"MAX!" my mom yelled at me, but I couldn't hear her. I was too busy dancing around and singing like an idiot to my ipod. "MA-AX!" I absolutely loved music. It was my escape from everything, and right now I needed a good escape. I was starting my sophomore year today and I was so not excited.

"Max!" my mom's voice called from the door. She started banging on the door so I strolled to the door lazily and opened it for her.

"Yeah?" I asked, taking one ear bud out of my ear.

"Nudge is here," she informed me. I nodded and grabbed my backpack, giving her a kiss on the cheek. "Have a great day sweetie!" she called as I ran down the stairs and out the door.

"Are you excited, or are you excited?" Nudge asked me, well, excitedly as I slipped into the passenger seat.

"I pick the third one," I replied, pulling my blonde highlighted hair into a pony tail.

"Aw, come one. You weren't excited for being a freshman and you weren't excited when we started middle school either. Think about, after this year we are halfway through high school!" she batted her eye lashes at me. I laughed at her face and put my legs up on the dashboard.

"You have a reason to be excited, but I don't really."

"You do too! Uh… let's see, you get to be in classes with me this year! That's something to be excited about," she struggled for ideas. I snorted.

"Yeah, I was in classes with you last year too, babe."

"How about this: you're going to ruin my mood! I'm so excited I have classes, finally, with Iggy and you're going to make it seem awful," she reminded me.

"I was going to ruin it anyways," I smiled innocently.

"Please, you promised not scare this one away," she pouted, giving me bambi eyes. You see, I had a slight tendency to be protective. Let's just say last year I earned the nickname "Mama" from our group. Knowing Iggy I'm surprised he didn't call me "Papa."

"Keep your eyes on the road," I warned, "Plus, Iggy and I are friends. He knows I don't bite," I smiled toothily at her. She rolled her eyes and make the sign of the cross. I stuck my tongue out at her. She had liked Iggy forever and was so glad to find out he was interested in her. That was the target of my teasing, obviously.

"Crap, we're going to be late," Nudge said, looking at her clock and accelerating, while fixing her perfectly straightened hair in the mirror.

"Whoa! Slow down there cowgirl. We have fifteen minutes," I pointed out.

"We're going to be late to meet Ella," she corrected.

"I think she wouldn't mind us getting to school alive." Nudge was not my most favorite driver, but she had an early birthday and mine was late, so until the end of September she was my designated driver. She made a sharp turn into the school parking lot.

"Wow, how about we don't give Max a hear attack, huh?" I asked sarcastically and she hit the brakes hard.

"Come on, Maxie," she ignored my comment, "Let's find Ella." With that we were off to start our first day of school. YAY! Please, note my negative tone.

"Max!" Ella rushed up to me with a huge smile on her face.

"Hey, El," I patted her back as she hugged me. I wasn't a hug-ger.

"Guess what?" She squealed, still smiling.

"Let me see…did you sleep with a hanger in your mouth again?" She looked at me confused, but the smile was still there. I chuckled at her expression. Ella was a cute girl, she had the whole dark hair, dark eyes thing, but the expressions she gave you were so hilarious. "Nevermind, tell me."

"I got the principal to agree to my proposal!" She exclaimed, clapping her hands.

"What proposal?" I asked. Ella was very involved in the school activities. She was secretary of the student council and in all honors classes. She was also probably the smartest person I knew. The only problem with that was that she would shoot ideas right and left and I could hardly keep up with them. Half the time I had no idea what she was talking about.

"The idea?" she urged. I shook my head at her. She sighed dramatically, "Fine. I'll explain it. So, last year before school ended I had this genius idea! My idea was that we have this 'pen pal' system with all of the students," she smiled, like it was the best idea in the world.

"I don't get it," I admitted. I didn't mention the fact that I never got her ideas without at least an hour explanation, but I'll save that confession for later.

"What we do is that we all get this private e-mail account and a completely anonymous user name. Then, we're assigned a pen pal who we write to, without revealing our identity, about anything. I read about one time and heard it was supposed to be a fun and encouraging for us all," she finished, saying the last park with fake enthusiasm.

"Hmm, sounds interesting," I commented.

"You say that when you aren't listening."

"No, no, I was listening. Anonymous pen pals, e-mails, fun, and all that jazz!" I exclaimed in mock excitement. She shook her head at me in the 'tsk, tsk' way.

"Come one, let's head to homeroom and make sure Nudge isn't torturing Iggy too much." We both smiled at that thought. Me, because Iggy and I were friend-imies, and Ella because she also had a crush on Iggy.

As we searched for the right room I was once again amazed at how easy it was to get lost in this school.

"Hey, Max, heads up. Ang-fay at twelve o'clock," Ella whispered. I shot my head up and immediately caught his eye. I pursed my lips and purposefully walked quicker.

"God, he is so cute. Why do you hate him again?" Ella asked me for the quintillionth time.

"You know why," I mumbled. Fang Wren was my least favorite person in the world. But, we'll get to that later.

"All right," She sighed, stopping at a door, "Here we are."

We walked in to find Nudge talking animatedly to a smiling Iggy. I felt bad for Ella, but I knew this other guy that liked Ella a lot, and truthfully, he was a lot better for her. Of course, I would never pass up the chance to tease.

"Ella!" I said in a stage whisper, "That is not true! Nudge does not have a crush on Iggy!" Iggy's pale face turned into a tomato and Nudge giggled nervously. I winked at them. Iggy ran a hand through his strawberry blonde hair and bowed.

"Ah, Maxwell, it's been too long," Iggy said, trying to recover. His face still resembled a tomato, though.

"Same here, Ignus," I smiled and returned the bow. Iggy was a great guy, really, we just have always teased each other. Then, when I found out that he like Nudge I decided to have a little fun with that.

"I saved a seat just for you Maxie!" He said in a purposefully feminine voice, clapping his hands.

"Aw, you're too sweet, but Ig, there's a person in my seat!" I smiled at the red head in my seat.

"Hey hon, could 'ya scootch? You're in my seat," I asked. She looked at me challengingly.

"I was here first," she said in angry voice.

"First is the worst, second is the best," I sang. She looked like she was going to say more, but decided against it. Instead, she got up and moved.

"Thanks sweetie pie!" I called across the room.

"Who's that?" I whispered to Nudge, who had been comparing outfits with Ella.

"That's Lisa Landers. Don't you remember her?" She asked me.

"No," I shook my head, struggling to remember.

"She used to have big glasses and braces. She's okay. A little mean, but I don't blame her. Everyone was awful to her last year." Nudge explained.

"Oh, okay," I said and turned back to everyone else. We all chatted a little about summer and I managed to tease Nudge a little more before the teacher called attention.

"Okay class, today we will be picking partners…" And my first day of sophomore year began.