Reach For Me
//\\
Ah, Valentine's Day. Howie sighed. There was no day more sensual and intimate as Valentine's Day. It was supposed the most romantic day of the year. For Howie, Valentine's was always more than cheesy candy hearts that read "Be Mine" or "I Love You" or little teddy bears with balloons. He tried to make it less commercialized for whomever he happened to be with at the time.
This year he was single.
As the days grew nearer and nearer to the deadly day in February, Howie began to feel less and less a part of the group. Kevin and Brian were happily married and A.J. was engaged. Nick was the only one besides Howie that lacked a woman on his arm. However, to Nick, who had just turned twenty-two, that sort of thing didn't really matter yet.
But Howie was twenty-eight, over the age where it was okay to go out partying and take a girl back with him every single night. He had done that early on, hated the almost whore-ish after feeling and never tried it again.
Brian was two years younger than him and was married. Kevin had married around Howie's age. And A.J. had proposed to his fianc�e Sarah Martin in December, right before he turned twenty-four. Howie wanted nothing more than what his band mates had. He wanted someone to be in love with him and be that devoted to him. He wanted someone to care for. He just wanted someone he could trust to be with. He found most of the women he dated saw him as a celebrity and it ended there. How had Brian done it? Or Kevin?
They were recording songs for their new album, as the squares on the calendar were x'ed off one by one approaching February fourteenth. Singing emotional love songs with three of his love struck band mates was hell on earth for poor Howie. Seeing Brian chat adoringly on the phone with Leighanne, Kevin become annoyed and impatient because Kristin was far away from him, and A.J. fucking floating around wherever he went only made Howie's heart break further.
No one noticed.
Except Nick...
\\//
"They're disgusting, aren't they?"
Howie blinked and turned his head slightly, seeing Nick's mock horrified expression as he watched A.J. babble incessantly to Sarah on his cell phone. Howie made a halfhearted attempt at a smile and instead of replying buried his gaze in the knots of dark brown in the tabletop.
Nick winced, seeing his attempt at counseling Howie D was proving itself to be unsuccessful. He sighed. He had to cut the humor and the bullshit. Howie needed the truth. After all, who of Howie's friends knew the pain of losing your best friend to a woman better than Nick?
"You're worried about losing him, aren't you?" Nick asked softly.
Howie ducked his head, shutting his eyes. Nick watched as Howie slowly nodded, a tear released from his clamped eyelids. Howie struggled to take in a short breath and laid his hand on his forehead, lightly rubbing his fingertips into his burning skin. He started to cry, hiding his tears the best he could with one hand from A.J., who was completely oblivious to anything outside the cell phone and Sarah.
Taking a quick glance at A.J. to make sure he wasn't paying attention, Nick looped an arm around Howie's shoulders and nearly lifted him onto his feet. Nick was worried. Howie was falling apart. He had been for quite some time, since long before A.J.'s rehabilitation. It was now to the point where Howie actually weighed less than A.J. And Nick was not only worried...he was scared.
A.J. didn't notice when Nick protectively led _his_ best friend out of the room, still crying. Nick's eyes flashed and his cheeks burned furiously. How could he not see how badly Howie was suffering? All A.J. was tuned into was Sarah and their engagement. He had already begun what Brian had done to Nick. But Nick wouldn't let him do that to Howie.
Howie tried to ask him what he was doing, but he lacked the breath to form words coherently. So instead, Nick guided him to his bed, shutting the door on A.J. behind him with a tiny bit of annoyance echoing in the resulting slam. Once there, Nick pulled him into his arms and gently rocked his friend until he felt his breathing even out.
Nick sighed and pressed his lips against Howie's forehead in a silent promise that he would take care of him the way he _deserved_to be taken care of. Then he smoothed out his hair comfortingly until Howie adjusted to being without Nick's body heat. When Nick was positive Howie was all right, he left the room and gently shut the door.
Then he got pissed.
He stormed into the living room to see A.J. still on the phone (not to Nick's surprise), his face broken into a cheerful grin. Nick's heart began to burn with anger. How could A.J. just abandon Howie like this? His _best friend_, who had stood by him through absolutely every scrap of bullshit and every speed bump in the road of A.J.'s life, was dying inside and all he was concerned with was whether he had proposed to Sarah at the right time or not.
Seeing A.J. on the phone with that lovesick look on his face brought an onslaught of memories back to Nick. Memories of approaching Brian with a basketball in hand asking if he wanted to shoot a few... Then Brian glaring at him and waving his hand while pressing the phone tighter to his ear and saying, "What was that, Leigh? Oh, that was Nick. No, nothing. Yeah. Mm hmm..." Then Nick would feel his chest constrict and he would walk away, bouncing the lonely basketball from one hand to the other.
He didn't like basketball as much as he once did.
And now A.J. was going to do the same thing to Howie. Give all his love to Sarah and their relationship so Howie would be left in the background, supporting as Nick had originally done for Brian. But sooner or later A.J. would just forget about him completely and toss him away like a rag, left this time in the shadows where no one could see you cry.
This in mind, Nick's hand shot out and in a swift motion, he had slapped A.J.'s cell phone out of his hand and into the wall. The phone smashed into broken pieces. A.J. stared at the pieces of phone, then at Nick furiously, then the phone, the wall, and Nick again. If smoke could really come out of your ears when you were mad, A.J. could have made more air pollution in five seconds than twenty cars could during New York's five o'clock rush hour.
