DISCLAIMER: All characters of Phineas and Ferb are the property of Dan Povenmire, Jeff "Swampy" Marsh, and Disney Channel.

Chapter 1 – A Hard Day's Night

The last day of school is a time known for its rambunctious mayhem. The students of Danville High were no different than you or I, and were more than a little eager to relieve the hallways of their presence for the summer. Lockers were cleaned out, exams were passed to the students' eager (or in the case of Buford, not so eager) hands, and numbers were exchanged for the new students to make plans with the friends they'd made over the year.

Then the final bell rang and the population flooded out of the front doors, excited to leave the thought of school behind and for the actions of summer to begin.

What a feeling that was. Isabella would have to make a note to remember that, because she sure wasn't feeling it now.

Oh, she had ran out of the school with the rest of her friends in celebration of their first year of high school, talked excitedly on the bus about her plans to get a ton of new badges, and sat in her room daydreaming about her crush, Phineas Flynn, and what over-the-top contraptions he would be making for the next three months.

Then her phone rang.

And speak of el diablo, it was her red-haired neighbor with another crazy idea.

Well...crazy to her.

Isabella pinched the bridge of her nose, trying to calm the impending headache. In Phineas' defense, doing all of their summer homework that night made sense; if they did it all in one night, he explained, that would leave the entire rest of the summer to do whatever they wanted.

The problem, Isabella had realized, was the sheer amount of work to do.

She had strolled right over to the house, greeting Phineas with her traditional "Whatcha' doin'?" and immediately starting on her science essay. Both Phineas and Ferb had joined her not long after, and after a couple of hours (and a little help from Ferb), she was able to complete it with little difficulty. Her English paper was not so lucky; droning through pages upon pages of old Shakespeare was not her idea of a good time. Perhaps it was when she was still ten, but now that she was four years older, the whole subject seemed kind of dull.

Quickly seeing the amount of work to complete and the growing frown upon her face, Phineas was quick to suggest that she could spend the night at his house. Isabella, staring at her encyclopedia, only heard part of his proposal, but upon registering "spend", "night", and "house", she immediately squealed her consent, the sheer volume of her voice sending Phineas' pet platypus careening out of the rocking chair.

However, even after sitting with the family for dinner and a quick trip back home to gather some belongings, Isabella still wasn't done with the entirety of her work. She guessed that that was the point; no one, not even the great, wonderful, dashing Phineas Flynn was going to be able to finish all of the work in one night.

It sure wasn't for lack of trying.

Phineas was making a valiant effort, having finished his Shop Class essay, an atom model for his Chemistry class, a paper on grammar for English, and was currently talking with Baljeet on his phone about Pythagorean formulas. Papers were strewn all over his half of the coffee table, themselves littered with doodles, problems, and snippets.

Isabella dropped her pencil and leaned back on the couch, sighing. She looked at the grandfather clock and saw that it was eleven o'clock, bedtime for a rational person. Ferb had done the intelligent thing and gone to bed at a reasonable time; she knew the green-haired teen was smart enough to layer his homework over the week and get it done. Candace has withdrawn from any sort of work; she had finished her classes at Danville University for the spring, and there was no way that she "was going to stay up any longer than she had to", in her words.

So it was just her and Phineas, the situation that Isabella had dreamed of since she had met him such a long time ago. Of course, she imagined it would have been something better than trying to cram a summer's worth of homework in one night, but at least she was with him, giggling at his jokes or laughing whenever they came across a funny passage in a book.

But enough was enough. She was tired and needed sleep. Grabbing her pillow and blanket, getting dressed in her pajamas (purple shorts with a white and purple shirt), and packing up her school things wasn't enough of a hint, apparently.

Isabella needed him to go to bed. For his sake and hers. And if he didn't get the jist now, she would strangle him.

With love.

And then her hands.

"Hey, Phineas," Isabella said, turning her head toward her best friend. "Whatcha' doin'?"

"Math work, still," Phineas replied, scribbling yet another note on a spare piece of paper.

"Why don't you take a break? You look awfully tired."

Phineas narrowed his eyes, partly to hide the redness from Isabella. "Nope, gotta finish this."

"Phineas, you need to go to bed. You're gonna get an aneurysm or something," Isabella pleaded.

"You only get aneurysms from injury or heredity, not overdoing." Phineas grinned, glancing at her. "If you read my Science paper, you would know that."

Isabella smiled weakly, relieved that he was still attempting humor. "I will read it, Phineas...tomorrow. You know, the day that's coming in less than an hour."

She saw him glance at his phone, then back at his paper. "I just need to call Baljeet back about this one problem." He reached for his cell-

But his hand never got there. It was grabbed by Isabella, who was now on the verge of a breakdown.

"Phineas, I'm not going to let you go brain-dead over some stupid homework that you can do another time. Besides, Baljeet's probably asleep. Like a normal person," Isabella emphasized.

"Isabella...it's just homework," Phineas said. "It's not going to kill me."

"Yeah, well, I'm going to kill you if you don't stop. You're my best friend, Phineas." Isabella squeezed his hand tighter. "I love you too much to see you do this to yourself."

Phineas looked at her hand still resting on his, then raised a groggy eyebrow at his friend. "Wait...what?"

Only then did Isabella realize the critical error in her conversation. One word. One dang word had done her in.

She had spent so much time over the past several years concocting plan after plan to get Phineas to notice her. The Night of the Falling Stars Dance, the movies, pep rallies. Every single event was another opportunity for her to get her man. And yet it seemed somewhat fitting that a casual slip of the tongue was the way it was going to go down.

Isabella looked into Phineas' eyes, the whites still red from the work but his blue irises still shining bright, thirsting for more information. Information, Isabella thought, that she would finally divulge after so many years.

"Phineas, I-"

Three things then happened in a very short amount of time.

A tremendous flash came from outside.

A thunderous crash followed.

And then the lights went out.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: If you're confused about the end, don't think of it as a random insert. Think of it as a "comically convenient weather pattern".

This is going to be a three or four chapter story, depending on whether I want to split the last chapter into two.

I was going to put this up over the weekend, but I may be too busy to do that, so I decided to put this out a little early this week. Depending on whether my plans go through or not, there may be either Chapter 2 or another long one-shot that I'm almost finished with later this week.

In the meantime...enjoy. Read and review, if you like.