With the worry about his parent's reaction to Chauncey off of his shoulders, TJ felt comfortable enough to talk about his around his parents. This mostly included how cute he thought Chauncey was and why. At first he didn't think he would go into much detail, but found that he had it broken down to a science. Although his parents were willing to accept the possibility of him being gay, they had to remind themselves of the other possibilities.

The next day at school his friends noticed a happier, more normal TJ and wondered what had happened to make him this way. None of them actually questioned him about it for fear that they may inexplicably cause it to stop. But they did remember to ask him on Saturday. In the meantime, they were content with him acting like his old self.

They were all looking forward to Saturday, especially TJ. He had invited Sam and Chauncey to the sleepover, but did not tell his friends for two reasons. First, he didn't want Spinelli to bring her boxing gloves and fight Sam; though as long as she didn't threaten Chauncey in some form, he was sure that Sam would refuse to fight. The second thing would be that he didn't want to tell them that he was dating Chauncey. He wanted that to be a surprise.

They all agreed to meet over at his house at four o'clock Saturday; Sam and Chauncey were going to come thirty minutes later to avoid conflict. Until then, TJ spent his time cleaning his room. Soon he was actually able to see his floor. He usually argued with his mother about his room not being clean; his argument was that he was a boy and boy's rooms were usually messy. It didn't hold up with his mother. Still, his room usually stayed messy, but not dirty. For today, he figured that since his friends were coming over that he should sort through the mess.

Soon enough it was 4:00 and the doorbell rang, and his mother yelled upstairs that his friends were here. After meeting them downstairs they went out to the backyard.

For a while, they were having a pretty good time. That was until the backdoor opened and Sam and Chauncey stepped through.

"What are they doing here?" Spinelli asked.

"I invited them," Said TJ.

"I thought this was supposed to be with us only!"

"I asked Dr. Million if it was okay and he said yes. Just give them a chance Spinelli, you don't even know them." Once they made their way over, no one talked. Not wanting to start off like this TJ broke the silence.

"We should do that thing teachers do when there's a new student," He said. "You know, when we all go around and say something about ourselves."

"I hate it when they do that," Sam mumbled. "Do we have to?"

"We aren't doing anything else."

"Fine, but I don't like it." In minutes everyone was sitting in a circle. "Do we do the whole 'what's your favorite color, what do you like to do, and what's your talent' thing?"

"Just get on with it," Spinelli told her.

"Don't rush me, pigtails. Okay my name is Samantha, but since I hate that name you all have to call me Sam. If you call me Samantha I will not acknowledge you. My favorite color is pink but since I can't wear it much with my hair color, i have to substitute it with its ugly cousin red. I like to paint, but I'm really into singing." Sam said. "Okay next person." She pointed the person to her left, which was Gus.

"I'm Gus but you all know that already," Gus said. "My favorite color is green and I know a lot about the army. I just moved here about three and a half months ago." They all went around, in the order of Sam, Gus, Gretchen, Chauncey, Vince, Mikey, Spinelli, and TJ. At the end, everyone still felt an awkwardness in the air and they all silently agreed what they had done was pointless. Now they all lay on the grass, trying to think of something to do.

"Wanna go to the movies?" Chauncey suggested.

"There's nothing good out," Vince told him.

"What about the park?" Gus asked.

"No, the park's been getting really dirty lately," Gretchen said. "What about the museum?"

"No offence Gretchen," Spinelli said. "But the weekend was meant for fun, not learning."

"Don't have to be so negative, pigtails," Sam told her.

"Look, we're not going to the museum!"

"Why not! I'd actually like to!"

"Then why don't you go and leave?"

"You got a problem with me, pigtails?"

"Yeah I do!"

"You know what we should do?" Chauncey spoke up and caught everyone off guard. "We should let them fight. I wanna see who would win."

"Are you crazy," Vince said. "They'll kill each other."

"We have nothing else better to do," Chauncey said.

"Its fine with me," Spinelli said. "She's been getting on my nerves for a while now!"

"I'm not fighting you, pigtails," Sam said, not moving from her place on the ground. "Calm down."

"What are you, afraid you'll lose?"

"Spinelli if she doesn't want to fight don't fight," Mikey told her. "You two can talk this out."

"Listen to him," Sam said. "He's right. We can talk."

"Come on, Sam. We have nothing better to do," Chauncey said.

"How many people want us to fight?" Sam asked them. Spinelli, Chauncey, TJ, Vince, and Gus raised their hands. "Okay, I'll fight you. Any rules?"

"No shoes," TJ said. "Spinelli if you kick with your boots it wouldn't be fair."

"I won't need to kick," She said. "I can just punch her and win."

"Yeah whatever," Sam said. The two of them removed their shoes and Sam pulled her hair back in a ponytail and removed her earrings.

"Who do you think is going to win?" TJ asked the others.

"It's hard to tell," Said Gretchen. "We all know how well Spinelli can fight, but we've never seen Sam fight. As far we know it's 50-50."

"Not even that," Spinelli said as she and Sam took their places across from each other. Everyone else stood on the edge in between the two girls. All of them, except Mikey because he was against fighting, were wondering who would win. Some of them actually thought they might kill each other or at least get close to it. After a count down from Chauncey the two charged at each other but ended up locking hands, each trying to push the other.

