The little crush I had on Nick carried me through the next few days, as crushes tend to do.
I felt like I was in junior high again, when my sole purpose for going to school was to see whichever boy I thought I was in love with that week. I remembered sitting behind Ben Polwarth in science class, just staring at the back of his head instead of my textbook, daydreaming about kissing him instead of listening to the lecture. I was too shy to talk to him outside of class, but in science, he was my lab partner; we dissected a frog together. I wasn’t afraid to touch the frog, like most of the girls in my class were, but I let him do most of the dissecting, to make him feel macho. It was no wonder I got a B in science that year, instead of my usual A. Even so, it was my favorite class.
Being around Nick was a lot like that.
I had grown out of my shy phase, so I had no trouble talking to him. I felt like we were friends, even if our friendship had sort of been forced, and I loved hanging out with him. But his mere presence distracted me, and the growing feelings I had for him made it difficult to keep playing my part as his own personal nurse. Whether he was aware of my feelings or not, I knew that I was crossing a line. I’d always had my toes on that line, just being a fan, but now I felt like I had one foot over.
I had always liked him, and he knew it; he used it to his benefit whenever he could. But something had changed. Our relationship was more than that of celebrity and fan, and it was more than patient and nurse. I felt more than friendship for him, but if I let it become more than just friends, it had the potential to get awkward - more awkward than it already was. I cared about him, but I couldn’t let my feelings get in the way of caring for him.
So I tried to keep my distance. Even though we were still sharing a bus, it wasn’t as hard as you’d think. He spent most of our day off in Connecticut playing World of Warcraft, which was apparently a very involved game - it kept him occupied for hours, while I read in my bunk.
The next day, we had a show, followed by an after party. I didn’t go this time. I’d found the one in Miami too crowded and chaotic, girls swarming around the VIP booth with cameras and phones in the guys’ faces constantly. But Nick had bailed on the one in Virginia, the day after his doctor’s appointment in Boston, so he felt obligated to go to this one. He got back on the bus in the early morning hours, exhausted and buzzed, and promptly crashed in his bunk. I kept my comments about his drinking to myself and let him sleep.
When he woke up in the morning, we were parked somewhere in Ohio, while our driver took a nap, after driving through the night. It turned out to be about a fifteen hour drive from Uncasville, Connecticut to Highland Park, Illinois, and it was early evening before we crossed the state line from Indiana. I looked out my window in time to see the sign that said Welcome to Illinois, The Land of Lincoln and caught a glimpse of Lake Michigan, which was so wide, it could almost pass for the ocean we’d left back on the east coast. Then I-90 veered north, and I could see the Chicago skyline out my window. Chicago had always seemed like someplace new and big and exciting on the rare occasions I’d driven there with my dad or grandparents as a kid, but now, it felt almost like home. I looked out at the Sears Tower and John Hancock building and the Smurfit-Stone building, with its shiny, diamond-shaped roof, and felt like I was back in familiar territory.
“Glad to be home?” Nick asked, flopping down next to me on the couch. He was hungover and disheveled, but he still managed to look hot with his clothes all rumpled and his hair sticking out.
“I’m not home yet,” I replied, looking out the window, “but yeah, it feels good to be back in Illinois.”
“Are you still planning to drive back to your hometown tonight? It’s gonna be pretty late, ain’t it?”
“Yeah,” I said, “but it’ll be worth it. I really wanna see Hambelina. And my dad, of course.”
He snorted. “I gotta meet this pet pig of yours. You gonna invite me home with you, or what?”
I looked over at him, caught by surprise. I hadn’t invited him to come with me, mostly because I’d figured he wouldn’t care to. I’d given him his last G-CSF injection the day before, and he didn’t start chemo again until Saturday, so it wasn’t like he needed me around; he would be fine on his own for a night. But now I raised my eyebrows and asked, “Do you want to? You’re more than welcome to come.”
He stretched his arms above his head and scrunched up his face. “It’d be nice to get off this bus,” he said. “Sleep in a real bed... enjoy some home-cookin’.” He shot me a grin.
I laughed. “Well, I’ll warn you now, my dad’s not much of a cook, unless it’s something he can put on the grill. But he’s got an extra bed, and it’s yours if you want it. We’d love to have you stay.”
“I’ll take you up on that offer, then,” replied Nick, and a little thrill ran through me. What would Jess say in the morning when she saw I’d brought Nick Carter home with me? And introduced him to my dad? After all her talk about getting in his pants, I was never going to live it down. But even though I’d been trying to keep my distance, there was a part of me that was secretly glad he had invited himself along.
We each packed an overnight bag, and our driver was nice enough to drop us off at an Enterprise before continuing on to park the bus. We rented a car and jumped right back on the highway, heading south this time. It typically would have been at least a three-and-a-half hour drive down to Decatur, but I made it in under three.
