Herondale.

"Yeah yeah, but you fell right into that." And if he had said anything else, I didn't hear it, because he was still walking backwards and had backed straight into a trash can.

I hold in my laughter as he trips over the trash can and onto the sidewalk. I hear a string of curses and step around to help him up, but he was already on his feet and dusting himself off. "And I fell right into that," he says.

That's when I realized two things:

A. Being friends with Nicholas West was going to be easy.

B. And it was not gonna be boring.

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The bell rings and I pick up my bag, 100% ready to pig out at lunch, when my Advanced math teacher calls me back. "Miss Taylor! Can you stay back for a few minutes? There's something I wanna go over with you," she says.

I head to Miss Mulligan's desk. I never really liked this teacher; she'd always snap at students who had any questions like it was their fault they couldn't follow during lectures. Now, she's smiling at me extra-sweetly. "Would you like some extra credit?"

"Um...yes? What would I have to do?"

"I need you to tutor Carter Daniels once a week."

"Is he a junior?" I ask. I don't know a Carter Daniels, and that's probably because this is my first year taking AP classes with seniors.

She glares at me, the smile from before gone. "Of course not. You're the only junior in my class."

"You want me to tutor a senior?"

"Are you saying no?" She quickly composes herself, schooling her face into a tight smile. "It would be a big help, since I just don't have the time for that..." she says, looking at me expectantly.

Oh. I see. She was told to tutor him and she can't be bothered so she's passing it onto me. I almost say no just to spite her.

But then I think about the extra credit, and the fact that if I don't do it, this Carter Daniels will have to get tutored by her and he probably won't learn anything for all her patience. So I do what any good person would do; I nod.

"Good. If you give me your cell phone number I'll pass it onto him so you two can coordinate," she says, handing me a page torn out of a notebook. I write my number on it and wait for her to give me more instructions. After three seconds, the glare is back and she snaps, "what are you still doing here?"

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"There you are," Nicholas says, popping up to my left. Miss Schuyler hadn't come to class, so they let us go for free period and I chose to spend the time signing up for drama. I had just finished writing my name under the props department when Nicholas got here.

"Hi. We're still on for Bookish Brews later for the assignment, right?"

"You know, Taylor, if you wanted to go on a date with me you could have just asked. I would have given it some serious consideration." He winks at me and surveys the signup sheets attached to the bulletin board in front of us. "So are you putting your name down for acting, or shall I do the honors?"

"No no no. I'm sticking to props."

"Why not?" someone says from my right. I freeze for a bit and then turn around to face Julian, who's casually leaning against the wall. He flicks his gaze to Nicholas for a while. "Nico."

Nicholas inclines his head with a grin. "Julian."

"You two know each other?" I ask Nicholas, mainly because I don't think I can look Julian in the eye without going tomato-red again. "We've met," he says.

I turn to Julian. "Hi." Holy crap. This is the third time I've ever communicated with him. I look like an idiot. Oh my god why is he to my right? My scar my scar my scar--

"Hi," he says, and I swear the earth just cracked open and all the stars in the universe aligned to shine a light on Julian freakin' Andrews as he smiled at me. "Bella, right? I've seen you around in drama."

"You...have?"

"Yeah. You should audition for the play."

My god, it's really happening. He's talking to me. "Er, no, I can't act."

He raises an eyebrow. "Can't as in you don't know how to act or can't as in you've got stage fright?"

"I have stage fright!" Nicholas chimes in cheerfully. "Oh, actually I don't. But the info's there if anyone needs it."

I glare at him and turn my attention back to Julian, who had ignored Nicholas completely. "Can't as in I've got stage fright." He smiles at me again.  He needs to stop doing that. I feel like he's Superman and I'm melting under his laser eyes. "You should audition, Bella. Trust me. Just try it out, what do you have to lose?"

"Her dignity, her self-esteem, her soul," Nicholas counts off, crossing his arms.

"Maybe I will." The words are out of my mouth before I can think better of it. "I've always wanted to try acting."

"Well, there you go," Julian says. His phone beeps and he glances at it. "I have to go. But I'll see you tomorrow?" He looks at me expectantly and I nod. "Bye."

"Bye, Bella. Nico." And then he walks away.

I turn my back on him and listen quietly for the sound of his footsteps turning a corner, and then I start hitting Nicholas and laughing. "Oh my god oh my god oh my god! He talked to me!"

"Ow! Get off, woman!" He says playfully, batting my arms away. "Yes, I know, I was there too."

I bite my lip to keep from squealing. I'm 100% sure the blushing I'd been able to stamp down earlier is back in full force. "So, Andrews, huh?" Nicholas teases.

"You have a thing for last names, don't you?"

"Not as much as you have a thing for that drama dork." And then I start hitting him again, and he starts laughing. "You should have seen your face when he showed up, Taylor. Priceless."

The bell rings and I stop hitting him, quickly scribbling my name on the signup sheet. "Come on, we have work to do."

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Unknown: psst

Me: Hi? Who is this?

Unknown: hi :) im carter. mulligan said ur gonna tutor me in math?

Me: Oh hi :---) Yup that's me. I'm Bella. Are you free on Fridays?

Carter Daniels: im carter. but i already told u that. u know u dont have to do this if u dont want to.

Me: Why wouldn't I want to?

Carter Daniels: idk dont u have anything to do on fridays?

Me: Um...not really.

Carter Daniels: oh shit i wasnt being mean im sorry

Carter Daniels: omg pls dont feel bad i wasnt thinking

Me: Haha no it's okay. :---) And I'm game if you are.

Carter Daniels: u sure?

Me: Yup. Don't worry about it. Do you know Bookish Brews?

Carter Daniels: my brother does. that where u wanna study?

Me: If it's okay with you :---)

Carter Daniels: yup. that place on fridays it is

Carter Daniels: and thanks bella. :)

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THE ADORABLE NICHOLAS TO THE SIDE <3 ((he doesn't smoke it's just a really good picture of joshua anthony brand i'm dead))

dedicated to arrowheads just because

ALSO, IF U GUYS HAVEN'T READ "LETTERMAN JACKET" BY HER you really really should c: