Nothing Personal by Pengi
Summary:

When it comes to the relationship between Nick and Jaymie, there's only one rule: nothing personal. But what happens when everything in Nick's life changes and he realizes that maybe he's interested in something more than friends with benefits?

Categories: Fanfiction > Backstreet Boys Characters: Group, Nick
Genres: Drama, Humor, Romance
Warnings: Death, Graphic Sexual Content
Challenges:
Series: None
Chapters: 39 Completed: No Word count: 82239 Read: 76820 Published: 04/27/14 Updated: 10/21/14

1. Prologue by Pengi

2. Chapter One by Pengi

3. Chapter Two by Pengi

4. Chapter Three by Pengi

5. Chapter Four by Pengi

6. Chapter Five by Pengi

7. Chapter Six by Pengi

8. Chapter Seven by Pengi

9. Chapter Eight by Pengi

10. Chapter Nine by Pengi

11. Chapter Ten by Pengi

12. Chapter Eleven by Pengi

13. Chapter Twelve by Pengi

14. Chapter Thirteen by Pengi

15. Chapter Fourteen by Pengi

16. Chapter Fifteen by Pengi

17. Chapter Sixteen by Pengi

18. Chapter Seventeen by Pengi

19. Chapter Eighteen by Pengi

20. Chapter Nineteen by Pengi

21. Chapter Twenty by Pengi

22. Chapter Twenty-One by Pengi

23. Chapter Twenty-Two by Pengi

24. Chapter Twenty-Three by Pengi

25. Chapter Twenty-Four by Pengi

26. Chapter Twenty-Five by Pengi

27. Chapter Twenty-Six by Pengi

28. Chapter Twenty-Seven by Pengi

29. Chapter Twenty-Eight by Pengi

30. Chapter Twenty-Nine by Pengi

31. Chapter Thirty by Pengi

32. Chapter Thirty-One by Pengi

33. Chapter Thirty-Two by Pengi

34. Chapter Thirty-Three by Pengi

35. Chapter Thirty-Four by Pengi

36. Chapter Thirty-Five by Pengi

37. Chapter Thirty-Six by Pengi

38. Chapter Thirty-Seven by Pengi

39. Chapter Thirty-Eight by Pengi

Prologue by Pengi
Prologue



Jaymie

So this is the part where I tell you this sweeping narrative about the first time I slept with Nick and how we met and all that and you’re all like, aww, because you think you know where this story is going and you’re picturing the moment when Nick realizes that it’s been me all along and the big romantic gesture and the wedding bells and all that white-taffeta-dress kind of shit.

Except this isn’t that kind of story.

Honestly, I don't think I'd even want it to be that kind of story. I mean, c'mon, how boring can you get? Sex friend becomes wife - yawn, yawn, yawn - talk about a cliche!

I am fucking anything but a cliche. I hate cliches.

I would rather die than be a cliche.

And also, it can't be that kind of story because, second of all, I don’t really remember meeting Nick. Like I’ve got the basics - club, late at night after one of the Backstreet Boys’ shows, a fake ID, too many drinks, a little too much cleavage, a boner, and an offer. The rest is history, only to be commemorated by the used condom in the hotel room waste bin beside the bed on his side. Other than that, the only thing I remember about that night is the hangover. Because, holy shit, that was the Queen Motherfuck of all hangovers.

Oh, and a gold faucet in the bathroom. That was weird enough to cut through the haze of Vomit Fest 1996.

But I don’t remember the sex for a damn.

Which is unfortunate because really the first time you sleep with a Backstreet Boy is kind of something you’d like to remember, you know? At least it wasn’t like a once-in-a-lifetime deal for me, like it was for most of the other girls. I mean I had lots of opportunities to remember sex with Nick. I have opportunities on a nearly daily basis. Sometimes, twice a day, even.

Besides, I don't believe in marriage. And I always thought Nick wasn't into it, either. That was part of why I'd always liked him - even before we were Friends With Benefits-ing it. I thought I'd never have to worry about it becoming that kind of story. Sex is easy, love is complicated, marriage is fucked up.




Nick

I never wanted to be that wants-to-get-married, How-I-Met-Your-Mother kinda guy. Like it was just never in my game plan. I am not Ted. I am Barney fucking Stintson... fuck, I make Barney Stintson look like a stand up guy.

Especially by the time he got to season eight.

Even when I was a kid, I never thought of myself as a knight in shining armor saving the day and winning the princess. I always thought Mario was kind of a tool for going through all that shit for Princess Peach, and don't even get me started on my feelings about The Princess Bride or any of those other sappy romances most guys my age will reflect on. Or Brian, for that matter.

But then AJ got married.

Mother-fucking AJ. AJ was my bro, he was the one person on this planet that had a sex drive as revved as mine, who didn't judge me for my fetishes and rotating door on the bedroom.

And now he was getting married.

I remember standing there at AJ's wedding as he smooshed his face all into Rochelle's and they literally tongued each other in front of the gathering of their closest friends and family. I found myself thinking maybe getting married doesn't have to ruin sex. Then, when we went on tour, AJ was talking and he was telling me about all these terrific sexcapades him and Rochelle had been having since the wedding and how god damn amazing it all was.

"Dude," he said to me one night after Rochelle and him had engaged in God-knows-what via Skype, "You've got to get married. You owe it to your dick, man. Seriously."

That's kind of when I started thinking about it.

But I mean, I'm not the marrying kind of guy. I have a thousand girlfriends all over the world, women I meet up only when I'm on tour, booty calls in every country we frequent. And of course there's Jaymie.

God knows I ain't marrying her.

You don't marry your sex toy.

Chapter One by Pengi
Chapter One



Nick

I blinked up into the face of a middle aged man with a wide nose, who was staring down at me, a stethoscope hanging around his neck. I could see his lips moving, but my brain was slow to comprehend the words. Everything felt kind of fuzzy and far away.

“Der Blutdruck ist ein über hundert sechzig.”

“Sauerstoffwerte stabilisieren sich.”

“Mr. Carter -- Mr. Carter, can you hear me?”

“Where’s Brian?” I asked. Because even through everything, Brian was the first person I always asked for when things turned bad.

“Your friends are following us to the hospital,” he replied calmly.

“I want Brian,” I replied. And I tried to shift to sit up, but a ton of machines started freaking out and three sets of hands pushed me back down simultaneously as a ripping bolt of pain shot through my chest from one shoulder to the other, like an electric shock.

“Nein!”
I gasped, and I grabbed at where my heart would be if it was outside of my body - because it felt like it was - and found all these plastic suction cup thingies all over my chest, like I was fucking E.T. or something. “What is this? What are you doing to me?”

The irrational side of me thought I have been abducted by aliens.

“We’re taking you to the hospital, Nick,” the man with the wide nose answered. “Do you know what happened?”

I closed my eyes, squeezing them tight, trying to remember.

Stage. I’d been on stage. I’d been dancing. I’d been singing. I’d been okay. But then, I hadn’t been okay. Very quickly I went from okay to not-so-much, and I… I fell? Did I fall? I think I fell. I opened my eyes and stared up at the guy again. I must’ve passed out because I remember fans, I remember the stage, but I didn’t remember anything that would’ve brought this old guy staring down at me.

“You had a - a heart attack, Nick.”

A cannula was in my nose, I realized as my hand traveled north from my chest to my face and I felt the oxygen wires curling around my cheeks and the nubbins in my nose and I tried to pull it away because I suddenly was very afraid I was being suffocated by the tubes but the wide-nosed man pulled my hand away gently. “It’s okay,” he said, “We’re here to help, Nick.”

Tears, hot and wet, burned just behind my eyelids, threatening to escape to my face. I felt my throat getting raw, too. I felt so helpless as I was poked and prodded and I felt needles poking me and the low rumblings of doctor voices and somewhere overhead a wailing siren and the slight bumps in the road as the ambulance flew through city streets. At my feet was a couple of tiny bean-shaped windows and I could see headlights piercing the dark behind us, and the blue lights of the German ambulance reflecting off the wet pavement.

I guess it was raining.

“Fast gibt, bereiten Sie ihn zu bewegen.”

I’ve never felt so fucking terrified in my life as I did during those moments in that ambulance. Silent tears just poured over the lids of my eyes and I gripped the sheets below me and stared out the window, stared at the headlights piercing the night behind us and the flashing blue, and even though the guy with the wide nose was talking to me, I couldn’t hear a word. The German doctors speech garbled around me, all of it white noise, my mind swimming in a sea of absolute terror.

I didn’t want to die alone, in Germany, I thought.

At least let me get home to LA, I prayed.

But what good would getting to LA do? I wondered. It’s not like there was anyone waiting for me there, except Nacho. And it’s not like Nacho was going to do anything for me if I suddenly dropped dead on the living room floor. He’d probably lick my face or something. Eventually it’d be like on the news that time when that lady died and her cats ate her.

Then the ambulance was slowing down and the doctors were putting stuff around my legs on the bed and the cage-like sides of the ambulance were raised and the doctors were moving me forward, out of the ambulance, and lowering me down to the pavement and the wheels of the gurney thingie bumped the ground and then we were running, a couple drops of rain tapped against my forehead before we got under the shelter of the hospital roof. Then it was frenzy. People were everywhere, machines, noises, shouting.

I was too busy thinking of Nacho eating me one day to comprehend much of it.

“I want Brian,” I said to a petite woman who was standing to my left when I rolled my head to the side. “Where’s Brian?”

“Es tut mir leid. Ich weiß nicht Englisch,” she said, shaking her head.

I felt my lower lip tremble.

“Your friends are on the way,” I heard another voice say, heavily accented. I turned my head the other direction. A heavy-set woman was pulling on a pair of latex gloves there. She smiled sadly at me, “They’re on the way. It will be just a little bit before you can see them. We’re going to take you care, first.”

I nodded, but I didn’t really understand. I wanted them now. I always get what I want. All the times I got my way over stupid, meaningless things, like seating at restaurants and song choices on albums and fast food selections, and now - now, the one time I really, really give a damn - I can’t seem to get anyone to just give me what I god-damn want.

I clutched the sheet again as a group of doctors shifted me from the ambulance gurney onto another bed, and the guy with the wide nose leaned over me, “It’ll be okay, you’re in good hands. I am praying for you, Mr. Carter.” And then he was gone.

I closed my eyes.




Jaymie

I watched as my father’s car drove away from the house, ducking low in Nick’s car so he wouldn’t see me. I stared at the rear-view mirror overhead until I saw his taillights turn the corner at the end of the street after stopping at the sign. Then I leaped out of the car and ran across the street, my sneakers scuffing on the sidewalk. I glanced around for neighbors that might see me, but there wasn’t much of anyone around, so I jumped over the gate to the backyard, ignoring the Beware of Dog sign, and made my way around back of the house.

A German shepherd came running from the porch the moment I turned the corner. I knelt down and Rusty bounded up and licked my face with excitement. “Hey,” I whispered, kneading my fingers through his fur, “Hey, boy.” I pressed my face against his neck, his big tongue trying to lick me was leaving drool all over my back. I could feel it sloshing around on my shoulder. “Shit, I missed you,” I kissed his furry cheek and then stood up and laughed as he pressed his big wet nose against my knee.

I walked up the steps to the back porch and glanced around one more time, but the high stockade fence provided enough privacy that I could easily pick the lock without any observers. “Sit,” I commanded Rusty, and he dropped to his haunches. “Stay,” I added, pressing a quiet finger to my lips as I backed into the house.

Inside, the house had been redecorated within an inch of being recognizable. Any personal touches that had been my mother’s were completely vanished, replaced by her, my stepmother, my father’s new wife with a twenty-seven inch waistline and an even smaller brain. I mean, her name was Pilates, like the exercise. Who the fuck names their kid Pilates, you ask? Nobody. She legally had it changed to Pilates. This woman literally purposely gave herself the stupidest name ever.

I snuck through the living room, being careful not to bump into anything. Pilates was famous for ordering thousand dollar vases on the Internet and putting them in various locations where they were certain to be knocked over by Rusty, which is why he’d been confined to the backyard, to a doghouse in the far back by the old shed. The house was like a minefield.

I thought of this game Nick and I play a lot on Steam where you have to navigate yourself through a pretty intense minefield without getting blown up. He never made it very far, but I was excellent at the game, and he always insisted I was cheating.

I made it to the stairs and I took a deep breath, looking back across the room I’d traversed. I could see Rusty, pressing his nose to the glass, watching me from the other side of the sliding glass doors.

Upstairs, I slid down the hallway toward what had once been my bedroom, the room Pilates always made a big deal of calling the guest room, as though I’d never existed there. I pushed the door opened. Of course she’d redecorated it, I knew that had long ago happened. She’d painted the walls and boxed up whatever was left of mine and donated it to the Goodwill and rearranged and covered the bed with a duvet.

Luckily, what I needed was hidden in a place she’d never find it.

I knelt down, pushing aside a braided rug, rolling it so it stayed out of my way, and I expertly punched in just the right place, loosening a floorboard, which I lifted away to reveal my secret hiding place.

Inside were some of my most important worldly treasures. A really old stuffed pig, a couple diaries, a mix-tape of all the music they’d deemed banned from the house, a pack of cigarettes, a bag of weed, and a cigar box, held closed by several rubber bands. I lifted out the cigar box and the weed (because, seriously, why not?) and slid the floorboard back into place, making sure to push it down really well so it wouldn’t come loose accidentally, and rolled the rug back over it.

Tucking the weed into my bra where it would be safe, I clutched the old cigar box, a lump rising in my throat.

Then I heard Rusty barking.

I peered through the window, down to the driveway, where Pilates was just climbing out of her white BMW, her hair all wrapped up in a stupid flowery scarf like she was from the 1960s or something. She pulled a bag from Victoria’s Secret out of the passenger side and clicked the remote lock on the key chain, heading into the house.

I didn’t have time to go back downstairs.

I pushed the window open. I held tightly, protectively, to the cigar box, and crawled out onto the roof below the bedroom window, carefully closing the window behind me. I inched close to the edge of the roof and reached for the thick branches of the tree. I’d done this a thousand times before when I was younger, but somehow it felt more terrifying now that I was grown up and being caught meant less grounded for a week and more charges of breaking and entering.

I carefully pulled myself into the branches and slid down the trunk of the tree to the ground below like it was a fireman’s pole. Then I ran, off to one side so I wasn’t immediately visible from any of the front windows, and crossed the street quickly. I made my way back more tediously, ducking behind other cars parked on the pavement until I reached my own car, where I slithered across the passenger seat and drove away.

My only regret was not getting to say bye to Rusty.

I was at a stoplight a couple blocks away when my phone vibed on the dashboard.

It was AJ.


End Notes:
*Please excuse any poor German, I was using Google translate. Got a better translation? Let me know. :)
Chapter Two by Pengi
Chapter Two



Jaymie

I stared in surprise at the ID on the phone screen, my eyebrows furrowed. The car behind me honked and then sped around me and I realized the light had turned. I slid my thumb across the answer button and drove forward as I pressed the button to put the call onto the Bluetooth in the car. “AJ?” I asked, my voice incredulous.

“Hey Jaymie,” he said, “How are you?”

I squinted against the sun, which reflected off various metal mailboxes and the other cars I passed as I drove through the suburban neighborhood my father lived in. I glanced at the cigar box on my passenger seat. “I’m… okay,” I replied. I didn’t know AJ well enough to try to explain what I was doing. It was better just to leave my response at okay. “What are you calling for?” I asked point blank because, really I didn’t want to talk at that moment, I had more important things to take care of, and also because AJ never calls me. Never. Like seriously, I don’t even know why he had my number to begin with.

AJ hesitated, “I’m calling… about Nick.”

“About Nick?” I said, “What about Nick?”

AJ took a deep breath, “We’re in Germany,” he said.

“I’m aware of that,” I replied. I turned onto the highway.

“Well we were on stage earlier and Nick just… passed out, or something,” he paused. “We’re at a hospital right now.”

There was a shit-ton of traffic on the road. I came to a stop among a sea of cars. I gripped the wheel tighter. “He okay?”

“Yeah,” AJ answered, then, “Well, I mean, I guess so. We haven’t really heard much yet. But the doctor came out to ask us some questions, like about his lifestyle, and he was asking if Nick’s been doing any, you know, drugs or whatever.” He paused again. “So, uh, has he?”

“No,” I said.

“Are you sure?” AJ asked.

“Yeah,” I replied, “I’m sure.”

“He been drinking at all?”

“Not a lot,” I answered. “Not like we used to. I mean, some. But not a lot. Not in excess.”

“Okay.” AJ cleared his throat. “This is probably a stupid question, considering… but, uh. Sex?”

I laughed, “AJ. What the hell else am I for?”

AJ laughed too. “Fuck if I know,” he answered.

I ran my hands over the steering wheel. “Do they know what’s wrong?” I asked, “Like… what they think anyways?” I bit my lip. The car crawled along behind the brake-light sea ahead of me.

“Heart,” he answered.

“Is it the Cardiomyopathy again?” I asked.

AJ sighed, “They think it was a heart attack.”

“Damn,” I answered.

“Has he been more stressed lately?” AJ asked.

“AJ, you know our rule,” I said, “Nothing personal. I don’t really know if he’s been stressed. He hasn’t said anything to me about it if he is.”

“Yeah.”

“I mean his parents are assholes, but so are mine.” I thought of Pilates with her stupid hair scarf and her stupid Victoria’s Secret bag and the guest room and the ugly, expensive vases. I wished I’d let Rusty in so he could break every damn one of them. But if he had she probably would’ve had him put down or something. She only just barely put up with Rusty anyways.

“Well,” AJ said, “I’ll keep you in the loop with what all is going on, anyways.”

“Thanks,” I said as I took the next exit.

“Yeah. No problem.” And he hung up.

I drove on another couple blocks, thinking about Nick and wondering what medical is like in Germany, if they were really good enough to be treating someone like Nick there or if it was like third world country-esque or whatever. I’d only been to Germany a couple times with him, and I’d never had to visit a doctor of any kind while there. I pictured him in one of those beds like in movies about World War Two with, like, the nurses with the paper hats washing his face with damp washcloths. He’d like that.

I turned into a cemetery. The stones dotted the grass, monolithic reminders of all the people who had lost other people. The car tires crunched over loose gravel roadways that wound among all the resting places and kicked dust up in it’s wake. I passed an old man climbing out of an old Hyundai, holding an orchid in trembling hands, and a young woman kneeling at a grave, holding an American flag. My heart went out to them. But then I saw the big old elm tree and I rounded the corner and forgot about everyone else, even Nick and AJ.

I parked the car and grabbed the cigar box and walked, winding my way around the graves, being careful not to step on anyone’s space. Flowers and teddy bears and rosary beads and flags and notes and candles dotted the more fortunate markers. I wondered if these were people who were more cherished than the empty ones, or if the empty ones were cared for by people whose pain was too great to stare down at the granite that was all they had left of their loved ones.

I sat down next to the stone I’d come for, swiping away dust from the stone. The groundsmen must’ve mowed recently. I plucked a few weeds away from the stone’s front. “Sorry,” I said with a sigh, and I tucked my feet in under my knees, sitting Indian-style. “It’s been awhile, I know, it’s just, I’ve been busy, you know?” I put the cigar box on my lap. “I don’t have much to tell you, though. You don’t really wanna know what I’ve been up to, trust me.”

Silence, of course.

“Anyways, I went to Dad’s house this morning. Saw Rusty. He’s doing okay. I mean he’s old, obviously, but he’s still got some energy. He ran over to say hi to me. He’s got grey fur under his chin, like he’s an old man or something,” I laughed. “Pilates almost caught me, but I went down the tree.”

Still silence.

“So I finally got the cigar box,” I said. I picked it up and held it up, like I was showing the stone, and then I slid the rubber bands off. One fell to the grass beside my thigh and I picked it up. An earthworm was wriggling near where it landed. I picked him up, too, and moved him off the grave space. I hated the thought of the worms being near him. It made me think of other worms and what was happening below the surface of the grass, below the dirt, in the grave, where his body was falling apart, decomposing. I pushed the thought out of my mind, scared it might haunt me if I let it linger too long.

“I don’t even remember what we put in here,” I said, turning back to the cigar box, and I lifted the lid slowly.




Nick

I don’t know how long I slept or what all happened to me while I was out. But when I woke up, I was laying in a hospital room, and the four guys were all there. Brian was asleep, his head leaning against the bed by my knees. AJ leaned against the window, sitting on an air unit, while Howie and Kevin sat in chairs by my feet. Eddie was there, too, curled up on top of the blankets on the second hospital bed, and Justin, sitting on the floor, slumped against the wall, staring down at the LCD screen on his camera.

Outside the window behind AJ, I could see the moon in the sky and the lights of Berlin stretching off until they faded in the darkness.

AJ looked over. “He’s awake,” he said. Everyone else, except Eddie and Brian, who were both asleep, looked over.

Kevin stood up and came over to my side. He stared down at me, his big bushy eyebrows all full of concern. “Hey man,” he said. “You know, it’s awful narcissistic of you to give yourself a heart attack with your pelvis thrusting.” Kevin smiled gently.

Justin laughed. “He’s been waiting for hours to say that,” he said. “As soon as we knew you were okay. He’s rehearsed delivering that line about a hundred times while you were out.”

“I’m just that sexy,” I mumbled. And I realized how insanely dry my mouth was and my lips felt cracked and parched. I struggled to attempt to sit up and find some water, but Kevin was a couple steps ahead of me and grabbed a cup from the nightstand and aimed a straw into my mouth.

“You stay right where you are,” he commanded.

“Well I gotta move sometime if I’m gonna be doin’ the show tomorrow,” I argued.

Kevin looked at Justin, Howie, and AJ.

“Actually,” he said slowly, “We, uh, we kind of -- we had Eddie cancel… well, everything. Until further notice.”

I stared up at him. “Then, shit, man, you better go give that further notice because I’m fine,” I said. And I really did sit up this time. “I’m stage ready.”

Moving made Brian wake up. He looked up at me in surprise, then relief, “Oh Jesus, thank you.” He leaped up and wrapped his arms around my head, pressing my cheek to his chest, then he pulled back so I was at arm’s length and stared into my face. “You bastard, you had me scared to death.”

“I’m fine,” I repeated.

“Nick, they think that you had a heart attack,” Kevin said, shaking his head. “You aren’t fine.” He took a deep breath, “You need a break. You need to go home and rest. You need to get your health in check before we can tour safely. I’m not losing you, I’m not going through what we went through in 1998, always worrying you’re going to drop dead on the stage in front of the fans. Just no.” He shook his head, “Tour postponed. It’s already done, there’s no use arguing about it.”

Brian nodded, “Kevin’s right, Nick. Trust me. I know.”

I shuffled my feet under the blankets.

“Once you’re cleared to leave, we’ll fly home, and you’re gonna get checked by your cardiologist,” Kevin said, taking command like usual. He paced to the foot of the bed and back as he spoke. “We’re only thinking of your safety.”

“That was terrifying,” Howie piped up, “Seeing you go down like that.”

“If you want to see how bad it was,” Justin offered, waving his camera.

I shook my head.

“Once you’re better, we’ll finish up tour,” Kevin said.

I nodded.

“How long have you been putting this off?” Brian asked, a knowing tone to his voice. “Weeks? Months?” His eyes were sad, and I pictured him remembering his own days of suppressing chest pains and secret doctors appointments and putting off taking care of his heart. I pictured him imagining me having some harrowing, secret life I didn’t tell them all about. Like he thought I was broken inside.

I stared at the cup of water, focusing on the straw, letting everything else go blurry.

If they had any clue what was actually going on…

I shrugged in response to Brian’s question. “Awhile, I guess,” I answered, and I sipped the water in silence, wondering how much longer I could keep it all from them.


Chapter Three by Pengi
Chapter Three



Nick

It took a couple days before the doctors decided, in their very German opinion, that I could leave. But when they finally decided I could go, Eddie booked the next flight home to Los Angeles he could get us on. I texted Jaymie on the way to the airport, between Brian asking me if I was okay and Kevin rushing to grab all my bags before I could try to carry anything heavier than my cell phone.

Can you pick me up at LAX at 4?

A few moments later: AM or PM? Because like 4am? wtf?

PM.

OH. Well. that’s a horse of a different color isn’t it? See you then.

I put my phone back in my pocket as the car pulled up to the curb. A group of fans were standing out front, once again knowing in their mysterious, magical way that we would be there. They wore worried expressions, staring at me like I was a puppy that had three legs or something. We hurried by them, only time to quickly touch finger tips as we passed. I didn’t feel much in the mood for hugs and photos and all that and luckily the guys sensed it and ushered me along without pause. I felt bad, snubbing the girls like that, but I mean, I had just had a heart attack and everything.

On the plane, as other passengers were taking their seats and Kevin was trying to jigsaw puzzle all our carry-on bags into the holding bin overhead, I checked my phone again. I had a missed text from Jaymie. Are you ok by the way? AJs bad at keeping people in the loop btw.

Yeah hes almost as bad at that as he is at keeping secrets, I typed back. Then, I’m not dead.

Well that’s good. I mean it’d be a little cool because then I’d be getting texts from a ghost.

Eh its really expensive to send a text from heaven yknow... thats why people don’t do it much.

Gotcha.

The flight attendant had come over and helped Kevin finish getting the shit all up in the compartment, and he settled down next to me. “You okay?” Brian asked from the other side of me. Brian was taking one for the team, sitting in a window seat, despite his aversion to flying, so he could sit next to me.

“I’m okay,” I replied.

Kevin fiddled with the in flight menu and magazine and shit in the little pocket on the back of the chair in front of him, stretching out his legs and sighing. Brian was readjusting his seat belt for the ninth time. He’d keep doing that until we took off, too. He always did. I looked back at my phone.

See you soon then, she’d said.

See you, I answered, turning the phone off and leaning back in the seat.

We weren’t in the air long before Kevin and Brian were both asleep. I sighed, running my palms over my knees. My hands were sweaty. I stared at the little TV screen, The Neverending Story playing. I slid my headphones off, letting them rest around my neck, and sat there listening to the hum of the plane and the general din of people sleeping all throughout the cabin. It was a long flight, and long flights were good for thinking, particularly when you’re the only person besides the flight attendants that was awake.

“Would you like anything to drink, sir?” whispered one of them as they walked by.

“Maybe a ginger ale?” I requested.

She smiled, “Let me get that for you.”

I stared past Brian at the window. Outside it was a mirth of dark blue - sky, ocean, everything all mixed together in one uniform palette, broken only by the glow of the moon I couldn’t see from the window glowing on low settled clouds to form a grey horizon line in the distance. Recently, everything in my life had started feeling a little bit like that, I thought, all the same, all dark and distant and blurry. I sighed. Or, at least, it had been like that, and my life only now looked like that, in retrospect.

The flight attendant returned and held out a cup of ice, a small straw, and a can of Seagram’s Ginger Ale. “Here you are, sir.” She smiled.

I took them and put them on the drop-down tray in front of me. “Is there wifi on this flight?” I asked her quietly.

She nodded, “The password is in your in-flight instructions pamphlet,” she replied, waving to the laminated chart in the seat pocket in front of Kevin.

“Thanks,” I said.

I pulled my phone out and used the password in my chart to log on my cell phone’s browser. While my email loaded, I poured my ginger ale. My email was pretty boring, so I opened my instant messenger and scrolled through contact names until I found Jaymie’s.

TampaBuccsFan28: u up?
PurpleNailPolish: yep are you?
TampaBuccsFan28: yes…this flight is boring as fuck
PurpleNailPolish: so literally you are up then ;)
PurpleNailPolish: would you prefer it end like Lost and your on an island somewhere eating Howie’s liver?
TampaBuccsFan28: Howies liver is too spicy
PurpleNailPolish28: whose liver would you rather then?
TampaBuccsFan28: Idk. Maybe AJs????
PurpleNailPolish: Too much ink poisoning from the tattoos.
TampaBuccsFan28: true. neways.
TampaBuccsFan28: what r u wearing?
PurpleNailPolish: a pink gstring and a lacy bra to match
TampaBuccsFan28: really?
PurpleNailPolish: yes because thats what I really do wear to bed at night when you’re not here.
TampaBuccsFan28: i’d fuck u even if u were in sweatpants
TampaBuccsFan28: i miss your boobs
PurpleNailPolish: lmao...Really? Thats’ what you miss? My boobs?
TampaBuccsFan28: yes. i miss squishing them. send me a picture of them?
PurpleNailPolish: okay. one second.
PurpleNailPolish: you ready?
TampaBuccsFan28: yes.
PurpleNailPolish: okay.
PurpleNailPolish: here you go
PurpleNailPolish: ( . )( . )
TampaBuccsFan28: ha.
PurpleNailPolish: you laugh but you’re probably jerking off looking at that aren’t you?
TampaBuccsFan28: dont be a bitch lol
PurpleNailPolish: it’s ok if you are...boobs are boobs...even if they’re just typographic depictions
PurpleNailPolish: when you get home they’re all yours
PurpleNailPolish: like the real ones ,not the drawing
TampaBuccsFan28: O Good I was worried I’d be stuck with four parentheses and two peroids
PurpleNailPolish: :P

Jaymie and I kept talking for awhile, just bantering back and forth like that. It was nice to stop thinking, stop worrying, and just let myself fall into mindlessness with her. That was the beauty of my relationship with Jaymie, and always had been. There wasn’t anything to it. It wasn’t complicated, it just was. I liked that she didn’t ask me a hundred million questions about everything, didn’t continuously ask if I was okay. It helped me forget that I probably wasn’t okay, something that I realized I was going to have to start coming to terms with more. I just wasn’t ready to fully engage myself in my own reality.

And Jaymie made it possible to forget.




Jaymie


I pulled up to the arrivals door in Nick’s car and parked in one of the ten minute spots, standing at the back end of the car with the trunk open and biting my fingernails. I was exhausted. Nick had stayed online chatting for hours and hours (it would’ve been easier to stay awake and pick him up at 4am than it was to get up to go pick him up at 4pm, as it turned out). I felt like a zombie and I was pretty sure I looked like Night of the Living Dead Sex Friend. Especially since I’d worn sweatpants and one of Nick’s old Buccaneers jerseys.

I was just beginning to notice a cop was eying me and the timer over my head - which was now reading twelve minutes since I’d occupied the space - when Nick finally came out the door, Kevin beside him, dragging a luggage trolley. Kristin was waiting with Max and Mason a few cars away, I realized, as I heard a squeal of delight and she rushed over to him. Nick looked up from his cell phone, a rare phenomenon, and glanced around, squinting in the light. I waved. He nodded and said something to Kevin as he reached for the trolley. Kevin pulled away from Kris and pushed Nick off the trolley, then came toward me with it.

“Hello,” Kevin said stiffly.

Okay so now I guess is as good a time as any to let you in on a secret you may or may not have guessed yet -- the other Backstreet Boys don’t particularly approve of me. AJ is the closest one, I mean he’ll talk to me, even hang out with me, but a lot of times the other guys… especially Brian… well, they don’t exactly approve of the relationship Nick and I share. Never have. I know for a fact that Nick and Brian have dueled it out over me before, though not because Nick has ever told me about their fights, but because Brian’s actually pretty vocal about it himself. And don’t even get me started on what his wife thinks of me. The looks Leighanne has given me is similar to look I imagine that God gave the earth to cause the great Ice Age. And though Kevin’s always been civil, I know he’s not terribly impressed with me. Even Kristin hung back with the kids, one hand on Mason’s shoulder, like she was holding him back, like you see women do in movies when they’re protecting their children from evil political leaders.

I sighed inwardly, but smiled outwardly, “Hey,” I said, “How was the flight?”

“Boring. As. Fuck.” Nick announced.

Kevin cleared his throat and nodded at the kids.

“Sorry,” Nick said, then, to me, “Boring as duck. But with an F.” He grinned at Kevin and I heard Mason laugh.

Kevin sighed, exasperated, and shoved Nick’s bags into the open trunk of the car. “Now listen to me,” he said, staring at Nick, “I want you to make an appointment with your cardiologist on Monday and get this taken care of. No putting it off, no being stupid about it, no going out drinking instead, none of that bullshh--- turd.” He glanced at Mason and Max. Nick grinned. Kevin’s eyes traversed back to Nick. “I’m serious,” he added. “For some reason, I actually like having you around and I’d like you to stay alive for another twenty years, if you don’t mind.”

“I’ll do my best,” Nick answered.

“You better.” Kevin sighed, this time more of a heavy, doubtful that Nick would listen to him kind of sigh, and pulled Nick into him for a hug. I looked down at my feet as Kevin crushed Nick and Nick patted Kevin’s back awkwardly.

“I’ll be a’ight Kev, I ain’t a kid no more.” Nick pulled away.

“I know,” Kevin said. He nodded at me, then took the trolley with his own luggage still on it, and walked off with Kristin and the kids.

Nick looked at me. “Well, hi,” he said.

“Hi,” I replied. I smirked. “Are you ready for your welcome home present?” I asked.

Nick’s eyes twinkled, “Am I gonna like it?”

“Mmhm,” I nodded. “I think you’ll like it a lot.” Eager, Nick slammed the trunk shut as I walked around to the door and got in, starting up the car. He followed a moment later, tossing his sweatshirt into the backseat and licking his lips as he pulled the seat belt across his chest.


Chapter Four by Pengi
Chapter Four



Jaymie

Despite how anxious to get home for his present, I could tell something was bothering Nick. There was just something about his body language, something about the way his eyes looked. But I’d asked him once and he’d said he was fine, so I wasn’t going to push it. That was one of our rules. We had one chance to ask each other if there was something wrong and if the other one said no, then we were to believe them. Or at least respect the boundary that was being set. Because, we’d decided, there should be a line that boys and girls just know not to cross. And that was where we’d drawn it.

But that didn’t make me stop wondering.

Kind of like driving by an accident. You don’t want to see it, but some sick, curious part of you really does kind of want to see it, even though you know once you do you’ll regret it.

When we pulled into the circular driveway and I parked by the house, Nick stared up at the house, a smile spreading across his face. “Christ, I wasn’t so sure I’d see it again for awhile there,” he muttered, and he pushed open the door and climbed out even before the car had come completely to a stop. I turned it off and got out. He was already at the door of the house, unlocking it. He turned back as I was opening the trunk to get his bags. “We’ll get’em later,” he said, “I want my present.” He grinned and disappeared into the house.

I shrugged a couple of the bags onto my shoulders (and, of course, Nacho in his pet taxi) anyways before slamming the trunk shut and following him inside.

The hallway of the house is about seven times larger than the apartment over his garage, which I rent from him. Well, rent is kind of a loose term. It’s kind of part of our agreement. Not that I’m, like, a hooker or anything. It’s just that it’s easier for me to be there for him at any given moment if I’m nearby. And there aren’t exactly affordable apartments near his house in Malibu. It was just easier - a convenience for him, really - that I take the room above his garage, which he converted into a studio apartment, bathroom and all. But when he’s on tour, I have to babysit the house. And the cat.

Mr. Mulder was licking himself on the fifth step of the stairwell, his bald leg extended out, looking like it was one of those turkey legs that kings eat at the round table. “Mulder!” Nick said, excited, and the cat looked up from his preening as I put the pet taxi containing Nacho down in the hallway. Nacho growled under his breath in the taxi and Mulder stood up, arching his back slightly before Nick scooped him off the carpeted steps into his arms. The cat’s legs flayed as he was flipped onto his back and Nick grinned down at him, “Shit Mulder, I wouldda missed you if I died over there, you ugly bastard.”

Ugly Bastard was a good term for that cat, I thought, letting the bags slide over my cat-scratched arms to the floor. Nick came over, and after he tapped Mulder's nose to his own, he let the cat down, who hissed at Nacho’s taxi door, then sped off to places unknown as Nacho pressed his face flat against the taxi grate. Nick was standing right in front of me now, his eyes intense. He reached for my hips and pulled me into him so we were stomach to stomach, chest to chest. I stared up at him. “So, uh, can I unwrap my present now?” he asked in a thick voice.

“I didn’t wrap it,” I said in a hushed, sexy tone.

He blinked, “I meant your clothes. Can I take your clothes off now?”

“Please. You just had a heart attack,” I said, batting him off me. “Like you’d know what to do with me without clothes on right now.” I shook my head, “Crazy ass.” I pulled away and reached down and let Nacho free. He sped off in hunt of Mr. Mulder. Then I led the way into the den.

Nick followed, looking slightly deflated, “Wait. So my present isn’t sex?”

“No,” I said. I shook my head as he trailed after me, “You know, I read on the internet that most guys are afraid of having sex after they’ve had a heart attack.”

Afraid of having sex?” Nick’s voice was incredulous.

“Yeah, like, they think they’d die during having it and stuff,” I sat down in the chair by the couch and crossed my legs, staring up at him as he stood there dumbly in front of me. “But you’ve apparently missed that train.”

Nick blinked at me for several long minutes, “So wait. Wait. You’re serious? My present isn’t your boobs?”

I laughed. “No, Nick, your present isn’t my boobs.”

“You said I could have your boobs when I got home, though.”

“And then I looked it up on the internet and you have to wait a couple weeks.”

Nick eyeballed me. I had a feeling he’d veto out that announcement later, using the cause that I was getting too involved and personal for our relationship rules, and then subsequently talk me into having sex, whatever WebMD might recommend be damned. But for that instant, he let it go and changed channels, “So then what the hell is my present, if it’s not your boobs?” he looked thoroughly confused.

I waved my hand at the table. On it, I’d splayed out all his favorite movies. From Alien to Ghostbusters to Almost Famous to all eight seasons of Breaking Bad. I’d put down popcorn and a 24-pack of bottled water. He stared at the collection of stuff. “You,” I said, “Need to relax. And we’re going to relax. Watching every one of your most favorite movies and shows. Binge watching them, even,” I explained.

Nick licked his lips. I could tell the way he did it that he was excited about this prospect, but a little bit sad that the present hadn’t been sex. It took a moment for him to let go of what he’d thought he’d had coming before he could allow himself to be excited about what he actually did have coming.

“Awesome,” he said, and he dropped onto the couch, “This is going to be great.” He grinned and grabbed hold of the box for the final season of Breaking Bad, flipping the box over and staring down at the blurb and the pictures. “I have just one question,” he said.

“Hmm?” I asked.

“Does a blow job count as sex?”

“Yes.”

“No sex for -- for how many weeks?”

“A couple weeks.”

“Two weeks?”

I nodded.

He sighed and looked around the coffee table. “Well shit, if your goal here is to distract me, then you’re gonna need a lot more movies than this to keep me busy.”

I laughed, “I’ll keep that in mind.”




Nick

We didn’t start the movies immediately, obviously, I’d just gotten home from overseas. I took a shower first and while I was in there Jaymie made some food and then we settled into the movie marathon, with a couple plates of veggie-pasta and the waters. Just to keep me from getting too excited, she said, she’d sat in the easy chair, her body a U as her legs hung over the arm rest and the plate of food balanced in the gap between her chest and legs.

I kept stealing glances at her, trying to figure out how to plausibly use my nothing personal veto against her no sex rule without appearing like a sex-obsessed, suicidal maniac for even suggesting it.

But here’s the thing: I knew the heart attack wasn’t from hypertension caused by over-activity on stage. I knew performing wouldn’t cause another one - be it on stage or on the bed. This is why I wasn’t afraid of having sex or anything else for that matter. The heart attack wasn’t a mystery to me, like it was to everyone else. I knew that the hypertension that had caused the heart attack was really just a side effect. And, whatever anyone said, having sex wouldn’t kill me.

So about halfway through Ghostbusters 2, I looked cleared my throat. “Jaymie,” I said thickly. She looked over her shoulder at me. “I don’t think that - that sex would - you know - kill me.” She stared at me. I was about to launch into my second part of my speech (the part where I explained what could kill me instead), but before I could Jaymie had put the plate onto the floor and sprung to my side on the couch, our mouths finding each other like magnets.

“Shit,” she gasped as we struggled with clothes, peeling them off quickly between kisses, each working on our own the way couples that had been together a hundred thousand times before might. She struggled with the tiny hooks on her bra and I slid my pants onto the carpet and we fell backward onto the cushion, our skins touching. “I missed you so fucking much,” she gasped.

I pressed my mouth against her neck as she straddled me, her knees on either side of my waist. Then she was leaning into me and slowly, I was laid back until I was prostrate against the sofa’s seat cushions, Jaymie looming over me. She stared into my eyes, then said, in a thick, low voice, “You promised Kevin you’d relax…” A grin curled across her face. “So hold still.”

And good God was what came next amazing.

It always was with Jaymie.

But here’s the thing:

I had really wanted to be the one in control. I’d really wanted to lean over her, feel my palms pressed into the cushion… I’d wanted to be the one moving my hips in strokes that would make her contort her face and gasp and beg for more. I’d wanted that power of slowing down and speeding up and putting my hands on her and my mouth on her and I’d wanted to be the one making her moan and scream and writhe.

Instead, she set herself upon me and, as hot as it was, something was lost for me, and try as I might to stay in the moment… I couldn’t.

Which made me nervous for more reasons than just the one.


Chapter Five by Pengi
Chapter Five


Nick

I woke up during the night. Jaymie was asleep beside me, her head on my biceps, breathing deeply and soundly, her legs tangled around my left leg. On the TV screen, the colors blurred into shapes I couldn't distinguish. I stared at them, my heart rate accelerating as I tried to piece them back together, to comprehend them. My mouth felt dry and the longer I couldn't figure out what I was looking at, the more I panicked. It was the strangest feeling because I knew I was looking at words and pictures. And what's more is I knew that I knew what the menu said and what the pictures were. I knew I shouldn't be having this problem. But I was. And it scared the shit out of me.

I struggled to get away from Jaymie. I knocked her off the couch by accident in my rush to get away. She hit the carpet with a thump and I rushed to crawl over her, and hurried off to the kitchen without waiting for her to get up.

My feet thundered the stairs and down the hallway to the bathroom, where I grappled at the faucet, turned the water on and splashed my face. My heart was slamming in my chest like crazy. Calm down, I begged myself. I couldn’t end up back in the hospital with another heart attack. Finally, I pulled back and sat, shakily, on the closed seat of the toilet, breathing heavily. I closed my eyes. I felt Mulder rub his skin against the back of my leg. He must’ve been hiding in the cupboard under the sink, one of his favorite places.

"Jesus Christ, what the hell?" Jaymie asked, suddenly in the room.

"Sorry," I said. I looked up at her, framed by the doorway, her narrow body only just covered by my Buccaneers jersey, which she’d peeled off of her body earlier on the couch. Her long legs seemed to go on forever and ever and ever underneath it.

Sorry?” she asked, eyebrows raised, “That’s it? That’s all you have to say for jumping up in the middle of the night and running off like you’re fucking Paul Revere?”

“I would never fuck Paul Revere,” I said in as serious a tone as I could muster.

Jaymie stared at me for a long moment before caving. She rolled her eyes and let out a sigh that told me she was amusedly annoyed. “You’re insane.” And she turned away. I heard her feet padding down the carpet of the hallway.

I stood up and moved to look at myself in the bathroom mirror. My face was pale, my eyes red. I reached for a bottle of toothpaste and read the words on the package carefully - every one of them, even the ones I didn’t really know, just because I could. I closed my eyes and dropped the paste into the sink basin when I’d finished, holding in a plethora of emotion that I knew that, should I ever let it out, would never be capable of being bottled again.

It would mark the beginning of the end, I thought.

So I swiped away the tears that were forming at just the very corners of my eyes and took a couple deep breaths and headed downstairs.

On my way to find Jaymie, I paused in the doorway of the den and glanced at the TV. It was the Ghostbusters DVD menu that I’d been so perplexed by. Simple words like play and scene selection had seemed like foreign language, and the picture of Bill Murray as abstract as anything Picasso ever could’ve come up with.

Jaymie was in the kitchen. She’d put her sweatpants back on, I noticed. Outside, it was still dark over the ocean. Nacho was snoring in the little doggie bed by the sliding doors to the deck. Jaymie had started the coffee machine and was rooting around for cream from the fridge. I lowered myself into a seat at the bar counter and watched her for a long time.

“So. Did anything exciting happen while I was gone?” I asked finally because the silence was awkward.

Jaymie shrugged. “Not really.”

“How’s work?”

“Work,” she replied simply. I would’ve asked a more specific question, but I had no idea what the fuck Jaymie did, so I couldn’t.

“Me, too,” I said.

Jaymie turned, letting the fridge slam shut behind her, and put the creamer on the counter, then dug around for a couple mugs from the cupboard. She poured coffee, when it was ready, and pushed the creamer and a little jar of sugar at me when she’d handed me my mug. She stood on the other side of the breakfast bar, the Buccs jersey clinging to her boobs all perfect, and sipped her coffee, staring at me as I sipped mine and stared at her boobs.

“So,” she said.

“So,” I echoed.

Jaymie raised her eyebrows.

“I’m okay, if you’re asking without asking,” I said, my voice pointed. The last thing I wanted was Jaymie prying. Though I don’t know why it would’ve been so terrible if she knew. At least I’d have someone to tell, someone who wouldn’t tell the fellas because, well, none of them would talk to her, really. But, like being upset about it, telling someone would make it more real and I didn’t want that. Plus, that would be stepping over a huge ass line that we’d drawn in the proverbial sand years and years before.

“I wasn’t,” she said. But I knew she was lying. Sometimes, Jaymie did this thing with her eyes that was a little bit concern and a little bit a challenge, like she was daring me to try to cross the line. That was the look she’d given me just then.

I nodded and focused on my coffee.

She finished hers and washed out the mug and headed for the kitchen door. “Where are you going?” I asked, raising my eyebrows at her this time. “We still have a shit-ton of movies to watch, remember?”

Jaymie stood at the doorway, her hand on the knob. “Yeah, well. I’ll be back. You should be sleeping anyways,” she added, glancing at the clock.

“So should you.”

“I gotta do something,” she replied, “I’ll be back. Go to bed.” And with that, she slipped out the door, without giving me even a moment to say another word. Nacho looked up from the sliding deck doors, craning his neck to see the kitchen door from where he laid.

“She already left,” I told him, and I got up and poured out the coffee I had left into the sink and wandered back to the den. I turned off the Ghostbusters menu, thinking about what had happened, and by the time I walked up the stairs, I’d completely forgotten about Jaymie and her mysterious departure.




