It's Your Party, Howie. You Can Cry If You Want To by honey
Summary: A tribute to Howie's 35th brithday and my Response to Rose's challenge for the August challenge on the AC boards!

CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE and find out how much trouble you can get into when the guys surprise you with a five-boy birthday all-nighter!
Categories: Fanfiction > Backstreet Boys Characters: Group, Howie
Genres: Adventure, Humor
Warnings: None
Challenges:
Series: None
Chapters: 10 Completed: Yes Word count: 6059 Read: 16337 Published: 08/22/08 Updated: 08/22/08
Story Notes:
Rose's challenge to me... I challenge you to write a story in 2nd person. (You're walking down a darkened hallway, the lights dim as they flicker sporadically. Turning your head you glance about when a loud crashing could be heard before shrugging it off as the horrible weather outside. ...etc. for example. like what's used in those old choose your own adventure books) The "you" is one of the boys, and interacts with the others somehow.
No other limits cause 2nd person is tough. Fun, creative, but tough.

1. Surprise! by honey

2. Roasting Mallows by honey

3. Mallow Fight by honey

4. Rescue Me by honey

5. Dog Run by honey

6. Video Games by honey

7. Pulling The Plug by honey

8. Camp Out by honey

9. Bubbly Bath by honey

10. Night Hike by honey

Surprise! by honey
Chapter One: Surprise!

Today is August 22nd. Your name is Howard Dorough and today is your birthday. A few of your close friends got together to have a nice lunch with you and your wife took you shopping at the grove afterward to celebrate, but as you drive home, you can’t help feeling a little bummed. You’re not disappointed with your wife’s gifts, and you really don’t mind that you’re officially 35 years old. What you’re upset about, is the fact that all of your band mates were too busy to get together today. “I know they all have lives,” you complain as you pull into your driveway, “but none of them have even called.”

“Honey, you know they love you,” your wife answers with a reassuring kiss. “I’m sure there are four messages waiting for you on the answering machine right now.”

You don’t feel so optimistic, but your wife’s smile is so beautiful that you cheer up a little, thinking that there are other ways to celebrate your birthday than hanging out with a bunch of guys. “I love you,” you say as you pull your wife into your arms suddenly overcome with an urgent passion.

For a moment you are both lost in the kiss, until the room is filled with bellowing voices. “SURPRISE!” they chant while you blush at the intrusion of the tender moment.

Your embarrassment is forgotten instantly when you see your best friends in juvenile party hats, blowing obnoxiously on matching noisemakers. They’re all here. All together. Even Brian has flown out from Georgia for the occasion, and you’re heart is so filled with joy that you become afraid you might shed tears. “Happy birthday,” your wife whispers, coming to your rescue, before she conveniently slips back out side to leave you and the guys alone for the evening.

After a round of hugs and birthday wishes, the guys inform you that your wife has arranged for you all to have a good old fashion sleepover and won’t be back until the morning. For a while you use all climb into the hot tub and catch up, because it’s been a while since you all just relaxed and enjoyed one another’s company. A you try to decide how you should spend your male bonding night, the guys inform you that after a unanimous decision to ignore Nick’s suggestion to find a strip joint, they have two ideas and want to know which you’d rather do first.

The first is to embark on an all night pro madden basketball tournament on the X-box – the first loser being the one to spring for the pizza.

And the second is to get a fire going on the back patio and just chill out and relax with the bottle of champagne your wife bought yesterday. (And the sparkling cider she’s snuck in there, knowing AJ would be here today.) Plus, Kevin’s brought the necessary ingredients to make smores.

If you choose to try your hand at the x-box, skip ahead to chapter 6.

If you’d rather roast a mallow, continue on to chapter 2.
Roasting Mallows by honey
You’ve loved smores since the camping trips you took with your family when you were just a kid. You’re also excited to try out that new high tech fire pit you had installed on the deck just last week, so you waste no time moving the party out back.

AJ’s back in the hot tub before you and Kevin can figure out how to turn on your latest toy, but once the flames are roaring, you dash inside to find a few roasting sticks. The closest thing you can come up with is your wife’s fondue set. “She won’t mind,” you tell yourself as you grab the sticks and head back outside. “When’s the last time anyone had a fondue party anyway?”

