Sponge: Welcome to chapter 6! The last chapter's title, "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" is a song by The Beatles! (which yes, would have been an excellent chase song in SDWAY). Congratulations to FredTrap for coming up with the correct answer! Warnings: language and mentions of alcohol addiction. Disclaimer: I don't own any of the Scooby Doo characters. They belong to Cartoon Network, Warner Brothers, and Hanna Barbera.

Chapter 6: Tell Her About It

"He lives just down this street," Velma said. Fred nodded and turned the steering wheel.

It was later that evening, and everyone was in the Mystery Machine on their way to Tony's house. Velma was giving Fred directions from the backseat. Daphne sat in the passenger seat touching up her makeup while Shaggy and Scooby tossed Scooby Snacks into each other's open mouths.

"Which one is his house?" asked Fred, slowing down.

Velma peered out the window. "That one. The third one on the right."

"Uh...the one with the...interesting van parked out front?" Daphne giggled, tucking her lipstick back into her purse.

Shaggy and Scooby looked out the window as well and laughed out loud. Fred and Velma's laughter soon followed. If they thought the Mystery Machine was ostentatious, it was nothing compared to the vehicle outside of Tony's house. It was quite possibly the ugliest car Shaggy had ever seen. It was painted a garish brown with bright pink and orange accents, which clashed horribly, and the dim light of the streetlamp it was parked under did it no favors. The band's name, "Heavy Meddle," was printed on the side in a terrible font that was somehow familiar to Velma, though she was really laughing too hard to give it much thought.

Everyone was still chuckling as they exited the Mystery Machine and walked up to Tony's front door.

"Jinkies," Velma exclaimed, shaking her head between giggles. "That van! Oh my God!"

"Like I know," Shaggy replied, snickering. He stole another look back at the band's van. "It's just..."

"Hideous?" Velma supplied through a laugh.

"Like yes!"

All five of them burst into giggles again as Fred rang the doorbell. Shaggy and Velma briefly made eye contact and smiled, but Shaggy quickly dropped his gaze. He felt a pang of guilt in his chest. He'd been avoiding her all day, and he knew it was wrong. But he was so paranoid about Scooby picking up on any tiny little thing.

"Hey, hey!" Tony smiled at them all as he opened the door. "You're just in time. The band's here and the pizza just arrived, so –"

"PIZZA!?" Scooby and Shaggy exclaimed in one voice. They pushed themselves into the house and ran for the kitchen, leaving Daphne, Fred, Velma, and a bewildered Tony standing in the threshold.

"Uh..." said Tony shaking himself. "Anyway...come in, make yourselves at home."

Tony's brother and the rest of the band were also in the kitchen. Felix, Priya, and Leon sat at the kitchen table, but Julie and Joey stood near the small island where the pizza boxes sat. True to form, Shaggy and Scooby were there too, shoveling pizza into their mouths while Joey and Julie watched with bemused expressions. Felix and Priya weren't paying them any mind, but were going over what looked like a set list. Leon stared into space listlessly, but looked up when Tony entered with Fred, Daphne, and Velma.

"Hi there!" Fred smiled and waved at Julie and Joey. They came over and each shook Fred's hand hello in turn. "Thanks so much again for playing our prom."

"Hey, you kiddin'?" Joey grinned. "Happy to do it." He gestured over to the pizza. "You wanna grab a slice or two before we get started? And before your friends ah...eat it all?"

Scooby looked up, slightly embarrassed. "Rorry," he said, grinning.

"I like your earrings," Priya said to Velma. She turned to Daphne. "And your scarf is beautiful."

Both girls smiled as they took a seat. Daphne decided that Priya was her favorite so far – she was so sweet, and easy to talk to. It was no wonder her sister had been friends with her. Everyone chatted a bit as they ate.

"So how long have you guys been a band?" Fred asked, taking a seat with his pizza. There weren't enough seats at the table for all of them, so Velma stood at the kitchen island with Shaggy, Scooby, and Julie. Joey and Tony pulled out sodas and cups so everyone could have something to drink.

