Disclaimer: I don't own any awesome and sarcastic winged children. They're JP's headache.

"Awwww, Gazzy! That was GROSS!!!"

"Couldn't you have gone into the bathroom or something?"

"Ok, who let him eat 8 pieces of cheesecake?"

Gazzy grinned. "It was you who let me get cheesecake, Max."

"Touché." I agreed. The kid had a point. "But next time Gaz, you might want to leave the lobby before you let it rip. I think that girl over there is about to pass out."

We had just returned from; get this; a normal day. A nice, normal afternoon at the beach. I was ready to freak out. I felt like there was tension, just underneath this tranquility. It like an overfilled water balloon, ready to pop. Except in our case, the water balloon wouldn't just pop, it would explode. Yep, that's me, little Miss Sunshine.

"Hey Max? I'm hungry." Nudge said, predictably. She seemed to have worked off all her hyper energy at the beach.

"Can me and Angel and Gazzy get something from the vending machine down the hall?" She asked.

"You could get Iggy to take us if you're worried." Angel chipped in, reading my mind.

I frowned. Something didn't seem right about this, but I couldn't put my finger on it. Whatever. Nudge was just hungry. She always was. "Fine," I said, digging some quarters out of my pocket. "But go with Iggy, and don't spend too much, ok?"

Nudge nodded eagerly, and then went off in search of Iggy, with Angel and the Gasman in tow.

The elevator dinged, and Fang and I stepped into the car.

"Why do I think that was engineered?" I asked him. He only shrugged, and gave me one of his rare, attractive smiles. My heart quickened at the- No, bad Max! You don't like him that way. He's like your brother.

Everyone has to grow up sometime, Max. Stupid Voice.

Shut up. I told it. I swear, if it could've chuckled, it would have.

"Max?" Fang sounded concerned.

"I'm fine."

"Good."

And then it suddenly became awkward. I think that was one of the longest, most awkward silences I've ever heard. The elevator dinged, and we disembarked, heading for the room that we shared. Then Fang decided he would start up the conversation again.

"Hey, uh, Max… there's uh, I mean..." he was stammering. Fang never stammers. How many more surprises was I going to get in this crazy day?

"There's, there's something I've, uh, been meaning to tell… um…" Then he kissed me, briefly and on the lips. "Happy Birthday." He said, and started to walk away.

"Hey, um, Fang, wait." Eloquent, eh? I ran after him for a few steps. When I caught up with him, I kissed him back. I pulled back, and he looked into my eyes for a long moment, and then kissed me again. His lips were soft on mine, and warm. His arms were slowly making their way around my waist, as mine were going around his neck. I grasped his bottom lips, pulling him closer into me. His tongue was tickling my lip, asking for an invitation…

"Whoa, Max! Fang! What?" Oh crud. The flock was here. Fang and I jumped apart, cracking our foreheads together in the process. "Ahhh! Ow!"

I scanned their faces. Nudge was giggling, Angel had a little smile on, Gazzy was grossed out, and Iggy was looking rather impatient. "Would someone please explain why Nudge is snickering?" He asked, tapping his foot.

"Fang and Max, sitting' in a tree, kay-eye-ess-ess-eye-en-geee!" Nudge was beside herself with laughter.

"Oh," said Iggy, smirking. "That explains it."

"Hey, Nudge, I told you so!" Angel said. "You owe me five bucks!"

I was incredulous. "What? You knew?" You had a bet?" Why hadn't Angel told me?

"Yep. I overheard Fang thinking about you, so I was going to tell you, but Fang figured out I knew first. He had to tell you tonight, or I would."

"So you tell Nudge?" That still didn't explain why Angel had a bet.

"Well, she's like, the worst secret keeper ever, but she didn't believe me, so we made a bet."

True. Nudge is pretty bad at keeping secrets. Well, some secrets. "Fine. But I'm going to bed. It's an early morning tomorrow. We need to get back to the mainland." We had decided that afternoon that we were leaving Hawaii. It had been a nice vacation, but the Erasers were bound to find us some time. I preferred to fight them where we had room to run away, if necessary. "Get some sleep, guys." Grumbling, they all turned around and went into their own rooms. Iggy was with Gazzy, Angel was with Nudge, which meant, yep, you guessed it, Fang was rooming with me. And there was only one bed. This was going to get awkward.

Fang sat down on the bed almost at the same time I did.

"So now what?" he said.

"I don't know." Like I said, awkward. His hand was beside him on the bed, inching toward mine.

"Max, you look like a crushing sheep." He said, almost cracking up.

"Baaaah!" I replied, and stuck my tongue out at him. "I'm so sheep-like, the Red Haired Wonder would be jealous, huh Fang?" Fang blushed. Yep, he actually blushed. How's that for surprising?

"Well," he said, "If you get to bring up Lissa, then I get to bring up Sam."

I kicked him in the ankle. He kicked back, so I grabbed his feet between mine. He started tickling me. (On the stomach, get your minds out of the gutter.)

"No…fair!" I managed between giggles. Iggy pounded on the wall from the next room. "Guys, it's barely even dark!" He called. We could hear Gazzy starting to cackle through the wall. Oh boy. I had a feeling that Fang and I would be the butt of many cruel and perverted jokes in the near future. Meanwhile, I was laughing so hard I couldn't even give a witty retort. I lay flat on my back, Fang still tickling me mercilessly. "Fang… stop that… can't breathe…ooof!" He was sitting on my stomach, leaning over so that our faces were nearly touching. He waited until I got my breath back, then kissed me. Any hope of coherent thought I had flew out the window. When we finally drew apart, he told me, softly, "The Red Haired Wonder has nothing on you."

"You will pay for this, Ari, I swear-" I woke up, trying to sit, but something strong was holding me down, pinning me to a solid wall behind me. I struggled harder, and found that the wall was moving. It was almost as if… Oh. It was Fang. Right.

"Max?" He asked sleepily. "What's wrong?" He released me from how he had been holding me, his arm around my waist.

"A nightmare, that's all." I told him. "You were being captured by Ari."

He brushed his lips across my forehead. "I'll never let that happen Max, I promise. Go back to sleep."

I looked at the clock. It was 2 a.m. "I know." I said, snuggling into his chest. "I just… worry, that's all."

He brushed my hair out of my eyes. "Never worry, Max. Never worry about me."

With those words, we both went to sleep.

As I said, revised. C'est tres drole, est-ce que tu pense? I think that means "it's very funny, don't you think?" Ahhh!!! Darn the basic French courses! I know no grammar! (No offense Mme. G) and by the way, MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! ('cause evil laughter still rules!)