Chapter Three: Love Requited

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Our gang now frequented Sylar's as regularly as we had frequented Peter's TV room. Nathan turned one of the rooms into a TV room where you could view your purchases at a small additional charge. Although we had promised to pay the full amount, since Sylar's appeared to become very popular as time went on, he gave us 'discounts,' which basically meant that he sometimes gave us them for free. Especially if it was something we had been looking for for a long time.

After school one day I decided to pay a visit to Sylar's to see if Nathan had received the movies I had specifically asked for. Gabriel had to help his dad out at the store and Peter had a hell of a lot of homework to get through so I was no use to them. Thus Sylar's was my destination. Plus I hadn't filled my Nathan quota for the day.

He looked up as the bell above the door jingle and smiled when he saw it was me. He bent down and picked a box, placing it on the counter.

"Here they are," he said, thinking the movies I had requested were the only reasons I had ventured into his store without Peter and Gabriel.

I gazed into the box in amazement. Reverentially I picked one of the videos up. "Mr. Smith Goes To Washington?" I whispered. "And The Best Man?" I added, picking up the one underneath. Then I peered deeper into the box and had to quell a whimper.

I looked up at Nathan. "You didn't." He merely grinned.

He had bought me every season of Smallville. Now you understand why I found him absolutely freaking adorable. I gazed at him in apparent adoration. "You," I began, "are my Hero. With a capital H."

He actually blushed and then quickly busied himself with whatever he had been doing before I interrupted.

I gazed awhile at my new videos, stroking them in turns. Yeah, I know, I was – and still am – weird.

"Rachel?"

"Hmm?" I asked, absentmindedly, trying to tear myself away from my new videos. It wasn't that hard. Nathan always won out over movies, even ones I really liked.

He looked so nervous as though he was going to ask me something he thought I wasn't going to like. "Umm...you realise that Peter likes Gabriel...in that way...don't you?"

I blinked. What had that got to do with anything?

"Um, yes. Why?" I asked, stumped for a reason.

He looked relieved. "Oh, never mind."

Then I caught on (boy, am I slow sometimes). "Oh, I don't like Peter that way," I said in a rush. "I mean, he's cute and all but...not my type." You are, I wanted to add.

It was his turn to blink. "Oh. Okay. Umm...then would you mind...umm...going on a date with me?" he asked, the last part in uncommon haste.

Okay. I had not expected that. He had that look on his face, that look that meant he thought I was going to laugh in his face. It was rather adorable. God, how many times have I used the word 'adorable' to describe Nathan? So many, many times.

"No."

He looked utterly crestfallen. I had to smile. "No, I wouldn't mind going on a date with you," I clarified. And that is why my Mum said I should major in English when I go to university.

I don't know he suddenly seemed to be on my side of the counter and at that point I didn't much care. Especially when he kissed me. Things like that just don't matter when the man you have had a crush on for years kisses you.

It was everything a first kiss should be, and more. It was a rather sweet little kiss at first, as though he was waiting for my response. Once he learnt I wasn't going to slap him he deepened the kiss until I was lost in his mouth on mine.

He pulled away a few minutes later but I was having none of that. "Don't stop," I whispered, before pulling his mouth back onto mine. And I just couldn't resist the Fleetwood Mac reference.

I told Peter about kissing Nathan and he was quiet for a very long time. I was suddenly apprehensive, thinking he didn't approve (not that that would have stopped me from kissing Nathan), and asked, "You don't...mind, do you?"

He jumped a little as though he had been lost in his own little dream world. "What?" he asked, confused, then his ears caught up with his brain. "Oh! No! Why would I mind?"

"You seemed a bit quiet there for a moment, that's all," I replied, feeling relieved.

Peter, who was never very good at hiding his feelings or lying for that matter, looked shifty. "Oh? Was I?"

Okay, now I was intrigued. "Yes. You were." I narrowed my eyes at him. "You didn't have a ton of homework, did you?"

Peter's shiftiness increased. My eyes widened of their own accord. "You went to see Gabriel!"

