Title: Hero Worship
Author: Shea Pierce
Rating: R
Fandom: Lost
Disclaimer: Not mine, mostly. Liam, Charlie, Patrick, and Sinjin belong to people not me. I wish they did though. Julianne, Catherine, Terry, and anyone you don't recognize belong to me. I stole the title from an episode of Star Trek.

And this I know

His teeth as white as snow

What a gas it was to see him

Walk her every day

Into a shady place

With her lips she said

She said

Hey Paul, Hey Paul, Hey Paul, let's have a ball

"Gigantic" The Pixies

Chapter One: Gigantic

Charlie Pace and his friends, Patrick Gleason and Julianne Morgan, usually dawdled on their respective ways home, but their footsteps were quite a bit more quick this particular day. Not only was this a Friday, but it was a Friday before a long weekend. These were more exciting.

The trio stepped through the double doors and paused for a moment on the big stone steps to untie ties and untuck shirts. Once outside, Sister Maria couldn't tell them how to wear their uniforms.

"You guys coming over today?" Charlie asked, like he did everyday.

"I can, Mum won't be home until later," Julianne replied, tucking one long red strand of hair behind her ear. Patrick agreed, he could come, and it seemed a normal Friday afternoon.

The three walked to Charlie's house, chattering happily and other such teenage-like stuff.

"Who's car is that?" Julianne asked, ending the conversation abruptly. A strange car was parked, sort of on an angle, in the driveway. Both Patrick and Julianne looked at Charlie, whose eyebrows were furrowed in confusion.

"I don't know. I guess we'll find out, right." Charlie headed up to the door and Patrick and Julianne followed quickly.

"Mum, who's here?" Charlie yelled as soon as he got inside. He dropped his bag and headed to his room to change out of his uniform.

"Baby brother!" Charlie was stunned to hear Liam's voice, but before he had time to be, well, stunned, Liam was right there, arm around Charlie.

"Hey, Liam, what are you doing here?" Charlie pushed away a bit, Liam smelled like he'd been drinking.

"Not happy to see your brother?" Liam slurred, and Charlie was sure he'd been drinking.

"Not when you're drunk. What are you doing here? Where's Mum?"

"Do you still play?" Liam seemed to be avoiding the question of why exactly he was home yet, Liam usually went out on Friday nights.

"What? Of course I do, you know that. Why?" Charlie now was confused. "Is that your car? That's not your car."

"It's not my car. We could be big, Charlie." Liam finally answered one question before finally moving to his original point.

"Liam, I have friends here, can we talk about this later..." Charlie tried again to leave, but Julianne spoke up.

"I know when I'm not wanted, I'll go. See you, Charlie." Julianne let herself out, and Patrick looked back and forth between the door and Liam and Charlie.

"Should I? Perhaps this isn't the best time. I'm going to catch up with Julianne." Patrick, too, let himself out.

"So we can talk now?" Liam asked after a moment of silence.

"I think they call this an exposition dump. Anyway, to spare the details, I'll fill you in on what happened. Charlie, Liam, and Patrick started playing together, they called themselves Gigantic. Well, they started playing together formally, in clubs and the like. Liam graduated, surprisingly, some would say. The whole time, indeed, since we were thirteen, I'd liked Patrick, but I never got my chance, he started dating Melissa Reid, who'd never spoken a kind word to him until he was in a band. I still see Charlie often, but it's no secret I don't much like Liam.

I guess when all is said and done, if you're not in the band, you're an outsider, and I, Julianne Morgan, had been an outsider my whole life. I wish I could say there was a happy ending for me, but there's not. Truthfully, the day I left, the day Liam was drunk and Charlie half-attempted to stick up for me, was the last time things were the same. We never gathered at Charlie's anymore, I rarely saw Patrick alone, and our life wasn't the same much after that."

Julianne felt a little hurt, as Charlie'd not spoken to her since she left his house, and Patrick hadn't spoken much to her either. She tried ringing Patrick a couple times, but his mother told her he was busy, and the one time he'd answered, he spoke about four words and hung up.

At school they acted like nothing was different, Charlie put his arm around her and chatted and Patrick joked around and plotted the demise of a certain Melissa Reid, who this time had "accidently" spilled her tray down his front at lunch.

Thinking all had been forgotten, Julianne ventured to ask, "Are we going to your house today, Charlie?"

Charlie stopped his chatter. "Me and Liam are going to Pat's today, Liam's going to pick us up." Charlie exchanged a look over Julianne's head at Patrick. "You can come though, but we're just going to play."

"You guys haven't played together in, well a long time, why the change?" Julianne was confused. Then she placed it, turned to look Charlie right in the eyes. "It's what Liam said on Friday, wasn't it?"

"Jules-"

"Forget it Charlie, stop acting like I won't understand. What has ever made you think I won't understand" Julianne looked into Charlie's eyes again. Then without another word she walked away.

