Brian frowned. That girl was too much. Pressing 1 and then pressing send he was soon connected to the voicemail system. The first four messages were from Paris and Brian deleted them as fast as he could. The fifth message was from him and he chuckled. He sounded different on the phone. The next set of messages were from Paris and Nikki except for the second to last one which was from Justin. Deleting everything else he gave the phone back to Nick. "Justin called and left a message for you." Brian didn't listen to it thinking that it might be personal or something. He just figured that if Nick would want him to know what it was about then he would tell him.

Nick rolled over onto his back after a few seconds of contemplating whether or not he should listen to it now or later. "Okay," Nick said as he played the message.

//Hey Nick, it's Justin. I know it's kinda late but your mom said that I should call when my parents came home. Well, my parent's came home and I'm calling to let you know that. Is your phone still turned off? If so then I should tell my parents to call your land phone instead. *There was a brief moment where Justin paused and Nick could picture him biting his bottom lip as he ran his hand through his curly hair.* Um, thanks for helping me with the math. Well, I hope to talk to you or see you soon, you know, so we can get the tutoring thing done and whatnot. Yah, well, I should like go now. I had fun today and I hope you have a good night. Bye. Take care. Okay, I'm hanging up now. Bye. Um, yah. Night. *click*//

Nick smiled and then looked over at Brian who was desperately trying to listen to what the message was.

Nick chuckled. "Curious much?" Nick handed the phone over to Brian so that he could listen for himself. "Here."

Brian blushed but took the phone happily. Listening to the message Brian couldn't help but chuckle. "He's got it bad for you!" Saving the message figuring Nick would want that he handed the phone back to Nick who connected the charger back and set it on his nightstand.

"He's gay, has been since he was born," was all that Nick said as he settled back in.

Brian raised his eyebrow. "He told you? Just like that?"

"No," Nick said and then began to recap every single detail from picking Justin up from P.M. homeroom until his mother came to pick him up. By the time he was done telling Brian they both were seated indian style facing each other on the bed.

"Whoa," Brian said. "You do realize that Angels In the Out Field and A Walk To Remember are perfect date movies!"

Nick wrinkled his nose. "Hmm, now that I think about it, yah, they are."

"So, why didn't you?" Brian questioned.

"Huh?" Nick asked confused.

"Why didn't you hold his hand? I mean, you said that you felt the urge to do it so many times, why didn't you?" Brian knew Nick was shy when it came to exploring his feelings for someone and knew that Nick in general was the kind of guy that would never approach someone he likes on more than a friendship level.

"I can't just hold his hand out of the blue!" Nick said. He'd thought about it but the fear of Justin freaking out and getting upset with him kept him from doing just that.

"He LIKES you and you LIKE him," Brian pointed out before shrugging. "I don't see why not and I don't see why you have to be so shy about it."

"I've never dated a guy before Brian," Nick said in a soft voice. "Heck, I've never even kissed a guy before much less have feelings for one. I don't know how to or what to think of all these feelings and thoughts and urges."

"Neither have I," Brian said as he placed his hand on top of Nick's left hand. "Did Justin tell you if he's ever had a boyfriend or a girlfriend?"

Nick shook his head. "No, he didn't. We were gonna talk more about it after the movie but my mom came so we couldn't."

Brian nodded his head. "Tomorrow, why don't you two like hang out or something. Invite him over here and you two can go play some one-on-one basketball and use that time to talk and get to know each other better!"

Nick thought about that for a moment. He really wanted to but his stomach was making knots at the moment. "Maybe, I don't know. I'm kinda nervous."

"There's nothing to be nervous about. He seems like a really cool guy and I have a feeling that you two will get along great," Brian assured Nick. "C'mon let's get to sleep so that you can wake up nice and early and call him."

Nick nervously chuckled. "Yah. Okay. Sure." He got under the covers again and took a deep breath. "Night Brian."

