Well, There's A First For Everything

They both had reputations, famous and/or infamous, circulating long before their worlds collided.

As the Sheriff's son, even if he didn't have a dime to his name, Stiles had access to things and a reputation for making tickets disappear and getting friend's vehicles out of impound in less than conventional means. As the daughter of an administrator at the school, Lydia was virtually untouchable when it came to delinquency, and because of that she made irresistible company. Not to mention her wealthy businessman father, who would compensated for his lack of parenting skills with expensive clothes, world travel and paying off her exurbanite credit card debts.

By itself, their paths only would have crossed at school, but between grades 3-9 they never spoke.

1st Time They Speak Its Chemistry – Mr. Harris' Class To Be Exact

"Reflecting on your test results from the last quarter," Mr. Harris uttered his terms, "to combat the plague of ignorance you're going to combine efforts in a selection of paired assignments. The entire sophomore class will have partners dictated to them for the rest of the year."

With an ominous air about him, Mr. Harris handed down papers like verdicts, facedown so no one student knew what to expect. On it read their end of term projects, grade averages and the name of a partner selected based on opposing percentages in hopes that the 'lacking' might be dragged up from the depths by association.

"This is crazy!" Scott crowed, beaming down at his assignment.

"This is crazy," Stiles sounded less enthused, not that Scott paid him any mind.

"He paired me with Allison," Scott held out the paper. No, flapped the paper under Stiles' nose as evidence. "What are the chances?"

"Pretty good actually," Stiles brow raised and Scott looked at him inquisitively. So he explained with an easy shrug, "Your grades are crap. Her grades are not."

Even if Scott deflated a little, he didn't stop looking at the assignment like it was a tablet sent down from heaven. Stiles however, figured his assignment had to be a practical joke because his partner made no sense at all.

There was no way, not in this universe, not even in the darkest timeline would Lydia Martin rank as his scholastic polar opposite. Social? Fiscal? Fashionable? All of those, check, check, check. But in grades? And yet, there it was in Times New Roman print. This deserved investigation, but demanding answers from Mr. Harris sounded as appealing as asking to be castrated for funsies. The only other option was the nuclear option; asking Lydia.

As he edged across the aisle to the front of the classroom and neared her desk he could feel classmates' judgmental stares jabbing at him while hearing the titters of early gossip. But the worst of it had to be the look she gave him when she realized who he would be. A flash of uneasiness, anger and then ultimately disappointment settled in her big bright eyes just before she returned to absently flipping through textbook pages with one hand and twiddling a pencil with the other. They would have been beautiful eyes if they weren't so vicious.

"Stiles," he said by way of an introduction, shoving his hand out for her to shake. People did handshakes, right? Like, casually?

"What the hell is a Stiles?" she glanced up, her eyes narrowed further and she leaned further away like his touch would burn.

Quickly, he yanked his hand back and wrung the straps of his backpack, trying like hell to still them.

"Uhm, it's my name. We're assigned together."

"That's not the name I have on the assignment sheet," she responded dismissively.

"Please!" he stepped closer and hissed at a whisper. "Just call me Stiles. No one calls me that."

After she realized they were drawing more eyes, she blew out a breath and with the end of her pencil, gestured for him to take a seat across from her. And he did, dropping like a sack of bricks.

.

Keeping to himself, unsure of how to start a conversation or begin to study, he began to pull out notebook after notebook instead. He flipped back and forth through his notes, then opened up next folder filled with revisions and then the next. Piling up a hefty stack onto the center of the desk between them.

"I thought I was passing," he mumbled in a barely audible voice.

"What?" Lydia asked. It was hard to know if she actually asked the question or if he imagined it, because when he looked over at her she looked uninterrupted. She never stopped scribbling circles along the margin of her textbook while she sulked off toward the classroom clock.

"'What' what?" Stiles straightened up and stared.

"What do you mean?" Lydia looked over unnerved, her pencil stilled.

"I mean, how can I be paired with you if I'm passing?" he asked, genuinely mystified displaying all of his semesters work in fistfuls. Very slowly her eyes widened, that earlier uneasiness turned into full blown fear.

"What are you talking about? Of course you're passing," she lied poorly. "I'm failing, why else would they pair us?"

"Nu-uh," his eyes narrowed slightly, trying to see if this were a test. "Okay, I'm not a genius but I can't be the only one who knows how smart you really are."

"Shhh," she hissed fiercely and leaned closer, ducking just out of view from their classmates. "If you don't tell anyone about my good grades I won't tell anyone your name. Deal."

It was a statement, not a question and of all the great many things he heard about her, Stiles had to acknowledge - Lydia Martin always got what she wanted.

.

The next time they had chemistry, the room buzzed with the energy of students getting to know their partners and their subject matters. Not them. They could think of nothing they had in common and since their yearend project could be worked out over an extended weekend, they agreed to do exactly that. Why bother with it now?

Lydia drew notes into the margins of her textbooks and kicked a nervous rhythm as she counted down the minutes of the period, while Stiles continued to flip through his personal revisions like a madman with periodic breaks of stoic contemplation.

While tapping his chin and mumbling lists to himself he'd finally realized what had happened to cross their destined paths; "Oh, of course! I'm failing because of my paper-"

"What about your paper?" she asked, whether out of boredom or curiosity it wasn't clear, but she stopped kicking her foot.

"I detailed the entire history of the male circumcision," he said as he unkinked his neck.

She regarded him closely, "this is chemistry class. And you handed that in to Mr. Harris?"

"Mmhm," his expression went strained when she no longer responded. Neither by kicking her foot, tapping her pencil, blinking or even seemingly breathing. It looked very much like he had ruined any chance of them having a working relationship for the rest of the year.

Finally she said low, biting her lips a little "that's funny."

"Is it?" His eyes screwed up in disbelief. "You know you can physically laugh if you think it's funny."

With that she scoffed lightly, tossed her hair over her shoulder, went back to flipping through her textbook while the heel of her pump built an anxious tandem against the table leg. Something about the act unnerved him, not exactly her kicking the table but the idea that someone would say 'that's funny' rather than laugh.

After sitting back in his seat, he gave it great thought, and for the rest of the period observed her without looking at her. A brilliant girl that hid her wits from the crowd, her nerves in high end boots and laughs behind keen eyes, and he made an executive decision. Since Stiles had nothing else to do during class, he would spend the rest of the year trying to make Lydia laugh.