Disclaimer: I have no rights to these people, have no hold on them. I get nothing out of them except feelings of joy and pleasure.

Statement: I haven't read a story yet that deals with the guys coming out to anyone, so I wrote one. If there is one from before my time on the list, and I accidentally copied or plagiarized from someone, I'm sorry. This song was inspired by Queen's "Friends will be friends". This was a best case scenario I could think of. Most people get over their feelings, but not everyone can handle a loving relationship. I didn't want to include any gay bashing people, I didn't think that anyone here, or any of the characters, would even think about it. That's another story.

Coming Out.

They were interrupted by a knock on the door. Nick and Derek had retreated to Nick's room for some time alone. Work and all had kept them apart for longer than they liked. They were still insecure in this relationship, it was so new to both of them. Derek had other lovers before Nick, but still each relationship was different. All they wanted was half an hour to cuddle together and hold each other. "Rachel, what do you need?" Nick asked as he stripped off his shirt and sat on the bed. Derek had opened the door to the unsmiling face of their resident doctor and then went to sit on the weight bench. She was carrying a tray with a bowl of soup, some sandwiches, and two glasses of milk.

"Thought that you might want some food. You both looked exhausted earlier. Alex said you had retreated upstairs for a nap, I thought I would prove to you that not all doctors are bad." She put the tray on the bed beside

Nick. "Peace offering?"

"Sure." Nick smiled up at Rachel. He looked over at Derek and silently asked a question with his eyes. At Derek's subtle nod, Nick sighed in pleasure. They had planned for this moment, in long detail over the last few days. "Rachel, sit down. We have something to tell you."

At hearing the sigh, and hearing the pleasure in Nick's voice, Rachel sat on the bed next to Nick. Derek got up from his seat on the weight bench and started pacing the room. She got more and more confused by their attitudes.

"Is something wrong, guys? Did I do something wrong?"

"No, no Rachel, you did nothing wrong." Derek took a deep breath and held it for a second. "We need to share something with you. You may not want to hear it, but we think it's time we came clean."

"Rachel," Nick said, "Derek and I are...committed to each other." At the shocked look on Rachel's face, Nick went on quickly. "We didn't want to hide it from you, but we wanted to make sure things were going to work out between us before we let anyone in on it."

They waited patiently for her reaction. Her face went from pale to flushed to red. "How. . . how could you...why...what about..." Rachel's stuttered mumbling reached the pair, increasing their doubts about making other announcement.

"Rachel, we never meant to deceive you. We've only been together for a little under a month." Nick tried to reason with her. He knew she wouldn't have trouble with their relationship to each other, just with her feelings towards them. She had made it clear that she wanted to date Derek, but was waiting for him to see it. She probably felt foolish and lied to.

"I know this comes as a shock, but it just happened one night. We never saw it coming. We want you to understand." Derek walked over to her and squatted down in front of her. "We both know that you and I were close. I still want to keep the friendship, but only if you're comfortable with it. If not, then we'll work to have whatever sort of relationship happens between us." Derek patted her hands clasped in her lap.

"I...I...I'm happy for you both. This just is a *big* shock. I don't ...I need time to come to grips with this." She got up and walked out of the room. Nick and Derek look at each other in resignation. They knew Rachel would come to grips with it eventually, but until then the atmosphere in the house would be strained. It wasn't long before another knock came to the door. Derek guessing the identity of their new visitor called for Alex to come in. When she came in, she looked pissed.

"What did you say to Rachel. She murmured something about you two and left the house in a hurry. She grabbed Kat like some demon was going to come steal her baby from her and pealed out of here."

"We told her the truth." Nick said trying to calm her down.

"We sat her down and told her that we... we came out to her.

Derek told her he still wants to be friends and all, but she apparently needs time to get used to the idea."

