to all the reviewers: thanks, we really, truly appreciate it!

hey, here's chapter 14. enjoy and don't forget to review!

-Kristine and Cimmy

disclaimer: see last chapter. I'm too lazy to type it out today.

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Chapter 14: I'm Coming Out
By NYgoldfish54

Anna's POV

"I'm telling you both, for the final fucking time, I am not letting Fred screw me!" were Lex's parting words to Sammie and me last night before she'd shut the lights. We'd been teasing her, and we didn't mean anything by it, but she snapped at us and turned out the light. I couldn't tell because it was so dark, but I think she was crying.

If Lex was crying, she wasn't showing it when she was beating me awake at 6:30 AM (entirely too early for people who went to sleep at 1:30 in the morning) with a pillow, when she was helping pack the instruments into the truck, and she isn't showing it now at 7:30 during breakfast. She's sitting in between Charlie and *gasp* Fred. All the Ducks are down here, but I don't know why. If I was them I'd be sleeping, but I'd bet money Connie woke them all up.

I put my bowl of cereal down next to Averman, slide into the seat next to him, and engage him in conversation. He had me laughing so hard yesterday. He's rather sweet, and unlike Fred, doesn't have a girlfriend.

"So what are our plans?" asks Ken loudly, grabbing everyone's attention.

"Well," Chris says, "we've got rehearsal from 8-10, but after that…"

"Yeah," says Matt who was talking to Luis, "You guys will have to entertain yourselves for a few hours, but after we're back, I thought we were heading for the beach?"

"We are! We are!" Connie exclaims, hopping up, practically pushing Guy off his chair before losing her balance and falling back into her own seat again.

"I thought you said I could come with you to rehearsal?" Julie says from Jeff's side.

"I did say that, didn't I?" Jeff looks cheerfully oblivious to the nasty looks that Lex, Sammie, Anthony, Matt, and Chris are giving him. I'm probably throwing him dirty looks too, but I can't see my own face. We really hadn't wanted the Ducks to hear any songs until the show. We wanted to 'wow' them, so to speak.

"Hey, if Julie gets go, we all get to go!" Cecilia cries. She's been chatting it up with Anthony since he went to find her last night. I don't know what he said, but it seems to have done the trick. Cecilia's in an incredibly good mood this morning.

Anthony probably won her over by taking care of her while she was drunk. Anthony's sweet like that. He's got a knack of knowing when people need to be taken care of and then he does it. When Chris got the chicken pox, Anthony came with board games and calamine lotion. When Sammie and Matt had the flu, Anthony brought them each a hot water bottle and some Campbell's Chicken Soup. When Jeff had strep-throat and a fever, Anthony brought cough drops and played cards with him for hours. Anthony was the one who held Lex's hand when she went to have her appendix out, and Anthony was the one who took me out for Valentine's Day last year after my date stood me up. Yeah, Anthony's a sweetheart, and it wouldn't surprise me one bit if that's why Cecilia trusts Anthony now. He's taken care of her.

"Oh, we want to come! Come on, please?" Averman says to me.

"It's up to Lex," I say.

"Come on, Lex, please?" Adam whines.

"Don't you guys want to do stuff here?" Lex asks the Ducks. She looks rather desperate for them to say yes.

"Not really," says Goldberg, chewing his banana.

"Why is this up to me?" Lex snaps at me.

"Cause you're lead singer…you know, captain," I say, grinning at her.

"Come on, Lex, let us come," Portman cuts in. "We'll be good, even me."

"Promise?" Lex asks.

"Promise," says Portman.

"Alright, I guess you guys can tag along if you want," Lex gives in at last.

As we get on to the bust, Lex slips away from Fred and catches up to me.

"If this turns out to be a disaster, it's on your head," she says to me.

"Why mine?" I ask.

"Cause you're backup singer…you know, second in command," she says grinning evilly and climbing on to the bus.

Interesting. Very interesting. I didn't see that coming. I should have, but I didn't. I sort of walked right into it, but I didn't see it because I'd always figured that Jeff was second in command.

***

Fulton's POV

Portman and I had a very long discussion after his performance last night. That ass, coming out to Cecilia and Luis. He still doesn't want to tell the rest of the team about me…and him…about us. He's so aggravating sometimes.

We're on the bus going with the band to rehearsal. Jeff invited Julie, and somehow the rest of the Ducks have gotten to go too. Lex and her friends didn't look too happy.

"What's this show for?" Dwayne asks. "Is it for charity or something else?"

"Well," says Sammie, answering from her seat next to me, "it's sort of a talent search for a rock and roll band. One of the local New York radio stations puts it on every year. We sent in one of our tapes, and the radio station liked it. They called us in and we did a live audition, and we got picked.

"So you just play songs?" Kenny asks.

"Not exactly," says Matt. "They gave us a list…like, we have to play so many songs by the Beatles, so many by the Rolling Stones, this many by Zeppelin, that many by the Who. A bunch of non-classic rock, and so on."

"What does the winner get?" Goldberg asks.

"It changes each year. This year you get to be opening act for the Stones on their summer tour next year. It would be a huge chance for us," Chris says.

"The problem is," Lex cuts in, "that winning won't be easy. We've got the least experience, the least professional touch, etc… I mean, the first day they gave us a list of all the competing bands and the information on the people in them. Stuff like name and age. We're the youngest band there, and by a lot. The next youngest person after us is 23 years old."

"That would definitely make you the youngest," Portman says, glaring at Sammie. Sammie's in Portman's usual seat. She and I got along so well yesterday, and I really like her. Not how I like Portman, mind you, but I like her.