As Peter began to blush a bright crimson I continued with, "You kissed him, didn't you?"

Peter nodded slightly. I waited with bated breath but he said nothing. "And?" I prompted.

He squirmed under my eye. "And...nothing."

"Nothing? What do you mean 'nothing'?" I exclaimed, actually enraged on behalf of my friend.

"Wait." I eyed him suspiciously. "You ran, didn't you?"

Peter seemed to be disappearing into his chair as we spoke. I took that as a sign that I was right. "And why exactly did you do that, you idiot?" Sometimes I really did not understand boys.

Finally Peter spoke, although very quickly. "Because...because what if he didn't like me that way? What if I ruined our entire friendship? What if..."

At that point I interrupted. Being the expert I am on unrequited love I had every right to. "And what if he does like you that way? What then? What must he be thinking? You ambush him with a kiss...and then run away? Hmm? What then?"

Peter couldn't answer. Thankfully at that moment there was a knock at the door.

"Rachel? Gabriel's here!" my Mum yelled on the other side of the door. Although I could hear her perfectly well if she spoke in a normal voice she insisted on yelling. I do not know why.

Peter looked absolutely petrified so I took pity on him.

"I'm coming!" I yelled back, and then turned to Peter. "You," I said, pointing at him. "Stay." I didn't think he was going anywhere but you can never be too sure.

Gabriel was waiting for me in the kitchen. My parents absolutely loved him. I think my Mum even had a bit of a crush on him, although it only showed when she was talking to me.

"Hey," I greeted him, because I couldn't think of anything to say. He merely nodded.

There was silence in the kitchen for a moment until Gabriel asked, "Is Peter here?"

Because it was very hard to lie to Gabriel Gray I merely said, "Yup."

An expression appeared on his face that I had never seen there before. "Umm...so he probably told you what...happened?" Oh god! Gabriel Gray, always-cool, intense-eyed Gabriel Gray was nervous. And was that a smidge of embarrassment I detected?

I settled for, "Yup."

Since he didn't appear to have anything else to say I decided to help him. "So...did you like...what he did?"

Another expression I had never seen before appeared. "Yes," he murmured dreamily.

"He's in my room if you want to talk to him," I added, just in case he hadn't seen the huge grin adorning my face. Gabriel, after an initial pause, left for my room.

After awhile Mum came into the kitchen. "What was all that about?" she asked.

"My two best friends in the whole world are sucking face at this very moment," I said with importance. "Well, hopefully." Because sometimes you cannot count on boys to do what they should do.

Mum was surprised, to say the least. "Peter...and Gabriel?"

Dad said, as he entered, "Yeah, didn't you guess?"

Mum gave him an accusatory glare. "You knew? And you didn't tell me?"

Dad had the grace to look ashamed. "Sorry. But it was sort of obvious." I must have inherited my slowness from Mum. I decided then not to tell Mum about being kissed by Nathan. At least, not until she had gotten over the shock of Peter and Gabriel.

That didn't actually seem to take long. When Peter and Gabriel finally came downstairs, trying to keep the identical grins off of their faces, Mum invited them to dinner as though it was what she had been planning to do all along. Which it probably had.

I broke the news about my kiss with Nathan when we were doing the dishes. Peter, Gabriel and Dad were watching TV. Peter had commandeered the remote so it was probably reruns of Gilmore Girls or something. Dad thought Lauren Graham was hot was he probably wouldn't mind.

Mum was overjoyed. I was slightly overwhelmed by how overjoyed she was. She kept hugging me and bouncing up and down while doing so, and then stopping and looking at me. Rinse. Lather. Repeat. Sometimes I did not understand my own mother.

"So?" she asked, slightly out of breath. "Does this mean you're dating?"

"Yes...I mean he asked me out on a date before he kissed so...I guess so." I gazed up into Mum's face. "Mum, why exactly are you so excited?" I asked, to forestall another bounce session.

