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Chapter 19: When Help is Offered, Accept

"Alex?" Jameelah called out in confusion as silence came from the other end of the line. She waited a few seconds before calling out again, "Alex, are you still there?"

"Oh, uh...yeah! Sorry!" AJ suddenly replied, bringing himself out of his spacing moment. "Sorry about that."

"It's no problem," Jameelah giggled as she switched the phone to her other ear. "I was starting to think that you had hung up on me."

"Me? Hang up on you?" AJ asked in mock disbelief. "No, never. I could never hang up on you."

"Well that brings me great relief and comfort to know that," Jameelah teased. "Anyway...what's up?"

"Well, I had a bit of down time so I thought I would call you. I tried calling you earlier from the venue, but I got the answering machine."

"Yeah, Jenny dragged me off to some get-together with her friends. I didn't really want to go, but she was counting on me being there. It wasn't anything to brag about. I was quite bored the whole time if I do say so."

"I bet you would have had a better time if I was there," AJ blurted.

"Actually..." Jameelah began to answer, "If you were there, yes, I would have had a better time."

"My apologies to you, then. If I would have known about it, I would have been there," AJ joked in return.

Jameelah had to smile. "So...how is everything going?"

AJ hesitated.

"The last I heard, you were having conflicts with your bandmates. Did you get that worked out?" she continued.

"Oh, that," AJ answered. "Well, yes. Everything is ok now...after a few fist fights and nosebleeds, we got everything settled."

"Please tell me you're not serious about the fighting part, Alex."

"Nah, I'm just playin'...but I had you going, right?"

"Unfortunately...yes."

"Don't worry, we got everything settled."

"So everything is going ok for you now, right?"

Once again, AJ hesitated. There was no way he could tell Jameelah about what his horrible intentions had been. She would defenitely think he was insane and she would no doubt never speak to him again. How she'd be able to understand his problem wasn't even possible, in his mind, and he didn't want to take a chance that could jepordize their friendship.

"Alex?"

"Hmmm?"

Jameelah laughed. "You must really be spacing today, huh?"

"Sorry..." AJ apologized, feeling himself blush. "What was it that you asked?"

"I asked if everything was going ok for you now?"

"Yeah, I guess..."

Jameelah took a second before replying. "Why do you not sound so sure of that?"

"What, I'm not convincing?"

"Sorry, Alex...but, no. You really aren't."

"Hmmm...I guess that's something I'm going to have to work on, huh?"

"If you absolutely want to put it at the top of your priority list, I won't stop you," Jameelah teased. "But really, are you sure everything is going ok for you?"

"The truth?" AJ sighed.

"Might be helpful..."

"Well, yes and no then."

"Yes and no?" Jameelah asked with confusion.

"Yes everything is going ok as for me making ammends with the guys. The no part..." AJ trailed off towards the end.

"Why are you hesitating?"

"It's no big deal. I guess I'm just getting a little toured out, ya know?" AJ quickly lied.

"I'd say I understand how you feel, but I'd be lying," Jameelah replied, "But, it makes sense. I can't imagine how tiring it must get...being on tour all the time, that is."

"It can really be the high life, but it isn't always the greatest," AJ answered in a thoughtful tone. "I love it though, so I guess I shouldn't complain."

"As long as you keep a good attitude about it."

"Well, we have a small break coming up soon. I'm defenitely looking forward it."

"That's great. I know you all deserve a break. You work hard enough for it."

'You have no idea' AJ thought.

"Wait a minute," Jameelah suddenly blurted. "Don't you have a concert tonight?"

'Oh no, the concert!' They were supposed to be back at the venue over an hour ago. AJ racked his brain, trying to think of an answer. "The concert...um, we did...until, well, Nick came down with a nasty case of the flu. He can't perform in tonight's concert, so we contacted management and convinced them that it was necessary to cancel the concert."

"Will you guys be making it up?"

"Yeah, most likely."

"Tell Nick that I said I hope he feels better soon."

