Casey's POV

" You're drunk." I laughed as I watched him nearly knock over the almost empty bottle as he reached for it to fill our glasses again.

" No, you're drunk." He laughed back at me. " I'm just clumsy."

" You just said that you liked Scrappy Do more than Scooby Do, that means you're drunk. Scooby was the star of the show. How could you like Scrappy more ?" We'd been having this argument for almost ten minutes now. And I just couldn't see his reasoning.

" Scrappy was always ready for the fight, you know." He explained. " He wasn't scared. He might have been little but he was brave. Scooby was just a burned out stoner that jumped at his own shadow."

" Scooby was not a stoner !" I protested.

He lowered his eyes at me and gave me a look that said I was clearly insane. " You are delusional. Scrooby and Shaggy were always stoned. Stoned out of there minds. Always."

" How can you say that ?"

" Okay, tell me this, where were Scooby and Shaggy like all the time, in every episode ?"

" They were looking for clues." I answered, certain I was right.

" No, Dear. I hate to break this to you. Its like telling you there's no Santa Claus, but Scooby and Shaggy spent all their time in the kitchen or where ever there was food, feeding the munchies."

I blinked at him and fought back my laughter because he was absolutely right. I'd never seen it before, but now that he explained it, he was right. Scooby and Shaggy were Pot Heads. Still, there was no way I was going to let him win, so I puffed out my lip and tried to make my eyes tear up. Then I batted my lashes at him and gave him my best whine. " There's no Santa Claus ?"

He howled with laughter and threw a pillow at my chest. I so was drunk there was no way I was going to catch it, but I tried and ended up laying on my side, clutching the pillow to my chest and wondering how the fuck I was going to get back up again.

" Okay, " I asked, as I struggled to get back upright. " Who is the better villain, Magneto or Skeletor?"

He looked over my shoulder for a moment, then dipped his spoon into the pint of ice cream we had discovered in the kitchen on our quest to feed to munchies. He pulled the spoon back out and licked it while he thought about my question. The sight of his pink tongue curling around the spoon and dripping with the brown ice cream made my insides clench, but I tried to ignore it, for now anyway.

" See, " He began as if this were going to be a long drawn out explanation. " I never thought of Magneto as a Villain. I mean, sure he did some things that he probably wasn't proud of, but deep down all he really wanted was equality and it pissed him off when he felt like he was being pissed on." He looked at me and smiled, " I can see the reasoning there. So I'm going to have to go with Skeletor who was just an evil greedy bastard without rhyme or reason."

I laid back against the pillow that I had once again began to think of as mine and stretched. The alcohol had been consumed and we were almost sober again. Two joints had also been consumed, yet we were far from sober from that yet. I was full of ice cream and several other goodies we'd managed to pilfer from the kitchen downstairs. And I was happy. Content. Pleased even.

We had been sitting on his bed debating about cartoon characters and other nonsense for almost five hours now and I had no intention of stopping. It was the furtherest thing from my mind.

I still wanted him. I still knew that I was completely in love with him. The fact that we seemed to be able to spend an entire evening doing and talking about absolutely nothing only reinforced that feeling.

Even without the weed and the alcohol, I knew I would have had the best night of my life.

I wanted to kiss him. I wanted to grab him and tell him that I loved him with everything in me and that I had never stopped, but I didn't. I couldn't.
Because I was Scooby. I was so terrified that if I told me, if I confessed how I really felt about him, this would be over. He would tell me that he was just my friend, that he didn't feel that way about me anymore. Then he would say that we obviously couldn't just be friends and he would throw me out because he didn't feel the same.

He certainly didn't act like he felt the same. I was pretty sure he had spent many evening in the exact same way with Beaver or Wade.

I had tried flirting with him here and there, but he ignored it. I tried accidentally, on purpose touching him, but he always shied away. I was his buddy. He was making that perfectly clear.

I tried to tell myself that I could live with that for now. That Max deserved a chance. He hadn't done anything wrong. In fact, in most cases, he had an eerie way of doing everything right.

No, Max was a great guy and I since Cappie obviously didn't want me, Max would get a shot at my heart.

Cappie sat the ice cream aside and shifted beside me. I was beginning to wonder what the hell he was doing. His hand was snaking ever closer to me and I thought for second, my entire inter-monologue, all the reasoning I had just done was for nothing. I thought he was making a move, reaching out to touch me like I wanted him to so badly.

I held my breath as his fingertips brushed my side. I still didn't breath when they inched up the hem of my skirt. I was baffled, completely confused by his movements, until....

The next instant his bare hand, freezing cold from holding the ice cream connected fully with my stomach and I yelled out in shock.

" You son of a bitch." I shrieked, bringing my knee up instinctively and hitting him square in the crotch.

Shit.

He rolled to his side, groaning in pain, folding himself into a tight fetal ball.

" I'm so sorry." I gushes as reached out to touch him, trying to determined how much damage I had done.

" It's okay." He panted as he rocked in pain. " It's my own fault. I should have been more prepared."

I tried to stifle my laughter because it felt every inappropriate with him laying there writhing in pain as he was, but I couldn't help it. It just bubbled out.

