As it turned out, Jake and I both had Mrs. Loche for first period science. On one side of the room there was a glass tank with a rattlesnake in it, which made me a bit uneasy. I don't like snakes. I guess I like them more than spiders, but I don't like snakes.
About 10 minutes into the class, one kid in the class accidentally knocked over Wally's cage (Wally was the snake). Wally fell onto the desk of the girl who sat next to me. Her name was Beth.
Beth screamed and jumped out of her chair. The rest of the class also screamed - boys (and Jake) included - and ran to one side of the room. I saw Mrs. Loche jump on top of her desk.
If the situation weren't so serious, I would have started cracking up.
Looking back at it, I do.
So anyways, I decided to play "heroine" and grab the snake before it went on a killing rampage all over the school, so I leaped at it and tried not to let it bite me.
Unfortunately, somehow his poisonous fangs ended up in my hand for a couple of seconds, or at least until I got a hold of Wally and threw him back into his cage. I guess I swayed a little from the poison, because the world started spinning, and Jake rushed over to me and put his hands on my arms to steady me. Mrs. Loche jumped back off of her desk and came over to Jake and me.
"Are you all right?" Mrs. Loche asked me.
I shook my head. "Um, I don't think so. Wally bit me." I thought to myself, Oh, man. This is so not good. I could die from this.
Mrs. Loche put her hand on my forehead. "Jake, you'd better take Cassie to the office and have them call a doctor or someone. I don't think Cassie's doing to well."
Jake put my arm around his shoulders to help me stand. "All, right, Mrs. Loche. I'll be back." He helped me to the office and felt my forehead. "Yeah, you don't feel so good. You don't look so good, either. Your forehead's all clammy."
The nurse came up to us. She felt my forehead once and led me to one of the beds. "What happened?" she asked Jake.
Jake looked worried. "The short version? This is Cassie. She's new here. We're in Mrs. Loche's class. She got bitten by Wally, the snake."
The nurse knotted her eyebrows together in worry. "I knew we shouldn't have let her have that rattlesnake in there. Okay, Cassie." She looked at me. "Where do you live?" she questioned as Jake sat down in the chair next to the bed.
I told her. Barely. I hardly had enough energy to just lie there, let alone talk.
I heard the nurse and Jake talk, and then the nurse called someone. She was probably calling my mom or my dad. Jake leaned forward and touched my arm lightly.
"It's going to be okay, Cassie. Just hang on," he said, and everything went black.

CHAPTER THREE

When I woke up, I saw I was in a hospital room. I looked to my left. Curtain. I looked to my right. Dad was sitting there, looking at me. He clapped his hands cheerfully.
"Oh, goodie! She's awake!" he cried, putting on a goofy smile.
I smiled weakly. Good old dad, trying to make me feel better with, well, stuff. And it was working, too. Wow.
"What time is it?" I asked weakly.
Dad pointed at the nightstand next to my bed. "It's right there."
"Oh." I looked. 4:28 P.M. "When did I get here?" I asked.
"About 12:30 is when I finally got you here. There was really bad traffic," he explained.
"How bad?"
Dad shrugged. "Oh, pretty bad. We were all crawling at about 2 miles per hour because of an accident, but don't worry. No one was really hurt."
I gave Dad my "whatever" look. "Not the traffic, Dad. I was talking about me."
Dad turned bright red. "Oh yeah. Only mild enough to make you pretty weak and pass out occasionally, but nothing that you can't handle, Snake Woman."
I made a face at him. "Thanks, Dad. Thanks a lot." Then, just because I was surprised she wasn't here, I asked, "Where's Mom?"
Dad frowned. "She's really sorry she couldn't make it, Cass. Some kind of something came up that your mom couldn't get out of."
I leaned back, exhausted from talking for just five minutes.
Dad stood up and stretched. "Well, I gotta get home. I was right in the middle of bandaging up an injured skunk when the school called about you." He walked to the closed curtain and turned around like he had forgotten something. "By the way, how're you doing?"
I looked at him and gave him a thumbs-up. "Just great, Daddy. I guess I'll see you later."
"Bye." Dad popped his head out of my room.
I laid my head back down and looked at the ceiling. I suppose I'll be here overnight, just for observation, I thought to myself. I fell back asleep after five minutes.
I woke up to the sound of someone coming into the room. When I looked up, I saw it was Jake. I smiled.
Jake looked at me and smiled back, seeing that I was awake. "Good evening, Sleeping Beauty," he said.
I grinned even wider. "Hi, Jake. So, did we have any more classes together?" I felt a lot stronger after my short nap.
Jake pulled out a manila envelope stuffed with papers. "Yep. In fact, we have all of them together. And I have homework for you from every class, too. Especially from the Loche-ness Monster. My brother, Tom, had her three years ago. He said she's a really hard science teacher."
I groaned. "Great. Just what I don't need. Science isn't even my best subject, either. Oh, woe is me. What am I going to do?" I draped my arm over my forehead Shakespeare style to attempt a joke.
Jake laughed. "You're going to try out for Shakespeare when you get older, but for now you're going to work just as hard as everyone else who's gotten A's in her class. I know you can do it, Cass."
I thought of something. "Hey, you don't think she'll go a little easy on my, do you? You know, since I nearly died saving all of our butts," I mentioned.
Jake shook his head as he sunk back into the chair by my bed and yawned. "Doubt it." With that, he closed his eyes and fell asleep.
I looked at the envelope with the homework in it and sighed, falling asleep again.
I woke up and sat up in bed. I needed to get out of bed. I needed to move, but the doctors probably wouldn't let me. Considering I'm not the biggest risk-taker in the world (yeah, right), I wasn't about to try it.
I closed my eyes and fell back asleep.