“You find something that will work?” Kevin asks when you reappear.

You hold up the sticks, but soon realize that if you don’t hurry, the sticks won’t be necessary. “Seven!” Nick shouts – or at least that’s what you think he says, but you can’t really be sure since his mouth is too full.

Brian shoves a marshmallow into his already gorged mouth and takes a moment to make sure it won’t fall back out when he shouts, “Eight!”

You snatch the now half empty bag of marshmallows before they’re gone, and you hand one to Kevin for roasting. You pull one out for yourself but before you get it on your stick AJ raises a hand from the hot tub. “Throw me one of those!” he calls.

As you toss him the marshmallow in your hand, Nick attempts the rip the bag from your other hand. You’ve got a good grip, so the bag rips in half and all of the marshmallows scatter. Some fall into the flames – getting your brand new fire pit all nasty – and the rest all over the deck, and even a couple over the railing down the side of the mountain.

You want to be annoyed, but for some reason the moment just makes all five of you burst into laughter. Do you a.) Seize the moment and become the first to declare your patio as a Stay-Puft war zone, or b.) Send Nick to the store for another bag of mallows while you all take a relaxing dip in the hot tub?



If you choose to send the dog on a run, skip ahead to chapter 5.

If you can’t resist pelting the punk with a mallow, continue on to chapter 3.
Mallow Fight by honey
You love smores. Your mouth is now watering for them, but the key ingredient has been spread across your beautiful back deck. For a moment you consider the ten-second rule, but you know that hint of OCD in you would never let you enjoy it, even if you could bring yourself to roast one anyway.

You sigh as you bend down to gather the spilled mallows, but on the inside you’re grinning because you know that Nick will assume that the neat freak is just cleaning up the mess. The punk actually allows you to pick up every last one without bothering to help, but for once you are glad. When you have every piece of ammo back in the ripped bag, you wait for the perfect moment.

Nick grabs a gram cracker and then joins AJ in the hot tub. Once he’s good and relaxed, you unleash your aim and begin hurling mallow after mallow at his face. “Dude!” he laughs, “Howie!” You only throw harder. “Hey! That one got in my eye!”

“Are you honestly going to tell me you got poked in the eye with a marshmallow?” you laugh when he ducks for cover.

Your laughter ignites the need to fight back, and Nick reaches for one of the slimy wet marshmallows floating in the water around him. You recognize you mistake instantly and duck for cover just before the sticky goop can reach you. You throw again, but you accidentally hit AJ, and now you’ve got him throwing mush at you too.

You hold your ground, though, because you see Brian sneaking up on them with an evil grin on his face. You distract Nick and AJ with a new round of fire and Brian takes the moment to grab to gooey mallows of his own. “Happy birthday, Howie!” he calls as he plasters gooey stuff onto each Nick and Brian’s heads.

An all-out war is now on. There are Backstreet Boys ducking for cover everywhere, while an oblivious Kevin continues to patiently cook the marshmallow Howie had given him before the tragic spill. No one is more anal than Kevin when it comes to an evenly roasted mallow, and he’s so focused he doesn’t even notice the chaos going on around him.

Meanwhile, Nick managed to nail you right in the face with a glop of gooey goodness. You figure this action simply can’t go unpunished, so you grab the bottle of birthday champagne sitting by Kevin, and you shake it up real good before unleashing your fury on the young blond.

“Take that!” You cry as you chase Nick around the patio, spraying everything in your path, including your wife’s new curtains that are hanging over the back door you left open.

You cringe for a moment, knowing your wife is going to kill you for that, and Nick seizes the moment, tackling you to the ground. He tries to wrestle the bottle away from you, but you’re quicker, more agile. You scamper away, managing to spray Nick in the face with the last of the champagne, but you both end up tumbling into Kevin. The crash forces Kevin’s near-perfect mallow right into the flames and sets the thing ablaze. “Aww, come on!” you hear him pout.

