No, God, no, please, let it be my dream! I’ not hearing it! I am not!! 18-year-old Frank Hardy thought to himself as he turned onto the other side after hitting his alarm clock which stood on the night table next to his bed. The clock stopped making heart-rending sounds, and silence filled the young man’s room once again. Oh, Joy!

Mmm, this is so nice…. Frank even smiled to himself and covered himself with his warm blanket, ready to drift off to sleep again. His smile suddenly faded away as he thought of the reason why the alarm clock had waken him up this morning. No, it can’t be! Please, God, give me just another day of holidays, but don’t make me go to school today! It’s too early, the summer’s only started…

There was nothing God or anybody else could have done — it was the 1st of September and no one could change that.

5 minutes later he finally, growling, got out of his bed and headed to the bathroom. Once in there he looked into the mirror and, seeing his hair which was a total mess and a pair of dark brown eyes which seemed to be still sleeping, he bitterly smirked, "Ah, I am so handsome this morning…. What a look! Thank God Callie isn’t seeing me now. She’d definitely be scared!"

"Frank, come on, hurry up or you’re gonna be late to school!" Mrs. Hardy shouted from the kitchen only 20 minutes later, after her son and husband had finished their breakfast. "It’s your first day, so be quick!!"

"I'm coming, I'm coming!" Frank shouted back, finishing typing an email. This was a letter of complaint which he was going to send to his friend who lived in Lyon, France. That friend was still in high school, too, so he could understand his feelings. A minute later Frank finally clicked ‘send’ and another minute later he was rushing downstairs. "Ok, I'm on my way," he smiled at his mother and kissed her cheek. She smiled back at her son, "Go. Good luck."

"Thanks! I guess I’ll need it," he replied. Then added. "I hate school."

His mother said nothing in reply.

"Bye, Dad, wish me good luck!" Frank waved his hand at his father who was busy reading "Bayport Today", a local newspaper.

Fenton looked up and, seeing Frank off, said, "Good luck if you need it so much and bye to you too."

Frank climbed into his blue Mustang, which his parents had bought him for his 18th birthday, and started the engine. Another 10 minutes – and he’ll be there, in the most loathsome place for almost every school student….

Frank and his family moved to Bayport from New York when he was only 2 years old. He has been living here ever since, he knew his friends from the very early childhood. He met Phil Cohen in a sand-box, Biff Hooper – at the mall when he wanted his father to buy him another toy-car. He used to mock at Callie Shaw, his beautiful girlfriend at the moment, when they were only 7-8 years old, never knowing they would become close several years later.

As he was the only child of Laura and Fenton Hardy, he grew up being a very serious and self-confident boy, he was a straight A-student and the pride of Bayport High. Taking major interests in computers and maths he was going to devote the rest of his life to programming, although sometimes he wanted to take after his father, who was a world-famous private investigator, and start studying law or even join the police. Frank even talked to Fenton Hardy about that but his father assured him that he should do what he liked, not what his fathers wanted him to do. Besides, it was pretty dangerous, especially since he had no one to back him up. None of his friends wanted to work in police forces, so soon Frank agreed that it would be better to work with computers.

Back at home he had a great computer with loads of the best software. Fenton and Laura never tried to save on their son’s interests, so he had almost everything he wanted. It’s not that his parents were rich to afford everything their son wanted, but they could always afford all the necessary things which their only offspring ever needed.

Many people could envy Frank, but little did they all know that Frank didn’t have something he desperately wanted, something that their parents couldn’t buy for any money: a sense of fullness of his soul. Sometimes he felt terribly lonely when his parents would go out, leaving him all alone in the large Hardys’ house. That’s when he dreamt of having that something or, to be more precise, someone: a brother or, at least, sister. Sometimes he wished he had, at least, a pet, but because of Fenton’s allergy to such fluffy creations, they still had none.

