Liam was freaking out. Come to think of it, he seemed to be doing a lot of that lately. Now, the fact that he was freaking out was something that Heath hadn't failed to notice. The big give aways were the parts where he wouldn't talk to Heath, or even look at him. And Heath decided this was a situation he needed to do something about. Right, so Murphy needed to relax, take a chill pill, no wait, scratch that, chill pills weren't a good idea, not that Heath was considering actually offering him drugs, it was a figure of speech or whatever...anyway, all this was way off track. Man, thinking was overrated, just doing stuff was way better.

"C'mon Murph, take a break," Heath suggested. "Let's go to the beach."

"What? Now? Are you serious? I've got way too much stuff to do..." Murphy said, looking rather frazzled. His hair was all over the place as though he'd been running his hands through it all morning and he was surrounded by equipment which Heath had no clue as to what it did. Cords and speakers and pedals, it seemed like a fuck load of shit just to make a guitar work. Add to that the scrunched up bits of paper lying everywhere and Murphy really did look like a crazy person.

"What's all this crap?" Heath said, bending down and picking one of the discarded bits of paper up off the floor and attempting to unscrunch it. "Are you writing more songs or something?"

"God no," Murphy said, "now is so not the time for that." Heath finished flattening out the bit of paper and saw it was a list of songs, with some crossed out and arrows all amongst them. Murphy was back to mucking around with some piece of junk or other. Heath scooped up another ball of paper off the floor and found it was almost identical to the first one.

"Are these all like this?" he questioned, beginning to worry a little about Murphy's state of mind. He held the crinkled bit of paper up for Murphy to examine.

"Yeah, so?"

"So this is crazy. You're stressing this much over a set list? Who the fuck cares what order you sing them in? You've got CD's don't ya? Just roll with that order..."

"I can't do that-"

"Why not?"

"It's just not what you do..."

"Fucking hell, this isn't the Liam Murphy Spectacular! It's just a few songs in the corner of a small town bar..." Silence hung between them. Heath wondered if he'd done it again, he hadn't meant to upset Murphy but he needed to be told... Thankfully the silence was broken by Murphy's laughter, and thankfully it was good-humoured, not that maniacal, crazy-person laughter.

"You know what? You're right," Murphy conceded. "Let's go to the beach."

xxx

It was nice to be out in the sunshine on such a beautiful morning. Heath kicked off his thongs and pulled his singlet over his head, discarding it on the sand.

"You wanna go for a swim?"

"I can't swim, remember?" Murphy said, knocking his knuckles against Heath's skull. Heath scowled at him, did Murphy think he was a moron or something?

"I know, but it's not like I'd let you drown..." Heath said in offering. Teaching Murphy to swim wasn't entirely unselfish, he wouldn't mind seeing a shirtless Murphy mucking around in the surf...

"No, not today..." One day Liam would let Heath teach him but he was one-hundred and ten percent sure it would involve an argument and he didn't need the hassle today, they were here to chill out after all.

"Well what are you gonna do? Sit there and watch meswim?"

"I wouldn't be opposed to it..." Liam said, making absolutely no effort to hide his shameless ogling of Heath. Heath rolled his eyes and attempted to brush it off but Liam didn't miss the smile playing at his yummy River Boys' lips. And now he wanted to kiss those lips. Liam pressed his hand to Heath's chest and leaned in, intending to do just that but Heath wouldn't have a bar of it.

"No, no..." Heath said firmly, taking a step back. "For once in your life you are going to act like a normal person at the beach." Wasn't this exactly what 'normal' people did at the beach? But Liam didn't get a chance to say anything before Heath declared, "we're gonna build a sandcastle."

"Huh?" Building a bloody sandcastle was the last thing Liam had had in mind.

"You heard me. Don't tell me you're even too retarded to build a sandcastle?"

"No, of course not," Liam huffed, immediately dropping to his knees in the warm, white sand and beginning to level a patch. In his determination to prove Heath wrong he missed the affectionate smile Heath bestowed upon him before he plonked down next to Liam to assist him with the construction.

xxx

"Hey Case, you alright?" Brax asked as he came to stand by Casey who was leaning on the railing outside the Surf Club gazing down at the beach. His little brother had a slightly disturbed air about him, though under the circumstances that was understandable.

"Yeah, I'm just waiting for Dex and Xave, their gonna help me...catch up with..." Casey trailed off, seemingly distracted. Brax followed his gaze and there on the beach were Heath and Liam building a sandcastle. Quite frankly, it was fucking bizarre.

"What the fuck are they doing..." and by that Brax meant, why? Why in God's name would two, presumably sober, grown men be building a sandcastle together at ten o'clock in the morning?

"It is pretty weird isn't it?" Casey said, "I mean how happy they are together, they hated each other so much...it's like they both had brain transplants or something..."