"We started freshman year," Joey explained, shutting the refrigerator. "We all met in music theory class. Everyone played a different instrument, so we joked about being a band. And then...I don't know, one day it just happened."

"We didn't really get started till about a year ago though," Priya said. "We had to wait until Joey..." She suddenly widened her eyes and abruptly stopped talking. She shot Joey a worried look. Julie, who stood beside him, pursed her lips at Priya, but Joey shrugged.

"It's all right, Priya. I don't mind," he told her. To the gang, he said, "I struggled with alcohol addiction a few years ago. I took a year off school, went to rehab – it was pretty bad."

The gang all shifted uncomfortably and glanced at Tony. They actually already knew this – Tony had told them about his brother's struggles with alcohol the previous year while they'd all been in the musical together. Tony looked sideways at all of them, and they could tell from his expression that Joey did not know that Tony had told them this.

"I'm much better now," Joey told them, seeming not to notice the brief glimpse that his brother and the gang had exchanged. "I couldn't have gotten through it without Julie." He put an arm around his girlfriend, pulled her to him, and kissed the side of her head.

"Ruck," Scooby murmured to Shaggy with a snicker.

Shaggy said nothing, but glanced surreptitiously at Velma. When he saw she was looking at him too, he quickly dropped his gaze again.

"It's actually kind of how we started dating," Julie told them. "We were already friends, but I would send him goofy letters while he was in rehab."

"I'd always joke that they were from my 'secret admirer,'" Joey said with a smile. "And then I figured out that I actually did like her, you know, that way. In fact, I more than liked her...I loved her. And when I got out of rehab, I told her."

"It was very romantic," Julie said. "And we've been together ever since."

"Aww," said Daphne, bringing a hand to her heart. "That's so sweet! Isn't that sweet Freddie?"

"Yeah," Fred replied. "Hey Velm, maybe that'll happen with you too! With your secret admirer."

Tony choked on his drink and Leon and Felix looked up swiftly. Daphne shut her eyes in exasperation and Velma sighed.

"...Crap," Fred said. "I forgot not everyone knew about that. Sorry, Velma." Fred scrunched his face apologetically.

"It's no big deal, Fred," Velma replied, wryly shaking her head.

"No big deal? That sounds pretty exciting to me!" said Julie. "What are they doing like, leaving you love notes?"

"Yeah," Velma relented with a shrug. "He put this one in my locker this morning." She reached into her messenger bag and showed the note to the others. Tony, Leon, Felix and Priya studied it at the table before passing it back to the island so Julie and Joey could read it.

Julie smiled. "That's adorable! How long has it been going on?"

"Like all year," Shaggy said before he could stop himself. Velma glanced over at him in surprise, and Shaggy immediately looked away. That was stupid. He shouldn't have brought up that he'd been keeping track of how long the secret admirer had been sending notes to Velma. That was suspicious as hell.

Thankfully, Tony came to the rescue. "I didn't know about that, Dinks," he said, still gazing at the note. "Any idea who they're from?"

Velma scoffed. "I think that's kind of the point of a secret admirer. You know...that they're secret."

"Oh. Right." Tony looked embarrassed. "Well, you guys are detectives. I bet you could solve this mystery in a snap."

The college students all looked at Velma dubiously. Velma knew exactly what they were all thinking. The only mystery to solve is how does a frumpy dork like that have a secret admirer?

Daphne spoke up. "I should tell you guys about how Fred and I got together. That was a roller coaster."

"I'd love to hear that story!" said Priya.

"I'll clean up," Tony volunteered, beginning to gather empty pizza boxes and dirty plates. Felix and Joey both jumped in to help while Priya and Julie leaned forward and listened intently to Daphne's account of her courtship with Fred.

