Date: Thu, 1 Mar 2001 04:16:39 EST
From: Kb79@aol.com
Subject: Life's Discoveries, Chapter 10, Boybands

DISCLAIMER: This story is a work of fiction. The characters are real
people but are being written in fictional situations. This is not
saying anything about the sexual orientation of anyone mentioned.

WARNING: This story deals with homosexual themes. If this offends you,
don't read. If you are under 18 years of age, don't read. If reading
this story causes you to break any laws, don't read.

FEEDBACK: I'd like to know what you think, email me at Kb79@aol.com

QUICK NOTE: Sorry Chapter 9 took so long, I've become lazier than ever!
So I tried to get this one out way quicker that normal. Hope that makes
up for it :)

QUICK THANK-YOU: Thanks to my little 'brother' for the fireworks idea,
you're the best :)

Life's Discoveries
Chapter 10
By: Kelly

Lance stood outside the door to the basement Kevin hadn't shown his face
yet this morning. He knocked softly.

"What?" He heard Kevin grunt.

"Can I come in?" Lance asked softly.

"No." Kevin grunted again.

"We need to talk Kevin." Lance said softly.

"You're just going to come in anyway... so why don't you fucking get it
over with." There were hard breaths between the words Kevin spoke.

Lance opened the door slowly, slightly worried at what Kevin might be
doing.

What he saw was Kevin doing pushups at a rigorous pace.

"Kevin?"

"What?" Kevin stopped doing his push ups and sat slumped on the floor.

"I'm sorry?" It came out as a question.

"Gee, that sounds heartfelt."

"Well... I am sorry I upset you."

"Who said you upset me?"

"Kevin, you freaked out on me."

Kevin looked Lance in the eyes at the point.

"So, you're sorry you upset me... and?"

"I just wanted to tell you, I'm not sorry I kissed you though... I wanted
to explain myself."

"Go ahead..."

"I thought you meant me..." Lance said softly, wringing his hands.

"Huh?"

"When you were talking about the one who was always there for you... and
how you felt about that person... I thought you meant me."

"And that's why you kissed me?"

"Yeah..."

The hard tone Kevin had adopted dropped, along with the icy look in his
eyes.

"Shit Lance..."

"I'm sorry Kev... I didn't know... I never imagined there was someone else
you were in love with."

"Yeah... how could ya have known..."

"I guess I couldn't have..."

"No..."

"Do you except my apology?"

"Of course... I'm sorry... I shouldn't have flipped out like that... things
are just still so fucked up."

"Yeah... I know... I completely wasn't thinking when I did that."

"It's okay... it's all good now... don't worry."

"Thanks Kev... can I ask you something?"

"Yeah... what's up?"

"Who were you talking about?"

"Ugh.."

"Is it one of the guys?"

"Ugh..."

"Okay, you don't have to tell me."

Kevin stayed silent.

Lance looked at him, sitting on the floor. He was hurt... Kevin didn't love
him, okay, he could live through that... but now he wouldn't even answer
him. He turned to leave the room.

"Wait!" Kevin shouted.

Lance turned back around.

"What?"

"Nick."

"What?!?" Lance reacted fiercer than he had planned on.

Kevin gulped, taken back by Lance's tone, but he answered anyway. "Nick,
I'm in love with Nick."

"Ohhh..." Lance seemed stunned. "Does he know? I mean, are you two..."

"No, he doesn't." Kevin said softly.

"How long have ya been in love? Is it recent?" Lance questioned, trying to
get interested.

"Recent? God no... three years now, at least." Kevin smiled dreamily for a
moment.

"What's that about?" Lance asked.

"Huh?" Kevin snapped out of it.

"That look on your face, what was that about?" Lance still found Kevin
good-looking, especially when he got goofy like that.

"Sorry, I was just thinking about Nick, and these past three years." Kevin
replied.

"It's okay." Lance smiled genuinely. "You really do love him, don't you?"

"Yeah..."

"Tell me about it." Lance suggested.

"Really?" Kevin was surprised.

"Yeah, really, now that I see that all the passion you had in your words
when you were talking about 'the one' was directed toward Nick, I want to
hear about him and how you feel for him." Lance honestly confessed.

"You are amazingly understanding Lance, thank you."

Lance just smiled and gestured for Kevin to speak.

Kevin started to tell the story, starting with the day he met Nick and then
right up to the recent occurrences.

"Oh... well that explains your reaction to not being able to find him the
other night."

"Yeah... I panicked hard core. I still feel dumb about that Lance."