"Why now, Nick. Why not over supper or some night when we're all relaxing together?" Alex was getting calmer, but not by much. She knew that the actions of two of her best friends, her family, had hurt another friend. She felt torn between her loyalties. She didn't know if she should be mad at Rachel for taking it like that, or at Nick and Derek for telling her before she was ready. "For that matter, why didn't you sit me down and tell me something officially? Huh?" Alex tapped her foot waiting for an answer.

"We thought you already knew about us. Had guessed or something. And we tried to break it gently to her, she just didn't take it well."

"I gave him permission to share our relationship with Rachel. We both thought you had picked up on our not so subtle signals to each other. We're sorry if we hurt you also, Alex. This was never our intention." Derek ran his hands through his hair in frustration. "We just wanted to come clean ..."

"He means that there shouldn't be secrets among us. Not ones like this anyway." Nick looks over at Derek and smiles at all the secrets he had kept from everyone. "We knew it would come out sooner or later. We wanted to be open around you guys. You two are family to us. We just..."

"I know what you're trying to say ,Nick," Alex interrupted him. "I did know about this. You two have been acting like teenagers around each other now for almost a month and a half now."

"One month tomorrow, Alex." Derek told her. "We were planning on officially telling you and everybody else in the house then, but we both figured that we should tell Rachel privately."

Derek gave her a small smile. "We all know that she had feelings for me, and we didn't want her to hear it in a group setting or from someone else."

"I know, Derek. You were both trying to be sensitive about this, but I think you underestimated her feelings. You may have hurt her bad." Alex walked over and gave first Derek, then Nick, a hug. They both looked like they needed it. "I'll leave you two alone for a while, you look like you need to hold each other." Alex started to leave the room, but turned around with a final comment. "I don't mind you guys kissing and stuff in front of me, but nothing heavy for a little while until I get used to it, please." She hadn't wanted to ask the favor of them. After all, if they had asked her to not kiss her boyfriends around them she would be hurt; but she saw that they took the request in the way it was meant. She turned and left the room, closing the door behind her.

Nick looked at Derek and patted the bed beside him. "Come here. We could both use a hug." Derek came to Nick and gently encircled him in a loving embrace. "That didn't go as well as we expected."

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Rachel sat in her living room and cried. She could do that now. She was home, safe. Kat was upstairs in her room. She cried because of her hurt feelings and her disappointments of hopes and dreams. She cried because she had loved Derek. She loved him totally, had fantasies about him, thought about him and her together, everything. She looked up as Kat came downstairs to get more milk

"Mom, what's wrong?" Kat was a sensitive young women, not to mention talented and gifted with psychic abilities. "What happened upstairs at the castle that upset you?" She knew her mother had went upstairs to Nick's room with food, but not what had prompted their flight from the people who were like a second family to her. Kat walked over to her mother to give her a hug, she looked like she needed it.

"Kat, sit down. We need to talk." She held her daughter close for a moment before letting her sit on the couch. "Derek and Nick and I had a talk while we were upstairs."

"Did they tell you they were dating?"

"How...how...when...Katherine Corrigan, what are you talking about?" Rachel finally managed to get a sentence out. She was shocked at her daughter's question. She hadn't even guessed, but Kat had know what was going on. Rachel was jealous, and a little hurt, that Kat had picked up on this before she had. She felt like screaming at those men for letting her daughter see them.

"Mom, they've been acting like they're dating now for a while. It was kinda obvious if you were watching them." Kat felt badly as soon as she said the words. "You know I don't have much to do there except for watch people work. I noticed that Nick and Derek look at each other a lot when the other isn't looking. I've seen them touch each other for absolutely no reason." Kat looked at her mother's face. All she saw was astonishment and pain. She hadn't meant to hurt her mother, but it came out wrong. Now she didn't know how to fix it. "I'm sure you were just too busy to notice it." There maybe that had smoothed over the hurt some. Kat gave her mother another hug and went into the kitchen for something to drink when it was apparent that nothing more was going to be said. She heard her mother get up and go to her bathroom to run a bath. Kat knew that everything would be alright when her mother came out. It always was.