Soon everyone was laughing and chatting happily again. Scooby continued eating pizza and Shaggy simply stood by, listening contently to various snatches of conversation between the others. Priya and Julie were sighing as Daphne re-lived her first (non-drunken) kiss with Fred at his sixteenth birthday party. Joey and Felix had become intrigued by the information that the gang were detectives, and listened intently as Fred described a few of his best traps. Shaggy saw Fred beam when Felix compared him to Rube Goldberg.

Leon didn't talk to anyone, but had gotten up from the kitchen table and was now leaning against the wall between the kitchen and the living room. He seemed to be watching everyone else very closely. It made Shaggy feel creepy. To avoid the scrutiny, he let his eyes roam around the kitchen, and saw Velma wander into the next room. He continued looking at her surreptitiously out of the corner of his eye as she fingered the keys of the baby grand piano in the living room.

"You play?" Leon asked. He'd also noticed Velma at the piano.

Velma looked up sheepishly. "Yeah, a little."

Tony scoffed. "'A little,' she says," he laughed, following them into the living room. "Dinks has been playing since like kindergarten. She had to play for the musical we were in last year and she did great."

"And last spring the chamber band did a performance of Rhapsody in Blue," Daphne called from the kitchen table. "Velma played the piano solo."

Velma ducked her head.

"I play a little piano too," Leon spoke up, sidling up closer to her. "For a long time in high school, I had a crush on a girl who played the piano – that was how I got started. I wanted to impress her, but…it didn't work out that way. It turned out I have a pretty good memory for compositions, but I'm awful with orchestral jazz." He cocked his head towards the piano. "Show me what you've got?"

Velma chuckled. "All right," she said, sitting at the piano bench and poising her hands over the keyboard. She turned to glance back at Leon. "I don't have the whole thing memorized."

Leon shrugged and adjusted his glasses. "No problem. I wanna to hear it anyway."

Velma looked around again and noticed Shaggy watching her as well. He peeked over at Scooby, who was still face-first in the pizza. Once he saw that Scooby was distracted, Shaggy nodded encouragingly at Velma. She shot him a small smile. Then she turned back to the piano, took a deep breath, and began. Her left hand played the trill, and Shaggy watched her with rapt attention. As Velma's fingers glided up and down the keyboard, Shaggy was transported back in time to last spring, at the band concert where he'd first heard Velma perform this composition.

Velma had been so nervous beforehand. Shaggy knew because she'd constantly fretted to him (and the rest of the gang) about the performance. But the evening of the concert, you wouldn't have been able to tell from looking at her. She'd walked out onto the stage sleekly, elegantly, exuding self-confidence. Shaggy had applauded enthusiastically, along with everyone else in the audience as she took her seat at the piano. He remembered sitting there in the auditorium, between Daphne and Scooby, and watching in awe as Velma's hands flew across the keyboard. It had seemed that the notes resonated throughout his bones, and he felt the music in his heart, in his soul. Goosebumps erupted all over his arms. He'd wanted to look around at Fred, Daphne, and Scooby to see their faces, but he found he couldn't keep his eyes off Velma. She was so talented, so beautiful, beaming and luminous at the piano. He knew how hard she'd worked, how much she'd practiced, and now it was all paying off. He remembered how proud he felt of her. How astonished he was that she was his (albeit secret) girlfriend.

Sitting there in the auditorium that night while Velma performed Rhapsody in Blue had been the first time that Shaggy'd had the feeling that maybe he was in love with her.

This thought brought him back to the present. No! Stop, he scolded himself internally. He'd had this conversation in his head hundreds of times. Before he fully admitted his feelings, he knew he needed to tell Scooby about his relationship with Velma. It wouldn't be fair to her for Shaggy to say he loved her and then still ask her to be a secret.

With a plunk, Velma finished playing. "That's uh, all I remember off the top of my head..."

"You're good," Leon told her sincerely.

Velma ducked her head modestly. "You said you played some, right?" she asked.

He shrugged. "A little. You know this one?" He started playing the lower part of Heart and Soul.