"I'll be sure to," AJ answered just as he heard a soft knocking on his hotel room door. "Hold on," he called over in the direction of the door.

"Who were you just talking to?" Jameelah asked.

"Oh, just my mom. She's out in the hall," AJ answered.

"When did your mom come?"

"A couple days ago...she surprised me. Anyways, I'm going to have to cut this conversation short, but listen, Jaymee, I want to see you again soon."

Silence suddenly took over Jameelah's end.

"Jaymee?"

"Yes?"

"I said I'd like to see you again soon, if that's alright with you, of course."

"That's totally fine," Jameelah answered, still feeling speechless that AJ had asked to see her again. "Um...w-when?"

"I'm not sure," AJ replied, scratching his temple, "I'll have to get back to you on that one. But I have to go now so I'll talk to you later."

"Ok."

"Here's my cell number so you can call me when you want," AJ told her and began to give her the number, just as his mother began knocking on the door again. "Call me whenever and I'll probably call you back later sometime."

"Sounds like a plan. Bye, Alex."

"Bye babe."

******

"You have to wake up now," AJ heard a voice telling him, though to him it seemed far off and he just tried to bury himself away from the voice. That's when he felt a gentle hand shaking his shoulder. "C'mon, Alex..."

"G'way..." he mumbled back in reply, almost incoherently. Sleep, that's all he wanted... So why was someone trying to interupt the one thing he needed the most at the moment?

"I can't do that, honey," the voice continued and pulled the covers away from his body.

He suddenly shivered and forced his eyes open. No wonder he was cold...he was only dressed in a pair of boxers and someone had turned the air conditioning back up. Then he looked to see his mother standing next to the bed with an amused smile on her face, victorious in waking him up in no time. "Mom..." he whined, trying to hide his head under a pillow, but his mother only pulled that away also. "Mom!" he whined even louder, glaring up at her with a pout.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah..." Denise laughed, crossing her arms over her chest. "Now get up."

AJ looked over at the clock. "It's only 9:30!"

"But you have a meeting to be to in a little bit."

"Since when? I don't remember management scheduling a meeting for today."

"Management didn't schedule this meeting, Kevin did."

AJ groaned, closing his eyes as he rubbed at them. "Why?"

"I think you know why, Alex..."

"Is anyone from management going to be there?"

"No, it's just going to be you and the guys."

AJ sighed and nodded as he sat up, rubbing the back of his neck and throwing his legs over the side of the bed.

"If you're going to take a shower, it needs to be a quick one because Jeff will be here soon to escort you to the meeting," Denise explained as she knelt down in front of her son. He still looked distressed, even after just waking up. She gave him a soft smile and patted his leg. "Everything is going to be alright."

AJ only nodded and stood up to go into the bathroom.

"Mind if I come in?" Jeff asked as he opened the door and peeked his head into the room. He, like everyone else, had been given a temporary copy of AJ's hotel room key card so they could check up on him at any time. The copies were ordered to be made without reason given.

"Come in if you'd like," Denise answered, offering her son's body guard a friendly smile. "Alex just stepped into the bathroom for a quick shower, so he should be out shortly."

"And he knows about the meeting Kevin called for?"

"Yes, I let him know about it."

Jeff sat down in one of the chairs. "How's he doing this morning?"

"To tell you the truth, I'm not sure and that's what worries me the most. But I guess that's my Alex. He can be stubborn and sometimes it is hard to get into his head to find out what he is thinking. It's just going to take time though."

"Any plan yet of how to go about taking care of this situation?"

"I suppose the Boys will be discussing that during their meeting. I spoke with Kevin a little bit ago and he agreed that once they were all done talking, he, Alex, and I would have a talk and come up with a plan."

"What about their management? Have they caught wind of what happened?"

"No, I think the Boys are choosing not to let them know."

"How long will that work or last?"

"I'm not sure."

Jeff nodded and crossed his arms over his chest as he leaned back in his seat, waiting for AJ to come out of the bathroom.

