Scott

The door slammed and as I turned my attentions back to our circle, I noticed that Clint's eyes were fixed on Taylor, and not just Taylor, Taylor's envelope. It was the envelope from earlier, unopened and no doubt hiding yet another photograph from our own personal session.

"You sure are loved. Wonder who's stalking you?"

My dad's words made Taylor and I jump, startled, and then cringe as we realized he had no clue about the photos and menacing messages; his words were purely in fun.

"Hey . . . I don't want to play anymore," I managed softly, feeling like I should get Tay into the bedroom again so we could open the innocent-looking envelope and add the next piece into this entire puzzle.

"Me neither," Bob spoke, surprising me. He was the one who'd produced a Scrabble board from seemingly nowhere, but as I exchanged a glance with him I realized that both he and Clint sensed the panic, the nervousness, from me and Taylor.

"Yeah, not if Scott keeps making up words like he is," Clint added, trying to be mean but also looking at me with that I realize this is important to you look.

"Man, you guys are party poopers," pouted my dad, setting down his letters. "That's okay, I'm gonna change into some sweats anyway. This shirt is annoying me . . ."

YES, LEAVE, all four of us silently urged. I pretended to put up the Scrabble game as Dad got up and headed for the bedroom next to the bathroom. Then, I scooted over and put my hand on Tay's arm, deeply sorry I couldn't put it on his thigh instead, or wrap him in a warm hug.

"Open it."

Taylor glanced at Bob and Clint quickly, but his fingers tore at the envelope nonetheless, and pried it open in record time. I felt a sick twinge in the pit of my stomach as he peeked in the envelope and slowly pulled out the picture. I gazed over his shoulder intently, and saw a massive smear of red on the usual black and white image - and breathed in surprise.

The black and white picture was stunning. Albeit slightly blurry, the blurriness only attributed to the magical, almost angelic quality of the photo. It was a close-up of Taylor's face, handsome as always, his eyes falling off to the side, brooding yet looking luminous at the same time, as if he were a thoughtful cherub on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. His lips were pursed slightly, and the way his hair was coming out from his ponytail and framing his jaw was absolutely magnificent. His skin seemed to glow with health even though the image was black and white and slightly blurred. If the red marker hadn't been smeared on it so, it would have been suitable for framing, and I probably would have demanded that I keep it.

The red marker was a smeared, badly-drawn heart around Taylor's face, looking more like someone had drawn it with the hand they weren't good at. The marker also looked as if it had spazzed and leaked with the way the ink was smudged and spread out so oddly. There were words at the bottom, too. Those neat capitals. Red marker.

"I THINK I LOVE YOU."

My heart leapt up into my throat, nausea spreading over me like it had earlier with my panic attack. Taylor was silent, all words past him. He simply stared down, his lips hanging open ever so slightly, his eyes going over and over the words like he almost didn't understand them. Dad had better get out of the bathroom because I am going to hurl in about three seconds, I thought distantly.

Clint and Bob's presence suddenly cut through. "What is it?" Bob wanted to know. I was surprised at Taylor as he almost blankly handed the photo to Bob. He and Clint crowded together and stared at the black and white image. "Woah, this is rather - uh . . . weird," Bob commented.

"It smells funny," Clint commented, and I supposed he was talking about the marker. I knew the last ones smelled a little strongly of permanent ink. He took the photo from Bob and investigated it.

"The song, Tay," I murmured, and he nodded, his eyes registering me briefly.

"Uh - ew - oh my God," Clint blurted, his nose against the photo and his fingers scratching at it quizzically. Everyone looked at him, and he looked back, his face flushed a little green. "Guys - uh . . . no wonder it smells funny . . . I think this heart is . . . written in . . . blood."

The unreal, horrific words had barely sunk into me when Tay's chest suddenly heaved, and by the lack of color in his skin I knew what was going to happen, and reacted quickly. In an burst of urgent, sudden strength, I was hauling Taylor into the bathroom, flicking the lights on, getting him to the toilet just in time for him to be sick.

I had to close my eyes as Taylor emptied himself, for I was feeling heavy waves of nausea myself, and listening to his pained coughing was not doing a thing for it. However, I sympathetically held his usual loose fly-aways behind his head as he fought with his stomach. Clint and Bob, I suddenly realized, were on my heels and stood in the doorway of the bathroom.

"Damn it, Clint," I snarled over my shoulder. "You'd better be damn sure about that, or Taylor's yarking his guts out for no reason!!"

"Scott, look," Clint said softly, a tinge of sadness in his voice grabbing at my heart. "Look."

I put my hand on Taylor's back and he appeared to calm for a minute and take his own hair. I stroked his back for a second before turning to Clint.

"What."

Clint stepped into the bathroom next to me and we peered at the photograph. I reeled in surprise - in the bright lighting of the restroom, I now noticed the deeper, darker shade of red the heart was scrawled in, and could see the missing scratches where Clint had dug at it with his fingernails. Again, my brother scratched at the heart - the red flaked off like a scab from pale skin.

"Oh, God," I whispered, feeling like I was going to faint all of a sudden and grabbing the counter behind me.

"Don't you be sick, too," Taylor said weakly from his crouching position by the toilet.

"I'm not," I said, trying to be strong.

Taylor reached up a shaky hand and flushed away the remains of his stomach, then pulled himself up, lowered the toilet lid, and sat down heavily, the sick look on his face still vivid.

"How could someone be so sick? Do they hate you or love you?" Bob wondered, compassionately joining us in the bathroom and putting an arm around Taylor.

"I - don't know."

My love's hair fell back into his eyes.

"How come you haven't told us . . . Dad . . . your family . . ."

Clint didn't want to put the photo down and expose it to our sight, but he looked like he didn't want to be holding it, either.