Frank often used to wonder why his parents didn’t have another kid or even more children. Once he asked his father about that, it happened more than 10 years ago. The expression of Fenton’s face changed immediately when his 5-year-old son had asked a simple question, ‘daddy, why don’t I have a brother or a sister?’; Frank was surprised to see pain and guilt in his father’s eyes. Mr. Hardy was silent for a few seconds, then he managed a week smile, "I don’t know! I guess me and your mother wanted you to have everything we could offer you." Frank nodded and slowly left, feeling that he had something he should have never asked. Although he was little, he understood that his parents had a secret from him, a secret he should not ask about….

He never forgot that conversation, even when he had grown up. He could have forgotten about if of he wasn’t very attentive.

Frank noticed that every March the 25th and every January the 14th his parents would become very sad, they barely talked to each other. Fenton was always in his study while Laura was upstairs in their bedroom. Frank always wanted to know why this was happening every year, but when he would come into his father’s study to start a conversation Fenton was very gloomy, he was close to tears, he refused to answer Frank’s questions. Then, when he had no luck with his father, Frank would come upstairs to his parents’ room just to find his mother quietly crying….

Frank didn’t want to force his parents to tell him anything, he trusted them and so was almost sure that if they kept a secret from him then when the right time came they’d tell him.

"Frank!! Frank!!!" 18-year-old Callie Shaw, a slim girl with long sunny blonde hair and green-blue eyes which were sparkling brightly everytime she saw the man of her dreams, shouted as she spotted her handsome 18-year-old boyfriend get out of his car. She beamed all over her cute face and ran to him. "It’d been the longest summer ever! If you only knew how much I wanted to see you! I missed you soooo much!" she said and hugged him, giving him a quick kiss on his lips. "Oh no, you’ve grown again!" she commented as she looked up to see Frank’s warm dark-brown eyes.

Frank laughed, put his arms around her and smiled warmly at his beautiful girlfriend, "I missed you very much, too," he sincerely said. "But now we’ll be together all the time for a year. I thought of you every single day. How was you holiday?"

Callie opened her mouth to reply when another voice interrupted her. "Look who we got here! Isn’t it famous Franklin Hardy with his lady Callie Shaw?"

Frank turned around to see his best friends since the very childhood Biff Hooper, Chet Morton, Phil Cohen and Tony Prito approaching him with huge grins on their faces.

"Hey guys, long time to see!" Frank greeted his friends, beaming all over his handsome face, he missed them as much as he missed Callie, but he kept his happiness under control. For some reasons he was sure that real men never showed their real feelings and emotions. He shook hands with all of the guys.

"Hi to you, too. Where the hell have you been?" Tony asked leaning against Frank’s Mustang. Tony was a guy from Frank’s class and one of the very best friends of his. "I used to call you every week but your Mom would always say you were away."

"My Dad was always away on cases, we planned on going fishing and camping together, but that was impossible for…erm…well-known reasons," everyone nodded. Frank went on, "so he sent me to my uncle who lives near Miami, Florida. That was soooo great! Just think about it: surfing, sunbathing, swimming…. Mmm…"

"Florida?" Chet raised his eyebrows, he was chewing a sandwich, like he always did. "Wow! If only you knew how envious I am! I had to spend this summer in Louisiana with crocodiles and bees. And it was my Dad’s idea! He thought it was the best he could offer me for the summer!"

They had 10 minutes before the first class. Since it was still warm and sunny they stayed near Frank’s car at the parking lot talking about their holidays.

Vanessa Bender, a friend of Callie’s, joined them when she came. She was a young lady of 17 years old with long blonde hair and soft brown eyes. When she smiled there were two dimples seen on her cheeks. Being a very beautiful girl, she could never avoid men’s attention, but her heart was still waiting for that One whom she hadn’t met yet. "So, are there any new comers here who could take my breathe away?" she asked. Since no one saw anyone new, they all shook their heads. Vanessa playfully sighed, "Oh, no! Another year without my Romeo? Why hasn’t he come to meet me yet??" She theatrically pretended to wipe away her tears from her cheeks.

Her prayers must have been heard because 5 minutes later the group saw a cherry Peugeot 206 park next to Frank’s car where the place hadn’t been occupied by another car yet.

"Well, well, well, someone new in Bayport High. Vanessa, this is your chance. Let’s hope the driver’s not female," Frank commented, this was the first time he saw this car.

