Author's Note: Thanks to each and every one of the lovely people who left such wonderful reviews! And the people who favorited and put alerts on! I've been so busy lately and I've barely even had time to read fic never mind write it. I also didn't realize it'd been so long since I last updated! I'm a bad fic writer and I am sorry... :( So here's a crazy long chapter in apology!

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Kevin was nearly ready for Macy on the second morning. By nearly he meant that he was half-awake and half-dressed. He'd been able to swindle 15 minutes to shower and change by producing the box of muffins that just happened to be Macy's favorite. And thanks to his half-awake state he'd been able to pull off the little white lie of being shocked at the complete randomness of him buying her favorite muffins from her favorite bakery.

On the third morning he was multi-tasking. Finishing breakfast and brushing his teeth at the same time was apparently a bad idea but he had managed to tug on his newest track suit jacket just as the quiet knock sounded from the front door.

By the fourth morning he was well rested, fully dressed and waiting on the front stoop by the time Macy arrived.

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Kevin wasted more time than necessary getting to the school grounds that morning. It was surprisingly easy to distract Macy with random questions and make a few 'wrong turns'. The longer it took to get to school the less workout time they had. Plus, either way, he was spending time with Macy so win-win, right?

When they finally made it to the school field, Kevin easily fell into the stretches that Macy had gone over with him on the first day. Macy seemed delighted that he'd been so prepped to go this morning and that he hadn't needed any prompting to start his pre-workout stretches. Or at least he thought that's what the rosy glow to her face was. It was odd though that it hadn't really happened until he'd tossed his jacket aside. "So, you said we're doing running today? Like sprinting and stuff?"

"Huh? What?" Macy blinked and momentarily considered simply speaking to Kevin's arms. But that might be creepy? No, creepy was that weird little grade 10 who constantly looked down her shirt. Macy addressing Kevin by staring at his arms would be odd. Odd was slightly better than creepy but still pretty much frowned upon. Finally tearing her eyes from the nicely muscled upper arm, she looked up determinedly to meet Kevin's eyes. "Right! Yes, sprinting and short distance running today."

Yup, she'd spent far too long staring at his arms. There was a blush reddening his face that Macy couldn't talk herself into believing was from the stretching.

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An hour and a half later Kevin collapsed on the bench next to Macy. This had quite possibly been the best workout to date with Macy. Sprinting was so something a member of JONAS could pull off. Man, concert days were one sprint after another. Sprint to stage from the dressing room, sprint from one side of the stage to another, sprint for a wardrobe change, more stage sprinting... And of course the all too often sprinting away from gaggles of grabby fangirls.

Speaking of fangirls, even Macy had looked pleased with todays 'progress' while she was making notes in her binder.

Handing over a bottle of juice, Kevin helped Macy collect her things up and head in towards the change rooms.

"See you later?"

"Of course," Kevin agreed, lingering briefly at the girl's door before heading to his locker for a uniform to change in to. Kevin really hopped his brothers had remember to bring his school bag with them today.

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Kevin paused mid-sentence explaining about the logistics between cross-breeding a flying squirrel and a mole when he spotted Macy coming down the stairs talking with a guy Kevin was pretty sure he didn't like on theory alone.

"Kevin? Not that I want you to continue but what--"

Kevin paid his brother no attention though. The Guy really was walking far too close to Macy. And why hadn't Macy noticed him yet? Well, y'know, noticed the band because it was the band she was in love with and it was the band that was barely 20 feet away. But, nope, not even a flicker of notice as she continued happily chatting away with The Guy.

An odd feeling of sick aggravation washed over Kevin as he finally gave up on pretending to eat. Seriously, The Guy was so close that they were practically touching! It was that burning in his gut and the fact that he'd squeezed his fist so hard around his fork that there were now deep, angry red imprints on his palm that finally made Kevin push away from the table and hurry to Macy's side.

"Hey Macy. I've been waiting for you." It took a surprising amount of restraint to not reach out and pull Macy towards him -- to pull Macy away from The Guy.

The Guy gave Kevin a quick once over before bumping fists with Macy and leaving.

Kevin was still frowning down the hall at The Guy when the sharp slap of a hockey stick to his shoulder brought Kevin's attention back to Macy.

"Oh! Sorry!"

Kevin tried to smile through the pain. "Here, let me hold that for you."

"Thanks!" Macy smiled as Kevin yanked the hockey stick from her grasp.

"I, uh," Kevin hesitated, risking a quick glance behind him and wasn't too surprised to see both his brothers and Stella not even remotely trying to hide the fact they were eavesdropping, "was wondering if you wanted to go to one of the school ball games with me."

"Sure, I have a game in two days!"

