- Text Size +
Half my life's in books' written pages
Live and learn from fools and from sages
You know it's true
All the things you do, come back to you

-Aerosmith 'Dream On'


My head was in my hands as I listened to Kevin on the phone. Apparently Nick had called him in the middle of the night after drunkenly crashing his car into a tree. Now he was sitting in the airport waiting for a flight out to Tampa to presumably go and kick Nick's ass.

Why, why had I let him go back to Florida?

“I told him to call 911,” Kevin said, his voice tired. “To make sure he wasn't hurt too badly. He's damn lucky he wasn't killed or that he didn't kill someone else.”

“Do you know what happened after that?” I asked, still sitting with my hand on my forehead. I kept picturing Nick's car slamming into a tree over and over and over again. With him drunk and stupid and apparently completely okay to drive right behind the wheel.

“As far as I know he's gone into the hospital. I don't know anything else. I won't know until I get there. I'm going straight to his house.”

I nodded my head, but of course Kevin couldn't see. I could just picture him sitting in LAX, holding onto a full cup of coffee and just watching people go by as he waited for his flight. It would be just like him to sit in the airport all day instead of going home first, but as long as he was there he probably felt like he was accomplishing something.

“This isn't going to help us,” I mumbled into the phone. It was a horrible thing to think considering what could have happened to Nick. But with our tour being postponed and all the media attention surrounding AJ's rehab, Nick stepping out with a DUI wasn't exactly the press we needed.

“I know,” Kevin sighed through the phone. “I haven't even talked to management about this. Fuck,” he mumbled. “I didn't even think about that part.”

I instantly felt guilty, because here was Kevin worried about Nick and Nick only and here I was worrying about the group as a whole. But someone had to. No one else was.

And no one else ever would be if we didn't get our collective shit together. Things were starting to fall apart and it was clearer now more than ever. If Nick didn't turn it around I didn't even know if there would be a Backstreet Boys for him to fuck up in a year's time.

I hated thinking like that, but I wasn't exactly thinking clearly or positively given the situation at hand.

“I'll call them,” I offered. Kevin was already going to deal with enough when he got to Florida. He didn't need to worry about the PR aspect as well.

Really, it should have been Nick handling that. But he was in no shape to do so. He'd always been sort of a PR nightmare. But I couldn't imagine it getting any worse than this. I'd never even imagined it getting to this point, but here we were.

“Thanks,” Kevin said gratefully.

“It's fine,” I waved it off. “Good luck with Nicky, Kevin.”

“Thanks,” he sighed, still sounding tired. I couldn't blame him. It wasn't like he was about to get any time to relax either.

He hung up the phone and I stared at it. Yeah, I had to call management like I told Kevin I would. But first there was someone else I had to call.

~~~


“Hello,” I laughed into the phone as Leighanne and I stood in the middle of our kitchen, cooking breakfast. She wrapped her arms around my waist and kissed my neck.

“Hey,” it was Howie, sounding more serious than I would have liked. He didn't usually sound like that.

“Hey Howard,” I laughed as Leighanne continued to kiss me. “What's up?”

He paused for a moment and then sighed. Not a great sign, but I didn't really catch it since I was too focused on my wife and her kisses. “There's been an accident.”

I crinkled my eyebrows. What did that mean? I stopped giggling and frowned a little bit, causing Leighanne to look up at me. “What?” I asked.

Howie sighed again. Now I was beginning to get scared. What in the heck could have happened for Howie to be calling me like this?

“Nick wrapped his car around a tree.”

“Was he drunk?” were the first words out of my mouth after Howie told me that. Can you blame me?

Another sigh from Howie. Clearly disappointed in Nick, clearly not his usual forgiving self. “Yes,” he replied finally.

Now it was my turn to sigh. Leighanne had pulled away from me completely at this point and was staring at me. Probably wondering when I was going to get back to our breakfast kissfest. I was sort of wondering that too. It wasn't like there was anything I could do to help all the way in Atlanta. Hell, there wasn't anything Howie could all the way in LA.

“He's an idiot,” I said point blank. “I don't know what you expect me to do about it.” Leighanne looked at me with her eyebrows knitted. “Howie,” I mouthed, pointing to the phone. She shrugged. I'd tell her afterwards. Or maybe I wouldn't.

“I just thought you'd like to know,” Howie said softly.

He was right, it was nice to know. I just didn't care to do anything. Nick was lucky he hadn't been killed or that he hadn't killed someone else. But as far as his stupid antics (which included drinking far too much, among many other things) went, he could let someone else deal with them. I'd dealt with them one too many times already.

“Thanks,” I said, getting ready to hang up.

“Brian, wait,” Howie said. “Do you think we should tell AJ?”

I bit my lip. That probably wasn't the sort of news that he needed to assist in his recovery. He'd already taken steps to better himself – steps that Nick was far from taking himself. Hearing about Nick would only upset him and probably make him feel guilty. Plus it wasn't like he'd be able to help him at all. He had to help himself before he could even think about helping anyone else.

“No,” I said finally. “At least not yet. Not until he's out.”

“Yeah,” Howie agreed. “I'll tell Kevin. He's gone to see Nick, by the way.”

Not much good that would do. But I didn't say that, because Howie probably thought that Kevin would have some kind of heart-to-heart with Nick and that everything would be okay. I knew Howie wasn't actually that naive, but I also knew that he saw the best in everyone and often hoped things would just work out. I didn't know when he was going to learn that that wasn't the case. Especially not with the five of us.

“Well maybe that'll help,” I said with a little bit of hope in my voice. Because I knew that's what Howie needed to hear.

“Yeah,” I sighed. “Maybe.”

“Tell me if anything else happens,” I said, glancing over at Leighanne again.

“I will. Later, Brian.”

“Bye,” I said, hanging up and walking over to my wife.

“What was that?” she asked.

“Nothing,” I said, leaning over and kissing her on the cheek. It wasn't like she would care anyway.