And Frank’s words must have been heard too. The driver took his backpack and got out of the car. He was a young man of about 17-18 years old who was dressed in a pair of blue jeans and a red T-shirt with number 10 on his chest. Not paying any attention to anyone he started towards the school building, girls were turning their heads to look at him.

Indeed, there was something to look at! Tall and slim, the guy had sunny blond hair and blue eyes, his skin was a little bronzed, but still fair. It was obvious he got used to be women’s dream so whenever an impressed young lady greeted him with ‘haaaaaaaaaiiiiiiiiii’ he would say simple ‘hi’ in reply and go further. Wide eyed and mouth opened girls were whispering behind his back as he was passing them by, their eyes were sparkling.

Soon he disappeared in the school’s entrance. One glance at his girlfriend and Frank saw the same expression on her face. He growled, wasn’t he cute enough for her? "Callie?" he asked her. "Hello, Earth to Callie Shaw!"

"Have you seen him or was it my dream?" Callie asked Vanessa. "I think I'm sleeping!…." She never heard Frank ask her a question.

"No, we can’t see the same guy at the same time when we’re both sleeping…. Oh yeah, he’s gorgeous!….." Vanessa replied. "I haven’t seen him before, he must be new here," she said watching other girls who seemed to be impressed by the newcomer, too. "How I wish he was in my class…." She dreamily said. "This is a sign! I talked about a newcomer and there he is!"

"Hey, girls, do you mind us being here?" Tony asked. He wasn’t as interested in the new guy as the two girls were. As a matter of fact, he wasn’t interested at all. "Or should we go away so that you could dream on?"

"No, you may stay if you want to" Vanessa said and looked at Callie, her eyes narrowed. "He’s mine!! You have got Frank!" she said before her friend could say or think anything.

Not daring to say what she wanted to say when her boyfriend was here, Callie only shot her an evil look. "Yours?" she mischievously grinned and pointed at all the girls who were around. "Well, my darling, it looks like all the girls from school will be after him. Look around, my sweet!"

As Vanessa did so, she realized that Callie was right. She sighed, but said nothing.

"Ok, ladies," Chet interrupted them. "We have the first class in three minutes, why don’t we go in there?" he asked, not wanting to hear the girls’ rave reviews.

Vanessa was sitting at her desk waiting for her history teacher to come. As she looked to her right she whispered ‘thank you, God!’, because fortunately for her the place was empty. The guy who had been sitting there the previous year was said to have moved to Toronto this summer. Ben Morrison, the boy, was an ugly pimply guy with tousled hair and protruding ears who was in love with Vanessa. It would be okay if not one "little" problem: he had the strangest ways to make Vanessa see how truly and deeply he loved her – he used to tug at Vanessa’s braid or to leave his love letters on the door of her locker so that everyone else could read them.

"Today is my day!" Vanessa said to her friend who had told her before the lesson that Ben had, fortunately, moved away.

The next moment the door opened and Mrs. Wharton, the history teacher, came in, and…. the new blond headed guy followed her into the class!

Vanessa’s heart jumped as she saw him, a smile lit up her face. That’s when she heard other girls take a deep breathe in and saw them looking at the newest Romeo. Anyway, she switched her attention to the teacher. And to him, too.

"Good morning, I'm glad to see you all here, back in school. Please, meet your new classmate, Joe Stevenson, he is from Chicago. Martha, you’ll have a lot of time to talk to Stephanie, don’t do it now," Mrs. Wharton said seeing the girl whisper something to her friend. "Joe, you may sit next to Vanessa." She pointed at the empty desk.

Joe managed a quick smile, said a quiet ‘hi’ to the class and went to take the seat which was next to Vanessa’s. "Yessss! Thank you God!" she thought to herself and made a face at Martha who had shot her an evil look from her seat. "Man she’ll be envious!!"

As Joe sat down Vanessa turned her face to look at him. "He looks much better when you see him nearer." She felt chills run up and down her spine. This was the first time she felt like that. "Is it love knocking on my door or the sound of my beating heart?" she remembered a line from Jennifer Lopez’s song and smiled.