The bright smile Kevin received was unbelievably distracting. "I was, uh, actually thinking of the boys game tonight." Scratching nervously at the back of his neck, it slowly occurred to Kevin that he was maybe...kinda...asking Macy out.

"You don't want to see me play?"

"No! I mean, yes, of course! I love watching you," Kevin trailed off momentarily, smiling at Macy, "Play stuff! I love watching you play stuff...sports, y'know. But I was thinking if we saw the game tonight we could watch it t-together and you could explain it to me. Baseball is so confusing." If Kevin had long hair he so would have flipped it over his shoulder right then. It was something he'd seen Stella do numerous times.

Joe, who'd been leaning nearly out of his chair to closely watch and listen to the exchange chimed up, "Dude, we go to games all the time with dad. You totally know--"

Kevin turned and shushed his brother before spinning back to smile at Macy. "He gets me confused with Nick all the time. It's sad really." Kevin flashed her another smile and went to lean against his locker. Except he was no where near any lockers and stumbled backwards instead, using the hockey stick to catch himself from falling. "So, uh, you want to go to the game tonight?"

"Sure. I have to be there anyways. I'm co-manager."

"Oh, well, let me walk you to your locker," Kevin darted back to the lunch table and grabbed his bag. "This hockey stick sure is heavy and I wouldn't want you hurting yourself. So, do you prefer rye or cracked wheat?"

The three remaining people at the table craned their necks to watch the pair walk off.

"Did Kevin just ask out Macy?" Nick asked, still frowning at the exchange.

Joe snorted, "Please. It's just, like, homework for all the gym stuff he's been doing lately."

Stella just smiled as she finished her juice box.

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Kevin gave a startled shriek as he was pulled from the hall into a darkened classroom. There weren't supposed to be any female teams or groups coming in from other schools today! "Don't hurt me! I'm just a defenseless boy!"

"Kevin, it's just me." Stella waved and dragged Kevin further into the room. "I've been texting you the last hour."

"Oh." Kevin patted his pockets down before giving a shrug.

"So," Stella started, hopping onto one of the desks, "how are things going with Lacy?"

Kevin frowned and looked completely lost. "Who?"

"The girl you asked me for pointers on how to get close to."

"Oh, you mean Ma--Lacy!" Kevin chuckled nervously. "'Lacy', right. The girl you have never met before and therefore wouldn't be able to tell her that I like her. I think things are going ok."

Stella was proud she didn't shake her head at Kevin's use of air quotes. Who did he think he was fooling? "So you've been able to make good use of your one-on-one time with her?"

Picking at his nail, a small smile spread over Kevin's face. "It's been great. We've had lots of time to talk. I think she's mostly gotten over the fact that I'm in a band."

"You'll have to introduce me to this Lacy," Stella said, smiling at the sweet smile on her friend's face. "She must be something special."

"She is," Kevin said dreamily, "She does this thing where she nibbles on carrot sticks and giggles."

"Huh, my friend Macy does the same thing too."

"Oh, heh, what a coincidence. I should really be going now."

"I just hope she doesn't get the wrong idea, this 'Lacy', about you asking Macy out after school."

Kevin paused a long moment, clearly thinking his reply out carefully. "Lacy isn't like that. Do...do you think Macy knows -- I mean, thinks that this is a date?"

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Macy, it turned out, didn't think it was a date at all.

In fact she looked really confused when she spotted the picnic dinner he'd rushed home after school to prepare, with forced help from his mother, before snatching up his car keys and heading right on back to school.

"Uhm," Kevin trailed off, looking down at the basket he was carrying.

"Hmm?" Macy asked, distracted, her eyes clearly focused on the players. "If you don't give it up and trade that bat in for a lighter one, Sheltz, I swear I'll take you out of the starting lineup! Macho idiots..."

"I'll just put our dinner over here." Kevin gave a quiet grunt as a 6 and a 1/2 foot player pushed past him.

"Hey, man, is that for us?"

Kevin blinked at the guy next to him on the bench. It was Charlie from his morning trig class. 'That', Kevin realized, was referring to the basket. "Uh, no. No, sorry. It's for Macy and..." And me. Kevin frowned and stood to make his way to Macy.

He found her holding a clipboard as she called names out. "Sorry, Kev, I'll be with you in a moment."

Charlie passed Kevin on the way back to the bench and said, "Ish good!" around a mouthful of pastrami on rye.

Everytime Kevin sat back on the bench in the dugout, the basket seemed to be a little more empty. By the fourty minute mark Kevin had given up on trying to keep the baseball players out of the dinner he'd brought.

By the end of the first inning Kevin admitted full defeat and took a standing position next to Macy so he could pepper her with random questions whenever she had a free moment.

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"So?" Joe asked, trying to get the binoculars away from his brother. "I'm right aren't I? It totally isn't a date is it?"

