You Do What You Have To Do: Chapter 2
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by: Tina and Danielle
Rated: R (adult stuff, ya know?)
copyright: 1999
This part written by : Danielle
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This part written by: Danielle
"I love you too, Nick. More than you know."

Kevin watched as Nick slept cuddled up to his chest. He had put so much
planning and time into this whole Australia plan. He closed his eyes, a
flinch of pain crawling across his face. Kevin knew Nick was afraid to go
back. Hell, so was he. 'We can't live in fear. We have to get past this.
I won't let her ruin our lives for the second time.'

Kevin opened his eyes again and traced his fingers over Nick's shoulder and
arm, feeling him shiver and snuggle closer. Kevin sighed. He hated being
awake when Nick was sleeping. It gave him too much time to think. Too much
time for his thoughts to swirl out of control until they closed in on him
and it felt like he couldn't breathe.

But as much as he hated being awake, being asleep was even worse. There he
couldn't block thoughts of Stefanie out. There she seemed to still be
alive, no matter what his head said. There he saw the flames around Nick,
consuming him, and there was nothing he could do, his feet rooted to the
spot. He could take Stefanie invading his dreams, it was the ones about Nick
that did him in. In his dreams he had seen Nick die a thousand horrible
deaths and each time he could only stand there helplessly.

Nick and Kevin had both come to the same decision about sleep. Yes, it was
a necessity, but now it was something they only did as little as possible.
Only enough to survive, no longer a guilty pleasure.

Kevin clenched his jaw trying to hold in the anger, 'Damn you, Stefanie.'

Nick seemed to feel his anger, flinching in his sleep. Kevin softly and
slowly took deep breaths to calm himself for Nick's sake. He knew what
those flinches meant. It meant that very soon that a nightmare would wreck
any chance for Nick's sleep that night. The same nightmare's that Nick had
been trying to keep from him. The same nightmares that he had been trying to
keep from Nick.

Tonight Kevin decided to try something different. He gently laid Nick back
on the pillows and watched him sleep. Every time a flinch or grimace went
across Nick's face, Kevin leaned down and softly kissed Nick on the forehead
or cheek and brought his lips to the younger boy's ear, "It's ok. She can't
hurt you. She's dead, she can't hurt us any more. I'm right here and I'm ok,
I'm not going anywhere." It was the same thing he had to tell himself when
he woke up from the nightmares. When he pulled away, Nick had calmed and
lay sleeping peacefully again.

Kevin kept up the same ritual for hours until finally Nick slipped into a
deep sleep where there were no nightmares to haunt him. With an exhausted
sigh, Kevin pulled Nick close to him and fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
Too tired to even move, much less dream. For the first time since the whole
ordeal had happened, the two of them slept through the night.

I woke up to sunlight streaming into the cabin of the boat. I blinked in
wonder that I had slept through the night. That hadn't happened
since.....well it had been a long time. I looked beside me and saw Kevin
sleeping, looking exhausted. I could remember his voice coming to me
whenever the nightmares were getting too much to bear. Just the moment
before I would be jolted awake I remembered hearing his voice telling me
everything would be ok. I stroked the back of my fingers over his cheek and
bit my lip. How long had he been watching over me while I slept? I stroked
the side of his face again and heard him sigh before he snuggled his head
deeper into the pillow. I leaned down and kissed his temple before getting
out of bed and slipping on a pair of shorts.

I quietly went around the room packing the two of us up and tried hard to
quiet my nerves. No one knew about us, not even Brian. Oh God, Brian.
He's going to hate the both of us. What am I thinking? None of them are
going to understand this. My hand went to the scar running up my side, my
fingertip trailing over it unconsciously as I thought. AJ would probably be
shocked a little, but he would accept it. Howie....no...he was already
sensitive enough about all the speculation that he's gay, to the point that
he ridiculed anything that wasn't macho and masculine. I shivered, what
would he do to Kevin and I when he found out? Then there was Brian. We all
teased him about being a choir boy, but now it was different. Brian was
family to Kevin and the older brother I never had. Would he turn his back on
the both of us when he found out? Would everyone?

That's what scared me the most, that everyone would turn away and everything
we had ever known would be taken from us. A little voice in the back of my
head questioned relentlessly. Was I really in love with Kevin, or was it
just because of what we had gone through? Was he really in love with me? Am
I really gay or is Kevin the only man I'm attracted to? One question echoed
louder than the others, is this worth risking everything for? Family,
friends and most of all our careers.

