This is my first McFly fic EVER. Probably also the only. The idea of this story, somehow started off and just utter rubbish and drabbles when out from nowhere I'm picturing Danny Jones and Dougie Poynter as characters and how? I don't know, especially because I've never been a HUGE HUGE fan. I mean, yeah I like them and they're a super talented band and seem like overall good guys. I have some of their stuff on my Spotify playlist but the urge to write fanfiction never struck me as something I would consciously do. This first chapter is more like a teaser- let's just see how this goes. There's plenty more in store but I just wanted to see how his can start out. Okay, now I'm waffling on. Anyway, as the usual goes I don't own any characters except for a couple right now but that's okay they should grow on you. Hopefully they're good people. Enjoy. Oh also, if you don't like feel free to rip me to shreds in the comments or you know, say it's good or whathaveyou.


The Heart Never Lies

Chapter 1.

July 2007

On the morning of his funeral Cassie 'Cass' Jones was tearing her bedroom apart trying to find something that was appropriate to wear apart from black.

"Damn it!" She cursed under her breath, throwing the entire contents of her wardrobe across the other side of the room, becoming more impatient by the second. The wardrobe doors hung open exposing a bare closet but she still poked her head inside completely, hoping she had missed something. Tears welled in her eyes helplessly as she sighed and slumped herself onto the carpet amongst her clothes.

"Cass?" Her mother called from the other side of her bedroom door. "Are you alright?"

Cass mumbled incoherently in response. Of course she wasn't alright.

Today she would be burying her boyfriend, her high school sweet heart, Nate Campbell. Well, ex-boyfriend now she supposed. It wasn't exactly a smooth relationship towards the end, especially the last time she saw him alive. Poor Nate, she couldn't stop reliving their last wild exchange. Neither left saying 'I love you.' But she hoped he knew deep down that she really did love him throughout their tempestuous and exhausting five year relationship. He wasn't perfect but he was a good man and at one point, a perfect partner despite his busy lifestyle.

He wasn't sick and he wasn't reckless. One day he was there, the next day he was gone.

'It happens,' doctors said, 'congenital heart disease.' He went to sleep last Thursday night and didn't wake up.

Nate was leisurely travelling his way back home after an impressive stint of touring his way down the countryside alone with his guitar. He'd been gone two months playing gigs in bars, small venues and opening for other halfway famous appearances in theatres.

The last time Cassie saw him was the night it ended. She'd left his hotel room in tears and he'd chased her into the lobby calling after her to come back. He had appeared desperate to sort things out but the stories she had heard from her friends were too much to make her change her mind in that moment.

Cassie shrugged away the memory of the breakup playing on repeat in her mind and she finally decided on a dark navy wraparound dress. She sighed unimpressed with her reflection and adjusted the knot loosely around her waist, it was the only modest dress she found that properly fit and that would match black boots and stockings. The stress of the past week had caused her to bloat which paired with an uneasiness that hadn't left the pit of her stomach for days. She still hadn't wrapped her head around the fact that Nate was gone, she didn't miss him yet and wasn't sure when reality would hit that she'd never see him again. The haze of shock was an easy place for her to stay and hide, it was better than accepting the reality of his death and the relief and the guilt that would follow.

The service was held at the Brighton and Preston Cemetery. A mass of black and grey covered the scene with umbrellas shielding off the impending rainfall. It was an unusually warm day for July though it was muggy and had reached 24°c before 10am.

Cassie stepped out the car and saw the clouds were still low, holding in the heat of the crowd and their tears. Step by step the congregation grew larger and she could now see Nate's grave in between other headstones and the faint melody of his favourite song "Somewhere only we know' by Keane was heard softly playing. His mahogany coffin gleamed underneath various objects sitting atop of it where roses and candles sprinkled around a portrait of him smiling and laughing as though he had just heard an insane joke. His warm and inviting smile that so many people loved and found comfort in faced the sombre crowd contrasting against the overall mood of the occasion.

The urge to run the opposite direction rose in her chest, it wasn't the tears of sorrow that dusted her eyes but the tears of fear that surged at the sight of Dougie standing with his hands clasped in front of him and his eyes fixed on her as she neared. As she approached closer to the four men she called her family, Dougie and Cassie locked eyes briefly before she realised he was standing next to Danny. Her heart broke at the sight of him; her big cousin now looked so frail. Danny was unrecognisably thin and pale, clad in a black and grey suit with eyes red to the iris. Cassie had never seen her big, wisecracking cousin who never took anything too seriously look so… ill- almost like he was dead himself.