~~~


My entire life I'd been scared of Kevin.

Okay fine, that wasn't true. Because I only met Kevin when I was like, twelve. But that felt like my entire life. My entire Backstreet life anyway, which was when my life actually started. Not when I was living in a dirty trailer with those idiots who called themselves my parents.

But I don't think I'd ever been as scared of Kevin as I was when I walked back to my house that afternoon. Because I knew he was there and he was probably mad and he was probably going to kill me.

I really thought I'd been okay to drive. I mean yeah I was drunk but I'd driven drunk before and nothing bad had happened. I just figured I was still a good driver when I was drunk.

Anyway, Kevin. He was going to kill me. I felt like I was fifteen again and had told off Lou. Which was the other last time I was scared of Kevin. Because he flipped his fucking shit. Probably because he wanted to tell Lou off too, but he didn't have the balls to do it.

I walked up the front steps to my house and stopped for a second. Then I swallowed and braced myself for a lot of fucking yelling as I unlocked the door.

There was Kevin, sitting in the living room on the couch with his arms crossed over his chest. He couldn't have looked more like a scary-ass pissed off dad if he tried.

“You're lucky you're still alive,” he said, glaring at me. Great, Kevin. Let's just start with the lecture. Don't even ask me if I'm okay.

I shrugged, looking at the ground. Definitely felt like I was fifteen again. Fifteen wasn't even that long ago, when I thought about it. Only like, six years.

Felt like a lifetime ago, now. And I didn't know that it was so lucky.

“I know,” I said instead, because if I launched into some kind of self-deprecating rant Kevin would ignore and just yell at me more. Why the fuck had I even called him?

“What the fuck were you thinking?” he asked. He was still sitting on the couch.

I shrugged again. I guess I hadn't been thinking. Then I sat down on the couch. Not beside him though. On the other side and as far away as possible.

“Do you not see what happened to AJ?” he asked, leaning into me. His face was red and he was really fucking pissed off. I thought his eyes were going to pop out of his head. I would have laughed if I wasn't so terrified.

I nodded.

“Do you not understand why we're on a break right now, Nick?” he shouted.

“I know!” I yelled back. Fuck off Kevin, obviously I know why we're on a a break. “You don't think I don't fucking know why we're all at home? Why you guys are enjoying your fucking time off? You guys don't even give a shit about being on stage, you'd rather just be off on your own. This break is the end of the group, Kevin. And if you don't-”

“Stop it,” he cut me off. I didn't even know what I was ranting about, just that I was. Because the whole reason for the break was AJ's drinking and cocaine. I didn't care about the reason for the break, I just cared that we were on it.

I huffed and crossed my arms over my chest.

“The point is that AJ had so many problems that we literally had to stop our tour right in the middle.”

Yeah, I know that Kevin. Thank you so much.

“The point,” he said, pretty much spitting out every word. “is that he had a problem and it became the whole group's problem,” he continued, still glaring at me. “I don't...”

And then he did something that terrified me more than I ever thought possible.

~~~


I started to cry. Where there on Nick's god damn couch I couldn't take it any more and cried into my fucking hands.

He just sat there, of course. He just sat there staring at me in shock. He probably thought it was more likely that I was going to beat him senseless rather than actually cry because I cared about him so much. Because it was so unfathomable to him that someone would actually be glad that he wasn't a dead mess underneath a tree.

I knew that. I knew all of that. It didn't excuse what he did, because Nick had to grow up at some point and deal with the cards he'd been dealt. But even if I didn't understand, I knew.

“I can't,” I shook my head, still set in my hands. “I can't do this anymore.” Once the floodgate was open it wouldn't stop. I just sobbed right there on Nick's couch. “I can't keep worrying about you or about AJ. I can't keep worrying about the future of the group, I can't keep worrying about management. It's too many things to deal with, Nick. I can't keep doing this with you when I have too many other things to worry about.”

I looked up at him and he nodded. His eyes were still wide. They sort of looked like they were going to pop out of his skull.

He slid over a bit closer to me. “I'm sorry,” he muttered, which was probably the best I was going to get out of him.

I nodded, wiping my eyes with the back of my hand. So much for giving him a piece of my mind and scaring him straight. Although I supposed I'd accomplished that in a different kind of way.

“Can you just cut back on the drinking?” I sighed, looking at him sadly. “Because I don't want to be worrying every night that I'm going to get another phonecall like that.”

He nodded, although I wondered how real that was. I knew that this probably wasn't going to fix his issues. It'd probably scare him for a few days and then he'd be right back to his usual lifestyle. But at the very least maybe he'd be a little more responsible about it.

“Can I...” he muttered, looking down at the ground. “Can I come back to LA with you?”

I breathed a sigh of relief. At least now I wouldn't have to drag him back there kicking and screaming. “Of course you can,” I sighed, leaning in to hug him.

And he actually hugged me back.