Darkness Turned To Light

2. New Project

Emma Swan is a very alert and aware person. There has never been a moment within the last year that she has been caught off guard. Her past taught her this. She always stays cautious of the people around her, and what their facial expressions tell her. It was just a thing that she picked up over the years of her troubled past.

If you would list off all the attending students at Storybrooke High, she could put a face to all the names.

This is how she knew who Killian was. This is also how she knew that he was in her World History class and Algebra II class. He sat in the back, and usually slept through all of the lessons. Emma couldn't tell if his carelessness made her envy him or be annoyed by him.

She was always so alert about things which caused her no time to relax. She envied Killian since he was able to do that, but she was also disgusted by his lack of care to his future. Did he think that he would just fly by high school without needing to do any work and then just live in his parents house for the rest of his life?

Emma was studying his body language. He had his legs crossed and propped up on the desk as he leaned back in his chair with his arms folded and his eyes closed. Little did she know that his eyes were just slightly open for him to see that she was staring at him. "See something you like?" He whispered as he quirked up one eyebrow and a smirk grew across his face. Emma's face turned bright red, but she tried to cover up her embarrassment by scoffing, rolling her eyes at him, and facing back towards the front of the class.

"Okay class," the teacher spoke, "I know we're only into the second week of school, but we are starting a partner project." All sorts of groans and grunts filled the room. Emma on the other hand, sat up straighter in her seat. She always loved doing projects. 'Hopefully I get a good partner' Emma thought.

"I will be assigning your partners, and I will do so by picking your names out of this hat. Okay now let's start," she said and then picked the hat up from off of her desk.  She swirled her hand around the inside of the hat a couple of times to mix up the papers.

"Jenna . . . you are with Kaden."

Jenna smiled widely and quickly hopped out of her desk to go sit with Kaden. They were a couple, so of course they weren't upset.

"Tanner . . . you are with Austin."

Tanner had the usual pissed off look on his face as he went to sit next to Austin. Austin was one of the more popular guys, but Tanner didn't talk much.

Finally after many of names being called that weren't Emma's, the teacher announced who her partner was.

"Emma . . . you are with Killian," she spoke.

Emma let out a loud gasp and Killian sat up straight in his seat. He quickly rose his hand to protest.

"Excuse me Ms.Stevens, can I please have a different partner?" Killian asked politely. Emma rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. 'Why does he dislike me so much?' She wondered. 'He was the one who assumed stuff about my life.'

"No," Ms.Stevens said, "you get whatever partner I assign you and that is final."

Killian groaned loudly and sank back into his seat.

"And if you have a problem with it Mr.Jones, then you can go see the principal."

Killian rolled his eyes in annoyance.

"Okay! So, this handout has the list of subjects that you and your partner can choose from to do your project. They are all different, major things that have happened through out history. They are also different subjects that we will be talking about in class this year. So basically you and your partner will research the basics of the topic you get and present it to the entire class. I'm doing this in hoping that it will give you all a better understanding of these subjects when we get to them. Now go sit by your partner, and when you decide on which subject that you want to do, come see me and I will tell you if that subject is already taken or not," Ms.Stevens spoke and sat back down at her desk before logging on to her computer to check her recent emails.