Danny was the last person to see him alive. He had driven to see Nate's last gig at St George's Hall in Bristol, by the time Nate had planned to come home McFly would marketing their first single release of the year. The two boys had spent the night after his gig having dinner at the pub and they clinked their glasses to another successful show for Nate, "This is the one, mate." Danny had said before drinking his beer.

"This is the show that will make it all happen." Nate would have had it in the bag if he had just made it home.

Dan for sure had been hit the hardest by the loss of Nate; the boys had been inseparable since kindergarten.

When Cassie and Nate started dating in high school when she was 15, Danny was over the moon that his best friend and favourite cousin fell in love. When McFly really took off, Nate was there with his best friend and the band as McFly travelled the country, even the world. He was there when the guys met Lindsay Lohan and starred in a movie titled after one of their songs! All the while Nate was beginning to make a name for himself as well with his own music gigs as a solo artist. Wherever Nate played, Danny was there too.

"Cass is here," Tom announced to the three men beside him quietly enough to be a whisper as though to provide comfort to the group and they appeared to have relaxed a little at the sight of her. She was greeted by Tom and Harry's low chorus of sad mumbles and overly tight hugs before she was scooped into Danny's embrace. She finally let go of the sobs in her chest that had been aching all morning and felt the relief as tears dropped onto his shoulders. Together they stayed rocking back and forth in a long speechless hold refusing to let go of one another for support. When the Priest began to address the crowd Danny's hand gripped onto hers and squeezed.

The ceremony was a blur. All that Cassie could concentrate on was the coffin sitting in front of her and knowing that Nate was in there. She found herself wondering what how he looked and what suit he had been dressed in, which suit had his mother chosen for him to remain in forever? It was only then she wished she did agree to see him at the viewing. Guilt stabbed her in the stomach once again and she held back the urge to throw up by sucking in deep breaths through her teeth and concentrating on the scattering of Nate's favourite things sitting on his coffin. First, her eyes fixed on a pint glass filled with Guinness pinning down a Slade t-shirt. Slade… He thought they were just the coolest band ever!

She could hear his voice in her head repeating their greatest debate over 'Slade vs Quiet Riot'.Who did the better version of "Cum on feel the noize."? In the end, she did agree that Slade did do a better performance but Quiet Riot's version was just that little bit more successful. She remembered the look of horror Nate gave at the mention of any other band being better than Slade, 'Nobody is better than Noddy Holder' He'd argued passionately more times than once. Noddy was his God.

A wreath of photographs showed family pictures and prepubescent Nate and Danny eating ice blocks and doing karate poses and then she saw her favourite photo, The Three Stooges; Nate, Danny and Cassie dressed up at their school formal. Neither one of them was looking at the camera. Danny was hunched over laughing, Cassie was looking at Nate with a smile and Nate had an arm around her shoulders but was looking at Danny and making a silly face. Those would be the days that she and Danny had to hold on to, those jokes and memories they shared would be the glue that would keep them bound no matter how far apart they'd grow in life.

Danny's hand slipped out of her grasp, knocking her out of her dissociation and watched her cousin walk towards the front of the small congregation barely holding it together. He sniffed and cleared his throat repeatedly before he could piece his words together. Danny spoke well to the crowd feigning strength while ignoring the tears glazing his already raw eyes. The candles burning beside him were straining their wick against the morning breeze to stay alight during his short eulogy.

Upon winding up, he surprised the crowd by producing a bottle of Whiskey and then a tray of shot glasses. He poured one shot glass and downed it before muttering, "This is for you, mate."

The music was cued to play the hymn 'Meet Me There' and shots were being handed out each to take. Danny played bartender, making sure that everyone was holding a drink before the music had come to an end where everybody held their cups to the sky and led everybody through a salute.

"…To friendship, family and Nate."

###

Abut fifty people accompanied Mrs Campbell's invitation to her sons wake at the family estate in between Marine Parade and Madiera Drive in Brighton. Caterers dressed in white offered out glasses of wine, cakes and sandwiches to the guests and fumbled over the odd request for stronger liquids such as spirits.

Cassie kept swatting away at condolences from strangers while Danny barely left her side all afternoon. "Feels weird." He said, hushed into her ear. "I don't even think he liked half of these people all that much." She agreed with a quick nod while her eyes searched the four corners of the room, squinting through the doorway and out to the wide hall searching for one other familiar face or some form of distraction. Seeing all these people crammed into the small family home made her claustrophobic, heat was rising from her core and she fought it down, willing it to not spread into a panic. She'd met no more than ten of the guests in the time she had known Nate and Danny had agreed. Who were all these other people who claimed to hold some possession over Nate? She wondered to herself as she realised that not one face she saw was she able to clearly connect a name to.

