::Brook::


"Wow. I didn't expect to see you home so soon," Jenny said when I had walked into our apartment.

I narrowed my eyes at her, confused as to why she was home too.
"I could say the same for you," I said, slipping off my coat and hanging it up on the hook next to the door.

"My last class got cancelled," she said stretching her arms over her head. "Let me tell you though, I almost fell off my chair in class earlier when I saw your text that you were blowing off work."

I rolled my eyes and sat on the edge of the couch by her feet.
"I'm didn’t blow off work. I really did have a headache when I woke up this morning and you know how my headaches are, Jenn. I can either sleep them off or end up feeling really sick all day."

"And let me guess," she smirked. "You slept it off?"

I nodded. "Woke up around ten good as new."

"Of course you did," Jenn smirked again. "You could have gone in late..."

"Yeah," I shrugged, "but then I wouldn't be able to spend the day with myboyfriend," I said slowly, waiting for her reaction.

"Boyfriend?" she repeated, her eyes opening widely. "Shut up!"

I nodded, smiling a bit.
"Yep."

"Oh my God, Brook! Why didn't you say anything sooner? When did it happen?"

"Last night. Well, really this morning," I said trying to control how wide my smile got.

"Well, there was no wasting time there. Tell me everything!" she said excitedly, leaning closer to me.

I shrugged. "I don't know. We were laying in his bed and I was saying how I had to get home and he wouldn't let me because we had to talk and how he practically practiced this speech to Matt, he’s the band’s tour manager, the entire flight home."

“What speech?” she asked, hanging on my every word.
I laughed softly. “I’m not sure he actually got to it. He sort of panicked and told me that he really liked me and rattled off all these really random and super adorable things that he liked about me.”

“Like what?” she pressed, the smile on her face growing.

“Like how he’s never heard me curse but noticed I sometimes slip one in Italian. How I ask him to text me when he gets home so I know he got there safely. He likes my giggle and how I’m not embarrassed about my love for the Jonas Brothers…”

“Wow, he said all that?”

“Yeah,” I nodded. “He said a bunch of other really sweet things and then I said a bunch of sweet things about him and then there was some kissing and a little more talking and a little more kissing and before we fell asleep, we became official.”

Jenny nodded slowly with an impressed look on her face.

"And he still hasn't gotten into your pants?"

I shook my head no and thought back to the incident right before I left.

"No..."

"Why do you say it that way?" she asked raising her eyebrow. “Did something happen?"

"Well, this morning we were kind of making out, I guess and I guess it got a little heated because all of a sudden Alex jumped away from me and I realized that- uh- something had come to life in his pants..."

I could barely make eye contact with Jenny as I told her this. I feared her reaction.

She stared at me in silence for a long second before she said anything.

"Please say something..."

A poorly hidden laugh escaped her mouth.

"You gave him a boner?"

I nodded slowly, looking away from her as my cheeks flushed.

"He was so embarrassed, Jenn. I felt so bad."

"What did you do?" she asked, biting back her giggles.

"I didn't do anything! I repeatedly assured him that it was okay. I think I asked him if he wanted to take a cold shower and told him I was flattered," I said, shaking my head.

"You're such a dork," Jenn laughed, not trying to hide it anymore.

"Look, what was I supposed to do with it?"

Jenn opened up her mouth and I quickly held my hand up.

"Please, God, whatever it was that you were about to say, don't say it."

"All I was going to say is I know where we can get you some videos to teach you whatever you need to know."

"I'm good," I shook my head.

"Why are you so afraid to have sex with him? It's not like you've never done it before."

"Sex complicates everything,” I sighed. “Our situation is complicated as it is. I don't need sex to make it worse. Plus, it's not like he's trying all too hard to do it. Even with his issue this morning, he didn't try anything. Nothing at all."

"Maybe he's really just gay?"

I rolled my eyes. "We're done talking now," I said, standing up.

"Oh come on, Brook. I'm just kidding," Jenn said, following me into my bedroom where I began to pull out clothes for the day.

"I know but I have things to do," I said, holding up a shirt and deciding whether or not I wanted to wear it.

"What things?"

"I'm only here to shower and change my clothes and get some stuff together to bring over to Alex's. We're going to make pizza tonight."

Jenn leaned against my door frame, crossing her arms over her chest and stared at me.
"Was that his idea or yours?"

"His," I shrugged.

"Big, bad rock star he is and he wants to spend his first Friday night home making pizza with you?"

I narrowed my eyes at her.

"You make it seem like a bad thing."

"It's not. You just better put out soon," she said, turning and walking back towards the living room. "He sounds too good to be true."


::Alex::


"No, no, no," Brook giggled. "If you do it that way it's not going to flatten evenly," she scolded, watching as I attempted to use a rolling pin, for the first time in my life, and flatten the lump of pizza dough we had just created from a bunch of ingredients.

I looked at her and laughed.

"I'm sorry. I wasn't aware there was a wrong way to do this," I said with a smirk and she rolled her eyes.

"Shush," she hissed, sliding her arms around me and placing her hands over mine, gently guiding me in the right way to roll the dough. "Just like this," she said, her breath hitting the side of my neck and her body leaning into my back.

