Seven Times Better, by Poet on the Run

Chapter One: Smile

A groan escaped from Macy's lips as she sat herself on the bench in the atrium. She massaged her thigh, unable to hide a grimace at the slow, painful throbbing. One of the only drawbacks of being a sports star (besides injuring the three most awesome guys on the planet with her equipment) was the sore muscles. And the fact that she couldn't afford to be distracted during a game.

But yesterday's fiasco was over and there was little she could do to remove that sting, so she decided to concentrate on the dull ache in her legs.

Of course, if she hadn't freaked out when Jessica told her about—

No! Macy cut herself off before she could journey down that road. It wasn't just you! We all need to work on concentration.

She was so distracted by her thoughts that she didn't even notice another student approaching.

"Hey," someone said above her, causing the girl to start. She looked up and gasped.

"Nick!" she exclaimed. She jumped off the bench as if it were electrified, ignoring the screaming protest from her thighs. "I'm sorry; I totally forgot that this was your spot! I'll just let you—"

"Macy," the boy said quickly, trying to halt the flow of apologies—without much success.

"Sorry, I was just tired and the bench was there and—"

"Macy…"

"I wasn't even thinking about you at all—not that I don't ever think about you! I—"

"Macy…"

"I don't know what I was thinking; I mean—"

"MACY!"

The girl finally fell silent upon hearing his exasperated tone, looking positively chastised. She looked down at her hands, which were still clenched tightly around the handle of her gym bag.

This meant that she missed the rare smile that crossed his face.

"Macy, it's okay if you want to sit here," Nick said slowly and deliberately. He knew that Macy knew that he was sincere when he used that tone. "It's not really my spot, so you can sit here if you want. And… the bench can hold more than one person at a time."

Macy's eyes jumped back to his face, but it was too late to catch the smile. Her eyes sparkled with… what, exactly? Hope? Excitement? Happiness?

"Really?" she asked. Her voice was hushed, as if she thought that speaking louder would shatter the chance.

"Well, yeah." Nick said. He smirked a little. "Look at how long this bench is. It was made to support at least two people."

Her laughter was unexpected, to say the least. A titter might not have surprised him. An all-out belly laugh would have been within the realms of possibility. But the soft, appreciative giggle threw him for a complete loop.

"I guess you're right," Macy said slowly. Still, she waited for him to sit first. She turned to put down her gym bag, missing the second rare smile Nick gave her—even rarer because it was the second in about the same number of minutes. But she might have caught it, had she not grimaced again when her thighs complained at the movement.

"You okay?" asked the boy. She never knew that he had smiled, for the expression had been replaced by one of concern. His brown eyes seemed liquid and she fought hard against a blush.

"I'm fine—just recovering from volleyball practice after the game yesterday," said the brunette. She tried for a smile and found that it came easier than before.

"But couldn't the game be considered practice?"

"After the way we played?"

Nick looked stricken for a moment and he glanced away, a sheepish expression on his face. He gave her a sort-of-kind-of half-of-half of a smile.

"Sorry about that," he said. "I didn't mean to cause trouble when I came yesterday."

"What?" It was Macy's turn to look like she'd been hit. "No, that wasn't your fault! If we were better players, you wouldn't have been a distraction."

"Still, I could have been less visible… Worn a hat and sunglasses…" The young Lucas was grasping at straws, but he truly didn't want Macy to blame herself.

The girl waved off his excuses. "It doesn't matter. What's done is done. We'll do better next time, with or without you watching."

Nick opened his mouth to say more, but eventually closed it when words failed him. He merely nodded and prayed she wouldn't hold yesterday against him.

They were quiet for a few minutes, unable to think of something to say. The silence seemed to stretch uncomfortably between them, until an idea finally struck Nick.

"If I said that—" he started.

"Stella told me—" Macy began at the same time.

Shocked, they stopped and looked at one another. A moment passed and Nick suddenly grinned.

"You go first," he said, gesturing with his hand before resting it on his knee.

Macy, dazed by the smile (the first she'd seen of the three that had transpired), could only comply.

