Disclaimer: Not my characters. That is all.

Nick Gets Mad

Kevin had seen it coming from a mile away.

It was late. Nick was frustrated. Macy was still chipper. She was an easy target.

"You're not helping," Nick finally yelled when the camera came just an inch too close to him and he still couldn't understand the formula in front of him.

Macy's eyes widened. Her lip quivered. She ran out of the room.

Nick sighed.

"Keep studying," Kevin told him with a pat on the back. "I'll take care of it."

Kevin waited what he thought was long enough for Macy to be over most of her tears. Still, when he finally made his way to the living room to sit next to her, she wasn't done sniffling. She looked up at him with watery eyes.

"He's just tired and nervous. It's not about you, Macy."

"He's been mad at me before," Macy told Kevin. "But he's never yelled."

"I know. And tomorrow, he's going to be really mad at himself, and he's going to think up something fantastic to make it up to you."

"He doesn't have to think of something fantastic to make it up to me."

"I know." Kevin smiled. "He knows, too. But he will, because I know that he never in a million years would want to make you cry."

"Okay," Macy sighed.

And like the big brother he was, Kevin pulled Macy against him and held her while she cried against his chest.

*J*B*J*B*J*B*

Macy waited until everyone was distracted the next day—Kevin saying good-bye to his guitars and Stella and Joe having a moment that no one would dare interrupt—before she sought Nick out. She found him sitting at the window looking out.

"For you," she told him, handing him the apple she'd been holding. "For a job well done."

"Thanks, Macy." Nick reached out and wrapped his arms around her for a moment. "And I'm sorry I yelled at you."

"That's okay. You were stressed."

"I was mad," he corrected.

"You aren't used to not understanding things."

"I was mad that you were there."

Macy's face dropped. That she certainly hadn't expected.

"Oh. Well. I mean... if you had wanted me to leave you could have just said so. I would have left."

"I didn't want you to leave."

"But I definitely didn't want you to be mad at me."

Nick smiled a ghost of a smirk. "I wasn't mad at you. I was mad at me. I was mad you were there because I'm not used to you seeing me screw up. I don't want you to see me screw up."

Macy shrugged. "Well, it's not like you haven't seen me at some of my worst moments."

"Yeah, but I like you at your worst moments. You, on the other hand, you like Nick of Jonas. Failing math isn't very Nick of Jonas."

"I adore Nick of Jonas. I make signs for him at concerts and I make boys who like me dress up like him."

"Exactly."

"Nick Lucas, on the other hand, I get to call my friend."

"Friend," Nick repeated with a nod.

"And I get a shiver when he gives me that impatient look because there's just so much passion there even if it's anger. And I like how he tugs at his necklace when he gets nervous because it shows that he can get nervous too and that makes me feel better about when I feel nervous. And I like how some days his hair looks like he wasn't able to do anything with it, because it makes me think I might really be able to fit in his life. Like it's okay that I'm not perfect and still around him because not everything else around him is perfect either."

Neither of the pair had noticed that they were slowly moving closer and closer to each other as Macy spoke, but Nick certainly noticed how easy it was for him to reach out just a few inches and grab Macy's hand.

"I really am sorry I yelled at you."

"Oh," Macy shrugged. "I'm sure you can find a way to make it up to me."

And though he didn't mean to, Nick tugged the dogtag on his necklace and Macy blushed. Surely he could think of something.

*J*B*J*B*J*B*

Macy woke to the sound of her cell phone ringing. She blinked a few times before finally finding her bedside clock. Three in the morning. What the...

"Hello?"

"Come outside."

"What?"

"Come outside."

"All right," Macy finally said. She had no idea what was going on, but she knew how stubborn Nick could be, and she'd rather give in and get the chance to go back to bed than fight with him for half an hour and still not get her way.

"What's going on?" she asked once she'd found a sweater to throw over her pyjama tank top and made her way outside.

"Sorry. Kevin said I should throw pebbles at your window, but I didn't know which window was yours, and there aren't really any pebbles around."

"Okay..."

"I'm here to make it up to you."

Macy smiled.

"Really?"

"Yep. Come on."

*J*B*J*B*J*B*

"This is beautiful," Macy said after she and Nick had been sitting quietly on the hood of his car for twenty minutes. "But you were already forgiven, you know?"

"I didn't want to be forgiven. I wanted to make it up to you."

"And you thought taking me to see the stars would do it? I didn't know that I gave out the vibe of a girl who wanted to see the stars."

"You don't. But, your fan site does describe your ideal outing with a member of Jonas as something quiet and this was as quiet as I could think of."

"You looked at my site?"

"Of course. We let you make a video for it. I had to see where it would be going."

Macy nodded.

"And I might have looked at it before because I was curious."

"Well, I just wrote that because I get to see you guys almost every day now. I just never get to see you anywhere quiet."

"Wait, so this isn't your ideal outing? Macy! You're not making this easy on me."

"Careful, you're almost yelling and I wouldn't want you to have to make something else up to me."

Nick narrowed his eyes at her, but couldn't help letting a chuckle escape his lips.

"This is fantastic," Macy assured him. "But aren't you kind of busy? I mean, you guys are leaving for tour tomorrow. You must have a hundred things to do."

"Well, Joe and Stella are pretending that she has to explain something to him about clothes so they have an excuse to be together without admitting that they just want to spend as much time as possible together before they have to be apart, Kevin is sleeping on the ground surrounded by his guitars, and my parents are... well, they're sleeping. It's four in the morning, you know."

"So everyone is saying good-bye to the people the love."

"So I'm exactly where I should be," Nick told her.

Macy's eyes widened and she turned her head to face him.

"It's been a big year," Nick said to her.

"Yeah. I mean, to think that I didn't even know you guys in September, and now..."

"And now, we're going to be thinking about you every time we see a crazed fan in the crowd."

Macy bit her lip.

"It's a good thing. For you and them. I think Kevin, Joe and I are going to see crazed fans differently thanks to you."

"So, every crazed fan will be me."

"No one else could be you. But, maybe you could come visit us for a few shows, and then the crazed fan that makes us smile would be you."

"I'd like that."

"Me too."

Macy wasn't sure how she'd missed it, but she suddenly realised that she and Nick were holding hands.

"I think that you made this year really different for us, Macy. And I'm hoping that maybe next year will be different too."

"How?" Macy asked, the smallest part of her hoping that the answer wouldn't be that she would completely disappear from their lives.

"Maybe you'll be less clumsy. Maybe we'll go watch you play more than you come watch us play. Maybe there'll be more this," Nick told her, as he leaned in and let his lips brush against hers for the shortest of moments.

"I'm okay with all those things," she told him.

"Good."

They leaned back against the car and stared up at the sky in silence for a few moments.

"You're not saying all this to make up for yelling at me, are you?"

"Definitely not."

"And you couldn't have told me this a little earlier than the night before you leave for the entire summer."

Nick chuckled and moved so their joined hands were resting atop his heart. "I'll find a way to make that up to you too."

Macy smiled. If this was how Nick was going to make things up to her, she certainly didn't mind.