A.J.'s eyes flashed. "You better have a damn good reason for doing that or you better be planning on buying me a new cell phone or you're not goin' to live 'till twenty-three." He clenched his fists, eyes scalding with rage.
But Nick was too angry himself to care that A.J. was pissed. Wrathfully he spat out, "I won't let you do it."
A.J. frowned. "What in the fuck are you talking about?"
Nick's eyes flashed. "_Who_ in the fuck, you mean."
"What? Who?"
Nick growled deep in his throat. "I won't let you break Howie's heart and tear his soul in two the way Brian did to me. He's been a fucking saint to you for the past, what, _nine_ years? And now what the fuck are you doing to thank him? Ignoring him! Talking to _Sarah_on the phone while your best friend is fucking _dying_."
A.J.'s eyes widened. "What the hell are you talking about? How-Howie's not dying," he stammered.
"Like fuck he isn't," Nick snapped. "Maybe you can't see it because you're a blind, selfish bastard, but he's dying on the inside. His eyes are practically dead, have you seen that? He can't smile right anymore. He just forces it." He dug his fingertips into his palms furiously. "Don't take Howie for granted, A.J.," he snarled. "I know you've heard love dies eventually, _Alex_. Friendship lasts forever...if you treat it right. You're going to wake up one day and D won't be there to hold you while you cry over a fight with Sarah."
He spun on his heel, prepared to abandon A.J. and leave him in the bus' living room to feel sorry for himself when A.J. said softly, "You're so na�ve, Nick."
Nick turned around, temper flaring. "What the fuck's that supposed to mean?"
A.J. gave a halfhearted chuckle. "You have no idea, do you?" he asked, shaking his head.
"No idea about what?" Nick advanced on him suspiciously.
Smiling sadly, A.J. whispered hoarsely, "I'm in love with him."
Nick's jaw fell open. "B-b-but you-yuh..." He stopped, searching his mind for the right accusation. "You're _engaged_! To a woman!"
A.J. rolled his eyes. "I know I am." He winced. "I have to be. I mean, she kept me grounded and she went through all of this with me. She's been there for me when I've needed her..."
"So has Howie! You can't just abandon him because of Sarah. I'm starting to build up serious hostilities towards _you_. If you don't fix what's going on with Howie..."
A.J. slammed his hand on the edge of the table irately. "You don't _get_it, Nick! You don't!" He stood and began to pace, biting his nail polish off his nails occasionally. "I love him more than anything I have in my life. I would give up anything in the world just to touch him or kiss him. I know he doesn't understand, and neither do you. I've been in love with the man for six years, Nick. _Six_. _Fucking_. _Years_... I've had six years to think about this, I think I know what I'm doing." He sighed, turning his lost brown eyes on Nick's startled blue pair. "Look, don't tell him about this."
Nick was silent for a moment. "But...but _why_don't you tell Howie? It's possible he might feel the same way, you know."
A.J. laughed bitterly. "You know how often I've dreamed of hooking up with him? I'm obsessed with him, Nick, and it needs to end. Sarah can ground me and keep me on earth so I can stop this insane crush on someone I'd very easily die for."
Nick didn't know how to phrase his next question, so he took the easy way out. "Why?"
"Why. Because, Nick, I'm not good enough for him. He deserves better than me. You see what I've done to him just by avoiding him." His expression grew icy. "I've made him cry more than just now, you know. But I don't trust myself to hold him anymore. I would give up my soul to be able to do that again, just hold him and not worry that I might not be able to let go... I fell in love with him, Kaos, and I can't live my life feeling guilty that that will always be curbed. I need someone who can break me out of this."
"But-but you love him!" Nick protested, horrified.
A.J. nodded. "I do. Lord knows I do, but it's not enough. If I hurt him again, I'm never going to be able to look at myself in the mirror again. I can't hurt him. I just... I don't have the strength to watch him go through another mental breakdown."
"You're _gonna_ hurt him again, A.J.," said Nick darkly. "We both know that. You're going to have to avoid him to try and stop loving him and he'll get hurt the way I did and he'll cry and you'll lose each other forever." He bit his lip. "Don't do that to him, A.J. Friendship is what's been holding him together for so long. He loses you and he'll fall off the deep end."
A.J. rubbed his forehead. "Nick, I - "
The door to Howie's bedroom opened and both Nick and A.J. looked to the doorway where Howie stood bleary eyed and hair tousled. He looked from Nick to A.J., then back to Nick. "What's going on?" he inquired quietly, his voice laced with inertia.
Before anyone could speak, the bus pulled into the hotel's garage. The three singers stared at each other. Nick watched when finally he was ignored A.J. and Howie gaze at each other, both longingly, but one guiltily and unwilling to take the other's heart into his hands and the other scared he was losing the best friend he had ever had.
"C'mon boys, y'all gotta get up bright and early in the morning," one of the representatives from management said, poking his head into their bus momentarily. He waited until they nodded to stalk off in search of Brian and Kevin's buses.
A.J. and Howie broke eyes and wordlessly passed each other in getting what they needed for the next two days of recording. As they brushed past each other, Nick had a stunning urge to bang their heads together. A.J. was being so _stupid_. Howie was once again the victim in another game with his heart. But this time A.J., his protector and best friend was the one screwing with his heartstrings.
//\\
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