“Jingle Bells, Brian smells, Kevin laid an egg! Howie D can’t find his teeth, and AJ lost his leg! Hey!”

Kevin groaned and pulled a pillow over his head.  It was too early to deal with Nick’s antics.  Even as he drifted back into sleep, the bed bounced.  Apparently, it was never too early for Nick, which meant it was going to be an early morning for everyone.

“Seriously, Nick.” Kevin’s voice was muffled by the pillow.  “Do you have to wake the entire world up?”

Nick bounced a little more before he grabbed the pillow away.  “Come on, Kevin! It’s the day of Backstreet Christmas! I’m so excited you’re here with us, and we can’t waste a single minute of today.  Who knows when we’ll see you after this?”

“I can’t believe I actually thought I’d miss this.” Kevin blearily opened his eyes and stared into Nick’s anxious, smiling face.  Why on earth could he never turn the kid down?  “Are the others up?”

“Yup.  They’re in the parlor! Come on, Kev! Let’s go see what Santa got us for Christmas!” And, he was off, shooting out of the room.

Kevin rubbed his fingers over his eyes and wished for a huge mug of coffee.  AJ was bound to have some if it was—he checked the clock—six-forty-two in the morning.  “Jesus.  Why did I agree to do doing this again?”

When he stumbled into the main room of the enormous suite, he found AJ downing a cup of coffee like a shot, Howie half-dozing on the couch, and Brian banging his head against the window.  Yeah, Nick Carter had surely done it again.  Except, this time, it wasn’t Christmas, it was December twenty-first, and the day the group had decided to meet for a “Backstreet Christmas” in order to spend quality time together, especially with Kevin.

“God, I can’t believe I actually thought I’d missed this,” Brian groaned, and Kevin grinned as he made his way over to where his cousin stood.  “Why did we agree to this again?”

“Because we thought it’d be nice to have the five of us together again, and because it’s been a long time since we’ve been together for Christmas,” AJ recited before taking another gulp of his steaming hot coffee.  “Where the hell is Nick? This was his brilliant idea.”

Nick bounded into the room with a Santa hat on his head and a sack slung over his shoulder.  “Ho, ho, ho! And, no, there isn’t one for you, AJ,” he added with a wink.  “Merry Christmas, you guys!”

Howie straightened and tried to wake himself up a little more, but didn’t quite manage it.  He wasn’t called Sleepystreet for nothing.  “Nick, couldn’t we do this at a more decent hour? I mean, why aren’t you sleeping? You love to sleep.  I love to sleep.  We all should go back to sleep and do this later.”

In response, Nick dumped a newspaper-wrapped box in Howie’s lap.  “Okay, then, you get the first present, Mr. Grumpy Street.”

Kevin chuckled a bit then turned it into a cough when he saw Howie’s glare.  “Wow, Nick.  Couldn’t you afford to get it gift-wrapped?”

“I wanted to do it myself.  If I let someone else do it, it wouldn’t be the same,” he said simply, and Kevin just smiled and nodded.  Really, that was all you could do when Nick was in this mood.

Brian came over to sit next to Howie as the present was revealed.  “Ooh, that’s a good one, Nick.  I’m sure Howie will really enjoy those.”  Howie glared at Brian now while a boxed set of fuzzy, leopard print handcuffs sat in his lap.

Nick’s brows lifted, and he smiled foolishly.  “Whoops! Wrong person, wrong present! Those are for AJ.”

AJ glanced over and spotted the handcuffs.  It only took him an instant before he snapped them up.  “Great! Now I can add leopard-print to the zebra ones I already have.  Thanks, Nick!”

“No problem.  Use them wisely, oh horny one,” Nick said in a somber voice before he cracked up.

“Oh, man. It is way too early for this, Nick.” Brian leaned his head on Howie’s shoulder.  “I agree with Howie.  Let’s all go back to bed.”

“Come on, Brian! You used to love getting up early to see what Santa brought us! Remember that time in Madrid?” Nick grinned at the memory.  “We tried to find one of those fake Christmas trees for our hotel room, but there were only real ones.”

AJ laughed a little as he, too, remembered.  “Yeah, and when you and Brian woke up really early the next morning to get us all up, the bark on the tree was being eaten away at by termites!”

“That was really gross,” Howie said, but he was chuckling a little.  “Man, the two of you were convinced that there were going to be termites in all those presents you stacked under the tree.”

“Yeah, well, there could have been,” Brian defended his past self.  “And Kevin freaked out when he thought there was a termite in that hat Nick gave him.”

Kevin folded his arms over his chest.  “I did not.  I knew it was a piece of fuzz the whole time.  I just wanted to see your reactions.”

“Sure.” Nick rolled his eyes.  “Whatever.”

“Seriously, who knew there would be termites in a Christmas tree?” Brian shook his head.  “That’s the weirdest Christmas thing that’s ever happened to me.”

AJ shrugged.  “I’ve had way weirder.  Remember that box that showed up at the hotel room in Germany that one year? I think it was, like, the second year we were on the road.”

“The one with the troll doll?” Howie scrunched up his nose.  “That was so not okay.”

“Wait, I don’t remember that,” Nick said, frowning as he tried to recall a troll doll incident.

Kevin grinned.  “That’s because we threw it out before you saw it.  We didn’t want to corrupt your precious mind or anything.  After all, we all remembered how upset you were when Brian was talking about the no Santa Claus thing and didn’t realize that you still thought there was a Santa.”

“Hey! I did not get upset, and I was totally joking about that,” Nick lied.  After all, it was still embarrassing to think that he’d still believed in Santa until he was fourteen.  “Anyway, what was the whole troll thing about?”

AJ grimaced at the memory.  “You know those kinda weird troll dolls that all the girls loved way back when?”

