Groggily; Howie opened his eyes, trying to make sense out of what had just happened. Four worried faces looked down at him, and he felt a pair of strong arms and hands holding him.
"Howie? You okay?" Brian knelt down and felt his head. "He's a little warm."
"I'm okay," Howie managed to mumble.
"Nevertheless, you should go and rest." Gwen said looking at the others for support
"She's is right D.," Kevin nodded, and with great ease; he lifted Howie into his arms fully, and carried him to his bedroom.
AJ pulled the sheets and stepped aside so Kevin could place him on the bed. After Kevin did that, Brian pulled the comforter over Howie's body and tucked it under his chin.
"Rest bro. We'll talk later." AJ said and followed the others out of the room. Once in the hallway, and out of Howie's earshot, they spoke.
"What do you think he saw?"
"Is he going crazy?"
"Is he sick?"
"Has this gotten to him to much?"
"What do you think we should do?"
"You think there's more then one ghost haunting this house?" Shocked, everyone turned to face Brian. "Well," he said, "Andrew wouldn't do anything to hurt anyone one so maybe there is another ghost here that we don't know about."
"Maybe," AJ said slowly, "but who? And how come we didn't see them, why did they only make themselves visible to Howie?"
Shrugging, Brian said, "Who knows?" The four of them walked the rest of the way downstairs quietly.
After taking various seats around the living room, AJ spoke up, "The 'ghost' that D. saw, it scared him, so it's a bad ghost..."
"Naw, really?"
"Lock it Brian, I'm not done." AJ said, continuing, "Anyway, before I was rudely interrupted," He shot a glance at Brian, then went on, "Anyway, I thought, that maybe, the ghost," He paused for dramatic effect, "is Andrew's step father.."
Everyone was quiet for a minuet, pondering what AJ had said. Slowly Kevin spoke, "I think he's right. But why would his step father show his face now after so many years but never show it before?"
They thought hard, but didn't come up with an answer. After a while, the conversation drifted and the atmosphere changed into a lighter mood.
About a quater past nine Gwen looked at her watch.
"Shit, guys, I've to go."
"Oh, okay," Kevin said, "you coming back tomorrow?"
"No, I'm busy the next two days. Listen, just get Nick ready for the concert. Get the sheet music and have him practice, here," She wrote an address down on a piece of scrape paper she had in her pocket. "this is the address to a place about an hour away with every type of sheet music you could imagine. Chances are; they have Andrew's songs. Go buy them and have Nick learn them."
"Okay, cool," AJ said taking the paper and looking at it.
"See you guys around three-ish in two days, 'k?"
"Gotcha Gwen, bye!" AJ said. Kevin and Brian also shared a goodbye.
After Gwen left; Kevin stood up and stretched, "I'm ready for bed, today was absolutely exhausting!"
AJ nodded, "I'm so fah-" He yawned and continued his word, "Fatigued right now."
"Whoa- the Bone daddy using big words!" Brian playfully teased AJ.
"Ah, shut yer yap!" AJ laughed, "G'night you losers!" He smile and waved a slight goodnight to the cousins and went home.
Several moments later, Brian left, his goodbye to Kevin short and tiring.
Kevin, however, did not go directly home, he first walked into Nick's room to see how he was.
Nick's body was curled into a loose ball, his arms, wrapped around his body and his head resting gently on the pillow. His eyes were closed, considering the fact that he was asleep, and his mouth was opened a little bit. It created the image of a young boy, although Kevin knew full well that Nick was far from young. And the situation they were in wasn't helping him keep any youth. Kneeling by his younger 'brother's' bedside, Kevin felt his head. Content that he felt no warmth, he leaned over and kissed Nick's forehead. "It'll be over soon..." He whispered and got up. Walking out of Nick's room he left the door slightly ajar, and, on tip toes, as not to wake anybody, Kevin made his way down the hallway. He reached Howie's room and peeked inside. Howie lay awake on his bed, facing out his window. The moon's glow silhouetting his figure with a blue light. Howie's chin rest on his hand, he was propped up with a few pillows against the wall and window. His hair fell around his face, framing it with curls. His legs were covered partially with a blanket, with one knee up and his other arm resting on it.
