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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The final credits of the movie were rolling a little later with Kevin and I
still cuddled up on the couch. I loved the feeling of his head cradled on
my chest his head tucked just under my chin. As the screen went black
before going to promos for whatever was next on the movie network, Kevin
pulled away and started to I suddenly got very interested in the wall that
was behind me, the one that I had to turn away from Kevin to look at.

I squeezed my eyes shut and willed him not to question why I wasn't looking
at him. It didn't work.

I felt his big hand on my shoulder, "Nick?"

I didn't turn around, "Yah Bumpkin?"

I felt the couch sink a little as he sat beside me, setting a hand on my leg
and rubbing the material of the robe I was still wearing in slow strokes. I
felt my resolve not to turn around melting with every movement of his hand.
"Nicky? Why won't you turn around?"

His voice sounded so soft and hesitant that it sent me even more over the
edge than I already was. I slowly turned around and he saw the tear streaks
down my cheeks. I looked at the floor and ashamed to meet his eyes.

His hand came under my chin and tilted my head back until I was forced to
look into his eyes. His thumbs ran over my cheeks, wiping the moisture
away. "Why are you crying?"

I felt my face flushing from a combination of embarrassment and the effect
his touch and concern had on me. I took his hands from my face and held
them in mine, "It's stupid, let's just forget it ok?"

I saw the corners of his mouth lift a little in a smirk, a small one, but it
was a smirk. I swore under my breath, I was busted. Kevin put his forehead
to mine, the smirk evident in even his voice, "The chick flick got to you,
didn't it?"

I crossed my arms over my chest and turned away, "So what if it did? I'm not
made of stone you know. I do have a mother and I will cry if someone dies."

I felt myself being enveloped in big, strong arms from behind and brought
against the column of solid muscle that was my Bumpkin's chest. "It's not
stupid. It's adorable..." I felt his lips land on the side of my neck and
slide upwards until he was nibbling on a spot behind my ear that made my
Kevin induced asthma start up again full force. I shuddered as his warm
breath flowed over my ear as he spoke into it, "Adorable and strangely sexy
as hell."

My mouth opened and closed, but for the life of me, I couldn't find my voice
at that moment. The rest of my body was too involved in being caught up in
what Kevin did to me, without even knowing it, to worry about a trivial
thing like speech.

Kevin took advantage of my speechlessness to catch his lips to mine and jolt
my tongue and vocal cords back to life as I let out a sound that I didn't
even realize was from me, but damn did it sound like I was enjoying myself.
I wrapped my arms around Kevin, one around his broad shoulders and the other
tangling itself in his hair while our tongues communicated in an unspoken
language that had been shared by lovers for centuries.

I felt the heat start to shoot through my veins again, the feeling like I
had bubbles running through every part of my body. I felt a heaviness
settle in the pit of my stomach, slowly working it's way to a dull throb
deep inside of me. When my hips started to move closer to his, needing to
feel contact with him, totally without the permission of the rest of me, I
reluctantly pulled away, our lips breaking contact.

It took me nearly a full minute to catch my breath enough that I could
speak, "You..you need to take a shower."

Kevin looked at me, an eyebrow cocked, "What? Do I offend?"

He started sniffing himself and I had to suppress the urge to laugh. I
shook my head, "No, but I've already had a shower and one of us needs a nice
cold one or we are definitely going to have things get out of hand. So you,
Bumpkin, are having the shower."

He grinned at my logic, "Okay, I'll have a shower. It was getting hot in
here anyway. You just sit out here and think about me in the shower..." He
stood up and stretched right in front of me, his abs peeking out from the
bottom of his shirt, "naked...." He stooped down nuzzled my neck, planting
a kiss on my furiously twitching jugular, "soapy..." then stood back up and
dipping his finger in the glass of water that was sitting among the dinner
dishes on the table and traced his wet finger over my lips, "And soaking
wet."

I swallowed. Hard. Kevin smiled, satisfied that he had driven me out of my
mind. He laughed, no cackled like some sort of evil warlock, all the way to
the bathroom. A minute later I heard the shower running and just like he
said, I sat there thinking of him. Images of him leaning his head back into
the cascade of water, the water running in ribbons down his chest and
abs.... I shook my head to clear the mental image, "Damn him!"

I had to get the mental pictures out of my mind, so I started to load up the
room service cart with the dirty dishes and pushed it out into the hall,
leaving the main room as clean as we had found it, which was definitely a
first for me.

I went back into our bedroom and heard the shower still going. I went to
the bag that had still been packed and in Kevin's car from our little
fishing trip. I pulled out a pair of silk boxers that I had kind of stole
from Kevin and slipped them on.

I let the robe fall open as I looked in the full length mirror that was in
the corner of the room. I looked over the my chest and ran my fingers over
the blotches of yellow and brown that were the remnants of my bruises. I
winced as a couple of them were still a little tender on my sides, over the
spots where my battered ribs were. I pulled the left side of the robe open a
little more and had to turn away from the mirror.

I just couldn't look at it. I knew there was a scar there and it was
something I was going to have for the rest of my life and I ran my
fingertips over it almost daily when I was thinking or nervous, but I had
never looked at it. It felt horrible when I ran my fingers over it, I could
only imagine what it looked like. When I was in the hospital, the nurses
changed the dressings and when I got out, the dressings were gone and it was
on it's way to healing.

Kevin never looked at it, or touched it. I think he was afraid he would
hurt me or make me uncomfortable. I sighed and forced my head around to
look into the mirror, my eyes meeting those of my image. Slowly I forced
my eyes downward and my eyes fell upon the angry red line running up my side
from just below my belly button up towards my hip. I had to pull the edge
of my boxers down to see the whole thing all at once.

