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Chapter Twenty-One


It was February 10th - over a week since we'd been home from the first leg of the tour - and I still hadn't scheduled my doctor's appointment. I don't know why, I'd promised Leighanne I would do it and then she'd forgotten to ask again and I'd just pretended to forget to actually do it. I don't know why I didn't want to call and make the appointment, but every time I'd thought about dialing my doctor's number to make it, and subsequently having to call and tell my parents that I was coming up to visit them, my stomach had turned and I'd chickened out. Much like what was happening with me asking Leighanne to marry me.

And besides, the longer I was on the break, the less I was thinking I needed the appointment anyways. The ache in my chest had barely surfaced since being on down time. I was sleeping a lot, but I was still recovering from the tour so that was to be expected, wasn't it?

Long story short, as of February 10th I still had no appointment.

Nick knocked on my bedroom door at nine in the morning - two days after the incident at the mall. I was officially used to sleeping until after ten so this was an ungodly hour in my eyes. I groaned for him to go away, and unfortunately go away apparently sounds a lot like come in to Nick, and he shoved the door open.

"Brian, I need a favor," he said.

"Ask me later, when I'm not tired and don't want to strangle you, please," I groaned, "Results will be way more favorable for you then."

"I need a ride."

"Ask... me... later..." I pulled my pillow over my head.

"I can't," he said. I felt my pillow get pulled away.

"Why?"

"Because," Nick replied, "My court hearing's at eleven."

I rolled and looked up at him.

"Remember the other day at the mall I said you owed me if I pretended to give a crap about the video game store?" he asked, "Well I need that favor."

Fifteen minutes later, I was driving Nick across the state to Tampa. He was fiddling with a tie I'd lent to him and a suitcoat we'd "borrowed" from Kevin's closet, since Kevin didn't seem to be home. Nick was fumbling with the paper Mr. Armando had given him about the hearing and tapping his foot nervously against the floor. I glanced over at him, "Relax, okay? You're gonna be fine."

"I'm just worried about the whole jail thing," he said.

"You aren't going to jail," I answered.

"I was looking it up online and I could," he replied, "I could go to jail and end up there for like three years or something."

"You were a minor at the time you did it," I answered, "Relax, you're gonna be fine."

He didn't stop tapping his foot though.

When we arrived in Tampa, we found the courthouse and I parked and Nick and I went inside. Johnny was there, along with the lawyer that he and Lou had gotten for Nick. Nick let an officer know he was there for his hearing, and the officer allowed Nick and the lawyer into the courtroom. Johnny and I were told to sit in the waiting room while he went in. Nick looked sick to his stomach as he disappared into the court room. All I could do was sit and wait, hoping that I was right and he wouldn't go to jail.

Johnny and I were there only a few moments before he received a call and had to go outside. But I heard him answer it with annoyance in his voice, "No, I'm not in New York. I had an issue with one of the Backstreet kids I had to take care of, but I'll be back to the City in the morning to sign the paperwork with Justin then..."

Even in a situation like this, he couldn't help but be on the phone about freaking NSYNC.

I felt bad for Nick the more I thought about the fact that the poor kid was going to court and I was the only person out here for him. I flipped nervously through a magazine, unable to concentrate on any of the articles, mostly just staring at the advertisements and the pictures. The longer he was in there, the worse my lack of concentration seemed to become. I wondered what in the hell they were doing that was taking so damn long.

He'd been in the courtroom almost an hour when the entry doors opened and Jane Carter came in, a flurry of energy and nerves. She strutted past me, despite the fact that I'd stood up and said "Mrs. Carter?" Instead, she went right to the cop where Nick had checked in and demanded to know where he was.

Nick's mother was always a really headstrong woman, loud and pushy in that way that overbearing parents can be sometimes. I pictured her like one of those stage moms that go psycho or whatever, to be honest. I can't imagine Nick had an easy go of it with her managing his career when he first started out. She was a little scary, actually.

The cop pointed to the area where I was waiting, "Waiting area's over there," he said dryly. "He'll be out when the hearing's over."

She turned and, wringing her pocket book strap, came my direction. She noticed me now and she frowned. "Hello," she said flatly. She sat down in the chair that I'd been occupying, so I switched chairs and sat too. She stared at me for a long moment. "Why was he pulling fire alarms?" she demanded. I could tell by the tone of her voice that she thought I'd assisted in the task and was just letting him take the heat.

"I don't know," I said.

Jane sighed. "The things he does for attention, I swear to God. You'd think we didn't pay attention to him or something. To him. Like its possible to not pay attention to Nickolas."