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The next night at dinner, everybody sat in silence. Rachel and Kat had come back by request so that the whole house could talk together. Derek and Nick sat next to each other, the younger man trying hard not to fidget at the silence. Rachel looked at them then back at her plate. Alex joked quietly with Kat, while Kristen just stared in confusion. She had only gotten back today, but she knew something had happened while she was gone.

"Umh." Nick cleared his throat. With look at Derek and a slight smile, he started off. "Derek and I felt that the best thing for the house was to sit and talk."

"Yes, we wanted to make a formal announcement tonight while everyone was here. Then something happened so we decided that we all needed a time to talk, together about this." Derek picked up another mouthful of food and ate it. He looked around the table expectantly.

"Derek, "Kristen asked, "I'm lost. What announcement? What is this?"

Nick picked up Derek's hand and squeezed it. "This is this, Kristen. Derek and I have decided to become attached to one another. We're together as a couple now, and have been for a month tonight."

"Oookaaay." Kristen let out the word slowly as she thought about the implications. She didn't like what she heard, but she couldn't do anything about it now. "You and Derek are dating?"

"Yes" was all Derek said. He looked at Nick, who looked back. After a moment, Derek turned his attention back to the others. "We want to not hide this from you, our friends."

"It would only come out anyways, with hurt feelings," Nick threw in.

"We don't want to shove it in your face, but we don't want to have to sneak around either. We wanted to share our love with

you, not to hurt you."

"Derek, I've been thinking since yesterday." Rachel looked over at the pair. "I wasn't really hurt, just surprised. It came as a real shock to me. I didn't mean to hurt you and Nick. I'm sorry for my reactions and running away like I did." Rachel reached over and ruffled Kat's hair. "She made me see what I didn't want to."

"So, Kat, honey are you okay with this?" Nick looked at his might-as-well-be niece. At her nod, he smiled.

"Nick I knew already. I noticed that you two were looking at each other months ago." She rolled her eyes at the pair. "For two observant men, you sure caught on slow." She went back to eating supper after noticing the grin that spread across Derek's face. She had said the right thing.

"Derek, like I said yesterday, I already had guessed. It doesn't bother me. I just want, and truthfully need, to get used to the idea before walking in while you're sucking on superman here."

Alex patted Nick's arm and turned to Kristen, the only one who hadn't said anything yet, really. Alex knew that Kristen came from a conservative background, but she hoped that her time in the Legacy would have given her an open mind. "I ...I ...just don't know what to say. I'm shocked. Upset. I don't know how I feel about this." With that Kristen got up and left for her room. They all watched her go sadly. They had expected a negative reaction, but weren't prepared for it. None of them spoke for a while, just looking at the empty seat at the table. Alex got up and went after her. None of them felt hungry after that.

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When Nick got up in the morning for his run, Kristen had left the house. He found the note in the kitchen sitting on the table.

I can't deal with this right now. I'm going away for a few days to think about this. It's not something I've been faced with before, and I need to deal with it. I'll call Alex tonight and tell her where I am.

Kristen.

Nick looked at the note and sighed. It wasn't a bad, but it wasn't the unconditional acceptance they had gotten from everyone else. He carried the note upstairs to his lover. They had spent last night moving his things into Derek's room, their room. He only hoped Kristen wouldn't try anything to hurt them.

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Epilogue:

Kristen came back two days latter. She pulled Nick and Derek into the office and told them that she wouldn't do anything, but she wouldn't accept it or encourage them. They told her they would keep their relationship not so obvious around her. She walked out of the office and went back to work. Three months later, she couldn't take it anymore and left the house. London made sure they sent only people who wouldn't disrupt the house from then on.

When Philip came back for a visit, Nick told him personally. Philip just hugged him and gave his blessing for them, telling Nick it was about time he noticed Derek loved him. The rest of the house went on calmly with the knowledge held secure to their hearts of the love that existed in the house.