“Yeah.”

“So, some psycho fan, I guess, thought it would be fun to give me a troll doll that represented me.” His ears turned a little red at the thought of what the doll had been dressed…er…or not dressed in.  “Let’s just say, whoever sent me that doll thought I was way more risqué than I ever was or ever will be.  That’s all I’m saying.”

Nick’s brows furrowed.  “Wait, so what was it wearing?”

“Let’s not talk about it,” Kevin suggested.  “I’m not in the mood to lose my breakfast before I’ve even had it.”

“Oh, come on, guys!” Nick fisted his hands on his hips.  “It can’t be that bad.”

Brian stood.  “Oh, it was.  Trust us.” He started out of the room.  “I’ll go get the stuff I have for you guys.”

“I’ll get mine, too,” Howie said and quickly followed him out.

AJ finished off his coffee and glanced at Kevin.  “Hey, Kev? Wanna help me bring my stuff out here, too? There’s a lot of it.  I kind of went overboard with the sales.”

Kevin rolled his eyes.  “Yeah, but then, you get to be my pack mule, too.”

“Great.” They started out of the room, leaving Nick behind, frowning.  “So, how’s Mason doing?”

Nick stood alone in the room and wondered why they thought twenty-seven year old Nick couldn’t handle what fourteen year old Nick hadn’t been able to.  Seriously, he thought, Kevin had only been twenty-three then.  What was the big deal?

He was torn from his musings when silly string hit him in the face.  “What the…”

“Merry Christmas, Nick!” The other guys giggled and shot more silly string at him until he looked like a very colorful abominable snowman.

“That was for dragging me out of my bed so freaking early,” Howie proclaimed.

Brian giggled so hard he missed Nick and hit AJ in the face.  “Oops! This is just too funny.”

AJ swiped away the silly string from his nose and shot a strand at Brian.  “Oh, yeah? Well, this is pretty hysterical, too!”

And, before they knew it, everyone was covered in silly string.

“Damn it, this stuff is sticking to my eyebrows,” Kevin complained as he tried to peel it off his face.

Nick grinned and looked around at the others.  “This is pretty great, you guys.  Seriously.  I’m glad we decided to do this, and I’m glad you guys are really okay with me waking you up so early.  It means a lot to me.”

“We never said we were okay with it,” Howie muttered.  “That’s still three hours of sleep I’ll never get back.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve missed a hell of a lot of sleep in the last few months that I’m never going to get back,” Kevin told him as he stripped another bit of silly string off his eyebrows.  “Maybe, next year, you’ll know what that feels like.”

Howie’s expression softened and took on a dreamy look as he imagined a little Howie, Jr. running around.  “Yeah, maybe.”

“Cherish it while it lasts,” Brian told them.  “Because it’ll be over before you know it, and then you’ll find yourself missing those middle of the night feedings or the changing of diapers at the crack of dawn.”

“Oh, god, yes.  There’s nothing like the smell of baby crap to wake you up,” AJ quipped sarcastically.  “I’ll take coffee any day over that, thanks.”

Nick wrinkled his nose at the thought of baby poop.  “Yeah, okay.  If we’re done with this disgusting topic, do you think we could move on? Maybe exchange presents or something?”

The others agreed, and the next half hour was spent unwrapping and fooling around with the presents they gave each other.  Brian especially appeared to enjoy the complete set of Muppet Babies stuffed animals AJ had give him for Baylee.

“Wocka wocka wocka!” He said repeatedly, waving the Fozzie Bear around.  “Man, I used to love these guys.  And, now, Baylee will, too!”

Nick poked at Gonzo’s elongated nose one last time before getting up to retrieve one more wrapped present from his bag.  It was a flat, rectangular shaped package and was wrapped in pretty wrapping paper with a ribbon.  

“There’s one more thing for you, Kevin,” he said as he handed it to Kevin.  “And, before you ask, no, I didn’t do the gift-wrap.  This time, we paid for it.”

“ ‘We’?” Kevin asked and looked around at the rest of the guys.

Howie nodded.  “Yeah.  It’s just something we started putting together when we were over in Europe last month.  AJ had the idea on Thanksgiving, and the rest of us started to help out.”

“So it’s from all of us,” AJ added.

“Merry Christmas, Kevin,” Brian said cheerily as they all watched their old bandmate unwrap his final gift.

When the gift sat in his lap, completely unwrapped, Kevin was at a loss for words.  They’d captured all the random moments from all the different promotional stops they’d had on the Unbreakable promo tour.  It was everything no one but the guys would have known about.  Some of the shots—like the one of Nick trying to jump rope with a string of sausages in Germany—made him smile.  Others, like the one where Brian comforted Howie on the anniversary of his sister’s death, made his eyes mist.

“It’s so you can be with us, even though you’re not,” Nick spoke up, nervous when Kevin continued to say nothing.  “We know you said that you want to move on, and that’s fine.  But you’ll always be a Backstreet Boy, Kevin.”

“You’ll always be a part of us, even when you’re not,” AJ said quietly.

“So we wanted a piece of us to be with you,” Howie continued.

Brian leaned over and squeezed his cousin’s hand.  “The way you’re always with us.  Even if we are four now.”

Kevin couldn’t speak for a few seconds.  He patted Brian’s hand and looked around at the four men who had so quickly and so easily become his younger brothers.  They were right; the five of them would always be a part of each other, even when they weren’t together.

“It’s a damn good thing Nick closed that door,” he said finally.  “Otherwise, I might just change my mind and come back to stop Nick from jumping rope with sausage.  What the hell were you thinking?”

Instantly, the mood went from solemn to cheerful, and the Backstreet Boys, all five of them, celebrated Backstreet Christmas the way it was always meant to be celebrated…