You scramble to your feet, but you’re too close to the burning marshmallow. Kevin lifts it quickly before you can put your eye out, but it slips off his makeshift skewer and goes soaring to the house. “Would you two knock it off before someone gets hurt!” Kevin yelps in that ‘I mean business’ voice that makes the rest of you freeze no matter what is going on.

All eyes turn to Kevin, and none of you, not even Kevin, realize that the blazing marshmallow, landed on your wife’s new curtains, until the woosh from the igniting champagne, nearly singes the back of Nick’s head.

Within seconds the entire back door is engulfed in flames. You, along with all of your friends, stand there with you mouth gaping open for a moment. You all scramble for handfuls of water from the hot tub, but it’s no use. The fire has already reached your wife’s beautiful sued couch. “On the bright side, she won’t know about the curtains,” you mumble to yourself, still suffering from denial as your house begins to burn down.

It’s not until Kevin shouts, “Someone call 911!” that you realize the severity of your predicament.

You’re all in swimsuits. All cell phones are now on the wrong side of the flames. There is no way in the house, and there’s no way off the patio. The only thing you can do is go down the concrete stairs to the lower deck and get as far from the fire as possible. “The alarm will call the fire department,” you assure your friends as you reach the farthest part of the deck.

You can all feel the heat and you wonder if the flames will jump from the house to where you’re standing. You look down the mountain behind you, and can only think of two plans. Wait where you are until the Hollywood Fire Department comes to your rescue, or try to jump the patio railing and head down the hill to safety.

If you’ve always wanted to be rescued by a fireman, continue on to chapter 4.

If there’s no way in hell you’re sticking around to get roasted like a mallow, skip to chapter 10.
Rescue Me by honey
It’s quite a drop, you decide as you peer over the railing of your deck to the steep hill below you. Plus it’s dark, and you’re barefoot, and who knows what kind of wild animals are out there – it wasn’t that long ago that the guy up the lane from you found his poodle ripped to bits. “I think we’ll be safer staying here for now,” you say, praying that the others will agree.

All five of you look back up at the house that has now lit the night sky around it. The flames seem content with the house, and haven’t tried to make their way down the hill to you yet, so you all decide that you’re going to wait it out unless it becomes critical to make the leap down the mountain.

After only a couple minutes you hear sirens approach, but it still takes a good ten minutes before anyone hears your collective screaming. The relief you feel when you see flashlights headed through the trees coming for you is unlike any relief you’ve ever known. You feel so much better when they get there, that despite the fact that your favorite house and all of its contents are going up in smoke, the climb down the latter and being carried back up the hill by firemen is actually kind of neat. Then, you, Kevin, AJ, Brian, and Nick sit against one of the fire trucks, each wrapped in a standard issue emergency blanket and watch the most amazing sight of firemen hard at work battling the beast like it’s better than any movie you’ve ever seen.

It’s not until the fire is squelched and things are much quieter that the reality of your situation begins to sink in. You just burned down your house because you were horsing around with the guys. You walk up to what’s left of your home and cast your eyes around the ashes that are still smoldering. “Leigh’s gonna kill me,” you breath to yourself, but you can’t help but laugh like a half crazed madman. It may not have turned out as originally planned, but you can’t remember when you’ve had more fun on your birthday. “This birthday will definitely be one to remember.”

“Very true,” Kevin agrees, throwing a shoulder around you.

Soon all of the guys are huddled on either side of you trying to hold back their smirks. “Happy birthday,” they all laugh in unison and then Brian clears his voice and hums a pitch.

Without a single spoken word AJ, Nick, Kevin, and Brian burst into a harmonious version of the happy birthday song.

You listen to the voices you’ve grown to know better than your own, and look around at the four men who mean as much to you as brothers. You can’t help feeling sentimental. “Thanks for coming today, guys,” you say kind of bashfully. It’s clear that you’ve become a little choked up.

“It’s your party, Howie,” Kevin teases lightly with underlining sincerity, “you can cry if you want to.”

“Cry if you want to, cry if you want to!” Nick echoes in his best falsetto.