It felt weird to be driving familiar roads with Nick Carter in the passenger seat. Even when I’d flown out to Los Angeles to meet him, I had never guessed I would be bringing him back to my place. As we got closer to home, I started feeling nervous. I pictured his beautiful, high-rise condo and wondered what he would think of my dad’s little old split-level house. I thought of my dad, probably asleep in his recliner in front of the TV by now, and wondered if I should have called ahead to let him know I was coming - and bringing a guest. He was always up for visitors, and I knew he’d be thrilled to see me, but what if the house was a mess? Or what if he’d locked up for the night and gone to bed already?
As we turned onto his street, the street I’d grown up on, I was relieved to see a lamp on in the front window. That meant he was still up. The curtains moved in the window as our headlights cut across the front of the house, and I knew he was peeking out, trying to figure out who would be in his driveway at nine o’clock on a Wednesday night.
I cut the engine, and Nick and I got out. “Is this the house you grew up in?” he asked, looking up at it, as I led him up the concrete steps to the front porch.
“Yep. My dad’s lived here for thirty years. I don’t think he’ll move until he can’t climb the stairs anymore.”
The porch light went on, and the front door opened before I could even knock. There stood my dad behind the clear, glass storm door, squinting out at us in astonishment.
I grinned and held out my arms. “Surprise!”
He threw the storm door open and cried, “Cary! Why didn’t you tell me you were coming down, sweetheart?” He pulled me into his arms, squeezing me tightly, and I closed my eyes, inhaling his familiar scent. He wore the same brand of aftershave he’d used since I was a little girl.
“I didn’t know for sure when we’d get in,” I said apologetically. “I wanted to surprise you.”
“Well, you certainly did. That’s the best surprise you could give an old man.” He ushered me in, then looked up at Nick, as if noticing him for the first time. “And you brought company. I’m sorry, I should have introduced myself. Frank,” he said, holding out his hand.
Nick shook it. “Nick. Nice to meet you, sir.”
I snorted at Nick calling my dad “sir.” The over-the-top politeness sounded so stiff coming from him. “You don’t have to be formal around here, trust me,” I said, shooting him a grin.
“That’s right,” said my dad. “Well, come on up, kids. Can I get you two anything to drink?” He had probably been conked out in his chair five minutes ago, but now he was up and animated, in full host mode. “I’ve got root beer, milk, Kool-Aid...”
Oh god, did he really just offer Nick Carter Kool-Aid? I laughed to myself, shaking my head, as we followed him up the stairs to the main level of the house. “Root beer sounds good, Dad, thanks.”
“Same here,” added Nick.
At the top of the stairs, I stopped and looked around for my pig. She always followed me into the kitchen at my apartment, but apparently, she hadn’t picked up the same habit with my dad. Or maybe she was just hiding because she knew there was a stranger in the house. “Hambe-li-na!” I sang, my voice ringing down the hall. “Where are you, baby? Hammy girl?”
I didn’t even care that I sounded ridiculous, or that Nick was probably laughing at me behind my back. When I heard that familiar squeal and saw my little, pink teacup pig trotting up the hall toward me, I threw my arms open and cried, “Hammy!” Hambelina gave an oink of excitement as I scooped her up into my arms, planting a kiss on her snout. “Oh, my baby, Mama missed you!”
I stood up, cradling her in my arms, and finally turned back to Nick. He was smirking at me, his eyes sparkling with amusement. “This is Hambelina,” I said in a dignified way, holding her out for him to see.
“Aww... she’s a cute little pork chop,” he teased, grinning. “She’s like a bacon bit.”
“Ah, I see you found your little oinker,” said my dad, reappearing with two glasses of root beer in his hands. “Come on in and sit down.”
We went into the living room. The TV was on, and so was the lamp next to my dad’s recliner. The remote was resting on the arm of the chair. I wasn’t surprised to see that the White Sox game was on. Nick noticed, too, and stopped in front of the TV to check the score.
“Are you a baseball fan, Nick?” my dad asked, settling back in his chair.
“Eh, from time to time. I’m more of a basketball and football fanatic, though, to be honest.”
“Been watching the NBA finals?”
Nick’s whole face lit up with enthusiasm. “Heck yeah! I’m hoping my Celtics will come out on top tomorrow night.”
“Celtics? I figured you’d be more of a Lakers guy.”
Nick shook his head. “Oh, no. I live in L.A. I breathe Boston.”
I was surprised he wasn’t wearing that damn cap of his again, but, apparently, he saved it for game days. He’d been hurrying back to the bus after his shows about every other night for the last week to catch the end of the Celtics/Lakers games. I knew nothing about sports, but even I had to admit, it had been a pretty good series, with the two teams going back and forth, dragging the whole thing out to the seventh and final game.