He raised his head and widen his eyes. " So, now you think the fact that I may never father children is hilarious."

I just laughed harder. " I'm sorry. It's not funny. I know it isn't." I told him with the laughter still in my voice. " Are you okay ? Really ? Do you need a doctor ?"

He straightened finally and pulled his hand through his hair. " No, apparently with you around I need a cup."

" Hey, I wasn't the one that tried to pull a sneak attack out of nowhere. I was just laying here quietly contemplating when you ambushed me without provocation, I might add." I told him with my hands on my hips.

He raised up on one elbow and gave me a look that I couldn't describe. " Well, yeah." He said. "That's why I ambushed you. You were contemplating. Having some serious thoughts and I didn't think tonight was the night for serious thoughts."

" But they weren't bad thoughts. Just thoughts." I muttered.

" Well, how was I supposed to know they weren't bad thoughts." He argued. " You've been having bad thoughts all night long. I didn't want you to go back there. I wanted you to stay happy."

I smiled at him. " No, you made all the bad thoughts go away. You always do."

He gave me another of those looks that I couldn't explain and I swallowed at the intensity in his eyes.

" You make all my bad thoughts go away, too." He told me after a moment of silence.

I batted his arm to lighten the mood. " You don't have bad thoughts."

" Oh, you have no idea." He breathed.

I leaned up on my elbow, matching him and looked into his eyes. He was closer than a friend probably should have been, but then Cappie and I had never really had personal space with each other. For everyone else my personal space is rather large. But never with him. " Tell me about you're bad thoughts." I don't know what made me say it, but I felt like maybe I could give something back to him for all he'd given to me.

He leaned in closer, as if it were almost involuntary and his breath brushed my cheek as he spoke.

" I can't remember any. You've made them all go away."

I swallowed again. I wasn't sure what was happening. Well, okay, I knew what was happening. I recognized the look in his eyes instantly. What was happening was what always seemed to happen with us. He was going to kiss me.

My stomach jolted at the thought and I felt all the air leave me lungs for a second.

But before he did it, before he closed the last remaining centimeters between us, he jerked back. The suddenness of the movement made me reel with shock. One moment he was there and it was going to happen and I wanted it to happen more than I wanted to breath and the next he was gone, settling himself away from me.

I blinked at him in confusion. He reached his hand up like nothing had happened and brushed my hair.

" Your hair's a mess. We should try to get it untangled before you go to sleep. Or it'll be worse tomorrow and it'll take hours to straighten out." He said, as if nothing had happened.

Okay now I was really confused. What the hell was that all about ?

Cappie's POV

It was the weed or maybe the alcohol or maybe a combination of both. I didn't know. All I did know was that I almost ruined everything in one moment of weakness. I almost tore apart the very foundation of what I was trying to build between us.

I almost lost it all, just for one silly little kiss.

But when she'd told me I made all her bad thoughts go away, I fell in love with her all over again. Further and deeper than I ever had before.

Actually, I'd spent the entire night falling in love with her again. My whole body was at war with itself. I spent every minute fighting against my urge to reach out and pull her to me.

I needed to put some distance between us, to separate us physically before I lost the battle and the war.

Sitting up, I reached into my nightstand and drew out my brush.

Then I gestured for her to sit up as well and she did. Her movements seemed sluggish which was no wonder, but there was a confused look in her eyes as well. I hoped maybe if I continued to pretend nothing had happened she would eventually go along with me.

She did, after a moment. She turned her back to me and I began to run my brush through her hair.

The moment the smell hit me, I knew that I had made another mistake.

I thought, when I saw her hair, that I could handle it. I thought that it was something familiar between us, something I used to do all the time. Something that would put her back to him instead of her lips which were just begging me to kiss them.

That was my reasoning when I picked up the brush. Now there I was, brush in hand, pulling it through her beautiful blond hair, the smell of strawberries assaulting me so heavily that I knew I was defeated.

I knew I had lost everything. There was no possible way I was not going to turn her to me and kiss her breathless.

That's when divine intervention stepped in or maybe it was just dumb luck. But her phone rang in her pocket and she reached in to dig it out.

After surveying the screen for a moment, she glanced over her shoulder at me.

"It's Max." She said, quietly as she pushed a button and raised the phone to her ear.

She sounded happy and carefree as she conversed with her boyfriend while I sat behind her doing her hair.

Oh, God, I suddenly felt like her gay friend.

She snapped the phone shut after a few minutes and glanced back at me.

" He wants to see me. Says he's finally found the perfect costume." She explained.

I dropped the brush and gave my best nonchalant shrug. " Then you should go."

She started to get up, but stopped after she'd turned towards me.

Then she leaned in and brushed her lips over my cheek. " Thank you for tonight." She whispered quietly.

" Anytime." I answered, dazed by the feel of her lips against my cheek. " I'm always here. I keep telling you that."

She got to her feet and grabbed her jacket from the chair beside the door. "And I just keep coming back, over and over again."

I smiled. " Casey, I promise you, I wouldn't have it any other way."