"You two will work it out, from the sounds of the relationship the two of
you have, you go through stuff like this sometimes."

"Yeah... we have rough patches, but it is because we are so close." Kevin
was getting a goofy grin again.

"I can see." Lance smiled at Kevin. "So... when did you really know? When
did you know Nick was the one?"

"Oh... God, like I said, it was three years ago. We were at Nick's old
house, in the backyard, for the Fourth of July. All five of us were
stretched out on the lawn chairs, staring at the fireworks as they went
off. Nick was sharing the chair I was sitting in, because there were only
four of them. I turned toward Nick for a second, I still don't remember
why. He was looking up at the fireworks with such joy in his eyes, just
like a little kid. But... it was the first time I noticed exactly how much
he had grown up. And I started to think could this man be the child that
grew up with me? Could this man, be the Nick that helped me grow up? And
then it finally dawned to me, could this man, be the man I love? And it was
all over then. I watched the fireworks dance off his face and I knew I had
fallen a long time ago, I knew he was 'the one'."

"Wow... that's really sweet Kevin." Lance felt a twinge of jealousy as he
wished that all that passion could have been directed his way.

Kevin blushed slightly.

"I'm going to go back upstairs now. I'm glad we worked this all out. We're
still friends, right?" Lance asked.

"Of course!" Kevin answered.

Lance turned to leave and Kevin got up and gave him a hug before he left.

Lance climbed the two flights of stairs to head back to his room. He was
happy he had worked thing out with Kevin, but he was still feeling a little
down that Kevin wasn't interested in him, because he sure was still
interested in Kevin. He was about to go into his room, when AJ came
strolling out of his.

"Hey Lance, wazzup?" AJ asked, way to energetically.

"Nothing." Lance answered simply.

AJ furrowed his brow. "You okay dude?"

"Yeah, I'm fine." Lance couldn't stop the sad sigh that followed.

"No, come on, something is obviously wrong, you want to talk about it?" AJ
pressed softly.

"You sure?" Lance asked shyly.

"Yeah! Of course, let's go in your room, we can talk in private."

Lance and AJ went into Lance's room and made themselves comfortable sitting
on the bed.

"So tell me dude, wazzup?"

"I stupidly thought I had a chance with Kevin..." Lance started hesitantly.

"Uh-oh, what happened?" AJ asked.

"I kinda put the moves on him to find out he wasn't interested."

"Ugh, that had to hurt. But I coulda warned ya, Nick and him are gonna end
up together."

"How did you know he liked Nick?" Lance blurted out, surprised.

AJ's eyes went wide with surprise, pleasant surprise, but still
surprise. "I didn't, but I do now!"

"Dammit!" Lance hit himself in the forehead. "But wait! What do you mean
Nick and him are gonna end up together? Is Nick gay?"

"He'd kill me for letting you know, so don't day anything, but yes, he is."

Lance wasn't sure if his heart would make it through the day. "He is? Does
he like Kevin?"

"Oh yeah... a lot!" AJ answered.

"Shit! Why don't the two of them do something about it than?" Lance
questioned.

"Well, for starters Kevin doesn't know that Nick is gay, and Nick doesn't
believe that Kevin could ever be interested in him." AJ stated.

"We should help them out!"

"What could we do?"

"We need to think of a way to get them together. Think!"

The two young men sat there and pondered the situation for a few minutes.

Finally AJ spoke up. "Why don't we just sit them both down and tell them,
it's better than trickery. They may get a little pissy at us both, but at
least they'll know."

"Hey, simple, but it just might work!"

"When should we? Tonight?"

"Why wait?"

"Okay, tonight after dinner, we sit them both down!"

The next few hours crawled. Lance was feeling better, if he couldn't be in
love himself, at least he could help his friends. And AJ just seemed so
excited about it. The two of them chatted as they cooked dinner. It had
started to rain heavily about an hour ago, and every once in a while the
house shook as lightning struck and thunder rolled.

"AJ?" Lance said as he was peeling potatoes he had planned to mash.

"What?" AJ replied from the salad he was tossing.

"Go tell Nick we need to discuss something with him after dinner, so he
doesn't make other plans or anything."

"Okay, you gonna go tell Kevin?"

"Nah... Kev's more suspicious in nature. We'll just corner him when we are
done."

"Alrighty, be right back."

AJ ran off to tell Nick and came back a few minutes later to let Lance know
all was good. They continued cooking. The finished a half an hour later and
everyone joined in the kitchen to enjoy the meal. Kevin got a phone call
when everyone was almost done and had gone into the basement to talk in
private. The kitchen had been cleaned and the dished were done, but Kevin
was still on the phone.

