Chapter 2

"But seriously now, what did all that mumbling mean?" She said a strange look on her now deadly serious face. He looked up at her and stared right into those beautiful hazel orbs. God, how he wished he could be brave. Like John Wayne, or Jimmy Stuart but most of all Gary Cooper in that film 'high noon'!

"Well, I just…" He trailed off, trying to find something suitable to say that wouldn't make him seem like a poof or would make her run full pelt into the pub. Alex, who was getting cold and (to be honest) rather fed up off all this 'umm'ing and 'arr'ing!

"Look Gene, either say what you were going to say or, you know what never mind. I'll see you in the pub!" She began to storm off but Gene grabbed her arm. He looked pleadingly into her eyes.

"Alex, please! I'm trying; it's just so hard to say!"

"To say what! WHAT ARE YOU TRYING TO SAY?"

She turned away from him and started towards the pub but something stopped her, something loud and beautiful, something that really, she had wanted to hear since the moment she met Sam Tyler and heard his mad stories about going back to the past. Words so pure and honest it seemed that god had just thrown them down from the heavens.

"THAT I LOVE YOU!"

Gene heard a gasp and watched Alex turn round.

"W-what did you say…" he took a deep breathe of air then blurted out,

"I love you, and I think I always have, probably always will but you know that's life for you."

She looked at him like he was mad, so he said it again,

"Look Alex I love you, I really, really, really, really, really, LOVE you and I'm gonna keep saying it 'till you accept it." She again looked at him, the scepticism written all over her lovely face.

"You're in love with me?" Doubtfulness in every word. Finally he thought it's finally sinking in,

"YES Alex! I AM IN LOVE WITH YOU and I want you to stay here, with me." She gasped,

"But I can't you said it was my time and that I am to move on and there's Chris and Ray and Shaz to consider, plus Sam and Annie are in there too and,"

Gene shushed her and pulled her face gently up to his, kissing it softly. She responded for a minute or two but as Gene pulled away (he felt the need to say something special) she moaned at the loss off warmth and softness on her lips.

"Look Alex, I guarantee there will tough times and I guarantee that we will fight and want to murder each other, and it may make us want to walk away from this but I also guarantee that if I don't ask you to be mine, I will watch you walk away and it will haunt me until I die; well not die but you know go into the pub and… erm… yeah. So when I say I love you it's not because I want you, or because I can't have you. It's because of the way I feel when we're together, I feel like I would quite happily top myself for you to live, like chubby little angels are camping in my head firing little heart shaped arrows into my brain every time I see, smell, hear, taste, touch or even sense you in the room, so I'm dosed up with love and I am too much of a dopey git to say anything worthy for your beautiful ears to hear. I feel like the world is perfect just because you've smiled or laughed and when you cry and feel sad the world is cold and blue until your laughing again! You give me freedom I've never felt before and give me life when Im weary so I feel at one with myself and my surroundings and – Oh for god sake!" He yelled as he turned and looked behind Alex. She shook her head having been hypnotised by Gene's speech,

"What? What is it Gene?" She turned around. Then smiling gently, she said,

"Thought you lot were getting the drinks in?"

Ray, Chris and Shaz looked at her; clearly amused at the position she and their 'Guv' seemed to be in. Alex unlatched her arms from around Gene's neck and tried to wriggle her torso from out of his interlinked arms but he refused to let go.

"No you lot need to hear this too. Now you are my team, but you are more than that, you are my best friends too. So this choice is down to you, you can either:

1: Go into the pub/heaven

2: Stay here with me and Bolly

3: We all go into the pub

4: We all stay here

Take your pick."

"I hope we get to pick as well Gene?" Said a voice from behind Ray, Chris and Shaz who promptly split apart to reveal…

"SAM AND ANNIE!" Everyone cried apparently happy, the best friends all hugged and Sam shook his head fervently,

"Now let's stop all these nancy boy speeches and get in the pub, Im gasping for a pint!" And with that they all walked through the pub door, embracing the paradise that awaited them on the other side.

The End!