"It wasn't this bad - or this sick - before," I wheezed sickly. "It was scary, but it seemed more teeny at the same time."

"Are you going to have to pay homage to the porcelain gods, Scott?"

I opened my eyes to Bob's half-kidding half-concerned expression.

"Heh . . . no, I don't think so," I sighed.

"Just how many expressions are there for 'vomit,' anyway?" Taylor wondered jokingly, his face still pale and his eyes tired.

"Uh . . . let's see . . . vomit . . . puke . . . throw up, upchuck, uhh . . ."

We all laughed slightly at Clint, who was suddenly listing them.

"Yark," I offered up.

"Spew," Tay nodded, slumping back against the back of the toilet a bit.

"Call Roy," said a voice at the doorway. We all looked up to see Dad, standing in Canucks and Roots sweats at the doorway.

"What?" laughed Bob.

"I had this friend in college who was drunk all the time, and when he got back at three in the morning on Saturday nights, he would spend about an hour in the bathroom hurling his alcohol right back out - hurl, that's one - and when he threw up, it sounded like he was saying 'Roy.'" A sick look passed over Tay's face at the thought, and none of the rest of us looked too delighted to hear that, either. Dad laughed at us all. "So we used to go, 'Oh, where's George?' 'Oh, he's calling Roy."

"That's disgusting, Dad, thank you so much," I almost gagged. "I think I might have to call Roy now, I feel completely sick."

"I get the phone after Scott. I might have to call Roy, too." Clint still looked a little green from earlier when he'd been investigating the photo.

"Now Tay, were you calling Roy? You certainly look like it. Are you okay?"

"Uhhh . . . I think it was something bad I ate," Tay managed, lying very convincingly, and Clint and Bob looked at me in unison, their twin vibes making them twice as powerful.

Why are you keeping this a secret??

Zac

It ended up costing us around thirty-seven dollars to get the film where we wanted it to be. Not only was the film a more expensive kind to develop, since it was professional and glossy black and white (or so the woman said), but we had to bribe her with a large chunk of cash to overlook what she was already currently developing and get ours to us ASAP. If it hadn't have been for Dave flashing her doe eyes and using an incredibly cute, plaintive voice, she probably would have made us leave the store, 'cause God knows she didn't like me!

I annoyed the twenty-something woman by hanging persistently around the photo-development counter, prodding at the impulse items by the check out, buzzing around like a moth by a flame. Dave sat calmly on the bench by the door, looking at a newspaper he'd bought for fifty cents passing his time wisely. I played with squishy foam key chains, fake bugs, bought some gum, tinkered with those ugly pens you find at drug stories that I'm quite sure nobody below the age of eighty-six would ever be seen with, and tried to make chit-chat with the annoyed film-developer ("Do you like your job? You should quit. I bet you could be a model. Are you in the Employee of the Month calendar?") until she gave me an icy look and asked sharply,

"Do you want the exposed frames developed, too?"

"How many are exposed?" I asked nervously.

"Three in the front."

"Yeah," I decided, concluding in my mind that if there was anything on them worth seeing, I was going to make sure nobody saw them. The young woman turned again and dismissed me by busying herself. I cracked my gum in a silent retort and went to go take a seat by Dave. He didn't tear his eyes from the paper, so I leaned against him a little to peer over his shoulder and see what was so interesting.

"I so hope Dear Abby is able to help Distressed in Detroit," I kidded Dave.

Dave finally gave me a look from the corner of his eye, one that conveyed the message You Must Be Kidding, I Am Not Reading Dear Abby. "Do you have a pen?"

"Uh . . . yeah." I stood up and grabbed one of those ugly pens, then sat back down and handed it to Dave. He half-smiled, still looking at the paper with his eyes a bit squinted. He'd folded it back, and was now contented in doing Crossword Land. "You like word games, don't you, Dave?" I asked him. He filled in 3 Across.

"Why do you say that?"

"You seemed to be quite the Scrabble lover." I watched him fill in 1 Down with the word "paradigm."

"I like to read," he replied. "I think I read too much . . . 'cause my eyesight sucks sometimes." I had noticed his slight squinting. "But yeah, I like them, I guess, because I find them both fun and easy."

"To be able to know an eight-letter word for 'an example or model,' then yeah, I guess you do like them."

"Four Down . . . What's Latin for 'love'?" Dave questioned me. "Isn't it . . .?"

"Um . . . amour? Amore? Or is that French . . . I have no clue. Something like that?"

"I don't now. I'll leave it blank for now." He doodled in the blank margins with the lavender I Love My Grandkids pen. "We should ask our brothers. "They do speak the language of love, after all!"

"Gag . . . they're like . . . too perfect or something." I mock shuddered, but smiled still, reflecting Dave's tolerance. "It is rather amazing how we met like that, though."

"Yeah, that was preordained," he agreed.

"Do you think there's one person for everyone in the world? Like that kind of Fate?" I wondered.

Dave, still taking the utmost interest in his puzzle, didn't notice me looking at our blurry reflections in the clear plastic of the gumball machines. He gave a little laugh. "I don't know. But if there was, I'd say Scott and Taylor have that covered." Then, he glanced at me. "I think we were destined to meet too . . ."

"Really?" I couldn't help a pleased smile.

"Yeah . . . I think we're Tay and Scott's guardian angels. We're always watching over them."

We laughed, but looked up as the film developer called out Dave's name. We stood up and walked to the counter in a nervous excitement, and Dave took the picture's colorful paper envelope from the woman with a sweet word of thanks. I jumped a little as he opened it up and pulled out the wide pictures.

Slowly, he looked past the three exposed frames. "Hm."

Nothing but pretty, colorful pictures of flowers as we flipped through.