Jaymie


I was laying in the grass at the cemetery when the sun came up.

“I was thinking about getting a tattoo,” I said to the headstone. I was using some Kleenex I’d found in the car to pick dirt out of the letters, etched in the granite. “But then I was afraid Nick might ask what it was and I’d have to tell him about you.” I sighed. “That’s stupid, isn’t it? Being afraid of telling Nick about you?” I laughed sadly at the irony of that. Irony, because I’d spent most of the time I’d had with him, actively trying not to tell Daniel about Nick.

When I’d gotten all the dirt out of the letters, I pressed my cheek to the cool stone and closed my eyes.

“Excuse me,” a voice called out. I sat up and looked around. A guy was leaning out of the window of a car, pulled up behind mine on the pavement by the edge of the grass. “Are you okay?” he asked.

“I’m okay,” I nodded. “Thanks.”

He nodded, too, and drove away.

I looked back at the stone. “Everyone always asks that but nobody really gives a shit. You know? Like it’s obligatory to say are you okay or how are you to people and nobody really, really gives a crap what the response is. As long as they fulfilled the duty of having asked.” I sighed. This was one of the mutual feelings Nick and I shared that had led to our regulations in the relationship we had. If we asked, we had to really care because it hurt too much when people just asked arbitrarily.

Of course, sometimes it hurts worse when they don’t ask at all.

“I think what I miss most of all is knowing you cared,” I said suddenly.

Silence.

“Anyways, I better get back. I’ll never hear the end of it if I’m out too long.” I got up and dusted myself off and grabbed the handful of tissues I’d used to clean the stone, then backed away slowly, staring at it. Sometimes, I thought, it was still hard to believe that such a stone existed at all.

I walked back down to the car and got in, tossing the dirty kleenex onto the passenger side floor. My cellphone had several missed calls and text messages. All from Nick.

ur takin forever
wtfffff where are u?
bring home milk when u come were out & mulder needs it
and also I need a new toothbrush

“You aren’t demanding at all,” I muttered as I texted back that I’d get the stuff and be home soon. I rolled my eyes and glanced back at the stone in the grass, one among a sea of stones. I was just one lonely person among a planet full of lonely people, I thought. And I drove away.


Chapter Six by Pengi
Chapter Six


Jaymie

Nick was sitting on the deck, staring off at the ocean, when I came home, toting along milk and a toothbrush. He must've been deep in thought, too, because he didn't even look up when I let the door slam behind me by accident. It was one of the rare moments when Mulder and Nacho were getting along, both sitting in close proximity of their master, lazing in a beam of sunlight together. Nick’s hair ruffled in the ocean air and I almost thought he might’ve been asleep. I put the milk in the fridge and the toothbrush on the counter, then stepped out onto the deck. "Hey," I said quietly, not wanting to wake him up if he was sleeping.

Nick looked up, a surprised expression on his face. "When did you get back?" He asked, "I didn't hear you come in."

"I'm a ninja like that," I answered.

Nick laughed, a smile crossing his face. But a very short one. Then he let out a heavy sigh, like someone who is stressed and exhausted from being stressed, and he leaned forward and rubbed the back of his neck with his palms, staring down at his feet. I almost asked what was wrong, but I'd been asking that a lot lately and I wasn’t sure how he felt about me asking all the time. So instead of asking, I went over and gently started to massage his shoulders. He stiffened at first, but as I kneaded the knots from his shoulders he loosened up and melted back in the chair, rolling his neck in appreciation. I could almost feel the tension leaving his body as I worked on his muscles. "Oh ffffuuuuuck, that feels good," he murmured.

I smiled, happy to make him happy, and continued massaging him. I leaned in so my mouth was near to his ear. "You're sooo tense," I said in a husky tone. "Your muscles are just… soo… sooo tight…”
"Yesss," he hissed as I moved my hands from his shoulders to his pecs, continuing to massage him.

I leaned closer still and kissed his ear, softly nipping at it with my teeth. He groaned and bit his lips. Then, I brought my chin around his shoulder and our cheeks pressed against each other. My hands roamed over his stomach, down to his crotch, kneading all the way. Nick groaned and pushed his hips upwards, harder into my palm.

He groaned.

"You like that?" I asked.

"Ohh yeah."

I turned my face and he turned his and our mouths locked, tongues tangled as I slid my hand into his pants. He moaned and arched his back, biting his lower lip, eyes rolled back, enjoying my touch. Then, suddenly, he got up and turned toward me so he was sort of half-kneeling on the chair. He leaned toward me, his hands grabbing onto my hips, trying to remove the Buccs jersey I wore, but instead, his foot caught the end of the chair, knocking it over, sending Nacho running into the house in a panic as it thumped to the floor. Mulder inched back and stared at us with his deeply judgmental eyes. I flipped the cat off behind Nick's back as he half tripped and half climbed over the chair.

Nick’s less-than-graceful move had him falling into me, and making me stumble back as he stumbled forward into the kitchen/dining room inside. The velocity of Nick's fall kept us stumbling backwards until my back slammed into the far wall of the dining room, and Nick's mouth pressed against my neck as he kissed and licked the skin at the spot where my neck and shoulder met. He pushed his entire body into mine and lifted me up from the floor, hands on my hips, under the jersey. My legs went around his waist and his pelvis aligned with mine. I could feel him, barely contained by his jeans, pressing against me. He pushed the Buccaneers shirt off of me, finally, sliding it up, over my head, moving my arms up the wall with his hands, his pressing hips the only thing keeping me up. He leaned forward, his face delving into the cleavage formed by my bra, licking and nipping the skin with his teeth softly. I gasped and tightened my legs, afraid of slipping from his grasp, my ankles hooking around each other at the small of his back. His fingers tangled with mine, our arms still up over my head on the wall.

Nick suddenly pulled away, wrapped his arms around me, holding me to his chest, my boobs pressing into him. He staggered, carrying me, up the stairs and we bumped along the wall as he tried to catch his grip on me as I slid slowly down his body, our mouths locked. Finally, he reached the bedroom, twisted the knob open with some difficulty, and we fell backward, onto the bed, kicking off our pants as we went.

I wasn't entirely sure how this all happened. I'd just come home, and there he'd been, all tense and brooding and... and... it just happened. This is how it'd always been with Nick and I. Even when we tried not to make our relationship about sex, it always became sex, regardless.

His body was heavy on mine, and I stared up at him, my heart pounding. As I felt it slamming in there, I was afraid of what his might be doing, too. Even if he wasn't afraid of having a heart attack during sex, I realized, the truth was that there was a little tiny part of me was afraid of it.

I mean, what exactly would I do if mid-stroke the guy just clutches his heart and tips over? Call an ambulance? Do many people have heart attacks during sex? I don’t know if I’d ever be able to have sex again, ever, if Nick had a heart attack in the middle of it. And if he ever died from said heart attack, I’d feel guilty as all hell for the rest of my life. Then again, what an epic sexual resume - being so good in bed that your partner literally has a heart attack, right? But yeah, no, the thought was absolutely terrifying to me.

But it didn't seem to slow him down.

Within moments, my fingers were tangled up tight in the sheets and sweat was beading all along my body, and Nick's forehead was soaked and dripping with sweat, too. He pushed into me again and again and again. I could hardly breathe, my mind slowly slipping away from me as pleasure began to break over me. He closed his eyes as he released, a groan rumbling in his throat.

Then it was over and he fell to the side and we laid there on the bed, staring up at the ceiling in the morning light, panting, trying to catch our breath.

And into the silence around us, he said, "The scariest part was that I don't wanna die alone."

I looked over at him, and I saw a shadow of sadness on his face and I realized he might be a little more scared than he was letting on after all.

And then I noticed it. The present tense.

“Don’t?” I asked. “Or didn’t?”

Nick looked over at me.




Nick

Part of me wanted to tell her.

I stared at her, right into those bright green eyes of hers, and I knew if I did tell her, she wouldn’t tell anybody else. And I really, really, really, really wanted someone to be close enough to me that I felt safe to tell them, that would care when I told them, that would know to touch my cheek and tell me in a voice firm enough that I’d believe I’d be okay. And Jaymie could maybe do that, I told myself, staring at her, both of us still breathing heavily from having all of the sex. I wanted to tell her, to twine my consciousness and my heart around her the way we’d just done with our bodies, to embed a part of my soul into her…

I shook my head, turned away from her hypnotic green eyes. “Didn’t,” I laughed. “Jesus Christ that was fantastic,” I muttered. “Did you learn new moves while I was in Europe?” I raised an eyebrow, challenging her to question my topic-change.

She stared at me a long moment.

Please. Just let it go, I begged her. Because if I told her, I’d realized, I’d be crossing the line. I’d be violating everything she and I were. And that wasn’t fair to Jaymie. To suddenly change the definition of what we were just because I was afraid, because I didn’t want to be alone. Jaymie didn’t want that, and, I’m sure, least of all with me.

“I might’ve studied up,” she answered after the longest pause of my life. She turned her head away, too. I felt lighter without her eyes on me, like the lie of omission wasn’t as bad or as glaring as long as she wasn’t looking at me.

But something in my stomach started to churn.

I got up grabbed my jeans on the way, and went into the adjoined bathroom. I closed the door and leaned against it, sliding down until I was sitting on my bare bottom on the floor. I took a deep breath.

Brian and I got in a fight once, a long time ago, about Jaymie and me and the relationship we shared. You can’t just have sex with someone, Brian had shouted, without getting your souls involved!

Yes, I can, I had replied. I can and I do. We have sex every single day and our souls have nothin’ to do with it!

Nothin’.

I’d been right then and I was right now.

But that didn’t mean I didn’t want my soul to be close to someone else, I realized. Close the way AJ and Rochelle were close, I thought. And my mind stumbled over the memory of the way I’d felt after watching them hold hands and say vows. I’d wanted so desperately what they had that day… and I wanted it now.

I wanted it bad.

I wanted it before it was too late.


Chapter Seven by Pengi
Chapter Seven


Nick

I was still hiding out in the bathroom when I heard Jaymie talking in the other room on her phone. I stood listening to the sound of her voice rising and falling, almost tumbling over words. I ran water over my hands and splashed it into my face, my head aching. I closed my eyes. It was a sensation I’d become used to recently, but at some times it was worse than others. I opened the medicine cabinet and found some Excederin and downed a couple pills. As I was gulping back eight ounces of water, I heard Jaymie’s voice pitch loudly, the words she was shouting were muffled by the door, but I’m pretty sure I heard the word pilates.

I put down the glass and wiped my mouth and opened the door of the bathroom just as Jaymie hurled her cell phone across the room, narrowly missing me. Now if we were in a movie, the phone probably would’ve broke into a thousand pieces. But being that we are not a movie, the phone just hit the wall with a pathetic crunch of a sound and lay there. Really, it spoke wonders for the Otterbox company that Jaymie could chuck her phone so spectacularly and see no damage. I looked up at her, “Christ, warn me before you send cellular missiles,” I chided her.

She looked back at me, rage in her eyes, “Fuck you,” she said thickly, her voice heavy as she choked back emotion. I looked at the phone, then back at her.

“You already did that,” I teased.

Jaymie glowered at me. She was pulling on her sweatpants in an irritated fashion and, because her shirt was somewhere downstairs, she grabbed mine from the floor and yanked that on over her head, too, covering her boobs. That was unfortunate.

“Okay, okay. I’m sorry,” I said. I took a deep breath. “Are you okay?” I asked because I’m pretty sure that’s what you’re supposed to do when a chick freaks out.

Jaymie grabbed her phone off the floor. “Forget it,” she said. She wasn’t shouting anymore, her eyes were thick with the threat of tears, “Just - just nevermind. I’m gonna go.” She turned toward the door.

“Don’t go,” I said. Because I didn’t want to be alone. Not even for a moment. Especially not with my head feeling like this. I grabbed at her wrist as she started for the door anyways, “Jaymie please, don’t leave.” She stood still, staring at the door, refusing to look at me. She shook her head and started to struggle to pull away, but I tightened my grasp. “Jaymie, please.”

Jaymie turned to look at me, tears were streaming down her face, “Me crying is probably against the rules isn’t it?” she snapped.

I hated when girls cried. And she was right, it was one of the rules that we’d mentioned once. However, I didn’t wanna be alone enough that I was willing to overlook it. “I don’t want you to leave.”

Jaymie swallowed, snuffled, and stared at me through her wet, teary eyes.

“Please,” I repeated.

“Okay,” she said thickly. “Fine, I won’t leave.”

“Thank you,” I said, and I released my grip.

She nodded and pushed the hair out of her face slowly. And we stood there awkwardly for a moment by the door of the room, the bed sheets all messed up from our earlier escapades, the bathroom light streaming out across the room in a trapezoid of warm light. Jaymie looked down at her feet.

“So what’s wrong?” I asked.

Jaymie looked up at me, a frown on her face. “My father called,” she answered with a shrug.

I didn’t know much about her father, but the way she said it, I understood that it held the same basic weight as me saying that my father had called. My parents could teach a class: Emotional Turmoil 101. I’d be a Ph. D. in that program. I knew everything there was to know. I nodded. “I’m sorry,” I said.

Jaymie sighed and went over and sat down on the bed.

“Was he being an asshole?” I asked because I didn’t know what else to ask. It’s awkward, talking.

Jaymie was picking at her fingernails as she spoke. “Just asking if I’d been to his house lately,” she answered.

I laughed. “Wouldn’t he know? Since he lives there and all?”

She shrugged, “Well I might’ve broken in.”

I laughed again.

Jaymie looked up at me and her eyes were dead serious.

“You broke in?” I asked, serious now, “To your father’s house?”

“Well. Yeah, kinda. I only wanted my own stuff, though, I didn’t steal anything that wasn’t mine.”

I stared at her. Suddenly I pictured her like zip lining in skin tight leather with night vision goggles. “So why didn’t you just call?”

“Because they didn’t know I had stuff there still,” she said. “It was hidden. In a floor board. In my old room.” Jaymie took a deep breath, “Look, this is really just -- it’s stupid. And -- I… It’s… it’s personal.” She stood up and paced around the bed for a moment. “It’s really personal, that’s all. I didn’t want him to know about it.”

I nodded. “Okay. I’m sorry.”

Jaymie stopped pacing and looked at me, “Sorry?”

“For pressing you. I’m sorry for getting too personal.”

She resumed pacing.

“Do you wanna go watch a movie?” I asked because the air was thick and I couldn’t think of a damn other thing to say.

And she burst into tears.




Jaymie

I just stood there, in Nick Carter’s bedroom, crying my fucking eyes out like a little kid. He stood a couple feet away, looking utterly perplexed in the way guys usually do when a woman starts sobbing for what appears to be no reason in their eyes. I could barely breathe, my throat felt so tight from crying, I’m pretty sure I had snot and tears mixed together on my face. My knees went weak and I sat down on the floor, my back against the bed.

Nick was staring at me now the way someone might stare at a wounded animal they had to put out of its misery. I was the chipmunk under the wheel of the car.

“Are you a’ight?” Nick asked, his ghetto-ized English coming out.

“You can leave,” I said, addressing how uncomfortable he looked.

Nick hovered. I could tell he was kinda torn between wanting so much to run -- not walk, run -- away, and not wanting to look like a total asshole. To my surprise, he came over, lowered himself down next to me on the floor, and put his arm around my shoulders, pulling me into his chest, “Hey,” he said, “It’s gonna be okay. Whatever is the matter will be okay soon.”

I shook my head, “No it won’t,” I answered.

“How can you be so sure?” he asked, “Everything is okay in the end. Always.”

I shook my head, “Don’t be so naive. You know better than that. There are some things that you can’t fix.”

“Tell him you’re sorry,” Nick suggested.

“I’m not sorry,” I replied.

Nick shrugged, “That doesn’t mean you can’t tell him you are.” I stared down at my hands, picturing apologizing to my father for taking what was mine out of the house, but I couldn’t. Pilates apparently had seen me after all, as I was slunking along to the car, and she’d become suspicious, seeing me being all sneaky around the house, and investigated and I’d dropped the bobby pin I’d used to break in outback by Rusty’s bowl on the porch. Plus, Rusty had tried like mad to get inside when she went out to investigate, finally knocking Pilates over, running through the house, tail shattering at least two vases, and up to the guest bedroom, where he’d snuffed the floor, walking in circles, tracking me, until my father got home and Pilates told him to get Rusty outside. Pilates then insisted that things were missing around the house and I owed them for damages for the two vases. “So,” Nick said, breaking a rather long pause that had settled between us, “What was worth breaking and entering for anyways?”

“One second.” I stood up, and, feeling kind of numb, like I was moving in slow motion, I went out to the apartment over the garage and got the cigar box from the shelf in my room and returned to Nick’s bedroom, where I sat back down beside him. He’d waited without moving, and stared up at me until I’d sat down. He looked over at the box.

“Cigars?”

I shook my head. “My grandfather smoked cigars, this was one of his boxes, but it doesn’t have cigars in it.” I opened the lid and inside was a motley collection of pure crap. A ring pop, still in it’s wrapper, and several origami-folded notes, a couple of baseball and hockey cards, a mix tape, and a small handful of Polaroid photos. “It’s a time capsule.”

Nick laughed and reached over. Part of me wanted to stop him, to swat his hand away, but I didn’t. He picked up the trading cards and inspected them. “Some of these are probably worth some money,” he said, waving them at me.

“I wouldn’t sell them for the world,” I answered.

“No?” Nick asked, picking up the Polaroids. “Why?”

“Because they belonged to Daniel,” I answered. Saying his name in front of Nick felt… so… strange. It’d been almost eighteen years since I met Nick. I’d been seeing him more than half of my life, off and on. And this was the first time that I’d spoke Daniel’s name to him.

Nick was staring at the Polaroids. Daniel and me on a swing set in the backyard when we were nine. Daniel and I on the beach with bologna sandwiches that tasted like sand. Daniel, my mother and I, reading a book on the couch. Daniel, teaching me how to fish. And the first-ever selfie, a picture of me and Daniel that he’d taken by holding the camera out as far away as he could to press the button. Nick licked his lips, “Twins?” he asked.

I nodded.

“Damn,” he said. He shuffled through the pictures again.

I busied myself putting the trading cards back in the order Daniel had left them in.

“So you broke in to stole the time capsule you and your brother made,” Nick laughed, “Why didn’t he help you break in?” I stared at the box, trying to gather words to say to explain. “Was he too chicken shit to join you?” Nick teased.

“He’s dead,” I snapped.

Nick looked bewildered, and he put the Polaroids back in the box quickly and I snapped the lid shut. We sat there in silence for a long time. It was a mistake, I thought, telling him this, getting so personal, telling him about Daniel. It wasn’t a part of our regulations and it would upset him and he’d end things, I thought. Where would I go, I realized, if he did decide to end things? I didn’t know. Clearly, home to my father and Pilates wasn’t an option.

“I’m sorry,” Nick said, breaking into my thoughts. “I know it’s hard to lose a sibling.”

That was the first time he’d ever brought up Leslie dying to me. In the year and a half it’d been since she’d been gone, he’d only mentioned her a couple times. Once, to tell me about it, obviously, and one other time, after he’d tried calling her on her birthday and gotten a notice that the number had been disconnected.

I’d understood that feeling all too well.

But I hadn’t told him about Daniel, even then.

“How’d he die?” Nick asked quietly.

“My parents were fighting one night. My mom had too much to drink. She went for a drive. Daniel didn’t want her to go alone, he was trying to talk her into letting him drive, so he went with her.” I closed my eyes. “You know what? I don’t think I wanna talk about this anymore.”

Nick was staring at me with the saddest eyes. And I couldn’t handle that -- that pity look.

I stood up and took the cigar box. “I’m gonna go lay down for awhile. Your toothbrush is downstairs on the counter. Milk’s in the fridge.” I left the room, pulling the door shut behind me so that when the sob that was building in my chest finally broke free, Nick might not hear it.


Chapter Eight by Pengi
Chapter Eight



Jaymie

I was laying on the floor in my apartment over Nick’s garage, feeling thoroughly depressed, and a little over exposed. It’s weird because in a little better than seventeen years, I’ve slept with Nick about a billion times, he’s seen every single square inch of my body, every blemish, every mole, every birthmark. Yet I tell him about Daniel and that is what it takes to feel exposed.

I’d been laying there, crying and generally feeling miserable, for probably two hours, when Nick knocked on the door. He didn’t wait for me to open it or invite him in, just knocked twice and opened it up, stepping into the room with an almost cautious attitude. He ducked under the low doorway, and glanced around. “Looks different in here than I would’ve imagined it,” he commented.

This was the first time he’d ever come out to my apartment.

I sat up slowly, swiping the tears away from my eyes. I was kind of shocked that he had come out. I stared at him, unable to fathom words out of the vortex of thoughts in my head. He sat down on the chair nearest to where I was on the floor and leaned down so his elbows rested on his knees. He studied me a moment, his eyebrows furrowed. I felt like some kind of artifact or specimen he was analyzing. Then he said, “Why didn’t you tell me about him before?”

I thought about the answer for a moment, trying to decide if I should lie about it or just tell him the truth. I wasn’t sure what his motives were for asking. Nick never inquired about anything - and he avoided tears like the plague. Yet here he was, in my apartment, pressing for more information. Like he cared or something. He must want something colossal, I thought, and I wondered what it could possibly be that Nick Carter wanted from me that he didn’t already get on an almost daily basis.

“I didn’t tell you about him because… I didn’t want you to want to meet him,” I said.

He made a face, “What?”

I took a deep breath. “Okay. So. Daniel… he was everything a protective brother proverbially is expected to be. If he’d ever found out about… about you and me… he would’ve beat the crap out of you for, you know, deflowering me.”

Nick raised an eyebrow for a moment, seemed to teeter on the edge of amusement even, then said, “So wait… he died after you knew me?”

I nodded.

“When?” he asked.

I licked my lips. “Just before Millennium came out,” I said. “May 10, 1999.”

“Why didn’t you tell me when it happened?” he asked, concerned.

“Nick, you were in the middle of a gigantic explosion of awesome and I couldn’t even begin to think about telling you something like that. Besides, you were constantly touring back then, we didn’t see each other like we do now. It was only when you were in town, which wasn’t very often. Remember? It wasn’t like you were close enough to even notice the extreme depression I went into because of losing him. You had like a million girls back then.”

Nick took a deep breath and ran a hand through his hair to the back of his neck. He looked up. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry I didn’t see it, that I didn’t ask, that I didn’t… that I wasn’t there for you.”

“It’s not like I was very good at being there for you when Leslie died,” I answered.

“I can’t believe you were able to stick around through that, knowing this now,” he replied, a hint of admiration burning in his voice.

I shrugged.

“I mean, it wasn’t easy,” I said.

“I’m sure it wasn’t,” he replied, staring down at his hands.

“But it’s not like I was some insane pillar of hope through that, either,” I pointed out. “I hardly said a word.”

As weird as it sounds, Leslie’s death had been oddly… beneficial… to the relationship between Nick and I.

See, here’s the thing - when I said that Nick and I were on again and off again before, I really do mean we were really super-super on and off. I met Nick in 1996, at a club in Toronto, where I was on a class trip with my school. The Backstreet Boys were super fucking huge in Canada, but nothing in the US. In fact, they hadn’t even released a CD in the US yet. Their CD had only just released in Canada, but they had this insane following. My roommate on the trip was this girl I barely, a foreign exchange student from Germany on her second semester in the US, freaked out when she heard that BSB was in town. She had like three singles and a bunch of posters of the Boys, sent to her by her best friend in Germany via Air Mail. So when she found out that the Backstreet Boys were doing a Much Music thing like three blocks from the hotel we were staying at, she talked me into sneaking out with her and walking to the event. So we faked sick to get out of dinner with the school group, and snuck down the backstairs of the hotel. We were dressed cute, armed with fake IDs that said we were eighteen - something that, at sixteen, both of us could more than get away with, especially in the cutesy fashion scene of the late-90s - and we went to the event. We got in, we got close somehow (she was kind of a ninja, I think), and somehow or other, we found ourselves right next to the stage area when the Boys themselves came out. I discovered a few things that night: a) the Backstreet Boys were fucking awesome, b) the weird German foreign exchange girl was actually really fricking awesome, and c) the fastest way to get my clothes off is a glass of vodka with cherry coke.

Nick kept looking at me and Monika all night, kind of sneaking glances, flashing smiles. I had long ago decided he was the cute one, despite Monika’s excitement over the one with sweet curly hair, who I later learned was Brian. We danced to the music and let loose and had so much fun that by the time the event wound down, we were way too hyper to just go home, something I shouted out over the music a few moments before they were about to escort the Boys away through the crowd. Suddenly, Nick was at our sides, accompanied by AJ. “Hey,” he said, his voice a nervous, jumpy sound at the time -- I mean, sixteen, talking to women who were going ballistic over him, of course it was. “Me and Jay are gonna go out dancin’,” he said. He glanced around, then said lowly, “And, I dunno, maybe drinkin’, too.” He smirked. “You wanna come?” He said it to my boobs.

Yes.” Monika said for me. Nick didn’t notice I hadn’t said it. My boobs were his focus.

And as previously discussed, I don’t really remember much else after that until the gold faucet in the bathroom as I puked my guts out over vodka and cherry coke fumes.

But Nick apparently remembered more than I did.

And I must’ve been fucking amazing because he kept the phone number I had scribbled onto a scrap of hotel stationary while Monika stood in the hotel room, holding her high heels and squealing that I had to go right now. We got in so much trouble back at the hotel our school group was staying at. In fact, Monika was sent back to Germany to finish the last quarter of the school year at home. I was expelled for a week.

I’d written about what I remembered in my diary and told no one what happened. Only Monika, who had become my best email buddy, had any clue about the events that went down that night in Toronto.

“I bet he calls you soon,” she had written once, about a month after the event. “If you get married you have to have me be your bridesmaid.”

I’d agreed.

But it was over a year before we had any fresh material.

When the Boys came to the US finally, and they started doing appearances on American radio stations and TV circuits, they frequented Los Angeles, an easy twenty minute drive from the suburbia where I grew up, as you already know. I remember reading that the Backstreet Boys were coming to LA and freaking out and telling my mother that I had to go while Daniel rolled his eyes from the La Z Boy recliner. My mother had agreed to let me borrow the car so I could go, even though she thought that their music was a bad influence on me after what had happened in Canada because of them. It was 1998, and I never dreamed that I’d hear from Nick Carter - ever - until the phone rang about a week before the event and my mother called me to the kitchen because it was for me.

It’s a BOY, she mouthed, handing it to me, her face scarlet with excitement. I’d been seeing this boy at school, Craig, who said he’d bring me to prom maybe and would call me when he found out about if his mom could rent him a tux or not and my mom had been waiting with baited breath for the official prom invite. And that’s what I thought it’d be, too, when I answered the phone. But instead, it was Nick.

“We’re in town,” he said. “I wanna see you again.”

“I’m going to the event,” I said, looking at my mom with wide eyes.

“Awesome,” Nick had said, “I can’t wait to see you.”

I wasn’t old enough then to realize how booty calls worked, and I was just naive enough to not get the concept of celebrities with hos in different area codes. Which is probably how I so easily became one. Every time Nick was in town, I got a similar call. Free tickets to shows followed when the Boys toured in the fall. And Nick was always in and out of town so quickly that it felt urgent when he was there. And still I kept this all a secret some how. When I’d get free tickets, I’d say I won them. I’d be going out with various boys from school when Nick was in town and it wasn’t for a show, or hanging out at my friends houses. And Daniel had been wise enough to keep his mouth shut, although I know he knew that I wasn’t really seeing any of the people I said I was.

“So where are you going?” he’d asked me one night when Mom and Dad were on a trip upstate. We were sitting on the couch watching some stupid TV show on Nickelodeon, eating popcorn and fudge pops and a pizza with extra cheese and extra pepperoni, drinking beers that we’d stolen from Dad’s mini fridge in the den.

“Just out,” I lied.

“C’mon, Jaymie,” he’d said, “I’m your twin. I know somethings going on. I can feel something is going on.”

I shook my head, “Nothing’s going on.”

“You’re so full of shit,” he’d argued.

But he’d let it go.

And Nick and I continued seeing each other off and on. And then 1999 came. The Backstreet Boys were huge. My parents were fighting over finances all of the time as my dad’s company suffered some turmoil, and it was setting Daniel and I on edge. We were fighting a lot between each other and I was spending a lot of time in moody teen mode in the bedroom under headphones. He was getting ready to go to college in New York in the fall and I was pissed he was leaving and he kept telling me I should be applying for colleges, too, but I didn’t know what I wanted to do. I had no idea. None. And the more pressure I felt about deciding, the less I could actually decide.

The night Daniel died, my parents were fighting. Daniel had knocked on my bedroom door and come in and we’d sat on the floor, listening to the bickering through the floorboards. Daniel had sighed. “You want to know a secret?” he asked.

“Okay,” I said.

“I’m going to New York to get away from them.”

Tears had come to my eyes.

“I really wish you’d come with me,” he said. “I don’t want to leave you. I just wanna leave this.”

The sound of shattering glass had emphasized his point nicely.

“I get it,” I answered.

“I’ve been thinking,” he said, “And don’t laugh at me, I think this is a really, really good idea. What if you went to school for journalism?” he asked.

“Journalism?” I laughed.

“Yeah, like music journalism. You could write about your damn Backstreet Boys all day and get paid for it,” he laughed.

I’d stared into his eyes, “I’d be terrible at that,” I laughed.

Daniel shook his head, “You’d be really good. I know it. You’d be amazing. You write like crazy anyways, and you’re really great at it. And you’re really interested in music and everything. And NYU has a great journalism major, Jaymie. You could go with me. We could get an apartment together. Us against the world, you and me.” He smiled. “At least apply.”

The expulsion would’ve kept me out of NYU anyways, probably, in retrospect, but at the time it had filled me with this enthralling hope to know that Daniel and I would band together against the world, that we’d be somewhere exciting like New York City, and I pictured myself like Carrie Bradshaw, in flirty dresses with friends, drinking cosmos in the city.

And then my mother had burst into the room to get the car keys from me since I’d been the last to drive her car. And she was tipsy and Daniel had jumped up and insisted on going with her and they’d left.

Daniel died that night in the car crash. My mother got out with scrapes and bruises and a tainted, broken spirit, which my father only broke more as he blamed her as much as she blamed herself for Daniel dying. I didn’t move out, I didn’t apply to college. Instead, I dropped into this horrendous depression that seemed to numb my veins and soul. I saw Nick twice in the year that followed, and the drinking and drugs he was starting to dapple in were the escape that I needed, too, and I didn’t turn down anything he offered me both times he came. Then in early 2000, my mother killed herself and my depression was even worse.

Even though Nick and I were living very different lives this one thing about them mirrored: We were getting increasingly sadder at the same time, and increasingly willing to blot out reality with drugs.

By the time I moved out of my father’s house (and into a crappy one-room apartment in the most sketchy neighborhood LA had to offer), he’d met and married the evil Pilates (within a year of my mother’s death, making me wonder if he hadn’t been seeing her before she’d died, too). Nick had moved to Los Angeles full time and I was seeing him at least once a week, sometimes twice. We’d go clubbing or we’d go back to his place and snort some coke, smoke some weed, drink some booze… And it escalated over the years. We started seeing each other more and more and Nick confessed one night that I wasn’t the only girl he was seeing, but that it was slowly becoming me more frequently than anyone else.

“I’d make you my girlfriend,” he’d slurred over a bottle of Jack Daniels he’d got from AJ, “But then we’d have to be all like emotional and huggy-kissy and crap and alls I want is the sex, you know? Is that rude? It is, isn’t it?”

“Very,” I’d slurred back. “But it’s ok. Rude is ok. Rude is honest. Honest is good. I like honest. So I guess I like rude.” We’d stared at each other. “So wait. Are we dating now?”

“No we’re fucking,” Nick had laughed like a hyena. “But we’re fucking exclusively now. Or at least mostly exclusively. Unless you wanna come to Florida with me sometimes.”

“Florida’s nice. Except the crocodiles.”

“They’re nice too,” he said. “They don’t eat people.”

“Sure they do,” I argued.

“Nope they done a study, they don’t eat people.” He stared at me, “Rule number one. Nothing personal.”

I snorted. “What?”

“Like you don’t wanna hear about my family shit, and I don’t wanna talk about it neither, so -- nothing personal. You don’t tell me shit, I don’t tell you shit. We fuck, we talk goofy, like this about crocodiles and stuff, but its just fun. Nothing serious, nothing crazy. And very importantly, no going fucking psychotic on me like every other girl ever. Every time I date a girl they go fucking psychotic.” He shook his head.

“I’m not fucking psychotic.”

“Good. Stay that way. Rule number two…” and he slurred through several more rules that were mostly just covered under the first one. We’d shook hands on it.

That’s basically how it stayed for awhile; on again, off again, booty calls when he was in LA, a couple cross-country-or-even-extra-continental trips to soothe his horny soul… He dated others during that time, most notoriously Paris Hilton, but I was always kind of simmering on the back burner. Waiting.

When Leslie died things changed, though. Nick had been on a solo tour. I hadn’t heard from him since just before Christmas, when he’d been in LA for a couple weeks and needed a date to a few awards shows in December. Before that, it’d been about seven months since I’d heard from him. His friend, Chris, called and told me what was going on. I flew out to meet Nick in Baltimore, two days later. Nick and I didn't talk about it at all, though, despite what he made it sound like now. Rather, we just had some of the most intense sex ever.

“You were exactly what I needed,” Nick said now, looking up from his hands and into my eyes. “And that meant a lot to me.”




Nick

When Leslie died, I didn’t need someone who would listen to me cry about it - I had a therapist for that. I didn’t need someone to tell me what I could’ve done to change things - I had my entire family for that. I didn’t need someone to lecture me about my own habits (my personal trainer, doctors, and Brian had those bases covered), and I didn’t need someone to try to give me motivational speeches laced with too much enthusiasm (thank God, nobody did that at all). I just needed a tension release that wasn’t drugs or alcohol.

Enter, Jaymie.

No innuendos intended.

She didn’t ask questions, she didn’t try to cheer me up, she didn’t pep talk me. She just gave me what I needed and that was control and something that made me feel again. Because at the time I couldn’t feel much. But I remember one night, just before Jaymie ended up moving in over the garage, that she put her hands on my face, right on my jaw bone, and held my face so that we stared into each others eyes the entire time, and I have never in my life felt more cared for than that moment. It sounds weird. And maybe it’s fucked up, I dunno.

I felt bad because now I was finding out that I’d never done that for her. I’d never cared for her like she did me. And I was really confused because more than anything this desire was coursing around in me to find some way to repay the favor. I wanted to care for Jaymie.

And even weirder still, I kinda liked knowing. I liked that she’d told me. I liked that we now shared that bond of having lost a sibling. I liked that there was something between us. I stared into her eyes as she spoke, saying God knows what because I was too busy watching her talk to actually comprehend what she was saying, and I realized that, even if it wasn’t fair and it was completely not at all what she’d signed up for, maybe I didn’t care and maybe it’d be kind of nice to tell Jaymie my secret and tangle us up together for the rest of my life.

However long that might turn out to be.


Chapter Nine by Pengi
Chapter Nine



Nick

“You ever been in love?” I asked.

It was a couple days later, after our conversation in Jaymie’s apartment. We were in the kitchen, she was making dinner and I was just haunting her. I’d spent the morning at the doctor’s office, as per Kevin’s request when he left me at the airport, and I wanted nothing more than to be near her, near somebody, anybody. And Jaymie was there to be near to. But I’d been thinking since we’d done all our talking about her and I and the relationship we shared and what it was I wanted and what Jaymie and I could be if we only refocused ourselves. And somewhere in the forty-eight hours that separated then and now, I’d realized that I wanted that potential to become reality.

“What?” Jaymie looked at me from the stove, where she was watching the water boil for some ziti. I leaned against the counter, holding a bottle of beer I’d just pulled from the fridge, the cap still in my hand. I twisted it over my fingers, making it dance over my knuckles.

“Love,” I said, “Have you ever been in love?”

Jaymie laughed and turned back to the stove. “Love is something commercials made up to sell candy on February 14,” she said. “It doesn’t exist the way everyone thinks it does. So probably not.”

I put the cap in the trash and took a sip of my beer. “Yeah, I guess.”

“Have you?” she asked.

I shrugged.

“Love is kind of like this idealized concept, I think,” Jaymie said. “Everyone wants it so bad but nobody gets it, ‘cos it’s nothing like they think and they all expect it to fix everything. Like half the TV shows and movies and books and shit are all about falling in love, right? Well what happens after the fall? What happens when you’re actually in the love?” She shook her head. “Nobody sticks around to find out.”

“Yeah,” I said.

“And it seems pretty shitty. I mean, all the fighting and the responsibility….”

“Maybe it’s not always that. I mean, my parents fought all the time so I dunno. But maybe it’s just a bad example. Maybe love’s not really like that for everyone. I mean, Brian and Leighanne seem okay. I mean, she kinda sucks, and he’s kind of judgey but I don’t think that’s like because they’re married or whatever, I think it’s just natural. I dunno. Maybe love changes people. Maybe it’s not always for the better. But… don’t you think maybe it could be?” I was watching the way her hips moved as she swayed side-to-side in front of the stove.

“I think marriage is just people’s way of defining something that doesn’t need to be defined if it’s real,” Jaymie replied. “It puts too much pressure on it and that’s why it cracks.” She was opening the blue pasta box as she spoke.

I stared at her as she poured the dry noodles into the water and put my beer down. “But don’t you think being close to someone and being cared about by someone is, I dunno, worth it?”

Jaymie shrugged. “Sometimes things are better left unsaid,” she said. “If you stay uncommitted, then you stay unattached, you stay unhurt. There’s less pressure.”

“Some people are worth getting hurt for.”

“Nobody’s worth getting hurt for,” she answered.

“But some people are, though,” I argued. “Like once in awhile there’s a person that is. That’s why people do that weird adrenaline rush thing where they can, like, pick up cars and shit to save people and why there’s people willing to run into burning houses and jump out of airplanes and stuff.” I rubbed my nose.

Jaymie laughed, “Those people are paid to do those things, usually.” She turned on the oven timer, then turned to look at me. “Where is all this coming from anyways?” she raised an eyebrow. Then she gasped. “Did you meet someone?”

I shook my head. “It’s theo-retorical,” I said.

Theoretical,” Jaymie corrected my pronunciation. She opened the cupboard beside me, nudging me to one side a bit, and rooted around for a can of tomatoes. I picked up my beer and took another sip. “You probably shouldn’t be drinking that,” she said, waving at the beer.

I shrugged.

“You’ve been really talkative lately,” she commented, heading back to the stove where a skillet of browned hamburger awaited.

“I have been?” I asked.

“Yeah. Usually you’re all quiet and the most words I hear from you are, like, something you read about on Cracked.com or let’s have sex or hey how about a blow job. But lately it’s been like have you ever been in love and like, actual, real conversations. What’s going on?” Jaymie opened the can of tomatoes and dumped them in with the beef.

“I dunno,” I replied, “Just been thinkin’, I guess.”

“It’s just weird,” she said.

“Well, I’m pretty weird, what did you expect, exactly?” I smirked.

“I don’t know,” she answered. “But you’re like a whole other person lately.” She stirred the sauce she was making and added various spices and drained the pasta when the timer went off a couple minutes later, while we stood there in silence, her cooking, me sipping beer she didn’t think I should have. After a few more sips, though, I poured it out down the drain. She was right, I probably shouldn’t be drinking it. Especially not with all things considered, the things she still didn’t know. I put the bottle in the trash as Jaymie poured sauce over the pasta she’d already put into bowls. “Dinner’s up,” she said, carrying the two bowls to the table in the dining room.

I licked my lips as she leaned over the table, her tight jeans hugging her body perfectly. I took a deep breath. I’d decided at the doctor’s office that morning to tell her about everything and see where we landed after the conversation. Now I needed to get my nerves built up to actually do it instead of beating around the bushes, asking silly questions that got her suspicions up. But I was scared. Particularly after her pronouncement that nobody was worth getting hurt for.

I think I’d kinda wanted her to say that I was worth getting hurt for.

Since that’s what I was essentially going to be asking her to do and all.

“Do you want anything to drink?” I asked her.

“Just water,” she answered.

I grabbed two bottles of water and sat down in the chair opposite of where she was settling herself in, putting a napkin on her lap as she sat indian-style on the dining room chair. I slid a water across the table to her and she unscrewed the cap and downed about half the bottle in one go. I picked up my fork.

It was now or never.




Jaymie

“I went to the doctor this morning,” Nick said as he spun his fork in his hand. He’d been doing that a lot lately - spinning things in his hands. The bottle cap earlier, coins, pens, anything he could get his hands on, really, was subject to being spun between his knuckles. Like a nervous tic of some sort. He’d been acting so weird, wanting to talk all the time, that I’d started watching him kind of close, and so far that was the only finding I’d had.

“Yeah?” I took a bite of my pasta.

Nick nodded, stared at me for a couple moments, then suddenly plowed into the pasta. It was like he had been about to say more and changed his mind.

“So how’d it go?” I asked.

I take it back: The tic wasn’t the only thing I’d noticed. He also had been baiting me into conversation for the last couple days. Like he couldn’t just walk in the room and start a conversation - oh no, that would be way too easy. Instead, he had to start a conversation and kind of leave it on a cliffhanger and wait for me to ask for the next nibble of information. Like this. He couldn’t just say I went to the doctor and this is what happened. Instead, he had to start it, appear distracted, and wait for me to press it. I wasn’t sure what this new habit was all about. There was a time when Nick just said things if he wanted them said, and he’d get annoyed if I asked for more information than what he initially gave. But he’d seemed upset and tried various times to get me to ask over the last couple days if I didn’t on the first bite. So pair that with the tic and you’ve got full blown suspicious activity.

“Went okay,” he replied. He chewed, waiting, staring at me, challenging me to ask.

I chewed, too, staring at him, challenging him to just tell me more without me asking.

“Yep…” he said, nodding, “Got all examined and stuff. Checked out.” He spun the fork between bites.

“That’s good,” I said, “It’s always good to be healthy.”

“Or some resemblance to it anyway,” Nick laughed and pushed the pasta around on his plate.

“So you did well then, good,” I said.

He nodded, “Well he was a cardiologist. I’ve told the fellas about a thousand-hundred times that I’m okay there.”

I nodded, “Good. So did you call Kevin then? Are you going back on tour?”

Nick shrugged. “I texted Kev about it.”

“Good.”

“Yup.”

We ate in silence for a few moments. Nick mostly pushed the food around on his plate and spun the fork. “So,” I said when the silence was oppressing, having stretched far too long, “What are you nervous about?”

Nick looked up at me. He licked his lips, his eyes almost panicked. He put the fork down and pushed his chair back a little. I thought he was going to get up and leave, like maybe that had been one question too many and he was upset or something, but instead he said, “I want what AJ has.”

“What? Too many tattoos?”

“No,” Nick answered.

“A receding hairline?”

“Shut up, no,” Nick replied.

“Okay, so what then? Tell me.”

Nick took a deep breath. “Like… Rochelle. Like Ava. Like… y’know… love.”

I stared at him. I wasn’t sure he was joking or not. He looked like he might be serious, but Nick sometimes could keep a straight face. I laughed lightly to see what his response would be. But he didn’t crack a smile or laugh, too, or anything. He was serious. “You want to get married?” I asked, confused.

Nick nodded.

Now I laughed. “To who?” I asked.

Nick tilted his head, “To someone… like… you know… someone cool. Someone who I can talk to. Someone the sex is great with.” He bit his lower lip.

“So you don’t have anyone in particular in mind, you’re just like I wanna get married?” I asked, confused.

Nick shrugged.

I stared at him. I really wanted him to be joking. Then I had a thought. “Jesus, Nick, what kind of fucking drugs are you on?” I asked. I eyed him.

“I’m not on drugs,” he said. “Well, Excederin, but that doesn’t count.”

“Okay then what alien race are you and why have you abducted Nick Carter and when can we expect him back?” I challenged, jokingly.

“I just wanna be happy!” he said defensively. “Is it so bad that I wanna be happy and cared about by someone?” he demanded.

I shook my head, “Not bad, no, just so impossibly unlike you, and very sudden,” I answered.

“Well maybe that’s how people change sometimes, they change suddenly. Maybe that’s what happens when you ain’t paying any attention!” he said, standing up for real this time.

I stared up at him, “Jesus, Nick, why are you mad?”

“Because!” he said, “Because I bared my soul and you asked if I’m on drugs.”

“Because you’ve said a hundred-thousand times that you aren’t interested in getting married or any of that serious shit,” I answered, standing up, too. “And suddenly you’re like I wanna get married and you don’t even have a girlfriend right now. You sound like a thirty-five year old woman who just realized her biological clock is ticking.”

“Clocks are always ticking!” he said, anger lacing his voice, “They always tick, all the time!” and he turned and left the room.

I stood there a few minutes, squinting at the seat he’d been occupying, completely mindfucked. “Ugh,” I groaned and I sat back down and finished eating.


Chapter Ten by Pengi
Chapter Ten


Jaymie

I finished eating, cleaned the kitchen, washed and put away the dishes, and then gave Nick fifteen more minutes - an hour in total since he had stormed out of the dining room. I figured if he wanted to talk about it that he’d come back downstairs and talk about it. I sat in the living room, the TV on but muted, watching the clock and QVC.

I knew how to calm him down.

I got up and went upstairs and knocked on the bedroom door.

Nothing.

“Nick,” I called. Still nothing. “Nick.”

The door opened and he stood in the frame with an unreadable expression. “Sorry,” he said, followed by a short sigh. “It’s just been a long couple weeks or whatever it’s been.” Nick leaned against the door jam, his hands on the wood, the veins in his forearms sticking out as he put his weight against his wrists. “I didn’t mean to act like a moron down there.”

“Well you did really good at it, for something you weren’t trying to do,” I said.

“It’s a talent of mine,” he said, “One of the lesser-known ones. Being a moron. Didn’t really brag about that one much to Tiger Beat back in the day, so few know how really good I am at it.”

I shook my head, “Nobody believed anything in Tiger Beat anyways. Not after we grew up.”