"I'm hearing ya..." Brax agreed, "though it is nice to have Heath so...occupied..."

"Yeah," Casey agreed, "keeps him outta trouble..." Brax didn't miss Casey's meaning. He reached out and gripped Casey's shoulder, looking him in the eye, as he gave it a reassuring squeeze.

"It's gonna be alright Case," Brax told him and then he wandered off, back into the real world.

xxx

"Well, I think it's pretty good considering we had nothing to use but our bare hands," Heath declared as he stood to admire their castle. Ok, so maybe it was a little wonky and Heath's side wasn't as arty as Murphy's but still, it seemed to work.

"Hmm," Liam mused, "it's missing something..."

"Like what?" Heath said, as he brushed his hands together to remove the sand from them, the castle looked pretty satisfactory to him.

"Like...flare or something. Maybe we can decorate it with some shells..."

"Race ya to find the best ones," Heath said as he took off in search of said shells. Liam rose to the challenge, hurriedly combing the beach for some super pretty ones. He wanted ones with cool colours and that weren't broken but Heath didn't appear to be so fussy. By the time Liam came back to the castle, Heath was already pushing his loot into the walls of the tower Liam had made.

"This is my room," Heath declared, as he took care not to crumble the tower as he decorated it, "it's the best one."

"We aren't gonna share?" Liam asked as he kneeled down to begin decorating the rest of the structure.

"No, get your own room."

"What if a cyclone comes and blows your room away?" Liam said and then he swung his hand at the castle destroying 'Heath's room'.

"Oi," Heath protested, looking rather distraught for a moment before his usual audacity returned. "I'm definitely not sharing with you now. I'm taking your room and you'll have to sleep outside..."

"What if the whole thing gets blown away?" Liam said and then he pushed Heath back, falling on top of him and crushing the castle beneath them. "Then what will we do?"

"We'll have to huddle for warmth I suppose..." Heath accepted, wrapping his arms around Liam and pulling him in for a kiss. When they broke apart, Liam had a moment of looking down at Heath and feeling the weight of this moment. Liam never imagined he'd be here like this with the River Boy, but he was oh so glad he was. Heath looked back at him, and there was no one in the world but them, this, right here, was everything.

"What?" Heath said, his eyes alight with the joy of life…and maybe just a hint of trepidation.

"Nothing," Liam said with a smile, knowing words would ruin the moment, "just kiss me again." And Heath did. A fleeting thought of the long shower they would need take after this sandy encounter flashed through Liam's mind before he melted into the kiss completely, life was good.

xxx

Dexter Walker, ultra-nerd, and Xavier Austin, reformed bad boy and now all round nice guy, were on their way to meet Casey Braxton. Casey Braxton who had apparently decided he was too cool for school and had now suffered a change of heart. They slowed their pace a little when they noticed that Casey wasn't alone.

"Let's wait till he's gone," Xavier said, referring to the eldest Braxton brother.

"Ok," Dex agreed with obvious relief, "he is kinda scary."

"Yeah..." Xavier agreed, because it was the expected response.

"Do you really think they're drug dealers?" Dex asked, kind of excited by the potential dangerousness of the Braxton's.

"Maybe," Xavier shrugged. It wasn't a lie, it just wasn't the whole truth either. He knew the Braxton's were dealers, Heath had hooked Xavier up when he'd first come to town and was making a little cash by selling pot to his classmates. Xavier was happy to steer clear of the elder Braxton's, they were seriously hard core, and he didn't need their kinda trouble anymore. They watched Casey's brother leave and headed over to where Casey stood. 'Heys' were exchanged all round and that's when Xavier and Dexter saw them, eyes nearly bugging from their heads.

"Is that-" Dexter began but he was cut off mid-question.

"Yes," Casey sighed.

"And is that-" Xavier attempted to ask but was cut off as well.

"Yes," Casey sighed again.

"And are they-" Dex asked, just to be sure, because this was the weirdest thing that had happened since New Line announced Peter Jackson would not be directing The Hobbit.

"Yes. It's my brother Heath and his boyfriend Liam Murphy rolling around in the sand together..." Casey left the 'snogging each others brains out' part unspoken.

"I didn't know your brother was a fag," Xavier said offhandedly, now that he'd recovered from the initial shock.

"He's not," Casey said, still struggling a little to come to terms with the fact that his man whore of a brother was in a relationship with a dude.

"But..." Xavier protested, raising his arm to point towards the enthusiastic couple.

"Stop that," Casey said urgently, pushing Xavier's arm down, he didn't need any more attention drawn to the situation. "It's not like he wants every bloke he sees..."

"Yeah but he is snogging a bloke right now..."

"I'm aware of that," Casey said flatly, "now can we go?"

"I think we better," Dex chimed in, looking rather troubled, "I knew there was a reason I didn't watch Brokeback Mountain..."