Chapter 31: Answers

Yeah...you guys were waiting in suspense for a whole year for that. xD haha. Anyways, not much else to say except you people make me smile with all the lovely, extremely capitalized reviews. (:

Special shout out to for being the epic 300th reviewer ! :D

No one's POV

"I don't even know where to start," Courtney muttered, mainly to herself, as she looked at Duncan as if he was some type of foreign specimen. They were both comfortably situated on her bed; he was lying down with his hands behind his head, and she was sitting Indian style, facing him. While she was trying to find a suitable beginning, he was doing a little pondering himself. One question was most prominent and sticking out right now, even though he really should have concentrated on her questions instead of his own pursuits. Key word: 'should.'

You see, he figured she had feelings for Duncan, but now that she knew he was Matty too...did she still like him like that? Good lord he still hoped so. Or all his efforts this past month would have been spent for nothing.

Duncan simply shrugged. "Ask away whenever you're ready, Spitfire," he smirked. The brunette promptly stuck her tongue out childishly at the new nickname.

In that moment, she might have come off as relaxed, but on the inside, she was still a jumbled mess. After the mental dam of her mind faltered, all of her emotions were getting mixed together; kind of like a crayon box that exploded. Courtney was still, even after half an hour of just sitting there in her own thoughts, trying to process that Duncan was actually the childhood friend she had a crush on. And she also (even though she wouldn't admit it aloud) had a tiny, minor, little, itsy bitsy, microscopic crush on Duncan.

...

Okay, fine. She liked him. A lot.

So this was kind of extremely convenient.

"Well...I guess I can start with some basics," she said after another moment of crucial thinking. "Where did you move to?"

"Nova Scotia," he answered, zoned out and only half paying mind to her questions.

"Why did you start going by Duncan instead of Matty?"

He sighed. This was definitely going to be a fun question to answer. "You see..I kind of wanted to forget my old life after I moved." He snuck a quick look at Courtney, seeing that she was hanging on every word, then reverted his gaze back to the blank ceiling. "I was a kid, so stuff like moving was difficult for me. I told everyone to quit with the Matty crap and call me Duncan." He wanted to come right out and say it was because he missed her, but that might have been a little too straightforward,if not somewhat creepy. Pausing, he then threw in, "Besides, Duncan sounds more bad ass."

A pillow to his face was what he got in response.

Courtney rolled her eyes at his cocky attitude. "Next question: why the punk look?" She figured it was a rebellious stage in his life, but she might have guessed wrong.

"Like I said, I wanted to forget my old life," he said simply. She thought it was a weird way of coping, but then again, this was Duncan. Unpredictable as hell.

"Now, I've been wanting to ask you this for a while." That caught his interest. "What the hell is up with your hair?"

Courtney stifled a giggle at the deadpan expression dominating his face. "Really? You resort to making fun of my hair?"

"It's a legit question!" she argued back. "What normal person dyes their hair green?"

"Me."

"Reasons?"

"I liked green."

She had to resist the strong urge to roll her eyes again. This boy was ridiculous. "So? I like green too, but I'm sane, so I'm not going to go get neon highlights."

"What's so fun about being sane?" Duncan asked, running a hand through his hair as he halfway sat up on the bed with is other arm propped behind him. "It's boring. For instance; you."

"You're such an ass," Courtney said as she playfully glared at her friend.

"What are you going to do about it?" he challenged. She thought for a moment. At first, she was going to take it as a good natured tease, but decided making him suffer would be more fun. She leaned across Duncan to reach her PDA that was resting on the small bedside table, unintentionally getting him high off her scent. Again.

Curious as to what the brunette was planning, he fully sat up and raised a brow while she tapped on the keyboard of the device.

"Close your eyes." It was an odd request, but only peaked his curiosity. Courtney smirked when he complied without much hesitation, then held the LCD screen up to his face. "Open."

When Duncan's baby blue eyes opened, he fell off the bed with a scream that could rival a seven year old girl's. When the punk finally stood up from the floor, he glared at Courtney- who was currently laughing like a hyena.

"You think that's funny, huh?" Duncan said in an intimidating voice.

Well, it would have been intimidating if he had been used it on anyone other than Courtney. "Y-You should have seen your faaaace! Hahaha!" He really hadn't seen her laugh like that in a long time. "I can't believe you're still afraid of Celien Dion!" He shuddered at that name, and the memory of the picture that was shoved in his face five seconds ago. Why did he ever mention his phobia to her again?

