70A/N: Yo guys! What's up? Haha... *nervous laughter*... So, I'm sorry for the long "hiatus" and for not updating sooner. It feels like it's been so long since I last updated, like a month or two, maybe more. I was honestly about to forget about the story and move on with my life, but before I deleted it, I went back and reread the comments. I know a lot of authors say that reviews keep their story going, but you guys actually saved this one. I especially want to thank those people who saw that I hadn't updated in forever but still chose to read this fanfic and to review it after. So anyways, I felt bad for having kept everyone waiting so long, especially since I had the next three chapters already outlined, and decided to write more. However, as my luck would have it, as soon as I decided I would start writing again, I ended up in the hospital and had to get ankle surgery. I don't know if any of you have ever had any type of surgery, but I can assure you that it is a pain in the butt. Good news is that I am walking again, with the help of physical therapy.
Anyways, I think I've kept you all waiting long enough.
Last time on Magix:
As they were walking out of the King's mansion, Flora looked to Bloom in deep concentration. She's not telling us the whole story. Normally, whenever Bloom was with a guy, no matter how long, she would always tell them about it; how awful the guy was, how he only wanted her for her money. But this time, it was different. Bloom had blushed when she and Stella had mentioned Sky (he was in her third period biology class) which meant that something more happened between them.
Mornings at Magix were exciting, to say the least. School started at seven thirty, but people made it a point to get there at least an hour early to greet the Superior 6 as they came into school.
It was always the same, Layla thought, as she watched the wave of students crowd around the front door. The girls would unbutton the tops of their shirts and hike up their skirts, style their hair and fix their make up, while the boys would try to look cool, leaning up against walls with their sleeves rolled up. All just to get the attention of one of the Six.
As if. The Six walked around the school with that air of I'm-so-much-better-than-you; like they ruled the school. Which they do. Layla thought as the Six made their way into the school.
Layla stood at the top of the stairs, watching as students pushed and shoved to get a closer look at the Six. It was pathetic, she thought, that all they wanted, all they thought was worth coming to school for, was the approval of the Six.
It seemed that sometimes, only she and her friends were the only ones who didn't care about the Six, and even then, that wasn't always true. Helia and Sky were both crushing on one of the Six (the Flower Princess and Little Ms. Perfect, respectively), and while Musa would never admit it, Layla knew she had a secret thing for Riven.
"Hey, Layla! What are you doing?"
Speak of the Devil, Layla thought, as she greeted Musa. "Nothing; just watching our fellow students throw themselves at the Six in desperation and what they call 'love', while we all know it is all just lust for power and money. You know, the usual."
Musa chuckled, shaking her head at her friend, and looked down as well.
There was almost something entertaining about watching the students try to please the Six. In her four years of high school at Magix, Layla had seen everything from cakes being brought in on the Six's birthdays to girls just running up and trying to kiss the guys, all to no avail.
One time, near the end of Junior year, a little freshman girl had made Riven a cake - a small one, but still nicely decorated - to celebrate the football team's national victory. When Riven had taken the cake in his hands, everyone had been shocked - Riven never accepted anything from anyone, no matter what it was, but there he was, holding a tiny cake made by an insignificant freshman. That is until, he dumped it on the girl's head, claiming that he didn't eat anything that wasn't made by a gourmet chef.
Layla shook her head. If she looked close enough, she was sure she could see that girl, now a Sophomore, in the midst of the crowd of students.
"Hey Brandon, do you have any juice left?" Layla heard Riven ask. She could tell that he was mad, as he always was, and was about to take it out on some unfortunate soul. Not that they would mind; they would all swoon if Riven so much as glanced at them.
"Yeah, a little bit." Brandon said, warily, but still handed Riven his juice bottle when his hand struck out.
Everyone had quieted down once they saw Riven uncap the bottle and head over to his victim. It was a boy, probably a Junior, and he had gone incredibly pale. While everyone wanted to have the attention of the Six, Riven was still by far the most intimidating.
Without a word, Riven reached over and spilled the remaining contents of Brandon's Fruit Punch Juice onto the boy's coat. That looked expensive, Layla thought, as she watched the boy look down at his coat in shock. Placing the now empty bottle in the boy's hand, Riven turned and continued down the hallway.