Brian opened his eyes and looked at Nick. "Night Nicky."

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SATURDAY - 11.13.04
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Groaning, Justin blindly reached his arm out from under his warm sheets and grabbed the ringing phone. "Alo?" He questioned, his voice hoarse and groggy, a sure sign that he's still sleeping. Clearing his throat he greeted again, this time clearer and a bit more awake. "HA-llo?" Well, that wasn't so bad, he thought to himself.

"Oh god, I'm so sorry," Justin heard someone say on the other end of the line. Not recognizing the voice he questioned, "Who's this?"

"Uh, it's Nick," Nick stated nervously. It was 11:47 in the morning, he was sure that Justin would have been up by then and that was why he called. "I thought you'd be up by now, sorry if I woke you up." Nick apologized.

Justin's eyes immediately shot open and his body ejected into the seating position. "Oh, it's okay. I was supposed to be up by 7:30," he rushed out, quickly looking at the clock to see that it was almost noon. "Oh god, I overslept," Justin groaned as he fell back on the bed.

Nick chuckled. "Are you sure? I can call back another time if you'd like," Nick said a bit shyly.

Justin sat up again. Nick called him. Nick called HIM! NICK CALLED HIM! His mind screamed and danced. If it wasn't already obvious, Justin was happy. Thrilled. "You called," Justin barely breathed out, that's how much overjoyed he was. Then he frowned when he realized that Nick had called him. "Why?"

Nick was quiet for a moment before he spoke up. "Uh, I just wanted to see if you wanted to hang out today. My building has this indoor basketball court and a swimming pool and a video arcade. It's the weekend and I thought that maybe we could hang out without having textbooks around or something like that."

Justin's swallowed hard and before he knew he found himself standing in front of his closet trying to figure out just what he should wear that day. "That sounds like a totally cool idea, Nick," Justin said.

"Really?" Nick questioned. "Um, do you want me to come pick you up or do you think you'll be able to come over if I give you the directions?"

"Uhh," Justin craned his neck as he looked out at the window. "It stopped snowing, at least, for now. I think I'll be okay if you gave me the directions."

"Okay, you got a pen and paper?" Nick questioned as he got comfortable on the couch as he waited for Justin to say it was okay.

Justin headed over to the desk and sat down with a pen in hand. "Okay, ready!"

"Okay, do you want to walk or do you want to take the subway?" Nick questioned.

Justin thought about that for a moment. If he walked he'd probably get there sooner than if he were to wait and take the subway. But, just in case, it'd be nice to get the directions for both walking and taking the subway. "Just give me both and I'll see which one will work best," Justin said.

"Okay, if you take the subway from your stop...you're gonna have to take the 1 or 9 train downtown to 42nd and Times Square. From there you're gonna have to take the Shuttle train to 42nd and Grand Central. Then you take the 6 train uptown to 96th street. Then you walk about a block and a half west to Madison Avenue and then make a left turn. My apartment building is on that block." Nick paused. "Was that helpful?"

Justin had copied down the directions nodding his head. "Yah, one sec," Justin said as he looked up at the map of the NYC transit subway/bus he hung on his wall. Looking over the directions Nick had given him he could easily tell just where Nick lived. "Yah, perfect. How 'bout walking? How do I get there?" Justin also noticed that he'd have better chance of getting there sooner if he walked through central park than taking the subway.

"Simple, cut through central park!" Nick stated. "I think at either 95th or 94th street on your side of central park there's the West entrance. Just follow that path through central park and before you know it your on the east side on either the 97th or 98th on fifth avenue. From there all you gotta do is walk down to 96th and then a block east to Madison Ave. Again, look for my building in the middle of the block. If you want I could wait for you at the entrance of Central Park on my side?"

Justin didn't want Nick to have to come down and wait for him in the cold just so they could go back in the building and hang out. But at the same time he wanted Nick to pick him up just in case he got lost or couldn't find Nick's building. "Yah, I think it'll be best that you wait for me at the 98th East entrance. Just in case!" Justin said. "Oh, keep your cell on too. I'll give you a call when I leave, how does that sound?"

