A/N: Sorry for the late update! Hate to be keeping you all in suspense (actually, I love it!).

06. She's Killing Me

The day most high school students loathed had arrived: Monday. Everyone was grouchy as ever, missing their weekend dearly. Even though Tori had managed to postpone her inevitable encounter with Beck, there was no avoiding it now. She practically shared all her classes with him.

However, Tori Vega had thought of a plan: as long as Beck couldn't get her alone with him, he was in no position to confront her about the situation at hand. He certainly wouldn't dare speak of his emailing pal who happened to be a girl with Jade.

Strolling through the hallway, Tori felt like she needed a pair of eyes in the back of her head, afraid Beck might jump at her and start asking her all these questions. Questions she didn't want to answer. All she wanted was just to forget about it and move on.

Tori entered the school building, vigilantly peeking around the corner before making a quick break for it, heading straight for her locker. With haste she pulled her locker open, to find a blue coloured note in it which said:

Tori,

Please stop avoiding me, I need to talk to you.

- Beck

Frowning she ripped the note into little snippets and tossed it in the trash can, stuffing a few books in her bag and heading to Mr. Sikowitz's class. She inhaled a few deep breaths before turning the doorknob and crossing the threshold.

The classroom was already quite full. Her eyes were frantically scanning the room for any sign of Beck. Boom – two big brown eyes were staring right back at her, intrudingly.

Instead of sitting down in the vacant spot next to Beck and André, she settled for a seat way in the back of the classroom, which caused a few eyebrows to be raised because it was unlike her. But Tori ignored it, sitting down and folding one leg over the other.

"Nice of you to join us after all, Miss Vega." Mr. Sikowitz said whilst patrolling around in front of the class.

During the entire class Tori was quite absent. Her main focus was to keep her eyes set straight in front of her, almost as if looking in Beck's direction was life-threatening: like Medusa, from the Greek mythology. She could petrify people by looking into their eyes.

The bell rang and Tori was the first at the door, but she wasn't the only one who had been keeping her eyes on the door: Beck was too. He saw it as his opening window.

"Tori." He said in a strained voice, his eyes beckoning for her gaze.

She ignored him however, striding into the corridor and mingling herself into the flood of students that came rushing out of all of the classrooms.

"Tori!" Beck called, trying to heave his voice above the masses. But it was no use, Tori had disappeared – again.

There was only one place in this school where Tori would be safe from Beck: the girls' bathroom, and that's exactly where she was heading at the speed of light. Lightly panting, she pushed the door open, many girls crowding in front of the mirrors, redoing their make-up and hair.

Tori rolled her eyes, looking down at her watch. She figured she could hang here another twenty minutes, if it meant avoiding Beck. Her mind was reeling. Jade could not find out, because if she did, Tori's head would be on a platter, ready to be chopped in half in a matter of seconds.

As the stir in the bathroom started to die down, Tori's cell phone rang. As she looked down upon the screen she read: Anonymous. Without thinking about it more than a second she picked up.

"Hello, this is Tori."

"Tori, finally." Beck's voice sounded in relief. "Please don't hang up."

She wasn't speaking, but she wasn't hanging up either.

"Listen, you and I both know we need to talk."

"Do we?" Tori retorted. "Because, I don't see why we have to so badly."

Beck heaved a sigh. "Let me rephrase it then: I need to talk to you." He said quietly.

"About what?" Now Tori was just playing dumb, to prolong the inevitable.

"We both know about what. Please, just drop by my house tomorrow night. Jade will be with her grandparents, so we don't have to worry about her finding out."

"Are you sure she isn't eavesdropping you? Because if she finds out, I'm dead meat."

"I promise you, she won't find out. Eight o'clock, be there."

With those words Beck hung up. Tori groaned, gently hitting her head against the tiled wall of the girls' bathroom, chanting softly: "Crap on a freaking cracker."

Despite having tried her very best to dodge Beck's pleas, she felt like she couldn't do it anymore. Deep down inside she too wanted to talk to him about this. He was after all the guy she hadn't been able to get off of her mind since the day they met in that chatroom of Hollywood Arts.

From: oceanxatlantic [oceanxatlantic ]
Sent: Monday 25 April 2011 10:13
To: tcsnike09
Subject: One condition
I'll be there, but stop stalking me. Do we have a deal?

From: tcsnike09 [tcsnike09 ]
Sent: Monday 25 April 2011 10:24
To: oceanxaltlantic
Subject: RE: One condition
Deal. Don't forget: eight o'clock.

Eight o'clock tomorrow night it was.