It looked like it would be a tie until Sam let go. Since she was pushing so hard, Spinelli feel forward but didn't reach the ground as Sam grabbed her by the back of her collar and kneed her in the stomach and then let her go to fall on the ground. Everyone watching was speechless. A moment passed until Spinelli picked herself off the ground, ready to try again. Not giving Sam a chance to get ready she lunged forward landing a good upper cut to her jaw, punches to her stomach, and a kick for good measure. Stumbling back, Sam had to give her credit, she was good. Standing up straight, she calmly walked over to her. Everyone thought she was going to give up but was proven wrong when Sam grabbed Spinelli's head at the sides and slammed her own head against the one in her hands.

Soon it was just a mess of punches and kicks and neither of the girls looked like they were going to give up. But after ten minutes they found themselves exhausted, standing across from each other.

"You're better than I thought you would be," Said Spinelli.

"Same here, pigtails," Sam said. "I think we're even. Wanna call it even?"

"No," Said Spinelli. "I don't. But we are. It's even." They shook hands then looked over to the others who were trying to comprehend the violence they just witnessed. "You guys might want to close your mouths."

"Yeah, you're letting flies in." Sam said. "So now what do want do?"

"I dunno, toss a ball around?" Asked Vince. Everyone nodded. They found a ball in the bushes and started to toss it around.

"Anything interesting happen to anyone?" Gus asked, tossing the ball to Mikey.

"They opened up a new Mini Lounge," Sam said.

"What's that?" Gretchen asked.

"It's this place where kids go to just relax," Sam told them. "But it's underground, only kids know about it. The last one got closed because some kids blabbed about it and adult found it. The only reason I'm telling you all is because I trust you not to tell anyone else. But they opened a new one. We can go tomorrow if you want."

"That sounds fun," said Gus. "Anyone else."

"I'm dating someone," Said TJ as he caught the ball.

"Who?" Everyone asked in unison.

"C-Chauncey," He said. There was silence, and then everyone except himself, Chauncey, and Sam who were standing next to each other laughed.

"No really," Spinelli said, trying to stop laughing. "Who is it?"

"It's Chauncey," He repeated. Trying to convince then he wasn't joking he took Chauncey's hand in his. Everyone stared at the two of them. The longer it took for them to say something more worried TJ became.

"WHAT?" Spinelli yelled.

"But he's a guy," said Vince.

"I know," TJ said. "Is that a problem?"

"Can you do that?" Gus asked him.

"Yeah," said Chauncey. "It's not illegal or nothing."

"But he's another guy!" Spinelli yelled. "You know what I think? I think you're only doing this because of what happened and it messed you up in the head! And you," She walked up to them and grabbed Chauncey by the collar. "I think you're taking advantage of that!"

"Watch it, pigtails!" Sam grabbed her hand and pulled her off of him. "He didn't take advantage of anybody! From what he told me, TJ proposed that they date first! So back off!"

"Is that true?" Spinelli asked TJ. He nodded. Instead of saying anything she just looked at him and walked across the yard.

"It's okay with me," Mikey said. "If you're serious about it then it's okay."

"Yeah, it's fine with me." Said Gretchen.

"Me too," Gus said.

"It's weird," Vince told them. "It's really weird. I still want to be your friend and everything, but I think it's weird."

"So what do we do now?" Chauncey asked.

"Anyone up for Monopoly?"

For the rest of the day everyone played Monopoly, which was perfect because it was well-known that it was the longest game anyone could play. They all played, except Spinelli who sat in the corner. However what they didn't plan was on TJ winning seven times in a row in three hours.

After a dinner of pizza and dessert of ice cream, everyone went to sleep in the living room.

~*~DREAM SEQUENCE~*~

It was dark, and he could feel that his arms and legs were tied together, and that he was wearing a blindfold along with tape over his mouth. At first he thought that he was taken back to that old house, but remembered that it was impossible and told himself repeatedly this was just a dream, and like all dreams, he had to wake up eventually.

Before that happened however he was pushed onto his stomach on the hard floor and the weight he was hoping never to feel again fell over him. Even though he had he tape over his mouth he started to scream as loud as his voice would allow.

~*~OUT OF DREAM SEQUENCE~*~

Everyone in the house was woken up by a blood curdling scream. Jumping up out of their sleeping bags, everyone in the living room looked around to see TJ sitting up, screaming at the top of his lungs with his eyes closed. They tried to calm him down and make him open his eyes but it didn't work. After a few minutes he stopped and looked around, shaking.

"What happened?" Sam asked him. His eyes darted around the room.

"A really, really bad dream," He said.

"Are you okay?" His mother asked, walking into the living room.

"I think so," He mumbled. "It was just really bad. I can go back to sleep." He laid back down in his sleeping bag and the others followed suit. The lights were turned back off as he found it difficult to fall asleep again.

Donna nnov: It's complicated. That's the only way I can describe it. It's gonna be bitter sweet.

RandallXSpinelli: I hope I made this chapter interesting, it took me while to type.

Please review!