"Perfect. And I'll leave about ten minutes after you call. It should only take about 10 - 15 minutes to walk your way through there."

"Okay, thanks. I'll call you in a few, then."

"Okay!" Nick said and hung up the phone. He was sporting a big smile on his face and his stomach was doing the summersaults again.

"I'm going to take that as a 'yes, Justin is coming over' look," Brian said smiling as he sat down beside Nick and nudged the younger teens thigh with his own. He'd just gotten out of the shower and was wearing one of Nick's t-shirts that read 'grabbabottie and pinch.'

All Nick could do was nod his head.

"Were you able to add their numbers to the call-block list?" Brian questioned.

"Yah, I called the company before I called Justin. It took a while but they finally adhered to my requests." Nick looked over at Brian and noticed what he was wearing. "Why are you wearing that?" Nick questioned, laughing. "It doesn't even match your personality." Brian was one of the most religious/spiritual people Nick had ever had the pleasure of meeting in his life. So, to see Brian wear that t-shirt was something he couldn't quite see Brian doing even though Brian was sitting next to him wearing that t-shirt.

Brian just shrugged. "That's why I'm wearing it." It's not that Brian was too lazy to go back to his place and take a shower/change there it's just that after all these years with him sleeping over and Nick sleeping over at his place, they kinda started to make room in their closets for the other boys' clothes and belongings. They were like brothers and neither really cared whether they wore each other's clothes.

When he was done with his shower he'd walked over to the closet and looked at his clothes only to find none of them too appealing to wear. So he raided Nick's part of the closest and found a long sleeved plain white shirt and the 'grabbabootie and pinch' t-shirt. He wore the long sleeved one under the t-shirt before going over the dresser and pulling out a pair of black boxers that had his name sewn onto it, really small. Jane had done that when it came to her attention a long time ago when Brian or Nick would leave their clothes at each other's rooms. She didn't mind that they shared shirts and pants but she did mind if they shared underwear and much to her satisfaction, both Nick and Brian had minded too and agreed to let Jane stitch their names in.

"Uh huh," Nick said and looked at the time. "What time do you have to go to school?"

Brain, too, looked at the time and sighed. "I have to be there at one." It was almost 12:15 and he has choir practice that day. It's not that he doesn't want to go, it's more like he doesn't want to go in the snow to school on a Saturday. That wasn't fair. "I don't like this."

Nick chuckled. "That's what you get for being a perfect godboy!" Nick teased and ducked his head when Brian's hand came to swat him in the head. "Sorry, sorry," Nick said between laughs as he stood up. "I should start getting ready too," Nick said as he looked down at his pajama clad body.

Brian nodded his head. "Okay, I think I'm gonna head home and then head on over to school. I gotta pick up my music sheets," Brian said as he stood up and walked over to the door. "I'll talk to you later and you better tell me how this goes, detail after detail so pay attention."

Nick laughed. "You know I'll tell you but I can't promise that I'll be paying attention," he replied. "Talk to you later, Bri." Nick locked the door and headed back up to his room. Quickly he picked out the clothes he was going to wear for that day and headed towards the bathroom for his shower.

He quickly showered and was fully dressed in a pair of black faded jeans, black boxer-briefs, a long plain black sleeved shirt which was worn under a mustard yellow colored t-shirt, and a gold anchor chain his grandfather had given him for his birthday earlier that year. His hair for styled into chaotic spiked perfection and he smelled of the wonderful scent of Liz Clairborne's Curve cologne.

Padding his way down the hall, down the stairs to the second floor, and to the end of the hall, he knocked gently on his parents' door. When he heard his mother confirm to enter he opened the door and peaked his head in.

"Hey mom, sorry to wake you," Nick said and then walked into the room as his mom sat up straight in bed.