Looking at it, I couldn't help but go back to the moment it had happened.
The look in her eyes as she held the knife over the flame was....it still
haunted me. She was enjoying herself, she looked happy when she was
dragging the hot metal across my side, ripping it open and searing my skin.
Even after having the crap beaten out of me, I had never felt pain like that
in all my life. The pain was so horrible, like your whole body being dipped
in a vat of acid and then thrown in another filled with salt. Even after I
blacked out from the pain, it was still there waiting for me when I came
around. And it had been there everyday since. No one knew that, but
everyday it still hurt. The physical pain wasn't so bad any more, but the
pain inside was still raw and I didn't think it would ever go away.

I was so lost in my own thoughts, that I jumped when I felt another pair of
fingers tracing over my scar and the warmth of another body behind me. I
looked into the mirror and saw Kevin standing behind me, a towel wrapped
around him and his fingers entangled with mine, sliding gently over the scar
on my stomach.

He kissed my temple and leaned his head against mine, "Where do you go when
you think I'm not watching?"

I looked at both of our hands running over the scar, then Kevin took his
hand away and slid it under mine, covering the thin red line under the
warmth of his hand. I closed my eyes and leaned back against him, "I think
about what happened to us. I think about how I'd feel if you weren't here
with me. I think about what would have happened if I had burned on that
cross. I think....I don't think there is a god anymore, Kevin. I just
don't see how god could let someone like Stephanie walk the earth and nearly
get us both killed in the process."

Kevin winced and closed his eyes as Nick continued talking, every word
adding to the pain in his heart.

"Right now I was thinking about how ugly this scar is and the fact that it's
going to be there for the rest of my life. About all the awful colors that
the bruises are leaving as they are fading and how can you possibly find me
attractive like this? "

I didn't hear anything but silence when I finished and from the coolness
settling on my back, I knew that Kevin had stepped away. My heart sank as I
felt the prickles of unshed tears behind my eyes.

My eyes snapped open when I felt something soft and smooth pressing
carefully over my scar. I looked into the mirror and saw Kevin kneeling
before me, his lips kissing over the line of my scar. My mouth fell open
and my fingers tangled in his wet hair, pressing him closer. I hadn't
realized how sensitive it was, how mindblowingly sensitive. Kevin's tongue
was sliding out from between his lips every few kisses to trail over my
skin, leaving me gasping each time. It felt like warm, wet velvet as it
rubbed over my skin. My head fell back and a whimper left my lips.

Kevin started to pull away, thinking my whimper meant he was hurting me, but
I tangled my fingers more tightly in his hair and refused to let him move.
"Don't stop, oh god, don't stop. That feels sooooo good."

He granted my wish and his lips went back to my stomach, kissing, licking
and then gently nibbling until my knees started to wobble and he got to his
feet and swept me up into his arms and laid me down on the bed. He pushed
back both sides of the robe and then the shoulders, lifting me slowly, piece
by piece to slide the robe off. Then just sat there facing me, his eyes
taking in every part of me lying there on the bed. He looked up into my
eyes and leaned down to kiss me softly. "I love you, Nick. Every color on
you from the red of your lips to the yellow of that bruise on your ankle."
He leaned down and kissed my ankle, being careful not to press to hard on
the fading bruise. He sat back up and stretched his arms out so I could see
the pink scars running up both of his wrists, "Do these disgust you?"

I shook my head vehemently, "No. They are just a part of you. You know I
like tracing my fingers over them, I couldn't do that if they disgusted me."

He traced a finger over my the scar on my abdomen, making a shiver race
through me, "Just like this is a part of you, Nick. I didn't fall in love
with what's here on the surface, I fell in love with what's inside of here."
He put his hand over my heart, feeling it beat steadily beneath the surface.
He leaned down and kissed me softly, making me sigh when his lips were drawn
away again, "I didn't want to touch it unless I knew it was ok with you. I
know from this..." He pulled his towel down a little to reveal the faded
incision from his appendix being taken out, "that they are very sensitive
and I didn't want to cause you any pain or discomfort at all. But I ended
up doing that anyway by avoiding touching you and making you feel like I
didn't love you completely, scars and all. I'm sorry."

He leaned forward and rested his forehead on my chest almost like he was
ashamed to meet my eyes. I took his head and pushed it off my chest gently,
leaning his head back to look at me, "I don't even think there is a word for
how much that meant to me. And you have nothing to be sorry for. It was my
insecurities that were ruling the rest of me. I know you love me, Kevin,
scars and all. And I've always known that and loved you completely, scars
and all."

We both smiled at one another and I leaned up and kissed him softly and
tenderly before laying back on the bed. I don't know what it was that
happened between us, but it felt as if we had turned some sort of corner and
something entirely new and amazing was laying in front of us.

Kevin brushed the hair off of my forehead and kissed it, "You're tired Nick,
I can tell because your cheeks are all flushed. So no arguing, it's time to
sleep."

He was right, I was tired. It had been a long and emotional day. I
stretched my arms up over my head and wriggled around on the bed, getting a
good stretch going as Kevin grabbed the blankets and slid them over me. He
got up off the bed and walked to his bag and rooted through it looking for
something. "Stop looking at my ass, Nick."

I giggled and knew I was busted, once again. I pulled the covers up until
only my eyes were peeking over the top and watched him slide a pair of
boxers on before dropping the towel. When he turned back around, he laughed
softly when he just saw my two blue eyes peeking over the covers at him.
With a smile he crawled into bed beside me and we curled up close to each
other in the dark.

"Goodnight Nickers"

Goodnight Bumpkin"

Then the two of us spit out with "Goodnight John Boy." at the same time,
making us smile as we drifted to sleep.


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