Tuesday morning goes by fairly quickly. I'm sitting in English with a knot in my stomach knowing I'll have to face Jacob and I'm still not ready. However, the newspaper needs to get done and I'm not going to let him stop me from finishing it. I'll focus on that and stand my ground. I'm hesitant to leave when class ends. Dylan walks out with me and nudges my arm. "Just do your best to ignore him," he tells me. "I'm going to focus on the paper and nothing else," I nod. I inhale a deep breath when I see the classroom. "I can do this." His eyes are on something behind me. "You better be. He's about to walk in." I catch Jacob's eye before he walks into Mrs. Thomas' class. His eyes flutter between me and Dylan before he stalks off. "He always looks so happy to see me," Dylan jokes. "I'm pretty sure I make his day." I laugh. "Yeah, you put him in a real great mood." "Well, I gotta get to class," he says. "You got this," he winks at me as he says it. Rolling my eyes, I can't help but feel butterflies in my stomach. I'm not sure if they're caused by Dylan's wink, or by my nervousness to see Jacob. As I walk in, Sophie appears in front of me. "Hey, we missed you yesterday," she says as her eyes brighten. "Luckily for you, I was done with all of my work so I worked on your stuff for a bit. It's not much, just a couple of pages." I breathe a sigh of relief. "That's the best news I've heard all day. I really appreciate it." "No problem," she shrugs. "My editing skills aren't as good as yours, so you'll probably have to fix a couple of things, but I tried." "That's perfectly fine with me," I smile at her. "How much is left?" She twists her face as she thinks about it. "Three pages, if I'm remembering correctly. And one more ad needs to be put in." "One step closer to publishing this one," I hold up my hand and she gives me a high five. "You're a life saver, Sophie." She smiles. "It's no big deal." I make my way over to the computers in the back and sit down. Ignoring Jacob, who is in his usual spot next to me, I log in. "Well, hello to you too," Jacob says. He's looking at his computer screen instead of me. Will and Vicky are sitting down and I smile at them. "Hey guys." Dismissing Jacob will only make him angrier, and I'm hoping if I make him mad enough he won't want to talk to me at all. Will looks at me strangely. "Hey, Lacey." "Ha-ha, very funny," Jacob says behind me. "Why are you ignoring me?" "I don't want to talk about it, so let's just get to work," I say. I open my files and find the pages Sophie formatted for me. Jacob actually listens to me for once and stays silent. I finish the pages Sophie didn't get to before formatting the pages Will did. Once I have everything done, I scroll through one last time before emailing it to Mrs. Thomas. "So, what now?" Will asks me. "Now we wait for Mrs. Thomas to proofread it and if everything is good, then we send it off to the printers and we get the hard copies," I explain. I'm excited to see it all come together, especially since it's my turn being senior editor. At the end of class, I pick up my things and start to follow everyone out of class. I try to rush out of there before Jacob tries to talk to me, but he catches my arm and tugs me back. "We need to talk," he says. I jerk my arm away. "We really don't." I need to be firm. Be firm. His face twists into a frown. "You don't even want to talk about what happened on Saturday? Or the fact that you've obviously been avoiding me?" Instead of answering, I push past him and make my way down the hallway. There's so much I want to say to him, but everything is getting jumbled in my mind. Nothing is making sense, nothing is clear. He ends up following me and walks alongside me. "You can't just stop talking to me, Lace. I know you still feel something for me, because you would've pushed me away if you didn't," he says, stepping in front of me. "I know you're pissed at yourself because you kissed me. I know that, but there are feelings there. I just need another chance. Things will work out this time around." Things will work out? "I was at your game to support you, like friends do," I stress. "You broke the simple rules I gave. I told you I don't want you back and you still overstepped that boundary." "What boundary? You're clearly still in love with me," he says, raising his voice. "I don't see what the problem is." He's right. I know in my heart that I still have feelings for him, not matter what I try to do to stop them from resurfacing. The plan I formulated to stop my feelings is crumbling. If I got back together with him, I would always doubt his feelings. I don't want to be manipulated into getting hurt again. "I know you, Lace, better than anyone else. Just push past that pride of yours and give me another chance." Pride? "This has nothing to do with pride, Jacob. My words are not getting through your thick skull." "Everything okay here?" Dylan asks, appearing next to me. I can see the frustration behind his eyes and I know he's heard most of the conversation. Jacob crosses his arms. "Of course, you'd be here. Can you just fuck off for once?" Dylan moves in front of me and faces Jacob head on. "Lacey doesn't want to talk, so why don't you run along. Don't you have a ball to go kick around?" Jacob smirks. "You have a crush on my girl, Parker? You think you actually have a chance with her?" Both boys have their jaws clenched and I chew on my lip nervously. Things are escalating quickly. "You better back off before I punch those teeth out of your loud mouth," Dylan's voice goes low. Just as I think things are going downhill, Anthony comes from behind me and stands next to Dylan. "We don't have a problem here, do we?" he asks, directing it to Jacob. Jacob laughs at both of them and backs off. He peeks around them and says to me, "I thought you could fight your own battles, Lace. Thought you were better than these two." And with that, he turns around and starts walking down the hall. Anthony scoffs. "What a douche." Dylan has a strange expression on his face. "What happened to ignoring him?" he asks me, clearly irritated. Maybe I'm not as strong as I thought I am. Even after the pep talks that Dylan and Casey have given me, I still can't do it. Will I ever let go of Jacob? "I know. He got to me," I say, avoiding his eyes. "Am I missing something?" Anthony asks, glancing between us.