“Not so loud, Train. He’s got a headache,” said AJ, bouncing down the steps of the bus.
Kevin raised his bushy eyebrows. AJ shook his head and smiled. It was all good.
And it was.
When Nick had started to cry, Terence and AJ looked at each other. No more beer, was the first thought that ran through their mind. Nick rambled on about how lucky he was to have Abby and how much he loved her and how he didn’t ever want anyone else in his life but her. AJ let him go on, trying to figure out why these thoughts made Nick cry. Terence handed over some tissues when Nick stopped to draw breath and while he was blowing his nose, AJ stepped in.
“So this Ronni chick, she’s ancient history?” AJ used Howie’s words.
Nick nodded. “Yeah, yeah,” he said, waving his hand dismissively.
“Good,” said AJ. “I’d really hate to see you fuck up what you’ve got with Abby. I’m just asking ‘cause…”
Nick raised his eyebrows.
“…cause…in Chicago, it kinda looked like…” AJ paused.
“Like what?” Nick wanted the answer to that. AJ didn’t know anything about what happened in the dressing room. And Nick didn’t think he’d given anything away before that. She was just a fan.
“Well, she was kinda all over you backstage, and then during the show…”
”What?”
“There was a lot of eye contact and shit between you. It looked like you had a history, I guess.”
Terence watched Nick’s reaction carefully. He knew how Ronni had got that backstage pass, how she’d gotten into the pit for the show. She’d got there because Nick had put her there. He wanted to see what Nick had to say about that.
“We did,” said Nick. “And that’s what it is…history. It was Abby that promised her the backstage pass. They work together on the Symphony committee.”
“Does Abby know about her? I mean, about you and her?”
“Yes, no...I…” It was all too much. Nick lumbered to his feet. “I gotta bail before I puke.” He staggered up the bus and fell face down on his bed, fully clothed. He passed out in seconds and didn’t wake up until late the next morning. It took him a long while to focus on who he was, where he was and what day it was. But he figured it out eventually. He was Nick Carter, the idiot with the headache. He was on a bus to Charlotte, North Carolina. And it was June.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~“So this is Abby’s big weekend, is it?” asked Howie. They were gathered in the workout room at the Charlotte Coliseum.
“What do you mean?” asked Nick. He’d had two showers and consumed a big lunch. He was starting to feel better. He was still pale, though, and a little shaky.
“The book launch, you dummy,” laughed Brian. “Jeez, where’s your head at, these days?”
Nick blushed and then narrowed his eyes at Brian. “I knew that. It’s just that Abby doesn’t want it to be a big thing. She wants it kept low-key.”
“What did you send her?” asked Kevin.
“Send her?”
“You know, like for a ‘welcome to New York’ thing. Good luck. I love you. That kind of shit.”
Nick’s face drained of what little color it had.
“You asshole,” blurted AJ. “You didn’t do anything? You didn’t send her flowers, even?”
“I…I…” Nick looked over at Terence.
“’S okay, Boss. I put Mary on it.”
Nick breathed a sigh of relief. The guys were right. He was an asshole. He’d spent the last two weeks navel-gazing and wondering about his sad, sorry self…and treating Abby like shit. He knew he’d been different in the emails, mostly because he was afraid he’d let something slip. He’d talked to her about her trip to New York…or rather, he’d listened. He really hadn’t had much to say about anything.
“Why don’t you call her?” asked Brian. “You’ve got some time now. It’s what…nearly five? She might be back at the hotel.”
Nick was embarrassed. He didn’t want to admit that he didn’t know how to call her. He thought she’d said she was staying at the Plaza, but he wasn’t really sure. Maybe he’d said that he always stayed at the Plaza. If he could get back on the bus, he could check out the email on his computer. But he couldn’t figure out a way to do that without admitting what a lousy bastard he was.
“The number’s on the bus,” he said. “I…I don’t have it with me. Or my phone.”
“You mean you weren’t planning on calling her until after the show?” Howie asked in surprise.
Nick didn’t want to tell them that he wasn’t planning on calling her at all…that they didn’t do that.
“I carry Nick’s phone for him on show days,” said Terence, pulling it out of his pocket. He handed the phone to Nick, along with a folded piece of paper. “There’s no one in the dressing room,” he said. “You could go there.”
Nick opened the piece of paper. It had the phone number of the Plaza. Underneath it was written, Room 842. “Thanks, Man,” Nick said casually, but he gave Terence a look that said how grateful he was.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Abby put down the phone. There! Dinner was ordered. So now what? Should she have her shower now or wait until after she’d eaten? Oh, such big decisions, she thought, with a smile. Wasn’t the life of a published author just a whirlwind?
It had been a bit of a crazy day which was why she was eating dinner alone in her room. She wanted some peace and quiet, after having spent the day with so many people. Lawrence had been rather insistent that he take her to dinner. He was a lovely man but he had a wife and family to get home to and Abby felt that she had already stolen half the weekend from them. Besides, she wanted to be alone. Finally, she begged off with the excuse that Nick would be calling her and she had to be in the room to get the call. Stupid excuse, really, in this era of cell phones. People took their communication devices with them.