"Shut up," Duncan grumbled. "It's unnatural for someone to smile that much!" Unfortunately for him, that only made her burst into another round of laughter. Resorting to a different tactic, he said, "At least I'm not scared of green jelly."

That sure as hell shut her up.

"That's different!" Courtney yelled, her eyes narrowing into thin slits. "It's gross and giggly and it looks like snot!"

"And yet you don't scream your head off when you see regular snot? Yup, makes perfect sense Princess." With that he sat back down beside a very pissed off Courtney, curving up one side of his mouth as her freckles stood out in rage.

"Have I ever mentioned I hate you?" she huffed out with her eyes now barely open from glaring so insistently.

"Many times babe. Many times." They were locked in a staring contest now; Courtney glaring and him looking nothing short of amused. This carried on for twenty seconds until Duncan ultimately rolled his eyes at her childishness (Any one else see the irony here?). Reaching over to poke the space between her eyebrows, he said "Your face is gonna get stuck that way if you keep doing that."

After swatting his hand away she fell back on the bed,the pillow making a poof-like sound as the air flew out of it. They were silent for a little while, probably around three minutes, until the CIT spoke up in a voice laced with confusion. "Hey, Duncan?"

"Hm?" He was feeling too lazy to actually give a full response as he looked out the window at the night sky full of stars.

"Why didn't you ever report Zach like you said you would?" He turned to her in surprise. She gave him a curious look. "You took care of him yourself, but didn't go to the police or anything...Why?"

Duncan kissed between his teeth for a moment before letting out a sigh. "I..didn't really think it was necessary."

"Like throwing him out of a window was?"

"Shut up!" he cried indignantly. "At least I did something. Besides, he's going to be in the hospital for another two weeks, then he's transferring back to our old school. The ass isn't even coming back, so you're welcome," he stated, seemingly as arrogant as ever. Courtney looked at him with pursed lips for a moment before letting out, what he figured, was a sigh of defeat.

"I'm not going to thank you for almost killing him," she stated, giving him a pointed look. "But I will say thanks for getting him out of my life."

Duncan smirked. "Any time Princess."

"That reminds me. Why do you call me Princess?" Courtney really never even thought about that seriously until now. Why not just call her by her actual name? There really wasn't any significant point to calling her Princess. She wasn't a spoil brat, and she was most certainly not an heir to a throne.

He opened his mouth to answer, but closed it instead. Standing up and heading towards the door, he said, "Come with me." After waiting by the entrance for a few seconds, he realized that Courtney was blankly staring at him with a raised eyebrow. Duncan sighed. Walking over to the brunette, he grabbed her hand, hauled her off the bed, then drug her out of her room and into his.

"What are you doing?" Courtney asked as she plopped onto the couch while Duncan went in search of something near the corner.

"Gimme a sec," was his only response. She sighed and started examining her chipping sky blue nail polish, deeming that they needed to be repainted within the next two days. Courtney was broken out of her thoughts when she felt the delinquent plop down to her right, that same guitar in his hands. She raised an eye brow.

"I asked you to tell me why you call me Princess, not to play me a song," she deadpanned. He smirked, holding in a chuckle.

"I decided to show you why I call you Princess, Princess." With that, he laid the guitar on his lap with the back of it facing up, careful to subtly cover the 'MxC' carving with his thumb. Using his other finger to graze the crown sticker, he started talking. "You remember this?" She nodded with a reminiscing smile on her face.

"Yeah, I put that stick on there right after you got the guitar," she answered.

"And do you remember where you got the sticker from?" Courtney's eyebrows furrowed as she went deep in thought, then smiled sarcastically.

"A princess coloring book."

"Bingo."

She gave him a look. "You are so lame."

"How so?"

"You gave me a pet name because of something I did years ago!"

"I would hardly consider that lame. Maybe something like-"

"Stupid?"

"Actually, I was going to say 'witty.'"

"Definitely not."

Duncan smirked at her after he set the guitar on the ground. "You do know I remember your other weakness, right?"

"What other weakness?" Courtney seemed nervous and confused at the same time. What was he talking about?

