The bell let out a shrill ring and everyone cheered as the last of their papers flew into the air.

"SUMMER," Some kid at the back of the class screamed, others joining in excitedly. Jeff looked back at Nick excitedly who mouthed "finally" to the other boy. The blonde nodded in mutual agreement. The year at Dalton had seemed like an eternity. The stress of finals (the kind that makes you grind your teeth and stay up all night) and Warbler performances were over at last.

Jeff packed up all his books in his bag and shuffled out of the class room, waiting for Nick outside the door. Of course, even on the last day of school Nick was the last one out.

"Why are you always SO slow?" Jeff mock-complained. Nick elbowed him playfully in the ribs.

"I am SO not the slowest one and you know it!" Jeff smiled, he couldn't help it. Nick was utterly adorable sometimes. Wait...no, he totally did not just think that about his best friend. He coughed to hide his embarrassment. "Are you coming down with something?" Nick questioned. His brown eyes were kind of... glowing and pretty. WHAT?

"N-NO!" Jeff spat out his cheeks by now a nice shade of crimson. Nick lifted an eyebrow and analyzed his best friend closely.

"Whoa, okay dude. Sorry I asked. But seriously you're not getting sick are you cause that would really suck. It's the last day of school and all and I don't want to have a video game tournament with you if you're going to be hacking on me."

"I will not be hacking on you," Jeff said looking anywhere but Nick. What on earth was he thinking? He thought Nick's eyes were pretty. Guys don't think other boy's eyes are pretty especially if that guy happens to be the other's best friend! Not unless... No. That wasn't what it was.

He just needed some time to think, away from Nick. He needed to date a girl. That's what it was. His last date with a girl had been months ago. She'd broken up with him, saying that he spent way too much time with Nick and was more concerned for his friend than her. Oh well, what did she know?

Although time away from Nick would be hard. They were joined at the hip most of the time and he would surely notice something was up. He stole a glance at the brunette as they continued to walk and couldn't help but notice; the way his brown hair swept up to one side and the way that he has distinct laugh lines around his lips.

"See you next year Nick," some boy passing the opposite direction shouted.

"Yeah, see you!" Nick shouted cheerfully and Jeff couldn't quite place the feeling. Nor could he stop the burning that seemed to grow in his chest when Nick smiled at someone else.

It jostled him out of his thoughts when Nick suddenly spun around and said, "So, I'll see you in my dorm for celebratory pizza and a call of duty marathon at 5:00pm?"

"Y-yeah," Jeff replied, happy that he was the only one Nick invited. "Bad Jeff," he thought to himself. You like girls. You don't like Nick. This is just hanging out.

"Okay," Nick said looking at him quizzically before patting his shoulder and leaving to go to his room. Jeff turned to go into his respective room and couldn't hide the smile that bloomed on his face as he reached up to touch his shoulder which was suddenly warm.

Nick hurried around his room making sure it was immaculate. All his books stacked, bed made, furniture in place and all dusted. He didn't really know why he was going through all the trouble Jeff and him were only going to mess it up later. Maybe it was because he felt guilty. Tonight he'd planned on telling Jeff about his girlfriend Sarah.

He'd put it off for so long because of how his last relationship had panned out. Jeff hadn't been supportive at all and had gotten depressed. That had been the worst time of his life. He needed Jeff around and although he didn't approve of his friends behaviour and found it rather immature, for the sake of their friendship, he'd ended it. He'd just guessed it was because Jeff's relationship with his girlfriend at the time had fallen apart.

He heard a knock on the door which singled him of Jeff's arrival. He walked over to the door almost tripping over the edge of his carpet. He opened the door to find a flustered Jeff. As soon as he saw Nick's face he flashed a smile, show casing his perfectly white teeth, his blue eyes shining.

"Hey," he said giddily.

"Hey," Nick responded, not quite sure why he chose now to notice Jeff's teeth...weird. Jeff slid off his shoes putting them by the door and turned around. His eyebrows scrunched up in confusion as he took in the room.

"Is there any reason why I can actually see your floor for once?"

"No," I lied, "I just got tired of tripping over crap." Crap was right. This was going to be a lot harder than I had originally planned. Jeff looked really happy as he bounced on to my bed, making wrinkles in the once smooth fabric as he lay down.

"So," he said, once again smiling, "are we going to do this thing or what?"

"W-what thing do you mean?" I stuttered, thinking that he'd caught me staring at his smile. My face heated up a bit at the thought. "Nick," I pep talked myself, "you brought him over here to tell him about Sarah. You cannot afford to drag this out. You'll be spending the whole summer with him so the sooner he knows the better."

"Um, Jeff," I asked, sitting down on the bed beside him.