Nick smirked, “I can show you the Beanie Baby collection to prove it, if you want.”

“You don’t have Beanie Babies,” I said.

“I do,” he answered.

“Liar.”

Nick’s smirk grew. “They’re in Florida. I wish to fuck they were here just so I could blow your mind.”

“I think there’s something else you’d rather blown,” I said.

Nick’s smirk receded and he lowered his arms from the door frame slowly, shaking his head. “Not right now,” he said, and he turned and went into the bedroom, leaving the door open.

I stood in the hallway, stupefied for a moment, then followed him. “What?” I said.

Nick lowered himself into the chair in front of his desk.

“Seriously, Nick, what’s going on with you? In seventeen years, you have never turned down a blow job.” I raised an eyebrow and put my hand on my hip.

He closed his eyes. “I have a headache.”

“Okay. You’re seriously a woman recently.” I stared at him.

He opened his eyes and looked up at me. “Stop being a bitch.”

“I’m pretty sure turning down sex because of a headache is more of a bitch thing to do than anything I’ve done,” I snapped.

Nick licked his lips, angry. “Why’d you come up here for? To keep making fun of me?” He stood up. “I told you something real down there and you just blew it off, like you think it’s funny, like you think I’m not capable of falling in love and being married.”

“Because you aren’t,” I laughed, “Nick. This is you.”

“Yeah, it’s me,” he said, his eyes piercing, “I’ve done a fuck of a lot for myself, haven’t I? Look around you. This house? This career? It wasn’t exactly handed to me. I worked like a son-of-a-bitch for everything I’ve got. I can do anything I put my mind to and that includes marriage, okay? So don’t treat me like I’m some kind of unlovable asshole. It’s not true. I know it and you know it. I mean, you gotta love me, at least a little. Or else you wouldn’t be here.” He paused. “Right?”

I didn’t want to define what I felt about Nick. I spun away from him. “I’m not saying you’re unlovable or that you’re incapable of being married. I’m saying it’s not like you to want that. Nothing you’ve been doing lately is like you.”

Nick came around me so we were looking at each other again. “Maybe that’s the point. Maybe I can’t be like me anymore.” He stared into my eyes. “Jaymie, I don’t wanna be alone anymore. I need someone.”

My mouth felt dry. I’d wondered for years what would happen to me when this time came, when Nick grew up and realized that the relationship we had wasn’t enough for him. I didn’t have anywhere to go, I realized. I never did go to college, I never really made much of myself other than everything Nick needed me to be. In the real world, I was a broken shell of a person, void of experience, void of knowledge. Panic filled me at the thought of leaving, of having to rely on that world out there.

Maybe, I thought, I’d stuck around with Nick so long because I was afraid of facing reality.

Maybe it was time I did it anyways.

“Jaymie,” he said thickly, “I --”

“I’ll help you,” I interrupted him.

He blinked, “What?”

“I’ll help you find someone.”

“But that’s not --”

“It’s okay,” I interrupted him. “It’s okay. I think it’ll work. I can help you find the perfect woman for you. And -- and I’ll work on moving out. So you can -- be happy. With her.” I nodded.

Nick licked his lips, “You don’t have to move out.”

“Yeah I do,” I said, “I lived with my father and Pilates long enough to know I do. You don’t want me being all awkward and third-wheely while you’re married to some perfect dream woman,” I laughed. “Besides, imagine trying to introduce us? Honey, this is Jaymie, she used to be my fuck buddy? I don’t think that would help your marriage much.”

Nick laughed a little, and looked down at his feet.

“Besides, you’re right. You can do anything you put your mind to and you deserve to be loved the way you want to be,” I added. He looked up at me and I gently rested one of my hands on his cheek. “You’re a good man, Nick. And you’re going to live happily ever after.”

His eyes practically burned into mine. “I dunno about that,” he said thickly.

“I do,” I said.




Nick

On the computer on the desk behind Jaymie, I could see the web page of Google Images I’d been scrolling through when she’d come in. Pictures of MRIs and diagrams and bloody surgical pictures glowed on the screen as Jaymie leaned in and wrapped her arms around me, squeezing me tight, having just said pretty words about happily ever after.

I could barely breathe.

I was waffling again. I had been since I’d come up the stairs. I couldn’t do this to her. I couldn’t reel her in, attach myself to her, and… and die. To do so would be to be far too much like the tumor was doing to my brain.

Me, that’s me, I’d thought, staring at this particularly nasty diagram of a brain tumor which looked like some kind of horrifying alien monster, metastasizing itself to the inside of a perfectly normal human brain, all these stringy little arms curling and weaving through the folds of brain flesh. Me, the tumor, and Jaymie, the brain. The brain that deserves better than a fuck-up of a cell cluster ruining everything.

I closed my eyes.

She was right. Nothing I’d been doing lately had been like me because me had had all the time in the world. No deadlines. There was nothing pushing me out of immaturity, nothing forcing me to come to terms with myself, to experience life before I couldn’t anymore. But now there was this wall, this point zero that I was counting down to, like a spaceship aimed at the atmosphere, rockets firing, the countdown on.

It occurred to me that if it wasn’t fair to do it to Jaymie, it wasn’t fair to do it to anyone. Not that I particularly wanted anyone else. But anybody that I fell in love with, that I shared myself with at this point, would be forced to love something so temporary that it would be like running into a firing squad, infatuated with the bullets that filled the air… or into the maw of a great white shark, professing adoration for the gleaming teeth it would rip them apart with. Falling in love with the kill switch.

I had waited too long.

Houston, we have a problem, I thought.

Jaymie rubbed my back, then pulled away. She looked up at me, a smile on her face. “Now, Nick, I need to know something very important.”

“Yeah?” I croaked, my eyes still on the images on the computer.

“Are we still going to fuck each other? At least until you find her?”

I nodded numbly.

“Is your headache better?” she whispered.

“It’s as good as it’s gonna get,” I replied honestly.

“I think I know a remedy,” she said hoarsely, and she took a hold of my hands and pulled me around, pushing me gently into the desk chair and dropping to her knees in front of me, running her hands up my thighs to my belt. I reached over and shut the lid of the laptop, hiding the pictures I’d been looking at as she opened the button and unzipped my fly and pulled my jeans away, and my stomach turned with excitement and fear because this was as close to someone as I’d ever be. And even this, I realized, was far too dangerously close. After all, an indirect hit can sometimes cause more damage than a direct bullseye.

Even this would have to end before the end.


Chapter Eleven by Pengi
Chapter Eleven



Nick

I woke up with Jaymie asleep against me, her legs tangled in mine, hair splayed behind her on the pillow. I blinked my eyes repeatedly, trying to figure out what had awakened me. My phone was vibrating, I realized. I grabbed it from the nightstand. Jaymie groaned as her head rolled from my shoulder. I looked at the screen. Kevin.

“...’lo?” I mumbled.

“Well hello there,” Kevin said. “How are you?”

“Asleep.”

“At ten in the morning?”

“I had a long night,” I answered.

“What time is it?” Jaymie whined out from the pillow where her head had landed.

“So I hear,” Kevin said. He paused. “Hey, look, I got your text. Your cardiologist cleared you? Just like that?”

“Well after the general waiting period,” I murmured into the phone. Jaymie was battling the sheets to roll over, kicking at them. I shook them off her to end her struggling.

“Fuck, it’s ten?” Jaymie exclaimed, sitting up now that she was freed from the sheets. “Ayyyye,” she groaned as she climbed out of bed quickly and started plucking clothes up from the floor.

Kevin’s voice was low and mildly sarcastic. “Yeah, it sounds like you’re doing a great job with that waiting period.” He sighed. “Okay. Anyways. I’m calling to find out what you want to do with the tour. Call it off, reschedule?”

“I don’t wanna call it off,” I said.

After all, who knows, this could be my last chance to tour.

I needed to be able to say goodbye to the fans in a better way than having a fucking heart attack on the stage.

“Okay then. Get me an exact date from your cardiologist, we’ll talk to Eddie, get the dates rescheduled.”

“A’ight,” I replied.

“Thanks,” Kevin said. “Have a good day, man.”

“Uh-huh.”

And he hung up.

I looked around. Jaymie had disappeared into the bathroom. I stretched, my body aching, and the sheets, which were all in a ball after Jaymie’s attack on them, fell off the end of the bed. I got up and stumbled toward the bathroom. She was in the shower, so I just did my business and got dressed and went downstairs. Nacho followed along after me and scratched at the back door. Standing on the deck while Nacho ran around below, I stared out at the ocean as it rocked and rolled and took a deep breath of the ocean air. I missed Florida’s ocean, which was supremely superior to California’s in every way. But it’d do.

I’ve always found peace in the ocean. It’s so much like me. I say that because from a distance it seems really calm and together, like it has all it’s shit worked out, but really there are secrets only the ocean knows - dark, deep things. It’s so unsettled deep inside of it, where there are monsters lurking. It’s peaceful enough to rock a boat gently or to rip it apart and leave nothing but the broken pieces behind. I’m like that, too, with my tangled up, convoluted past. Sometimes, when I stare out there at the water, I imagine that it could play the part of fortune teller, too. Maybe it could tell me where I’m going if I wait long enough.

“You didn’t join me.”

I turned around. Jaymie was stepping out onto the deck, her hair wet and hanging around her shoulders, wearing a plain yellow sundress. She came out and leaned against the railing beside me, her back to the water. She raised an eyebrow at me. Below, Nacho was barking at seagulls that had the audacity to land on a log of drift wood.

“A lot on my mind, I guess,” I said.

“Who was calling before?” she asked.

“Kevin,” I answered. “Curious about if we were continuing the tour.”

“Already?” Jaymie looked disapproving.

I shrugged. “He wasn’t pressuring me. He knew I went to the doctor already. He was just curious. Probably management is pressuring him and he wanted something to tell them.”

Jaymie sighed.

“I told him I wanted to finish the tour,” I said.

Jaymie chewed her lower lip, “So… you’re going back then.”

“Yeah, not like tomorrow or anything, but soon.”

“That’s probably the best time for me to move out then,” she said, looking up at the house, squinting in the morning sun that was streaming over it. “While you’re gone. So it doesn’t, you know, interfere with your life any.”

I nodded. Mostly because I didn’t really know what else to say or do. I didn’t want her to move out, but if she was going to insist on it… I didn’t know how to tell her what I needed to. And really, maybe her moving out would be a good thing. It would help me distance myself from her. It was only fair, letting her out early. Before the grenade I’d become detonated.

“Nacho!” I called. He looked up from the surf, where his feet were getting wet and mud-caked as he barked at the birds, circling, waiting to be able to get back to their roost. “C’mon, Nacho. Let’s go.” He glanced back at the birds, barked one last woof, like a warning that he’d be back to get them later, and rushed across the beach and up the steps to the deck. The gulls came in and settled on the log the moment his back was turned. I opened the door and he ran inside, shaking mud as he went, leaving little pawprints. I looked at Jaymie, who was still leaning on the banister, and followed the dog inside.

Jaymie came in a couple minutes later. “Okay, so if we’re gonna find you the perfect woman, we need a list of characteristics,” she said, “Things to look for.”

“I can find my own women, Jaymie,” I said. I was opening the fridge to get a drink out. Nacho was spinning circles on his pet bed in the corner, about to take a nap from his exhausting excursion on the waterfront. “You might’ve noticed over the last seventeen years, I’m kind of good at it.” I popped the lid on a can of ginger ale and sipped it.

Jaymie pushed the inside of her cheek with her tongue, making her cheek bulge. She did this whenever I was annoying her and she wanted to say something, but didn’t dare to. She took a deep breath through her nose and shrugged, “Okay whatever then.” She came out to the kitchen and pulled a second can of ginger ale out for herself and mimicked me, sipping it, staring at me over it. “You know,” she said, her voice calculating, “I think there’s something you aren’t telling me.”

I laughed, “Something I’m not telling you?” I smiled. “Now that would be different, given our rules.”

Jaymie leaned against the counter, right where I’d been leaning the night before while she was making the pasta. “Hmm, no, not too different. Except that you’ve been different lately. And I feel like whatever it is that’s making you different is the same thing that you aren’t telling me.” She eyed me. “Call me crazy, Nick, but we both know something is going on.”

I ran a hand over my hair. I felt a pang - not of physical pain, but of some shadow of it, something just in my head, so to speak - when my hand traveled over the area the tumor was in. “Maybe,” I said.

“Well whenever you’re ready to talk about it, let me know,” she said. She put the can down on the counter, half finished, and walked away, out toward the stairs that led up to her apartment.

I sighed and put my own can down. When I heard the door close, marking her exit, I glanced at Mulder, who was just coming around the corner, tail twitching, seeking breakfast. I put my hand back on my head over the spot, and I closed my eyes, picturing it in there. I knew, only from Google Images, what actual tumors looked like, but still, in my imagination it looks like that illustration with all the twisty arms and stuff, like a tiny octopus all splayed out, fucking around with all my controls. I put the two cans in the sink, scooped some cat food onto a plate, which I noticed Nacho spying on with one half-closed eye from his bed, and went back upstairs to the desk, opening the laptop.

How do I tell my loved ones I have a brain tumor? I typed into Google search.

I scrolled through pages of search results, trying to find one with a summary paragraph that looked like it might answer my question. But none of them seemed to. I sighed and Xed out the page. I didn’t know how to say the words to them, didn’t know how to deal with the looks on their faces. I imagined throwing a party. Having a big cake shaped like a brain with like a tumor surprise center.

Somehow I had a feeling that would just traumatize them all against cake.

I couldn’t take cake away from them, too.




Jaymie

I opened my computer.

Symptoms: changes in personality.

The first five hits were Alzheimer’s.

I shook my head. That wasn’t it. I scrolled further. Borderline personality disorder. Brain tumor. Pick’s disease. Antidepressant side effects. I clicked on the last one, scrolling through it, reading lists of symptoms and that I tried to tie in with Nick and his recent behavior.

Any number of these could apply to anyone, though, I thought.

Fuck you, Internet.

I needed more information.

I closed the webpage and spun around from the desk in the chair, looking around at the stuff in the apartment, all the things I’d have to wrap in newspaper, box up, and carry away. I pictured the actual act of moving out, of leaving all this behind. I’d become more than a little spoiled since living with Nick. I’d grown up pretty spoiled, too, actually. I couldn’t imagine going back to a piece of shit apartment in the crappy side of Los Angeles. Maybe, I thought, I should leave LA altogether. But that would mean never figuring out what Nick’s big secret was.

And also, leaving Daniel’s grave behind.

I got up and pulled the cigar box off the coffee table and opened it for the hundredth time. This time, I went for one of the little folded notes in the bottom of the box, notes scribbled on math graphing paper with magic markers and number two pencils in messy nine-year-old script. I unfolded them until I found the one I wanted. The one Daniel had written to future me. We’d each written a note to our future selves and one to each others’ future selves.

Hello future Jaymie, he’d started, It’s 1989 right now. Maybe when you read this it’ll be the future, like after 2001 if the world makes it that far. You’re annoying me today. We fought about where to hide our time capsule. Anyway I hope you didn’t grow up too much and that you didn’t get annoyinger in the future. I hope we’re still best friends like now. Even when you annoy me you’re still my best friend.

We probably would still be best friends if he was around.

I would’ve had to tell him about Nick by now.

I wondered how Daniel would’ve reacted to knowing about Nick, how the two of them would’ve gotten along (if they would’ve gotten along). Probably okay-ish, at least until Daniel heard Nick was thinking about breaking up with me because he wanted to fall in love.

Speaking of which, it was kind of pointless for Nick to be breaking up with me for that. I mean, he was all gung-ho, rawr, he can do anything, but dude, seventeen years is a really long ass time to have invested in somebody without managing to fall in love with them. So how in the fuck did Nick think he was going to meet someone and fall in love in anything less than the seventeen years he’d spent with me? If he had any kind of intelligence level, he’d just spend a couple months working on falling for me and save himself the crippling blow of finding out he wasn’t capable of falling for someone else and doing the whole marriage thing.

I mean, not that I wanted to marry Nick. I didn’t.

I wasn’t lying when I said I didn’t believe in marriage.

It’s just I knew deep down Nick didn’t either, and if anyone was gonna prove something can exist it’d be two people that didn’t even believe in it, right?

And it was better if something implodes and falls apart when it’s something you didn’t really want than if you invest a whole shit load of extraneous time in it. By that I mean it’d be less heartbreaking if Nick and I didn’t work out than if he went and spent more time investing in this marriage scheme of his. Way less.

But how could I convince him of that?

And did I even want him to be convinced?

Not like it was any skin off my back if Nick went and got married to the wrong woman only to have it bust apart.

Not like I care what Nick does with his life.

That’s far too personal.


Chapter Twelve by Pengi
Chapter Twelve


Jaymie

“Come! Come here.”

I groaned and rolled over in bed. Outside, it was dark, the moonlight pale bluish-white, cast through the window. I kicked my blankets off as I blinked, trying to adjust to reality from the dreamstate I’d been in. Rolling off the bed, I went to the window and peered out at the beach, a light breeze coming in through the screen, ruffling the curtains. Below, the sea grasses rolled in the movement of the air, bending and dancing as it steered through. Lost in the pale moonlight, my eyes struggled for a moment to catch sight of either of them - that’s how much they blended with the sand at this hour - but finally my eyes caught sight of Nick and Nacho. Nacho was running, unruly and unchecked, barking as he went at gulls. Nick was frustrated, hands on his hips, by the base of the steps that led from the deck down to the sand.

“Come back! Please, just….just.. come… come back!” his voice broke midway. Like he was… crying?

Panic went through me like electricity.

I grabbed my bathrobe from the hook on the backside of the door, pulling it around me and tying the waist belt and hurried down the stairs, through the house and out onto the deck. They were quite a ways down the beach from the house now. I didn’t have time to put shoes on, I just hurried down the steps and onto the sand, running barefoot and naked under the robe. Sand kicked up under my feet, leaving the trail of footprints behind me.

Nacho was running circles, coming back around, and Nick turned and I was close enough that he nearly ran into me. We collided and he caught me by my shoulders before I could go down and steadied me, “Sorry,” he muttered, “I’m sorry, I’m trying to - to get my dog…” he ran around me and rushed on after Nacho. “Come here,” he called as Nacho rushed toward the edge of the beach grass, his tongue lolling out, panting. He clearly thought this was a super-fun game.

“Just go inside, he’ll follow you,” I said.

He didn’t answer me, he just kept going on after Nacho.

“Ugh,” I groaned and I ran up behind him, frustrated and grabbed his arm. “Why don’t you ever accept help, god damn you?” I demanded as he spun to face me.

He ripped his arm away, his eyes wide and a strange, wounded-animal sort of expression on his face. “Nick?” I asked, my voice gentler than it had been when I initially grabbed at him. He took two steps back. “Nick, what’s wrong?” I glanced behind me because the look on his face was similar to that in horror films when the guy sees the ghost behind the girl’s shoulder seconds before it kills her. But obviously there was nothing behind me. “Nick?”

He tripped. Stumbled over the bottom step of the deck and landed, sitting and sprawled just a little, on the fourth step, catching the railing for balance. He squeezed his eyes shut a moment, gripping onto the rail tightly.

“Nick? Jesus are you okay?” My voice was pitched with concern. Even Nacho realized this wasn’t fun and games anymore and he rushed over and trotted up the steps quickly, licking Nick’s ear as he sat up. I hurried to offer him a hand, to pull him up, but he batted it away.

“Fuck,” he choked out the word. He hugged Nacho to his chest, “Fucking damnit shit,” he muttered, squeezing the dog. Nacho’s legs flailed, but he couldn’t get away from the bear-hug Nick had him captured in. “Don’t do that, don’t do that to me,” he said, pressing his face into the dog’s neck. “Don’t go away from me like that, don’t go.”

I reached out tentatively. Nacho looked panicked by the show of emotion. He wanted out of there. “Nick…” I said, “Nick, it’s okay.”

Nick loosed the grip on Nacho, who leaped away and ran up the stairs to the deck. Nick looked at me in surprise. “J - Jaymie,” he said. He swallowed.

“I heard you chasing Nacho,” I said. “I came out to help.”

He stared at me for a long moment.

“Are you okay?” I asked slowly.

“Yeah. Yes, I’m fine,” he replied. He pulled himself to his feet, again not accepting my help, and rubbed his backside. He’d taken the step pretty hard, it had to have hurt. “Sorry,” he said, “About… about panicking. I was upset about -- Nacho.” He was talking funny, with pauses in places and doubling words after them. Like he was trying to remember the words.

“It’s okay,” I said, concerned. “C’mon. Let’s go inside.”

“Okay.” He turned and climbed the stairs to the deck. Nacho was waiting at the top, watching and waiting for Nick to come, and as soon as we reached the last couple steps, he bounded through the doors. Nick followed and he walked to the table and sank in the closest chair, his hands covering his face, and he let out a heavy sigh.

I went to the kitchen and pulled out the stuff to make hot chocolate because it was kind of cold out there on the waterfront, for LA at least, and neither one of us were really dressed for it. Even Nacho was kind of shaking a little as he came over to investigate the opened fridge door. I gave him a couple pieces of deli meat and he ran off, delighted, hitting his pet bed in a rollling leap that ended in him on his belly, legs stretched out behind him, eating his midnight snack.

Nick put his head down on the table, resting his forehead against his forearm.

A couple minutes, and a lot of stirring later, I poured the hot chocolate into two steaming mugs and counted out eight marshmallows (the number Nick demanded be placed into hot chooclate) and went over to the table, putting his eight-marshmallow mug in front of him. He turned his head to look at the mug, and then again to look at me.

I sat down, sipped my cup, and stared at him, resolute that I wouldn’t leave the table without knowing the whole story.




Nick

I forgot his name.

Nacho woke me up during the night, begging to go outside, and he’d pressed his nose into my neck and I’d rolled over and looked at him and… I didn’t know his name. I’d stared at him. I knew he was my dog, I knew I loved him, I knew what he wanted and why he was asking it from me, but I forgot his mother-fucking name.

I’d brought him outside and let him off the deck, stood on the sand, watching him run, the panic rising in my throat because I still couldn’t remember it. I tried to think of something - anything that would’ve reminded me, but nothing came to me and I finally knew I had to go inside and look at my journal to find the name and I’d called him - generically - and he hadn’t come and the frustration built until there was full-fledged panic and I was blinded by it. And I don’t really know if it was that blinding panic that made me not recognize Jaymie or if that, too, was a side effect of the tumor’s limbs spreading around my brain.

Now she was staring at me, a mug of cocoa steaming in front of me, waiting for an explanation I wasn’t ready to tell her yet.

“Can you believe how dark out it is?” I asked, sitting up, trying to pass it off as a simple low-lighting error.

Jaymie raised an eyebrow. “The moon’s out,” she said simply. And then, “We were under a lamp post.” She sipped her cocoa.

I turned the mug in front of me, staring down at the eight marshmallows floating and melting in the chocolate. I wrapped my palms around the ceramic, feeling the heat permeating through. I took a deep breath. “I don’t really wanna talk about what happened,” I said.

“Why?”

“I just don’t.” I said. Then, old reliable, “It’s too personal.”

She stared at me, challenging me with her eyes in a way that only Jaymie can do. “Don’t you think,” she said slowly, “That you’ll have to get way more personal than this with any woman you plan to fall in love with?”

I closed my eyes.

“You can’t be in love with someone without telling them things. You think you can handle getting married to some girl then you’re gonna have to tell her everything. You can’t get away with half-truths to your wife. You might be able to with me, but I’m nothing, I’m ---”

I stood up so fast the chair behind me knocked over, cutting Jaymie off mid-sentence. I grabbed the chair and uprighted it, annoyed. Nacho looked up from his doggie bed and scooted out of the room quickly at the loud sound the chair made as I slammed it back in against the table.

Jaymie stood up, too. “Why the hell are you mad at me?” she asked.

I didn’t really know how to put words on it. I guess because she thought she was nothing to me. She wasn’t nothing. Maybe she was once, but now -- now if things were any different I would sweep her off her feet and prove to her what she was; she was everything. Somewhere between booze in a Canadian nightclub and sex and the talking we’d done over the last few days, I’d fallen in love with Jaymie. Yes. That’s right. I love Jaymie. But I couldn’t tell her that. I couldn’t tell her what she meant to me because if I told her she’d wanna get closer to me, she’d want me to be more personal, obviously because she thought that’s what made marriage work, and maybe it is, but I couldn’t get personal with her or closer to her. I had to get further away from her before I dropped dead. The more I was forgetting shit, simple things like Nacho’s fucking name for example, the worse the tumor was getting. The less time I had to push everyone away.

Everyone, I thought, thinking of the four other Backstreet Boys and how utterly and completely alone I was going to be.

But I wasn’t important. After all, I was going to be dead. Like a rich man that gives away money before his death because he can’t take it with him, I had to shed my friends and give them their lives, spare them of the guilt and pain of watching me die.

It was gonna hurt.

But it had to happen.

And it hard to start here.

Now.

“Because,” I said, my voice low, laced with a venomous kind of anger, “You are breaking our rules.” I didn’t want to say what was coming out next, but I couldn’t stop it, either, it exploded out of me, from the part of me that knew I had no choice but to save her from the shrapnel my death would create if she stayed, “I want you out. Out. We’re done.”

Jaymie looked at me, appalled.

I turned and got my wallet out of the kitchen, pulled money out of it, and tossed it onto the table. “Get yourself a fucking hotel room until you can get a new apartment. I don’t want you here anymore. You want too much from me. Get the fuck out of my life.”

I heard her choke a sob back as I walked to the stairs, my hands shaking, tears streaming down my face.

Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick.

I’m a bomb.



Chapter Thirteen by Pengi
Chapter Thirteen


Nick

I couldn’t breathe. I was sure I was about to die. The ceiling fan blew air over me, but I was suffocating. I curled up, my fists between my knees, sobbing.

I don’t cry a lot. But when I do, it’s really embarrassing because I don’t just let tears fall, I make a sound like a wounded animal, like this deep-gutted sound that emerges from the bottom of my lungs.

I cry like a child.

Nacho crawled up onto the bed tentatively, inching closer to me, inspecting me, sniffing the sheets, like he wasn’t sure he wanted to know what was going on, but curiosity got the best of him. Outside, the sun was probably thinking about coming up, a new day would be starting. I’d heard the door to the garage slam shut, and even though I hadn’t really heard the car I was sure Jaymie had left, so I cried, unchecked, not caring how much noise I made, not caring if my sobs broke through the entire neighborhood. Let’em hear me, I thought.

It was strange because I was feeling this emotion so much deeper than I normally felt anything. These cries were not cries a man makes when he’s just thrown his fuck-buddy out the door. It’s not even the cries a man makes when he’s lost someone he loved. I know. I didn’t even make these sounds for Leslie. But here I am, and there’s no stopping it. Sob after sob just kept wrecking through my body, like a demolition.

Nacho nudged my arm with his nose. I rolled away.

At first I was crying about Jaymie. Then I lost track of what I was even crying about. But I wasn’t sure what I was doing was even crying anymore. It felt too heavy, too hard. It was pulling and I realized I was unable to stop. This was like everything in my body stopped, stopped for a moment, and pulled tight and collected somewhere deep in my core before releasing me.

Was this another heart attack? I wondered. It felt different, though. And I was shaking. I couldn’t stop shaking.

I had to go see a doctor.

Maybe there was something he could do to make it stop.

I crawled to the edge of the bed and tried to stand up, but my body tightened just as I went to and instead of standing, I only managed to fall to the floor. I lay there, convulsing, shaking, for a moment before I could move properly enough that I was able to struggle to pull myself to my feet from the ground, my knees barely holding my weight.

This was definitely not crying. This was almost like… almost like… seizures.

”Nick… we need to talk.” The doctor had come into the exam room, hugging a clipboard to his chest. He’d closed the door behind him and pulled the little wheely stool away from the counter in the corner. He sat down. “Have you seen a doctor recently at all, back home?” he’d asked, his brow furrowing.

We were on tour. It was Summer. I’d gone to the doctors a few times with bronchitis and what I thought was sinus headache, but several weeks after recovering from the bronchitis and taking medicine for the headaches, they were still happening and they were getting worse. I basically was there for super strength excederin because regular excederin wasn’t cutting it anymore and the stage lights weren’t helping at all.

“I had bronchitis,” I said. “Look, man, I just want the headaches to stop.”

The doctor had nodded. He stood up and pulled his clipboard back. He had a bunch of pictures, X-rays of my head they’d taken, trying to figure out what was causing the headaches. He put them up on a lightboard on the wall. “Have you ever seen a brain scan before?” he asked, looking at me as I stared at the blue-black globs of information before me. I had no idea what I was looking at. I shook my head. “This is a side-shot of a brain,” he said, which was pretty much the only thing I did know about them. “The brain is kind of spongy texture, and very easy to damage, so it’s protected. There’s your skull first, as the primary defense. Then there’s a layers of this stuff that’s like plastic wrap, in a way, like when you bubble wrap something fragile you’re going to ship.” He pointed. “There’s a bunch of fluids after that, which keep your brain kind of floating around. Think like the dice in a magic eight ball.” He moved his hand inward. “Then there’s your actual brain.” He took a deep breath.

“Okay, that’s cool, I guess?” I asked, confused.

He continued. “Okay so here’s a brain again...this one is a top-down view,” he explained. “Here’s the left hemisphere and the right.” He pointed to the scan, then… to a similar one to the right of it. “That first one...that’s a typical 33-year old man’s brain. And this, Mr. Carter, is yours.” He moved so I could see the next slide. “Do you see the difference, Mr. Carter?”

“That giant spot,” I said.

“Mr. Carter, we think that spot is a tumor. We believe it may be an anaplastic astrocytoma.”

“A what?”

“Anaplastic astrocytoma.”

“I can’t have that,” I’d said, dizzy as I stared at it, “I can’t even pronounce that.”


But pronounce it or not, I had it.

Grade III Anaplastic Astrocytoma.

”You’ll need immediate surgery, Nick.”

The words swam in my head as I slammed against the dresser. Nacho was standing at the end of the bed, his tail wagging, a sob had clutched me from what felt like the very bottom of my intestines and squeezed and I’d doubled over, my head resting against one of the drawers as the choking cry came out of me. I clung to the handle of the dresser, trying to balance myself.

”Surgery? Brain surgery?” I’d laughed. “Dude, I can’t do brain surgery right now. I’m in the middle of a god-damn tour.”

I hit the carpet.

I’d signed paperwork, releasing the doctor from the responsibility of my health care because I’d turned down the surgery. I’d do it after the tour, I’d told myself. But I hadn’t made it to the end of the tour yet. I hadn’t gone back yet.

“Oh fuuuuck,” I half choked, half screamed the word. And my chest felt tighter, and then every muscle in my body did, too, and I felt like I was being tied into a knot. I curled into myself, struggled to remember where my phone was. Nightstand. Back there, back by the bed, where I’d started. It seemed so far away. Nacho started barking as I struggled for air. My head felt like it was splintering into pieces.

“Please,” I gasped. “Please. I don’t… not alone… please. Oh fuck, Jesus, please.”

Suddenly the door opened and the light snapped on. “What the hell is happening in here?”

I looked up. Jaymie. Jaymie was framed in the light. She hadn’t left after all. “Help… me,” I said, and then everything went black.




Jaymie

I’d heard him.

I’d heard him yell.

I’d been downstairs, in the kitchen, grabbing a couple things I’d need at the hotel - a box of crackers, a couple bottles of water. The money he’d thrown onto the table. I’d been just about to leave after taking my time packing up in my room, crying the entire time, when I heard him scream out. “Oh fuuuck!”

The cry just sounded so anguished, so desperate… I couldn’t ignore it. So… I’d gone upstairs to check on him. And it was a damn good thing I did, too.

I rushed to him, dropping to my knees beside him. “Hey, hey, Nick, hey, it’s okay. It’s okay.” There was spit on his mouth and cheek and his eyes were unfocused and he was shaking and it occurred to me this wasn’t just crying, this was… this was a seizure.

I’d seen a man have a seizure once in a mall food court when I was a kid, right by the bright carousel. He’d suddenly grabbed onto the little green metal fence that surrounded the painted ponies and gone to his knees and he’d ended up laying on the floor, on his side, shaking, all tight and convulsing, just like Nick was doing now. The carousel attendant had rushed to his side to take care of him. I have no idea if he lived through it or not. No idea who he was, even, to find out.

I pulled my cell phone out of my pocket and dialed 911.

I rolled Nick to his side. I’d seen them do that at the mall. I tried to remember what they’d done to help that man. I grabbed the blanket from the bed, sending Nacho running under the chair in the corner of the room and shoved it under Nick’s head, my hands on his arm to steady him.

Nick vomited just as the call picked up. The smell was terrible.

”911, what is your emergency?”

“He’s having seizures,” I said quickly, gently wiping throw up away from the corner of Nick’s mouth, being careful not to touch the pool of it lurking beside him. “Help him.”

”What is your location ma’m?”

I couldn’t think. What the fuck was the address? Nick’s eyes were rolled back. It scared the living fuck out of me. My palms were sweating. He started shaking again. “Oh no. No please,” I begged. Then, to the operator lady, “4611 Los Bernados Boulevard. I think. It’s the big grey one by itself at the end of Los Bernardos anyways; big glass windows, you can’t miss it.”

”I’ve dispatched an ambulance, they are on their way,” she promised. ”What is the patient’s name?”

“Nick. Nick Carter,” I replied.

There was a pause.

I pictured a woman trying to resist being unprofessional. Certainly being a 911 operator in a city like this would bring it’s share of brushes with fame.

The seizure ended and the tension left Nick’s body for a moment, his muscles relaxing, going limp against the blanket I’d put under him. His eyes moved toward mine and he just stared up at me in this haunting sort of way, his mouth moving the way a fish’s does, no sound coming out. I rubbed his arm softly, tears staining my cheeks, “Help is on it’s way,” I whispered, “It’s going to be okay.”

”Is he responding to touch? Does he seem alert?”

“His eyes are moving,” I replied.

”Move your finger in front of his eyes, see if he can follow your finger.”

“Can you see my finger, Nick?” I asked. As I moved my finger and Nick’s eyes moved a little jerkily, but they followed my finger. “He’s following it,” I replied.

”Does the patient have a history of seizures or any disorder which may cause seizures?”

“Not that I know of,” I replied. “I’ve known him for seventeen years…” I paused. I licked my lips, “He’s -- he’s been acting… funny… lately, not himself.”

I could hear her keyboard clicking.

“J-Jay-Jay-m-mie,” he croaked out.

My heart skipped a beat at the sound of his voice, however broken it sounded. He struggled to move his hand, grabbed hold of mine, and squeezed it.

“D-don-don’t go.”

“I’m here,” I said thickly, and I squeezed his hand right back.

”The ambulance should be there,” the operator said, just as I heard the sirens and saw the lights flashing through the windows from the driveway.

“Yes,” I said, “They’re here.” I turned to Nick, “The ambulance is here,” I told him.

He leaned forward, spitting the last of the throw up and excess spit from his mouth. It was a struggle, though, and I gently reached over and helped, swiping the inside of his mouth with my fingertip as carefully as I could. He looked up at me, all pitiful and shaky. “Sh-shhh-shouldda told you,” he whispered, eyes full of tears.

“Should’ve told me what?” I asked, running my hand over his hair.

But he couldn’t seem to get the words to answer me, and he just squeezed my fingers.

And a moment later, the door was open and there were EMTs swarming around him, and my grip on his hand was released and I was asked to step aside and they engulfed him in a cloud of medical attention, asking him loud questions and poking needles into his arms and sensors across his forehead.

But the whole time, his eyes never left mine, staring at me with an unfathomable something in them through a gap in the bodies around him.


Chapter Fourteen by Pengi
Chapter Fourteen


Jaymie

He was sitting up and drinking a bottle of water by the time the ambulance got to the hospital entrance. I sat in the corner of the vehicle, a ball of nerves weighing heavily on my stomach, watching the life return to his face gradually, color coming back into his face, which had been so pale in the moonlight when I’d entered his room twenty minutes before. But as much as I wanted to feel better, I was relieved in the immediate sense only. I mean, if this had happened once, then surely it could happen again. At any given moment. I stared at him, trying to figure out what could've caused him to have a seizure like that.

The EMTs pushed the doors of the ambulance open and rolled his gurney forward, lowering him out. He looked at me with pleading eyes, and I knew that look was his way of asking me to forgive him. And I did. I really did. I climbed out after him as they rolled the bed inside. I trotted to keep up through the maze of the trauma ward.

"Nick, hello. My name is Dr. Abdi. Do you have a history of seizures?" a doctor with a bushel of afro-like hair asked, looking at the clipboard the EMTs had provided..

"No," Nick answered.

"Anything in the family? Epilepsy, anything?" the doctor asked, pumping a blood pressure cuff, which he’d slipped onto Nick’s arm. I followed a couple paces behind as the EMTs guided the gurney into a corner and pulled a curtain around the bed to create a makeshift room. "Any drugs?" The doctor raised his eyes pointedly.

"Not recently," Nick answered. He glanced at me, standing in the corner, then took a deep breath, "I uh, I have a -” He paused. Like he didn’t wanna say it, whatever it was. Then he closed his eyes for a moment. “I have a grade three, um, anaplastic astrocycoma," he said. He looked away from me quickly when he opened his eyes again, focused on the end of the clipboard in the doctor's hands. "In my um, my brain." He looked up at the doctor. "A tumor."

I felt gutted.

I'm sure my jaw dropped. The EMTs gathered their stuff and left. I couldn't hear anything except the ringing in my ears, although I could see the doctor's mouth moving, Nick shaking his head, actively avoiding eye contact with me. I couldn't tear my eyes off of him.

Brain tumor. I remembered seeing that on the Google search results list when I'd searched the symptoms Nick was displaying the other day. But it had seemed so fucking ridiculous of a thought that I hadn't even paused to consider it. No way could Nick Carter have a fucking brain tumor. He was Nick Carter, he was above shit like that, wasn’t he?

Evidently not.

Suddenly the contents of my stomach wanted out. My skin ran clammy and I got dizzy and I spun out of the room, rushing down the hallway to the women's restroom we'd passed on the way in. If he called my name, I didn’t hear it. I slammed through the door and into a stall and only just made it to the bowl. My hands shook as I clutched the seat to keep myself from falling down. When I'd finished, I dropped to the floor and sat with my back against the tiled wall, letting my cheek rest on the ceramic, the coolness feeling sooo good on the heat of my cheeks. I closed my eyes, tears sneaking across my face.

I don’t know how long I stayed in there, hiding, hugging my knees and crying against the cold tile. Long enough that the motion-triggered lights turned off. I probably would’ve stayed even longer if Nick hadn’t texted me.

I’m sorry

I stared at the screen. Somehow, I felt guilty that he was apologizing, like I shouldn’t have run away from the room like that. I swallowed and swiped my arm across my eyes to blot away the tears.

why didnt you tell me? I texted back after a couple moments of weighing out how to respond to him.

The pause was equally long in him coming up with a response. And when it came through, I knew he’d chosen his words carefully.

it was nothing personal




Nick

When the curtain moved at the edge of my little corner of the ER, I looked up. Jaymie slipped in, her hair in a messy ponytail, eyes blurry. She tucked the curtains closed behind her, standing there, staring at me, hands behind her back. “Hey,” I said.

She took a deep breath, “Hey.”

I swallowed and glanced down at my phone, my text the last one on the screen in our conversation. I put the phone on the table by my elbow. “I’m sorry,” I said.

Jaymie’s lips tightened and smoothed, and she looked up at the ceiling, then back at me. “New rules,” she said. She took another deep breath and stepped towards me. “One. We tell each other everything.”

I nodded.

“Two. You don’t ever fucking do this to me again.” She waved at the hospital around us.

I shook my head, “I can’t promise that.”

Jaymie reached for my hand. “You scared the mother-fucking shit out of me,” she said.

“I’m sorry,” I repeated.

“Nick… How long?” she asked.

I rubbed my nose with my freehand. I looked down at the chipped nail polish on her hand, coiled around my long, nail-bitten fingers. “...a while,” I said tentatively.

“How long is awhile?” she asked, “And don’t forget our new rule.”

I looked up at her. “Six months.”

“Jesus,” she whispered, shaking her head and looking away.

“We were on tour,” I said, trying to explain myself. “And I didn’t wanna interrupt the tour. I didn’t wanna make everything complicated.” I pulled my hand out of hers, rubbed my face. Behind my eyes, my head was aching, a dull throbbing that I’d been experiencing pretty much nonstop for like a year. “I just… I thought it could wait.”

“A brain tumor,” Jaymie said, incredulously, “You thought a brain tumor could wait until after tour?”

I shrugged.

“Jesus,” she said again. Brian would be cringing at all the time she’d broken the third commandment. “This is serious shit, Nick, you can’t just ignore it,” Jaymie said, her scolding voice coming out. “You need to get like radiation or chemo or something to fix it, so you can beat this and -- and -- and why? Why are you shaking your head?”

“Because,” I said, “Six months is why.”

Jaymie stared at me.

“I’ve made it this long without any problems.”

“You call this ‘without any problems’?” she demanded. “You having a seizure and being rushed to the hospital is ‘without any problems’?!”

“Jaymie… six months before having a problem is a long time in tumor time,” I said. “Some people don’t even get six months to live period after finding out. Because they let it get to them. They stop fighting. They stop doing. I don’t want radiation or chemo or surgery or laser whatever. Jaymie, I don’t want it. I just want to fucking live.”

She closed her eyes, like she was collecting patience or something from some unseen source. “Nick,” she said, “It’s not going to just go away spontaneously. You have to fight it, or you’ll lose by forfeit!”

“It might go, you don’t know, weirder shit has happened,” I argued.

“You need treatment!”

“After the tour.”

“You know, you always bitch about Brian and all he went through in ‘98,” Jaymie snapped, “But you’re sure quick to draw the same call.”

I shook my head, “This is not at all the same thing.”

“How?” she asked. “How is this not the same thing?”

“Because,” I said, “It just isn’t.”

“Except that it is,” she said, her voice sour.


Chapter Fifteen by Pengi
Chapter Fifteen


Nick

“You need to tell the other guys,” Jaymie said.

This was her mantra.

It was about two weeks after the Night of the Seizures and I was packing my shit to rejoin the fellas on tour the next day. Jaymie was perched on the bed, sitting Indian-style, holding her toes. She stared at me, a nervous look in her eyes.

Since that night, things had changed - a lot. Jaymie had decided I was somehow fragile, and seemed to watch every move I made with these vigilante eyes that followed me everywhere. When I brought Nacho out on the beach, she stood on the deck and stared down at us. She’d stand in doorways and her eyebrows would knit together worryingly. And she stared as I fell asleep, pushing hair off of my forehead and biting her lips, as though she was just waiting for the moment she’d have to haul my ass to the ER again.

She had spent a lot of these hours of staring and worrying trying to diplomatically talk me into getting the treatment.

Which I was still uninterested in.

And worst of all, as she stared at me falling asleep, she laid in my bed, wearing actual pajamas that she refused to remove because she was worried about having sex.

“I’m just not sure you’re ready yet,” she’d argued one night.

“I’m telling you,” I said, “I’m ready.” My crotch was practically a mountain. “Oh-man-oh-man, am I ready. I am reaaaaaady.”

She just shook her head.

So was I regretting her finding out about the anaplastic astrocycoma? Yeah-huh.

In every possible way.

“I doubt the Boys want to do the tour if they knew what was really going on,” Jaymie said, stretching out her legs over the bedsheets, like a little kid sitting in a sandbox. “They’d wanna postpone it a little longer. Let you get better, then wrap things up on the road.” She played with the shoulder strap of the duffle bag. “They’d understand.”

“I know they would,” I replied.

“So… so why don’t you do that?” she said, as though this was the first time she’d suggested it. As though this time I’d just suddenly, magically agree with her, as though all my prior responses were invalid.

“Because,” I said, for the millionth time in the last fourteen-or-so days, “I don’t want the last show I do to be the one where I had a heart attack on stage.”

“It won’t be. You’ll do more shows,” she said, “Just... you’ll do them after the treatment is over, that’s all.”

“Not if I’m dead.”

“Yeah, exactly. And you’re going to die if you don’t do the treatment,” she argued.

“You don’t know that,” I snapped.

“Yes I do,” she snapped back. “You will die if you don’t get this fixed. You will.”

“Yeah. But I could die in the middle of getting it, too,” I answered. “On a table, in a fucking hospital, under plastic, with some doctor’s hands up in my head, fishing around in there.” I wiggled my fingers at my forehead.

“You could be in the middle of dancing on the stage and suddenly one of the show lights hits you wrong and triggers a seizure,” Jaymie countered. “You could die on a stage, in a stadium, under the stare of 2,500 of your biggest fans, screaming and howling while security helps EMTs drag you off in a body bag.”

I shrugged, “Still preferable to the operating room.”

Jaymie pursed her lips. “You could be in a hotel in fucking Sweden or something and just die,” she said, “Alone. In the middle of the night. Like you would’ve if I hadn’t been here last time.”

I sighed. That was the only thing I was really worried about in all this. I turned and grabbed another handful of shirts from the closet and shoved them roughly, unfolded, into the duffle bag, frustrated.

“Please,” she said. “I don’t want you to be alone. I can’t even go out to my apartment without worrying and that’s attached to the house, for Christ’s sake, Nick. I can’t handle the idea of you being a world away without someone there to watch over you, to make sure you’re okay.”

“Then come with me,” I said.

Jaymie looked bewildered, “What?”

“Come with me.”

She stared at me like I had seventeen heads coming out of my body. “And -- what?”

“I dunno. Be there. Watch me. Make sure I don’t drop dead or something. That’s all you’re doing here anyways. Might as well do it in another country as to do it here.” I shrugged.

“Baby sit you.”

“Basically,” I answered. I pushed the bag of prescriptions the doctors had given me in lieu of actual treatment into the midst of the shirts. My eyes met hers. “I mean, if you care so much and all.”

She hesitated.