Nick was getting antsy. "Come one guys, you said you wanted to talk to me,
what's up? What are you waiting for?"

Lance and AJ just looked at each other. AJ had put his ear to the basement
door and could hear that Kevin was talking to someone from management, and
that most likely meant he would be down there for a good while. Should they
hold off? No, then Nick would get suspicious. They should just tell him,
and then wait for Kevin.

AJ started. "Nick, you are gonna like this, but Lance knows you're gay."

Nick shot up from his seat. "He what? How exactly did he find that out
AJ?!?"

AJ gulped. "I told him..."

Nick leapt toward AJ. "You little..."

Lance stepped in the middle of the two bandmates. "There's a good reason
Nick! Just listen!"

Nick backed off for a second. "Make it quick, and you better make it good,
if you want AJ to live!"

"Okay, okay, just sit down and stay calm for a minute." AJ said to him.

Nick glared at him.

"Nick." Lance said, drawing his attention. Than he began quickly "I was
talking to Kevin today and he admitted something to me. He told me he had
been in love with you for at least three years now. And then I ran into AJ,
and he told me *you* were in love with Kevin, but being neither or you had
planned on saying anything, we decided to go out on a limb and tell you
ourselves."

Nick's angry look dropped immediately, it turned to one of fear. He once
again shot up from his seat. But this time he bolted from the room, out the
front door.

"Shit!" AJ yelled.

"That did not go well." Lance muttered.

"Kevin is gonna kill us." AJ shuddered.

"Why am I gonna kill you?" A voice said from behind them.

Lance and AJ spun around to see Kevin standing behind them, wearing a warm
grin.

"So? What did you two do? Why am I gonna kill you?"

"Kevin, you better sit down." Lance said seriously.

Kevin's grin dropped as he lowered himself down onto the couch. "What's
wrong?" He asked nervously.

AJ quickly recapped what had just happened.

"What?" Kevin questioned angrily, not believing what he had just
heard. "What did you say to him?!?"

"I only told him what you told me Kevin." Lance answered.

"You told him what I said?!?" Kevin asked, incredulously.

"Yes, we wanted to tell you both together, but you were taking forever on
the phone."  Lance said calmly, placing a hand on Kevin's arm, as he sat
next him on the couch.

"But...  but, that was in confidence, I can't believe you two would do
that! Fuck Lance, where'd he go?  What happened?  What was his reaction?"
Kevin's mind was flooded with questions.

"Yeah, it was in confidence, but you two would have never said anything to
each other if we didn't."  Lance mentioned, trying to soothe Kevin. "I'm
not really sure where he went, he just ran out of the house. He seemed
terrified.

"He's out in that storm?" Kevin shot up from the couch. "In that rain?
Alone?"

"Kevin, sit down, calm yourself, he is a grown-up now." Lance stated, but
it was too late, Kevin had grabbed his jacket and was out the door.

'Terrified? Shit... he was fucking terrified? Terrified of me? But how?
Why? After all this time? How could anything I do terrify him? He knows I'm
gay... Could it be the fact that I love him, could that scare him that
badly? Fuck, where is he?' Kevin thought to himself as he ran around the
dark, damp street, in search of the man he loves.

"Kevin! Wait! There's a little more you should know!" Lance called after
him, but it was no use.

Kevin ran up and down the road, darting down paths, and checking every
direction Nick may have gone.

When he was soaked to the bone, and his appendages were beginning to feel
numb from the cold, he sank to his knees, in the backyard of Nick's house,
and looked up at the cloud cover sky.

"NICK?!?" Kevin screamed at the top of his lungs.

The only sound that returned was the rain and the waves from the ocean
lapping at the dock.

"NICK!!!" Kevin tried again.

Silence.

"Nick?" Kevin's voice was weakening.

Silence.

"Nick..." Kevin trailed off, and then started to drop his head to the
ground. But as he lowered his eyes, something caught his attention.

At the dock was Nick's boat, rocking strongly in the water, due to the
fierce winds.

>From where Kevin was kneeling, he could just barely see a flash of red. It
was the same red of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers jersey that Nick had been
wearing today.

Kevin bolted up and ran for the boat. When he got to the dock, he peered
over the railing. There was Nick, crawled up in a ball on the deck of the
boat. He was soaked to the skin and crying softly into a boat cushion.

"Nicky?" Kevin said softly, climbing slowly over the side of the boat,
hoping he wouldn't scare the young blond.