"I was asked many times if me and Julianne were dating. Truth is, she was most like a sister to me. It changed though. She came to a few shows, but it was no secret she didn't like my brother. Not entirely sure why, but I guess I don't see a lot of unlikeable things about Liam after having spent my entire fifteen, almost sixteen, years of life with him.

Actually, Julianne liked Pat. Pat either never realized, or didn't share her feelings, but nothing ever happened. I think when Julianne stopped talking to him was when he started dating Melissa Reid, the very person who was the object of Pat's loathing. She practically threw herself at Pat once Gigantic stated playing some Manchester clubs. We weren't even that great, we still did covers and were in desperate need of another guitarist."

"Your girlfriend doesn't like me." Liam complained to Charlie one morning.

"She's not my girlfriend." Charlie hurriedly tucked in his shirt and slipped into his shoes.

"But she still doesn't like me."

"I have to go now. Unlike you, I still have to pass. How'd you manage to graduate anyway?" Charlie slammed the door shut, leaving Liam alone in the kitchen.

Not for long though, Catherine Pace, Liam and Charlie's mother, drifted into the kitchen and put water on to boil for tea. She sat down at the table across from Liam.

"Aren't you going to give Charlie a ride to school?" She inquired, knowing of their current disagreement. A smile spread across her face. Mrs. Pace was very laidback with her sons, so long as they attended Mass each week. Liam would later admit that the reason he married Karen was that she reminded him of his mother.

"Don't worry, he can take care of himself. Put a shirt on." Mrs. Pace patted her son's hands and left, the kettle still on.

"The water's still on!" Liam shouted to his mother.

" I know. Tea's in the cupboard."

Charlie arrived at school before Patrick and Julianne. He concentrated on nothing as he sat outside waiting for either of his friends, hopefully Julianne, as he wasn't really in the mood to deal with Melissa, or Patrick's oblivious obsession with her.

Luckily, it was Julianne who showed up first. Charlie waved her over and she plopped down next to him on the stairs.

"Is Pat here yet?" she asked, watching the crowd.

"Not yet." Charlie also watched the crowd. They sat like that for a few minutes before Julianne turned to Charlie.

"Why do you think he stays with her? She treats him like crap."

"I treated you like crap last year, remember? When we first started the band."

"Yeah, but that's different. No, no it's not. I see your point, sort of. But he could do so much better, you know?" Julianne mused.

"If it makes him happy... I should listen to myself sometimes, shouldn't I?"

"Yeah." Julianne agreed absentmindedly, it was getting late and still no Patrick. Or Melissa, but neither one really cared if she showed up.

The bell rang and Julianne and Charlie went inside, to their respective lessons, Patrick still not there.

"I've always been close to my brother, we were each others best friends growing up, despite our age difference. Two years can be a big age gap, but that made no difference to us. When I graduated, I never went anywhere, swearing I'd wait for Charlie, and besides, we've got the band now. The band was going nowhere fast though, no one will sign a band who only covers other songs, except whoever signed Me First and the Gimme Gimmes, but it was still fun.

Then I met Sinjin."

The band practiced in Patrick's basement, since that's where his drums were and it's easier to move guitars.

Anyway, sometime early 1998, after one of the many practices, Liam made a point.

"We're never going to get anywhere if we don't write our own music." The problem here being, that he made his point when nothing in the current conversation related to this. Probably since there was no particular conversation. Melissa was there, and therefore her and Patrick were otherwise occupied. Charlie was sitting on the floor, leaned up against an amp, writing on his hands with a Sharpie, a habit he'd never been able to shake. Liam had been lost in his thoughts, where his point had come from in the first place.

Charlie looked up, and Patrick looked over. Melissa was still otherwise occupied, not particularily caring about what happened to the band as long as they were, you know, still a band. Patrick pushed her off, his attention on Liam now.

"Think about it. No one wants to listen to a band of teenagers who don't play their own music. The only reason we still play the clubs is because we're loud."

"He's got a point," Charlie observed, going back to writing on his hand.

"I've met a guitarist who just left his band. He's creative. We'll have another guitarist, Charlie can write, we can do it."

Charlie looked up again, and him, Patrick, and Melissa all stared at Liam.

"Can we at least play with Sinjin to see if it's possible?" Liam asked.

"You know, he's really got something going here. We can't play in Manchester clubs our entire lives." Charlie capped his Sharpie and put it in his pocket. "I can put music to some of the writing I've done, and we can do this."

Patrick looked back and forth between Liam and Charlie for a moment. "Sure, why not?"

Melissa smiled widely and kissed Patrick's cheek.

"Well, we played with Sinjin, and he was amazing. It was unanimous, we're going for it. Anyway, we played some of Charlie's songs and they loved us. We were more popular than ever, but things weren't so good for us. Melissa disliked Sinjin incredibly, and I decided to break it off. Sure Charlie pressured me into it, but it's for the best, I hope.

We needed a new name, we couldn't be Gigantic forever, we needed something our own to go with playing our own music."

TBC