“You’re the only person who knows,” I said after a long pause of her thinking about what I was saying. “And that’s how I want to keep it for right now. Because if everyone knows about it then I’ll feel more weak, and right now I need to stay strong to keep it from killing me. I need to feel invincible. Just a little longer. And if you don’t go, there won’t be anyone there who knows at all.” I chewed the inside of my lip as I paused in my speech. I zipped up the dufflebag, then looked up at her again. “I know it’s crazy. But I’ve never known anybody who’s taken cancer treatment and lived through it. My grandmother had breast cancer, she tried treatment, she died. I’ve seen tons of fans fighting and dying of cancer over the years. And I’m not a fighter that way. You know how I am when I’m sick. I get sick and I get convinced I’m dying. Over, like, a cold.” I shook my head, “I’d convince myself there was no living through treatment and sometimes I think shit like that really is mind over matter. Once I start treatment, I ain’t gonna see the other side of it. I ain’t gonna get better. I’m gonna die. And I’m not ready to yet. So. That said, I’m going to finish the tour, I’m going to prepare myself, and when I get back, after I’ve said my goodbyes properly to the fans and to the fellas, then I’ll get the treatment. Then I’ll die.”

Jaymie looked down at her hands. “So much for optimism, huh?” she squeaked.

“I’m a glass mostly-empty kinda guy, Jaymie,” I said. “So.” I took a deep breath. “So, you can come and help me and make it easier to fight this thing my way, or you can stay here and miss the last of me,” I said. “Your choice.”




Jaymie

I adjusted my sunglasses.

Nick was settling in next to me, shifting his weight in this annoying way that kept making our shared armrest wobble. He’d insisted I take the window seat (“I swear to fuck I’ll puke everywhere if I have to sit there,” he’d said), and was untangling the cord to his white Beats. I chewed my lip, my Nook resting on my lap, palms sweaty the way they always got just before take off in a plane. I looked over at him. He was concentrating on the headphones. “I hate flying,” I said.

Nick smirked, but didn’t look up. “Join the club.”

I tightened my seatbelt.

It was far less than ideal to be on the plane to begin with. I would’ve much rathered to be holding his hand at some specialist clinic getting him fixed than to be preparing for cruising altitude for ten hours over the Atlantic, but whatever. When it came to Nick, I’d learned long ago that he was stubborn as all hell and it was basically his way or the highway, and having been invited to come along and be there for him was as close to a compromise as I was going to get. It just scared the shit out of me, the idea of what exactly we were facing, what we weren’t saying, what was hanging there, like an invisible curtain, between us.

Nick got his cord untangled and grinned at me with this cheesy, triumphant look on his face, waving the plug at me with satisfaction. “You know, they say these things are tangle-free cords,” he said, shaking his head, “But fuck that shit, it tangles all the damn time.”

“Sometimes things just get messy,” I said with a shrug.

Nick nodded. He gently folded the cord back up and put the headphones in the pouch in front of him with his iPod, two football magazines, a book about UFO mysteries, PSP system, and four granola bars.

You just never know what is priority in a person’s life until you see how they entertain themselves during a long flight.

And my story in that department would tell you just as much as his did. On my Nook, I had loaded several research papers about anaplastic astrocycomas and the treatment options that went along with them.

The plane took off, mine and Nick’s hands wrapped tight around each other for moral support as gravity released it’s grip on us and we rose into the air at the mercy of a steel bird. My knuckles were white as my fingers tangled around his desperately. Somewhere on the plane, a kid was crying and the mother was shushing it and I was just sitting there thinking how awful I would’ve been feeling if Nick had left without me. I probably would’ve been sitting in the parking lot of LAX watching planes take off worrying about what would happen while he was out of my sight and reach.

There was a time when Nick leaving for tour had sounded like a break - like vacation sounds to most people with real “jobs” and lives that don’t basically revolve around a 24/7 availability for sex with a Backstreet Boy. A part of me missed that, suddenly, that callous belief that he’d be there forever.

Now, in the air and no longer anxious about the actual take off, I found my mind wandering ahead to the tour and the time I was about to spend on the road with him and the other Boys. It was going to be awkward, that was certain. I mean the other Backstreet Boys were still not very enthusiastic about my presence in Nick’s life and being that none of them knew about the tumor, none of them were going to understand why I was with Nick on the tour -- other than suspecting that he’d taken me along for the getting laid factor.

I glanced over at Nick, who had put his headphones on and was flipping through one of the NFL magazines, reading stats of recently drafted players, his lips moving as he read.

He didn’t know it yet, but I had this plan - this mostly evil plan - to make him tell the fellas as soon as possible without actually betraying him in anyway. I just had to figure out how to get him to do it. I knew if they knew about the tumor they’d send him home immediately, or at least I hoped that was the truth. Surely they wouldn’t try to force him to keep touring knowing he had a fucking ball of cancer in his skull, right?

I turned on my Nook and started reading, too, about the various forms of radiation and chemotherapy and operations that could be performed to treat the anaplastic astrocycoma. Most of them sounded quite terrifying and I really couldn’t blame Nick for being nervous about them. They involved doing things like cutting open his skull and inserting cameras on long wires and months of repeated chemical, vomiting-inducing injections. It was frustrating to me that something like a tumor could be picked up on a scan enough to be seen clearly, but not just as easily removed.

About two hours into the flight, Nick had devoured his four granola bars, flipped through the magazines and book until he was bored of them, and played his PSP until his battery was at half. He put the PSP back in the pouch and folded his arms across his chest, leaning back in the seat. He glanced over at me, then leaned his head against my shoulder. “I’m bored,” he commented.

“Don’t be bored,” I answered. I was about six pages deep on a nearly-impossible-to-understand research paper by a Korean doctor who didn’t believe in chemotherapy.

“But I am,” he replied. He watched me read for a few moments, then said, “Jaymie.”

“What?” I asked.

“Talk to me. I’m bored.”

“What do you wanna talk about?” I asked, still reading.

“I dunno.” Nick reached up and rubbed his nose before putting his face back against my shoulder. “What’cha readin’ about?”

“Your tumor,” I replied.

He frowned. “Borrrr-ring.”

“It’s not boring. It’s called being informed,” I replied. I scrolled the Nook to the next page.

“Yeah but, still. Boring reading stuff like that. What’s it, like a medical journal?”

I nodded.

He sighed heavily. “Jaymie. I’m bored,” he repeated.

“I heard’ja, but we’re on a plane,” I said, “There’s not a whole lot to do on a plane.”

Nick chewed his lip, and then pressed his teeth gently against the skin of my shoulder, “Jaaaaayyyyymie,” he whispered, voice husky.

“Nick. If you say you’re bored one more time --”

“Are you a member of the Mile High Club?” he asked.

I lowered the Nook and looked at him.

His eyes were twinkling dangerously.


Chapter Sixteen by Pengi
Chapter Sixteen


Jaymie

I felt like everyone on the plane knew what we were doing.

I was in the bathroom, sitting on the seat, waiting. He would knock twice quick, once slow, he said. Three knocks total. My heart was acting like a ping pong ball off my lungs - or at least that’s what I felt like was probably happening, even though I know that’s basically anatomically impossible. I fidgeted. I was crazy. This was crazy. This was so not a good idea. What if he wasn’t ready for sex yet? I worried as I sat there. I’d argued with him in hushed tones for a couple moments in the seat before coming to the latrine. He’d pointed out that we were both super stressed from the flight, that sex would relieve that stress, that the doctors had told him to stay destressed. “You’d really be helping me,” he hissed.

And well I mean I wasn’t made of steel, I had needs, too, and I’d been going through some withdrawals of my own, not being able to sleep with him over the last two weeks and getting the stress out did sound pretty tantalizing and he had a point. Who the fuck was I to argue what the doctors had said?

Knockknock, knock.

With a shaking hand, I stood up and slid the door’s lock across, allowing him access. He pushed the door open and slid inside, pushing it closed behind him, being careful not to open the door too wide for anyone to notice that I was in there. Still, I was certain that every passenger on the plane was sitting there, smirking at the wall that enclosed us.

I didn’t have too long to think about it, though, before Nick’s mouth was on mine and my back was pressed against the itty bitty sink, his back against the itty bitty door. There was barely enough room in the latrine for one person, not to mention two, and he picked me up and set me on the sink basin’s edge so I was sitting in front of him. He reached for my shirt, pushing it up over my head and dropped it onto the floor at his feet. He pressed his face to my chest, enveloping his nose and cheeks in my cleavage and I heaved a breath of excitement as he kissed my skin tenderly and ran his hands across my back to my hips, over my jeans to the button at the front. I reached for his shirt once I was sitting on the sink in my lingerie, and pulled his shirt over his head. It caught on his nose and he stifled a laugh and I tossed it to the floor, too. He undid his own belt and pants and let them drop to his ankles, not bothering to step out of them. He took my hands and slid them up behind my head against the mirror, effectively pinning me in place, and stepped closer, his waist pressed against my pelvis, and he repeatedly kissed my skin, my throat, my collarbone.

He released my hands and slid his over my back, detaching my bra and letting my boobs fall free. He grinned at them and licked his lips and pulled me toward him, fingers crawling and tip-toeing up my spine. I arched my back, thrusting my breasts at him, and he groaned as my nipples grazed his chest. Then he gripped hold of me, turned so he was sitting on the closed lid of the toilet seat and I was on his lap, straddling him.

He pushed my panties aside and pressed himself into me and I gasped and clutched at his back, my fingernails digging into his skin as he grinned and pulled me down on him, his hands on my hips, guiding me.

I moaned and tilted my headback, and he pressed his mouth to my throat, kissing all around my neck to my shoulder, as I used my feet to push myself up and lower myself back down, his hands guiding my hips with each rise and fall.

“Ohh fuck,” I gasped as he started to guide my hips faster, rocking me forward and backward as well as up and down. I felt like I couldn’t close my mouth for lack of oxygen. He was literally stealing my breath.

“That feel good, baby?” he growled.

“Yes,” I choked. “Oh God, yes.” I was biting my lip now to keep from screaming, my body torn between modesty of silence and the need for oxygen and I started shaking, my hands on his shoulders to steady myself. I could feel sweat beading on my back and my chest and he laughed quietly and sucked on the skin of my neck, his hair tickling my jaw.

Suddenly he stood, pressing me into the wall, thrusting hard into me in the motion, as deep as he could go. I wrapped my legs around him, my mouth opened in a silent scream. His hands were on either side of me, palms to the wall, my arms linked behind his neck. He thrust upward and inward again and again, his teeth gritted, forehead shiny with perspiration. I could feel tears forming behind my eyes, I was so stimulated. Suddenly, I felt like I didn’t give a flying fuck who on the plane knew what we were up to. They’d be jealous if they had any clue how god-damned amazing this felt. “Oh fuck, fuck, fuck,” I gasped. I don’t think it was loud enough anyone could have known.

Nick laughed breathily and increased his speed. I could feel his urgency. Any minute now and we’d both fall over the edge. I tilted my head back, biting my lips, tears streaming over my face… and that was all I could take. I felt dizzy with the eruption of pleasure as my body shook and tightened around him and he gasped as he pressed his face into my neck with a low, long moan, thrusting one last time as deep as he possibly could go and holding me there on him, as my body shook and convulsed around him and he gasped in deep breaths of air.

It wasn’t until it was over, and we were sweaty, panting, standing in the nanosecond of space between us, that I realized we hadn’t used a condom.




Nick


I stared at her and she stared back at me. I could barely breathe. She was still shaking. I ran my hands down her shoulders to her hands as I sat down on the toilet, pulling myself from her. I held her hands in mine, kissed her knuckles, her fingertips, and stared into those fucking incredible green eyes.

“Holy hell,” I whispered, voice uneven.

“I know,” she whispered back.

My mouth was dry.

We fumbled for a couple moments with the putting on of clothing. My t-shirt felt like it was glued to me because of all the sweat. Jaymie washed her face, splashing cold water onto her skin. She stared at me, looming behind her, in the mirror.

“How do we do this?” she asked thickly, glancing at the door.

“Normally, we’d go out one at a time,” I said back lowly, “But after those screams of yours, I doubt there’s any question of what we’re up to in here.” I raised an eyebrow.

Jaymie turned scarlet. “Did I really scream?”

“Yeah,” I said, grinning.

“Shit,” her face turned an even deeper shade of red.

“It’s okay,” I whispered.

“But they all know.”

I laughed, “Just imagine how jealous those girls from the terminal will be.” There’d been some fans staring at Jaymie with jealousy back at LAX when we’d boarded the plane together. She laughed. “They’re probably out there tweeting the world about this,” I snickered, leaning in to press a kiss to her neck, just under her ear.

“So all the world knows,” she said.

“Probably,” I laughed.

“Fuck,” she laughed, too.

“Precisely.”

Jaymie turned, meeting my lips with hers. “I love you,” she said.

We both froze.

We stared at each other.

I have a feeling both our eyes contained the same amount of panic in them.

Don’t, I wanted to scream. Don’t say that. Don’t say that now. Not now. Not when you know what’s happening. Don’t. Do NOT fall in love with me.

I cleared my throat, but the words wouldn’t form. I felt paralyzed in the larynx.

I pushed by her hastily and out the door, headed for my seat, my heart racing… whether from panic or residual from the sex, I couldn’t tell. Probably a mixture of both.


Chapter Seventeen by Pengi
Chapter Seventeen


Nick

I put my headphones on the second I got back to the seat and grabbed my book from the pouch in front of my knees. I could feel the girls from the airport staring at me and hear them giggling quietly to themselves. A nun a few rows ahead of me had glared at me as I passed. When Jaymie came back a good five minutes or so later, I avoided eye contact with her, even as I stood up for her to move past me and our pelvises brushed against each other and her cheeks pinkened. She dropped herself into her seat and sunk low, grabbing the air mall catalogue and burying her nose in it.

We didn’t say a word to each other all of the rest of the way to Germany, other than during a bout of turbulence about two hours before we landed. Jaymie jumped and grabbed my fist with her hand, her eyes wide and I’d moved one side of my headphones and muttered, “It’s a’ight.” But other than that, it was radio silence.

In Berlin, I held Jaymie’s hand as we moved through the airport - it was crowded and I didn’t wanna get separated. Her fingers felt tentative, though, as though she were hesitant to grip onto me. My mind worked this into a metaphor, imagining that Jaymie was regretting having said the L-word and was wishing she could take back the words, but couldn’t. I just hoped that she hadn’t meant them, that they were a token of the heat of the moment.

The last thing I wanted was to have her actually love me.

We collected our bags from the luggage carousel and loaded them onto a trolley and headed for the arrivals gates where Mike, my bodyguard, was waiting for us. He smiled when he spotted me, and the expression faltered slightly when he noticed Jaymie. Not in a bad way, I mean Mike doesn’t judge Jaymie. I think he was just surprised. But the way his face repositioned itself made me realize I hadn’t told any of the fellas she was coming yet.

“Hey,” Mike said as we approached. He took hold of the trolley. “Let me get that.”

“Thanks,” I said.

Jaymie stayed quiet all the way from the airport to the hotel. We were in the elevator when she finally spoke. “Can we pretend that I didn’t say anything?” she asked as the thing dinged, signifying we were on the floor the room the hotel had assigned us was on. She reached for the door stop button and stared at me.

I nodded.

“Okay then. So this weirdness,” she waved between her and I, like she was stirring some invisible pot of goopy, gunky substance, “This is over, yes?”

I nodded again.

She nodded, too, then released the door. “That’s settled then.”

The door opened and there stood Brian and Leighanne, Baylee dancing foot-to-foot in front of them in excitement. Brian was whispering something to Leighanne as the doors slid open. When Leighanne’s eyes landed on me and Jaymie they widened in surprise. “Oh!” she exclaimed, “Fancy meeting you all here.” She smiled - too wide - at Jaymie.

Brian looked from me to Jaymie and back again quickly. “Hey,” he said, and he guided Baylee into the elevator, “Welcome back. I’m glad you’re feeling better.”

“Me, too,” I replied, stepping out of the elevator and into the hall. Jaymie and Leighanne had a similar exchange of places.

“We’re going out to dinner,” Brian said.

“You’re welcome to join us,” Leighanne offered.

“We’re-gonna-have-dessert-my-mom-said-its-ok-as-long-as-I-eat-my-veggies,” Baylee shouted.

“We’re good,” I replied, waving the offer off. “But enjoy that dessert, Bay.” I high-fived him.

“Okay then,” Brian said. He smiled, a forced, stiff sort of smile, at Jaymie. “See ya.” And then he reached for the door close button as Baylee waved enthusiastically and Leighanne leaned in to say something in Brian’s ear.

Jaymie turned to me. “You didn’t tell them you were bringing me, did you?”

“Not exactly, no,” I replied.

She sighed.

“It’ll be a’ight,” I said. And I turned and walked down the hall to the hotel room, pulling the key out of the little paper sleeve they’d given me to keep it in. A swipe of the card and we were in the room, the window shedding a view of the city below, glowing colorful lights creating an abstract, stained-glass effect on the ceiling. I dropped my bag on the floor and climbed onto the wide, king-sized bed and spread out my legs and arms, feeling the bed cushion around me.

Jaymie closed and locked the room door and came out, letting her bag drop beside me. She stared around, then disappeared into the bathroom.

“Jesus, do you ever stay anywhere that doesn’t have gold plated faucets?” she demanded, staring at me with one eyebrow raised.

“Huh?” I said.

“The first night we ever fucked,” Jaymie said, “One of the only things I remember about that night was the faucet. It was gold.”

I laughed, “You don’t remember that night?”

“Nick. I had so much vodka in me that night. I was like a walking bottle of Absolut.”

“Absolutely amazing, maybe,” I said. I struggled to sit up to look at her. She stretched her arms and moved over to the wide window across the room, which was big enough to have a small couch that faced the doors that opened to a balcony. I licked my lips. “You had on this green dress,” I said. “It was the same color as your eyes. And you had gold eye shadow. And your hair was all up in one of those crazy side ponytails that were cool back then.”

Jaymie turned to face me, surprise in her eyes.

“I had on that dumbass yellow shirt that was about eleventeen sizes too big… with that early nineties triangle style print…”

“That shirt I remember,” she injected.

“And you were dancing with that chick by the stage when I saw you. You were so into the music. I just loved it. I wanted to feel like that again. It’d been awhile. We were so jaded already from all the work… Lou… et cetera… But shit you were so amazing I had to get the guts up to ask you to go with me to the after party. It was AJ’s idea. I had to ask him how to ask you.”

Jaymie laughed.

I got up off the bed and I walked over to her. “And we went to that club. And Fastlove was playing.”

Jaymie’s jaw dropped, her lips curled in a hesitant smile.

“And we were dancing. You know. All… nineties style…” I moved, thrusting my pelvis against her hip, dropping low, keeping my body pressed to her side as I squatted, then brought myself back up, pulled her into my arms, breaking out all the old-old-old Backstreet moves from the first tour. I stared into her eyes. “Gotta get up to get down, ya gotta get up to get down, ya gotta get up to get down… I won’t bore you with the detail… I gotta get there in your own sweet time… Let’s just say that maybe… You could help me ease my mind… Baby, I ain’t Mr. Right… But if you’re looking for faaast loooove, faaaaast love in your eyes… It’s more than enough…. had some bad love… some fast love is all that I’ve got… on… my.. mii-ii-iiind…

Jaymie stared up at me as I slid my hands down her sides. “The nineties were so ridiculous,” she muttered, her cheeks red, but eyes sparkling.

“So then,” I continued, “We left the club after a few drinks, a couple dances… went back to the hotel… I sang some more George Michael to you…”

“Oh?” she laughed.

I nodded. “I swear I won’t tease you… Won’t tell you no lies… I don’t need no Biiiible… just look into my eyyyyyes… I’ve waited so long baby, out in the cold, but I can’t take much more girl I’m losing contrrooool…” I dropped it low, shaking my booty so I was basically humping her leg.

Jaymie cracked up. “Stop that,” she laughed. “Oh my God, look at you.” I stood up and pulled her closer.

Sex is naturaaaal, sex is funnn, sex is best when its….” I stared into her eyes, “One on one.

“Why do you remember this so well?” she asked, shaking her head, staring into my eyes.

“The lyrics?”

“Those, too, but I meant the night,” Jaymie snorted.

C-cc-c-cc-ccome on,” I sang out and Jaymie’s laughter renewed. “What’s your definition of dirty baby…

“Nick,” she was wheezing.

“They’re classic lyrics.”

“So classic,” she said, rolling her eyes, her grin painfully wide.

“And as for the night… Well, I guess most guys do remember their first… you know… time,” I replied.

Jaymie choked.




Jaymie

Your first?!” I backed away from him, disbelief circling through my veins.

Nick nodded, “Why is that shocking?” he laughed, “We were sixteen.”

“But you were - you’re - you --” I squinted at him. “Do you tell all the girls they were your first?” I demanded, choking out a laugh.

Nick laughed, “Fuck no.”

“You didn’t tell me.”

He shrugged, “It didn’t seem important?”

“It didn’t seem --” I laughed, “That didn’t seem important to you?” I shook my head and turned away, biting my lip. I didn’t know what I was feeling. I just knew my heart rate had leaped almost as high as it’d been on the plane in the bathroom when he’d fucked me like no tomorrow. Oh my God, my brain screamed at me, You were the one that broke in Nick fucking Carter.

I turned around to look at him. He looked apprehensive. “You -- are you mad?” he asked, eyebrows cinched together.

“Mad?” I laughed.

Nick looked unsure how to take my laughter.

“No, not mad,” I said. “I guess… I dunno. Shocked?”

“Well I mean, I was… really awkward…” he said. “That night. Because, like, I didn’t know what I was doing and…” Nick grinned, “I mean clearly your reaction today on the flight proves I’ve learned well since, but that night…” he laughed, shaking his head. “Christ, you must’ve thought I was a fucking failure. Well I mean you don’t remember it so I guess it wasn’t so traumatizing as to burn in your memory for all time at least.”

I bit my lip. “I wouldn’t have known anyways. I wasn’t exactly experienced then, either. Like you said, we were sixteen.”

“So it was your first time, too?” he asked, surprised.

I nodded.

“Well damn,” he muttered.

I suddenly felt this like… unexplainable feeling. Like something was passing between us, something irrevocable. Something… something like the realization that we’d shared not only sex all these years but we’d shared something more, something deeper, something more core than just the sex.

We’d been each other’s firsts.

Nick stepped toward me, slowly, almost cautious. He put his hand on my lower back. His breath was low, slow, shallow. He closed his eyes, like he was saying a silent prayer or willing himself to do something or not to do something. Then he stared into my eyes.

“What you said,” he said thickly, “On the plane?”

“I thought we were gonna pretend it didn’t happen, like we said on the elevator?” I whispered.

“Just - one last thing, then… then, yes, we’ll pretend it didn’t happen.”

“Yes?”

Nick’s eyes were so blue and he smelled so intoxicating, his face was close to mine, his stare intense. “I didn’t run away because you said it, or because I was afraid to hear it or to say it back because --” He stopped, took a deep breath, then started again. “I ran because I don’t want you to get hurt when… when I, um.” He paused. “You know.”

“You’re not going to.”

He shrugged. “I refuse to hurt you.”

“I wanna be hurt.”

He shook his head.

I closed my eyes.

Nick kissed my forehead softly. “I just want you to know, before we forget about all this, that if the world was different… I-- would-- you, too.”

“Treatment,” I whispered. “Please. Get the treatment.” I looked up at him, opening my eyes, fluttering my lids and lashes to be able to see him through the tears that were threatening. “Don’t you see it? Don’t you see the more we let our nothing personal become something real, the more it’s worth fighting for?”

But instead of answering me, he just pulled away and laid back down on the bed.


Chapter Eighteen by Pengi
Chapter Eighteen


Jaymie

I was sitting up, biting my nails and hugging my knees to my chest, perched on the edge of the overstuffed chair by the picture window, looking out over the city. I wasn’t looking at the city though, I was looking at Nick, who was asleep, sprawled across the king-sized bed, still fully dressed, his mouth gaping open against the pillow, legs splayed like he’d fallen from the top of a six-story building and landed on the mattress. The sunlight was coming through a crack in the light-blocking curtains. Even though it was mid-morning local time, it felt like it was the middle of the night still because we weren’t adjusted to the change just yet. But even with the time zone difference and all that damn jet lag, I couldn’t sleep. So instead, I stared at the way his foot curved at the arch as it hung off the end of the bed, his toes spread. Everything about his body was fucking perfect and poetic. Even his god-damned foot.

In fact, the only thing about him that I would change was how damn stubborn he was. And, you know, the tumor.

If I was going to get Nick to get the treatment, I realized, then I needed a plan, a way to show him why it was so important and how crazy this idea that fighting it would make it worse. How much longer did he have to dick around before he’d lose the opportunity to heal?

Shuffling my feet a little to adjust my view of him, I wondered what kind of plan I could cook up that could actually get him to listen to me about the treatment. But I’d used the best argument I could possibly think of and he hadn’t caved even a little.

It occurred to me like lightening.

I bit my lip and slid out of the chair, sneaking past the bed, keeping my eye on Nick to make sure he didn’t roll over or wake up or anything, and inched toward the hotel room door. He’d get really pissed if he knew what I was about to do, but… whatever. Sometimes pissing people off to save them is worth it, I told myself. And this was worth it.

I slid out the door and into the hallway.

I walked slowly down the hallway, staring at the doors, trying to decide which one would contain the Littrells. Oh Nick was so going to kill me when he found out I did this, I thought. And I took a deep breath. I’d just have to knock on every door until one of them was opened by Brian, I thought. So I went over to the first door and was about to knock when the room across from Nick’s opened and AJ stepped out, carrying his daughter, Ava, on his hip. Ava was playing with AJ’s sunglasses, squealing with delight as she put them on her face and took them off, dimming and brightening the world with a flick of her wrist.

AJ looked surprised when he turned and saw me standing in the hall. “Hey,” he said. He paused, studying me, “You guys get in last night?” he asked.

I felt like I was being scanned, like he was trying to decide if I’d just finished doing Nick or not.

“Yes,” I answered.

Ava waved the glasses.

“I didn’t know you were coming with him,” AJ commented. “That’s cool. You like Germany so far?”

“So far all I’ve really seen is the airport,” I answered.

“You’ll have to make Nick bring ya sightseeing,” he suggested. He was uncomfortable. This was the first time I’d really seen much of AJ since he got married. It used to be that the main reason he and I got along is that AJ was great at flirting with anything with breasts - a criteria I certainly meet - and most of the dialogue we shared had been semi-flirtatious. Once, AJ had even propositioned me. Like, seriously. And now… now he was tamed and it was awkward.

“I guess I will,” I replied to his sightseeing suggestion. “Look, AJ, I need to talk to Brian. Do you know what room he’s in?”

AJ’s eyes flickered in surprise. “What do you have to talk to Brian about?” he asked. It sounded rude, but it wasn’t really, I guess. Just an honest question. One that honestly needed answering. Like I’ve said several times now, Brian and I weren’t exactly buds.

“I need to tell him something.”

AJ nodded. “Okay. Well.” He looked down the hallway and waved at a door two down from Nick’s. “Good luck.” AJ looked at Ava. “Say bye-bye,” he suggested.

Ava waved absently.

“Bye-bye Ava,” I said.

She looked traumatized, like she was wondering how the hell I knew her name. You’d think she’d be used to strangers knowing her name by now.

“See ya,” AJ said, and he turned and walked off down the hallway.

I turned to the room he’d said belonged to Brian and took a deep, shaky breath.

This was gonna be awkward.

I knocked.

I contemplated running away.

I looked around. I could hide in the vending machine room. I could run to the elevator or the stairwell.

Maybe he’d look out the peephole and see it was me and never open the door.

Maybe I could just go back to Nick’s room, pretend I’d never tried to talk to Brian at all. Maybe I could talk Nick into treatment on my own.

Maybe he hadn’t heard the knock at all.

And then the door opened and there was Brian, wearing basketball shorts and a t-shirt with a can of tomato soup on it. His mouth was full, he was chewing, one side of a pair of bright yellow headphones in his ear, the TV remote in his hand, and a confused look on his face. He stared at me and the confusion darkened slowly to a mixture of suspicion and concern.

“Jaymie?” He looked around for Nick.

“Nick’s asleep.”

He swallowed what I’d identified as cheerios when he’d spoken and leaned against the door jam, tilting his head to one side, folding his muscular arms over one another as he continued to stare at me with that same blended expression.

“Okay.” He stared at me.I licked my lips, unsure how to start. “I’m not trying to be rude or anything,” he said finally, “But… what do you want, exactly?”

“We need to talk,” I said. “About Nick.”

Brian raised an eyebrow.




Nick

When I woke up, Jaymie was asleep in the second bed, her back to me, hugging her knees. I stared across the gap between the two beds, as wide as the parting of the continents, and wondered what she was thinking about, if she was mad at me or if she understood me. I wasn’t even positive anymore if I understood me, really. I hugged a pillow, pressing my face into it the way I wanted to be pressing my face into her neck and shoulder. My fingers tingled with desire to run them across her soft skin.

“Jaymie?” I asked quietly. If she was awake, she’d answer, if not, I hadn’t said it loud enough that it would wake her up. In the pause that followed, I didn’t know if I wanted her to answer or not. She didn’t. I stared for a couple long moments before letting out a low sigh and rolling over so I was sitting on the edge of the bed, staring out at the city on the other side of the glass. I ran my hands through my hair and grabbed the pillow and held it on my lap, covering my junk.

There was a knock at the door.

At first, I wondered who the fuck would be knocking in the middle of the night, then I realized it only felt like the middle of the night. Obviously, dumbass, I told myself, you’ve just been looking out at the sunlit city. I turned and looked at the clock on the nightstand and found it was almost noon. Grabbing my jeans from the chair and tugging them on as I walked by the foot of Jaymie’s bed, I made my way to the door and peered out the peekhole. It was Brian.

“Hey Frick,” I said, pulling open the door. He stared up at me, his eyes were a little red, like maybe he’d been crying or something. “You okay?” I said, surprised.

Brian took a deep breath, “You hungry?”

I shrugged, “I dunno?”

“C’mon, I’m taking you out for lunch.”

“‘Rok, Jaymie’s here, I can’t just leave her --”

“She knows I’m coming.”

“What? She’s asleep,” I laughed, “How the fuck would she know you’re --”

Brian’s eyes were stone-serious, and I stopped talking mid-sentence as they locked on my own eyes. “Nick,” he said, his voice level, “You and I need to talk.”

I looked back at Jaymie on the bed. She’d been looking at us, too, but when I turned back she dropped herself back onto her pillow quickly and closed her eyes, back to pretending to be asleep.

A pit formed in the depths of my stomach.

I looked at Brian.

“She told you,” I said.

Brian licked his lips, “So there is something to tell then?”

“It’s… it’s nothing,” I lied.

“Nick, whatever it is, whatever’s going on, it’s not nothing. Jaymie has never once come to me to tell me that you need my help,” Brian pointed out, “She’s never once seemed to know anything about you when there’s something going on at all. So whatever it is, it’s something, something big enough you couldn’t hide it from her anymore. So what is it? What? Is it your heart? Is there something wrong?”

I closed my eyes.

“You’re a stubborn bastard,” Brian said, “I know you hate accepting help from people, but sometimes you’ve just got to.” He stared at me, I could feel him staring at me, even with my eyes closed. “So c’mon,” he continued after a long pause, “At least come talk to me. We’ll get some food and - and maybe a beer or something. Like - like old times. Just you and me.”

I sighed and turned away, grabbing my shirt from the chair, too. Jaymie laid still, eyes screwed tightly shut. I tugged my shirt over my head, then walked over to the bed and leaned close, “We’ll talk when I get back,” I said thickly in her ear. She didn’t move or react in anyway. I stood up and followed Brian out the door into the hallway.

Brian punched the button for the elevator. “There’s a pub down the street,” he suggested.

I knew the place he meant. I’d been there a few times before. “Okay,” I replied.

We stepped into the elevator and the doors slid closed and we leaned against the walls of the little box. I stared at my feet. Brian cleared his throat. It was awkward between us. I tried to think when this awkwardness had started, but there wasn’t really a clear point in my mind where it went from Brian and I being Frick and Frack to us being estranged, uncomfortable once-were-best-friends co-workers. When it went from me telling him everything to him being the one person I’d hoped would never know half the shit there was to know about me.

“So what’d Jaymie tell you?” I asked.

“Only that I needed to talk to you,” he replied. He stared at me for a long moment. “So how bad is this going to be? On a scale of one to ten?”

“Twelve.”

Chapter Nineteen by Pengi
Chapter Nineteen


Nick

The pub was dark and smelled like yeast. We sat in a corner, as far away from a crowd of futbol fans as we could get. A waitress came over and asked us, in German, what we wanted and Brian and I fumbled through the steps of ordering a couple beers and some food. When she’d walked away, I picked up the spoon on my place setting and started inspecting it. Brian leaned back and stared across the pub at the TV screens where guys in bright yellow uniforms were running down the field. He turned back to me.

“When did we get like this?” he asked.

I stared at the spoon. “I dunno,” I answered.

Brian took a deep breath, “I’m sorry,” he said, “If it was anything I did.”

I looked up at him. “I dunno if it’s anything either of us did, really, it’s just the way things were and the way they became, kinda.” I shrugged.

He nodded slowly, then mimicked me with his own spoon, inspecting it the way I was inspecting mine. I put mine down. “So a twelve, huh?” he said.

I scrambled in my head for something to tell him, anything, that wasn’t the whole truth but also wasn’t, strictly speaking, a lie, either. I knew how this was going to go down if I told him about the tumor. It’d go down exactly how I suspected Jaymie had hoped. Brian would freak out, tell the fellas, they’d cancel everything and I’d be on the next available table with a handsaw level to my forehead. The thought gave me the heebie-jeebies and I put my hand on my forehead, like I wanted to feel it was still intact, without any rough-edged saw cuts. My eyes met Brian’s and I knew my time to think was up, the longer I took to answer the more suspicious and worried he looked.

“Nick,” he started -- but he was interrupted by the waitress’s return as she put the two bottles of beer we’d ordered on the table. He glanced up at her, “Thanks,” he muttered, and she walked away. He turned back to me.

“I told Jaymie how strained stuff’s been between us,” I blurted out before he could ask anything. “It’s been bothering me a lot and I just - I told her, and I think because I never tell her anything like that, she kinda… she just took it more serious than it really was, I guess.” I took a pull off the beer, avoiding looking him in the eyes. Brian studied me, trying to decide if that answer was suitable or not. He shook his head. He wasn’t buying it. I put the beer back down on the table.

“That’s not it, Nick,” he said. “When Jaymie came by, she said, ‘I know stuffs been weird with you and Nick for awhile now but you need to talk to him’,” he explained, “She said, ‘I can’t tell you what’s wrong, but he isn’t listening to me, and he needs your help’.” Brian took a deep breath. “Is it your heart?”

“No, my heart’s fine. I got cleared by the cardiologist.”

Brian looked lost. “Well c’mon we can play guessing games all day. Is it your family? Is something going on with them? Are you drinking? Doing drugs again?”

I shook my head. “No, dude, nothin’ like that…”

“Then what?” he asked.

“Okay. If I tell you, you gotta promise not to treat me any different,” I said.

Brian’s eyebrows stitched together. “Are you gay?”

“What the fuck, Brian? No,” I shook my head, “Jesus Christ.” I turned away.

“Then just tell me what the hell is going on,” he pleaded, “As you can see, my mind is going a hundred thousand miles an hour in every possible direction!”

“I have cancer,” I said, “In my brain.” I pointed at my head, like he didn’t know where my brain was or something.

He stared at me, dumbfounded for a second. Then, “Wait. What?”

I sighed, “I was gettin’ these headaches. Back when I had all that shit with the bronchitis going on and I told the doctor and he scanned me and it turns out I got this anaplastic astrocycoma tumor thingy up in there and -- yeah. So brain cancer.” Brian didn’t say anything. His jaw kinda hung there all loose and stuff and he just stared at me. I realized I didn’t know what to do with my hands or how to hold my face right, like I forgot what normal looked like and all I wanted was to act normal for Brian. I shifted my weight. “That’s a twelve, yeah?” I asked.

Brian covered his eyes with his hand suddenly, staring down at the table. “Fuck Nick,” he said, and I realized his voice was thick with emotion. “That’s a god-damn twenty.” He looked up and his eyes were big and wet, his nose kind of flared so his nostrils looked even bigger than usual. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me sooner?” he asked.

“I didn’t really tell anybody,” I said.

“You told Jaymie.”

“Yeah,” I answered.

He looked hurt. “So how are they treating it? You look good for someone being treated for cancer, I mean usually ---” he stopped mid-sentence. “Nick, you are being treated?”

I shook my head.

The waitress came by with our food and put the plates down in front of us. Brian picked up his beer and looked up at her, “We’re gonna need another of these,” he said, then he took a long pull off the neck and put it down, never taking his eyes off me.




Jaymie

I sat on the bed, clicking through the TV channels. Everything was in German. I felt sick to my stomach, waiting.

We’ll talk when I get back.

The words rung in my memory, more venomous every time I replayed them. It was going to be a huge fight when he finally got back, I just knew it. I could almost hear the words in my head - he’d ask how I’d dared to go to Brian with his secret, and I’d point out that I’d been very careful not to actually tell Brian his secret, and he’d say I might as well have… We’d shout for a really long time, until he finally got sick of the fight and kicked me out. He’d throw more money at me, like he’d done the night of the seizures, he’d tell me to get the fuck on the next plane, to get out of his life, to be gone by the time he got back to the United States.

But he’d be forced to get the treatment. Brian would make him, wouldn’t he? I could trust Brian to at least make sure that Nick did what was best, couldn’t I? I wouldn’t end up with him, but at least Nick would live through this, at least he’d get better and maybe he’d see that what I’d done was the right thing. Maybe, eventually, he’d reach out to me again.

It seemed like forever before I heard the sound of the key in the door and the handle turning. I turned off the TV and sat up, steeling myself for the first words of the argument. Nick came in and tossed the key and his wallet onto the table and walked across the room to the minibar, which he opened and took a bottle of water from. He unscrewed the cap and drank almost the whole bottle without pause, then put the cap back on before laying down on the second bed. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and laid there like he was about to go to sleep.

I waited for several long moments, but there wasn’t any indication that he was gonna say anything to me at all. Finally, I said, “Is, um, everything okay?”

He didn’t open his eyes at all. “Mhm,” he said.

I hesitated. Surely he was gonna sit up at any moment and start yelling. Where were the cuss words I knew he’d want to yell about what I’d done? I stared at him, at his eyelids, at the way he just laid there, like he was about to take a nap or something. “Nick?” I said.

“What?” he asked. He opened his eyes and rolled them to look at me, not even moving his head.

“Did -- did everything go okay?” I asked, “With Brian?”

He closed his eyes again.

“Nick?”

He rolled to face the window, giving me his back.

“Nick,” I said, and I crawled across my bed and onto his, kneeling so I was sitting on my feet. I reached out my arm and put my hand down on his shoulder. He shrugged my hand away. “So this is it, huh? You aren’t gonna yell at me? Instead you’re just gonna turn your back to me?”

He didn’t answer.

“Nick,” I pleaded, “Don’t do this.”

“Don’t do what?” he asked.

“Don’t stop talking to me,” I begged. “Please.”

“Why? So you can tell everyone even more stuff?” he snapped, and he sat up and faced me, “So you can go knock on Howie’s door or Kevin’s door and tell them all the personal shit I told you?” Nick’s eyes were red. He’d been crying. And I realized his face was wet. He’d been crying just now, when he’d turned his back. “I fucking thought -- I thought --” he stood up. “I thought things were gonna be okay, that maybe trusting you was safe, that making this - us personal would work, but it’s not. I’m an asshole for even thinking it could’ve.”

“No you aren’t,” I said, and I felt my throat tighten with emotion, “Nick, I couldn’t just sit by and watch you get sicker. Someone else had to know. You weren’t listening to me about getting treatment, you needed someone who you do listen to to tell you why it’s important.”

He stared at me. “I didn’t want him to know yet!” he yelled.

I got up on my knees so we were level, “He deserved to know, he’s your best friend!”

“He is not my best friend,” Nick shouted, “He isn’t. He used to be, but he hasn’t been in a long ass time.”

“Well I’m sorry, then maybe I should’ve told AJ or Howie or Kevin or Chris or who-the-fuck-ever your new B-F-F is, Nick,” I shouted.

“It’s you, you dumb bitch, it’s you,” he shouted back. He turned away, leaned against the window sill and stared out. “Jesus Christ,” he groaned and pressed his face onto the glass, putting pressure on his forehead. He closed his eyes.

“Is your head okay?” I asked gently.

“I’m fucking fine,” he snapped. I looked down at the bedspread beneath me. Nick sighed. “I’m fine,” he said, his voice softer. “I’m just not ready for this yet,” he said.

“You never will be ready for it,” I pointed out.

“Readier, maybe,” he suggested.

I shrugged, “I don’t think there’s any way to get readier,” I answered. I crawled across the bed to the other side and got up and went over and wrapped my arms around him, pressing my cheek to his back. “Nick, I think you just plunge in and hope for the best and kick as hard as you can to stay afloat. I think that’s all there is to do.”

He took a shaky breath.

“I’m here for you,” I whispered.

He nodded.

“And now Brian is, too, right?” I asked.

He nodded again.

“So see?” I said, “That’s a good thing, right?”

He nodded.

I closed my eyes, just feeling the closeness of his skin through his shirt. Then his shoulders shook and I knew he was crying. I hugged him tighter.

There wasn’t anything else to do.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered. But I didn’t really mean about Brian or for what I’d done. I meant more like because of the fact that he had to go through any of this at all. I dunno if he knew that’s what I meant or not, but he nodded.

Chapter Twenty by Pengi
Chapter Twenty


Jaymie

Nick really did go take a nap after that. He laid on the bed, his limbs stretched all over the place, the sun setting in the window beyond. Now, with the tear tracks still drying on his face, he looked less like a god, and more like a little boy, scared of the future. I laid beside him until his breathing leveled out and he was definitely asleep before I rolled out of bed and started packing back up what little bit we’d unpacked since arriving. He hadn’t told me the official plans, but I figured we’d be going back to the States soon, probably in the morning. I was just tucking his headphones gently into his carry on bag, being careful to keep the cord from tangling, when there was a knock on the hotel room door.

When I opened the door, Brian was standing in the hallway. “Nick’s asleep,” I said quietly, glancing over my shoulder, not wanting to wake him up.

Brian took a deep breath, looking at me carefully from head to toe. “I just, uh, wanted to - you know - thank you. For telling me. About him. Sort of.” He looked sheepish. “It was really decent of you.”

“I just want him to be okay,” I answered.

Brian nodded. “I see that.”

“I care about him,” I added.

Brian nodded again. He took a deep breath, “Look, I know I’ve been an asshole about you two in the past, but it was never really you I was judging, just… what you two do, you know?”

I hovered somewhere between appreciation and annoyance.

“I’m sorry,” he said, seeing the look on my face. “I’m doing it again. It’s just hard because I want him to have the best of everything and I just -- Not that you aren’t -- I mean.” He stopped, his cheeks red. “Let’s start over?”

I nodded.

“Thank you,” he said sincerely. “And I hope that I get to know you better over the next couple weeks.”

“Next couple weeks?” I repeated, “Wait. Wait. What?”

“The tour. Over the next couple weeks on the tour,” Brian said, “You’re staying for the whole tour, aren’t you?” He looked confused, “Nick said y’all were gettin’ closer and all…”

“Didn’t he tell you about the astrocycoma?” I asked, dumbfounded.

Brian nodded.

“And y’all aren’t sending him back to get treatment?” I demanded, “How could you possibly think that it’s a good idea to let him do this?”

Brian took a deep breath. “Jaymie,” he said, “I’ve known Nick for over two thirds of his life. If Nick doesn’t want to do something -- he’s not going to do it. No matter how much you tell him he should, no matter how much you push him. In fact, the more you push him, the less likely he is to do it.” He glanced over my shoulder at Nick’s sleeping form, and added, in a hushed whisper, “Which is why, if you really want him to get the treatment, you’ll just let it go. He’s gonna make the right decision on his own, in his own time.”

“He doesn’t have time,” I hissed.

Brian’s eyes met mine. “It has to be his idea,” he whispered, “His choice.”

“What if he makes the wrong choice?”

Brian sighed.

“C’mon, I told you because I thought you’d be on my side in this. Don’t you get it? If he doesn’t get treated, he could die!”

Brian nodded. “But I know Nick too well to think for a second that he’ll listen to what he’s told.” He glanced at Nick on the bed again, who had shifted positions, stretching out his legs so his feet poked out from under the covers, hanging off the end of the bed. Brian beckoned me into the hallway. I followed, pulling the door almost to a close behind me. “Look, you have feelings for him, right?”

“Of course,” I answered.

“Like real ones. Not the superficial...whatever...y’all have had for years, right?”

“I love him, Brian,” I answered, point blank.

He leaned in, “Then listen close,” he said, “Because I’m about to become your Yoda.”





Nick

Jaymie was sitting on the edge of her bed, watching TV, when I woke up. She’d managed to figure out how to get the English subtitles going on and the screen flickered it’s way through a German-dubbed episode of Friends with the lines printed across the bottom of the screen. She was muttering the lines as she read them off the screen. I laid there in silence, watching her for a few minutes, unsure what to say. I hadn’t fully come to a resolution about whether I wanted to be angry about her telling Brian about my tumor or not. Part of me felt betrayed and really pissed off because of it, and the other part kinda understood that it wasn’t fair to me to expect her to be the only one in my life that knew and that I would’ve probably done the same thing if I’d been in her position. Part of me was just too emotionally exhausted from everything to even try to deal with any of it.

I sighed.

She heard my sigh and turned around to look at me. “You’re up,” she said, and she turned the TV off with a flick of her wrist. “Are you okay?”

The look in her eyes, I realized, was exactly the reason why I had been trying so damn hard to keep it all a secret. She was staring at me like maybe I’d break, like I was fragile or something. I hated it. I’d been avoiding this look since the doctor had told me about the stupid anaplastic astrocycoma to begin with. I wondered how many times that look would come my way now that she’d told Brian and he had, presumably, told the fellas by now?

“I’m okay,” I said. “Really. Don’t look at me like that. Please.”

“Sorry,” she said, looking away.