"Hey," Kevin said softly, making his way over to Howie.
Not looking away from the window, Howie repeated, "Hey."
"What's up?" Kevin sat on the bed. In answer; Howie shrugged. Kevin turned Howie's face towards him with his hand, "D., look at me. Tell me what's wrong."
Howie pulled away from Kevin. "Nothing."
"Bro- your eyes are like windows, I can see there's something wrong."
Howie sighed, "You guys think I'm crazy."
"No, of course not, why?"
"Why? Because I saw something, a guy, and you didn't, and then I fainted. And you do think I'm crazy." He paused, "But I don't think I fainted, I'm not like that, it's just that, something happened, the guy scared the living shit out of me. You didn't see him?"
Kevin shook his head, "We think we know who it might be, so, see, we don't think you're crazy."
"Whatever," Howie said in obvious disbelief, "who do you think it was?"
"Andrew's step father."
Howie looked shocked for a moment, after recovering he asked: "Why did he only let me see him though? Why not you, or better yet, Brian? Why me?"
Kevin shrugged, "We've no idea."
Howie sighed and started to turn to look out the window, but stopped midway. His voice came out harsh and whispered, "He's still here," Howie's eyes locked on a corner of the room. His face was frozen in fear, eyes wide, mouth opened a little, he was caught, in what, Kevin couldn't answer. He reach over and put his hand on Howie's shoulder.
"D.? Howie?" Snapping out of it, Howie returned to reality.
"Kevin?" He whispered.
"Yeah, you okay?" Howie nodded.
"I'm tired, I just-I just want to sleep."
"All right Howie, goodnight," After hugging Howie, Kevin got up and left the room, looking back for a moment just in time to see Howie slip fully under the covers. Catching his glance, Howie smiled. Smiling back, Kevin turned and left. Soon in his own room fast asleep.
"Rise and shiiiiine bushy!"
"Go away AJ."
"Nope, Iz come to wake yous up! So uppity up!"
"What the hell are you doing up so early? And why are you here?"
"Early? Kev, it's twelve thirty!"
"Twelve thirty?!" Jumping out of bed, Kevin faced AJ. "Why didn't anyone wake me up earlier?"
Shrugging, AJ replied, "You seemed stressed out last night. We thought you needed some rest. So we let you sleep. But now, it's late enough. So get up!" He turned to leave the room then paused and turned back around, "Brian and I went out and got copies of all the songs Andrew performed. Nick's in the 'room' practicing them. When you're ready, head over there. By the way; nice jammies! Ta ta!" He left Kevin to shower and get dressed.
After taking an extra long shower, Kevin dressed and headed downstairs to the his kitchen. Grabbing a bagel and a cup of coffee, he stood by the window looking out. Finishing his bagel, Kevin poured himself another cup of coffee. He finished getting ready and headed over to Nick's.
The blonde sat at the piano with AJ, Brian, and Howie crowded around it. Nick was studying the music and attempting to play, while the others watched. Kevin winced as he peeked at the sheet music. The songs looked extremely hard, but Nick played them as if he had played them for years.
"How's it going?" Kevin asked coming up behind Howie. Nick stopped playing.
"Okay," He said looking at Kevin. "My fingers are getting stiff though," He made a face, "they're starting to really hurt. I've been practicing non stop since seven."
"We told him to stop," Brian said in answer to Nick, "but the kids just to darn stubborn!" He laughed.
"Hmm-" Kevin said knowing how Nick felt. There had been times that he himself had practiced for hours and he knew how bad ones fingers could start hurting. "Here," Sitting down next to Nick on the bench, Kevin took one of Nick's hands in his own. Gently, he began to massage his joints. After a few minuets he said, "Better?" Nick nodded, flexing his fingers. Kevin repeated the process with his other hand. "You okay now?" Nick nodded again and smiled.
"Thank you."
"No problem."
"All right, I wanna hear what you got. Guys, sit down." Kevin said motioning the three men to the couch. They each sat and waited for Nick to begin.
Turning the music back to the first piece, Nick readied his hands and began.
The rest of the afternoon went just like that. Nick played as much as possible until his fingers hurt and Kevin, or one of the others, would massage them. By eight O'clock, Nick had the pieces down.