After Karaoke night, and after Portman and I had our chat, I left the room to go for a walk. Sammie was in the now empty dining room, practicing her guitar. She waved, and proceeded to play a few songs for me. She's really good…after she wrapped it up for the night, we talked for a while. She figured out Portman and me. I'm really not sure how she did it.

Actually, I do. She talked me into playing a game where she asked me a lot of random questions really fast and I'd say the first thing that came into my head.

"Favorite color?"

"Gray."

"Favorite food?"

"Pizza."

"Dog's name?"

"Don't have one."

"Favorite band?"

"Metallica."

"Love interest?"

"Portman."

Silence reigned supreme for a moment, and I was terrified of what she'd say. I'd only known her two days, and I liked her, and what if she didn't want to be friends now? What if she is a rabid homophobe? What if she told everyone? I'm ready to tell, but if Portman wasn't he may freak and possibly leave. That would kill me.

In that moment I watched her, in that one moment her face was expressionless, and in that one moment a hundred thousand questions crossed my mind. A million thoughts. I thought about how I'd always assumed Portman and I would come out together, and to the entire Ducks team, to our friends. Not me, alone, by myself, to someone I'd known for two days. What if Sammie freaked? What if the Ducks freak? What if Portman freaks? And what if I end up alone, by myself, like I am right now?

But after that one moment, in which Sammie's face was expressionless, and a million doubts, fears, and thoughts ran through my head, Sammie smiled. 'Portman, huh?' she'd said, grinning. 'He's sort of a jerk, always torturing Cecilia. Not bad looking though, but I'm more of a Ben Affleck girl myself. To each his own, though, right?'

I nearly cried when she'd said that. Relief flooded through my veins as she hugged me and promised me she wouldn't tell if I didn't want her to. I made up my mind right there about two things. One, I can't be mad at Portman because he came out without me because I just did the same thing. Two, Sammie is definitely a special girl and a keeper as a friend.

The chit chat, which I'd stopped paying attention to when I was thinking about last night, continues for the remainder of the trip.

When the bus finally comes to a halt, Matt climbs off the bus and tells us that we should go in through 'that door' he points to and take a seat. The door leads to a stage, and tons of seats. There are no chairs by the stage though, and we decide we want to be near the stage, so we sit over there on the floor.

20 minutes later at about 8:25, Lex, Jeff, Anna, Chris, Matt, Sammie, and Anthony all take their places behind various mics and instruments.

They open up with a song by the Rolling Stones called 'Start Me Up.' From there they continued with 'Layla' by Eric Clapton (technically Derek and the Dominos, but the hell with it), the Doors 'Touch Me' (Matt was absolutely brilliant in that song) and 'She Said, She Said' by the Beatles. The girls took over when the guys took a water break. Anna, Lex, and Sammie were incredible doing 'Edge of Seventeen' by Stevie Nicks.

I especially liked when Jeff sang the chorus of 'She Said, She Said'.

"She said
I know what it's like to be dead
I know what it is to be sad
And she's making me feel like I've never been born."

Rehearsal continued without incident from 8:25-9:45. Everyone was dancing and laughing, even Cecilia. Then at around 9:47, Dwayne was sent flying head first into a speaker by Charlie. Dwayne's flailing legs tripped up Guy and Connie, who tripped up Goldberg, who crashed into Portman, who knocked Russ off balance, and so on and so forth like dominos, until it all ended with Banks sitting in the wreckage of a drum set. The song the band was playing ('We Didn't Start The Fire' by Billy Joel) stopped abruptly.

"Uh-oh" Banksie says, climbing off the rubble.

"Oh shit," exclaims Matt, surveying what's left from the drum set from behind his own.

"Glad that wasn't ours," says Chris to nobody in particular.

"We're leaving at 10, but we're the only ones who'll be here until 3, when a different group comes in," says Jeff, a look of panic in his eyes. "If they ask about it, we'll tell them it wasn't like that when we left. Nobody's filming our rehearsals or anything, I asked when we first got here- so if we stick that that story, were in the clear."

"Let's pack up and go," Anna says quickly, practically throwing her guitar into its case.

Lex, Jeff, Chris, Matt, Anthony, and Sammie quickly followed suit. They loaded their stuff back on to the truck as we got onto the bus. I saw through the open door that Lex left two one-hundred dollar bills on what was left of the drums, before she sprinted away and joined us online for to get on the bus.

"I really, really hope that covers the cost," she says, grinning guiltily at me.

"Alright," says Charlie, "back to the hotel to get our stuff, then off to the beach, right Lex?"

"Right," she says, sitting down next to Fred. "Guilty conscience, Charlie?" she asks him.

"Yeah a little," he says. "It was me-"

"I know. I saw you start the domino effect," she laughs. "Don't worry about it. If they don't know it was us, they can't kill us," she says, but then she glances quickly at the building, probably searching for people. "Hopefully, they don't know it was us."

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the contest mentioned in this chapter is, of course, made up. I don't know how you'd earn the position of opening act for the Rolling Stones, but this contest isn't it. this contest isn't real. the Rolling Stones have nothing to do with it. please don't get me sued by telling people that.

we borrowed the titles and lyrics in this chapter from the following bands/artists (we did NOT make them up, nor are we making any money off them):
The Rolling Stones- Start Me Up
Eric Clapton/Derek and the Dominos- Layla
The Doors- Touch Me
The Beatles- She Said, She Said
Stevie Nicks- Edge of Seventeen