It was strange.

Of course, "strange" was just one of the many words Lola could think of to describe the newly-come-to-light relationship between Logan Reese and Quinn Pensky. A whole dictionary of words could be used, really.

As though the night hadn't already been strange enough, from Zoey's depression-thing and Quinn and Logan's dates to the stupid taxi driver and the idiotic nerds and the mysterious and unexpected reappearance of Chase.

After all of that, Logan and Quinn dancing together hadn't seemed so weird. They were friends, to a certain degree. Neither of them had seemed to be having much fun with their respective dates. It made sense that they would put aside their differences for that one night of fun.

But apparently they planned to put aside their differences for a whole lot longer than that. It took Lola pretty much the whole rest of Prom to piece together what had happened while she was traipsing through the forest after a gaggle of nerds, but eventually she knew the entire story. And she was shocked.

No way could smart, nerdy Quinn be in love with rich, egotistical Logan, and no way could he love her back. It simply wasn't possible. Lola liked to think she knew quite a lot about love. She understood all sides of the Zoey-James-Chase dilemma, and she knew why Brooke had broken up with Mark, and she knew why she and Vince were meant to be and she knew a whole multitude of other things.

But she did not know how Quinn Pensky and Logan Reese were ever supposed to be together. That just didn't compute.

Yet the evidence was right in front of her. There was the goofy smile on Logan's face and the silly giggle that escaped from Quinn's lips when he kissed her goodnight outside their dorm room. There was the way Quinn spoke of Logan with shining eyes when the three girls stayed up late into the night to catch up and rehash and squeal about the evening's events. And, Lola noticed, looking back, there were all sorts of clues she had missed that pointed to the inevitable conclusion:

Quinn and Logan really were in love.

It was most likely the strangest epiphany she had ever had, but also, she came to realize, the truest. Sure, she rolled her eyes and asked if they were going to be one of those couples the next morning when Logan greeted Quinn at breakfast as though he hadn't seen her in at least ten years, but she had to admit to herself it was kind of sweet. Quinn seemed to make him nicer, anyway, and that was just fine with Lola. And Logan made Quinn happy in a way that Mark never had, and she supposed that was all right, too.

All the same, it was going to take some getting used to.

Chase had shaken his head at them and wondered aloud if everyone had gone absolutely insane for the one semester he had been gone. Zoey was just as stunned as everyone else at first, but soon seemed to forget about it in her Chase-induced haze of love. Vince just shrugged in that calm way of his and said things happen sometimes. Lisa had awww'd and Michael had blithered like an idiot and Stacey—well, Stacey had cried at first, but she got over it. And when Lola saw James and expressed her disbelief, he'd just smiled calmly and said he'd seen it coming all along.

Over the last month or so of school, everyone adjusted. It was hard, at first, to have their group dynamic so seriously shaken up, to have every truth they had ever accepted turned on its head. But eventually it became just part of the routine. Zoey and Chase, Vince and Lola, Michael and Lisa, Logan and Quinn. Natural. And by the day the time came for them all to depart for the summer to far reaches of the country, Lola finally and completely understood.

Quinn loved Logan. Somehow, she loved him for who he was in all his jerky, egotistical glory. And Logan loved Quinn. He had managed to fall for her despite all their differences. And Lola came to realize it really didn't matter how strange it was.

It worked. And they liked it. And they were happy.

And if they were happy, Lola decided, then that was more than enough.