You can hear a round of snickers, and then all together you can’t help but burst into one last song. “You would cry too, if it happened to you!”

The End.
Dog Run by honey
You love smores. Your mouth is now watering for them, but the key ingredient has been spread across your beautiful back deck. “Niiiiicccckkk,” you try to wine, though it’s not too convincing because you’re still kind of laughing.

“Here,” he chokes through his mouthful of mallows with a shrug. He picks up a couple of mallows off the ground and wipes them on his shirt – as if something he pulled off his bedroom floor this morning is going to make it any cleaner. It sounds like he says, “Still good, see?”

You crinkle up face, is he really going to – yup, he is… Nick shoves the mallows in his still-full mouth and though you’re obviously a little disturbed, he grins triumphantly, “NINE!” is his muffled cry. “I WIN!”

Brian looks down at the soiled snacks and you wonder if he’s brave enough to follow suit. He thinks about it for a moment and then squishes the remaining marshmallows in his mouth into his cheeks, giving him the appearance of a chipmunk. “I forfeit.”

You all laugh again, but then everyone realizes that Kevin’s roasting the only edible marshmallow – he’s good too. It’s clear he’s had some training, and your mouth begins to water again at the sight of the perfectly golden-brown morsel. Your disappointment is obvious as the mallow is packed between chocolate and gram crackers. “Nicholas Gene Carter!” you threaten in the ‘I mean business’ voice that you’ve acquired since Kevin stopped attending recording sessions and rehearsals. “It’s my birthday, and if there is not a new bag of marshmallows in my hand soon, we’re going to play a nice game of smear the queer, only there won’t be any need for a ball!”

“But…” he starts to protest until Kevin gives him that look of his.

Nick disappears into the house without any further argument, and once he’s gone you and the guys all burst into laughter. “You’ve really got to teach me how to do that Kev,” you say, throwing your arm over his shoulder.

Kevin hands you the most perfect smore you’ve ever seen in your life. “Happy birthday, Howie.”

“Aww, you shouldn’t have,” you tease, but you happily accept the gift.

You eat your treat and then join Kevin, AJ, and Brian in the hot tub again, where you stay until Nick returns. After changing back into his swimsuit, he joins the party on the patio with a new bag of marshmallows. “I can’t believe I just had to drive all the way into the Valley for a bag of stupid marshmallows,” he grumbles as he shuts the back door behind him.

Realizing he left the roasting sticks on the kitchen counter, he turns around only to find that the door is locked. You think for a moment but you quickly realize that you are now locked out and there is no way off the secluded deck that hangs over the side of the mountain you live on. You try to jimmy the door open, but with everyone in their swimwear, there’s not a credit card among you. There’s not a cell phone either, so since you are not about to have your wife kill you for breaking the large picture window in the family room in order to get inside, you are now stuck with two options.

Brave the night, with your buddies on the back porch until your wife returns in the morning, or try to climb over the back railing and make your way barefoot down the side of the mountain to the nearest phone.

If you’re brave enough to venture a night hike in nothing but your trunks, skip to chapter 10.

If singing Cumbyiah around the fire pit till morning sounds like a better idea, skip to chapter 8.
Video Games by honey
You thought the video games sounded fun, but it turned out that you were the first one to be eliminated. It didn’t come as much of a shock since you’re terrible at sports – simulated or otherwise – you were really just hoping they might let the birthday boy win for once. Nick apparently can’t read your mind.

By the time you’ve called the pizza place AJ has joined you in the ranks of the video game losers and Kevin gets kicked out just about the same time as the pizza arrives. When you open the box, you remember just how much you love pizza and you, AJ, and Kevin dig in hungrily. “Dude! Somebody bring me a slice of that!” Nick calls over his shoulder behind him, never taking his eyes from the screen as he battles Brian ferociously for the title.

“Man, this is good! And it isn’t going to last long, so if you want some you’d better come and get it, Nicky,” you taunt, and then shove an entire piece into your mouth, as revenge for the brutal slaying he gave you earlier that ended your career as an NBA all-star.