"O-oh. I was just going to say that I heard Stella and Joe talking about your new song." Macy said. "Nothing big; just that it was giving you some trouble."

"Some trouble?" snorted the young man. "Can you say, 'understatement of the century'? I can't get it right at all."

Macy turned her head to the side to hide a smile, for she knew that perfectionist Nick wouldn't like the song until he was on the twenty-third draft. According to Stella, he was only on his fifth.

"Mace?" the boy said suddenly. He leaned around to get a good look at her face. "Are you—you are! You're laughing at me!"

That got the brunette's attention. "What? No! I was just… You were—"

"Being laughed at!" Nick accused. And suddenly, it was clear. He was joking with her again.

"Nick!" she said, smiling reluctantly.

"Macy!" he returned, also giving her a grin. "This song is just… I don't know where it came from. I got the inspiration a few days ago in English, but now I don't have a clue."

"What's it about?" Macy asked, tilting her head.

"A girl. What else?" joked the musician.

"Oh, come on," said the brunette. She quickly scraped up some courage and gently elbowed him in the side. "What about Live to Party? Or When You Look Me In the Eyes? Those weren't about girls."

"Look Me In the Eyes could be for a girl," Nick defended. But he remembered who he was talking to; Macy, number one super fan of everything JONAS. She knew exactly what had inspired that song. He sighed. "Okay, so this new one's partially for a girl. There was something in the passage we were going over—this phrase. Out of sight, out of mind. It just got me thinking."

"Out of sight, out of mind?" Macy frowned when she remembered where she'd heard the familiar phrase. "I heard my mom talking to my aunt about that when she got divorced; she said that if she put all of his things in a box and removed all the pictures of him, it would be easier to move on."

Nick half-nodded and half-shrugged. "That's not exactly the angle I was going for. I thought about what that would be like—to think that when you left someone's sight, they'd just forget about you. It'd be pretty lonely to think that you didn't make much of an impact on other people."

"So that's what you wrote the song about?" Macy wrinkled her nose a bit. JONAS songs could have a melancholic sound on occasion, but they weren't usually so negative. She was so preoccupied with her distaste that she didn't notice the fifth grin that Nick had given her.

"Well, that's what I tried for the first draft. But it was really…" He trailed off as he tried to think of a word to describe the feeling of the song.

"Gloomy?" suggested the girl. The boy actually laughed.

"Yeah, something like that," he said, still smiling. "So I scrapped it. And now I've got this… thing worked out for some kind of a chorus, but I still don't like it."

"Well…" Macy chided herself mentally for being a coward. "Maybe… I mean—um. Maybe I could… y'know… help."

Nick swung his head around to stare at her. There was something… more than shock in his eyes. Something she couldn't read. "Really?"

"Um… sure!" She smiled nervously. It was a tense moment, during which she found herself falling into habit as an attempt to break the silence. "What kind of number one super fan would I be if I didn't try to help you with your writer's block?"

Nick merely blinked and fished a folded piece of paper out of his pocket. He handed it to Macy.

"This is what I've got so far. I don't know if you just want to read it or if you want me to sing it…" He trailed off when he saw the look in her eyes and chided himself absently for thinking that she'd want anything less than an all-out serenade. "Well… I don't have my guitar right now, so…"

Without a word or a gesture, Macy was able to clearly communicate to him how little she cared about accompaniment. So he turned the paper toward him so that he could pretend to read it (for he knew it by heart), and leaned closer to her than was probably necessary. Ignoring the way her breath caught in her throat, he began.

I'm out of your hair,
But am I under your skin?
Oh, why can't this be mutual;
The way you pull me in?

Macy barely contained a shiver as he sang to her. His voice was soft and it was almost as though he was whispering the words directly to her—as though he had written the song with her in mind. But that wasn't possible… was it? He was awfully close… She closed her eyes and put a smile on, pushing those thoughts away. For now, she would concentrate on the song that was giving him trouble and savor the feel of his breath on her ear.

If I'm out of your sight,
Am I still on your mind?
'Cause I know when you're not there
I can still see your eyes.