Layla watched as the rest of the Six followed him, Brandon and Nabu clapping the boy on the back while saying "Sorry man", Bloom and Stella giving him sad smiles, as if saying 'This happens all the time, sorry it was you', and Flora giving him something to clean up with.
"Ughh.. Can you believe him? What kind of a jerk does that to someone? No, seriously, what gives him the right to just go up to people and -"
Layla rolled her eyes as Musa started ranting, and stated walking down the hall.
"Good morning, ladies and gentlemen."
Mrs. Morgan, the AP Biology teacher, had walked into her class 10 minutes late, carrying a stack of books in danger of falling. Sky was about to stand up to help his teacher, but she had already placed the books on top of her desk.
Sky looked around the room. Almost no one had noticed their teacher enter; everyone was too busy paying attention to Flora Taylor, who looked severely uncomfortable. The problem with having one of the Six in a class, Sky thought, was that they were always the center of attention, the only thing anyone paid attention to, even if the Six themselves did not want the attention.
Flora, he knew, was the shyest member of the Six, so it was no surprise to see her sitting awkwardly in her seat as all of the other students tried to talk to her.
When he heard Mrs. Morgan clear her throat, Sky turned around and faced the board.
Flora looked over at Sky Evens once he turned around and went over her information on him. He was a senior, his specialty was fencing, his parents owned banks and hospitals all over the county, and he had been quite obviously in love with Bloom for forever, but never mentioned his feelings to her. Flora giggled; he was the perfect guy for Bloom. (1)
Usually, whenever a guy told a girl that he loved her, it was to get in her pants. Whenever a guy told Bloom (or Stella, or herself) that he loved her, it was for money and status. Sky is different; I can tell just by the way he looks at her. Flora prided herself in being observant, and, in the past year or so, she noticed the way Sky stared at her friend; not like all the other guys who started at her like a lion about to pounce on their pray, but in sheer adoration. It was adorable.
"Well, today we'll be picking lab partners." Mrs. Morgan said as she walked to the front of the room, holding a large feathered hat. Excited whispers erupted from the class, already hoping to be paired up with Flora.
"Now, now. I've put the names of the people on the left side of the room in this hat. One by one, the people on the right side of the room will come and pick a name out of the hat, and whoever you pick will be your lab partner for the remainder of the year."
The people sitting on the right side of the room immediately deflated - there was no chance that they would be partners with Flora, not only one of the Six, but also the best student in the class - while the left side of the room grew even more excited.
Sky rolled his eyes. The last time he worked with a partner, he was stuck with all of the work.
"Miss. Taylor, would you please come up and pick a name?"
Bloom thought that taking Home Economics would be easy. No, she hadn't grown up with a master chef in the house like Flora and Nabu had, but she could make her way around a kitchen.
The assignment had been simple enough; make chocolate chip cookies. However, here she was, in the girl's bathroom, trying to get flour and egg out of her hair, with her partner, Layla Jackson.
Bloom looked over at the girl, who was leaning her head over the sink and running water through her hair, and felt a sudden wave of guild overcome her. This was, after all, her fault.
It had happened when she and Layla were gathering their supplies; it had been agreed that Layla would gather up the flour while Bloom got the eggs out of the refrigerator. On her way back to their station, Bloom had tripped over, sending the eggs flying and breaking all over the floor, some even landing on her head. Then, when everyone rushed over to help her up, they knocked Layla, who was holding the flour, over and sending the flour everywhere.
"I'm really sorry about this" Bloom said, looking over at Layla. The other girl looked surprised, as if she didn't think Bloom would talk to her.
"It's fine. I mean, who hasn't tripped something completely invisible before?" Layla said, smiling at Bloom. "I'm just sorry that we didn't get to eat any cookies today."
Bloom laughed, "Yeah. Chocolate chip are my favorite."
"I'm more of a sugar cookie kind of girl" Layla said, shaking her head at Bloom with an amused smile.
"Layla Jackson, I think this is the start of a beautiful friendship."