Nick casts his eyes back in a worried glance, shouting threats about saving him some, and Brian uses the distraction to break his defense and turn the score in his favor. “Damn it!” Nick yelps, and for the moment, the pizza is forgotten.

After you, Kevin and AJ, intentionally eat every single piece of pizza, despite the sick feeling it gives you all, you all begin to get bored while waiting for Nick and Brian’s never ending battle of overtime periods to be finished. When they refuse to call it quits before there is a winner, you all to end it for them. You can think of two ways to do this.

One is to shake up the champagne in the fridge and shower the dorks until they forfeit their controllers. The other is to pull the plug, and then run for your life.


If you decide to liven up the party with a little bubbly, skip ahead to chapter 9.

If pulling the plug is more your style, continue on to chapter 7.
Pulling The Plug by honey
The guys are always saying that you’re a little boring, and that you never do anything spontaneous, but that’s about to change. It’s your birthday, and you’re in a very good mood since your friends surprised you. While you don’t want to seal your fate by getting champagne all over your wife’s expensive couches, you still want to get this party started and that means, getting rid of the game system.

Nick and Brian are so engrossed in their game they don’t see you walk into the room. “Hey guys, let’s go roast the marshmallows now, or watch a movie or something,” you say, deciding to live up to your nice-guy reputation and give them one last chance.

“Yeah, yeah, ok,” is the only response you get from either of them.

That does it. In one fail swoop you snatch up the x-box yanking the cords from the TV and you head straight for the back door before Nick and Brian even realize what just happened. Without hesitation, you hurl the system over the back railing and down the side of the mountain behind it.

AJ and Kevin are every bit as shocked as Nick and Brian, but they burst into laughter while Nick and Brian shout curses and scramble to their feet. “What the hell, Howie?” Nick wines as he follows you outside.

“I’ll buy you a new one tomorrow, but I’m not spending the one night we all have together watching you and Brian play video games.” You laugh. “You needed to upgrade to the 360 anyway.

Nick is fuming, but you’re not worried. You know he’ll get over it, and Brian seems to know exactly how to make him feel better. “Howard Dorough,” he asks, cocking his eyebrow dangerously, “when’s the last time you had birthday spankings?”

“Whoa Rok,” AJ laughs as Brian and Nick eye you dangerously. “I never figured you be the one of us to come out of the closet.”

“It’s time for a birthday beating!” Nick agrees whole-heartedly. “Get him!”

AJ and Kevin may have been innocent bystanders in this brilliant plan of yours, but they aren’t about to miss out on the fun. Kevin sees you eye the door to the house and happily closes it so that you have less of a chance at getting past them to safety, and suddenly it’s four on one.

They wrestle you to the ground in a matter of seconds, and give you the appropriate amount of Charlie horses – suddenly you think 35 is too old. Then, after they’ve thoroughly dumped you in the hot tub, they decide roasting marshmallows sounds like a good plan after all.

You forgive the beating only to find that the back door is locked. You think for a moment but you quickly realize that you are now locked out and there is no way off the secluded deck that hangs over the side of the mountain you live on. You try to jimmy the door open, but with everyone in their swimwear, there’s not a credit card among you. There’s not a cell phone either, so since you are not about to have your wife kill you for breaking the large picture window in the family room in order to get inside, you are now stuck with two options.

Brave the night, with your buddies on the back porch until your wife returns in the morning, or try to climb over the back railing and make your way barefoot down the side of the mountain to the nearest phone.

If you’re brave enough to venture a night hike in nothing but your trunks, skip to chapter 10.

If singing Cumbyiah around the fire pit till morning sounds like a better idea, skip to chapter 8.
Camp Out by honey
You know you’re in for a long night, but nature has never really been your thing. Nor has making slightly dangerous jumps, or looking for pay phones in nothing but swim shorts. It’s not too hard to convince everyone to stay put. “I’m not going,” you tell the guys who are all still judging how difficult climbing down the mountain would be. “There are coyotes and possibly mountain lions down there, and if we do make it to the bottom, five Backstreet boys in bathing suits strolling Sunset boulevard in search of a phone will make more than the front page of the tabloids.”