I felt bad. It was rough ‘cos the Look wasn’t something I wanted, but it wasn’t something that I was particularly offended by. I mean, it only meant the person cared, really, but… I dunno. It made me feel shitty. “I get it, but it’s not like I’m a baby or nothin’, yanno?” I said aloud, “Like I’m not weak.”

“I know you aren’t weak,” Jaymie said, “I think you’re brave as fuck.” She looked up, her eyes sincere.

“Yeah,” I scoffed. “Brave.”

“Yes, brave,” she said, her voice carrying certain finality to it. She took a deep breath, then got up and climbed over onto my bed beside me. “Nick, I have a proposition.”

“Oh?”

“Yes,” she said. She cleared her throat. “Okay, so. I know you hate talking about this, and you know I want you to get treatment.” I started to interrupt her but she held up her hands, “Wait. Hear me out. If you promise to at least contemplate the treatment thing, I’ll shut up about it and unless you mention the tumor to me, I won’t say a word about it.” She drew a cross over her heart.

I hesitated, “Why?”

“Because. I just feel bad for stepping in where I didn’t really have the right to be telling your secret to anyone, and I don’t want this to drive a wedge between us, and I want you to know that I can be your safe place if you need it. I want you to want to tell me things, if you do indeed want to, and not to feel pressured into anything, in any direction. As far as our conversations are concerned, the astrocycoma won’t even exist. Okay? But only if you swear to me you’ll at least think about treatment options.”

I nodded. “Okay.”

“Okay,” she said. She smiled, “Done deal.”

I instantly felt like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders, like the world was a hundred times less stressful than it’d been the last couple weeks. I felt suddenly almost buoyant from the relief of it… like things could go back to how they’d been two weeks ago, before Jaymie knew anything about the tumor.

But I didn’t want things to go completely back to the way they’d been before. After all, something had changed between Jaymie and I in the last two weeks, something that I’d never expected. Something… something like feelings and a real relationship or something had come out of the blue between us.

I liked that the L word had been said on the plane. I didn’t wanna go back. Not now.

There was a lot to explore still.

But suddenly I wasn’t sure what the hell to do with that, to show her that I wanted to continue forward, despite the two steps back that this proposition of her probably seemed to be making. I mean what exactly is it that regular boyfriends and girlfriends do (if that’s what we could be classified as, that is, I wasn’t sure)? Like Jaymie and I usually just resorted to having all kinds of wild, wild sex. But that didn’t really seem like it would tell her anything much other than that things were back to the way they’d always been.

And that wasn’t the message I needed to get across right now.

“We should go out to eat,” I suggested.

Jaymie looked surprised, “What?” she laughed.

“Go put on something nice,” I said. I got up and grabbed the local cuisine guide to find a nice place. Something that would be impressive, I thought. “I’m taking you out. Like on a date.”

Jaymie smiled.

Chapter Twenty-One by Pengi
Chapter Twenty-One


Nick

Within the hour, Jaymie and I were in a cab headed to a five-star restaurant called Volt in downtown Berlin. She looked fucking gorgeous and I found myself feeling restless beside her in the backseat. The dress she’d pulled from the long garment bag was emerald green and seemed to hang from her shoulders like it was made to adorn her body. “You’re beautiful,” I said as the street lamps flashed by, a constant strobe light that gave her a magical, almost shimmering effect.

“Thanks,” she said quietly.

Volt was about fifteen minutes from the hotel, and by the time we got there it was drizzling just a little bit. Jaymie squealed as she ran from the car to the doors of the restaurant, and I held my arm up so she could duck under me to save herself from the water. She laughed, exhilarated by the run once we got inside and she’d made it without melting. The restaurant was warm and low-lit, wood and brick in a modern-meets-industrial-meets-elegance sort of feeling. Rows of tables lined the narrow walls, with fire escape style upper floors overlooking them. A fireplace crackled at the far end of the room.

“Willkommen!” a maitre’de said, stepping out from behind a low desk at the entry way.

“Hello,” I said, “er.. Two?”

“Ahh, visitors,” he said, smiling, “Welcome, in that case.” He grabbed two English menus from behind the desk, “Right with me.” And we followed him up a staircase to the furthest table on the second level of seating, overlooking the fireplace and the other patrons below. “Do you want to drink?” he asked, waving a wine list before us.

“I’ll have some red wine,” Jaymie replied, “Whatever you recommend.”

“We have a very nice Dornfelder,” he suggested, “It’s a very good wine. Very German.”

“Sure,” she smiled shyly, and he turned to me.

“None for me, thanks,” I answered.

“Your waiter will bring that to you in just a moment, miss,” he said, and he dropped the two English menus down in front of us with a flourish, smiled, and walked away.

Jaymie and I looked around the restaurant in silence for a few moments. Even though the music and atmosphere was elegant and mellow at this point, I could see how Volt might come to life later at night or with the right crowd, it had potential to double as a club the way it was set up and decorated. I looked over at Jaymie, who was watching the flickering fireplace, and I realized I had no idea what the hell to say.

“This place is nice,” she commented, looking up at me, catching me staring. “Very industrial, yet chic.”

“I like it,” I agreed.

“So…” she raised an eyebrow, “Do you bring all your German girlfriends here then?”

I shook my head, “Never been here before. Another first.”

She smiled and looked down at the menu, a little bit of a blush to her face.

I looked down at the menu, too, and we busied ourselves with selecting meals in silence for a couple of moments so that by the time the waiter arrived several minutes later with Jaymie’s glass of Dornfelder we knew exactly what we wanted to order. He put a basket of bread in the center of the table. Jaymie ordered a pasta dish and I got a lamb and kale sandwich and the waiter swept away, leaving us to ourselves.

I watched as she raised the glass of wine to her lips and sipped. She smiled as she lowered the glass, “Mmm,” she mumbled. “He’s a genius, that’s good stuff.”

“We can get a bottle,” I suggested.

She twirled the glass gently between her fingertips. I realized that she was just as lost for words as I was. We never had to manufacture conversation between us. Typically by now on any “date” that I’d been on with Jaymie, we would’ve been in the restroom for a quickie. I felt stirrings in my pelvis at the thought of it. But no, I told myself. This was different, tonight was different. She’d said the L-word on the plane, and as much as I’d wanted her to not love me, I couldn’t help but know that she did and… and maybe even feel the same way back.

And love didn’t always resort to quickies to keep from having to talk to each other.

I have a feeling that’s in the rule book somewhere or something.

“So,” I said.

“So,” Jaymie said.

“So,” I said again.

Jaymie laughed, “Jesus. We’re so awkward at this, you’d think we were strangers. What the fuck?”

Her cursing made some of the tension of the moment lessen for me and I laughed. Whatever happened, I realized, she was still the same Jaymie.

“Nick,” she said, “In all seriousness. How high should my hopes be? About us, I mean?”

I stared into her eyes, considering her, us, everything. A warm sort of feeling crawled through my stomach. “High,” I answered.

She lifted her wine to her lips again, a smile spreading across her mouth, “I like that answer,” she said, as she sipped, never moving her eyes from mine.





Jaymie

Nick was smiling at me from across the table still as I held my glass to my mouth, my eyelashes fluttering at him over the rim. I lowered the glass and he followed my hand as I brought it to the table, his eyes paused halfway… on my chest.

He licked his lips.

“So what are you thinking about right now?” I asked him.

Nick’s eyes traveled up to my face. “I… uh…”

“Perv,” I laughed.

Nick grinned, a little bit of a blush playing around his cheeks. “I am not,” he said, talking to his placemat.

“No?” I kicked my shoe off under the table, and slipped my foot up the length of his leg, “Are you sure?” I asked as my toes reached his thigh and slowly made their way upward. He closed his eyes and bit his lip when my toe made contact. I smirked, “Impressive bulge for someone who isn’t being pervy,” I commented.

Nick groaned quietly as I rubbed him gently through his suit pants with my toes, looking as innocent as could be from above. “Jesus,” he mumbled.

I dropped my foot away from him as our waiter returned. “More wine, miss?” he asked me, and I held up my glass in response. Nick was trying to collect himself while the waiter poured the ruby drink into my glass. I smiled across the table. “Can I get anything else for you?” the waiter asked.

“We’re good, thanks,” Nick replied, and he turned to watch as the waiter walked away.

I took the opportunity. While Nick was turned, I ducked under the table and crawled toward him. Nick jumped in surprise when I put my hands on his legs and pushed his knees apart. “Oh fuck,” he whispered. “Jaymie.”

“Shh,” I whispered back.

I pushed open his suit jacket and reached for the belt and buttons on his pants, undoing them quickly. He shifted his hips forward in the seat as I started rubbing his length slowly. “Shit,” he whispered, “Oh shit.” He was crazy responsive to my touch, his body pushing against my palm until I wrapped my fingers around him and guided him into my mouth. He almost choked and jerked his body in surprise. “Fuck,” he groaned. I laughed around him and bobbed my head against him. He put his hand on his leg, squeezing his knee with his fingers in reaction to my motion.

I think I had him pretty close to the end of his rope when I heard the waiter on the stairs and I released him quickly and backed away, hitting my head on the underside of the table. Nick scrambled to close his pants and I climbed out from under the table, catching the tablecloth on my way, my hair getting messed up. The waiter was just arriving to the table as I popped back up. Nick was flushed, still fiddling with his pants. “I found my contact lens,” I said, holding up my fingers, pinched together and I turned away, pretending to put in an imaginary contact lens.

The waiter didn’t say anything, but he smirked knowingly as he put our plates down on the table.

Nick stared at me as I started eating after the waiter had gone away. “What?” I asked.

“Just… your mouth, I can’t take my eyes off it,” he said.

I laughed, “Is my lipstick all fucked up now?” I asked.

He laughed, “Nawh. Well, maybe a little. But it’s okay. It’s hot as hell.”

“It’s the least I could do,” I said, “Considering what a wonderful place you’ve brought me to and everything. Consider it payback,” I smirked at him, then went back to eating my pasta.

“Jaymie,” he said, his voice serious. I looked up at him. “I don’t expect you to ‘pay me back’ with sex. You know that, right?”

“Yeah,” I answered. I sipped my wine.

He picked up his sandwich, stared at it, then put it back down. “Like seriously you get it, I want to be… yanno… more… right?”

“More?”

“Yeah. Like. Not just about sex?”

I nodded.

“Okay,” he said, and he picked up the sandwich again and took a big bite. As he chewed he studied me carefully. I speared a few more bits of pasta and chewed right back at him.

I wondered if he knew how much it was killing me not to beg him to get the treatment. If he could guess how many blow jobs I’d wager in payment if he’d just let the doctors fix him. My heart was screaming at me to make him an offer, to tell him to name the price it would cost to make him go. But my head was catching the whimsy of my heart, reminding it what Brian had said.

”The first rule of Brian’s Code is that you cannot tell Nick about the Code.”

“How very Fight Club of you,” I’d chided him.

“You’ve met Nick. This is way more intense than Fight Club.” Brian’s eyes had twinkled. “The second rule of Brian’s Code is that Nick must always, always,
always think that all major life decisions are his own. As they say, you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink. This is a true story. However, you can lead the horse to water after feeding him a whole bunch of salty snacks and he’ll figure out his thirsty all on his own, if you know what I mean?”

“You mean drop hints until he thinks of it on his own?”

“Exactly. Say it without saying it, and when he comes up with the idea you congratulate him like it’s an entirely original thought.”

I’d laughed, “You seriously think this will work?”

Brian had smirked, a dangerous twinkle in his eyes, “Jaymie… How do you think we’ve survived for twenty years with him? Just remind him what it is that’s worth living for and he’ll come to the conclusion on his own with the slightest of nudges in the right direction. Trust me.”


Well, I thought, staring across the table at Nick’s flushed face as he ate his lamb and kale sandwich, You better be right, Brian.

I had a lot to lose if he was wrong.




End Notes:
If you're curious, here's a link to a 3D view of the restaurant I was basing this chapter on: http://www.restaurant-volt.de/volt3d/
Chapter Twenty-Two by Pengi
Chapter Twenty-Two


Jaymie

After we’d finished eating, Nick and I went outside. It was still raining a little, but I didn’t care anymore if I got rained on. My hair was already a mess from my under-the-table adventure. Nick swung his arms as he walked, humming a tune I didn’t recognized that seemed to wander a bit as he led the way down the street. He seemed to know where he was going, which wasn’t all that weird with all the times he’d been to Berlin with the Boys over the years. The city was beautiful in the way that cities are to people who have never been there - cobblestoned road with string lights crisscrossing over head, creating a web of electric stars to replace the ones that were obscured by city glow and clouds.

“C’mon,” Nick said, a grin creeping across his face, “I know where I’ll take you.” He grabbed my hand and pulled me along, splashing through puddles that had settled in the sidewalk. He led me through a city square dominated by a roundabout, lined with little shops and cafes and pubs, down another side road, and we came out to a stone archway announcing our entry into a public garden. Nick’s smile only widened as we came to a stop just outside of it, and his eyes were alight like a little kids. He tore forward, laughing as he rushed into the park, excitement palpable in the air around us. “C’mon, c’mon,” he called excitedly over his shoulder, “C’mon!” He waved for me to keep up.

It was harder to run in my shoes and it didn’t take me long to kick them off and carry them, running barefoot through wet grass, just praying I didn’t step on anything that would cut my foot open, half wondering if Nick would stop running to come back for me if I did or if he was hopelessly beyond the point of no return.

When I caught up to him, he was standing at the edge of a playground, waiting for me. I came to a breathless stop beside him, holding my shoes by the ankle straps. I looked up at him. “Playground?” I asked.

He pointed across the playground equipment at a small fenced-in basket ball court. “Brian and I used to come here to shoot hoops, back when we first started,” he stared off at it nostalgically. “Lou used to get so pissed, he’d come ripping down here ready to tear us a new one ‘cos we weren’t working 25-8, you know?”

“25-8?”

“Like more than 24-7? You know?” Nick laughed.

It suddenly occurred to me that this was Nick’s way of inviting me into a world of his that I’d never really been in much. Like I had a little, obviously, but mostly from the same perspective that fans had been in that world. Onlookers from a distant vantage point. I just happened to have an in is all. But this… this was Nick’s life from his point of view, the personal side of things.

I was still processing this and exactly what it meant, when Nick grinned and said, “C’mon,” again and rushed forward onto the playground, launching himself onto a colorful jungle gym shaped like a lady bug. He grabbed hold of the bars and pulled himself along to the top, looking way too big for equipment built for little kids. It took him like a nano second to climb to the pinnacle of the dome and set himself down with a self-satisfied grin. “Jaymie, seriously, c’mon.” He held out his hand.

I dropped my shoes at the base of the gym and reached for his extended palm, his fingers closed around mine and held me steady as I wobbled my way up to join him at the top. It wasn’t that high off the ground - I mean, it was built for, like, seven year olds - but it was enough to make me cautious of how much it would hurt like hell if I fell and tumbled to the ground. When he got me up to the top, he laid back across the dome, staring up at the sky and I leaned back against his chest. He wrapped his arm around me. I felt the wet rungs of the gym on my back.

“I miss the feeling this place used to give me,” he said, eyes closed.

I closed my eyes too.

“Freedom,” he mumbled. “It felt like freedom out on that ball court.”

“When it came to playgrounds, I always liked the swings better,” I answered.

He chuckled. “Nawh, man. Slides are where it’s at.”

“Sesaws,” I said.

“Merry-go-rounds.”

I laughed, “Monkey bars.”

“Aw, fuck yes,” Nick groaned, “Monkey bars were bad ass as hell.”





Nick

I dunno what made me bring Jaymie to that old park, really. I’d been walking along with her and it suddenly had occurred to me that the park was there just a couple blocks away and this rush of wanting to see it one last time took me over. I laid there on top of the jungle gym, my eyes closed, feeling the droplets of rain on my face and the quiet of the playground at night, and Jaymie’s warm weight against my chest. Everything had a one last time sort of feeling to it.

I wrapped my arm around Jaymie, holding her close, glad she was there, wishing I knew how to tell her about all the shit that was stirring inside of me, all the emotions that were kind of mixing up and confusing me. I could’ve stayed like that all night. And maybe if I did, I thought, the feelings would kinda melt through me into her and she’d know without me figuring out what words to wrap around it.

“You wanna go play on some swings?” I asked quietly.

“Are there some?”

“What’s a playground without swings?” I asked, sitting up. I pulled Jaymie close and we slid down the side of the jungle gym. She laughed and squealed as we went until I’d put her firmly down on solid ground. She grasped my forearm to balance and I felt like all my body cells were pushing and shoving to be the lucky ones that she was touching. Like she’d never touched me before, my skin seemed to light on fire under her fingers. “Over here,” I said, directing her, feeling my mouth go dry.

The swings were wet, too, but she didn’t seem to care, she just plunked down in the nearest one and pushed herself back and lifted her feet to begin the process of pumping herself higher. I got on the swing next to her as she swept backward and forward, a pendulum. “Oh my God, I haven’t done this in forever,” she giggled. I swung myself lightly, slowly compared to her as she went backward and forward happily, her hair fluttering around her head like streamers. Her swing seemed much less grumpy about her presence than mine was - every move I made was accented by a groaning creak in the crossbar over my head. Besides, I was perfectly happy just watching her as she swung. I didn’t need to swing, too, when I could just watch. “Bet I can jump further than you,” she teased.

I laughed, “I know you can ‘cos hell will have frozen over if I jump from one of these things,” I answered.

“Really? You don’t jump?”

“Fuck no,” I laughed. “I’m accident prone. I might as well beg fate to break my leg as do that.” I shook my head, “BJ used to try to get me to do it, but I never would. I jumped out of a second story window with a sheet for a parachute, but I’d never jump off a swing set. Go figure.”

Jaymie laughed, “You didn’t. Did you really?”

“I did,” I replied. “I thought I was GI Joe or something.”

“Did you get hurt?”

“Had a lime green cast for like a month on my wrist,” I replied.

“I broke my wrist once, too,” she said, “My cast was purple.”

“How’d you break it?”

“Jumping from a swing set,” Jaymie smirked as she flew by.

“Nice,” I said.

“It was easier, being a kid,” I said, looking down at the way my legs had to bend in order to even lower myself far enough to reach the damn swing seat, which groaned and creaked beneath me. “Stuff was so much less complicated then,” I said.

“It was still complicated,” Jaymie said, “Just in a different way is all.” She slowed a little, dragging her bare feet across the gravel beneath the swings.

I nodded, “True.” I chewed my lip. I glanced over at her. “Did you have any other siblings besides Daniel?”

“Nawh,” she answered. “We were it.” She let the swing come to a full stop.

“Were you close to your parents? Before, I mean?”

She shrugged, “Mostly. I mean I didn’t know there was anything wrong with my family when I was real little. I was a Daddy’s Girl. I guess that’s partly why Pilates pisses me off so much maybe.” Jaymie twisted the chains of the swing around, then let it unwind, spinning her.

I twisted side to side, imitating her a little, the swing creaking immensely loudly now. “Pilates is a horrible name.”

“She chose it, too,” Jaymie said, rolling her eyes. “She purposely had it legally changed to that.”

I snorted.

I noticed a single tear running across Jaymie’s nose.

“You okay?”

She nodded and swiped the tear away. “Yeah, I’m okay,” she replied.

We sat there a few moments in silence. Then, finally, I said. “Jaymie?”

“Hmm?” she looked over at me.

“About what you said -- on the plane?”

Jaymie raised an eyebrow.

“I just want you to know that I ---”

But before I could get out the words, there was an almighty sort of creak, and I felt the swing give out before me, and I crashed to the gravel below.

Chapter Twenty-Three by Pengi
Chapter Twenty-Three


Nick

Fate has got this great way of kicking me in the balls to get my attention and stop me from doing things I shouldn’t do. And I guess maybe it takes a swift kick to get my attention sometimes. I’m not the best at divining the smartest choices in life. This situation being the perfect example. I had every single reason in the entire fucking world not to tell Jaymie what I was feeling about her - every reason - and yet it took Fate bending the laws of physics and gravity in order to make me stop.

I laid on the gravel, my ass sinking into foul smelling mud, staring up at the clouds overhead, the rain falling directly into my eyeballs, blinking in surprise at the sudden drop. Jaymie suddenly appeared over me, her eyes wide and hair all stringy from the rain. “Shit, are you okay?” she asked.

“Yeah,” I replied. I slowly pulled myself to a sitting position, feeling the fabric of my suit hit my skin all muddy and disgusting. I pushed myself up from the ground, slipped on the mud, and my ass hit the puddle again. “Jesus H. Christ,” I muttered.

“You sure you’re okay?” Jaymie asked, concerned.

“Yeah, I’m just probably bruised a little maybe,” I said, “Mostly in the pride. And probably also my ass,” I added as I actually managed to get to my feet. I ran my hand across my ass and the mud and gravel fell away thick and heavy to make a brilliant fwapp sound when it hit the earth. I looked up at the crossbar of the swings. One of the chains had snapped at the very top and now the thing hung sideways, the second chain laying in a coil on the ground beside where Fate had dumped me. The ground looked like someone had been making snow angels in the winter in the mud.

Jaymie reached back and ran her hand across my backside, helping to push the mud off the fabric. “This is your stage suit, isn’t it?” she asked.

“Yeah. Eddie’s gonna castrate me for wearing it out,” I muttered.

“Eddie won’t castrate you,” Jaymie said, “Your penis is a huge contributor to his financial success.”

I gave her a dirty smile, “My penis is a huge contributor, hmm?”

Jaymie raised her eyebrows, “Well I see you aren’t too bruised in the pride by your fall,” she said.

“I’m resilient is all,” I replied.

Actually, I was trying like hell to make her forget what we’d been talking about before the swing broke and I fell into the mud to begin with. I didn’t want her asking me what I’d been about to say because there wasn’t much space for backtracking and Fate clearly did not approve of me telling Jaymie about the feelings that were starting to form and stir around in there. And Fate knew more than I did about what all would happen.

Suddenly, a weird sort of sad feeling fell over me. If Fate didn’t want me to tell Jaymie that I was starting to fall in love with her, that meant that Fate didn’t want Jaymie to know, which meant that Fate knew we wouldn’t end up together, which meant that I probably wasn’t gonna get better. I was gonna die and Fate knew it and Fate was like shut the fuck up boy before you hurt her.

I didn’t wanna hurt her.

“Let’s go back to the hotel,” I said.

“Okay.” Jaymie walked over to the jungle gym and collected her shoes from where she’d left them, holding them by the straps.

I kicked the broken swing when she wasn’t looking and the chain swung a little in reaction. I felt frustrated and angry. Suddenly the lights hanging over the streets as we walked back toward the hotel weren’t beautiful, they were just lighting up dirty store front windows and the rain was no longer playful just wet and cold and I was muddy and my hair had fallen flat onto my forehead. Jaymie trotted along silently beside me, maybe she could feel the tension in me or something.

We made it back to the hotel and ducked through a crowd of fans, who looked at me with bewildered expressions on their faces at the muddy clothes I was wearing. They were apparently so surprised to see me looking so dismal and gross that they didn’t really ask for pictures or autographs (who wants to admit the one time they get to see me that I looked like shit?). Jaymie stepped into the elevator with me and when the mirrored door closed she said, “Oh Jesus I look like hell.”

I looked at her reflection, “You look better than me.”

Jaymie laughed. “Even covered in mud, Nick, nobody looks better than you.”

I sighed.

“You sure you’re okay?” She asked.

“Yeah.”

Jaymie looked down at her shoes. She waited a moment, then slipped her hand over and into mine. I squeezed it, though part of me wanted to drop it, to keep her from coming closer to me. I felt like a dangerous drug that she was taking, like something she craved but shouldn’t have.

In the hotel room I went in the bathroom immediately. I closed the door and stood, leaning against the mirror, staring into my own eyes as I undid my tie. I’d been lower than low in the past, I’d hit the rock bottom of everything, and still I’d never felt as shitty as I did right then. I turned on the faucet and splashed water on my face. As I did, the bathroom door creaked open and Jaymie came in. She’d taken off her dress, and all she had on was matching black lingerie. She stood behind me, her cheek pressed to my shoulder, staring into the mirror alongside me. She looked up at me, then she brought her arms around me and ran her hands up my arms. I felt her body press against my mud-coated back.

“You’re gonna get all muddy.”

“Oh well,” she said. She kissed the back of my neck, right at my hairline and peeled my jacket off me, sliding it to the floor. She turned me around so my back was to the sink and started on the buttons of my shirt.

“Jaymie,” I said quietly, “I don’t feel much like -- you know -- right now.”

Jaymie stared up at me, “We don’t have to fuck,” she said.

The words sounded harsh. We’d said it that way for years and years and that was the first time that the word had sounded wrong. I closed my eyes. It felt so weird, like I was being mentally abducted by aliens. Could all these feelings be because of the brain tumor?

I gripped the sink as she continued to unbutton my shirt and push it off my shoulders.

“We’ll just get you cleaned off,” she said.

I nodded.

My shirt joined the jacket on the floor and she undid my belt and pulled it out of the loops on my pants, then unbuttoned and unzipped those and let them fall. She turned away and got the shower running, sticking her hand under the stream to adjust the temperature, then she grabbed my hand and I stepped into the shower. She grabbed a washcloth from the shelf over the toilet and stepped in, too, still in her lingerie. She started gently wiping my back with the cloth, and I felt like she was washing away the entire world. I pressed my face against the cool tiled wall and lost myself in the feeling of her softly scrubbing my skin, down my spine and over the blades of my shoulders and down my arms, my biceps, my forearms… Then she turned me and I looked down into her eyes, her hair hanging wet and thick around her face and over her chest, where the water beaded as it crawled across her tan skin. She pushed the cloth over my chest and down to my abs.

I still didn’t want sex exactly. But I wanted her. There was some kind of difference in my head, something that I didn’t know how to explain. I leaned forward and pressed my mouth against hers, pulling her against me so her skin met mine and I just held her there, feeling her be so close that the water that cascaded over us couldn’t even make it’s way between us.

I dunno how long we stayed in there, making out under the water. But I could’ve stayed there forever.





Jaymie

I woke up the next morning and my eyes took a second to adjust to the sunlight in the room.

I felt the bed shift and looked over. Nick - a non-love-confessing version of him - was sitting up on the edge of the bed, a pair of camo cargo shorts and a grey t-shirt covering him. He was bent forward, tying his sneakers. He glanced back. “Hey you’re awake,” he said.

“Yeah, I’m awake,” I said.

Nick leaned back and took my hand and placed a kiss on my middle knuckle, smiling. “I didn’t wanna wake you up, you looked too pretty sleeping.” He sat up again, “I gotta meet the guys. We got a rehearsal this morning for the show tonight.”

“Oh cool.”

“After, if you want, we can get lunch. I know this place.”

I nodded.

Nick smiled. He stood up and grabbed his phone and wallet from the table, then bent to root around in one of the suitcases for a second. He pulled on his favorite Tampa Bay Buccaneers cap. A little ducktail of hair stuck out of the hole in the back. I didn’t bother telling him. It looked too adorable.

“I’ll only be gone a couple hours,” he said. “Feel free to order room service and stuff.”

“Okay.”

“Bye babe,” he said, and he headed for the door.

“Bye,” I answered.

Once Nick had left, I looked around the hotel room for the room service menu and called for some breakfast and coffee and then opened up my computer. I opened my email inbox. I had several bits of junk mail in there. I deleted those, saved a coupon from Bath & Body Works, and one from Forever 21. I had my weekly FitBit report, and a notice from iTunes telling me everything that was coming out soon. And an email from my dad.

I clicked on that, my heart racing. What in hell would he be emailing me for? I wondered.


Jaymie,
Pilates has asked me to contact you to see if you want to take Rusty. We will not be able to keep him at the house much longer as we have recently discovered that Pilates is allergic to animal hair. If you can’t take him we’ll figure out something else. Please respond within 24-hours.
Thank you, hope all is well,
Your Father.



I blinked at the email in surprise, then looked at the date and my heart leaped. I flung myself to the nightstand to grab my phone. He’d sent the email two days before, but I’d been so caught up with everything with Nick and Brian and the date and all that since we’d got to Germany that I hadn’t even checked my email. No way in hell could he get rid of Rusty. Rusty had been mine and Daniel’s dog and he was so old, nobody would ever rescue him from a pound…

My hands shook as the phone rang.

“Hello?”

It was Pilates. Why was she answering my father’s phone? I wondered.

“Hey,” I said, “Is my Dad there?”

“Who’s this?” Pilates asked.

Fucking hell, like she didn’t know. “It’s Jaymie,” I said, annoyed.

“Oh hello Jaymie!” she trilled, like she was happy to hear from me, like we were long lost friends. I wanted to reach through the phone and throttle her. “Jim,” she called, covering the mouth of the phone, “Your daughter is on the phone.”

I gritted my teeth.

“Jaymie?” my father’s voice came over the line.

“Dad,” I said, “I just got your email about Rusty… I’m sorry, I’m in Germany, I didn’t get a chance to check my email until today. Don’t get rid of him or anything. I’ll be home really soon and I’ll come for him the second I get off the plane.” I had no clue what I was gonna do with him. I couldn’t picture him living in that little apartment over Nick’s garage with me. But it’d have to do until I could figure something out.

“What in hell are you doing in Germany?” he asked.

I didn’t know what to say. I tried to piece together a legitimate answer, but nothing much came to mind. Finally I said, “My boyfriend took me with him on a business trip.”

“Seriously?” he sounded shocked. Probably more about the word boyfriend than any of the rest of it.

“Yes,” I said, “So I can’t come to get Rusty until I get back, but please, please just don’t get rid of him. I’ll take him, Dad.”

My father was quiet for a solid minute. “Well when I didn’t hear from you, I figured you didn’t want him --” he began.

My blood went cold. “Where is he?” I demanded.

“We brought him to the shelter,” my father said. “Downtown.”

“Which shelter?” I demanded. I grabbed my laptop and typed in shelters in Los Angeles into Google. The results were all for battered women and the homeless. I refined my search. Animal shelters in Los Angeles.

“I don’t know the name of it,” he said testily. “Look, Jaymie, now isn’t a good time we’re in the middle of a --”

“How the fuck could you just get rid of my dog?” I demanded, “How could you do that to me? You know what Rusty means to me… what he should mean to you. He’s a part of the family. He’s the only fucking part of the family that seems to give a damn about me anymore, at that,” I snapped. My throat felt raw. There were so fucking many animal shelters in LA, I felt dizzy looking at the list. Over seventy. SEVENTY. “He could be fucking anywhere!”

“Don’t use that kind of language with me,” my father said, angry. “I gave you time to respond before I got rid of him, it’s not my fault that you’re too busy gallivanting across the globe to check your email.”

Anger swelled up in my gut even more than it had at the sound of Pilates’ voice. Not a word to reassure me that he gave a damn about me, to correct me that the dog wasn’t the only family I had left. “Fuck you,” I said, and I pressed the end call button with so much pressure I’m surprised the screen didn’t snap beneath my fingers. I stared hopelessly at the list of shelters. “God fucking damn it,” I cried and I covered my eyes, my heart heavy.

I dialed Nick’s phone number.

Chapter Twenty-Four by Pengi
Chapter Twenty-Four


Jaymie

“Well Kevin’s gonna be pissed, but my mother did something like this to me once and I know how it feels,” Nick said, coming back into the hotel room less than an hour after he’d left it. He hadn’t even made it all the way to the rehearsals. He pulled out his cell phone and stared down at it as he came to a stop at the end of the bed.

“She did?” I asked, looking up at him. I felt sick and I’d started crying at the first ring when I’d called him.

“Yeah,” Nick said, “She got rid of my pug, Willie…” He put the phone to his ear and turned away, facing the wall, which he leaned his palm against and put his weight on his arm. “Hey Kev? It’s me. Listen, I’m sorry, but I ain’t gonna be at the rehearsal. Can you tell the fellas?” He paused, then glanced back over his shoulder at me. “Something came up is all.” He paused. “No, dude, it’s not like that… I know I have her with me, and her name is Jaymie, by the way, but no it’s not that.” He turned back to look at the wall. “Dude, something came up, that’s all. Just tell the fellas something came up and I’ll see y’all at the soundcheck at three.” He hung up the phone.

My mouth felt dry. Nick sighed. “He thought you were blowing it off for sex, didn’t he?”

Nick turned around, “Shows what he knows.”

“It wouldn’t be the first time you did that,” I pointed out.

Nick shrugged. He came over and sat beside me on the bed and stared at the screen where I’d left the list of shelters up. He scrolled up and down the list of 76 hits. “Well some of these are specific types of animals, there’s a few just for cats… this one’s exotic animals. We can narrow this down… There’s duplicate listings…” He murmured. “Once we figure out what shelter he’s at, I can call Chris and have him go pick him up.”

“So what are we gonna do? Call every single one of them?”

“‘Til we find him,” Nick said.

“That’s like a million dollars in calls,” I pointed out.

Nick looked at me, “There’s not really a price you put on family members,” he pointed out. “You do what you gotta.” He smiled, “Besides, I’m footing the bill, why’s it matter to you how much in phone calls we make?”

“I’m just saying…”

“Well don’t worry about it,” he said. He scrolled through the list of shelters again. “Okay, look, here we’ll start here.” He dialed a number and held the phone to his ear. While he waited for someone to pick up, I got up and started pacing the length of the room, my hands shaking. I felt sick with nerves. What if Nick couldn’t find him? What if Rusty had been put down or something? What if --- A million what ifs went through my head, none of them with any real answer until I reached what if I didn’t have Nick to call for help?

Nick grabbed a notepad and pen from the drawer of the nightstand and I watched as he scribbled down some numbers. He looked up at me as he hung up. “Jaymie,” he said, “Stop pacing.”

“I can’t help it,” I said.

“You’re making me nervous doing that,” he commented.

“Well I’m nervous.”

“Well be nervous sitting, then,” he said. Then he added, “Besides, you’ve got awhile before you’re gonna get any answers.” He held up the notepad. He’d written down a series of numbers: 11, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2.

“What’s that? Your guess for the lotto number?”

“Timezones,” he replied. “It’s two in the morning in LA right now.”

I dropped onto the second bed and stared at him. “Seriously?”

Nick nodded. “Yeah.”

“Shit.” I sat down and covered my eyes in frustration. No wonder my father had wanted to get me the fuck off the phone. It was the middle of the night.

“We can call after dinner, ‘round six or seven… that’d be like… nine or ten there,” he said, looking down at the numbers he’d written. “The shelters will be just opening.” He put the notepad down and closed the lid of my computer. “I’m sorry your dad’s a dick,” he said point blank.

“Me, too,” I mumbled.

Nick got up and came over and sat beside me and wrapped one arm around my back. “Yanno, I never realized how much we really do have in common ‘til we started talking recently. It’s funny we ended up stuck together even without getting personal, huh?” He rested his cheek against my shoulder. “And I’m sorry it took so long.”

“Me, too,” I said.

“And also that it had to be like this,” he added.

I nodded.

He felt warm and the nerves I had about Rusty started to melt away. I closed my eyes and let him comfort me. I couldn’t picture life without Nick in it anymore. It just didn’t make sense without him. I couldn’t remember life without him.

You felt that way once about Daniel, my subconscious whispered. And look, life moves on, doesn’t it?

I turned and buried my face into Nick’s shoulder. I was tired of moving on, though.

I wished he could feel the things I felt, just to know how desperately I needed him to get the treatment and get better. Brian had better be right, Nick had better make the right choice, I thought.

“I really glad that we got here somehow, though,” I said into his muscles.

He was quiet for a long moment.

“Do you need to go to rehearsals now?” I asked.

“You should come,” he suggested. “We can go with the fellas and get food after,” he added.

I shook my head, “The fellas hate me.”

“Nawh,” he said.

“Yeah,” I answered.

“Brian doesn’t hate you,” Nick pointed out.

“I guess not,” I answered, though a little reluctantly.

“And neither does AJ,” he added.

“It’s awkward, but he doesn’t hate me, I guess,” I conceded.

Nick smiled, “Howie doesn’t hate anyone. Howie doesn’t even hate the hate gene.”

“I haven’t talked much to Howie before,” I admitted.

“And Kevin hates everyone, it ain’t just you,” Nick said with a smirk. “So see? No reason not to come along with me. It’ll be great. We’ll do that, get some food, do the VIP/Soundcheck thing, then we’ll come back here before the show, make some calls and find Rusty, then I can send Chris over to get him, and we’ll go to the show and everyone’ll live happily ever after. You can’t get a better laid plan than all that,” he said.

I laughed in spite of the nervousness in my stomach. “Okay,” I agreed.

Nick smiled, “Excellent.” He whipped his cellphone back out and I watched from his shoulder as he texted Kevin, telling him he’d be there in twenty minutes. “Go get dressed,” he said, “Unless you’re going like that?”

In all the anxiety about Rusty, I’d completely forgotten that I was still only wearing the bra and panties I’d worn into the shower the night before.

“Yeah. No.”

“I mean I won’t complain…” Nick grinned.

“Hush,” I said, and I got up and got my clothes from the suitcase.

“You look good!” he called after me as I closed the bathroom door.





Nick

I could tell Jaymie was still anxious about Rusty and also about being around the fellas. I knew she kind of was right about the guys not really liking her and that made me feel bad. I wanted them to like her, especially now, because… well, I guess part of me felt like maybe she wouldn’t be alone after I… if I… you know. I just wanted everyone to be okay, and if they liked her, then maybe Jaymie would have a place in the same make-shift family I’d landed in after running away from my blood.

A big part of that anxiety melted when Brian waved enthusiastically at us as we came in the door. “Hallo!” he shouted, his voice echoing throughout the empty auditorium. He grinned.

“Is he saying hi to me?” Jaymie whispered.

“Seems to be,” I whispered back and I grabbed her hand, “I’m telling you, the guys ain’t as scary as you think they are.”

“I don’t think for no good reason,” Jaymie hissed, “It’s from experience.” She flashed Brian her brightest smile, “Hey!”

AJ, Howie and Kevin all three were looking at Brian’s back like he had seven heads sprouting from his spine as he jumped down off the side of the stage and gave Jaymie a hug and me a high-5. AJ looked at Howie and I saw his mouth form the words what the fuck? and Howie shrugged in response.

“Hey guys,” I waved. “Nice seeing you while I’m vertical again,” I joked. Last time I’d seen all of them together I’d been flat on my back on my way to the hospital.

“Yeah it is,” Kevin said, still staring at Brian in surprise as he pointed out a seat to Jaymie and ran back to the steps of the stage. Kevin’s eyebrows knit together questioningly, asking without saying a word outloud.

Brian smiled as though he didn’t register the look Kev was giving him. “C’mon Nick, get up here and rehearse with us,” he demanded, then promptly threw himself into a handstand and attempted to do some of the dance steps to All I Have To Give upside down.

Kevin pushed his feet down to the floor, tipping him over.

It was a tiring hour and a half, and I was glad that I’d made it to do the rehearsal. I’d forgotten a lot of the steps in the time I’d been away and it was good to get a refresher before there were thousands of people staring at me and scrutinizing my every move. Which they’d be doing even more than usual, seeing as last time I’d been on stage I’d dropped nearly-dead halfway through the show. Jaymie watched from the seat Brian had shown her, and the couple times I glanced over, her eyes following us, mesmerized as any fan might’ve been in the same situation.

“She hasn’t taken her eyes off you, dude,” AJ mumbled at one point while I was tugging my guitar strap over my head for the acoustic set. “Like legit that chick is fucking into you. More than before.” He picked up a bottle of water and a towel from the top of one of the amp storage boxes that lined the stage. “Something going on there?”

I shrugged.

AJ grinned, “There is, ain’t there? Are you finally making her a decent woman, my man?”

“A decent woman?”

“You know, lovin’ on her properly, not just ‘cos you like bein’ the beast with two backs?”

“There is nobody that’s as poetic as you when it comes to euphemisms, you know that, AJ?” I asked, rolling my eyes, “Jesus.”

“What? That’s Shakespeare, man,” he argued. “For real, dude.”

“You’re fulla shit,” I said. “And… I dunno what me and Jaymie are doing to be honest. I mean, we’ve been talkin’ about it and… I dunno. There’s like feelings, but…” I shrugged. I didn’t know how much Brian had told the other guys, and if they didn’t know, I didn’t really want to tell them about the tumor.

AJ glanced back at Jaymie, then at me. “Feelings, huh?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“Do you love her?”

“I dunno,” I answered.

“Does she love you?”

“She said she did, on the plane over here…”

AJ smirked, “I heard about the Mile High Club.” His eyes twinkled evilly. “So wait, you fucked her in an airplane toilet and then she said she loved you?”

“Yeah, basically.”

“What’d you do?”

“Run like fuck back to my plane seat, where I was glared at by nuns.”

AJ raised an eyebrow, “You didn’t say it back?”

“I wasn’t sure I felt it.”

AJ made a hand gesture, “Do you now?” he asked.

“I -- I dunno. Kinda, maybe. But there’s… there’s stuff that makes it complicated, and…” I shrugged again.

AJ took a long sip from his water bottle, staring at me with incredulous eyebrows.

“Are you ladies joining us out here or what?” Kevin called from his seat behind the little keyboard he used during the acoustic set.

“Yeah, my wood’s getting heavy ‘cos it’s so big,” Howie joked with a wicked grin.

AJ looked at me, “You get your shit together and tell that girl you fuckin’ love her. ‘Cos you do. It’s in your face.” AJ walked away to his place on the stage. "Of course your wood's gettin' bigger D, you're waiting for me to come over there and that turns you the fuck on you pervert..."

"You ain't causin' me no wood, J," Howie said back.

I walked over to my stool, tuning the guitar as I went.

Brian glanced over as I sat down. “Everything okay?”

I nodded, “Sure is.”

“Okay cool.” He grinned, then turned back to his own guitar. I looked out at Jaymie, who waved and smiled up at me. I smiled back, then put my fingers on the strings and began to play the opening chords of Madelaine.

Chapter Twenty-Five by Pengi
Chapter Twenty-Five


Nick

After rehearsal, we crowded backstage and dug into the catering the venue had brought in, gathering little meat pies and sandwiches from foil covered hotplates. Settling down at a couple folding tables, Jaymie scootched her chair closer to mine and stared around as the other guys settled in and started eating, banter flying across the table. “So, Jaymie,” Kevin said suddenly, making her head snap in his direction in surprise at being addressed, “What is it that you do back home in LA?”

“Besides Nick?” she joked. A month ago, this joke would’ve caused awkward silence. And at first that’s what it was received with until Brian laughed and the other guys joined in. Jaymie smiled, her nerves melting just a little bit at the warmth of them laughing at her joke. Once the initial ice was broken, soon the guys were laughing and joking with Jaymie, just like I’d hoped. I leaned back in my chair and watched, sipping on a cup of coffee.

When we’d finished the food, the VIPs were lined up outside and I kissed Jaymie on the cheek and went to do the soundcheck Q&A and meet and greet. Jaymie sat in the back of the crowd, watching, and I smiled at her a couple times during the soundcheck part as we sang some of the songs we don’t get to do in the show. After the tiring string of meet and greets had finally ended and the auditorium was clear, I collected Jaymie to head back to the hotel.

“We’ll be back in a couple hours,” I told the guys as we left.

“Better be,” Kevin said.

“I’ll make sure he’s back in one piece and on time,” Jaymie reassured him.

Back at the hotel, we made a list of the shelters that were most likely and split the list between us, each of us had about thirty numbers to call. I was starting to get a headache, so after I’d called a couple shelters, I went to the bathroom and leaned over the sink, my eyes closed, taking deep breaths.

Wetting a face cloth with icy cold water, I rolled it and set it on the back of my neck, leaning down onto the sink and pressing my forehead against the cold of the faucet. The headache was settled right behind my eyelids, a huge amount of pressure pushing against the front of my skull. It was like a bowling ball had been rolled forward on the inside of my head. I reached up and turned the light off, my knuckles tight against the counter.

“NICK! OH my God! They have him! I found him!” Jaymie’s voice was loud and seemed to echo around the inside of the bathroom, making my head ache even worse. I winced. “Nick, c’mere, quick! What’s Chris’s last name? Holy shit.”

Her excitement seemed foreign and for a second I almost couldn’t bring to mind why she was excited. Then I remembered: Rusty, the dog. She’d found the dog. Chris had to go pick him up. I took the cloth off my neck - it was hot and gross now from my body heat, and I dropped it into the sink, emerging into the too-bright living area of the hotel room. Jaymie was on her knees, looking ecstatic on the bed. “Nick, quick. What’s Chris’s last name?”

What is Chris’s last name? I wondered for a moment before it came to me, “Uhh, Stens -- Stensby,” I answered.

“Yes… yes Chris Stensby will pick him up… Do you take credit cards?” she turned away, clutching the phone to her ear in excitement as she finished rescuing the dog, oblivious to how shitty I probably looked. I reached in my pocket for my wallet and handed it to her. She mouthed the words thank you as she took the card from my palm. I nodded and headed back to the restroom because I could feel the meat pies and sandwiches crawling their way back up my throat.

When she’d hung up her phone, Jaymie knocked on the door, “You okay in there?”

“Be right out,” I called back. I was sitting on the floor in the dark, my forehead in my hands now.

“As long as Chris picks him up in the next two days we’re good,” she informed me through the door.

“Great,” I replied.

“You were brilliant,” she said, “Coming up with that idea. You’re amazing.” I heard her reach for the door handle. But I’d locked it, as she discovered. She rattled the handle. “Nick? You sure you’re okay?” she asked, concern coming to her voice.

“Yeah, yeah I’m sure,” I replied. I got up and took a deep breath, staring into the mirror to make sure I didn’t look completely unraveled, then opened the door.

Jaymie studied me a moment, then, deciding I really was okay, she said, “Nick, thank you so much.”

“No problem,” I said. “Like I said earlier, my mom did this to me once. I understand what it’s like to suddenly be without your -- what’re they calling them these days? -- fur baby?”

Jaymie laughed and smiled and wrapped her arms around me. “Still. You’re a hero.”

I laughed, “Not really.”

Yeah really,” she nodded, and she kissed me softly. But only briefly before pulling back. “Are you sure you’re okay? You feel clammy.” She put her hand to my forehead. “Jesus Christ Nick, you’re burning up.”

I hummed the opening chords to the song.

“No Nick, I’m serious,” she turned to the suitcase and started rooting around. “You need an Advil or something to break that fever…”

“I’m okay, really,” I replied.