He took a deep breath and drew away, enough to see her expression. Once again, her eyes were closed, so she had no idea that she'd just broken a record with Nick Lucas. Seven smiles within fifteen minutes; he hadn't been this cheerful since… well, a while ago. This time, his smile was more for himself than her. Her expression, a mixture of excitement, euphoria, and disbelief, was impossibly cute. He was almost tempted to…

"That was really good, Nick," she said softly, finally opening her eyes. She seemed a little startled that his face was so close, but continued nonetheless. "I think I understand what you were talking about, though. The melody makes it sound like you're going for something more… uplifting. Not moody."

"Exactly!" Nick exclaimed. He drew further back so that he wouldn't be shouting in her ear. "That's what I've been trying to tell Joe and Kevin for the past two days!"

She flushed at the praise, but continued with her 'analysis.' "Um… you're putting the speaker here in the role of the victim. If you want to go uplifting… I would say that you need to be the confident one."

"The confident one?" Nick repeated. The girl bobbed her head.

"Well, sort of like you're reassuring someone. You're letting them know that they're very much in your thoughts when they leave your presence." Macy said. "So it becomes more about them and the thoughts that you can't control. Or, um, something like that…" She trailed off when she noticed Nick staring at her with an unreadable expression in his eyes. It wasn't unpleasant… just unnerving.

"Um… Nick?"

He seemed to break out of a daze and immediately gave her the brightest smile she had ever seen on his face. It was nothing short of incredible—the way his eyes lit up and his eyebrows rose—the way his slightly chapped lips framed his white teeth—the way one of his cheeks dimpled as one corner of his mouth rose slightly higher out of habit. Macy knew that she could have died perfectly happy right then and there.

"Macy, I think you just broke my writer's block," he said, incredulous but deliriously happy.

"M-m-me?" she stammered. The smile wasn't going away—in fact, it seemed to be growing wider by the minute!

"Yes, you!" Nick said. All at once, he reached out and grabbed her, pulling her mouth to his in a swift, hard kiss. "You are amazing, Macy Misa! Amazing!"

He pressed another kiss to her stunned lips before he stood, eager to write down the ideas that were dancing behind his eyes. At the last minute, he fished a pen out of his pocket and took the paper with the old lyrics on it. He scribbled a note, handed the paper back to Macy, and picked up his bag.

He leaned down and hugged the girl tightly, whispering fervently in her ear, "Thank you!"

And before she knew it, he was gone.

Macy was shocked, needless to say, and it took a few minutes for her to understand exactly what had just happened. Even then, she didn't believe it. He had come so quickly and left so fast… she wasn't even sure that it was anything more than a daydream. Until she looked down at her hand, which was still holding the folded piece of paper. Gingerly, as though she was afraid of what she would see, Macy unfolded the sheet and read the message.

Sorry to jet off, but you know how I am when I get inspired.

If you think that I did what I did because I was grateful, YOU'RE WRONG.

Meet me here after school tomorrow if you want to hear the finished version of that song. I'll have my guitar.

Yours,
Nick

A delighted grin overtook Macy's face and she slowly closed the note. She had never been happier to be sore from a practice, or that her team had lost a game. Little things like that didn't matter in the long run, really.

Peeking at the note again, she finally let out a fangirl squeal that had been building up inside her for weeks. She couldn't wait for tomorrow!

a/n: So, it took me a total of three days to write this. The first draft was about four pages long when I wrote it in my composition notebook. I believe that when I typed it up, it came out to about 856 words. The story you see now is 2420 words long. You're welcome.

I wrote the lyrics that Nick sings. Yes, I intended them to be kind of suck-ish; Nick isn't happy with the quality, if you recall. I had two versions of the same song lying around from a scrapped fic, so the lyrics you see here are the earlier version changed around a bit. I'm debating whether or not to make this into a two-shot so that I can put the better version into use.

Hm. Why don't you tell me when you drop a review filled with constructive criticism? Gasp!

(Seriously, though; I'd love to get someone's opinion on this. There are so many parts that just don't seem to mesh!)

Much love,
Beth