I sat on the couch with Nick, holding Hambelina in my lap, and listened in amusement as the two of them talked basketball for a few minutes. My dad was a huge sports fan, and so was Nick; it was probably the only thing they had in common, but at least it was something. Finally, they remembered my existence, and my dad asked about the tour. I’d been catching up with him on the phone every few days, but it was good to finally talk face to face. Nick and I shared stories from the road, carefully leaving out all the parts he didn’t want anyone else to know.
Away from the tour bus, away from the pills and syringes and pouches of chemotherapy drugs in Nick’s suitcase, it was almost possible to forget, or at least pretend that he wasn’t sick, that we’d just been having the time of our lives over the last few weeks. Nick was in good spirits and as charismatic as ever; he talked and joked around like nothing was wrong. I had to hand it to him: when he was feeling up to it, he had that act perfected.
It made me sad, though, to wonder what was really going through his head sometimes. Even around me, he never really talked much about his feelings. He always seemed to be in a certain state of denial, where he acted like everything was okay - or would be, eventually. Like if he kept taking his pills and shots and doing his chemo, he’d be cured, just like that. Did he really believe that, I wondered, or was he just trying to convince himself as much as me? Did he ever get scared that it wouldn’t work?
I knew that fear. I knew that feeling of lying awake long past my bedtime, in my old bedroom in this house, praying with all my might for God to make my mommy better, and worrying about what it would be like if He didn’t. I prayed right up until the night my mother died, and for days, weeks, years afterward, I lay in that same bed and cried myself to sleep.
Sometimes, lying in my bunk on the tour bus late at night, listening to Nick’s faint snores across the aisle from me, it felt like déjà vu. I’d think, Why am I putting myself through this again? But, looking over at him now, watching the way he talked to my dad like they were old friends, I knew the answer. When you care about someone, you do everything you can for them. You’re there through the good times and the bad, and sometimes, you let yourself get hurt just to take away their pain.
I could keep my distance, but I would never abandon Nick just to protect my own heart, when I was the one person he had trusted to help him. Some things in life are worth the risk. Wasn’t that the whole reason Nick was doing this?
***
We ordered pizza for a late dinner, and after sitting around for a couple more hours, just talking and catching up, it was time for bed. We had an early start in the morning; I wanted to pay a quick visit to the nursing home and say hi to the people I worked with, and then it would be time to pick up Jess and head back to Chicago in time for the soundcheck and show.
My dad locked up and told me to wake him if I needed anything. With a smile, I reminded him that I had lived in this house for twenty-two years before moving out on my own; I knew where everything was. Other than keeping up with the usual repairs, he had hardly changed a thing in two decades, since my mom died. The carpet was the same basic beige she had picked out to replace the original avocado green shag that had covered the floors when they’d moved in as newlyweds. The kitchen had the same wooden cupboards, country blue laminate countertops, and off-white linoleum floor tiles. I couldn’t remember the last time the walls had been repainted or repapered. Only the pictures that hung on them showed the passing of time.
When I took Nick down the hallway that led to the three bedrooms, he stopped and looked at the framed photos that lined it. They were sort of like a storyboard, sequenced to tell the story of our family. Nick leaned in closer to get a good look at my parents’ wedding photo from 1980 - my dad a good thirty pounds lighter, with a full head of hair and something resembling a pornstache, and my mom in her poofy white wedding gown with long lace sleeves, her hair feathered out beneath her veil. “She looked just like you,” he said quietly, brushing his fingertip across her face.
I had heard that all my life, and it was true. She’d had the same thick, dark hair, before the chemo had taken it, and the same green eyes. I smiled. “I know.”
I was in the next picture, a newborn in my mother’s arms. From there, I dominated the wall; my face was in every frame. A toddler in a red velvet dress, standing in front of the Christmas tree. A kindergartener sporting a brand new bookbag and two missing teeth, waiting for the school bus on the first day of school. An eight-year-old with a long ponytail and a shy smile, posing by the piano before my first recital.
After that, there was a gap in the photos; I went from eight to thirteen in the next one, taken at my eighth grade graduation, when I had a big, fluffy perm and a mouth full of metal. Nick snickered at it. “Yeah, yeah,” I said, “Go on, laugh it up. I’ve seen pictures of you at that age - and videos.”
He groaned. “Let’s not go there.”
“Exactly. Keep walking.”
At the end of the hall, there were two empty frames. “What are these, the year you went as the Invisible Woman for Halloween?” he asked, smiling at his own joke.