Sighing, Nick lowered the binoculars. He hated being wrong but it clearly looked like Macy really was explaining the ins and outs of baseball to Kevin. Well, that is, when she wasn't shouting until she was red in the face to the players on the field. Even the picnic basket that had, he'd thought, sold the date angle had apparently been Kevin being far too nice to a bunch of guys he really didn't know.

More than Nick hated being wrong, he hated being wrong in lieu of one of his brother's being right.

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Glancing around, Kevin couldn't even find the fancy napkins he'd packed along with the dinner. The empty -- completely empty! -- basket was tossed into the trash while Macy chatted with the Coach. This hadn't gone exactly how Kevin had planned.

Not that Kevin had exactly planned it. This had all been very spontaneous and Kevin was pretty sure it was initially brought on by seeing Macy with The Guy.

So, that is what jealousy feels like. Jealousy was a new experience. Well, that was a lie. He'd experienced jealousy in many different forms before but the boy/girl jealousy was definitely new. Kevin momentarily thought of tracking Joe down for a bro-to-bro talk but memories of Joe's last jealousy induced incident brought on by VanDyke reminded him that maybe Joe wasn't the best person to talk to this about.

"Well, mission accomplished?" Macy questioned as she made her way back to Kevin. "Do you know all the ins and outs of America's favorite past-time?"

"Mission definitely accomplished!" Yeah, most definitely NOT accomplished. Not in the slightest. This mission had fizzled and failed. Glancing at his watch, Kevin was struck by inspiration. The mission didn't have to be over just yet, did it? "Maybe we could stop somewhere to grab a quick bite to eat?"

"Really?" Macy asked, eyes wide as duffle of bats she was carrying slipped from her fingers.

Kevin didn't see it coming and bit his lip to keep from crying out in pain. "Mmhmm."

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"Oh, McDonalds?" Well, that wasn't exactly where Kevin envisioned his first date with Macy to partake but he supposed it would be a cute tale for the grandkids. Not that he ever thought about stuff like that or anything!

"Kevin?"

"Yes, right. Turning in now!" Finding a free parking space close to the door, Kevin tried pepping himself up. Ok, the picnic dinner had failed as had the eating at an actual restaurant. But McDonalds? He could...he could work with that.

Before Kevin was able to get out of the car, Macy dug into her bag and produced a hat which she stuck on Kevin's head. "Sorry, I don't keep fake mustache's in my bag. We won't be long though."

Wouldn't be long? Well, Kevin supposed it was called 'fast food' for a reason. Macy was out of his car before he could even think of making it around to open the door for her. Tugging the cap lower over his curls, Kevin raced to catch up with her.

Macy quickly scanned the menu before lightly bumping her hip into his. "Up for a Big Mac?"

Kevin nodded and found it easier to just let Macy order for him. Before Kevin could even fully process what was happening Macy had their order paid for, bagged separately to-go and was tugging him back in the direction of his car. Moments later he was pulling up in front of Macy's house.

"Bye Kevin! See you tomorrow!" Macy gathered her bags up and was gone.

Kevin waved and slumped into his seat. What had just happened?! That hadn't gone as planned at all...none of his afternoon planning had. And the day had started out so well, too!

He'd been worried he was being too forward by asking her out so soon but...wow, apparently not a problem at all. He still couldn't figure out why they hadn't shared their dinner together. Had he said something? Because he was pretty sure he hadn't.

Taking his keys out of the ignition, Kevin pulled the takeout bag onto his lap.

The fried goodness did little to help, even if he had been a little tickled upon discovering Macy had ordered his favorite pop for him.

When he noticed a woman glaring out her curtains at him again, Kevin decided that it was time to stop lurking outside Macy's house. Trying to clean the grease from his fingers he started pawing through the takeout bag to fish out another napkin. He discovered a plastic bag instead. The bag, it turned out, contained a Happy Meal toy that Kevin realized Macy must have gotten for him.

Smiling at the small stuffed dolphin, Kevin placed it on his dash before starting his car up and heading for home.

He'd be seeing Macy again in 11 hours and if being slightly subtle was too subtle perhaps he could try a much sinister type of subtle.

A subtle that included blatantly abusing the fact that, including this morning, he'd caught Macy staring at his arms. He'd been a little unsure when he realized all of Stella's workout wear for him included sleeveless tees or tank tops but he was definitely in a place where he was willing to count his blessings and take full advantage of it.

Ha, Joe wouldn't be the only Lucas strutting around school tomorrow.

Stopping at a yellow light Kevin quickly amended that he probably wouldn't be strutting around the school but he'd be working it...or, uh, something! Something that involved arms...that wasn't flailing. Ugh, he'd figure it out later!

Ooh, perhaps there would be flexing!

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