"This." Courtney immediately burst out in laughter as Duncan's fingers started tickling her sides. She made several attempts to try and pry him away, but it seems an attempt was all it was considering all of her strength was focused on her lungs at the moment.

"D-D-Duncan! S-Stoooop! Hahahaha! P-Ple-Pleaseee! Haha!" She laughed, obviously about to pee her pants from giggling far too much. Courtney couldn't take it as he kept up his merciless attack, and inevitably fell backwards onto the comfy sofa out of pure exhaustion. It takes a lot of work to breathe when you're being tickled.

Though, in doing so, she unknowingly brought Duncan down with her. The smiles on both of their faces froze into shock as they fully took in the rather compromising position they were in. Courtney was lying out fully on the couch with Duncan's knees on either side of her thighs, his palms on the cushions near her head. Oh, and did I mention that their faces were barely two inches apart? Because they were. And it was highly awkward.

Both of them stared wide eyed at each other. And, to be honest, neither really wanted to move. Besides, if they did decide to sit up again, Duncan would have to be the one to initiate it since he was clearly on top- and he sure as hell wasn't about to let that happen.

Even though he had only gotten to know the teenage Courtney for about a month ad a half, he decided he liked her much, much more now than he did back then. And if some god in the heavens felt like getting him into a situation like this, then hell, he was going to take it for all it's worth.

Letting his icy blue eyes flutter close, he gently began descending his head downwards, only to stop when his lips made contact with hers.

Courtney was, for a lack of a better word, surprised. Matthew Duncan Evans, her childhood friend/teenage rival, was kissing her. Effing kissing her! And it didn't help her resolve that he was extremely good at it either.

In a half second decision, she knew that this opportunity might not present itself again in such a nice manor. In the end, she wound up kissing him back and lacing her fingers behind his neck in order to properly pull him closer, playing with the soft black ends of his hair. In a moment of bliss, they both were, at the risk of being cliché, lost in each other. It seemed like the whole rest of the world was zoned out of their minds and they were the only two left. Either that, or they were half brain dad because that kiss was so completely mind numbing.

Duncan also soon came to learn, to his utmost pleasure, that her lips tasted very similar to how she smelled and felt as soft as a rose, which made their lip-lock doubly nice. If this what what those eleven years had built up to, then he deemed it was extremely worth it when her lips started pressing even more firmly to his.

After slowly and reluctantly breaking the kiss for lack of oxygen, Duncan opened his eyes to look into her own glistening, half lidded onyx orbs. He was only half surprised at what had just happened though, and knew that she was probably thinking something along the same line that he was. Duncan, now back to reality, put on a smirk as he eyed the girl under him.

"You don't mind me starting a relationship with you, right?"

I kind of have a feeling that more capitalized reviews are in the making right now...

If you're thinking it right now, no. This story is not over yet. ;D hehe. I honestly have no plan for an ending, so I'm just gonna wing the rest of this story.

(As always) Sorry for the mucho lateness. Long story short; this was ready on Monday, but my sister stole my laptop on Sunday. I have literally gotten 4 PMs from you all in the last 3 days asking for updates, which is wicked awesome! xD Also, I have recently discovered a love for all things anime. O.O First, I only watched Bleach, but then I got suggestions for Special A, Kaicho wa Maid Sama, Ouran Highschool Host Club, ect, & now I'm seriously addicted. xD

ANNOUNCEMENT: So, I got a request from to write a story for him called "The Green Hood." He gave me a basic story line & everything, so I am in the process of working on that bit by bit. I'm going to put out the first chapter soon (hopefully within the next hour if someone won't come in my room), & some feedback from you guys would be greatly appreciated. Tips, suggestions, flames, whatever! :D

GUESS WHO SAW HARRY POTTER ON FRIDAY? ME! GUESS WHO DIDN'T UNDERSTAND MOST OF IT? ME! :D haha. I really don't get harry potter at all. I just watch it 'cause I can. xD But, I will say that was the best HP movie they've made. Especially when Nevil decided he could be all bad ass & was like "What now?" & did the the whole 'come at bitches!' pose. xD Plus, everyone in the theater was clapping when Ron's mom called that crazy chick (don't know her name -_-) a bitch. :P

But for now, I shall bid you farewell until chapter 32, & rewatch KWMS in the meantime. ;O Usui's so hot. x3

Review? :D

Love,

xXduncanxloverXx