“So what do we do now?” Nick asks as if it’s your fault you’re all locked on the back porch.

“Hang out?” you suggest. After all, what other option is there?

You have fun talking for a while and once it gets dark you start up the fire pit and somehow end up telling ghost stories as if you’d planned a camp out all along. You stay up for hours laughing over old stories and dirty jokes. Eventually you are all so tired you each find some kind of bench or lounge chair to crash on, and when it gets quiet you let out a small laugh. It may not have turned out as originally planned, but you can’t remember when you’ve had more fun on your birthday. “This birthday will definitely be one to remember.”

“Happy birthday,” they all laugh and then Brian clears his voice and hums a pitch.

Without a single spoken word AJ, Nick, Kevin, and Brian burst into a harmonious version of the happy birthday song.

You listen to the voices you’ve grown to know better than your own, and look around at the four men who mean as much to you as brothers. You can’t help feeling sentimental. “Thanks for coming today, guys,” you say kind of bashfully. It’s clear that you’ve become a little choked up.

“It’s your party, Howie,” Kevin teases lightly with underlining sincerity, “you can cry if you want to.”

“Cry if you want to, cry if you want to!” Nick echoes in his best falsetto.

You can hear a round of snickers, and then all together you can’t help but burst into one last song. “You would cry too, if it happened to you!”

The End.
Bubbly Bath by honey
The guys are always saying that you’re a little boring, and that you never do anything spontaneous, but that’s about to change. It’s your birthday, and you’re in a very good mood since your friends surprised you. It’s definitely time to get this party started.

You pop the cork on the champagne and before AJ and Kevin understand why you’re shaking the snot out of it, you’re showering the video game junkies. “Games over! I win!” you shout.

AJ and Kevin are every bit as shocked as Nick and Brian, but they burst into laughter while Nick and Brian shout curses and scramble to their feet. “Howard Dorough when’s the last time you had birthday spankings?”

“Whoa Rok,” AJ laughs as Brian and Nick eye you dangerously. “I never figured you be the one of us to come out of the closet.”

“It’s time for a birthday beating!” Nick agrees whole-heartedly. “Get him!”

You make a mad dash for the back patio. AJ and Kevin may have been innocent bystanders in this brilliant plan of yours, but they aren’t about to miss out on the fun. Suddenly it’s four on one. It takes them a minute to wrestle you to the ground and give you the appropriate amount of Charlie horses – suddenly you think 35 is too old.

While they’re busy making sure you’ll be sore in the morning, the champagne has caused the x-box to short circuit. The sparks quickly ignite the flammable beverage and before the guys are through dumping you in the hot tub, you entire living room has caught fire. By the time you smell the smoke and feel the heat of the wild flames, the back door is completely engulfed, trapping you on the back porch.

You, along with all of your friends, stand there with you mouth gaping open for a moment. You all scramble for handfuls of water from the hot tub, but it’s no use. “On the bright side, Leigh won’t know I doused her furniture with champagne on purpose,” you mumble to yourself, still suffering from denial as your house begins to burn down.

It’s not until Kevin shouts, “Someone call 911!” that you realize the severity of your predicament.

You’re all in swimsuits. All cell phones are now on the wrong side of the flames. There is no way in the house, and there’s no way off the patio. The only thing you can do is go down the concrete stairs to the lower deck and get as far from the fire as possible. “The alarm will call the fire department,” you assure your friends as you reach the farthest part of the deck. You’re suddenly grateful you didn’t listen to your wife and spent too much money on the ridiculously extravagant security system.

You can all feel the heat and you wonder if the flames will jump from the house to where you’re standing. You look down the mountain behind you, and can only think of two plans. Wait where you are until the Hollywood Fire Department comes to your rescue, or try to jump the patio railing and head down the hill to safety.

If you’ve always wanted to be rescued by a fireman, go back to chapter 4.