*****

AJ felt himself wanting to stray away from the group as they all sat around Kevin's hotel room, waiting for Nick to show up. Brian had rung him up ten minutes before to let him know he needed to get to Kevin's room as soon as possible for the meeting Kevin had called. Now the three of them sat around talking quietly about non-important things while AJ sat off by himself at the small table on the other side of the room. He could feel each of their stares looking over at him every once in a while, and in all truth, it was making him extremely nervous.

"So he nearly passed out several times when I was taking him to his room last night," Brian explained with an amused expression on his face. "We're walking down the hall and all of a sudden Nick starts snoring."

"You mean he started sleep walking while you were taking him back to his room?" Howie asked with a raised eyebrow.

"That's exactly what I mean," Brian nodded. "Oh man, but then, we get to his door and I go to unlock it to get inside and Nick keeps walking, but his sense of direction is horrible when he is sick and sleep walking. So somehow, he manages to run right into the wall opposite of us."

"Ouch," Kevin hissed, about ready to let out a laugh of his own.

"Yeah, poor Nick though. He threw up two times before I left."

"Dang, I wonder what he caught," Howie wondered.

"AJ's "flu"," Brian joked, glancing at AJ out of the corner of his eyes. AJ was slumped down in his seat, staring at his hands and messing with the few rings that were on his fingers. The grin immediately left Brian's face and he wished that Nick would hurry up and get there so they could start the meeting. They were all anxious to speak with AJ.

Then, almost as if on cue, there came a sharp knock on the door and Kevin hurried to answer it. They found a very sick looking Nick standing there, his face all rosey and his eyes puffy and red. "You ok, Nicky?" Kevin asked as he shut the door behind the tall blonde.

"Yeah, just peachy," Nick answered uncertainly as he ran a hand through his messy blonde locks and held a hand against his stomach.

"You look like you're gonna puke, Frack," Brian noted, watching Nick carefully.

"No, I'm-" Nick started to answer, but his face suddenly paled and his eyes started to bulge out. "Bathroom!" he gagged before dashing into the bathroom on the other side of the room and slamming the door shut.

"Good job, Bri," Howie chuckled as he stood up to check on Nick. "You jinxed him."

"Whatever," Brian replied shaking his head.

"Nicky?" Howie called out, knocking on the door. He could hear Nick retching inside and it made his own stomach queazy, causing him to squint. "Hey Nicky-"

"I'm ok," Nick coughed as he flushed the toilet and walked out of the bathroom. His face was even rosier then before.

"We might need to take you to the doctor," Howie suggested as he followed Nick back over to the bed where Brian and Kevin were. Brian slid off the bed so he was sitting on the floor indian style and facing the bed, while Kevin moved over so Nick could lay down, propped up partly by the pillows. Howie also took a seat on the floor next to Brian and AJ finally moved closer to the group, bringing his seat with him and sitting down. The five Backstreet Boys were now sitting together, the group forming a semi-circle shape.

"Well, first off, let's get down to business," Kevin started as he leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees and clasping his hands together. "Management got back to me last night about making up the concert we had to cancel at the last moment. They relayed that they weren't excited we needed to cancel with such short notice, but they said they were going to work in a make-up performance here somewhere near the end of the tour."

"Before we head back to Florida to close up the tour?" Brian prompted his cousin.

"Most likely," Kevin nodded. "But I know for sure that we will be making it up."

"I'm sure the fans weren't too thrilled when they were informed the concert was cancelled," Howie said, scratching the back of his head.

"You're right, D. They weren't," Kevin agreed. "Well of course fans are going to be angry and dissappointed if a concert is cancelled. There's an article in today's paper, though. Seems the fans were calling into the local radio stations wanting to know exactly why the concert had been cancelled, since most of them had already been waiting at the venue."

"This is all my fault, isn't it..." AJ spoke quietly, keeping his eyes trained on the floor. He knew for a fact that the real reason they had to cancel the conert the night before was because he had run off and they didn't know where he was. He was the reason the fans were dissappointed. It was his fault, he had dissappointed them. The fellas were making that clear, just not bluntly.