I didn't know what to say so I stayed quiet. However, from what Nick had described of his childhood and even the last week or so at home before he came to stay with us in Orlando, it didn't really seem like he did get enough attention at home. Maybe he was just an attention-hound, I don't know, but it was true that Nick did pull a lot of stunts to get attention from his parents.

Of course I knew the fire alarm had nothing to do with them and everything to do with me, but I wasn't about to admit that I knew anything at all about it.

After five minutes' of silence, I glanced over at her and she was fixing her make up in a tiny compact she must've pulled from her purse. I drew a deep breath. "The thing with Lou isn't for attention," I said.

Jane lowered the compact. "What?"

"He said you and Bob were fighting over what he said about him and Lou and I just wanted you to know, he told me and AJ about it, too, and I've been watching Lou the last couple of weeks, and he's not lying about Lou."

Jane's eyes were searching as she stared down at the compact she'd lowered, her brows pulled together. I imagined she was feeling a great amount of guilt for first doubting Nick before and for then driving him away by fighting over his situation instead of just acting on it.

"I told him to tell you when he told me," I said. I shook my head, "It's unbelievable, this past month has been so unbelievable. Between finding out about that and this stupid financial situation... I don't know." I leaned back in the chair, looked up at the ceiling. It was an ornate ceiling, painted with the words of the constitution in a faded ivory and a golden-brown. "Plus me with my heart thing. I mean he's been going through a lot."

I heard Jane shift in her seat.

"I guess the whole combination of it all is why he pulled the fire alarm, he's been under so much pressure," I spoke into the air, "Maybe he felt like his life needed an alarm to be rung." I shrugged. "I don't know. But anyway, I just wanted you to know that he's not making things up about Lou."

I could feel Jane's eyes boring into me, so I brought my head down and looked back at her. Our eyes locked for a moment. And as her eyes searched mine for a moment, the strangest feeling sweeped through me, washing over my nerves like cold water. Mayday, mayday, mayday, my mind was screeching.

"What about Lou?" Jane asked. Her voice seemed to echo around me and my mouth went so bone dry I nearly choked on my tongue.

Nick had lied to me about having told her about Lou. He'd lied to me.

I felt my mouth moving, felt my jaw shaking, trying to form words, trying to find something to say that would fix what I'd unadvertently done. Inside, I was cursing Nick, hating him for lying to me both because of the lie itself and because of the situation I was now in.

The courtroom doors burst open and Nick came bounding out of them, relief on his face. "I'm not goin' to jail," he crowed as he ran over to us. "I got a fine, sure, but a fine is a lot easier than --" he paused when he saw his mother and I and our eye-to-eye lock. I broke the stare first and looked at Nick. "Mom? What're you doing here?" he asked.

She turned to face him. "Nick, what did Lou Pearlman do to you?" she demanded.

Nick's face paled. He looked at me. "You told her?" he asked, jaw dropping.

"You told me you told her!" I replied.

Nick shook his head in disbelief, dropped the papers he'd been clutching and backed away slowly, "I can't believe you, I can't believe you. I told you not to tell anyone, I told you not to say anything..."

"Nick, you said she knew," I said, jumping up, "I was just telling her that she should believe you because it was true! I was trying to help. If anyone should be angry here, it's me! You lied to me."

"YOU TOLD HER," he yelled, "YOU TOLD HER!"

"Told me what!" Jane shouted, "What happened between you and Lou? What is going on!"

"FUCK YOU BRIAN!" Nick shouted, "I HATE YOU!" and in a fit of passion, he turned and ran down the hallway.

Jane grabbed the papers he'd dropped on the floor and went after him. "Nick!" she shouted, "Honey, wait for me."

I dropped back into my seat and covered my face with my hands. "Oh my Lord what in the hell did I just do?" I asked myself outloud, trying to remember how to breathe.

Numbly, I got up and walked out into the parking lot. Nick and his mother were in Jane's car, and I could plainly see they were arguing ferociously. I hesitated a couple feet away, then went over and knocked on Nick's window. He looked up and then looked away. Jane told him to unroll the window and Nick begrudgingly did. "Go the fuck away you've done enough damage," Nick snapped.

"Nickolas, watch your language," Jane snapped.

Nick folded his arms across his chest, tears threatening to spill over his eyes at any moment. I could literally see them building up. "Nick, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to --"

"Don't speak to me," he growled.

"What about your stuff that's at the apartment?" I asked.

"Just bring it to Spring Break."

"I could bring it to your house tomorrow --"

"No," he replied, shaking his head, "I don't wanna see your face anymore. Just go away." He rolled the window up.

"Nick I'm sorry," I said again as the window sealed. He didn't even look my way.