Jaymie still dug out the pills and shook two into my palm, then went for a bottle of water from the mini fridge. “Take those,” she commanded.

I took them.

“Are you sure you’re okay for the show tonight?” she pressed, staring up at me. I nodded. “Absolutely sure?”

“Jaymie,” I said, finishing the bottle of water she’d given me, “I thought we had an agreement about this?”

“I’m not saying you need treatment, I’m asking you if you’re okay.”

I sighed, “I’m fine. I swear. Lemme call Chris and tell him what’s up with the dog thing.”

Jaymie nodded and stepped out of my way as I went over to the bed and sat down. The truth is, I sat a little heavier than I intended to because my legs gave out on me a little. I gripped the edge of the mattress and closed my eyes for a second as I scrolled through the contacts list and called Chris, hoping for the world to stop spinning.

The Advil must’ve kicked in while I was on the phone explaining to Chris what was up with Rusty because by the time I’d hung up, I felt a little bit better. I smiled up at Jaymie, “Chris is gonna go get him in a couple hours,” I told her. “Said he’d text me once he did.” I looked at the clock, “We better get back to the venue.”

Jaymie was still staring at me in concern, but she didn’t ask again if I was okay, which I appreciated but also kind of felt a little nervous about. I hoped she didn’t think that my snap had been indication not to talk to me about personal stuff again or something -- that hadn’t been how I’d meant it. But I didn’t know how to say that to her, so we just walked down to the waiting car out front and went back to the venue, where the fellas - and a sold out audience - were waiting for me.

And I really was okay for the show.

Or at least for a good part of it.

The lights were hotter than hell and bright. They seemed brighter than they used to be or something. I squinted against them as I danced, the sweat building up on my body like a slick outer layer. Brian came by a couple times and asked if I was okay, and every time I assured him that I was. I couldn’t see Jaymie, she had seats somewhere in the first twenty rows, but the lights were so fucking big and bright I couldn’t see past the third row, so I wasn’t sure where she was at.

Before the break to the acoustic set, I stepped to the side to get my guitar, just as I’d done at the rehearsal, except this time Brian came over. “Nick,” he whispered, “You okay out there?”

I glanced at him, “I’m okay. Why wouldn’t I be?”

Brian raised his eyebrow at me.

“Right,” I said. I nodded, “I’m okay, though.”

Brian nodded too. “Okay.” He bounded away, his guitar already around his neck in the short amount of time I’d spent chatting with him. I went after him and climbed about my stool.

“We’re gonna take you on a journey waaay back,” Howie was saying by way of introducing the song,”Back to the place where we first began. If you know the words, sing along…”

And just like that the fellas launched into Quit Playing Games and I scrambled to do the same.

”Even in my heart… I see.. you’re not being true to me… deep within my soul… I feel… that nothing’s like it used to be…” Brian sang, leaning into the microphone, strumming his guitar.

I played too, my eyes traveling over the audience, staring into all these eyes and the lights moving, flashing and blinding me then moving along, swiveling, shooting beams of multicolored lights all over the venue. Girls screamed, the music swelled as Brian started singing the chorus…

”Quit playing gaaames with my heaaart…” He smiled over at me.

And the music played…

...and played…

And the guys were all staring at me… and the fans were mumbling…

“Nick,” Howie hissed, “Your verse dude?”

I looked over at Howie. “What?”

“Your verse. Sing your verse.”

I turned to the mic and realized I had no fucking idea what the lyric was.





Jaymie

He looked like a fish out of water, like that ad for asthma awareness where the goldfish escapes its bowl. Nick sat there looking perplexed until Howie jumped in and started singing the next line - “I live my life… the way… to keep you coming back to me…” But it was too late and the tension in the venue was obvious as everyone stared at Nick, whose fingers had slowed on the guitar as he stared at Howie in shock. He glanced back and forth. Brian was leaning forward to try and see Nick’s face.

Suddenly, Nick just stood up and swung the guitar off his shoulders and walked off the stage.

“Shit,” I gasped and I got up, pushing my way through the rows of girls to the front, where Mike was climbing onto the stage to go after Nick. “MIke!” I yelled from the third row. “Excuse me,” I snapped, pushing by a particularly stubborn-to-move fan. “Mike!” He turned around and spotted me, and pulled me onto the stage with him and we both ran after Nick while the other Boys tried their very best to pretend nothing crazy was happening, though I did see them glancing back over their shoulders with worried expressions as Mike and I dashed to catch up to Nick.

He was off stage by several feet, kneeling down, throwing up into an overturned fedora from the All I Have to Give set. Several of the roadies and production guys were standing around, looking disgusted as Nick retched into the hat.

“God damn it, someone get him something better to barf into,” I snapped at them as Mike and I approached. One of them dashed off to find something at my command. “Nick,” I said, kneeling down beside him. Mike did, too. “What’s wrong? And don’t you dare say nothing.”

“I forgot the lyrics,” he choked, eyes red, snot coming out of his nose. “They just… they weren’t there…” His stomach empty, he kept retching without producing anything, his hands shaking.

“Shh,” I whispered, and I rubbed his back. The roadie that had gone in hunt of an appropriate barf bucket returned with a tiny bag-lined trash bin, and I took the vomit-filled hat from Nick. Mike took it from me and threw it away in a huge bin a couple feet away. “It’s gonna be okay, Nick,” I whispered as he stayed bent over, hit with a new wave of sick every few seconds. I felt so helpless, just rubbing his back, telling him it’d be okay, because I didn’t know what the hell else to do. “It’s okay… it’s okay…”

But I was terrified it wasn’t.

“One of you call an ambulance,” I barked at the roadies again.

Nick shook his head, “No,” he spat out, looking desperate. “No ambulance. It’s just… just a little… throw-up,” he struggled. “I’m okay.”

“How the hell can you say that?” I demanded as Nick pushed himself, wobbly-kneed from the floor. Mike caught his arm, steadying him. “Nick you are so not okay,” I said.

“Yeah no I’m okay,” Nick gurgled and he pushed himself up. “Really.”

“Mike,” I pleaded, looking up at the guard as Nick started to attempt to hobble toward the stage.

Mike grabbed hold on Nick’s arm. “Nick, she’s right,” he said.

“I’m fine,” Nick scowled, “I’m not leaving… another… show…” he pulled out of Mike’s grip and wobbled three steps toward the stage before he started to go down again, but this time, Kevin was there, coming from the stage and caught him head-on before he fell down.

“The fuck is going on?” Kevin demanded, “I thought you said your cardiologist cleared you?”

Nick looked miserable.

“His cardiologist cleared him,” I confirmed pointedly.

Nick glowered and pulled out of Kevin’s grip, “You just wanna tell everyone, don’t you?” he snapped at me. He ripped the little headset microphone from his ear and shoved it at me. “Here. Tell the fucking world why don’t you? Just get it over with, just tell everyone. Just shout it out into the microphone, why don’t you?” I stood there, stunned. Nick pushed me out of the way and hobbled backstage.

“Nick!” Kevin shouted, and went after him. Mike did, too. I stood there, dumbfounded, unsure what to say or do.

Brian appeared. “What happened?” he asked.

I looked up, still clutching the microphone.

“You’re wrong,” I said, and I shoved the microphone set into Brian’s hand before charging after Nick.

Chapter Twenty-Six by Pengi
Chapter Twenty-Six


Jaymie

Kevin looked like an angry bear charging it’s prey when I literally collided with him in the hallway leading from the stage to the back of the venue. He caught me from falling down - or maybe he was going to grab a hold of me whether I’d nearly fallen or not, I’m not sure - his hands tightened on my shoulders. “What. The actual fuck. Is going on?” he demanded.

I heard footsteps behind me and without looking I knew exactly who it would be. “Why don’t you ask Brian?” I snapped, “Since he knows everything about Nick.”

Brian skidded to a stop behind me. “Where is he?” he asked without even addressing what I’d just said.

“He left,” Kevin replied in a flat tone.

He left?” I choked, panic bubbling up in me.

“Yes, he left,” Kevin answered.

“Why would you let him leave?” Brian asked, his voice as rough as I’d ever heard it.

I turned on him - a fire raging in me like I’d never felt before. “Like this is Kevin’s fault?” I snarled, “Fucking hell! YOU couldn’t just fucking back me up, could you? Couldn’t just agree with me that he needed the treatment, could you? Oh hell no, because your personal vendetta against me was sooo strong. Imagine you agreeing with something someone like me... Gotta go with this fucking reverse psychology shit…” I slammed my index finger against Brian’s chest, “You are playing roulette with his life,” I yelled, “And why should that worry you, really, I guess. It’s not like y’all have been friends in years. What the fuck made me even ask you for help - you don’t give a damn about him, you’re too busy judging the world from yon pearly gates of your heavenly throne. You don’t even know him anymore.”

Brian looked at me like a puppy dog that had just been kicked. His eyes were wide and they glistened around the edges. Let him cry, I thought bitterly. Please, for the love of God, let the guy cry. I kinda wanted to know that my words had created some sort of emotional response in him. “I thought --” Brian’s voice cracked. “I just -- he always used to...” but he stopped midsentence and took a shaking breath. “Look, what’s important now is finding out where he went and --”

“Fuck you. Be a better friend,” I snapped.

Kevin cleared his throat. “Treatment for what, exactly?”

Brian was staring at his shoes. I turned to Kevin. “Like I said. Ask Brian.” I pushed around him, “I have to go find Nick.” I slammed out the door to the back parking lot of the venue, leaving the Boys in a huddle in the hallway.

Outside, it was dark, and there were stars overhead, the moonlight pale across the cement. I stood in the yellow glow of a lamp on the side of the building and stared around. There was no sign of Nick anywhere. I could only assume that he’d taken Mike with him wherever he’d gone, which made me feel a little better. At least he wasn’t alone wherever he’d gone. I wondered what the Boys were doing about the fans inside, if they’d continue the show without him or if any of them would help me try to find him.

I pulled my phone out of my pocket. The odds of Nick just answering the phone were nilch, I knew that, but at the same time it seemed stupid not to at least try. I had a missed text message. I swiped my thumb to view it and it was from Nick - a screen shot of a Snap Chat from Chris. He was hugging Rusty, who was sitting in the front seat of his car, with a note that said, Look who I’ve got?

Nick had just sent the text.

Quickly, I signed onto messenger.

He was online.

PurpleNailPolish: nick
PurpleNailPolish: where are you?
PurpleNailPolish: im so sorry ...i didnt meant to be an asshole please talk to me. please.

I held my breath, staring at the screen. “Please,” I whispered outloud as the notation at the bottom changed from delivered to read with the timestamp. My heart raced. He’d seen the message. But he wasn’t typing. He wasn’t answering me. “Please,” I whispered again, willing him with every fiber of my being to just type me back a fucking message. Anything would do. Anything at all.

PurpleNailPolish: im freaking out nick please
PurpleNailPolish: don’t shut me out...not now

Then, mercifully, there it was. Typing… showed up on my screen and I let out a breath I’d barely realized I’d been holding.

TampaBuccsFan28: im not
PurpleNailPolish: tell me ur okay
TampaBuccsFan28: im ok
PurpleNailPolish: are you really?
TampaBuccsFan28: idk
TampaBuccsFan28: im back to the hotel
TampaBuccsFan28 has signed off.

I looked around the venue lot. He was okay. He seemed more defeated than pissed in writing, but it was hard to tell with him sometimes without seeing his face and hearing his tone of voice. I wasn’t sure how to call for a cab in Germany, so I turned back to the door to the backstage and tried to pull it open, only to discovered it was had automatically locked behind me.

“Mother fucknugget,” I muttered, kicking the metal door lightly. I sighed and leaned against the wall. I was gonna have to wait here for the Boys ‘cos there wasn’t really any other way out other than to walk all the fuck the way around the venue and who knows what sketchiness lay outside of those very high fences that surrounded the lot? I sank to the cement and hugged my knees. I wasn’t particularly looking forward to talking to any of the guys again. I’d managed to make friends with them and then destroy that friendship in less than ten hours. It had to be some kind of world record.





Nick

I’ll be the first to admit I was prolly acting more like a spoiled seven year old, but I wasn’t sure what the protocol was on something like this. It sounds stupid but I’d never been more stage fright in my entire life than in that instant when I realized I didn’t know the words to a song I’d been singing literally almost every day for over twenty years. It was the most terrifying moment… because it represented a lot more than just the song being fucked up. It represented my life being fucked up, it represented how this damn tumor was snaking around in my brain, taking away functions and memories. It represented everything that scared me most about it.

I paced the length of the big window that overlooked the city outside, the lights glowing bright and colorful below. I was muttering lyrics to myself, one BSB song after another, just an endless stream of Backstreet. “But we are two worlds apart, can’t reach to your heart, when you say, that I want it that way… Am I original? Yeah. Am I the only one? Yeah. Am I sexual? Yeah. Am I everything you need you better rock your body now… Open up your heart to me… and say what’s on your mind…” The door to the room creaked open and I stopped and looked up.

Jaymie was standing in the little hallway.

I stood still for a second, staring at her.

“Did you tell them?” I asked.

Jaymie shook her head.

“Did Brian?”

“I don’t know,” she answered. She dropped her purse onto the floor and took a couple slow steps towards me, like she was approaching a wild animal. I kinda felt like a wild animal, actually. She stopped a couple feet away. “I can’t imagine how terrifying this must be for you.”

I swallowed. “Terrifying is a good word for it.”

“I’m sorry,” she said.

I sat down on the end of the bed, staring down at my hands. I felt exhausted all at once. “There’s a lotta things I feel you can’t imagine,” I said, and my exhaustion turned into this strange exposed, super vulnerable feeling and I buried my face in my hands. I half expected Fate to step in, like talking about any feelings at all was maybe a violation of her allowances, but nothing happened, so I continued, “I’m sad and I’m confused and I’m lonely and I’m scared and -- I don’t want to die, but I feel like I ain’t got a choice.”

“You do have a choice,” Jaymie’s voice was gentle and she set herself beside me, “I mean not in the super long run because - news flash, you’re gonna die eventually, but not for a really long time. You have a choice right now. There’s options.”

I felt tears burning my eyeballs and I rubbed the heel of my hand against them, trying to stop the tears from actually coming out. I didn’t wanna look like a baby.

“And you shouldn’t feel lonely, Nick, because you’re not alone,” Jaymie continued. I looked up at her, still struggling to keep the tears inside me. “You have me. You’ve always got me. And the guys, if you’d tell them. They’d be there for you. And I bet your fans would, too.”

“But telling everybody makes it realer,” I said.

“Maybe it’s gotta be real in order for you to fight it,” she suggested. “It’s real whether it feels real or not, and the longer you wait for it to feel like it’s real, the harder your fight will be. It’s like you’re giving the tumor time to collect and hide it’s weapons of mass destruction, Nick. You gotta just go in and stop it before it has time to move.”

“Maybe,” I replied. I snuffled. “There’s just so many people depending on me,” I said. “I feel like I keep letting them down, all them fans, and the fellas and you and stuff. If I do the treatment, I’m gonna let them all down real bad. I’m gonna be sick a real long time and I’ma loose my hair and get ugly and stuff and -- and nobodys gonna like me anymore ‘cos -- well ‘cos I’ll be ugly and have lost my hair and be sick and stuff.” I looked at her. “You aren’t gonna wanna fuck a ugly hairless sick dude.”

Jaymie sat down next to me and then scootched closer. Her side was against my side. She grabbed my hand, spun her fingers through mine, and squeezed my hand until I bent my fingers around hers. “No matter what happens, Nick,” she promised, “I will be here by your side. I will not leave you.”

I looked at her, let her words melt into my skin.

Then, because I could think of nothing else to say and it was just so damn tense in the room and I couldn’t stand the intensity another second, I said, “I notice you didn’t say anything about if you’d still wanna fuck me or not.”

Jaymie smirked, “I think you’d be a pretty fuckable ugly hairless guy,” she said.

“Even though I’ma end up lookin’ like Mister Mulder?” I asked, “I know you hate Mulder.”

“That cat is the spawn of Satan,” Jaymie said, nodding.

“See? You won’t wanna fuck me if I look like Mulder.”

Jaymie kissed my face. “Nick. I will fuck you even if you look like Mulder.”

I smiled and turned my face to meet her mouth. “I love you,” I said, without even thinking twice about it.

Chapter Twenty-Seven by Pengi
Chapter Twenty-Seven


Nick

Jaymie pulled back and stared at me. “What?” Her eyes were wider than I’d ever seen them before. “You… what?”

My mouth went dry. I stared in her face and my tongue suddenly didn’t wanna work. I stood up, breaking us apart, walking the length of the room. What is wrong with you Carter?! I demanded of myself. Why would you say that? What are you, stupid or something?

“Nick?” Jaymie’s voice shook.

I felt like I might throw up as I came to a stop. “I can’t say it again,” I said.

She stared at me. “But you… you did say it, right? I’m not imagining this?”

I nodded reluctantly, slowly.

Jaymie stood up too. “You don’t have to say it again if you don’t want to.”

“It’s not ‘cos I don’t feel it,” I said. “It’s because of my brain.” I waved my hand at my head. “I don’t wanna hurt you. That’s why I can’t say it again.”

Jaymie stayed at a distance, “I understand.”

“Okay.”

“For the record, it wouldn’t hurt me… if you did say it.”

“It could.”

“It wouldn’t.”

“But it could. In the long run. If I -- you know.”

“That’s gonna hurt whether you say it or not. If you. You know. Not that you are.”

I edged toward the window. I felt like we were in some kind of show down like in the TV shows, like one of us should’ve been brandishing a gun, like one of us was nearly killed in an exchange of fire. If anyone had the death blow bullet in their gun chamber, though, it was me and my tumor. “It’ll hurt worse if we’re… together.”

“It’d hurt like a son of a bitch if I knew there’d been a chance and we didn’t take it,” Jaymie said.

I shook my head, “I can’t do that.”

Jaymie nodded, “I understand. But… just know that if you change your mind, if you decide you can…” she paused.

I nodded.

“Okay.” She smiled awkwardly, then, just as awkwardly, sat back down on the bed, “Yay for understandings, huh?”

“Yeah.” I said. “Yay.”

Jaymie and I were both quiet for a few minutes. I wondered why Fate hadn’t stepped in to stop me. The night before she’d literally thrown me to the ground on my ass before she’d let me utter those words. Tonight, she’d let me get them out. Had this been a test? Had I failed? Was Fate gonna kick me in the nuts at any given moment?

There was a knock at the door and I jumped in surprise.

Jaymie got up and went to the door. She looked through the peephole and groaned. She looked at me. “It’s Brian.”

I nodded and Jaymie opened the door.

Brian came in, sweaty and disheveled looking, like he’d run up the steps to get to the door. “Oh God, you’re okay, thank God.” He walked swiftly across the room and wrapped his arms around me.

“Yeah I’m alright,” I said, just standing there while he squeezed the ever-lovin’ life out of me. When he finally let me go, he held me at arms length and stared at me intensely. “Um…” I said.

“I’m sorry,” he said, “Jaymie was -- Jaymie was right.” I could tell it pained him to say the words. My eyes darted to Jaymie, who looked surprised. “She was right. Nick, you need to get the treatment. Now. Not later, not when you decide you need it, but right now. Yesterday.” Brian took a deep breath, “When it was me and my heart -- it got worse, Nick. If I’d just gone when I first found out I needed help --” he shook his head. “But I put it off. For this. For BSB.” He frowned. “You need to go. Now.”

“Well I just decided that I was ---” I started, but I was interrupted by Kevin, AJ, and Howie all pouring in the still open door. Jaymie turned in surprise as they came up behind her. AJ was staring at me with eyes almost as wide as Jaymie’s had been when I’d said the L-word a few minutes before. Howie was pale.

“You told me you got cleared to come back,” Kevin said thickly.

“I did get cleared,” I said. “By my cardiologist.”

Kevin stared at me for a long moment. “Nick.”

I took a deep breath. “Okay.” I let out the deep breath. “I have an anaplastic astrocycoma.” Kevin and Howie both looked like they knew what that was, but AJ was just looking at me with about a hundred questions in his eyes, so I added, “It’s a tumor, in the brain.”

Brian closed his eyes. Jaymie was hovering by the door, which she’d pushed closed behind the fellas after Brian’s admission that she was right. AJ shook his head, “Fuck you. It ain’t fuckin’ April Fools day.” But when I didn’t crack a smile he added, “We bein’ punk’d or something?” He looked around, then back to me, “This ain’t funny man.”

“I don’t think he’s joking, J,” Howie mumbled.

We all stood there for several long moments, none of us looking at the others, the weight of my words hanging among us. Finally, as usual, the first one of us to gather the strength up was Kevin. “So is this related to the heart attack?”

I nodded.

“And the forgetting the lyrics?”

I nodded again.

Kevin sighed and walked over and dropped into a chair by the window, pushing aside some clothes I’d left there, including the muddy remains of my suit from the night before. It seemed like eons ago, rather than hours. He rubbed his forehead.

“How long have you known?” Howie questioned.

“A few months,” I mumbled.

AJ turned around and, stepping around Jaymie, left the room, slamming the door behind himself.

Kevin looked up and frowned at the door. He sighed, then looked back down at his knees.

“Did they give you a prognosis?” Howie asked.

Kevin looked up again. Brian and Jaymie both looked at me, too.

“Just… just that I needed treatment…” I mumbled.

“And you didn’t do it?” Kevin asked, frustration in his tone.

“I’m standing here, aren’t I?”

“Damn it, Nick,” Howie muttered.

I licked my lips. “I just… wanted to be ready… incase. You know.”

Kevin’s jaw set, steel like, and he said, “Don’t even say that.”

“I’m just thinking realistic,” I answered.

We all fell silent again. And once again, the silence was broken several moments later by Kevin. “You’re going back to LA, you’ll get the treatment immediately. Everything is cancelled until Nick is better. I refuse to sing a note until Nick’s healed.” His demeanor was absolute.

My eyes widened. “But what about --”

“I’m not doing it either ‘til you’re treated,” Howie agreed with Kevin.

“But -- But shouldn’t y’all talk to AJ first?” I asked.

“The decision is majority. It’s made whatever he says. But I’m pretty sure he’ll agree with us anyway,” Kevin said. He studied me for a long moment. “We have your back, man.”

Brian looked serious. “Nick, you’re our little brother.”

My eyes felt hot and I had a feeling I wasn’t gonna be able to keep these tears in.





Jaymie

“This place was like another home to me,” Nick said, staring out the window of the car that was bringing us to the airport. I held his hand. He squeezed my fingers. “I practically grew up here with the Boys... There’s so many memories of this place… I hope I see it again someday.” His lower jaw trembled ever so slightly.

“You will,” I said.

He was bobbing his knee with nerves, his free fist balled around a handful of fabric at his thigh as he shook his leg. He closed his eyes and leaned back into the seat, leaning his head back to aim his face up at the ceiling. I leaned my head against his shoulder and tried to exude comforting feelings.

On the plane, Nick fell asleep almost immediately, his headphones on and in much the same position as he’d been in the car. I watched movie after movie on the little screen in front of us, rubbing his knuckles with my fingers as fictional characters’ dramas played out before my eyes and were resolved in a neat little package of 120 minutes. If only life were like that, I thought, how much easier life would be.

Nick stayed asleep through the entire flight, only waking up when I nudged him and slid his headphones off so I could whisper that we were about to land. “We are?” he murmured, “Shit.” He stretched, cracking his back from the stiffness of sitting in one position for all those hours in the air. “I feel like we just left,” he said.

“You were a sleepy head,” I answered.

“I have a headache,” he said.

“The pressure from the plane maybe,” I said, trying not to think about the significance of Nick and his headaches.

“Yeah,” he answered. He rubbed his forehead and leaned forward, covering his eyes.

On the way to the ground, he used both our barf bags, his hands shaking as he plucked them from the pouches on the back of the seats. I rubbed his back as the plane hit the tarmac, the wheels bouncing once...twice...three times before it settled, and Nick wretched into the bag. “There we go,” I said in a soothing tone, “We’re on the ground again.”

He nodded, his eyes closed.

“It’s gonna be okay,” I added.

He didn’t respond, just kept his eyes closed.

The plane taxiied to the terminal and came to a stop as the flight attendant thanked us for flying the airline and welcomed us to Los Angeles, running through the weather report. Sunshine and moderate temperatures, like always, of course. And I watched as the other passengers got up and collected their things from the overhead and shuffled down the aisles and off the plane. Nick didn’t move, he just kept gripping his head, bent forward almost doubled over, eyes closed.

“Nick, we gotta go,” I said.

“No,” he muttered.

I licked my lips. There were only two other passengers on the plane and they were pulling a guitar down from the overhead bin that would’ve been awkward to get with everyone else moving through the plane. The flight attendant was on their way towards us.

“Nick, we have to, the plane’s landed, everyone’s off it.”

“Excuse me, is everything okay?” the flight attendant asked, looking alarmed.

I looked up at him helplessly because I didn’t know what to say.

Nick lifted his head slowly, “I’m okay,” he said, squinting at the guy. “I’m fine. Thanks.” He waved him away, then stood up, shaky. He grabbed the seat in front of him for balance. The flight attendant reached to help him. “Don’t touch me,” Nick snapped. The guy held his hands up and backed up, looking at me helplessly.

“Nick…” I said, surprised by the attitude. “He’s just trying to help.”

“I don’t need help,” he said, his voice clipped. “I’m fine.”

I gave the flight attendant with an apologetic look as I grabbed our carry on bags myself and Nick moved slowly down the aisle of the plane, holding onto seats to stay balanced. We walked into the terminal with one of his hands constantly against the wall, fingers splayed, and in the lobby area, a couple of airline employees looked over from the little desk by the door as Nick stumbled to a chair and set himself down by the window, taking deep breaths.

I knelt down in front of him. “Nick, we need to bring you to the hospital.”

He closed his eyes.

“Nick?”

“No. No hospitals.”

“But you said --”

“Not yet. I wanna go home. I just want one more night in my home then we can --” he paused, wincing. When he’d caught his breath, he said, “Then we can -- deal with -- whatever…”

“But Nick,” I said, “If you’re in this much pain then you need to --”

He interrupted me as he gripped his head with both hands. “Fuck!” he shouted, his voice ringing through the airport. People walking by looked over. “I can’t -- I can’t think… it hurts…” He tangled his fingers in his hair, pressing his fists against his skull. His face crumpled, his eyes screwed tightly shut.

I pulled out my cell phone. “I’m sorry, Nick, but you’re going to the hospital,” I said firmly, as I dialed 911.

Chapter Twenty-Eight by Pengi
Chapter Twenty-Eight


Jaymie

I felt helpless. It seemed to take forever for the EMTs to get to us. Silent tears streamed down his face as he rocked forward and backward, clutching his head, and all I could do was rub his back and tell him it was gonna be okay and I couldn’t even say it with a lot of conviction because I wasn’t even sure that I believed myself. When they got there, they loaded him up onto a stretcher carefully, asking him all kinds of questions that he answered through gritted teeth. I shook as I followed after them, hoisting our carry-on luggage on my shoulders, my heart thumping so hard I could barely breathe.

At the hospital, they rushed him through the ER with me tailing them, through some double doors that prohibited me following them and the last I saw of him was him doubled over crying out because the pain had been especially sharp. I put my hand over my mouth and stood there, watching through little windows on the door until they’d turned a corner and he was gone.

“There’s a waiting area,” a nurse suggested, “Right down the hallway here.” She guided me down the hall to the little room. “Here we are.” She smiled in a half comforting, half apologetic way. “There’s a TV remote right by the chair there, sweetie, and books in this cupboard…” When I didn’t react, she reached for the remote herself and turned the TV on. She smiled, like she’d done something I should be immensely proud of her for. “Can I get you anything? Water? Juice? Coffee?”

I shook my head.

“Well the nurse’s stations just over there.” She pointed out the doors to the left.

“Thanks,” I replied.

When the door was closed I reached for the remote and turned the TV back off.

I used Nick’s phone, which I’d been handed by the paramedics on the ride to the hospital from LAX along with his wallet, and found Brian’s phone number and texted him, telling him what happened. I texted Chris, too, who was expecting us to pick up Rusty, Nacho, and Mulder. Then I leaned back in the chair and waited.

It took hours before anyone came for me in the little waiting room. And even then it was only the nurse that had sent me in there, checking to see if I’d changed my mind about the offer for water/juice/coffee. It was hours more still before a doctor came in. “Are you Jaymie?” he asked, looking up at me from a clipboard.

“Yes,” I answered, sitting up. Nick’s phone was clutched in my hand as I waited for a response from the Boys. Chris had answered almost immediately asking if I needed him to come down. I’d said no. But the Boys hadn’t answered yet. They were probably still on their various planes headed back from Germany, since they’d all taken later flights. I stared up at the doctor now, scared because of the serious look on his face.

“Let me bring you to Nick’s room,” he said.

I got up and grabbed our carry-on bags from around my feet and followed the doctor down the hallway and into an elevator. “Is he okay?” I asked.

The doctor took a deep breath, “I’m not really able to tell you anything, since you aren’t family.”

“Oh.”

He looked down at his clipboard. “He should’ve come in a long time ago,” he mumbled.

“I know,” I agreed.

The doors dinged as we reached Nick’s floor and the doctor led me through some maze-like halls until we reached a room whose door he knocked on gently as we walked through. Inside, Nick was laying in a single bed, blankets pulled up to his chest, a couple plastic-looking wires taped to his temples, machines beeping at his sides. He looked over at me as we walked in.

“Hell of a headache, huh?” I asked.

A slow smile crawled across his face. “It was a bad motherfucker,” he murmured and he held out his hand to me. I took it and he squeezed my fingers lightly, his eyes a little unfocused, lids heavy.

The doctor was standing at the foot of Nick’s bed. “As I was saying…” he said, clearing his throat.

Nick blinked up at me slowly, “I interrupted him before in the middle of talkin’ at me ‘bout all this…” He turned his head to look at the doctor again, “What’s up, Doc?” He laughed, breathy and low.

It killed me how much pain he had to be in, and yet here he was still joking around.

“Your anaplastic astrocycoma is worse than the last time we examined it,” the doctor said. He took a deep breath, “Mr. Carter, I strongly recommend surgery, followed by radiation and chemotherapy treatments.”

Worse. It was worse. My heart thumped against my innards like a bass drum. I looked at him. “Please,” I choked out the word. I felt a tear slip over my eyelids and slide across my cheek.

Nick nodded, “Okay.” He took a deep breath. “What are… what’s my… Am I gonna be okay?”

The doctor shifted his weight uncomfortably and my skin goosebumped. I closed my eyes. No good answer could come from a doctor who hesitated like that. Nick’s fingers tightened on mine. “If we’d done the treatment sooner,” the doctor said slowly, “There’s a pretty… steep… mortality rate.” He hesitated, “This is an aggressive form of tumor. The longer treatment is postponed, the harder it becomes to predict the results of the surgery…”

“Straight up, doc,” Nick said thinly. “How long?”

“Best case scenario…” the doctor paused. It was the longest pause in the world. “Eighteen months.”





Nick

In Israel, the word life is ‘n, pronounced chai, and it has a numerical value of eighteen.

In China, eighteen is a lucky number, making the eighteenth floor of office buildings the most expensive to rent or buy.

In Hindu cultures, there are eighteen chapters in the Bhagavad Gita, which is part of their holy book, the Mahabharata, which, incidentally, has eighteen books.

Eighteen is a retired number in the NFL for Emmitt Thomas, a hall of famer that coaches the Chiefs in Kansas City.

Eighteen is the number of holes on a golf course. I love golf.

And now, this just in, eighteen was the number of months I would, optimally, be breathing on this planet.

I felt like I’d been dunked in ice water. Every muscle in my body forgot how to function properly. I couldn’t even look at Jaymie. I knew if I looked at her that I’d break down and I couldn’t do that. If I did it, I’d never pull myself together. I took a deep breath, staring at the doctor. I didn’t know what to say.

It took all my strength, but finally I managed, “When do we.. do we start the treatment?” I asked, trying to let the words eighteen months wash over me, trying to act like they didn’t effect me like they really word.

Jaymie was shaking, practically vibrating, even.

The doctor stared at his clipboard for a moment. “I’d like to do the surgery today,” he said.

“Today,” I said. “Damn. Wow. That was… fast.”

“The longer we wait, the smaller your chances are.”

“Oh,” I said. My palms were sweating suddenly. “I… haven’t even told my family…” I looked at Jaymie. “I haven’t talked to my family in months,” I said, eyes filling with tears. “How do I call them and tell’em this?”

Jaymie shrugged.

I looked at the doctor. “What’s the chances of me dying during this surgery?”

“We have a 96% success rate at this hospital with this particular operation,” he said slowly. “But that’s better than the national average -- 93%.” He paused. “As bad as the surgery sounds by description, it’s an increasingly routine surgery.”

“High nineties. That’s good.” I nodded and looked to Jaymie. “I… I’ll be okay. I can tell my family… after. Later. Another day. Right?”

She hesitated. “You should probably call them.”

I looked down at my hands.

“Nick, they’re your family,” Jaymie said slowly.

I looked up at her. “You know what they’re like, though,” I said. “What if… what if they don’t care?”

Jaymie’s eyes filled with tears. “They’ll care, Nick.”

“What if they don’t?”

“They will. They have to.” Jaymie whispered.

The doctor tucked his clipboard under his arm. “I’ll come back in about thirty minutes to go over the procedure and begin prepping you,” he said. “That should give you time to… talk things over.” He ducked out of the room.

I looked at Jaymie.

“They’re gonna care, Nick,” Jaymie said thickly.

I stared at my hands. “You overestimate the character of my family.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine by Pengi
Chapter Twenty-Nine


Nick

Since I’d found out about the tumor, I’d talked to a member of my family only three times. That member was Aaron and two out of the three times he’d been asking me for large sums of money. The third time, he’d cussed me out and told me to fuck myself because I had refused to give him yet another massive amount of money. I’d tried calling my mother the night I found out about it and had been informed by her current boyfriend-slash-husband-slash-whatever-the-hell-they-were that she was unavailable, which meant she was standing there next to him, refusing to speak to me.

“The odds of any of them answering, even if I do call ‘em, is like zippo,” I said. Jaymie was holding up my cell phone, waiting for me to take it. I was refusing. I didn’t want to call them. It served them right if I died without giving them a chance to say goodbye. Although, I thought bitterly, fat lotta good that lesson did them when Leslie died.

They were still assholes.

“They don’t even deserve to know,” I said, folding my arms over my chest.

“It isn’t for them that you’re telling them,” Jaymie argued, “It’s for you.”

“How is it for me?” I demanded. “I don’t want to tell them, so obviously it’s not for me.”

“Because,” she answered. But she didn’t seem to have an answer other than because. She stared at me, “Nick.”

I took a deep breath, “They’re really not going to care. Not sincerely. And -- and besides, what’re they gonna do, even if they do care, or pretend to care? Get on a plane and fly here and what? Sit in the waiting room and play Boggle with you?” I raised my eyebrows, “You know what kinda hell they’d put you through if they came out? They’d judge the shit out of you. And my mother’s theatrics? She’ll call every fucking tabloid from here to Japan and back with the exclusive.”

The words burned in my throat as I said them.

“Whatever makes the extra buck,” I finished.

Jaymie steeled herself, her eyes closed, “I know she’s evil. And I know how hard it’d be for me to call my father, or Pilates, if it was me, but…” She opened her eyes and squeezed my hand. “Nick, at least call your siblings.”

I stared up at her.

“At least call them because you know the hell it is to lose one of them, and how much you have to say that you never… realized.”

I took a deep breath. I couldn’t argue that. There were a lot of things that I wanted to tell Leslie, things I never would get the chance to say now. And I could see it in her eyes that there was stuff that she wanted to tell Daniel that she’d never get to say, either. I pictured that haunted expression in Aaron, Angel and BJ’s eyes and it made my stomach twist.

“Okay.” I said.

Jaymie looked surprised, and handed me the phone.

“I’m gonna regret this,” I muttered, pulling up my contacts menu on the screen.

“Don’t go into it expecting the negative,” Jaymie said. “They’re gonna care, Nick. If they don’t, then they’re less than human.”

I raised my eyebrow. “Like I said. You’re overestimating the character of my family.”

“It’s called optimism,” Jaymie said, “And if you had more of it, then maybe you wouldn’t be laying here right now.” Her voice was pointed.

I frowned and stared at the phone, at Aaron’s info staring back up at me. “It’s hard to stay positive when you have a cancer cell taking over your brain,” I said hotly.

Jaymie closed her eyes in frustration, counted to ten (I could tell ‘cos her lips moved around the words), and said, “I know, Nick. I’m sorry.”

Cancer wins fights, I thought. There’s a silver lining to this shit after all. I wondered what other perks there might be in this for someone of my age.

We both were silent. Jaymie took a deep breath. “Well. Here. I’ll leave you to it then.” She put the cell phone down on my chest. “I’m gonna go for a walk so you can talk to them in privacy.” She turned and started toward the door.

“Wait a sec, I thought -- but I -- you said -- I thought I didn’t have to call?” I stammered.

“Of course you have to call,” Jaymie answered.

“But…”

“Nick. Call them.” And with that, she stepped out of the room and brought the door to a semi-close.

So much for silver linings.

I sat there in rebellious, stubborn opposition to the idea of calling any members of my family for several long minutes. Jaymie had left, she’d never know the difference if I didn’t bother. I stared at the whiteboard across the room where the nurse had written her name and the doctor’s name and my current vital records in big loopy marker writing. They hadn’t cared when it was cardiomyopathy. They hadn’t called when it was all over the news that I’d had a heart attack on stage. I didn’t get so much as a text message from them over that. Unless they wanted money or to get some free publicity from being near me or selling off stories about me to the tabloids, then they didn’t bother with me.

Well fuck them, it’d serve them right if I did die and they didn’t get to talk to me one last time. They’d have terrible memories of me and the way they’d treated me and that was what they deserved.

I sighed and rubbed my forehead.

“Bitter ain’t your color,” I muttered to myself, realizing what an asshole I sounded like. I closed my eyes. Maybe Jaymie was right. Maybe it was kind of for me if I called them. At least I’d be able to rest knowing that I’d tried. Whether they stepped up and came to see me and acted like the family they claimed to be or not, that was their prerogative. But at the end of everything, no matter how it turned out with them, I’d still tried and I’d be able to die knowing that I’d at least done everything I could.

So… I started with BJ.





Jaymie


I wandered through the hallway of the hospital, trying not to smell it. I hated the ammonia-soaked sick smell that permeated the hospital. It reminded me of every horrible memory. I had no good memories from hospitals, no births or miracles or anything of that sort. Just death. Daniel had died in this hospital, too, I thought as I walked. In fact, he’d died on this very floor, in the ICU… and as I thought it, I realized that’s where my walk had brought me, like my subconscious had delivered me outside the very door I was thinking of as I thought of it.

I paused outside the door, so innocuous from this side, so uncommanding of fear. Yet it scared the hell out of me to imagine ever having to walk through it, through the maze of hallways and rooms that made up the ICU and my stomach turned and I quickly headed back to the ward Nick was in.

Nick will not need the ICU, I told myself. He’ll go from here to the OR to recovery and then back here. He will be fine. There will be no complications. He will be fine.

Back in Nick’s ward, I walked by his room and I could hear his voice inside. He’d really called, I thought with relief. I did a lap around the center nurse’s station, unsure what else to do with myself until he’d had enough time to call all three of the remaining Carter siblings. Maybe he’d have good luck with them and end up calling his parents, too, I thought hopefully. I just prayed they were kind to him. He didn’t deserve anything less than kindness.

I was on my third lap when I nearly walked into a nurse, just coming out of Nick’s room, pulling a blood pressure monitor and bringing the door to the near-close behind her as I’d done. “Sorry,” I said. I paused, “Was he still on the phone?”

“He was,” the nurse replied. She stared at me for a moment then asked, “Are you the Jaymie he was asking for?”

I nodded.

She was young, with perfectly white tennis shoes. She was an LNA, not an RN, I noticed by the nametag on her chest. Her name was Brenda. She smiled shakily. “I hope everything turns out okay for you,” she said, and she started to pull the monitor away.

I’m fine, it’s Nick I’m worried about,” I said with a shrug. “He didn’t want to get treatment for this at all. I don’t understand it because he’s always been such a fighter, especially when it comes to medical stuff. You know he was diagnosed with cardiomyopathy a few years ago and he worked the hell out of himself until he’d practically healed himself of it?” I said, “That’s the Nick I know. Balls-to-the-wall, kick the shit out of anything that stands in your way… But this time, it’s like he gave up before he even tried. He didn’t tell anyone about this. With the cardiomyopathy, he told the world the second he found out practically.”

Brenda nodded, “It’s a side effect of the tumor.”

I blinked in surprise, “Come again?”

“Personality changes,” Brenda explained, “It’s a side effect. Emotions become super strong. The area that the tumor is in controls a lot of the emotion-based decision making he’s been doing. So it doesn’t really surprise me that he’s taking a different attitude toward the treatment cycle with this. He feels fear - super fear, magnified by the tumor. There’s probably a lot of things about his personality that’s changed since the tumor started growing. Changes in diet preferences. Feelings that he didn’t have before.”

My heart rate picked up a little bit.

“Feelings? Like what feelings?”

Brenda shrugged, “I don’t know, it’s different for every patient. Some of them get angrier, they tend to yell at people and get more aggressive. You’ll see them get road rage when they never used to, or become impatient. Some of them cry a lot. Big tough guys that don’t cry hardly ever will sob like a baby over a TV commercial if it catches them right.” She chuckled, “And good God I can’t even tell you how many of them have come in here talking on and on about the love of their life, men and women both. I’ve had patients fall in love with me while they’ve been undergoing treatment. But it’s not because they really feel any of that stuff, or that they would really feel it normally, it’s because the tumor’s pinching that part of their brain, manipulating it, making them feel that way. It’s just the tumor talking.” She squeezed her fingers together to indicate the pressure being made on the brain. “But no worries, once we get in there and cut out the tumor…” she separated her fingers, “They usually revert back to their old selves again.”

The blood in my veins was cold.

Brenda smiled, “So soon, you’ll have your old Nick back.”

I nodded.

“Okay, I’ve got to finish this round,” she said.

“Okay,” I said.

“I’ll come back to check on y’all soon.” She smiled again and pulled the cart away.

I looked at Nick’s door, my stomach turning, my mind reeling, trying to piece together when things had started being different. It’d been when he’d gotten home from the tour, after the heart attack. From that point onward, he’d gotten progressively more clingy, more open, more loving. Our relationship had been near to the same when he’d left for the tour, and when he came back things changed quickly. They’d escalated from the point of us being strictly friends with benefits to him saying that he loved me sitting on the end of that bed in Germany.

I shook my head and leaned against the wall as my knees got a little weak.

”It’s just the tumor talking,” Brenda’s voice echoed in my head. ”You’ll have your old Nick back.”

“Oh Jesus,” I whispered. I felt like I couldn’t get enough air in my lungs and I slid down the wall until I was crouching on the floor. I balanced myself with my palm on the tile. Could it really be that I’d allowed myself to fall for him, allowed myself to believe that he could fall for me back, when it’d been just the tumor talking? When he had the surgery, would he come back out the bachelor that he’d always been? I was shaking, I could feel my palm trembling against the tile floor.

It’s not like that, my heart was begging my brain, Nick’s not like that. He meant it when he said he loves you. He meant it. He did.

But it’s just the tumor talking, my brain replied. He meant it because the tumor was talking for him. Like being possessed. He can’t control it. The tumor made him feel things that he doesn’t really feel.

No, my heart cried out.

I felt tears rushing my face. “Oh God,” I whispered and I got up and rushed to the ladies room down the hallway, across from the elevator. I turned on the faucet and splashed water into my face, washing away the tears, trying to collect myself.

This shouldn’t be surprising. This shouldn’t even be happening. You should’ve known there was something like this coming from the very start, I thought. How could you ever believe that he loved you? After all these years? Of course he doesn’t love you. How could he love you? It literally takes a tumor in the brain for him to even think about loving you.

Chapter Thirty by Pengi
Chapter Thirty


Jaymie

Nick was staring out the window when I went back to the room. His phone was on the rolling tray table, pushed away a couple feet. He had a far-off look on his face as he stared intently. It wasn’t that great of a view - basically just the wall of the adjacent part of the circular hospital building. The sun was casting a shadow on the side of the building - a cloud, maybe - and a pigeon had landed on a little outcropping to the left of Nick’s window and was pecking at something. But I don’t think any of that was what Nick was staring at. He was in his own world. And so deeply that when I walked in, he didn’t even notice.

I’d spent a horribly long amount of time in the restroom trying to psych myself into being okay. I knew I couldn’t act any differently toward Nick because it would only hurt him and confuse him if I pulled away now. For him, nothing had changed yet. For him, he was still in love with me, our feelings on hold only because he didn’t want to hurt me. But the truth was once he got the surgery, he would more than likely come to his senses and realize the last thing he wanted was to be with me, and he’d dump me, or worse he’d ask me if we could pretend the last 24-hours had never happened, ask if we could go back to being just friends with benefits again, and I wasn’t sure if I could anymore. But I had to prepare myself for the moment when he asked, when my world shattered. I stood there staring at him, at the profile of his perfect face, and my heart could hardly take it. I had to remove myself emotionally if I was going to get through this.

And I had to get through this. I had to. Not just because I really loved Nick, which I did I’d realized. And not just to give a dying man his last wish, because if he asked me to remain friends with benefits, that’s really what it would be, wouldn’t it? How do you say no to a guy who has eighteen months to live? Especially when he’s that hot? But also because I realized as I stood there staring at him that apart from him, I had no idea who I was. I’d melted myself so perfectly into his life, into his needs, into being his, that I didn’t know who Jaymie was anymore.

I had eighteen months to figure it out.

“Nick?” I said thickly. He glanced over at me, then took a deep breath and turned back to the window. “How’d it go?” I asked.

He shook his head, and I saw a tear escape his eyes when he blinked. “I don’t wanna talk about it,” he answered. His voice was low and heavy and sad, like a little kid who didn’t get what he wanted for Christmas.

My heart ached for him. “I’m sorry,” I said.