"A bit out of our depth here," Danny whispered as though he read her thoughts once more before stopping a caterer in his tracks to pinch a handful of sponge cake squares. "We need a proper send off- this isn't him." Cassie half listened to her cousin describing the perfect send off. She could hear in the tone of his voice that he was devising a plan, one that she knew later on she would have no choice but to partake in. She just didn't have it in her to do anything Dan was suggesting, the thought cast a dark cloud around her sweeping from her middle working its way to her chest and fingertips. She had to get out so she could breathe.

"S'cuse me," she cut him off and hurried herself though the crowd, disappearing behind the back door leaving Danny alone helping himself to a sandwich square. He ate in times of stress, unable to taste the tuna and lettuce in his mouth he chowed down mindlessly, loosening the tie around his neck and joining Tom and Harry in the sitting room to his left.

20 minutes later outside, Cassie passed a hedge corner and stopped by the patio steps hearing a rumble of Dougie clearing his throat in front of her. His presence standing over her made her shiver in relief as her eyes turned up to see him finally standing alone by her and not with Tom or Harry. She took his outstretched hand in hers, feeling the painful electricity surge through her at his touch as he supported her shaky form up the few steps.

When they were face to face he took in the sight of her smudged mascara and cracked tear streaks down each cheek. The look on her face made him ache and want to wrap her in his arms as though it would take the pain away, "Here," He handed her a glass of water. "I saw you try to hide behind the bushes over there -," He pointed to the lilac hedges behind her.

Her eyes were still watery from the heaving and the taste of bile still threatened the tip of her tongue as she took the drink from him before he could finish talking.

"-I thought you'd need something to cool you down." His eyes turning soft, searching into hers, "I know it's a stupid question, but how are you holding up?" His voice dropped low into a whisper and his hands, finally, finally touching her.

"What, are you stupid?" She'd replied lightly and went to lean in a little closer to him momentarily forgetting where she was. He always had that effect on her. He leaned in a little closer too.

"Doug." She inhaled his scent as quickly as she shook her head coming to reality. His scent had become so familiar to her, it was almost like coming home and today she felt especially homesick, "I think I need something stronger." The pair snapped apart as quickly as they fell together.

Dougie swayed himself backwards while shoving his hands into his pant pockets and clearing his throat.

They stood together in silence for a moment, the two just looking at one another. "You look lovely by the way," Dougie muttered an attempt to clear the silence but was rebuked by her scoff.

"Let's go for a walk," He offered "Let's get some air." He gestured towards vast green yard behind them, behind the Lilacs the garden seemed endless.

There was freedom as Dougie led Cassie further into the garden past the Lilacs and Magnolias, past a swing and wilting fruit trees. Their footsteps grew silent as they ventured beyond the cobblestone pathway onto grass and rounded behind a row of Hydrangea's that had completely hidden them. By then they were hand in hand, the air was cooler and Cassie's head rested upon Dougie's shoulder when they slowed down their pace.

He placed a comforting kiss upon her forehead, "You've been so strong today," He said his mouth barely leaving her skin, his chest beating for her. He ached to erase her shame, to take their guilt away so he could hold her completely. If he had the power he would.

She replied with a heavy sigh and scrambled away from his touch, "This doesn't feel right." She continued between dry sobs, "It isn't right and it isn't fair." She resisted the urge to scream. Anyone could hear them if she dared to raise her voice and anyone could walk around the corner at any moment and then what would happen?

She knew it was inevitable but not today of all times and places.

Dougie's eyes refused to meet hers when she twirled around to face him, whipping hair out of her face. She could see his mouth form the words without sound, "I know." The silence was relieved by the message tone of Dougie's phone, "We should go." He announced before flipping his phone shut and started walking back towards the garden entrance, "Everyone is leaving, and I think Danny needs you."

"What about what I need?" Her voice fell quietly from her lips as though the words fell out by accident.

She followed behind him, making sure there was enough distance left between them.

Dougie didn't miss a beat after her question, "What do you need then, Cass?"

She didn't reply and he didn't push her any further. "Well," He paused, forever patient, "Let me know when you figure it out."

He exited the hidden garden with hands in his pockets again leaving Cassie behind to compose herself.