Velma chuckled and came in with the melody. They played for a little while, Shaggy still watching. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Tony shift his weight. Shaggy almost jumped. He'd nearly forgotten that Tony was there too.

"Hey," Julie poked her head in from the kitchen. "I think we're ready to start if you guys want to come back into the kitchen."

Velma and Leon stopped playing. Leon shot Julie a look that Shaggy couldn't decipher. "Yeah, all right," he said. Velma got up from the piano bench and Leon followed, still looking at Julie.

Julie just stared at him impassively. "Felix went to use the restroom, and then we'll be ready to go." She turned to Velma as she entered the kitchen. "Felix and Priya came up with a preliminary set list, kind of like our 'greatest hits' and some crowd-pleasers, but Fred said that you guys had a list of stuff you'd like us to play too."

"We can look over both lists and see what we've got," Velma told her. "I think that sounds like a great place to start." She took a seat at the kitchen table next to Daphne. Tony took the seat on Velma's other side.

"I'll go use the restroom too," said Leon. "Is Felix using the one on this floor or the one in the basement?"

Priya frowned thoughtfully. "I'm not sure."

Leon waved a hand. "Eh, I'll figure it out." He headed for the basement.

"Actually a bathroom break sounds like a good idea," said Joey. "Take ten, everybody! There's a bathroom on this floor, one in the basement, and one upstairs! Technically there's two upstairs, but please don't use the one in my parent's bedroom, because that's weird." Priya and Julie giggled.

The mention of the restroom reminded Shaggy of something. "Like Scoob?" he said. "You wanna go outside?"

"Rokay," said Scooby, who had just finished swallowing a last bite of pizza.

"Tony is it like, cool if we go out into your backyard?" Shaggy asked.

"Sure thing," said Tony, as he got up from the kitchen table and followed his brother upstairs. "We don't have a fence or anything, but the woods are right there."

"Rye don't need a rence," Scooby said. Shaggy grabbed his coat and walked out the back door with Scooby in tow. He stood on Tony's back deck while Scooby headed into the woods.

"Like try not to take too long, Scoob!" Shaggy called, bouncing a bit on the balls of his feet. "It's like, really cold out."

"Rokay!" Scooby called back as he disappeared into the trees. Shaggy shoved his hands into his pockets and waited.

"Hey."

Shaggy turned at the sound of the voice, and was surprised to see Julie closing the back door behind her.

"Like hi," he said. "I just had to take Scooby Doo outside."

"Sure." Julie nodded.

They stood together in silence for a while, shivering slightly in the cold, before Julie cleared her throat.

"So how long have you been in love with your friend?"

Shaggy was no longer aware of the chilly air. He now felt very, very hot. Except for his stomach, which now felt like it was made out of ice.

"Uh..." His throat was dry and scratchy so he coughed. "Like what do you mean?" Maybe if he played dumb, Julie would drop the subject.

But she just gave him a knowing look. "Don't bullshit me, dude. I saw the way you were looking at her while she was playing the piano. Are you the secret admirer?"

Goddamn it. Shaggy had known his facial expressions would give him away. And he'd been concentrating so hard on avoiding Leon's penetrating gaze that he hadn't even realized Julie had noticed him staring at Velma. Shaggy thought quickly. For a moment, he considered continuing to deny their relationship.

But Julie looked at him kindly and said, "Your secret is safe with me. I won't tell anyone that you're leaving her notes, I promise."

After several beats, Shaggy finally spoke. "I'm not leaving her notes," he admitted quietly. "That's like, somebody else."

Julie picked up on the despondent tone. "Is it like an unrequited love situation?" she asked.

"No, no, no," Shaggy told her. "It's like...complicated."

Julie blinked at him. "Complicated how?"

Shaggy took a deep breath. "We're like...kind of in a relationship," he whispered.

Julie nodded, but furrowed her brow. "Why are you whispering?"

"Because like it's a secret," he said. "Nobody knows. Except for Tony. But like that's it. No one else knows that Velma and I are dating."