"Ye-ah," he said waggling his eyebrows in a way that made him look downright silly.

"Stop it," I said punching him in the arm (not hard enough to hurt), "I'm trying to be serious."

"You wound me sir," he muttered, but gave me a look as if to say, "Go on." He folded his knees up against his chest and rested his chin against them, staring up at me with big unsuspecting blue eyes. Dear god those eyes would kill me. It was as if his sole purpose in life was to make me feel guilty but they were also kind of...I don't know...beautiful?

...

WHOA, WHOA, WHOA! Hold the phone just a minute there. Beautiful is NOT a word we use to describe our friends Nick, our perfectly straight friend that...did he just bat his eyelashes? No. You're not allowed to think like that. Think of Sarah or something!

What was wrong with me? Maybe the pressure of the finals really had gotten to my brain like Jeff had said.

"I'm all ears Nick," Jeff said in a sing-song voice. Aw, to hell with it all. If I didn't even know how I felt about my best friend how could I know what I felt about Sarah?

"Actually, never mind. Do you want to order some pizza?" Nick asked knowing that pizza would be the magic word that would get Jeff off his tail.

"Do you even have to ask?" He laughed jumping up to get the phone book that I stored in my desk. Nick smiled at him and eerily noticed the way his heart beat just a little bit louder when Jeff smiled. "I'd like to order a meat pizza with pepperoni, ham, salami and yeah...heavy on the meat." Nick laughed at Jeff's unhealthy obsession with meat or anything that involved the flavour of beef. At the sound of his giggle Jeff winked at him.

Nick quickly turned his head around to stare at the T.V, pretending to be interesting in the game that they'd just started up. In reality his heart felt like it was thundering a million miles a minute. The bed creaked as Jeff plopped down on it.

"Hey, do you want to watch a movie instead of gaming? I'm pretty tired from all the finals," he said moving closer. Damn it Jeff! Why are you moving closer? "By the looks of it you're pretty tired to," he motioned to the bags that I knew resided underneath my eyes.

"Yeah, whatever," anything so that I can stop thinking about your arm pressed up against mine. "Choose what you want to watch. I...um...need to go to the washroom. Before he even had a chance to say anything I was up and closing the door facing my mirror.

What was happening to me? I examined my face in the mirror, hating the way my cheeks were flushed pink. I groaned and felt my head smack against the sink with a harsh clank. That would bruise. I'd never noticed Jeff like this before. We'd just been friends, pals for as long as I could remember. We had both had girlfriends.

Yet I couldn't explain the feelings I got when he smiled at me, when his blonde hair fell in his face whenever he was hunched over studying, when he danced like no one was there or the way his bright blue eyes sparkled.

I was confused. Sure, I knew what all of this meant I could put two and two together but it couldn't work. Jeff was straight and I was...not gay. I don't look at guys on the street and think, "oh, he's handsome." I did think that way of girls though. It was only Jeff who escaped the rule. So I was...Jeff-sexual? I laughed at the term.

Opening the door to the washroom I found Jeff lying on my bed, head on the pillow with the opening credits to Narnia playing.

"You're such a nerd," I joked.

"Hey, you own the movie. So you're the geeky one. Besides you like that I'm nerdy."

"Yeah, nerds are a major turn on for me." The words spilled out of my mouth before I could stop them. How could I have just mention being turned on and Jeff in the same sentence? I dared myself to look back at him, trying to be suave and just pretend it meant nothing.

Jeff looked stunned for a few seconds but then just decided to let it go. I thought I heard him mumble, "I'll store that in my book for later." But I couldn't be sure. I sidled up next to him, well as close as I dared and tried to watch the movie. Honestly I did.

We devoured our pizza when it came. Although by that time I wasn't quite as happy. The pizza delivery boy had put a major damper on my mood. He was SO shamelessly flirting with Jeff, no matter how hard Jeff tried to deny it. Why wouldn't he flirt with him though? Jeff was amazing...

But who was that one that had him in their dorm room eating pizza? Ha! Take that pizza boy.

...I'd officially lost it.

"Nicky?" Jeff said sleepily. My heart swelled at the casual use of a nick name. We'd never done nick names before but I was more than willing to participate now if that meant getting to hear Jeff call me by a pet name.

"What's up J?" I asked, playing along with the name game. We were both sitting on my bed ignoring Peter being crowned by Aslan. Jeff's head was turned towards me his eyes half closed and wearing a smile that would melt anyone's heart.

"I'm sleepy," he concluded, resting his head on my shoulder. I stopped breathing for a few seconds. In all honesty I didn't know what I was. But all I knew was that this was amazing. The feeling of Jeff's head resting on my shoulder was right.