Because of You (Because of You 1)

I dreamed of my mom again that night, and when I woke up the next morning I was again filled with that peaceful feeling that everything would somehow be all right. I wasn't sure how, but it just would.

I tried to gear myself up that morning, to tell myself Derek was right. It might not be easy, but he was worth it, and I was not going to roll over and admit defeat to Kayla.

I had plans, dammit, and Derek was in them.

That day at school I made sure to find Derek before class, and then I walked to class on his arm, as his girlfriend should. He seemed relieved at my change in attitude, and that made me happy, too.

"Did you finally stop thinking?" he asked me on the way to class.

"No," I replied. "I just started thinking differently. I'm a Harmon, Derek; we don't go away without a fight."

He smiled. "No, I don't suppose you do."

At lunch, instead of letting his friends monopolize him, I took his attention for myself.

"So, we never get to see each other outside of school anymore, but I've been making plans and they involve you, so I want to talk to you about them."

Derek nodded. "Okay. Fill me in."

"I haven't really been talking to you about this since... well, since everything happened with Kayla."

He nodded his understanding so I didn't have to say it.

"Anyway, you know how you were talking about college? And how you brought up that you thought it was really silly for me not to go? Well, I've had a lot of spare time on my hands lately, so I've been thinking about it, and I realized you're right. I love to learn, and I want to be able to get a good job someday. There's nothing wrong with Wendy's, but I certainly don't want to work there forever. I want a job that I'll make pretty good money doing and that I'll enjoy doing. I want books to be involved, and I want to be able to buy myself a house and a nice car."

He smiled at me, his eyes twinkling. "You're going to college?"

I nodded, smiling right back. "Yeah, and I was thinking we could go together. I mean, I don't really know how your plans are looking right now, because we haven't been talking about it, but if you decide to do the community college and then transfer thing, I definitely want to do it, too. I don't know what we'll do about living arrangements, but we still have some time to figure it out. I've been doing some research, and I think we can do this."

Derek offered me a smile. "That's great, Nikki. I'm glad you're going to college, it seemed like such a waste for you to skip it."

"Yeah. But you're still going, right?" I asked tentatively.

"I'm... yeah, at least part-time."

I nodded, although I wasn't completely satisfied with that. If he had to go part-time though, it wouldn’t be the end of the world. The whole baby thing was going to require sacrifices, so I decided I should just be glad that he was at least going to try to go part-time.

It was still frustrating though. I hated to see anything holding him back, even if only temporarily.

Speak of the devil, his biggest obstacle came walking over to the table at that very moment, her unsmiling gaze sliding past me as if I didn't exist and landing on Derek.

"I need to talk to you for a minute," she said.

"Okay," he said, turning so that he could look at her.

Her eyes narrowed slightly. "Alone," she clarified.

Derek looked at me apologetically and told me he'd be back, standing up and leaving the cafeteria with Kayla.

I watched sullenly, thinking about how much I despised Kayla. That feeling wasn't made any better when one of Derek's dumber friends said, "She's hot."

I shot him a disgusted look, but held my tongue, looking up at the large clock and waiting for Derek to return.

It seemed like hours later when Derek finally came back into the cafeteria. He didn't look very happy, but Kayla had a smile on her face, which worried me just a bit. Obviously she won whatever she had set out to win.

"What was that all about?" I asked as he sat down beside me.

"Nothing," he said vaguely.