Joe noticed her glance and looked back at her, raising his eyebrows as if asking ‘is everything okay with you?’.

"Sorry," she mumbled as she realized she looked too shamelessly at him. She turned her head back to the teacher, pretending to be listening to Mrs. Wharton. Are his eyes really that blue? She wondered to herself and turned to look at him again.

"Why is she looking at me like that?" Joe thought, feeling a bit uneasy. He looked back at her. "What? Is there something wrong?"

Vanessa came back to her senses. "What?… Ah, no, no…. Erm…. This light from the window…. It’s too bright, you know…. I just thought I needed to look into another direction so not to get blinded by it [though I'm already blinded by you]…."

Joe nodded his understanding and turned to listen to the teacher.

Later that day Vanessa entered the lunchroom and looked around. Seeing her friends she ran towards them. "Callie!! He’s in my class!!!" she screamed, wide grin over her face. "Oh, I'm so happy!!! He’ll be mine! I'm sure he will!"

"Who?" Callie asked, not really understanding her. She was sitting next to Frank who had his arm around her waist. Phil, Tony, Chet and Biff were there as well. They looked up at the girl like she was crazy. They haven’t seen Vanessa so happy recently.

"That guy!" Vanessa sat next to her. "Oh, I’m so exited. I had a minute to talk to him. He’s such a dear! If you only knew! Too bad Andrea, Stephanie and Martha are after him as well as Helen and Katherine from another class…. All the girls who are single follow him everywhere he goes, so there’s gonna be a competition in Bayport High soon."

Knowing what they will be talking about Frank rolled his eyes, all the guys silently agreed with him, but they all pretended to be listening to Vanessa. "I guess this guy will drive all the Bayport High girls mad about him. Hmm, looks like we have a new rival…." Frank thought, looking around the lunchroom. But that guy was nowhere to be seen, so he switched his attention back to Vanessa.

"His name is Joe, Joe Stevenson, he moved to Bayport 3 days ago with his father who works for American Insurance Corporation, it has a branch here, in Bayport, and Joe’s father, Paul, is here to develop it. They moved from Chicago."

"Chicago?" Frank asked, obviously surprised. "Why did they have to move from Chicago to such a small town like Bayport?"

"I don’t know, maybe, as I said, to develop that branch of the Corporation," Vanessa shrugged her shoulders. "Anyway, he’s 17 years old and, yes, yes, yes, he doesn’t have a girlfriend! At least, yet, because I'm gonna be there to make sure he doesn’t feel lonely here. Oh God, he’s got such a cute face! Those incredibly bleu eyes, that smile, his parents should have named him Apolon, not Joe."

"Looks like you’ve finally fallen in love, eh?" Chet teased her. "How about those guys with broken hearts? Don’t you pity them?"

"They’re nothing but mother’s darlings!" Vanessa replied to change the subject, but everyone could see her face start blushing. Chet has said the right thing about falling in love.

"Why didn’t you ask that macho man to come here and eat lunch with us?" Biff asked, biting his sandwich. "I want to meet that lady-killer too, maybe he can give me some advice…."

"Ooooh, Biffy…." Phil playfully made eyes at his friend and beamed all over his face.

"Cohen, stop it!" Biff replied, moving aside from Phil. "I didn’t mean this!"

Vanessa laughed at them, "I did ask him, but he said he had to meet up with his father for their own reasons." The girl replied. Seeing the faces of her male friends she sheepishly smiled. "If you were girls you would understand my feelings, too."

"Girls? We??" Chet asked, wrinkling his nose. "NEVER!"

It was the end of the school day and Frank was walking towards his car when he saw Joe take an envelope which was under the windscreen-wipers of his car. He took a piece of paper out of it, read it, his face grew serious. Joe looked around, probably to see the person who had put it under the wipers. The only person he could see was Frank, other students were rather far away. Joe was watching him with narrowed eyes for some moments, but his intuition told him it was not Frank.

Since there was no one else who could leave the envelope, he sighed. Then Joe just crumpled the letter is his hand and threw it away, it fell not far away from Frank’s Mustang. A second later he got into his car and moved away.