"I t-think I got it n-now," I stammered, willing my body to keep cool.

I did not want to have another episode similar to what had happened that morning. It was one of the more humiliating moments of my life.

"Good," she said before pressing a big kiss to my cheek and letting my hands go and leaving me to roll the dough on my own. "You got it," she said, practically beaming with excitement when I'd successfully flattened the dough to the shape of her pizza pan.

"I think it's time to open my own pizza shop soon," I smirked, placing the rolling pin in my sink.

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves," she winked, moving over to my oven and setting the pre-heat and then stirring the pot of sauce on the stove.

"What do we do next?" I asked.

I was surprised at how much I was enjoying myself. I never enjoyed any kind of cooking that much but I guess doing things with Brook were different.

"While we wait for the sauce to cool a bit, we can make the crust," she explained, lowering the temperature of the burner where the pot of sauce sat.

"Okay and how do we do that?" I asked.

"It's easy," she said, moving the pizza pan in the middle of both of us. "You just have to pinch up the edge of the dough and shape it like crust. The more crust you like, the thicker the pinch. Personally, I don't like a lot of crust," she said, demonstrating exactly what I needed to do.

"Hey, me either," I smiled. "When I was a kid I used to make my mom cut it off for me before I'd even think about eating a slice of pizza."

She looked up at me and smile. "I did the same thing."

"Really? Did you also pick the cheese off and save it for last?"

"No," she shook her head. "That's just weird."

I laughed a little and bumped her gently with my shoulder. "Are you calling me weird?"

"I guess so," she shrugged, finishing pinching up the crust on one side of the pizza and spinning the tray to the unfinished side. "Your turn."

Once I finished with the crust, we covered the pizza with sauce, cheese and half with pepperoni. Brook let me carefully slide the pan into the oven and I almost dropped it to the floor before actually getting it in there. I was grateful that she pretended she didn't notice.

"And that's that," Brook said clasping her hands together after setting the timer for 35 minutes.

"Now what do we do?" I asked, leaning back against the counter.

"We clean up, of course," she said, shaking her head.

"Cooking and cleaning? Damn girl. Are you trying to kill me?" I laughed, coming up next to her at the sink as she started to wash the dishes that were in there.

I picked up a dish towel and dried whatever she'd finished washing and put it back where it belonged.

“I do have a dish washer,” I reminded her.

“It’s okay. I like washing dishes. It relaxes me.”

“Who’s the weird one now?” I smirked, putting a large mixing bowl on the top shelf of the cabinet.

"Shush you,” she snapped back, sticking her tongue out at me. “Just wait until we're done here. Then we're going to do laundry," she said with a wink.

"Laundry? What? Why?"

"Because the fact that you have three suitcases full of dirty clothes right now is driving me crazy."

"Fine," I sighed dramatically, causing a giggle from Brook.

"Don't be a baby," she smirked, bumping my shoulder with hers as she handed me the last dish to dry and put away.

"That wasn't so bad," I shrugged.

"Yeah," she laughed. "Cleaning isn't so bad," she said as she slowly pulled down the oven door and peaked inside at the pizza.

"How's it looking?" I asked, coming up behind her and wrapping an arm around her waist.

She closed the oven and spun around to face me.

"So far so good," she smiled, leaning up to kiss me quickly.

"You know, in the spirit of this whole cleaning thing, we should probably do something about your face," I said, looking down at her.

Her face scrunched up into a cute confused look.

"What's wrong with my face?"

"Well, normally it's perfect," I said. "But right now you have what looks to be flour on your cheek."

"I do?" she asked, quickly bringing her hand up and wiping at the wrong cheek. "Did I get it?"

"No," I laughed, bringing my hand to her other cheek and resting it there lightly before gently brushing the flour away with my thumb.

"All gone?" she asked, her voice had lowered and her eyes never left mine.

I nodded slowly, my hand still resting on her cheek. "Yeah. Back to completely perfect again."

"I'm not perfect, Alex," she said, her voice even lower this time.

"Yes, you are," I argued, bringing my other hand up to the other side of her face before I pressed my lips down to hers.

Brook leaned into the kiss, her arms wrapping around my middle. Eventually, my hands moved to her waist and her arms had wrapped around my neck and the next thing I knew Brook was sandwiched between myself and the counters, our bodies pressed tightly together.

This time Brook was the one to deepen the kiss, her tongue brushed mine and her fingers tangled in the hair at the back of my head.

I did not want a repeat of what happened this morning, so I tried my best to not focus on the way her body pressed into mine and the way I felt a shock down my spine every time she threaded her fingers through my hair.

I tried to occupy my thoughts with other things and the scary part was the only things that came to mind were all the bad things I had yet to tell Brook. It was almost like I was suddenly being taunted by all my own dirty little secrets and the next thing I knew things were flying out of my mouth like word vomit.

"When I was in high school I had an affair with a married woman that I was in love with."
***

Notes

Story Title: Taylor Swift - Sparks Fly
Chapter Title: One Republic - Secrets
Brook's outifit.