"J, we didn't know where you were," Brian answered, "You were gone for over four hours."

"You can't expect us to go ahead with the concert when you are missing," Kevin continued, looking over at AJ.

"But because I wasn't here, you had to cancel the concert."

"Nick is sick also. He was in no condition to perform last night."

AJ nodded, trying to signify that he understood that, but his mind just kept whirling with the fact that they originally had to cancel the concert because he had been an idiot and ran off. "I'm sorry..."

"Listen Aje, no matter how bad this is, we're here for you," Howie spoke up, his voice more serious then it had ever been. "You shouldn't feel like you need to run away because we don't understand. We may not understand exactly what you're thinking, but we're more then willing to try to."

"Suicide is serious AJ, and it's not something that we're just going to turn our backs on and make you deal with by yourself," Kevin agreed, keeping a close eye on his rebel brother as he spoke to him. "It's not something you can deal with by yourself. You're going to need help."

"You just need to admit to yourself that you need help. AJ, you yourself know that you can't deal with this alone," Brian said.

AJ looked away from his four bandmates' concerned stares. Why was he putting them through this again? It had hurt him greatly the first time when he had had his battle with his alcohol problem. He vowed not to put them through something like that again, and now this. They were having to deal with him being suicidal. He didn't see how he deserved their support.

"You just need to let us help you, J," Nick said before he erupted with a horrible chest-racking cough.

Kevin stood up and walked over to his suitcase where he began to dig through, looking for the little medicine bag that he always took with him on tour. After finding it, he opened it up and fished out a pack of cough drops. Going back over to the bed and handing Nick one of the cough drops, he sat down again. "AJ, we just want you to know that we're here to support you and we're going to back you up 100%," he continued, trying to get AJ to make eye contact with all of them. He began to realize how hard it was for AJ to be sitting there listening to this. He could just see it in his eyes that he was desperate for help, but that he was afraid to say anything about it. "AJ?"

"W-what?" AJ stuttered, rubbing at his eyes, trying to hide the fact that his eyes were beginning to tear over.

"Hey J, c'mon...look up at us," Kevin told him quietly, fearing for the fact that AJ was going to break down right there.

And he was right.

The tears slowly started to slip from his eyes and before they knew what was happening, AJ was trying to hide his quiet crying by burying his face in his hands. But there was no way he could hide it as he was hunched over in his seat and his shoulders were beginning to visibly shake as he continued to cry.

"I...I..." he tried to speak, but his voice shook horribly. AJ shook his head foolishly, embarrassed that he was acting in such a way, not knowing that his closest friends understood the reason why he was crying. "Guys...I-I'm scared..." he tried again, getting a deep enough breath to speak clearly. "I don't know what to do anymore."

"We're going to get you help, AJ," Brian told him, "And we're willing to do anything to get you the help that you need. You just need to help us out so we can help you."

"You're not in this alone, bro," Howie nodded.

"We can hire a therapist to come on the remainder of the tour," Kevin explained.

"What about management though?" AJ asked.

"They'll be a bit curious as to why you need a therapist, but we'll leave it up to you whether or not you want to let them know the real reason why. If you choose not to let them know the truth, well...we'll come up with a damn good lie then. We just won't let D come up with it," Kevin joked towards the end, hoping to get a small laugh out of his distraught friend. "No offense to you or anything, D, " he added.

"None taken..." Howie grumbled playfully, knowing Kevin was trying to lighten AJ up.

"You're going to get through this, AJ. We'll make sure of it."

"And everything will be kept confidential with the therapist."

AJ let out a small, strangled laugh. "This all seems a little too familiar..."

"How so?"

"Me having a problem, you guys getting me help. Next thing I know, my mom will be giving you guys the consent to ship me off to some mental institution."

"We aren't that cruel, J," Brian chuckled.

"I'm sorry for everything, guys."

"It's just going to take some time, bro. But we're always here, so don't forget that."

AJ could only nod.