It turns out that Mum (unlike Dad) had always suspected I had a crush on Nathan. Plus, according to her, any guy who can sit through The Philadelphia Story twenty times is good enough for her daughter. That is, she said, what had made her pick Dad in the first place. Also because he was adorable when he blushed. I had never seen this adorability but decided to take her word for it.

Dating Nathan was different from merely being his friend. Apart from the obvious, like being able to kiss him whenever I wanted, it was different because he liked to surprise me. He rarely told me anything of what he was planning for our dates no matter how much I bugged him. And that dates were always worth his aggravating silences.

Like one time he gave me a special screening of Blonde Ambition in the Viewing Room and actually sat through the whole thing with me, even though I knew he had never liked the movie. Or when he borrowed the Petrelli jet plane and took me to San Francisco where we watched the sun go down on the Golden Gate Bridge. Or when he flew me to Texas and paid for riding lessons.

Of course he wasn't the only one giving things. That part of dating I had never really understood. The guy does everything to please the girl – but what does the girl do? Just sit there and look pretty? No way, not me.

One time I bought him a kitten. He had told me once that he had always wanted a cat but because his mother was allergic (I knew there was something I didn't like about her) the Petrellis had never had one. He called the cat Hunter, because he was always chasing after his tail and various bits of fluff.

And then, on one of the rare occasions when I took him out on a date, I surprised him by taking him to a concert where one of his favourite bands, XTC, was playing. When they began to play 'Then She Appeared' he took me in his arms and kissed me very deeply and then as the song played he whispered the words in my ear.

Of course I wasn't the only who was sublimely happy at that time. Peter was enjoying his time with Gabriel. They spent most of their time together, whether pretending to do their homework or pretending to watch a movie in the TV room.

Just as Mum had never caught onto the fact that Peter and Gabriel liked each other neither did Mama and Papa Petrelli. When they found out that not only was I dating Nathan but that I was also the person who had convinced him that he should quit law school, they were (to put it as mildly as possible) furious. Of course I didn't know any of this until much later but it was around this time that they began to formulate a plan to get rid of me and get Nathan back on track.

On the day of my eighteenth birthday Nathan told me he had a surprise waiting for me at the store and that I should come around at eight. I had already realised that I could get nothing out of him when he wanted to surprise me and just agreed.

When I arrived Nathan ushered me upstairs where he had cooked a meal for me. Macaroni and cheese, my favourite. It was delicious but over far too quickly. He sat me down on the sofa afterwards and put Shop Around The Corner on to distract me while he did the dishes. He knew me too well.

About a quarter of the way into the movie Nathan joined me. He put his arm around me and watched the rest of the movie with me. Shop Around The Corner was actually one of the movies we both liked. Because we're both Jimmy Stewart fans, I guess.

At the end of the movie I had no time to glance at the clock and notice the lateness of the hour because Nathan chose that moment to kiss me very passionately. I was lost.

He broke the kiss too soon, by my mind. He then got down on his knees in front of me. The Famous Slowness struck again because I didn't click (of course, it could have been the daze left over from Nathan's kiss).

"Rachel?" he said, very seriously.

"Yes, Nathan?" I replied, going along with whatever he was doing.

"Will you marry me?"

I said yes before what I really understood what he had just asked. And then what he had asked me sunk in. He wanted to marry me. Nathan Petrelli wanted to marry me.

And I had said yes. Because (for goodness sake, people, catch up) I wanted to marry him.

"Rachel, are you alright?" he asked after a long kissing session. A panicked expression replaced the happy one. "You do want to me marry me...don't you?"

I smiled because frankly whenever Nathan showed the slightest (what his parents would call) weakness he was so bloody adorable I could never resist.

"Yes, Nathan," I replied, wrapping my arms around his neck. "My answer will always be yes."

He slipped the engagement ring on about then, I think. Of course, I wasn't paying much attention, distracted as I was by his oh-so-cute serious expression.

"So, this was my surprise?" I asked.

"Well..." Nathan said in a tone I'd never heard him use before. "Not all of it."

He kissed me. Quite passionately, in fact.