Nick shrugged. “I ain’t good enough for ‘em so even when I’m dying it’s nothin’...” he looked down at his hands as he spoke, “Who gives a shit.”

“Well fuck them,” I said boldly.

He nodded, still looking at his fingers, “Yeah.”

“Your real family cares, Nick - me and the Boys. We give a shit.”

“Yeah,” Nick said. He closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the pillows. “Maybe this all is what I deserve anyways. I was never there for them like I shouldda been. I was a horrible bother, a bad son. They deserved better. And I failed’em.” His lips were puckered into a frown. “I just… I tried so hard…” his voice cracked.

“You… are… amazing,” I told him, and I forgot all my worries and crossed the room to run my fingers over his forehead. He opened his eyes and looked up at me. “If they can’t see that then they’re dead blind.” The tears made his eyes extra blue.

“Thanks,” he said.

“I mean it,” I said. “Do not ever think you deserve the way they treat you. You don’t. You deserve to be loved and cared for and if they aren’t capable of seeing that, of treating you like you deserve, then they are the assholes for it. Not you.” I rubbed my fingers against his cheek. “You just keep on shining.”

He smiled. Just a little smile, but it was still a beautiful one.

The door opened and the doctor came in, followed by a few other doctors and two nurses, one of which was Brenda. I stepped back, letting my fingers fall from Nick’s face and his eyes darkened a little. “Hey,” he muttered as the fleet of medical personnel surrounded his bed and the doctor put up a couple scans of Nick’s brain on the wall.

I stared at those two little x-ray pictures, at something that looked like nothing more threatening than a dark rain cloud to my eyes that was changing Nick’s life entirely. It seemed like little more than a smudge on a screen. Nick looked up at the screen, then he looked at me and he held out his hand. I stared at his hand for a moment, at the wrinkles and creases and the long fingers and big knuckles and the weird way his thumb bent from so many hours playing on various game consoles… I took his hand and held it.

And we listened for the next forty minutes as the doctor described Nick’s tumor and the areas of the brain it was effecting. He branched into the passing of time, the way the tumor had grown and matured in the last several months since Nick’s initial diagnosis and the concerns that rose. He spoke about treatment options, including the operation and the radiation and follow-up chemotherapy and the long term side effects that could occur as a result of the treatment plan and the statistics that accompanied the tumor’s prognosis. And when he’d covered every last base, including a step-by-step description of the actual process of the removal of the cancerous cells, he turned to Nick and he said, “Ultimately, it’s up to you. But if you’re ready to treat this thing… we’re ready to start prepping you. I’ve cleared the OR.”

Nick sat still for a second, blinking benignly, like he was contemplating. I squeezed his hand, prompting him to speak and he looked at the doctors slowly. “Sorry,” he said, “I… have a bit of a headache.” They all chuckled quietly. He looked at me. I felt like he was asking me for permission to turn down the treatment. And this crazy little part of me wanted to let him. If he didn’t get it fixed then we’d be able to stay together, I thought selfishly. But instead I nodded ever so slightly and squeezed his fingers reassuringly and Nick took a deep breath and he said, his voice shaky, “Okay. Let’s, uh, do this.”

And just like that, before I could fully comprehend that they meant literally right now, a couple of the doctors stepped forward to start prepping Nick and Brenda rolled her little cart around to take another list of vitals.

I stood back, watching, feeling sick, wondering what would happen, wondering what I wanted to have happen. Part of me wanted it to stop, wanted to call it all off, to live the next eighteen months pretending the tumor didn’t exist. Another part wanted them to do the surgery, take every bloody ounce of tumor out, and maybe a miracle would occur. Maybe Nick would be completely healed. But then he wouldn’t be in love with me anymore.

That’s when I spotted his main doctor slipping out of the room.

I rushed after him. “Doctor,” I called. My eyes strayed to his ID badge. “Dr. Stanley… someone told me that personality changes were a side effect of this kind of brain tumor,” I said.

He nodded. “They are.”

“What about… like, say, romantic interests?”

Dr. Stanley hesitated a moment, then said, “Well, sex drives can certainly be effected by the --”

“No, no, not like the sex. Like -- falling in love, like getting suddenly… romantic. Suddenly noticing somebody that’s been there all along.” I stared up at him, hoping for him to shoot down the concept.

Dr. Stanley nodded slowly, “Yes, that’s possible.”

“Oh,” I said.

He took a deep breath, then said, “Doesn’t mean he doesn’t really feel it.”

“But it’ll go away. After the operation?”

“It could,” he said.

“Okay,” I said. I nodded. “Thanks.” I turned to head back to Nick’s room.

“Miss Jaymie,” he called, and I looked back at him. “We’re going to do everything we can to help fix this.”

“Thanks,” I said, and I stepped back into the room. Only to get pushed aside. They were already wheeling him out. “Hey wait,” I said. “Wait.” I scrambled to his side by his head. “Nick.”

He stared up at me. He smiled nervously. “You meant it about fuckin’ me even if I look like Mulder?” he asked.

I nodded.

“‘Cos they’re gonna shave my head in a second in there.”

I reached my hand up and ran my fingers through that beautiful hair of his. He closed his eyes as I stroked it. Then I laid my palm on his cheek. I stared into his eyes. “Nick, I --”

“I know, baby,” he whispered, and he put his hand on mine. “I do, too,” he whispered, and he brought my fingers to his mouth, kissed the pads of them, and let go of my hand. He stared up at me for a long moment, searching eyes. He took a deep breath, “You look tired. You should get some sleep.”

“No fair quoting the Bourne Supremacy to me,” I whispered. “You know I don’t think they’re as bad ass as you think they are.”

He smiled. “Bye Jaymie.”

I wanted to yell at him, to tell him not to say goodbye. But my voice caught in my throat and I couldn’t speak at all and before I could get anything to come out at all, he closed his eyes and faced forward and the doctors took that as their cue. They wheeled him out and I was left standing there in the middle of an empty room while Brenda rolled up the wires to the blood pressure cuffs and replaced it to her cart with a smile meant to comfort me.

“Can I get you anything?” she asked. “Water? Ginger ale? Popsicle? Coffee?”

“No,” I answered.





Nick

Back when Brian and I were best friends, he once described the clarity of mind he felt on his way to the operating table. He talked about how he could remember every detail of the ceiling lights that flashed by him on the way down the hall, how they seemed to flash to the beat of the wheel on the stretcher clicky-clacketing along and how the doctors had all moved and spoken in slow motion. Like everything was coming to a stop, the earth slowing down to observe the moment when he either lived or died. All of time, he said, felt like it was meeting him right there at that one spot.

That’s what I was expecting when they pushed my bed out into the hallway. But instead, it went so fast. Like what happened next took an hour at least I’m told, but it felt like five or ten minutes to me.

I was brought to a private room, and they parked the gurney and assured me they’d see me soon, once prep was done. An older, grandmotherly type nurse came in with a little tray that she set on a table near by me. She smiled, “I hear somebody’s getting a haircut today,” she sing-songed. She came over and hit the button to elevate the top part of the bed and I was made to sit up and my heart thumped around in my esophegus somewhere.

“I guess so,” I answered.

She stopped the bed from elevating and smiled some more. “Not a fan of the haircut?” she asked, her dark brown eyes only dimmed by age.

I wondered if she legit thought I was here just for the haircut or something. Didn’t she know why she was cutting off all my hair? Didn’t she know this was a somber event? “Not really,” I mumbled.

“If it’s looks you’re worried about, you don’t have nothing to fear,” she said, and she brushed her hand through the front part of my hair like she was measuring it with her fingers or something. I thought of the way I’d felt just seconds ago in the bedroom when Jaymie had run her fingers through it for the last time and my bellyached. The nurse bent a little to make eye contact with my downcast eyes. “You’re going to look very handsome.”

“I have a weird bump in my head,” I explained. “I look like a deformed Charlie Brown. Or Lex Luthor.”

“I’m sure that’s not true,” she replied. She turned and picked up an electric razor and switched out attachments, humming as she did. She must’ve recognized me, or else she’d chosen a tune randomly and her subconscious had recognized me, because I’m about 60% sure that the tune she hummed was a slightly off-balance version of Quit Playing Games.

I wanted to cry but I felt too numb to.

The nurse turned the razor on and, thankfully, it’s humming overtook her own, and she said, cheerfully, “Here we go!” and took a step toward me.

I wanted to jump up out of the bed and raise my arms in defense to make her stop.

Instead, I closed my eyes as the razor took out the frontline. I shivered as I felt the hair rain down around me and peeked to see it resting on my lap, strands of blonde and brown that I’d worked so hard on cultivating for the tour so it’d be perfect for all the fans. I stared at the wall as it continued to flutter around me. I felt like I was being unmanned.

Goodbye sexiness, I thought.

The buzzing of the razor and the fluttering hair is the closest to a slow motion moment I had, though. And though the nurse had to go over my head three times with various attachments, it didn’t seem to take longer than a minute or two before she was done. “You wanna see?” she asked, reaching for a hand mirror on the tray she’d carried in.

“No,” I answered quickly.

She looked surprised.

“I don’t wanna see myself like this,” I explained.

The nurse made a sound that was somewhere between disapproving, apologetic, and sympathetic, then picked up a little tube that looked like toothpaste and squeezed some onto her hand and rubbed her palms together. She set herself on the edge of the bed and reached over and gently massaged the lotion into my newly exposed scalp. “You have really nice eyes,” she commented. Not in a creepy hitting-on-me way, just observationally. “I imagine you must have all the ladies chasing after you?”

I shrugged.

If she didn’t already know that about me, then I wasn’t really in the mood to explain it, either.

Dr. Stanley came in the room just as she was finishing massaging in the lotion and screwing the cap back on the bottle. “How’s everything going?” he asked, stepping up to my side. He must see a lot of hairless people because he didn’t even blink twice at my new look.

“Just finishing up,” the nurse sing-songed, and she collected her tray from the table. “It was a pleasure meeting you, Nick,” she said. “Good luck.” She smiled and walked away.

I looked up at Dr. Stanley.

“Do you have any questions for me before we move you over to the OR?” he asked.

I thought for a moment. “Is it gonna hurt?”

“You won’t feel anything at all, I promise,” he answered.

I nodded and licked my teeth behind my lips as I thought of another question. I felt like I should have a hundred of them, but I didn’t have any more than just one other that I was a little afraid of asking. But since I didn’t have any others, I said, “If I die, who’s gonna tell Jaymie and the fellas?”

“I will personally tell them,” Dr. Stanley answered. He looked right in my eyes. “And I hate telling patients bad news, so you know I’ll be doing everything I can for you.” He smiled.

I nodded. “Okay.”

“I’m gonna take good care of you Nick,” he said. And with that, question and answer time was over and I was wheeled out of the room by another swarm of doctors. This time, the room we arrived to I knew was The Room.

It was steel with pristine white tiled floor with drains around the floor and a big scary-looking chair with arms that were stretched out, cuffs hanging off the wrists, and a padded halo looking apparatus at the neck. Over it hung a huge spider-like web of lights and a giant headset with goggles that looked like a cross between virtual reality head gear and something in a Tim Burton movie.

The doctors and nurses all around me helped move me from the bed I was in and onto the chair which reclined and my legs came up and I was laying down. They strapped in my wrists and I had to swallow back the panic that bubbled up inside me from being attached to this thing, like the meat inside a leather-upholstered lobster shell.

This was it. This was where it was gonna happen.

They rolled the bed away and I lay there scared beyond belief.

I felt small. I’d spent most of my life working my ass off to be not small, and here I was, tiny as anything, practically just a child for all my manhood and worldliness was worth here. I was trembling, even.

The anesthesiologist came over with a mask and he smiled at me in a friendly way as he adjusted the mask. I could feel cold IV needles and cloths being draped over me.

“Ready, Nick?” Dr. Stanley asked.

I nodded.

“Here we go then,” he said.

“Fuck,” I whispered, anxious. “Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck…”

The mask was lowered over my nose and mouth. “Deep breath,” the anesthesiologist said, “This will make us all go away for awhile.”

Dr. Stanley leaned in as I inhaled and the world started growing fuzzy. “I’m gonna kick this tumors ass for you, man,” he said.

I felt like I was melting.

If I die, I thought as the room grew dark shadows at the corners and slowly disappeared from my vision, my last words will have been ‘fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck’. How’s that for some famous last words, world…?

Chapter Thirty-One by Pengi
Chapter Thirty-One


Nick

….

Jaymie

It had been hours since they’d taken him out of the room and my ass was asleep from sitting in one spot for so long. Outside, the daylight had started disappearing, the shadows on the opposite hospital wall growing longer and darker until finally even the stupid pigeons that clustered around every nook and cranny of the building were unseeable through the darkness. Brenda came back periodically to check on me. She brought food I didn’t ask for one time, a sandwich sitting on a pile of ranch Doritos on a cheap paper plate and a bottle of water, which she set down on the rolling tray table that had hovered over Nick’s bed. “You need to eat,” she said.

“I’ll eat when he gets out,” I answered.

She’d sighed.

About six hours after they’d taken him away, one of the doctors that had been in the room earlier came in, all dressed in scrubs. There was some trace evidence of blood on the front of her clothing and my stomach flipped to think it was more than likely Nick’s. I knew the moment my eyes fell on her face that she wasn’t bearing bad news. She looked too calm. Then again, that’s what these doctors do day in and day out, isn’t it? Take people apart, put them back together, and many of those people were frankensteined together using spare parts from the people who’d been taken apart that just didn’t go back together.

“We’re about halfway through,” she said. “Dr. Stanley’s opened the skull and has accessed the tumor. He wanted me to keep you updated. He promised… Nick.” She’d had to think of what his name was. To her, he was just a patient on a table.

Halfway?” I said.

She nodded. “We’re making good time.”

I looked at the sandwich. Maybe I could eat after all, I thought, as the doctor left, leaving me alone again in the darkening room. I got up and turned on a light and the TV at one point, mainly because I didn’t know what else to do with myself, and I curled onto the chair and nibbled at the sandwich, pulling it apart with my hands into smaller, more surmountable bits.

“Good to see you’re eating finally,” Brenda said, returning. She smiled and put a cup of orange juice on the tray table, and a chocolate chip cookie wrapped in saran wrap. “I was going to try appealing to your sweet tooth this time.” She smiled and grabbed one of the other chairs in the room, pulling it up to face me. “You know, as his caretaker, it’s just as important for you to stay healthy as it is for him to become healthy.” She nodded matter-of-a-factly.

I nodded back.

Brenda glanced up at the TV. On it, I’d parked myself on reruns of Beverly Hills 90210. “I was named after Brenda Walsh,” she commented.

It unnerved me that there were people that watched Beverly Hills 90210 who were not only old enough to have children, but old enough to have children that were old enough to be a nurse. We both stared in silence at the TV for a few minutes while Brenda whined to her mother about some mother-daughter fashion show.

“So… so how long have you and Nick been going out?” I looked over at Brenda. She was staring at me intently. I suddenly realized why she was being so attentive and helpful. She was a BSB fan. I shrugged. “I’ve never seen you like in pictures with him or anything, that’s why I ask,” she explained. “Well, I mean, you don’t really see any girls in pictures with Nick much, but still.”

I looked down at my lap. “Nick likes keeping his private life… you know, private,” I said. I wasn’t sure what else to tell her. Keeping me out of Nick’s media personality had been a very well calculated obstacle course that we’d competed with over the years. I reached for the remote and turned the TV off, putting the bit of sandwich I hadn’t eaten yet onto the plate on the tray table. “I think I’m gonna take a nap,” I lied. I just wanted Brenda to leave.

“I can get you a cot,” she suggested, “And a blanket. A pillow.”

“I’m okay,” I replied.

“Okay.” She hesitated. “Let me know if you need anything. I’m on duty for another five hours.”

“Thanks,” I answered.

When she left the room I sat in the silence for a long time, just thinking about Nick, wishing that one of the doctors would come back and update me again, tell me that they got the tumor all out and he was healed and had decades to live and that he’d woken up calling my name.

I was watching the moonlight cross the building opposite nearly an hour more after Brenda had left the room when Nick’s phone hummed from the nightstand by his wallet. I jumped up and went over and answered it. “Hello?”

“Jaymie?”

“Brian?”

“Jaymie! Is he okay? What happened? I just landed in Atlanta and got your voicemail.” Brian’s voice was panicked.

Before I’d even started speaking I felt my voice shatter in my throat. “Oh God, Brian, it’s been awful. He had a headache on the plane and I thought it was just the air pressure, but then he just got so sick… I made him come to the hospital and they basically told him he has to go in for the surgery now and…”

“Shit,” Brian’s voice was low, “Shit. Let me talk to him.”

“I - I can’t. He’s already in the OR.”

What?” Brian’s voice was panicked now. “No. Jesus. Lord Jesus. Y’all are in LA?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll be there. I’m getting on the next plane. I’ll call you when I land.” He hung up.

And over the next couple hours, I got similar calls from the other three Backstreet Boys. First from Howie, who called an hour after Brian had from Florida. And then Kevin three hours later, when they’d landed at LAX. “We’ll be right there. Twenty minutes.” Kevin had said. “AJ’s with me.”

I decided while the guys were on the way that I could take a minute to go to the bathroom and wash my face. I had tear stains all across my cheeks and my hair was a mess, sticking up at the oddest angles. I turned the faucet on and splashed water across my face before pulling a paper towel from the dispenser to wipe the water off my skin. I couldn’t do much else, I decided, and I didn’t want to be away from the room too long incase they came back from the OR with another update on Nick.

I was walking down the hallway, heading back to the room, when the doctor that had come to see me earlier came pelting down the hallway a hundred miles an hour, carrying a bright red cooler. “ExcuseMe,” she yelled the words before she’d even reached me in the hallway and shoved by, running pell-mell through the doors that led to the operating rooms.

I stood there, numb and staring after her for a long moment while the implications of this sunk in.

I covered my mouth with my hands, thankful for the wall against my back. It was the only thing keeping me standing.

The elevator doors opposite me dinged open and there was Kevin and AJ. Kevin’s eyebrows were arched in concern. “We’ll just see if we can find Jaymie --”

“Found her,” AJ said, pointing.

Kevin looked at me and I must’ve looked horrified because his concern instantly turned into a more panicked expression. “Jaymie? What’s the matter? Is he okay?”

“I don’t know,” I stammered. “Oh God.” My knees gave out and if AJ and Kevin hadn’t have been there to catch me I would’ve hit the floor, but as it were the two boys caught me, tugging my arms over their shoulders and they helped me back down the hallway to Nick’s room. I couldn’t form words around what I’d seen, what I was afraid of.

AJ sat in the chair Brenda had sat in and Kevin knelt at my knee. He looked up at me with the concern a father would have for a daughter and I understood why Nick had always considered him a parental figure. “What’s wrong?” Kevin asked gently.

I stammered out my answer. “The - the doctor, one of the doctors working on Nick - I saw her. She was running.” I couldn’t explain what about the running had chilled me so much, other than the determined look on her face. She’d been a woman fetching something that was needed in order to save a life.

Kevin nodded, “Running doctors are -- scary,” he said, not fully getting it.

“What if Nick’s dying?”

“Impossible,” Kevin replied, “Nick can’t die. It’s a physical impossibility.”

I blinked at him. “But what if he is?”

Kevin cleared his throat, “Then we’ll deal with that bridge when we get there.”

I nodded and I tried to calm down. Kevin went and got another chair from the nurse’s station and we all sat in heavy silence. AJ hadn’t said a word since he’d first spotted me and was sitting in his chair with his fingers pressed against his lips like he was smoking an imaginary cigarette. He looked pale and twitchy. So when, nearly an hour after they’d got there, he suddenly said, “Be right back,” and left the room without further explanation, I jumped in surprise and watched him go, having almost forgotten he was there.

“AJ and hospitals don’t mix,” Kevin explained.

I nodded slowly.

“He probably won’t be back for awhile,” he added, “I imagine he’s going to go outside and get some air. Probably call Rochelle.”

I wished I could go outside and get some air, too. But if I did, I’d only get anxious and come back in, afraid to miss even the slightest of words from the OR. I looked at the clock three times within five minutes, wondering why I hadn’t heard anything. I leaned forward, putting my head in my hands and staring at my toes. “I wish they’d just tell us something,” I whimpered.

“No new is good news,” Kevin said. He’d been muttering that periodically, like it was a mantra more than it was an opinion.

I wished I felt the same way.

Any news was good news.

AJ still hadn’t come back by the time Brenda came in to check on us one last time. She turned the deepest shade of red I’d ever seen when she saw Kevin sitting there. “Can I get anything for you?” she insisted, “Anything at all?” She’d practically wet herself with excitement when Kevin asked for a cola and she took off like she’d been asked to assist in delivering jewels to the royal palace. She came back with a bottle of Coke, a cup of ice, a straw and a napkin.

“You brought all the accessories, wow,” Kevin said as she laid it all out triumphantly on the tray table.

“Hey.”

We all looked to the door as Brian came in, followed by AJ, who was sucking on a bright red lollipop. I couldn’t believe it’d been long enough that Brian had managed to get in from Georgia already. “How’s everything?” he asked as Kevin stood up and they started with a handshake that merged into a hug.

“It’s quiet,” I replied nervously. And before I knew what was happening, Brian had come over, bent down, and hugged me.

I was stunned. Brian had just hugged me. Nothing could’ve shocked me more. He could’ve walked in clucking like a chicken and I would’ve been less weirded out by that then the hug. He could’ve come in naked as the day he was born and I would’ve been less weirded out. Well, maybe not naked.

And if Brenda had been excited about getting Kevin a Coke, she was so far beyond excited now that three out of five of the Backstreet Boys were in the same room. The guys must’ve either been so used to seeing a fan’s reaction to their collective appearance or else they just really didn’t notice her having a silent heart attack in the corner, clearly torn between professionalism and wanting to freak the fuck out. I almost felt bad for her.

“Has there been any news?” Brian asked.

“A really long time ago they came out and said they were about halfway,” I said. “Nothing since then.”

Kevin repeated his mantra, “No news is good news.”

Brian nodded in agreement and AJ returned to his post on the chair, sucking avidly at the lollipop in his mouth, like it was a lifeline. Brian noticed Brenda. “Are you Nick’s nurse?” he asked.

She nodded.

“How is he?”

“He’s had really stable vitals,” she stammered. Brian must’ve been her favorite, I thought, because she looked at him like she couldn’t believe he was speaking to her. Like he was a god.

Damn crazy chicks.

I wondered if I looked at Nick like that.

Brian was about to ask another question when a doctor appeared in the doorway, eyes wide. He was young with messy reddish hair. He stood there, “Um,” he said, “Are you - are you Mr. Carter’s family?” he stammered.

My heart sped up.

“Yes,” Kevin said without hesitation, standing up with authority. I was glad he was willing to take the helm on this.

The doctor looked queasy, like he’d been hoping we weren’t. “There’s been a… a complication.”

I inhaled sharply and I felt Brian put his hand on my shoulder and squeeze.

“There was some bleeding earlier and Dr. Stanley managed to stop it, but we had to do a blood transfusion.” He paused, “We’re watching closely for any clotting in the artery as we proceed, which is making the process a lot longer, but Dr. Stanley is confident that we’ll be completed soon.”

“Thank you,” Kevin said.

I was shaking as the doctor left the room. “Fuck,” I choked. “I thought -- god damn, he couldn’t have started that off differently? Scared the hell out of me…” I realized how many cusses I’d uttered and I looked up at Brian, “I’m sorry,” I muttered, “Nick would’ve laughed at my potty mouth just now but you… I’m just so…” I couldn’t think of a single word.

“I understand,” Brian said, rubbing my shoulder. “We’re all family in here.” He managed a wobbly smile.

And it really felt true.

Chapter Thirty-Two by Pengi
Chapter Thirty-Two


Jaymie

Dr. Stanley came in over twelve hours after the last time I’d seen Nick, smelling like hand sanitizer, and a strong soap. His hair was unruly in places and flat in others from the scrub cap he was pulling off as he walked in, and he had bags under his eyes. Howie had arrived and, after going through the question-and-answers-catch-up with him, we’d mostly been sitting around the tray table in the room half-heartedly playing a card game with a deck that the nurse who’d relieved Brenda had located for us. We were all quiet. Kevin was asleep in the corner in a horribly uncomfortable-looking position, and AJ, despite playing, still hadn’t spoken much other than the words mandatory to stay in the game. But when Dr. Stanley came in, we all folded, dropping our cards to the table top. AJ kicked Kevin in the knee and he woke up with a sputter, looking around until he spotted the doctor.

We might’ve been the ones playing poker, but Dr. Stanley was definitely the one with a poker face. He stood there all ominously in the doorway, then took a deep breath. “Good evening,” he said. He looked around, “It looks like you’ve all made yourself quite comfortable. Who’s winning?”

Nick’s okay, part of me said, He wouldn’t be making small talk if he wasn’t.

Then another part answered, Or would he? Maybe he’s giving you all one last moment of normalcy before shattering the entire planet.

“Howie is,” Brian answered Dr. Stanley’s inquiry, nodding at Howie.

“I always beat you at cards man,” Howie muttered.

“It’s true,” Brian agreed. “Nick usually says he’s cheating.”

At the utterance of Nick’s name, all our eyes turned to Dr. Stanley with purpose.

Dr. Stanley took a deep breath.

Just say it already, I thought.

And without any prelude, he did.

“We removed approximately 97% of the tumor,” he announced. Kevin sat up and Brian’s eyes widened with excitement. “We encountered a complication when an artery was injured and we had some severe bleeding as a result. We had to pause from the process of removal in order to cauterize the bleeding and begin a transfusion to replace the blood in order to prevent bleeding out. There was some swelling, but I was able to open a little more to allow for that,” Dr. Stanley paused. I hated the pause. The pause meant there was more to say that he didn’t know how to say. Like the quiet before the storm, I felt like the pause was that moment of truth in which he could no longer hold back information that we didn’t want to hear. My entire body went into overdrive, preparing myself to take in the most horrible words that the human mouth could ever utter. But I was afraid because I knew no matter how high I built those emotional walls, there was no way to keep the blow from knocking them down. And Dr. Stanley continued before I could even fully steel myself. “Overall, I would consider this surgery a success, and all that’s left to do is wait until Nick wakes up to determine our next steps in treatment.”

He’d delivered the good news so quickly that I almost couldn’t comprehend the words. I’d been so busy bracing myself for the worst possible outcome that I had to mentally break down the walls I’d built in order to react to the good.

Apparently the other guys did too, because there was a long moment of silent, dumbfounded looks all around and then Kevin leaped up from his chair and pulled Dr. Stanley into a bear hug. “Thank you,” he said, voice thick and tearful.

I sat there, stunned, as Howie did the fist-pump thing and AJ yelped out a couple thankful F-bombs while Brian took his turn embracing Dr. Stanley and Kevin got out his phone to text Kristin. I felt so relieved and so terrified at the same time.

The most selfish part of me was wondering if, without the tumor, he’d still love me when he woke up.

And my stunned feeling didn’t go away.

“When can we see him?” Howie asked.

With a clearing of his throat, Dr. Stanley said, “Well… Jaymie.” I looked up at him. “I can bring you up to the recovery room, but the rest of you will have to wait here until we’re sure he’s stable and we can bring him down.”

The guys looked around at me.

My mouth was dry. “Me?”

Dr. Stanley nodded. “Nick specifically asked to have you there when he woke up.”

I stood up numbly. “Okay,” my voice shook.

I stepped forward to follow Dr. Stanley. Brian stopped me. “Tell him we’re here,” he said.

“Okay,” I said.

And the guys watched as Dr. Stanley led me into the hallway, past the elevators and through the double doors to the surgical wing, where we stopped at several sanitizing stations along the way. Every step brought me closer to Nick and made my heart rate go a little crazier. When we reached the room, Dr. Stanley paused outside. He looked at me for a moment, his hand on the knob.

“We shaved his head,” he said.

“I know,” I whispered.

“There’s a large incision,” Dr. Stanley said, “Stretching from here… to here…” he indicated on his own head. “There are stitches. It’s not pretty. We’ve got it covered up to an extent, but it needed to breathe for a little bit before being completely bandaged, so it’s not entirely out of view.”

I nodded. I hadn’t thought about stitches. I was glad he’d thought to warn me.

“Okay. If you’re ready?” Dr. Stanley asked.

“I’m ready,” I whispered.

He pushed open the door to the little room. Inside, a nurse was taking vitals, holding Nick’s wrist. He lay there in the bed, still out, his head rolled to the side. I was very thankful that Dr. Stanley had warned me about the stitches - even more so than I’d been moments before. It was a horrible sight, that stitching across his head. I was just thankful Nick wasn’t awake for the reaction. I could feel my guts turn inside out. And not because he was ugly - I stand by my proclamation that nothing could make that boy ugly - but it was still shocking to see. I gasped and covered my mouth.

“It’s okay,” Dr. Stanley said.

I nodded, feeling ashamed that there were tears burning the backs of my eyelids.

“I’m not sure how long it’ll be before he wakes up,” Dr. Stanley explained, and he checked a couple numbers on the machines connected to Nick and leaned over to inspect the stitching on his head for a moment. “He’s doing very well,” he assured me. He took a chair from the corner and pulled it over beside Nick’s bed and smiled, like he was trying to tell me everything would be alright. He reached for the nurse call button and handed it to me. “If you need anything,” he said, and with that he left the room.

I stared at the nurse call button for a couple minutes, then studied the pattern on the blanket that covered Nick’s legs, actively trying not to look at Nick’s head. Then I took a deep breath and I looked and my stomach kind of twisted again and I looked away. I put the call button on the edge of the bed and took his hand instead. It felt heavy with the weight of sleep and inanimation and I rubbed my fingers over his knuckles.

I sat there what felt like forever, driving myself crazy, trying to figure out if he’d wake up loving me or if he’d have come to his senses and realized the feelings he’d had were manufactured by mutated cells.

“Since you’re asleep and all,” I mumbled, “I thought I’d tell you that if you wake up and don’t love me anymore, I’ll still love you.” I licked my lips. “I didn’t think we’d ever get here. I didn’t think I loved you. Not like this.” I took a deep breath. I could feel tears falling across my face. I didn’t want to be crying when he woke up, I wanted to be smiling, I wanted to be that bright spot that made him glad he’d woken up. “Ugh. This is stupid, you can’t hear me, and even if you could, I almost wouldn’t want you to hear me saying this. I’m an idiot, falling in love with a god like you. Jesus Christ, and I really believed you loved me. Me. Like you’d stoop this low.” I laughed quietly. “My mom used to say why buy the cow when the milk is free, and I am your cow, aren’t I?” I shook my head. “It took a brain tumor messing up your head and all those weird chemically things up there that make you you in order for you to love me. And it turns out I’ve really loved you all along, whatever I’ve told myself about not wanting a fairy tale ending with you.” I turned his hand over and ran my finger along the lifeline of his palm, and to my surprise, his fingers curled to hold onto my finger.





Nick

My eyes and mouth felt glued shut. I struggled against my eyelids, trying desperately to open them, but they felt so heavy, I could only manage to lift them just enough that a little bit of light and color, too bright, came in. I let them drop closed. My mouth felt thick, like I’d swallowed a bottle of Elmer’s glue and it’d settled around my tongue and lips and teeth. I moved my tongue in the cavern of my mouth. I might as well have been trying to move a piece of heavy machinery.

“Nick?”

I forced my eyelids open again, just barely wider than I had before. Jaymie was right there.

There were tear stains on her cheeks.

“Look at you!” she said, her voice sounding funny, “You’re awake.”

I blinked against the brightness of the room, trying to focus. My limbs felt disconnected and far away. I wanted to say something amazing and witty, but I couldn’t think of anything. “J-- aymie,” I stammered. The words barely moved through my throat, it was so dry.

“I’m here,” Jaymie whispered. She reached up and put her hand against my cheek. “I’m right here.”

“Water?”

She pressed the nurse’s call button with her free hand, her other hand smoothing my cheek with her knuckles gently. “I’m not sure you’re allowed just yet, but I’ll get Dr. Stanley.” She stared down in my face, and the way she was leaning the light overhead reflected off those dried tears and I could see the worry that had hung in her eyes, being relieved by a new rush of tears. I hated making her feel afraid, hated seeing what I was doing to her.

“D- don’t cry,” I gasped the words out.

“I’m just so happy you’re okay,” she replied. She stared into my eyes. “You don’t know how scared I was… I don’t know what I would’ve done if you weren’t okay.”

But I’m not always gonna be okay, I wanted to say, You heard Dr. Stanley, even with the surgery and the radiation and the chemo and the whatever the hell else they do to me, I still only have eighteen months. At best.

What’ll you do then?

“I don’t know what the world would be like without Nick Carter,” she said.

“Q- quieter,” I mumbled.

Jaymie breathed a laugh.

“Less s-sexy,” I added.

The tears sat on Jaymie’s cheeks. “The shaved head look does work well for you,” she said.

“Of c-course,” I said, “Every l-look w-orks for me.” I tried to smile, but I could barely make my cheeks move. I could feel the corners of my mouth struggling to form the smile, but it just couldn’t quite form.

“That’s so very true,” she whispered. Jaymie smiled.

Now that’s more like it, I thought. Enough of this me-making-you-cry stuff.

Chapter Thirty-Three by Pengi
Chapter Thirty-Three


Nick

During my time in recovery at the hospital, I made a list. It wasn’t exactly a bucket list, not in the way that most people would think of bucket lists anyways. It was just everything that I wanted to make sure got taken care of before I died. Since I had eighteen months, at best, I figured it would be the most efficient to make it so I could check the box as I got each thing on it completed. It was all this really kinda arbitrary things. Things like, I wanted to make sure I cleaned out the basement, and I wanted to burn my journals and destroy some old computer hard drives. I wanted to make up with my family somehow and forgive them for everything. I wanted to write another book to say goodbye to my fans. I wanted to make up with Brian and maybe even be friends with Leighanne (I mean it was only eighteen months, anybody could be friends with anybody for eighteen months, right?). And, most importantly, I wanted to make sure I knew, beyond a doubt, that when I died, Jaymie would be okay.

And Jaymie being okay after I died spawned it’s own list. I wanted to make sure I left her a sizable amount of money so she was financially stable until she could get on her own feet again. I wanted to leave her enough, too, that she could go to school. I wanted to make sure she had a place to stay, that she had a car, and that someone would watch out for her. And most of all, I wanted to make her fall out of love with me. Because I loved Jaymie too much to make her go through losing someone she loved.

It would hurt, I knew that. But it would hurt less than knowing that I was gonna shatter her would hurt.

It’d been a week since the surgery and I was supposedly gonna be able to go home the next day, depending how I did during my first radiation therapy session. I wasn’t looking forward to it. But then there wasn’t a whole lot I was looking forward to. There wasn’t much forward to look at. But I was taking baby steps. For example, early the morning of Day Seven Post Surgery, Dr. Stanley had changed out my bandages and removed the staples from my head and, reluctantly, I’d agreed to look at myself in a mirror for the first time since they’d shaved my head.

I looked funny, pale and strangely unfamiliar. I’d pressed my fingers against my cheeks, trying to pull some color out of my skin.

I was standing in front of the mirror poking my face when Jaymie came in carrying a large take-out bag. She put it down on the rolling tray and dropped her purse into the chair next to the bed. “You look like you’re feeling a little better,” she commented.

“Mmm,” I half-heartedly agreed without looking over.

“I brought you an In-N-Out burger, but don’t tell Dr. Stanley.”

I stopped poking my face and looked at the bag. “Real food, holy shit.” I went over and climbed back into bed and she pushed the table to me. I ripped open the bag, the smell of burger filling my nose as Jaymie sat down on the chair, pushing her purse to the floor.

She sighed and closed her eyes, leaning back in the chair.

“You okay?” I asked around a mouthful of french fries.

“Mmm,” she said, mimicking me.

I ate quietly for a few minutes.

“Brian said he might come up later,” she said. She’d been saying that for seven days. Supposedly, Brian had been at the hospital off and on all week, but I hadn’t yet seen him. Jamie kept making excuses for him about why he wasn’t coming up to see me in my room, but I felt like maybe it was just a cover-up and he wasn’t really interested in seeing me at all. Howie and Kevin had stopped in a couple times each before Howie had to go back to his family in Florida. AJ had come in once with Kevin, but he doesn’t fare well with hospitals and that one time was the only time I’d seen him there. Brian, though, had never once shown his face.

“We’ll see,” I mumbled.

Jaymie watched as I ate as much as I could - about half the food she’d brought - and pushed my rolling tray away. I leaned back in the pillow and sighed. “You okay?” she asked, getting up and rolling the top of the bag closed. She straightened up the stuff on my tray and pushed it around until it lined up neatly with the side of the bed. I felt like there was more she was asking, but I wasn’t positive what exactly.

“Yeah, I’m okay,” I answered.

She nodded and neatened the night stand, putting the remote control and the phone at precise angles.

“You don’t gotta do that,” I said.

“Do what?”

“The cleaning,” I said.

Jaymie stopped like she hadn’t realized she’d been cleaning at all. “Sorry,” she said, and she sat down in the chair again. She looked at me with a look somewhere between worried and nervous.

“Don’t be sorry,” I answered. “What’s that look for?”

Jaymie looked down at her knees, “Nothing.”

I raised my eyebrow.

I had a feeling she wanted to ask me about… you know, what I’d said. All the love and stuff. But at the same time it kinda felt like maybe she understood, like maybe she’d thought about it, too, and come to the same conclusion that I had… that eighteen months wasn’t enough time to put her heart on the line for.

I licked my teeth. Part of me wanted to bring it up myself. Like maybe putting a name on the elephant in the room would make him shrink down to size. I pictured us talking it out, coming to a grown-up agreement. I won’t break your heart, and I won’t make it harder than it has to be to get over me.

I opened my mouth to say something, but Dr. Stanley, another doctor, and the lastest nurse came in the room at that exact moment. “Sorry if we’re interrupting,” Dr. Stanley said, smiling benignly as he barged in with the two followers in tow, “But this is Dr. Paulson and she’s going to be your radiation specialist,” he waved her forward and she stepped around Jaymie’s chair to shake my hand.

I awkwardly shook her hand, barely noticing it, watching as Jaymie stood and edged her way back from the crowd at my bedside.

Dr. Stanley started to talk about the therapy and what the next couple hours would entail for me, but my brain retained basically none of it because Jaymie muttered that she’d check on me in a little while and slipped out the door.





Jaymie

He’s going to break up with me, I thought as I walked down the hallway. I felt a little lightheaded from the realization that Brenda was right about what the tumor was capable of doing. I moved into an elevator and leaned against the backwall. I wasn’t sure where I was going, so I just pressed any arbitrary button and held onto the rail. He can’t break up with you, you were never together, the snarky side of my mind reminded me. You’re overreacting. You didn’t even want this remember? This is so stupid. You were never in this relationship for love, it was all about the sex. Remember? Remember when it was safe and meaningless and wonderful?

The problem was, it had been more wonderful since it had been less meaningless, if I was being honest.

And yeah we’d never really been together, so yeah he couldn’t really break up with me so to speak.

I’m being laid off, I thought dramatically. Fired. Given the pink slip. Let go.

I imagined Nick in a big old office like he was Donald fucking Trump.

I was outside without realizing I’d walked out of the elevator and I found myself standing on the sidewalk by the parking lot, under a little sign that said that the space I stood in front of was reserved for expectant mothers. The sun was bright and there was a considerable amount of pollens floating around like a lazy snow. It was hot and I was frustrated and tears were burning my eyes. From the pollen, I told myself.

I made my way around the perimeter of the hospital until I got to this little clearing off to the side and found a path that wound through a sort of pseudo-woods. Mostly they were palm trees in a cluster interspersed with planted trees that created a light shade. There was a bench halfway around it and I came to a stop and dropped onto the bench and closed my eyes. I could see the sun, glowing green through the leaves overhead, even through my eyelids.

Then the tears started.

Oh for fuck’s sake, my brain was saying. You knew this day would come, when he’d be done with you. Why are you so surprised?

Because I thought he meant it, my heart whimpered.

Well you’re dumb as shit, my brain accused.

I know, my heart replied. But I meant it when I said it, I think. I meant it with all of me.

You should’ve used me for once.

That was really the bottom line. I’d allowed myself to forget everything I knew and go along with just what I felt and now I was paying the price.

It was awful of me, I realized, that I felt more upset about what I’d lost in Nick’s healing than I was happy about the fact that he’d actually been healed to some extent.

I was a terrible person for kind of wishing that the operation would’ve been a failure and Nick would’ve woke up the same man he’d been in Germany when he’d sat on the end of the bed, our skin touching, scorchingly close together, and he’d uttered the L-word.

I’d never felt closer to him.

Even when he’d been inside of me, I had never felt that close to him before.

It was like I was the tumor.

“Ahem.”

I opened my eyes.

Brian was standing in front of me.

“Any room on that bench?”

“If you don’t mind sitting next to a sad, pathetic loser,” I replied.

“Only if you don’t,” he answered.

I scooted.

He sat.

“How is he?” Brian’s voice was quiet, like he was afraid he didn’t have the right to ask. I wasn’t sure if I thought he did or not.

“He’s okay,” I answered. “He’s his old self. He keeps asking about you,” I said.

I felt Brian actively not looking at me.

“I think he thinks you’re just a bedtime story I’m telling him to get him to go to sleep,” I said. I knew the statement bothered him; the muscles in his jaw tightened and loosened a couple times. “Are you going to go see him?” I pressed.

Brian took a deep breath. “I don’t know.”

“You should,” I said. “He needs his friends right now.” The word came out a little sharper than I’d meant for it to, and stung a little harder than I’d thought it would. It tasted like dirty pennies in my mouth. That’s all I am, I thought. His friend. My heart quaked. My brain shook it’s head in disapproval.

Brian either didn’t hear tone in my voice or ignored it. “Yeah,” he said, “But I’m not sure I fall under that category these days.”

“Of course you do.”

Brian shrugged.

“Just go see him,” I directed him. “It’s not like there’s an abundance of time for you to hem and haw over the choice. Time is very limited, and you don’t want to waste it all worrying about it when you could’ve had that time actually with him. Right?”

Brian nodded. “You’re right,” he said. He stood up. “Thanks, Jaymie.” He hovered over me for a minute, staring down. He paused. “So, um, are you and Nick… okay?” he asked.

I nodded even though I didn’t feel okay.

Really okay?” he asked.

I knew what he was asking. Like really asking. But I didn’t want to admit that I’d allowed myself to believe that Nick and I had any chance of ever being anything more than what we’d always been. Or that I’d even wanted it to be so. That I’d craved more, just as Brian had always warned Nick.

“Yeah,” I answered. “We’re really okay.”

Brian took a deep breath. “Since we’re in this kind of awkward, candid middle space… Listen, Jaymie, I’m sorry I’ve been such a - a - monkeywagon to you all these years.” In my head, I substituted monkeywagon for dickhead because whatever cutesy kind speak Brian inserted in the sentence, dickhead was what he meant by it. “I’ve been kind of a judgemental ass and -- well, you didn’t deserve it.”

“It’s okay,” I said. I paused a moment. Then, “I might’ve deserved some of it a little.”

Brian shrugged. “Didn’t mean I had to act like that, regardless.” He turned and started walking back up the path toward the hospital without saying anything else.

I stayed out on the bench for quite awhile, rambling over various scenarios in my mind for how, exactly, to make Nick believe that nothing had changed between us to relieve him of the stress of having to tell me so himself. I didn’t want to make him have to be the bad guy in this stage of his life. And plus, I didn’t want to hear his voice speak the words that he didn’t mean what he’d said.

It’d be easier on us both if I broke my own heart.

Chapter Thirty-Four by Pengi
Chapter Thirty-Four


Jaymie

Brian and Nick did talk. I don’t know what about. I managed to meander around the hospital long enough for them to have their privacy, eating a soggy chicken sandwich and drinking watery orange juice from a paper cup. By the time I got back upstairs, Nick was gone to his radiation therapy session and Brian was watching a basketball game on cable. When Dr. Stanley rolled Nick back into the room forty minutes later, he was tired and it only took a little bit before Brian decided he had to go and I was left alone with Nick, who was half asleep and nauseated. I rubbed his hand, my fingers running over his over-sized gamers’ knuckles, and we both stared up at the game Brian had abandoned on the TV, both too lazy to change the channel.

I looked over at Nick as he coughed a little, fatigued sort of hiccough that barely rattled in his chest. He looked so… worn out.

If I was your girlfriend, I thought to him, I’d tell you right now how much I love you.

He tried to shift his weight and he winced. I stood up, “Here,” I said, gripping his torso to help him in the movement, tugging the pillow in the direction he indicated, and adjusting the blankets around his body. My hand grazed his pelvis, and without really meaning to I felt his limpness and I blushed and pulled my hand away quicker than I really needed to, overcompensating by tucking the blanket under his knees and sitting back down without looking at his face.

“Thanks,” he murmured.

“No problem,” I answered.

He looked down at the blue blanket, whose texture reminded me of a waffle, but his eyes seemed to look past it. At the limpness, maybe. “One of the side effects of this thing is reduced sexual desire,” he said. “I was reading a pamphlet.”

“You can read?” I joked.

Nick smirked slightly, his lip only just barely turning up. “Well, I mean, you know. I’m not sure what this is gonna do to, like, us,” he explained. He cleared his throat. But, like his cough before, it was a pathetic sound that didn’t seem to really reach his lungs.

“We’ll play it -er- touch and go,” I answered, trying to be my usual gently teasing self.

Nick hesitated. “I’m just sayin’. Like… if… say, say you didn’t wanna, you know, stick around…”

Here it comes, I thought, steeling myself.

“...Like I’d get it. If you didn’t. Stay, I mean. Like if you wanted me to leave you alone. Not to drag you into all this. We were never supposed to be tied down. I don’t want you to feel like you - like you are. Tied.”

“I wouldn’t mind being tied by you,” I said. I hadn’t meant it suggestively. I’d meant the words the same way Nick had, meaning that I was willing to be committed to him. But I could see in his eyes that the words had come across suggestively to him, that he’d taken them to be a sexual comment, that, for the first time in all the time that I’d known him, Nick wasn’t in the mood. “I mean, I’m not going anywhere,” I explained.

