Summary: Justin's POV. The events leading up to Susan catching Andrew and Justin making out in the swimming pool, and what happened afterwards.

Disclaimer: Don't own. Don't sue. And the song is so not mine.

Author's Note: Sorry for the sucky title. Also, sorry if I went a little OTT on the angst. It just seemed appropriate at the time.

X x X

So why do we choose the boys who are naughty?

I don't fit in so why do you want me?

And I know I can't tame you… but I just keep trying.

- No Doubt, "Bathwater"

X x X

I didn't want to go to the party in the first place. I hate that house. It gives me the creeps. But Andrew wanted to go, and so I decided it wouldn't be too bad there as long as there were a lot of people there. And there were. At first.

But now it was after midnight and everyone was gone, except Andrew and me. I mean everyone. Even Zach Young, whose house it was, hadn't bothered to stick around.

I was sitting on one of the pool-side chairs, a towel wrapped tight around my shoulders even though I hadn't been in the water all evening. It was the kind of pleasantly warm night you learn to expect when you live in California… but I couldn't shake the icy feeling I got whenever I looked at the darkened front room windows and thought that, if I had sat in this same spot six months earlier, I might well have seen Mrs Young shoot herself in the head.

"Justin?" Andrew hoisted himself out of the pool and sat down next to me. He didn't bother trying to dry himself at all, and I was fascinated by the way the water beaded on his skin.

I pried my eyes away. "What?"

"Are you gonna sit there the whole night or are you gonna come swim with me?" he asked, his face taking on the deceptively innocent look that by then I knew all too well.

I shook my head. "I'm not feeling so good. Think I might head home."

I can't lie… not to Andrew, anyway. He raised an eyebrow.

"What?" I asked. "You know, we shouldn't even be here. If Young or his dad gets back and catches us here an hour after the party's over then you do realise that we can be charged with trespassing, right? And I really don't feel so good."

"Of course they're not gonna catch us here," Andrew said. "The dad's not due back for four days and Zach's off howling at the moon somewhere yelling Juuuuuulieeeeeeeeee."

If it was anyone but Andrew – someone like John, for instance – I would've probably aimed a punch at his shoulder. Of course the kid was screwed up – his mom had killed herself right there in the front room of his house. He deserved to be cut a little slack, even if he'd never been one of my favourite people. But, since it was Andrew, I forced a slight smile. I would have tried a laugh, but for some time I'd been feeling like I might throw up.

"Oh, I get it," Andrew said, as if he had read my mind, "You're freaking 'cause Mary Alice did herself in. Well, as if you needed reminding, that was in the lounge, not out here. The worst thing that's ever happened out here is Zach's choice of swimming trunks."

I shrugged noncommittally.

"So are you gonna come with me or what?" he asked, getting up without waiting for me to reply.

Resignedly I freed myself from the towel and stood up.

But instead of getting back into the water Andrew simply stood by the pool with his back to me. Since Mrs Young died it had apparently been left mostly unused, and almost all of the lights were out. He stood there regarding the dark water in the corner between the steps and the pool's edge.

"Have you ever thought it might just be easier to do what she did?" he asked, and suddenly I wished he'd turn around so I could see his face and assure me that I wasn't talking to someone else altogether. My already cold body took another freezing jolt and, not for the first time, I wished I'd accepted John's offer of a ride home an hour earlier.

"What do you mean?" I asked, although I was pretty sure I already knew.

"Just to kill yourself and have it over with," he said, and his voice held none of its usual dark humour. It didn't seem to have any emotion behind it at all. "I think it might be. It'd be easier than having to justify everything."

"Andrew, quit it," I muttered, "You're freaking me out."

He didn't seem to hear. Instead his voice rose in pitch until it was a fairly accurate imitation of his mother. If I hadn't been so damned scared for his sanity I would've laughed out loud. "Andrew," he mimicked, "Why do you drink so much when you go out with your friends? Andrew, why don't you find a nice girl to settle down with after you've gone to college? Andrew, why can't you be more like your sister?" He laughed. It was completely without humour. "She actually asked me that the other day. Why can't you be more like your sister? Holy shit, my family is a joke."

"Andrew," I said, finally steeling myself to take a few steps closer to him, "How much have you had to drink?"

He turned around and there was no trace of the self-destructive person I'd been speaking to only seconds before… except for the tears still visible on his cheeks even in the poor light. But the cynical smile he gave me was all Andrew. "Not nearly enough."

I barely heard him. All I wanted to do was put my arms around him, but I felt compelled to settle for gripping his shoulder in a way that seemed suitably platonic. "Andrew," I said, "You know you can talk to me if there's something bothering you, right?"

His puzzled expression seemed genuine.

I brushed one hand against his cheek, lifting it to his eye level so he could see the dampness that had not been there before. (I felt secretly proud that I had not allowed my hand to linger for too long.)

For a few seconds I thought he would break again. Then he grinned and batted my hand away. "Water from the pool, idiot," he said, but not completely unkindly. And he believed it. Andrew is capable of convincing himself of just about anything. It's one of the thousand traits that make him so remarkable.

He lowered himself into the pool as if the frightening pause in his actions had never happened. I followed him tentatively, preparing myself not to shriek like a second-grader when the cold water hit me.

But the water was agreeably lukewarm. I guess the heating system was in better repair than the lighting. I ducked under quickly, trying to bring my whole body to the same temperature.

When I resurfaced Andrew was discarding something at the pool's edge. It took me a second to work out what it was. When I realised it I honestly think my heart stopped beating.