I sighed and Jane backed the car out and they drove away and I stood there in the parking lot staring after them. If only it'd been raining out it would've been a perfect movie scene moment, but it was sunny and about sixty-eight degrees, making it feel more surreal than picturesque. My heart was thumping in my chest so hard and fast, I could hear it inside my head and I closed my eyes as my chest tightened.

"What happened?" Johnny asked, suddenly at my side.

I turned around, "He got a fine," I answered. I glanced back the way the car had gone, "And then he got stabbed in the back by his best friend."

Johnny looked confused.

"Just a fine," I said. "Look just -- just go back to New York. Be with NSYNC. That's where you really want to be right now anyway. Why even waste your time pretending you give a damn about us?" I turned and walked quickly. As I climbed into my SUV, I actually felt a little bit of surprise that Johnny hadn't tried to stop me or correct me, and instead was already back on his cell phone, already moving on from my harsh words. They'd bounced off him like nothing, like a gnat in the summer that he could just squash.

"How'd Nick's thingy go?" Howie asked when I got back to the apartment. He was watching TV, which he'd muted when he heard the door open.

"He got a fine," I answered.

"He must be relieved." Howie looked around, "Where is he?"

"He went home with his mother," I replied.

"Oh," Howie said. "Too bad, I was thinking we could play Pictionary with two teams tonight."

"Yeah."

I went into the kitchen and opened the fridge, staring in at the contents without really seeing them much. Guilt was settling into my stomach. I grabbed a can of soda out of the drawer and picked up the phone and dialed Nick's house. The phone rang and rang and rang, and finally one of his sisters picked up. "Hello?"

"Hey, it's Brian Littrell, is Nick there?"

"Uhh yeah I guess. Hold on." She covered the phone with her hand, "NIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIICK! PHOOOOOOOOONE FOR YOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOU!" she bellowed. She came back on the phone, "I called him. Hold on."

I heard Nick come into the room, "Jesus Beej could you yell a little louder, I think Nick's in freaking China are answering their phones right now," I heard him say. "Who is it anyways?"

"Brian Littrell," BJ replied.

I heard the phone get picked up and then it landed on the cradle as he hung up on me.

I stared at the phone in disbelief. Then I dialed the number again. BJ answered it again. "Hello?"

"BJ, it's Brian. I got disconnected. Can I talk to Nick?"

"Um... he's um... he's ... he's not here," BJ replied.

"What? Yes he is, I just heard him," I said, "Just a second ago."

"No he's not here, sorry," she answered with more confidence this time.

"Just give him the damn phone BJ."

She covered the mouth piece and her voice was muffled, but I could still hear her. "Don't be stupid, he knows you aren't here, why don't you just talk to him?" she was quiet while he answered and then she came back on the phone, "He says e tu Bruti."

I sighed. "Fine. Tell him I'll see him in friggin Jamaica then." I hung up the phone - hard.

"Troubles, bubbles?" Howie was suddenly behind me, an eyebrow raised.

"Nick's just pissed because I told his mom something I wasn't supposed to today," I replied.

"Smooth move," Howie answered.

I sighed. "He told me off using Shakespeare."

"Nick's read Shakespeare?" Howie asked, surprised.

"He saw the movie," I answered.

Howie laughed, "It'll pass over, don't worry. Y'all are Frick and Frack."

I stared at the table. "Yeah," I nodded.

Howie sat down across from me and we sat in silence, the only sound the clock ticking and the TV talking in the next room. It was so quiet I could hear the carbonation in my soda can hissing.

"You should invite your girlfriend over," Howie said suddenly, breaking the silence. "Then we'd have two teams again."

I looked up. "What's with you and the Pictionary obsession today?" I asked.

Howie shrugged, "I just thought it sounded like fun."

"I'll call her in a bit and see," I said quietly.

"Okay." Howie stood up, "Well let me know soon because I'm going to make dinner and stuff like that and I need to know how much to make."

"Okay." Satisfied, Howie got up and wandered back to the living room and I heard the channel change. I still sat staring at the table, listening to my soda hiss.

I couldn't help but wonder if Nick would get over this, considering the magnitude of what I'd done. Sure I hadn't meant to, sure I'd only been trying to help, and yes, he'd lied to me first, but the way he was seeing it, I'd betrayed him, no matter what the circumstance had been that led me to say something, I'd still said something when I should've kept my mouth shut.

I sighed and went out to my room, passing by Howie, who said I should call Leighanne soon, and I said I woud. I sat at my desk and stared at the canary legal pad with my proposal words written on it and closed my eyes, and realized that my heart was still hurting.