I indulged him with a smile back and said, “No. Before she died, my mom put all these up, with instructions for my dad about what to put in them. Eighth grade graduation... first car... senior prom... high school graduation... college...” I pointed out all the frames he had successfully filled. “She must have known he’d never get around to it otherwise.”
“Oh. That’s kinda neat...” he said, but I could tell he just thought it was sad. “So what are these last two for?”
I lifted the first frame off its hook on the wall and turned it over to show him the little piece of masking tape on the back, neatly labeled in my mother’s small, round handwriting. It said, Cary’s wedding day. On the other frame was a label that said, First grandchild. I didn’t mention that there was another frame I’d found once in the attic, one that my dad had either taken down or never hung up. Its label was Second wife.
Nick chuckled. “You better get a move on, girl,” he said, elbowing me playfully.
I knew he was just kidding, but that stung a little. It had been just over a year since I’d ended my last serious relationship, with the guy I’d thought might be “the one.” I had been ready to settle down with him, get married and start a family, but he hadn’t been up for the same commitment. After hemming and hawing over buying me a ring, when I’d been dropping hints for months, he’d finally confessed that he just wasn’t sure about getting engaged. We’d been together two years - which, when you hit your late twenties and feel your biological clock start ticking, seemed like an appropriate length of time to get to know each other. But, apparently, I hadn’t known him as well as I’d thought.
In a way, splitting up with him was what had prompted me to audition for American Idol. Dating after the break-up had just made me depressed, so I’d decided to swear off men for a while and do something crazy while I was still single and free to do it. I guess I had him to thank for the fact that I was now touring the country with the Backstreet Boys and had Nick Carter standing next to me in my dad’s house.
Something must have shown on my face, as all that went through my head, because Nick said, “Sorry, is that like a sore spot or something?”
I shrugged and shook my head. “No, it’s fine.”
His gaze lingered on me for a few seconds. Then he shrugged, too, and said, “I don’t believe in marriage anyway. Half of marriages end in divorce, so what’s the fucking point?”
I thought of my father, who had never really even dated, let alone thought of marrying another woman after my mother, and of my grandparents, who had been married for sixty years before death parted them. I didn’t agree with Nick, though I could understand his cynicism.
“If you love someone, you should just be together; you don’t need a title or a ring or a fucking certificate to prove it,” he ranted on, and that I could agree with. “Marriage just gets messy. Love, real love, should be simple.”
“You done?” I asked, smiling up at him to show I was just teasing.
He grinned back, blushing a little. “Yeah, I’m good. Let’s go to bed.”
I showed him to the guest room, which was fixed up with a queen-size four-poster and matching bedroom set that used to belong to my grandparents. Once he was settled, I went on into my old bedroom, which looked almost the same as it had when I was in high school. A little emptier, of course, but my old twin bed was still there, along with the dolls and stuffed animals I’d loved as a little girl. The closet held boxes of my old toys and clothes that still had sentimental value, and on the walls - oh God, I’d forgotten about the walls - were posters I’d put up in the late nineties. Along with images of Audrey Hepburn from Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Marilyn Monroe, and Betty Boop, the faded faces of various hot male celebrities I’d lusted over back then smoldered down at me from all sides - Brad Pitt... Leonardo DiCaprio... Devon Sawa... George Clooney... and, of course, The Backstreet Boys.
I started giggling when I stopped and looked at the Backstreet Boys poster. It was the epitome of a cheesy boyband shot, with the five of them striking a different sexy pose in front of a bright blue backdrop. Brian and AJ were dressed in matching shiny, silver track pants, the kind that snap up the sides; AJ was wearing the fugliest shirt I’d ever seen, some weird checkered thing, and Brian had on a blue, cable-knit sweater with his sporty pants. Kevin was in the middle and looked pretty normal, but in front of him, Howie had a black and red beret-type hat perched jauntily on his head, and behind him, floppy-haired Nick was wearing a short-sleeved, black turtleneck and looked like he was doing jazz hands on either side of his face. I wasn’t sure if I should avoid letting Nick see this poster or show it to him just to witness his reaction.
I thought Nick was a lot more attractive now; like a fine wine, he’d only gotten better with age. Still, it made me sad to see him so young, knowing what he was going through now. It was a lot like looking at the pictures in the hall, the pictures of me as a little girl and my mother when she was alive.
Stop it, I thought. Don’t go there. I was acting like Nick was dying or already dead. He wasn’t. He was just in the next room, I reminded myself. He was fine.
But then I thought of Nick, how he was always saying, “I’m fine,” when he wasn’t. If he was in denial, then maybe I was in just the opposite state: acceptance.
I knew he was sick. I knew it was serious. And I knew that, in some cases, all the treatments and prayers in the world aren’t enough to save a person’s life.
***