"Um, Andrew?" I stuttered. "What the…" I let the sentence hang, not even sure how I'd intended to finish.

"Skinny dipping is more fun, don't you think?" he asked rhetorically, and I could tell that was all the explanation I was getting.

I nodded mutely.

"Well?" he asked.

"What?" I replied stupidly.

He didn't say anything. Just looked pointedly at me, his eyes flickering down my body for a second before staring intently at me once more.

And suddenly all I could think was Oh my God. Oh. My. God. Ohmigod. In my head I sounded like some squealing, stereotyped gay guy from a bad '90s sitcom… which might not be as far from the truth as I once thought. In fact, I've recently become fairly sure that at least one of those applies to me.

Fortunately, my hands were steadier than my mind. In fact, I wasn't shaking in the least when I removed my trunks and threw them carelessly in the vague direction of the chair I'd been sitting on.

Andrew grinned, the cheeky half-smile that somehow always convinces me to do anything he asks. "Great," he said, and that was all the conversation we had for quite a while.

It was Andrew who moved first, but only because he didn't give me time to. He wrapped his arms around my waist and held me to him so tightly it felt like my ribs were turning to powder. I didn't care, though, because all of that seemed incredibly distant. This was more intimate than anything we'd done before, intimate enough to make me think that perhaps there was a time in the future where there could be an us instead of just him and me, and when he pressed his lips against mine I returned the kiss as hard as I could because I knew if I didn't I was going to say everything that had been on my mind since my talk with Gabrielle Solis. I was afraid that, if I didn't keep my mouth otherwise occupied, I was going to blurt out the fact – and it was a fact, it still is – that I was falling in love with him.

So I ordered myself to stop thinking, and instead concentrated on holding him as tightly as he was holding me, bringing our bodies so close together I could feel his heartbeat against my chest. Somehow we ended up in the corner between the steps and the pool's edge, with my slightly taller body pressing his against the joint in the walls. I never once let my mouth part from his.

All that time I was buzzing with a silent, previously unnamed desire that I was starting to accept as being as valid a part of me as blonde hair and blue eyes. Hormones were rushing all through my system, not just to the obvious places but everywhere; lending extraordinary sensitivity to the tips of my fingers where they dug in his hair; simultaneously making everything so clear and yet so hazy.

I wanted… something. I didn't care what we did but this time I wanted to do more than make out with him. And, yes, I don't doubt that I would have ended up losing my virginity, in someone else's outdoor swimming pool, in the middle of winter… if it hadn't been for what happened next.

It took a while to fully register that someone else was in the Youngs' back yard with us. Bizarrely, my first thought was It's Mrs Young. I knew she was watching us. Don't ask me why I thought that – being there with Andrew had the same effect on me as the few joints I've smoked in my time. I was spaced and nothing could pass through to my brain without getting scrambled like a bad TV transmission.

It hit me – hit both of us at the same time, as far as I can tell – that it would probably be a good idea not to get caught. But when you're wet, naked and turned on in a way that is visibly noticeable, there are very few options open to you in the way of escape routes. So we did the only thing we could think of, even if it was only a temporary measure. We ducked under water.

Andrew had been on the swim team at high school. I hadn't. I lasted a fairly long time under there, but eventually it was me who gave in first and went up for air.

The woman was one I'd seen around a few times, and although I didn't know her first name I knew who she was. Julie Mayer's mother. And suddenly I realised why she'd sounded so pissed. In the poor light, she'd mistaken the two of us for Zach Young and her daughter. When she saw me, she looked embarrassed.

When Andrew re-surfaced, gasping, she looked positively mortified. The only thing about Ms Mayer I knew, apart from the fact that she is Julie's mother, was that she is best friends with Andrew's mom. Andrew's homophobic mom.

So when he caught his breath, I shouldn't have been surprised that the first words out of his mouth were, "I'm not gay!"

But still, it cut like glass.

X x X

Ms Mayer – Susan, I found out later – had beat a hasty retreat as soon as she realised what was going on. Meanwhile, the two of us were recovering our clothes and dressing as quickly as we could. We hadn't said a word to each other since she left, and I'd stopped trying to look at him because he was flatly refusing to look at me.

Eventually, I broke the silence. "You think she'll tell your mom?" I asked.

He looked at me, that puzzled look he'd given me earlier, before I showed him the tears on my hand. "About what?"

He was blocking again. If he could tell himself he hadn't cried then I guess he can tell himself he's not gay. I don't know how long he can keep it up for – all I know is it's been three weeks now and we haven't… done anything since, although I've wanted to plenty of times. And sometimes I can see that he wants to, as well. But I think I might be the only one who'll ever know it. Like I said earlier, Andrew is capable of convincing himself of just about anything.

John had taken our truck when he left and would probably be asleep by now, and Andrew's car had been stolen a few months previously; so we were both stuck walking home at two in the morning. We stood at the arch which was the only break in the neat white picket fence which surrounded the Youngs' neat garden. Neither of us were in any hurry to be anywhere.

Impulsively, I leaned over and kissed the corner of his mouth. The soft, barely visible stubble on his face tickled my lips. I drew back and for a moment I thought he was going to kiss me again.

Then he said, "When you think about it, Julie Mayer's pretty hot, isn't she? She'll never model for Playboy, but hey – not bad for fourteen, right?"

I hung my head sadly and said nothing. The moment had passed. Perhaps it would never come back.

He walked off then, without even bothering to say goodbye. I didn't try to stop him. When he rounded the corner and was out of sight I slumped against the arch that might well have been the last thing Mary Alice Young ever saw. I didn't move for a long time.