"-so now I have to get a tutor if I want to stay on the team" Riven huffed as he sat down at his new lunch table. Bloom, Stella and Flora had already been sitting, eating their lunch and they looked up in curiosity.
"Honey, what is Riven talking about know?" Stella asked as Brandon slid next to her and kissed her cheek.
"What we all knew was going to happen eventually" Nabu said, snickering into his food before Brandon could answer.
"You know that new Algebra teacher? Mr. Harris?" Brandon paused, looking around to see if the girls knew who he was talking about. "Well, apparently, he said he didn't care who Riven was, but he wasn't going to let him pass his class just because he's rich."
"And if he doesn't pass all of his classes, they have to kick him off the team until he gets his grade up." Nabu finished, while stealing some of his sister's fries.
"Yeah, and that asshole said that the only way he'd give me an extension on any of the work is if I got a stupid tutor to help me study every goddamn day after school." Riven said, stabbing at his steak repeatedly.
"Ya' know Riv, this wouldn't be a problem if you did all of your work in the first place." Stella said, gathering up a forkful of salad.
"Stella, you fell asleep in class today." Bloom said, looking at her friend warily.
"That's different. I still do all of my work." Stella retorted.
"More like you get someone else to do it for you." Mumbled Riven.
"Hey! Don't talk about my girlfriend that way!" Brandon said, glaring at Riven and tightening his hold on Stella.
"Well, he's got a point man." Nabu said, looking at Brandon.
"Nabu! I thought you were on my side! E tu Brute!" (2)
"Hey, guys," Flora said, and immediately got everyone's attention, "I'll be right back. Try not to kill each other while I'm gone." And with that, Flora got up from their table, straightened out her dress, and proceeded to walk away.
"Do you know where she's going?"
"Nope"
"Not a clue"
"Hmph."
"We'll find out later."
"And then, the eggs went flying everywhere. One of them landed on my head and then I tripped and spilled the flour all over the place." Layla said, recounting the events from last period to her friends.
Her story had sent her friends laughing. Musa was clutching her sides and leaning on Tecna for support, who in turn was almost lying on the table's bench. The guys were chuckling at her, trying to keep their laughs in.
"Excuse me?" The soft voice brought them all out of their laughing, and everyone went silent. There, at the head of their table, stood Flora Taylor.
Layla looked over at Helia, and grinned. He had gone from laughing with Sky and Timmy to completely awestruck when he saw the girl. Yup, that boy was most certainly in love.
Once she saw that she had their attention, she continued. Flashing them a brilliant smile, she said "Hi, I'm Flora Taylor. I-"
Musa huffed, and before she could stop, she said "Yeah, we know who you are; you're only one of the most popular people in school."
Flora's smile faltered a bit and Musa felt instantly bad. Flora had never done anything bad to her; in fact, Flora had been one of the first people at Magix to compliment Musa on her musical abilities. It didn't help, of course, that Helia was giving her a stern look from across the table.
"You're right; I should've known that" Flora said, nervously scratching the back of her head. This wasn't as easy as she thought it would've been, not with practically everyone in the lunch room watching - especially not with that cute guy from her art class watching. (3)
"Look, I'm sorry. But if you came here to make us leave this table-"
"Oh, no, it's not that. Actually, I'm looking for Sky Evans." And as soon as she said those words, everyone turned to look at Sky; what in the world did the Six's Flower Princess want with Sky Evans of all people?
"Uhmm.. yes?" Sky asked. Out of everyone in the room, he had to be the most confused.
Flora's smile returned and she stuck her hand out.
"I'm your new lab partner."
YOOOO! That's the end of the chapter! Good? Bad? Tell me in a review (don't be shy, you know you want to)!
(1) Lol. Flora totally ships BloomXSky. Perhaps our little Flower Princess will help speed things along.
(2) So Brandon quoted Shakespeare.. what could this mean? *bum bum buuuummmmmm*
(3) Nudge Nudge, wink wink. I wonder who this could be ;)
So there was a lot of Layla/Aisha in this one; I dunno, I kinda felt like I was ignoring her a bit; the next one might be on Stella or Brandon, who knows.
Anyways, until next time.
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