CHAPTER FOUR

The next day, I was able to go home. Since both of my parents are vets, I guess the doctors decided I'd be safe enough if I decided to collapse. Like I would want to, but hey. They have to be careful. It's their job. Even though I went home, I couldn't go back to school for at least a week.
I was really surprised when, on Friday afternoon, I got a visitor. I didn't think anyone knew where I lived.
My parents were making me lay on the couch, and I was facing the door. When Mom answered the door, I couldn't see who it was until they actually stepped into the hallway.
"Cassie, you have a visitor," my mom called.
"Who is it?" I asked, sitting up.
My mysterious visitor poked his head into the room. "Hey, Cassie," Jake greeted me with a grin.
I smiled back. "Hi, Jake."
He came into the room. "Is it just me, or are you looking better by the minute?" He brought something out behind his back and handed it to me. "For you," he said.
My eyes widened as Jake put a bouquet of roses into my arms. "Jake, you shouldn't have," I insisted, smelling them. "Really." I raised my eyebrows and looked at him. "Where's my homework?"
Jake grinned slyly and pulled it out from his back pocket. "Here you go. It's not that much this time. I guess the teachers finally got together and decided to give us a semi-break from the homework. Surprisingly, the Loch-ness Monster didn't give us any homework over the weekend. I think that she feels sorry for all of us after you nearly died saving us all from certain death and the destruction of the school."
I rolled my eyes. "Yeah, right. She's just still freaked out of her mind. I think that experience gave us all an eye-opening experience."
Jake sat down next to the couch on the floor. "Yeah, I know. By the way, Mrs. Loche changed the seating chart, and now you sit next to Wally. I sit next to you. I guess she figured that you're the only person brave enough to sit next to a rattlesnake."
I rolled my eyes again. "Whatever. I'm just as freaked out about snakes as the next person. It's just that no one was doing anything, so I figured what the heck? It would be worth getting out of a few homework assignments." I smiled and noticed that Mom had gone back upstairs.
Jake smiled back. "Uh-huh. I really believe that, Cassie. That's why you risked your life for all of us, right?" he asked sarcastically.
I looked into his hazel eyes. "Naw. I only risked my life for you." There. I had come as close as I probably ever would to declaring my feelings for Jake.
Jake looked at the carpet, then back up at me. "You'd really risk your life for me?" he asked softly.
"In a New York minute," I whispered.
For a few seconds, we just gazed into each other's eyes.
Finally, Jake broke the moment by clearing his throat and standing up. "Well, I'd better get going. I gotta do my homework." He turned around and started walking towards the door.
"Hey, Jake," I called.
He turned around. "Yo."
I smiled. "Thanks. For everything."
Jake walked back to me and kissed me on the cheek. "You're very welcome," he answered.
After Jake left, I leaned back on my pillow and sighed deeply. What a day, I thought.
A few minutes later, Mom came downstairs. "So, what happened, Cass?" she asked.
I grinned. "Nothing important," I answered simply.
Mom was taken aback. "Nothing? Come on, Cassie. You can't fool me. You've got hearts floating around your eyes. You're in love, aren't you?"
I nodded sheepishly. "Do you want the short version? Yes."
"With who? That cute guy that just walked out?"
I nodded again. "Yep. Him. Oh, by the way, his name is Jake."
Mom sat down on the couch right next to me. "I know. He introduced himself. He's a cool kid, Cass," she commented.
I smiled. "I know. And if I didn't know better, which I don't think I do this time, I'd say he likes me, too. I mean, it's not every day that some guy you met less than 12 hours before visits you in the hospital and at home. He did that, you know. We met about 8:30 and he visited me at about 5:30 in the hospital."
Mom smiled too. "Yeah, I'd say he likes you, too. Grab him before he runs away, Cassie. That's a good fish. I can tell." She got up and left.
I considered her words for a moment or two, and then snuggled back down into my blankets. Think later. Right now, I was tired. I needed sleep.
As the world faded around me when I fell asleep, I thought about Jake.

CHAPTER FIVE

A few months later, around Christmas, I was working on a project that the Loche-ness Monster had assigned over Christmas Break. How evil. The project was supposed to be about any animal of our choice.
Anyways, I was doing research on the Internet when the doorbell rang. My mom answered the door, as usual. I saw Mom's face light up when she saw who it was.
"Hi, Jake," she said.
I grinned.
Jake walked over behind me and leaned over me to see what I was doing. He put his hand on my shoulder to help support himself. "Whatcha doin'?" he asked.
I groaned. "That evil project from Loche."
Jake laughed. "Yeah, it is pretty evil, isn't it? I did it in two days."
I raised my eyebrows in surprise. "Serious? Wow."
Jake squeezed my shoulders in support. "Wow is right. I did mine on the white Siberian tiger. What about you?" he asked.
I leaned back in my chair. "I'm doing mine on the spider monkey. They live in the Amazon rainforest. You know, I've always wondered what it would be like to become a monkey, or any kind of animal, for that matter. I'd always thought about what it would be like to run as fast as the wind, to swing through the trees, to become road kill. I've just thought it would be cool."
Jake laughed. "Come on, you know that's impossible. Nobody can turn into animals."
"I know," I protested. "I'm not saying I can, I'm just saying I'd like to."
Jake shook his head. "You're insane, as Marco would say."
"What was your first clue?"
I ended up finishing the project within a week.
What can I say? I'm a perfectionist.

EPILOGUE

It wasn't until a year and a half later when I realized what Jake and I were talking about.
It was when Jake, Marco, Rachel, a new kid named Tobias, and I were given the power to morph into any animal we touched when I really thought about how weird it was that I'd always wanted to turn into animals, and, since that night, I can. I have been a spider monkey, as well as many other types of animals.
I guess dreams can come true.