If there’s no way in hell you’re sticking around to get roasted like one of the marshmallows Kevin brought, continue on to chapter 10.
Night Hike by honey
“It’s really not that far down,” you muse aloud as you gauge the distance from the railing to the steep hill below it. If you could hang from the bottom rail, you’d really only be dropping about five feet. That’s not so bad. Plus, the hill may be steep, but it’s not that far a distance, and there are enough trees along the way to hold on to that you shouldn’t fall. It would probably only take ten or fifteen minutes to get to a phone. Really, it’s better than the alternative.

It’s Kevin who takes the first plunge. Granted he’s a lot taller, with a lot longer reach, but he is on the ground so swiftly it seems as if even a toddler could do it. Nick fallows suit, and then Brian. AJ is more reluctant, so you stay behind to make sure he gets down safely.

Finally it’s your turn. You climb over the railing, lower yourself down and then drop to the ground below. “Not so bad,” you say to yourself when you’re finally safe on the ground.

“Alright Howie, which way do we go?” Nick asks as if it’s entirely your fault that you’re in this situation.

“Try down, dipstick.”

You’re glad Brian was there to offer the smart-aleck response for you. You’re not always the best with quick smart-aleck responses.

You set forth into the dark trees making your way with no shoes as best you can. It’s unpleasant, but not as scary as you’d imagined. You’re even having fun with the guys, all trying to freak each other out in the dark.

You’re nearly to the bottom and can see the lights of civilation starting to peer through the trees, when suddenly Nick, who you noticed was the last one to follow – wuss – slips on a lose rock and tumbles into you. You both lose your balance and find yourselves tumbling down the hill.

You hit a big tree, and then hit your head on a rock before fall off a surprise drop of about four feet. Had you seen it, or been prepared for it, the jump would have been nothing, but since you were falling head over feet at the time, you land on the ground somehow getting your leg caught underneath you.

When Nick lands on top of you, you both here the snap. At first you’re both so disoriented that you’re not sure who snapped what, but at least you’re not still tumbling down the hill.

The pain hits you with lightning force as Nick pulls himself off you and you scream as you reach for your leg. “It’s definitely broken,” Kevin announces but you don’t here much because the pain is making you woozy.

Kevin sends the other guys to hurry and get an ambulance and before you know it, you’re at Cedars-Sinai with a cast that goes all the way to your mid thigh. You don’t remember passing out, but you’re definitely waking up, and you’re definitely doped up on something strong. “Hey guys!” you chime through slurred speech, laughing at the four men who’ve all been graciously given scrubs to wear after refusing to leave your side. “You didn’t tell my wife about this did you?”

They all laugh, which makes you laugh, and then AJ pipes up. “Are you kidding? She told us to behave right before she walked out the door.”

“She practically called a babysitter when we told her we wanted it to be just the guys tonight,” Nick added. “No way am I breaking the news!”

You look to Brian a little hopeful, but he shakes his head immediately with that same smile on his face. “Not a chance Howard. This one’s all you buddy!”

You all laugh again, but you can’t blame them for not wanting to call Leigh. That’s not a call you yourself are looking forward to, and she loves you. Oh well, you have the guys here with you, so what’s the rush. May as well enjoy the last few hours of your birthday first. It may not have turned out as originally planned, but you can’t remember when you’ve had more fun on your birthday. “This birthday will definitely be one to remember.”

“Very true,” Kevin agrees, throwing a shoulder around you.

Soon all of the guys are huddled on either side of you trying to hold back their smirks.
“Happy birthday,” they all laugh and then Brian clears his voice and hums a pitch.

Without a single spoken word AJ, Nick, Kevin, and Brian burst into a harmonious version of the happy birthday song.

You listen to the voices you’ve grown to know better than your own, and look around at the four men who mean as much to you as brothers. You can’t help feeling sentimental. “Thanks for coming today, guys,” you say kind of bashfully. It’s clear that you’ve become a little choked up.

“It’s your party, Howie,” Kevin teases lightly with underlining sincerity, “you can cry if you want to.”

“Cry if you want to, cry if you want to!” Nick echoes in his best falsetto.

You can hear a round of snickers, and then all together you can’t help but burst into one last song. “You would cry too, if it happened to you!”

The End.
This story archived at http://absolutechaos.net/viewstory.php?sid=9211