Nick stirred and looked up into the eyes of his angel.

"Kev?" Nick said, fear in his voice.

"Are you okay?" Kevin asked, squatting down.

Nick shook his head yes. "No..."

"What's wrong Nicky?" Kevin was speaking in a very soft warm voice, he
sounded like a kindergarten teacher.

"I'm scared Kevin, real scared." Nick admitted, shakily.

Kevin didn't want to ask of what, but he had to. "What's scaring you Nick?"

Nick looked Kevin directly in the eye. The tears rolling down his face were
mixing with the rain from above. He took a deep breath, so deep, it
appeared his lungs would pop. "I love you Kevin."

Kevin shot him a confused look. "I know Nick, I love ya to buddy."

Nick's face got more pathetic. "No Kevin, I'm 'in' love with you, and I'm
terrified."

Kevin's heart soared and then plummeted all in the matter of a
second. "You're in love with me? It terrifies you?"

"Lance just told me that you love me, love me in the same way I love
you. And that scares me. Cause if you are feeling anything close to the
same thing I am feeling and all this is true, I don't know if I can handle
it. My heart can't take this much longer. So I'm scared. Scared because
this love could never be stopped, if it is ever given a chance to
start. And everything screams that it would be stopped in an instant. And
that would kill me. And that is why I'm terrified." Nick poured his heart
out.

Kevin was right at Nick's side now. "We can live in fear, extend ourselves
to long, or we can fall below and lift ourselves to love. Fear can stop
your loving and Love can stop your fearing." Kevin placed his hand gently
on Nick's shoulder, hoping the words could convince him there was a way.

Nick placed his own hand on top of Kevin's. "But, it's not always that
clear."

Kevin was stunned into silence. How could he do that? Nick was able to take
his own inspired quote from an obscure song and rebut it with the next
contradicting line. It just gave Kevin another reason to fall deeper in
love.

Kevin swept Nick up in his arms and carried him out of the boat. He walked
down the dock and up the yard to the back door. He stumbled with the handle
to the door, but he managed to get them both inside and upstairs to Nick's
room.

Once inside the room Kevin laid Nick gently on the bed.

"Get undressed." Kevin demanded.

Nick scrambled to a sitting position. "What? Why?"

"Nothing sexual Nick, we're just soaked, we need to dry off and change into
warm clothes, or we'll get sick." Kevin explained.

Nick climbed off the bed and just stood on the rug for a moment.

Kevin walked out of the room, but quickly returned with two towels. He
handed Nick one and then turned his back to him.

Nick also turned around.

They both stripped off their clothing and wrapped the large, warm towels
around their wet bodies to dry off. They gathered tee-shirts and sweat
pants to sleep in. When they were both dry and warm they turned back to
each other.

"Where ya sleeping tonight, Kev?" Nick asked shyly, sitting back on the
bed.

"The couch, like usual." Kevin said, as he looked down, and dug at the
floor with his left foot.

"The couch kills your back." Nick said simply.

"Yeah, well, I'll deal." Kevin didn't raise his eyes.

"Stay here." Nick didn't really offer, he more insisted.

"I don't think so Nick." Nick still hadn't raised his eyes.

"Stay." Nick said with a little more force.

Now Kevin raised his eyes. They were bright with unshed tears. "Nick, we
both just found out that we are both in love with each other, after hiding
it for so long, one slightly longer than the other. Now we're avoiding the
subject all together. Do you really think it is a safe situation?"

"We need to talk this out. But not tonight. Tonight we're going to fall
asleep in each other's arms, with the knowledge that the one we love,
love's us back. And if just for tonight, we can sleep in a small amount of
warmth and happiness, it may be all we ever have." Nick reached over and
grabbed Kevin by the hand.

The tears in Kevin's eyes slowly spilled over as he allowed himself to be
pulled over to the bed.

Nick laid down on his back, on the left side of his bed, and waited for
Kevin. Kevin laid down also, on his side, looking at Nick. Once he did Nick
turned to face him.  They were both thinking the same thing. 'Do I hold
him, or does he hold me?'

The question was answered when they both leaned into each other, clumsily,
and snuggled up, face to face.

"I love you Nick."

"I love you Kevin."

And they drifted off to sleep, treasuring their small amount of warmth and
happiness.

*Woo-Hoo, they finally got a clue! Even if it was in a weird, where the
hell did Kelly come up with that junky idea kinda way. So what did you all
think? Should it be happily ever after now? Hope you're all enjoying it,
Hasta la byebye!*