“Okay,” Nick replied.

“I mean, unless you want me to go,” I said.

Nick shrugged.

“You can tell me if you do,” I told him.

“I don’t,” he said. And the moment he said it, I saw something in his eyes twitch and he looked away and took a deep breath. “Unless you want to.”

“I don’t,” I echoed.

“Okay,” he replied.

“Okay,” I replied back.

And somehow at the end of it I didn’t really have a clue what we’d really been talking about. But I didn’t know how to ask him, either. I felt like we were walking on emotional eggshells. I settled myself back into the chair and looked up at the basketballers running around after their little orange ball and the crowd acting all nutty and the jumbotron all bright and the announcers speed-talking, trying to keep up with the action. I didn’t know jackshit about basketball. It was one of those things that Nick indulged in that I didn’t really give much of a damn about. We’d had plenty of celebratory sex over the years because this team or that team won (or sad sex because they’d lost), -- (Though none of the basketball season sex was as intense as the football season sex. Those Buccaneers man… can’t they win a game once in awhile? I mean I’d love some hot, happy sex instead of weepy, losing sex guys!) -- but that was about the extent of my basketball knowledge.

Neither of us said anything.

Finally, Nick’s nurse came in and informed me that it was the end of visiting hours and smiled placidly while I gathered all my stuff.

“See you tomorrow,” I said to him.

“Okay,” he said.

“Maybe you’ll get to come home with me tomorrow, too,” I suggested, because he looked so blue. I smiled.

Nick nodded.

I felt bad, but there wasn’t anything else to say. Other than the L-word. And I couldn’t say that. So I didn’t. “Night,” I said.

“Night,” he mumbled.

And I left. I felt like crap, but I left. I don’t know what it was about that particular parting that made it more painful than any of the others, but there was a lump in my throat that grew larger and larger as I went down the stairs.





Nick

Thank you for holding my hand, I love you.

Don’t move out, don’t leave me, I love you.

I’m only trying to protect you, I love you.

Don’t go. I love you.

I watched her back disappear around the corner of the door, and I wanted to shout out Come back! I love you! But I didn’t. I just stared after her, sick to my stomach from holding it in, and turned to look back down at the blanket and fiddled with my fingers.

“So, how are you feeling?” the nurse asked. She moved in with her little rolly cart and started hooking up the ET finger and uncoiling her stethoscope.

“I love her,” I said.

The nurse blew hot air onto the plate of the scope, like I hadn’t said anything monumental at all. Like it didn’t really matter. She reached over and helped me lean forward. “I meant how you’re feeling about your radiation,” she said, pressing the scope to my back. Despite having tried lamely to warm it, it was cold and made me jump when it pressed to my skin.

I wondered if my heart was beating Jaymie’s name. It felt like it might be.

“I dunno, I’m really tired. Like my body is. I feel like I might throw up a little. Like I want to throw up but there’s nothing in there to throw up.” That was probably more to do with Jaymie leaving than the radiation, I thought to myself. The nurse pulled away the scope and gently guided me back to my pillowy resting point, looking at her cart, at the result of the ET finger clip and got the cuff for the blood pressure out. “It was different than I expected. It was like being microwaved for a couple minutes. I always pictured radiation as some like really crazy painful needles and stuff.”

“The painful part is the side effects.”

I shrugged, “They don’t seem so bad.”

The nurse was pumping the cuff.

“I feel shitty, but I mean better than I thought I would.”

“For now,” she replied.

You’re a ray of sunshine, I thought.

Unfortunately, she was right. By two in the morning, I was holding one of those pink plastic tubs and hurling, squeezing my eyes shut because even the muted, yellow light from the hallway was too bright. I clutched the edge of the bucket, my knuckles white from trying to remember not to let the bucket tilt too far to either side. I looked miserably up at the clock and willed it to move faster, so Jaymie could come back because I really, really missed her and somehow everything seemed more damning without her there. I missed the way she broke the silence just by breathing and the way she had squeezed my fingers earlier when I coughed.

I lowered the bucket as the nausea settled a little bit and let it rest on my knee. I glanced over at my cell phone sitting on the night stand.

Careful not to tip the bucket, I picked up the phone and pulled up my messenger.

TampaBuccsFan28: u up?

I waited. While I waited, my stomach twisted again and I lifted the pink tub to my chin and felt my organs all clench around the emptiness that was my insides. There was nothing left in there for my retching to produce, but that didn’t keep it from attempting to turn inside out. I closed my eyes. I’d been like that a couple minutes when I felt my phone vibrate against my leg. I looked down.

PurpleNailPolish: hey
TampaBuccsFan28: hey

I wanted to keep the excitement to a minimum on the screen. I didn’t want her to think I was being too clingy, that I was gonna back out of my promise to let her go if she wanted to go. But as casual as my answer in type appeared, my skin kind of burned with excitement that Jaymie was on the other side of the screen somewhere, thinking of me just like I was thinking of her. It made me feel better to picture her looking at the text.

PurpleNailPolish: Why are you still up? shouldnt you be sleeping?
TampaBuccsFan28: probly… sick tho
PurpleNailPolish: :(
PurpleNailPolish: Im’ sorry.
TampaBuccsFan28: me 2
TampaBuccsFan28: i feel like shit
PurpleNailPolish: hugs

It was just a word on a screen but I felt some kind of strange warming comfort from it. I put the tub on the rolling table top and leaned back into the pillows cautiously, afraid the motion might upset my stomach again. I made it without my stomach rolling over again, though, and I breathed relief at the feeling of my weight being supported by something besides myself. I felt myself turn to jello against the mattress, a thin layer of tears just rimming my eyelids.

TampaBuccsFan28: i miss u

I hated myself for saying it the moment I hit the send button. But it was too late to take back.

PurpleNailPolish: I miss you too.

Chapter Thirty-Five by Pengi
Chapter Thirty-Five


Despite two more bouts of sick, I was apparently reacting very well to the radiation therapy according to Dr. Stanley the next morning and he started working on preparing my release papers even before Jaymie had arrived back to the hospital. I was nursing a cup of ginger ale, a freshly cleaned pink tub resting on my lap (just in case), staring up at The Fresh Prince of Bel Air on TV when Jaymie arrived. She looked tired, too, her ponytail slightly off center and her eyes a little droopy. Her shirt was wrinkled, too, like she’d pulled it from a still-packed suitcase just moments before.

She looked beautiful.

Oh man, I really am head over heels. I thought.

“Morning,” I said. My voice sounded funny, kinda raw and scratchy from all the throwing up I’d done.

“Morning,” Jaymie replied. She settled into the chair by the bed and rested her head against my knee, looking up at me. “Has Dr. Stanley come by yet?” she asked.

I nodded. “Says I’m doing good. I can go home.” I liked the weight of her head against my body. I felt important, like I still served a purpose, even if it was just to be her pillow for a second. Even in my broken state, I could still do something for her.

She smiled, “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” I nodded.

“It’ll be good to have you home,” she said. “Nacho misses you, and you can meet Rusty. Some fresh air will be good for you. Add some pink to your cheeks again.” She ran her hand along the blanket and took my hand.

My stomach twisted a little bit at her touch. Excitement, not sick, but my instinct was still to grab the bucket and wince. She sat up and gently ran her palm over my forehead, careful not to touch the bandages, like she’d been thinking she was gonna smooth my hair but - whoops, it’s not there - as I leaned over the tub.

When Dr. Stanley finally came up stairs with my paperwork, he smiled warmly at Jaymie and handed her a thick folder. “Here’s some information. I know it’s daunting, but, as Nick’s primary caretaker, there’s a lot you need to know.” She took the folder and I looked down at my knees, guilty feeling that Dr. Stanley was just assuming it would be Jaymie who would be stuck taking care of me for the next up-to-eighteen months.

But then again, who else would?

“Thanks,” Jaymie said. She bent the corner of the folder down and shifted for a second around in the papers, then looked back up at Dr. Stanley, smiling in a wobbly kinda way.

The collective effort of nurse and doctor and Jaymie assisted me from the bed to the waiting wheelchair that was offered. Dr. Stanley walked with us through the hallways and rode the elevator down. We stood on the curb while Jaymie went to fetch her car from the middle of the parking lot outside, squinting against the sun. He looked down at me for a moment. “You take care of her, too,” he said.

I looked up at him.

“She might be your caretaker but it’s a two way street. She’s going to be tempted to dote over you and forget herself, but you need to remind her now and then that if she doesn’t take care of herself, she can’t take care of you.” Dr. Stanley’s voice was firm.

I nodded.

“I put my personal mobile number on the paperwork. Call me. Anytime, day or night.” He patted my shoulder as Jaymie pulled her car up in the half moon drive in front of the doors to the hospital. He helped me climb into the front seat and I buckled up. The nurse scooted in and put a clean pink tub on my lap, it was filled with prescriptions and a little planner with a picture of a yellow lab puppy in a basket on it that was filled in with all my appointments for radiation therapies, carefully inked in so I wouldn’t forget them.

“See ya,” I said.

“No offense,” Dr. Stanley said, slight smile playing on his lips, “But for your sake, I hope you don’t.”

Jaymie drove home, both of us nearly silent the entire way. I stared down at the contents of the bucket, at the complicated names of prescriptions I’d be swallowing every day but was completely unable to pronounce. She gripped the wheel, a far-away expression on her face, a worry or something that I couldn’t name buried only just beneath the skin. The radio played quietly, some emo-soft-rock band that reminded me of Dashboard Confessional or Bright Eyes but not quiet. Something local, something probably only Jaymie knew about. She was good at appreciating the underappreciated.

When we pulled up to the house, she parked by the door and got out to come around and help me. We walked up the steps to the front door and Jaymie unlocked it and opened the door. Nacho came bounding from somewhere in the depths of the house, his rolly-polly body shaking with excitement. I bent forward shakily and patted his head as he squirmed around, tail wagging, tongue lolling out. Jaymie put my duffle bag on the back of the couch and watched as Nacho put on a whole song and dance greeting for me.

I looked up from my crouched position by Nacho, balancing myself with one arm stretched out to the wall, and my eyes met Jaymie’s as she stood in the doorway of the living room. My breath caught in my throat a little because as tired and overall messy as she looked - probably from a week of pure stress caused by my sorry ass - she was ...well, breath-taking. Literally, apparently. I stood up slowly, careful not to break the eye contact.

There was a million things I wanted to say but my mouth felt like sandpaper and I just stood there like a big bald baboon instead, all the words caught somewhere in the back of my throat.

“I’m glad you’re home,” Jaymie said, and just like that she broke the spell and looked away as Nacho raced through the house to the back door, pressing his wet nose against the sliding glass and waiting for one of us to open it for him so he could run out on the beach and pee. Jaymie obliged, and Nacho’s paws clicked as he ran across the deck and down the steps to the beach below. “I’m going to go get Rusty, he probably has to pee too,” she said, and she ducked out the door that led out to her apartment.

I started out to follow Nacho onto the beach and caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror in the foyer. My cue-ball shaped head, the stitches covered by bandages in what looked like a headband around my skull, my tired, sunken in eyes. I shook my head and turned away from the image.

I stepped into the salty air of the deck, blinking at the brightness of the sun. Nacho was down on the beach barking at the seagulls as usual. Suddenly, a big German Shepherd came darting from around the side of the house, a red leather collar around his neck, tags jingling as he ran to help Nacho with the rounding up of the seagulls. The two of them stood yapping and running in circles, playing together, chasing gulls. Jaymie came walking around the house behind Rusty, carrying a leash, a smile on her face as the wind caught her hair and she walked along the beach, laughing at the dogs. She walked a little ways towards them, paused, and waved to me.

I waved back.

I wanted to yell I love you to her. But I bit the words back. I couldn’t say them. Not outloud. Not again. It wasn’t fair to tell her I loved her and then die.

She turned back to the dogs.

When I die, I thought, I hope this is what it’ll be like. Watching over her.




Jaymie

Nick had this perpetual look of there being something he wanted to say. Every time I met his eyes, this uncomfortable feeling came over me, like he was telepathically telling me things. I imagined his mind working out the tangled knot his mouth had made, trying to figure out how to undo what he’d said to me. He needed me, this much we both knew, so he didn’t want to upset me too much, didn’t want me to leave… but you don’t need to love someone to need them. So I was doing my best to try to show him he didn’t need to say the words that were making him so uncomfortable, I was okay, I understood. I was the Cool Girl, the one that didn’t need to be told he’d said something he didn’t mean, the one who would be there for him without him ever having to be there for me. The one that knew there was nothing personal between us.

I watched Rusty and Nacho, carefully keeping my back to Nick. Despite my Cool Girl attitude, I was fighting back tears of frustration. Mostly at myself. I’d let myself want more. I should’ve known better, should’ve stayed detached. We’d had it all, so simply for so long.

After I’d regained myself, I whistled and the dogs heads both spun around. Rusty came bounding toward me, trailed by Nacho, who had taken to doing whatever Rusty did, like he was a cool older brother to imitate. I patted both dogs and led them back to the deck and up the stairs into the house. Rusty paused when he saw Nick, but took to him pretty quick once Nick lowered his hand, palm out, for Rusty to smell.

“He’s a nice lookin’ dog,” Nick commented.

I smiled. Rusty really was a beautiful dog, with shiny fur that melted from deep rusted brown to dark black. He wasn’t one of those tan German Shepherds, not like the K-9 unit dogs. He was a black beauty with teddy-bear soft fur behind his ears that smelled warm and safe when you hugged him tight.

Rusty raised his thick foot up and stuck it into Nick’s hand - shaking paws was one of Rusty’s best tricks. Nick smiled and shook his paw and Rusty spun around after his tail like he was dancing. “He likes you,” I said.

Nick’s smile widened.

Nacho was staring at us from the door like he was annoyed we were taking so long, so I pushed it open and he rushed inside, a tan blur of clicking nails and snorts. Rusty followed, then Nick. He was still carrying his in-case-of-emergency pink tub and the prescriptions in one hand, and he put them up on the counter and sat heavily in one of the bar stools in the kitchen. He groaned as he sat and slowly lowered his head on his arm and stared at the world in horizontal.

“God damn,” he muttered. “I’m tired.”

“Tired?” I said, my tone lightly sarcastic, “Why are you tired? It’s not like you just had brain surgery or something.” I pulled open the fridge and stared into it for a long time. I took out a bottle of water and put it on the counter. “I need to go grocery shopping at some point,” I said, “I noticed Dr. Stanley gave us a list of things you should be eating in that folder he gave me.”

Nick just kept staring at the wall.

“Basically there’s beer and ketchup in there right now,” I said. I nudged the water at him so the cold touched his arm. “You need to drink some water, your lips are dry.”

His eyes swiveled to look at me. He licked his lips, like he was testing to see if I was telling the truth. Then he sat up and took the water and cracked it open. When he’d finished, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, “Thanks,” he said.

I nodded.

His eyes were burning with something, with unsaid words.

“Nick,” I said, “You don’t have to say anything.”

“I don’t?” he asked.

“No,” I said, “You don’t. It’s okay. I know.”

“You do?”

I nodded. “I know.” I took his hand. “And I’m not going anywhere. It’s okay.”

A smile slowly cracked across his face.

“I just… I know I shouldn’t feel like this,” he said, “That it isn’t right. It isn’t fair to you. But I don’t care. I need you… you know? And… and I don’t feel right saying it outloud. I’m just glad you already know.”

I nodded. Inside, I was breaking in a thousand pieces. So I was right, then. He didn’t love me. But at least he didn’t want me to leave. I don’t think I could’ve left him knowing eighteen months later I’d never be able to see him again. He twisted his hand under mine and squeezed my fingers.

That night, I cried myself to sleep.

Chapter Thirty-Six by Pengi
Chapter Thirty-Six


Nick slept on the couch that afternoon. I sat in the dining room, the lights dimmed, pouring over the information pack that Dr. Stanley had given me, studying it like it was a religious text and I was a shaman. I kept getting up and peering over the edge of the couch to make sure Nick was okay. The dogs laid in a knot at my feet, Nacho snoring loudly, curled against Rusty’s stomach.

Mostly the paperwork Dr. Stanley had provided were general information things. How to change the bandage that covered Nick’s head, how to clean the stitches, what to do if something went wrong. He wasn’t allowed to drive until cleared by a doctor, and the paperwork warned that could take as long as six months, depending on the progress of his recovery. Strenuous exercise was discouraged until cleared by a doctor, also. No running or fitness training, but things like walks were encouraged. He had to wear a shower cap in the shower until his stitches fully healed. There were certain foods that were recommended, a couple he was discouraged against eating. Information on his medications, the side effects I could expect from his radiation, how to help him, what was normal and what required medical assistance...

I shifted as my eyes flitted across the line about sexual activity.

Sexual activity is not discouraged. Patients will know when they are ready and activity, as long as it is not strenuous or extreme in nature, is perfectly healthy at any time following release from the hospital, as the patient sees fit.

I glanced into the living room.

I looked back down at the papers and cleared my throat and shuffled by it, trying to pretend my heart rate hadn’t increased. I’d let my mind stray to thoughts of Nick’s hands on me. It would be a lie to say that I wasn’t suffering withdrawals. My eyes kept straying back to that line.

I wondered what it was going to be like now, to sleep with him now that I knew he didn’t love me.

I mean I’d always believed he didn’t, but he’d never said it before.

Of course he hadn’t really said it now, but we’d come to an understanding.

When Nick woke up that evening, I greeted him with some dinner and we watched a TV show together, him laying on the couch still while I sat beside it on the floor, my back leaning against the arm of the couch. It didn’t take long for him to get sleepy again and I suggested we move him upstairs to his real bed, and I helped him up and guided him up the stairs, his arm over my shoulders. Nacho stood at the top, wagging his tail, encouraging his daddy-human on while Rusty took up the rear, like he was safe-guarding to make sure we made it okay.

Upstairs, I helped him into the bathroom. He blushed when he realized he couldn’t balance by himself just yet and I had to stay there with him. I’d been in the bathroom a hundred million times with him over the past eighteen years but something about needing me there and me just being there to brush my teeth or in the shower or something made it different. When he was finished, I set him down on the closed toilet seat and slowly, gently peeled away the bandage on his head. Underneath was the puckered line where the stitches Dr. Stanley had made once were, a curl that wound it’s way around Nick’s head. It made a queasy feeling roll through the bottom of my stomach. I tried to keep my breathing balanced.

“Is it really bad?” Nick asked.

“No,” I lied.

Nick closed his eyes and held still while I gingerly put some of the medicated solution Dr. Stanley had given him for cleaning onto a soft cottony pad like the ones I used to put make-up on in the mornings. I softly patted the cloth along the stitching line. The thought of that line having been split open… of Nick’s tumor that had been right under there… of someone’s hands reaching into the skull, into Nick’s brain… of him being so exposed, so broken… My hands shook, and I had to take extra care not to hurt him. He winced at each touch and I paused as his body jolted.

“Am I hurting you?”

“No,” he answered. “The stuff stings.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s ok,” he replied.

It took us awhile to get through the cleaning. When we did, I laid fresh wrappings over the wound and secured them as gently as I could. His eyes were getting droopy from sleep by the time we were done and I smiled, “Time for bed, sleepy,” I said.

“Okay,” he nodded.

Guiding him out of the bathroom and back to the bedroom took a couple minutes, he was extra stumbly now that he was so tired. Slowly, I lowered Nick onto his bed and tucked him in under his blankets, which I’d washed the night before, knowing he was coming home today. “It feels good to be in my bed,” he commented.

“I bet it does,” I answered. I smiled and I helped Nacho up onto the mattress, and the lil guy pressed himself against Nick’s side, tight as could be. “Do you need anything? Water? Anything?”

Nick shook his head sleepily.

I started to the door.

“Wait,” he said.

I stopped and turned around.

“Where you goin’?”

“I was gonna go clean the kitchen then go to bed…” I said, confused.

Nick furrowed his brow. “You aren’t stayin’ with me?”

“I mean… I didn’t think…” I paused. He looked like a little kid finding out Christmas wasn’t coming. “You want me to stay in here?” I asked. He nodded. “Okay…” I walked back over and climbed onto the bed beside him, laying on top of the comforter.

He stared up at me from the pillow for a minute. “I don’t wanna be alone,” he said.

“I’m here,” I answered.

He nodded.

And he moved so his chest was pressed into the softspot of my chest, his cheek against my breast. He snaked his arms around my waist and he held me close, his breath warm even through my t-shirt, his eyes closed, his chest rising and falling, already rhythmic with rest. I rubbed his back, my fingers scrawling across his spine, massaging a tight knot here or there, relaxing him at the muscular level.

I wanted to keep him safe from whatever the future brought.

After a few moments, Nacho moved himself so he was up against Nick’s back, his nose pressed into my palm, snoring within moments. I felt Rusty climb up and lay at our feet, his head resting on my ankle, and soon I, too, fell asleep, thinking how nice it was to be a part of this little ragtag team. We were like a funny little family.





Nick

The next week was a blur of days and nights similar to that first one. Sleeping on the couch between TV shows, then going for short walks on the beach while Jaymie played with the dogs, walking a little further each time, building up my stamina. We spent the nights all pig piled up in the bed, the blankets around us, keeping us warm, keeping us together.

It occurred to me I was indulging myself in everything I’d been afraid to. Jaymie was going to grow more attached, not distance herself, and the thought scared me because I knew the more personal it got, the more I would devastate her. And also the more it scared me to break it off with her, even if it was to protect her. After all, the more attached Jaymie got...the more attached I got, too.

It also occurred to me that I’d had a pretty solid list of things I needed to get done and with only the best-case scenario of eighteen months, I couldn’t afford to waste time. And here I was going on a whole week of wasted time.

We were sitting at the table, eating lunch, and it was Day Eight and Jaymie was reading the information pages Dr. Stanley had given her - again, for like the millionth time - absently poking at her bowl of tomato soup she’d made for us. I was dunking the crusts of my sandwich in the broth, trying to decide how to bridge into a conversation about the things I wanted to do that afternoon.

“I was thinkin’,” I said, breaking the silence. Jaymie looked up. “I’d like to go out today.”

“Go out?”

“Yeah. I gotta stop by the bank and also I need to see Jason.” Jason was my lawyer. I’d emailed him and asked about getting an appointment that week and he’d said to just stop by his office when I could and he’d make time for me.

Jaymie’s eyebrow raised.

“I got stuff I need to do.”

She licked her lips and put down the papers Dr. Stanley had given her. “You’re trying to do the whole putting your affairs in order thing, aren’t you?”

I chewed on my grilled cheese sandwich slowly. “It’s now or never,” I replied.

She shifted in her chair uncomfortably. I could tell she didn’t wanna think about me organizing myself and stuff, but she couldn’t really do much to argue with me or anything. “Okay,” she said.

We finished eating and got dressed - which was like a gymnastic feat in and of itself. I found myself wondering if I couldn’t put my own pants on how the hell I was gonna get done with everything I needed done before I - you know.

I was holding a briefcase on my lap, one that I’d bought years ago in a fit of fancy of becoming one of those slick suited businessmen back in the mid-2000s, when I’d taken on managing a band a friend of mine was in. The briefcase had my initials embossed on the front of it in little silver letters and had lived on the top shelf in the way far back corner of my closet for almost ten years.

“What are you going to do with a briefcase?” Jaymie asked, eyebrow cocked when I’d asked her to pull it down.

“Put things in it,” I answered, “Things I need to carry.”

She’d sighed and teetered on the little step stool, stretching her arms to reach it. It was covered with dust when she’d gotten it down, but a quick swipe with a paper towel and it was good as new. Mainly because it basically was new. I’d used it maybe twice.

“How do I look?” I’d asked, holding it securely once we’d cleaned it off.

“Like Rumpelstiltskin,” she replied.

After an hour and a half of getting ready, we were in the car and headed downtown. I was mentally running over exactly what I’d planned to do.

When we got to the bank, Jaymie pulled up close to the door and started to get out. “No,” I said, “You stay here.”

“But Nick, you --”

“Can do this on my own,” I answered.

Jaymie looked on worriedly as I pushed open the door and climbed out, bracing myself on the car door frame. I walked slowly, the way I walked on the beach, too, but I did okay. The briefcase was a bit obnoxious, but I’d need it once I got inside, and I wasn’t about to stop carrying it now anyway, not after all the hassle I’d put her through to get it down. When I got to the door of the bank lobby, I turned around and saw she still had that anxious look on her face. I waved and smiled and she smiled back, but weaker than I’d smiled at her, and I stepped inside.

“Good afternoon, sir,” a bank employee was standing behind a little podium to welcome me at the door. She was wearing a pink tweed skirt and jacket with pearls. Exactly what you’d expect a bank employee to wear in like the 1960s or something. “How can we help you?”

I took a deep breath, “I need to make a sizable withdrawal,” I answered, and I handed her a withdrawal slip I’d filled out already, torn from the back of my checkbook.

She stared at it a second, then looked up at me in surprise. “Are you sure this figure is correct? It’s just such a large --”

“Yes,” I replied. “That’s why I brought this.” I waved the briefcase.

She nodded. “Right this way,” and led me to an office.

Once I’d securely put all the money I’d withdrawn from my account into my briefcase - about 90% of my total balance - the bank employees followed me to the door and told me to have a good day. I walked slowly back to the car. Jaymie had turned on the radio and the deejay was babbling about some celebrity gossip story as I climbed in. Jaymie turned the volume down. “So.. how’d it go? You okay?”

“Yeah I’m good.” I put the briefcase on the floor. It was considerably heavier than it’d been before we’d started.

“Get everything you needed done in there?” she asked.

I nodded.

We stopped by Jason’s office next and once again I made Jaymie wait outside. Jason sat behind his big mahogany desk and listened closely while I detailed exactly what I wanted him to draft for me. He rubbed his fingers across his lips as he considered my requests. “Are you sure that’s what you want?” he asked.

“I’m positive,” I replied.

“Okay.” He sat forward, staring down at the notes he’d written while I spoke. “Okay. I’ll get this drafted for you and I’ll give you a call when it’s ready for you to come down and sign it.” He stood up. He held out his hand, then seemed to hesitate, like he was unsure if it was kosher to offer to touch me. I shook his hand, though not as strongly as I once would’ve.

“You’ve been a big help,” I told him, “Thank you for all the work you’ve done for me over the years. I’ve appreciated it.”

He smiled, “I’ll call you,” he said.

I nodded.

Maybe it was only two errands but I was exhausted by the time I got back to the car. I sank into the seat, my feet on either side of the briefcase, and sighed. I looked over at Jaymie.

“Tired?” she asked.

I nodded.

“Okay. Home it is then,” she said and she backed out of the lot. I watched the way the sun made shadows from her eyelashes as she drove and the way her mouth moved around words, and I felt my eyelids droop. I felt better already, just knowing I’d taken the first steps to making sure she was taken care of.

Chapter Thirty-Seven by Pengi
Chapter Thirty-Seven


Nick

I woke up at three in the morning from a dream.

A really good dream, if you know what I mean.

It was Day Twelve. I’d done my second radiation therapy appointment three days before and I’d spent two horrible days sick to my stomach and sleeping off the nausea that came in waves in the 48-hours trailing the treatment. But when I opened my eyes it was to a different kind of feeling in the pit of my stomach.

I stared into the dark, at the shape of Jaymie’s body on the pillow beside me, her head turned to the side, cheek against the pillow like a whisper. Nacho lay between us, a jiggling little jello-mold of do, his girth pressed against both our thighs. I moved slightly and he lifted his head to look at me in disapproval and I shooed him off. He got up and crawled away, jumping off the bed with a thump. I inched closer to Jaymie.

I didn’t read all the information Dr. Stanley had given her, I didn’t know what protocol was when it came to this stuff, but I knew what I wanted.

“Jaymie,” I whispered, and I leaned over, pressing my mouth to her chin. “Jaymie, wake up.” I kissed along her jawline, soft little taps of my lips. Her eyelashes fluttered. When I reached her ear, I whispered, “Jayyyymie…”

“Mmm?” she hummed and stretched a little, her legs elongating under the blanket.

“I need you, Jaymie,” I breathed and I caught the soft part of her ear between my teeth ever so gently, tugging just a little. Her breath was warm against my neck.

“What’cha doin’?” she murmured, still mostly asleep.

I kissed along the ridge of her ear. “I’m kissing you,” I answered.

“Mmm,” she hummed again.

I slid my hand around her, up the plane of her belly, up her torso until my thumb was on the bone between her breasts and my hand was just under them, my fingers wrapped around her side, pulling her closer to me. I used my other hand to pull her hair away so I could kiss the back of her neck.

That woke her up. She rolled over slowly, until her hands were against my chest, “Are you trying to--?” she said in surprise, looking up at me, not even finishing the sentence.

“Mmhm.” I kissed her nose, then her forehead.

She took in a breath and I slid my hand down her spine, feeling each bump in the bone ‘til I got to her bottom and I squeezed the soft skin there gently. She made a noise of approval and I pulled her close again so our bodies touched and tangled my feet up with hers, running my toes along her feet, stroking them with my own.

“Are you sure?” she asked quietly.

I kissed her as an answer. She tasted sweet and savory. “I missed you,” I said between kisses.

It was the most awake I’d felt since I’d woken up in the hospital. My senses were on overdrive. I knew I shouldn’t be doing this, knew I needed to separate myself from her, not get closer not get inside her, yet I couldn’t stop myself. I needed her like air. I slid my hands up her, sliding her t-shirt over her head. Her hair fell to the pillow, scattered every which way. I dropped the shirt away and tried to lean over her to feel her breasts press against my chest, but my hand slipped and I crashed down from the effort. She didn’t laugh, and she didn’t stop us from going any further, either. Instead, she leaned over me.

She stared into my eyes as she leaned, and she pushed my tank top up so it bunched over my collarbone, and she pressed her chest against mine. Just the touch of her skin was intoxicating. She smiled and got up and straddled me so her legs were on either side of my torso. “You stay right there and let me give you what you want,” she said, her voice thick. My heart raced. She reached behind her and undid the clasp on her bra and let it drop away, then slowly leaned down and kissed my mouth with hers.

She brought her hands up like she was going to run her fingers through my hair - probably without thinking about it because it was something she did all the time. Instead, her hands touched my scalp. She stopped short and I felt the surprise in her body as she tensed. She sat up and stared down at me, her hands withdrawn. I stared up at her. “Oh god,” she said, “Did I hurt you?” Panic was in her voice.

“No,” I said.

She looked worried anyway.

“You sure you wanna do it with a bald guy?” I asked.

She looked surprised by the question. “I just don’t want to hurt you,” she replied.

“It didn’t hurt,” I answered.

She paused, “Are you sure?”

I reached up and took her hands and softly brought them to my head. Her fingers splayed on my scalp. “I’m sure,” I said. And she softly stroked the skin above my ear, from my temple to the back on the side without the slowly scarring wound. It felt strange, but not in a bad way, just different and new. She did that for a couple moments, getting used to the idea, and then she reached for the waistband of the little plaid shorts she’d worn to bed and untied the ribbon that held them on. She shimmied out of them carefully, backing up to pull away my sweatpants, too, and then she straddled me once again and guided me into her slowly. I groaned quietly. She sat there for a moment, her eyes closed, both of us getting used to the feeling again. It was like coming home after a long tour, like being where I belonged.

She leaned down slowly, sliding me more deeply into her, and pressed her face into my neck. I clutched her, my fingers digging into her back, her palms on either of my biceps, and her breath hot on my shoulder. I moved my hips and she moaned my name into my skin, her mouth pressed to the spot where my shoulder and neck met.

This right here was worth living through all the tumor shit. I closed my eyes. It was like the ultimate reward for staying strong. The most amazing sex I’d ever had. I was in love up to my eyeballs with this girl and feeling her so completely surrounding me in every way was like being enveloped in a warm blanket on the coldest day. She consumed me, every sense, every part of me. I felt dizzy with excitement of being so fucking close to her. I could live and die and never see another moment and be perfectly happy.

This was beyond any drug I’d ever taken, beyond any experience I’d ever had.

I love you, I thought. I love you, I love you, I love you.

She could’ve swallowed me whole like some alien in a sci-fi flick and I would’ve been perfectly fine by that.

It was slow and magic and amazing and when we were done she curled up to my side and I wrapped my arms around her and I thanked my stars for letting me live long enough to experience that and my only wish was that I could live to have a lot more sex just like that.

“Still okay?” Jaymie whispered, her head against my bare chest. “Your heart’s racing.”

I nodded.

“Okay. Good.”

I waited. I wanted her to say it’d been amazing, wanted her to tell me that it’d rearranged the stars in her sky the same way it had mine. I wanted her to say something like I know we said we wouldn’t say the words but I love you anyways and then I’d say it back. I just wanted her to say it first because if she said it then I could say it without feeling guilty. But she didn’t say it.

I lay awake, staring up at the fan as it spun overhead, waiting.

But she never said a word. She fell asleep.





Jaymie

I dreamed the sex had somehow healed him. Dr. Stanley couldn’t explain it, but Nick’s cancer was gone and the only thing it possibly could’ve been was the amazing sex we’d shared. Nick turned to me, engulfed me in a hug, swung me around a circle and thanked me for saving his life and pronounced that he loved me. In the dream, everything had melted suddenly into a wedding and there we were on some beach in some place like Bora Bora or something, entwined in my veil, kissing our first as husband and wife and --

Rusty’s nose pressed into my ear and snuffed, waking me up with a start. He was soaked. “What the --” I rolled over and realized Nick was gone, and outside the window I could see dismal gray clouds and rain and Rusty’s wetness was explained. I sat up, holding blankets to my chest, suddenly modest in the daylight. I slid to the floor and grabbed my t-shirt and bra and shorts, pulling them all on as Rusty rushed back out the bedroom door, his tail thumping against the wall as he went down the narrow stairs.

I brushed my teeth and tried to straighten my just-fucked hair but it was no use, it was unruly as all hell and I wanted to get downstairs to check on Nick before putting in the time to tame it. He was sitting on the stool in the kitchen texting when I got down there. He looked up, “Morning,” he said. Something strange was in his voice.

“Morning,” I answered.

I wanted to ask if last night had been special for him, if it’d been at least half as good as I felt like it’d gone. I wanted to tell him about my dream, that for me it’d been so good I’d thought it was enough to save a life, but the look on his face seemed somehow removed, distant, and I wasn’t sure it was a good time.

“Jason texted,” he said, “I gotta go see him again later. Sign some papers and stuff. Also, I sent an email to my family.” He paused. “I invited them to come this weekend.” He stared at the phone. “I dunno if any of them will.”

I leaned against the bar counter he was seated at.

“I figure I’ll tell ‘em in person if I can. If they don’t come I guess I’ll email it, but…” he didn’t look up. He shrugged.

“We can go to the store and get something to make for dinner incase they come,” I suggested.

Nick nodded.

“Did you take your pills?”

He nodded again.

I hesitated. “You feeling...okay...today?” I meant because of the sex.

Nick shrugged, “I’m ok.”

“Okay,” I said. “You hungry?”

“I ate cereal.”

“Okay.”

I stood there, feeling helpless and pointless and kind of disappointed. Honestly, I’d kind of thought that maybe… just maybe… he did love me after all.

“So last night was --”

“A mistake,” he said.

“Excuse me?”

Nick shook his head, “We shouldn’t have done that.”

I stared at him.

“It’s not fair to you,” he said. “I’m just gonna die in a few months and then what? Last night was a bad idea and it can’t happen again.”

So many things flared up in me at those words. “Nick --”

He held up his hand, stopping me from saying what I was going to say. “It’s okay,” he said, “I’ve come to terms with it and I made a mistake, letting… stuff… get in between last night. And I shouldn’t have been so weak.”

“What?”

“I’m sorry, Jaymie, I’m just… I’m trying to do damage control.” He rubbed his forehead. “Jesus I’m horrible at this. Look, lemme just say it okay? It can’t just go back to like it was before because it isn’t like it was before.” He stood up. “I wanna make sure you’ve got everything you need and that you’ve got money and that you’re taken care of but that’s as far as this --” he waved between us, “-- can go.” He turned and walked out of the room.

My brain raced, trying desperately to catch up to what he’d said, what he’d meant. I felt like he’d slapped me. He might as well have, I thought. Was he saying he was going to pay me? After all this time, he thought he had to pay me?

What was I, some kind of long investment hooker? I mean I guess at one point I kinda had been. (Maybe I shouldn’t have been as offended as I felt, in retrospect?) But hadn’t that changed since he’d been sick? Hadn’t the fact that I’d dutifully taken care of him, cleaned his wound, fed him, taken care of his dog, cleaned his house, kept him literally standing up when he couldn’t by himself - wasn’t that more? How dare he think he was going to pay me like some street corner whore with fishnet stockings!

He came back a minute later with that damn briefcase he’d made me get down from the closet, put it on the counter and opened it. It was full of money. “This is yours,” he said, “All of it.”

I shoved it back at him.

“I don’t want it.”

“What?” he looked confused. “Jaymie, I really owe you more than this after all these years that you’ve been ---”

“Fuck you,” I said, and I stormed out the sliding door onto the deck.

Chapter Thirty-Eight by Pengi
Chapter Thirty-Eight


Jaymie

It was still raining outside. I wished I’d remembered the rain when I’d stormed out the door onto the deck, but I’d been too angry and once I was out there I wasn’t going to go back in. I stood at the rail, staring out at the monotone gray ocean and the rain falling diagonally across my field of vision. Nick took a few minutes before he opened the deck door. “Jaymie,” he said from just inside, where it was warm and dry, “Come back inside.”

“No,” I said.

“Let’s talk,” he tried.

“I’m not talking to you,” I said.

“C’mon.”

“No.” Even though I was back-to him, I crossed my arms, just to punctuate the no.

He stood there a second. He sighed. I could feel him staring at my back. “Jaymie, you know I can’t go out there. If I caught a cold or something right now…” he let the sentence drop away, his voice tired.

“I am well aware you can’t come out here in the rain. Why do you think I am standing in it? I want to be away from you. Leave me alone.”

“Jaymie,” he pleaded.

“Nick, for fuck’s sake.”

“What? What’d I do?” he asked.

I spun around to look at him, wild eyed, “What did you do? What did you -- I can’t even.” I turned back to the ocean. “Fucking A. What did you do. Jesus.” I gripped the railing of the deck, my fingers tight to keep from shaking. It was damn cold out there. I gritted my teeth.

“You’re shivering,” he commented.

“I am not,” I replied. But my words trembled a little.

“Jaymie. Just come inside.”

No.”

Nick let out a long, exasperated sigh. “Fine. You ain’t gonna come in like a reasonable adult…”

The sound of the door sliding followed.

I thought he went inside. Thought he closed the door.

Then, without any warning, I was swept up off the ground. I screeched, kicking my legs, and Nick, barefoot and in nothing but old sweatpants, carried me back into the house, my limbs flailing. “Put me down!” I screamed. He kicked the deck door closed and the wind and rain were left outside. “Put me down! What do you think you’re doing? You’re a bastard! Put me down!!!” But he didn’t until he got to the living room and then he deposited me on the couch unceremoniously.

I was dripping wet, my hair matted to my head. Now that I was back inside in the warm I felt even colder. I scrambled to sit up, though, and Nick sat on the coffee table in front of me. The ankles of his pants were soaked and there was water dripping off his scalp and off the end of his nose. I glared at him. “What the fuck did you do that for?” I demanded.

“What are you so angry for?” he asked.

“Because,” I replied.

“Because why?” he asked.

“Why’s it even matter?” I asked stubbornly, “Huh? Do my emotions really change anything for you? What’s the fuck it really matter what’s wrong with me? No one gives a damn what their hookers feel.”

“Hookers?”

I snuffed and crossed my arms and held my chin aloft.

“Is this ‘cos of the money?”

“You don’t pay people for having sex with you unless they’re a hooker.”

“That wasn’t -- ugh.” Nick leaned forward, covered his eyes with the heels of his hands and shook his head, “God damn it, Jaymie. How could you think that, after last night?”

“You said it was a mistake.”

“It was,” he answered.

“You know most girls would’ve dumped your ass the second you said you didn’t love them, that it was the tumor talking when you said you did. They wouldn’t have hung around and cleaned your house and fed your pets and done your laundry and cleaned your bandages and ---” I shook my head, “I must be the dumbest bitch in the whole world, to stay here when I know -- when a man tells you he doesn’t love you… you don’t stay, god damn it.” I stood up and paced away.

Nick lowered the hands from his eyes. He turned to look at me. “When in fuck’s name did I tell you that I don’t love you?” he demanded.

“When you came home from the hospital,” I said. “When we talked. You said you didn’t feel right saying it outloud ‘cos you still needed me, and I said it was okay, you didn’t have to say it, because I already knew. It was in your eyes for days.”

Nick’s nose flared, a pained expression in his eyes. “Jaymie,” he said quietly, “I never said the words I don’t love you.”

My brain raced. Hadn’t he?... but no, no actually, he hadn’t.

My stomach twisted.

“I said that I couldn’t say what I felt,” he said quietly. “I said it wasn’t fair to you to tell you how I feel about you.”

Was he saying…?

I could feel tears in my eyes.

“God damn it, Jaymie, I love you. I love you so fuckin’ much I can’t stand to tell you I love you because I’m afraid that when I die you’ll be broken and I don’t wanna break you.” He stood up, eyes fierce, straddling a line between love and anger. “So I made a choice not to say it.”

“Well maybe you should let me make my own fucking choices!” I bellowed. How dare he not tell me the truth, I thought.

My mind didn’t even process fully what he’d said.

“I didn’t wanna die and break your heart,” he shouted. And just like that, it was a fight. “I don’t know how you handle death! I don’t know what that would do to you, losing me. I didn’t wanna devastate you!”

Devastate me?” I cried out, “Because I’m so fragile that losing you would devastate me? That losing you might break me?”

I’d expected him to shout back at me. After all, that’s what he normally would’ve done. I expected the fight to continue because usually once we got going we didn’t stop for hours. But instead he stared at me, a flabbergasted look on his face. He lowered down onto the coffee table again and looked down, away from me. It took me a moment to realize that he was upset - not in the angry way we had been, but in a sad way. He took a deep breath, “I dunno,” he said, “Would losing me be devastating to you?”

I suddenly felt like shit. “Of course it would,” I said, recognizing a truly hurt look in his eyes. I walked back over and sat on the couch in front of him. I put my hands on his knees. “Nick. Of course it would be devastating, and of course it would break me.”

His jaw trembled slightly.

“Aw, honey…” I grabbed his hand. “Nick. Of course.”

“I didn’t wanna -- I just -- Nobody else…” His face was crumpled. I squeezed his knee gently. “I just wanted you to be okay after I’m gone and I ain’t here no more to take care of you.”

“Okay? If you died?” I shook my head. “Nick, I would never be okay if you died. I mean I would have to learn to let go eventually, but I wouldn’t just be like whatever about it... whether you’d said you loved me or not. I’d be broken whether you said it or you kept it secret from me all the days you have left.”

“But ain’t it harder?” he asked.

“It’s harder not being able to say it,” I whispered.

Nick looked up in my eyes. “So you… you still… yanno? You still love me? Even though I’m bald and dying?”

“Nick, I thought we covered this before? I reached up and ran my hand over his head softly, catching rain drops that were still dripping from his eyelashes. “Nick, I love you even if you looked like Mr. Mulder, remember?

“I love you,” he said quietly.

And that time the words sank in.





Nick

It was like having a billion pound weight lifted up off my chest. As soon as the words had slipped my mouth, knowing they were words she wanted to hear, I could feel the pressure inside me just seep out. It was so much easier to breathe when Jaymie knew. And hell, yeah I was scared still, but somehow things didn’t seem as impossible. Living for eighteen months didn’t seem far fetched and strange.

We hugged, acting strangely calm for a couple that had just said the long-awaited I love yous. We didn’t rush upstairs and hump like rabbits, we didn’t even make out on the couch. Instead, we both just calmly got up and started getting ready to get our errands done. I pulled on a pair of thick white gym socks and kicked on a pair of Adidas sandals and Jaymie scrunched up her nose when she saw the footwear choice I’d made.

“Seriously?” she said.

“What?”

“Socks and sandals?”

I shrugged.

I changed into a pair of sneakers.

We went to Jason’s office again and even though I’d told Jaymie I was going to take care of her, I still made her stay out in the car while I went inside to talk to Jason. She read an ebook on the ipad in the car while I was inside and when I came out she smiled and closed the little magnetic lid. We went to the grocery store and bought stuff to make food that might be considered okay by my family and I waved a box of condoms at her before dropping it into the basket.

We were unloading our grocery bags into the car when a girl approached me. “Excuse me?”

I looked up.

The girl’s face registered surprise. She cleared her throat. “Are, um, are you --” her eyes were riding on my used-to-be-a-hairline, “Are you Nick Carter?”

I wanted to say no. I could feel her eyes burning through my skull, taking in the scar on the side, the little purple dots that indicated where the radiation needed to point in order to effectively melt away the cancer cells.

I nodded. I couldn’t even say the word yes, I was too embarrassed.

She looked like she’d been about to ask a question, but held it back. Like something more important than what she finally did ask: “Can I have your, um, autograph?” she held up a store receipt and a marker.

I took her stuff and signed it.

“Thanks,” she said.

Then she left. She didn’t ask for a picture. I kinda had a feeling I knew why.

“Well. That was weird,” Jaymie commented. She was used to being basically invisible to fans, or else only noticed for being a good candidate to actually shoot the picture. Jaymie was a pro at shooting cell phone pictures of me with fans.

“Girl gets kudos for recognizing me at all,” I said as the car door closed.

But I’d be a liar if I said that I felt good about it.

I held Jaymie’s hand that she left resting on the center console as she drove home and I stared out the window, realizing how differently people were gonna look at me once they knew. I pictured telling the fans what was happening, pictured their reactions. Twitter was going to explode, I thought. My fingers squeezed Jaymie’s tighter.

“You okay?” she asked.

“Uh huh,” I replied. But I wasn’t. Not really.

I fell asleep that night with Jaymie laying in my arms and I tested out our new, allowable words in the dark of the room under the glow of a nightlight in the bathroom. “I love you,” I said.

“I love you, too,” she answered and she snuggled closer.

She couldn’t get close enough.

This story archived at http://absolutechaos.net/viewstory.php?sid=11273