A/N: I'm trying to make time go a little bit faster, so about two weeks have passed since Catherine's birthday. I'll answer some reviews, then you can read the story.

Silver Hair Fox: You seriously check at lunch to see if I've updated? That's so sweet! I hope the guy you like didn't see you crying, and if you want to check out the song, it's called Freshmen by The Verve Pipe. I can't hear it without bursting into tears. My friend has these really cool flame boxers, so I decided they'd be perfect for Nicky.

Gorgeous Nick Stokes: It seems like a lot of people are hoping Nicky will win Sara over, but who knows? I might decide to be completely evil and give her to Ecklie or something. Mischievious grin

ObessedTWFan: Gil took that lady on a date a long time ago (the lady who reconstructs faces with the skulls) but I don't think he kissed her...She's married now tear so I guess there's no hope for a second date. I'm trying to keep it so no one get's together until the end of the school year, but it's hard not to just let them all do what they want!

JoonSanders: I have some plans for those pix of the boys in their boxers, you'll just have to read and find out what!

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Warrick struggled up the driveway with a large ceramic dish in his hands. Grams had made a turkey for him to take over to the Thanksgiving party at Greg's, and it smelled delicious. He pushed the doorknob with his elbow, as he had no free hands, and eight pairs of hands grabbed him and pulled him inside. "You're finally here!" Mia squeeled gleefully, giving him a one-armed hug. "We've been waiting for hours.""Mia, you've only been here for..." Catherine checked her watch, "eight minutes. And no one came much earlier than you."
Mia laughed, her infectious good spirits causing the entire group to burst into racous peals of laughter. Then, red-faced and wiping tears from his eyes, Greg said, "Let's get out of the hall and go eat."Everyone agreed, and Greg led the way out of the hall and through one of the doors to a large kitchen, spotlessly clean, with a table and ten chairs in an adjoining dining room. The long counter was piled with food that everyone had brought, and a stack of plates and silverware was sitting next to it. Everyone loaded their plates with turkey and mashed potatoes, along with everything else that came to hand. Everyone even took a bit of the weird pot of stewed vegetables that Catherine had made herself. Contrary to their assumptions, she was an excellent cook and the entire group went back for seconds. When each person had found their place-card at the table, (Greg had set them out earlier, thinking it would be a good excuse to sit next to Sara) Mia proposed a toast. She tapped the blunt edge of her knife on the side of her glass, standing up and clearing her throat.
"Hey guys," she said nervously, "I just want to say thanks to all of you, you've been so nice to me, and you didn't even know me when we met at that coffee shop, but you let me join your group anyway. You guys are totally fab."
The group cheered and clumsily knocked their glasses together in the middle of the table, taking long drinks of bubbly before digging in to the fantastic food set before them. No one wanted any more wine after they had finished their first glasses, everyone was feeling much more content with the food than the drink that made them want to throw up with every passing sip. Indeed, Greg was looking a little bit green after half his glass was empty, and by the time he'd finished it, his usually bottomless appetite seemed to have been lost.Feeling quite cheery despite the tipsiness they were all experiencing for the first time, the gang headed upstairs to decide who was sleeping where. Greg said the girls could have his sister's room, and the boys would take his own room.
Mia, Catherine and Sara were aghast at the enormousity of the room they would be sleeping in, each of them choosing a place to sleep on one of the bunks on the bunkbed, or plush red couch. The room was neat and chic, furnished with everything a teenage girl could possibly want.
The boys, on the other hand, had embarked once again in a fight to claim the bed, this time in Greg's room. The floor was littered with books, broken chess pieces, crumpled pieces of paper, and every other kind of rubbish you could think of. Finally, they decided to sleep in another of his sisters' rooms. As the procession of boys, headed by Greg, passed by the desk and out the door, Nick noticed a piece of paper next to a blue ballpoint pen with the words, "Dear Sara" at the top.He snagged it quickly, stuffing it into his pocket to read later.
The girls said goodnight to the boys in the hallway that connected the bedrooms, and the group was a tangle of arms as everyone tried to hug everyone else simultaniously. After sorting everything out, Sara reached Greg last to say goodnight. He pulled her close to him and, checking to make sure Nick was no where in sight, gave her a kiss on the forhead. The feeling of her skin on his lips was electrifying to both of them, and they quickly pulled away, each going to his or her respective room.
Back in Greg's little sister's room, decorated in a lurid shade of pink, Nick pulled the letter out of his pocket and read it by the half-light of the moon coming through the window.

Dear Sara,
I don't know what to say. I've dreamed about the time when I could give you this letter for so long, and now that I'm writing it, I can't think of how to express what I feel every time I see you. It just seems like every time I see you I get butterflies in my stomach, and nothing I say comes out the way I want it to, when all I want to do is to shout out to the world how much you mean to me. I think, in some roundabout way, I've fallen in love with you. And I don't know what to do about it. I want you to be my lucky penny, my shining star. I want to be someone you can turn to when life gets to be too much. So I can only hope that maybe you feel the same, just a little bit, at least. So I can only hope you will except
All my love, forever and a day,
Greg

Nick finished the letter, fuming. He got up and made his way out into the hall and down to the bathroom, locking himself in. He began to slowly, deliberately, tear the letter into hundreds of pieces. They littered the air like confetti, raining down on the floor, and he was soon standing in a pile of his best friend's deepest thoughts, destroyed.
Nick swept the pieces into one hand and threw them into the wastebasket. He turned the tap on splashed cold water on his face, letting it drip into his eyes and down his nose, not caring that it had begun to mix with his own tears. He turned off the water and sat down on the cold linoleum, tears flowing freely from his eyes.
He damned his friend for being so poetic, for having the courage to try to tell Sara his feelings, when he, himself, had been overtaken by cowardice. Nick sat there until the sky began to lighten, and the glowing electric screen of his watch told him that it was 7am. He rubbed his temples, trying to rid himself of the headache that was sure to come along with a hangover. Pressing his face into a fluffy blue towel, he dried the tears from his eyes, and unlocked the door to go back into the room where his best friend was just beginning to stir.

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I hope that wasn't very depressing, I wanted a balance of happy and unhappy, because it seems like every chapter is either really lighthearted and nice, or it's this terrible whirlwind of sadness and pain. So tell me what you think, because if you don't say anything, I can't fix it.
Giant hugs and sloppy kisses,
Maddy