"So; now what?" Brian asked as he lazily slumped into the couch. He eyed his friends who also were lazing around the hidden room.
Nick shrugged, "Dunna." A sudden crash behind him made him turn around. He couldn't see what had dropped and neither could the other guys. Lightning flashed quickly, and with in seconds- the lights were out.
"Guys..." Nick said shakily.
"It's okay Nicky," AJ's comforting hand grasped Nick's shaking one.
"Let's go downstairs and light some candles," Kevin said quietly. In the dim light of the room, which was really just the quick flashes of lightning, he guided the boys towards the door.
However, about ten feet from the door; something else fell. All five men turned around to be faced with an angry looking man.
Howie screamed and jumped behind Kevin. Turning Kevin wrapped his arms around him. "D, that's...Andrew's stepfather isn't it?" Howie just nodded.
"Dear God," Brian muttered, he grabbed a tight hold on AJ's arm, Nick grasped the other. The five looked at him in absolute terror as he stepped forward. With every step something else in the room fell, shattering to pieces as they hit the floor.
A low growling sound erupted through out the room, and things started to fly about.
One of the windows shattered and sent streams of glass at the boys.
Knocked to ground by the force each of the five were too frightened to move. Finally gaining his senses, Brian yelled, "Guys! Let's get out of here!" He grabbed Nick's hand and pulled him up. Howie got up and helped AJ and Kevin. They ran out of the room and stairs. Not stopping there; each took off out of the house.
Once they felt that they were at a safe distance, the boys collapsed to the ground. The minute they sat, both Nick and Brian burst into tears.
Wiping his eyes, Nick mumbled, "Sorry."
"Don't be," AJ said, "I'm about ready to cry myself."
"Oh my God, AJ! Your head!" Brian exclaimed.
"What?" AJ brought his hand to his head. What he felt was a thick liquid, "Oh God.."
"Jay you're bleeding!" Kevin rushed to his side to examining his wound. Pulling off his T-shirt, Howie handed it to Kevin.
"Put this on it." Pressing the shirt to AJ's head, Kevin pushed his body down into a lying position.
"Stay still Bone, God, some glass from the window must have hit you."
"We can't go back in there. No, not tonight. Not before we stop this." Howie said, his voice on edge.
"D. is right," Kevin added, still putting pressure on AJ's wound. "Howie, start your car, we'll go back to my place."
Howie did as he was told, but the car wouldn't start. "Shit." He grabbed Kevin's keys and tried his car. The engine refused to roll over. Exasperated, he tried all of their cars. None would start. "Fuck! FUCK! Now what?!"
Calmly, Kevin answered. He knew he had to stay calm to calm Howie and the others down. "Let's just stay out here tonight. It's warm enough."
"But it's looks like it's going to rain." AJ mumbled from his position on the ground.
"So let it," Kevin answered, "would you rather be inside with that..that...thing?" Silently, the remaining four agreed. "Okay, let's just get a little father away from the house. How about the meadow?" Behind the house, in the backyard, about a hundred yards away after the small wooded area was an opening. It was a little more than two aces long and was filled with overgrown grass and wild flowers. It looked like something right out of the movies, and although it wasn't exactly a meadow, the boys dubbed it that name, not knowing what else to call it.
Quietly, they made their way through the woods and into the meadow. Settling in what they thought was the middle, each lay down next to the others and tried to clear there mind to get some sort of sleep.
Just as sleep was about to over take them, the sky opened up. Thick drops of rain fell and soaked them.
"I'm getting cold," Howie muttered a couple of minuets later.
Looking over the four other men, Kevin saw that each were shivering. "Get closer guys. If we use our body heat we can warm up a bit."
"What body heat?" AJ muttered, his bleeding long stopped.
"Just do it," Kevin whispered, and obediently, each boy moved closer. Kevin wrapped his arms around Howie, who was still without a shirt after giving it to AJ. He held him tightly, doing the best he could to help the freezing man. Huddled behind Kevin was Nick, with Brian behind him. In front of Howie, facing him, was AJ.
Even though they were warming up- none fell asleep till the rain stopped, which was early morning. And even then, nightmares continued to steal their sleep.
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER TEN
BBE INDEX
LONG STORIES
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