I heard stirring behind me and turned around to see Kevin roll over in the
bed and his arm came out and reached for where I was laying on the bed
before I got up. When it just hit air, I saw his head lift off the pillow a
little and look at the empty spot on the bed. He rolled over onto his back
and his eyes swept over the room. His green ones met my blue ones and the
sleepy smile that lit up his face sent sensations through me that I had
never experienced before by simply meeting eyes with someone. In that one
moment I had an answer to the question of whether this was worth risking
everything for.

Yes. Everything and more.

I walked over to the bed and sat down by Kevin's hip, facing him. I leaned
forward and kissed him softly, needing to know if this was really real or if
it was just from the intense situation we had been through. The moment our
lips touched, it felt like there was bubbles tingling through my veins. I
reached down with my hand and found his, feeling his still stiff fingers
curling slowly around mine.

His other hand reached up and curled around the back of my neck, his thumb
sliding up and down the side of my throat. That almost sent a whimper from
me, besides my stomach, the side of my neck was my second biggest hot spot.
I found myself falling further and further into the kiss as my tongue traced
over his lips and then inside of his mouth. His answered back as his
fingers slid up the back of my neck and started to sift my hair through
them.

We were so deep inside of the kiss that fireworks could have gone off around
us and I doubt we would have noticed. This kiss was more passionate than
anything I had ever experienced with him, I felt like we had crossed some
sort of line that told us it was too late not to go with this, that we were
already in too far.

A pressure on my chest brought me back around to reality. Kevin was very
gently pushing me away. I sat back up, still holding one of his hands. He
looked up at me and laid his free hand on the side of my face in a caress.
"Did you find the answer you were looking for?"

I felt my jaw drop in shock, it was like he was inside my damn head!
"Dammit, Bumpkin, how do you do that?!"

He sat up with an eyebrow cocked, "Bumpkin?"

I clapped my hand over my mouth, "Did I say that out loud?"

He grinned and laughed, "Yes, baby, you did.

I gave him a sheepish grin back, "Uhm, I....I have no idea when, but I just
started calling you that, never to your face. Are you mad?" I lowered my
head, afraid to look at him and see him ready to explode at me.

He reached out and put a finger beneath my chin, making me look up at him.
I raised my face, but I was still afraid to raise my eyes. I felt him
pulling me forward and I closed my eyes, not wanting to see the pissed off
look on his face.

They snapped back open when I felt his lips brush over my forehead and down
the bridge of my nose, his whiskers tickling me. "You are the only one who
could get away with calling me that, and live. But coming from you, I like
it."

I smiled in relief and leaned my head on his shoulder as he wrapped his arms
gently around me, being careful not to add to much pressure to my still sore
ribs. "Now we just have to find me an embarrassing nickname."

Kevin laughed, "Well I guess we'll know it when we find it. I want to know
how you came up with Bumpkin."

I snuggled closer to him, feeling his hands rubbing over my back. "Everyone
seems to think you are this slow reacting country hick from Kentucky. But
you catch way more than anyone realizes. Sometimes it seems like you know
exactly what I'm thinking just by looking at me. I guess calling you
Bumpkin is my way of saying that I know better, that you are anything but."

Kevin smiled and kissed my ear, "Then you are the only and I mean only one
allowed to call me that."

I smiled and turned myself around on the bed so I was sitting in front of
him and leaning my back against his solid chest and my head against his
shoulder. We sat there for a long time, just glad to be near each other and
not having anyone near us.

As all good things usually come to an end, our quiet time was no exception.
A knock on the door to our cabin signaled us that we had a half hour before
we would be docking again at the marina and back to our regular lives.

We both groaned and got out of the warm bed. We pulled on the clothes that
I had left unpacked for both of us and we readied ourselves to face the real
world again.

We went above deck with our bags and watched the Florida coastline come into
view. I felt Kevin's hand slip into mine and grip it tightly. I looked
over at him, "How are we going to do this?"

Kevin met my eyes and squeezed my hand, "We're going to be just like we
always were around them. Their friends. If they see us holding hands or
kissing, then they will have to deal with it. With all we went through to
find each other, we shouldn't have to hide it from anybody but our fans."

I nodded and hoped that we weren't the beginning of the end of the BSB.

Once we were docked, we said goodbye to our captain, Tom Lang and his two
sons Danny and TJ. They had been exactly what we needed, once they found
out about the two of us, they treated us like any other couple that had been
on their charter, even taking the yells of terror in the middle of the night
in stride. Kevin and I both thanked them profusely and walked down the dock
to Kevin's car.