Julie looked less confused, but now more concerned. "How come?"

"It's just...like I said, our relationship is a secret."

Julie crossed her arms. "And it's a secret because of...what? Are you embarrassed?"

Shaggy looked at her in bewilderment. "Like what? No, I'm not embarrassed. She's great. Amazing."

Julie dropped her arms. "Then what's the problem?" She seemed genuinely curious, like she wanted to help.

Shaggy sighed. He didn't know why he was telling her this. Maybe because she seemed so nice. Whatever it was, it caused him to talk. "I just...I'm like, worried about how he's gonna react," he admitted, inclining his head in the direction of the woods where Scooby had gone. "It's like, just been him and me for years and years. I'm worried that he'd feel like I was trying to replace him if he found out about Velma. And like, I know –" he said quickly, seeing the look on Julie's face. "– I know that I have to tell him eventually. And I'm sure it like, won't be as bad as I'm making it out to be. I just...I know it'll change like, the dynamic of our friendship."

Julie sighed. "Forgive me for prying but... isn't this causing problems in your relationship with her?"

Shaggy sighed. "I mean like, we fight about it sometimes. It's the only thing we fight about. Other than that guy who keeps leaving secret admirer notes in her locker, which I like hate, and I mean really hate, and I don't know..." Shaggy thought about what Velma had said in his basement on her birthday. "Maybe she like, wouldn't be getting notes if people knew that we were together." Shaggy felt slightly bewildered telling Julie all this, though it was nice to be able to unload after all this time.

Julie smiled good-humoredly. "I mean...call me crazy, but I can think of a pretty simple way to solve this problem."

Shaggy groaned. "Like I know. But I can't hurt Scooby Doo. Like, I don't want him to feel replaced, or like I don't care about him. I do care about him. A lot."

Julie glanced back into the house. Velma was still sitting at the kitchen table with Fred and Daphne. They were now joined by Priya, who was showing them the list they'd seen her working on with Felix earlier. Velma was bent over the list intently with the others.

"But don't you care about her, too?" Julie asked Shaggy.

"Of course," Shaggy replied without hesitation. "Yes, I care about her, she's like, the most important person in the world to me, besides Scoob."

Julie fixed him with a stare. "Are you in love with her?"

Shaggy made no response, and Julie had her answer.

"Does she know?" asked Julie softly.

Shaggy shook his head and felt his face flush.

There was a brief silence before Julie chuckled. "You know, it took Joey ages to admit to me out loud that he wanted to go out with me. I'd had a crush on him since the moment I saw him, but it took a lot longer for him to figure out how he felt. That story he told, about telling me he loved me when he got out of rehab? That's exactly what happened. He came right to my dorm the day he left – he didn't even go home first, he just showed up at my dorm with his suitcase and everything – and knocked. I opened the door and said, 'Hey dude welcome back!' and he said, 'I love you.' That was it." Julie laughed. "It wasn't the confession that did it for me, it was the gesture. He's not great with words. But he is good at showing me how much he cares, so I'm never left guessing about how he feels."

Shaggy glanced sideways at her. "So like, what are you saying?"

"Actions speak louder than words, my friend," Julie told him. "I would make sure she knows how you feel about her. If you can't admit it to her – or to yourself – you won't be able to admit it to anyone else. So, tell her about it. Or...show her. Whatever works for you. It'll make it easier when the time comes to tell your friends."

Shaggy sighed as he saw Scooby emerge from the forest.

"You can do it," Julie said, turning to go back inside. "It's easier than you think."

Yeah, like, sure it is, Shaggy thought. Telling Velma how he felt about her wasn't a problem. Telling Scooby, however, was going to be a whole different story.

Sponge: More and more people are learning about Shaggy and Velma's relationship. Anyone want to hazard a guess at whether Tony, Marcie, or Julie will spill the beans? Only time will tell! Thanks for reading. Review if you please, and don't forget to guess where the chapter title comes from!