We had come back at the last possible minute and had to drive right to the
arena where the other three had already been rehearsing for the tour for a
few days now. They understood our need for a little more recuperation time
and gladly let our need to be there slide until it was absolutely essential
that we were there.

We were both quiet in Kevin's 4runner on the way to the arena, simply
holding hands and lost in our own thoughts. I had decided to let all my
worries about Kevin and I go for the time being and concentrated on the
business at hand. Our tour. Howie, Brian and AJ had been working with the
special effects guys to come up with some slamming things to do with the
show. I could feel the excitement in me working up more and more the close
we got to the theatre, I had so many ideas for what to do! I wanted it to
be like, all futuristic and stuff. Like you were inside of a really good
video game.

Kevin must have noticed my excitement, because he was looking over at me
with a big smile on his face. He pulled into the lot under the arena and
parked beside Howie's car. I tore my seatbelt off and was out of the car
and around to Kevin's side before he could even turn the car off. He
laughed, "Calm down, Kid. I forgot this is going to be like Christmas
morning for you."

I nodded and grabbed his hand, dragging him behind me, "Come on! I want to
see what they've done with the effects guys!"

Kevin shook his head with another laugh and hurried behind me.

We finally made it to the stage and both of our jaws dropped as we saw
Howie, Brian and AJ surfing through the air on these wicked surfboard things
over where the audience would be. I whooped, this was even better than I
thought!

Brian noticed us standing on the stage and spoke into the headset he had on
and next thing we knew he was sailing over our heads and back out over the
audience, laughing like a maniac.

AJ was flipping and twisting in the air like a madman and then sailed over
to us, flipping backwards until he was upside down and reaching his arms
down to mess the hair of both me and Kevin. I had to smile, some things
never change. Before we could reach up and grab him, he had righted himself
and was sailing away back over the audience.

Howie waved at both of us and we waved back, watching him and AJ have a mini
game of chicken, swooping closer and closer to each other until you thought
they were going to smash into each other.

I decided to pull their chains and made a big show of yawning before yelling
up at them, "I give you three days on your own with effects guys and this is
all you come up with?" Kevin rolled his eyes and gave them the big L loser
symbol, doing his best to look thoroughly bored, playing along with me

Brian and Howie looked at us in shock and AJ shot us the finger. The
effects guys came over the speakers, "No, we also have this for the end of
the show. Instead of a curtain coming down, we have one shooting up, so to
speak."

Before another word could be said, a wall of flames shot up in front of me
as the whole edge of the stage was ablaze. I couldn't see anything but fire
in front of me and the blast of heat nearly knocked me off my feet. Despite
the heat, my blood froze in my veins. I could feel the wood of the cross
behind me and the smell of my own flesh cooking. I couldn't move. The was
nowhere to escape from the flames, I was trapped.

My mouth opened and a scream ripped out of it. Then another. And another.
I could barely get a breath of air before another scream was wrenched from
me. The sound coming out of me was the most horrible noise you have ever
heard. Like that of an animal being trapped and knowing that there is no
escape.

A pair of arms came around me and yanked me back into a solid body. I was
shaking from head to foot, my knees barely able to hold me up. I started to
struggle cries coming out of my lips, "No!! It's burning me! Make it stop,
It's burning me! It's burning me!!! Oh god, please! It's burning
meeeeee!!!!"

As quick as the wall of flames appeared, the vanished, but it was too late.
The damage was done.

My knees gave out beneath me and Kevin lifted me into his arms and then sat
us both down on the stage, cradling me in his arms. He rocked my shaking
body back and forth as I kept a death grip on him, sobbing in his arms,
screaming that I was being burned over and over again.

Kevin wasn't much better off than I was. It was hard to know who was
shaking more. He had been shot back into the same moment I had, as the only
thing he could see was me being engulfed by the flames as I was tied to that
cross. He held me tighter and told me over and over everything was going to
be ok. That I wasn't burning. I think he was trying to convince himself as
much as he was trying to convince me.

Brian, Howie and AJ all knew everything that had happened to us, but I don't
they really understood how much it had affected us until that moment. They
screamed for the techs to let them down and ripped out of their surfboards
and ran to the stage, my screams still ringing in their ears.

They watched helplessly as both Kevin and I were shaking and I was sobbing
uncontrollably in his arms. Kevin looked up at them, the tears that were
sliding down his face reflecting off of the stage lights. He just looked at
them with the most heartbreaking look on his face as he shuddered,
"Never.....EVER....again." He could hardly get the words out he was
shaking so violently.

Still shaking, he held me closer in his arms and stood up. Without a word,
he walked off the stage, my sobs still ricocheting around the arena.





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