Abby missed Nick. She would love to discuss the whole day with him and not have to wait until Monday’s email. Maybe she’d break with tradition and send one tomorrow evening when she got home. That would be okay, she thought, a long narrative telling all about her trip…and then Monday go back to the daily weather report.
Abby wished she had a computer like Nick’s that she could plug in anywhere and hop onto the Internet Express. There was Internet access in her room at the Plaza. Of course, there was…they had everything at the Plaza. It seemed a bit out of place amongst the gilt and marble of the stately, old building, but… Abby looked around the room. She thought Nick would seem out of place here too. He said that he always stayed here when he was in New York. It must be the convenient location, she thought. It didn’t seem to be his kind of décor…heavy velvet drapes and a chandelier…gleaming cherry furniture… brocade wallpaper…gilt picture frames.
The phone rang, startling her.
“Hello,” she said tentatively.
“Hey, Shakespeare!”
“Nick,” she said in a whispered sigh. She put her hand over her heart to keep it from jumping out of her chest.
The sound of that sigh ran a thrill through Nick from head to toe. She was genuinely happy to hear from him, he could tell.
“How’s my favorite author?” he asked.
“Good,” she said. “Tired. It was a long day.” Abby sat in the big armchair by the window, pulling her legs up under her. “How’s North Carolina?”
“Wet,” said Nick. “We’ve just stayed at the venue. Thank goodness we arranged for the publicity crap to happen here.”
“That’s good. You wouldn’t want to…”
Nick cut her off. “I don’t want to talk about me. I want to talk about you. Tell me everything. And uh…did you…um…did you get the flowers I sent?”
Abby looked at the vase on the desk. Two dozen yellow roses stood straight and tall. “Yes. Thank Mary for me.”
“I will…I mean, why would I do that? Why do you think she sent them? Don’t you think I’m capable of sending flowers?”
“Not these,” said Abby, with a laugh. “And besides, isn’t that what you have a personal assistant for?”
“What did she send?” asked Nick, happy that Abby wasn’t upset with him. Then the light went on. “Roses, right?”
“Yes,” said Abby. “They’re beautiful. They really are. I’m starting to rethink this whole ‘I hate roses’ thing. They’re yellow,” she added. Abby was glad that Mary had sent roses…because that told her right from the start that Nick hadn’t sent the flowers. And that made for no confusion when she opened the card. It said, ‘All my love, Nick’.
“So, how was the interview?” asked Nick. He settled down horizontally on a sofa in the dressing room with his arms folded behind his head. He tucked the phone between his arm and his ear and listened to his wife describe her day.
Abby told him about her session with the book reviewer from the New York Times. He told her upfront that he hadn’t been looking forward to the interview, that he figured she was just the wife of a celebrity trying to cash in on her husband’s fame. But then he’d read the story…
“That’s great, Abby! I knew you’d take the town by storm.”
“Well, it was hardly that,” replied Abby with a laugh, “but it went pretty well. We actually had quite a good chat about other books and authors.”
Nick felt a trickle of unease. He knew that he could never have that kind of conversation with her. Of course, this book reviewer probably couldn’t carry the ball in a conversation about fan message boards.
“How was the signing?” he asked.
“Busy. You’ve got a lot of fans out there, let me tell you.”
“What do you mean, my fans? They’re your fans.”
“Well, maybe some of them are now, but face it, Nick. Those were Backstreet fans lined up out the door and down the street.”
“Out the door and down the street?”
“Oh, yes. It was quite a zoo. But the good thing was that while they were standing in line waiting for me to sign, they read the book. So that by the time they got to me, they could say that they liked the book, along with how much they loved you.” Abby chuckled at the thought. “If you’d been there, it would have been chaos…Kaos!”
Nick burst out laughing. “Oh, Abby, I miss you,” he blurted.
Abby’s sharp intake of breath made them both pause.
Gap.
“Me too,” she said, softly, after a minute.
Gap.
“So…what about the press conference?” continued Nick after several long seconds.
“Now, you have to understand, Nick,” said Abby, “this wasn’t your typical Backstreet press conference. This was just a handful of book reviewers. Lawrence is pushing me to do more, but I don’t want to. Then it’s not about the book. It’s about you.”
“And you wouldn’t want that?” Nick thought maybe his feelings were hurt.
Abby could have kicked herself. The conversation had been going so well. “Nick,” she began, “have you ever had a girl who just wanted to…use you…because of who you were or who you knew…just wanted a little, reflected Backstreet light shining on them?”
“Yes,” admitted Nick, “most of them.”
“Well, I don’t ever want to be that. I don’t ever want you…or anyone else…to think that I’m doing that. If this book can’t sell without it being about you, then I don’t want it to sell.”
“Oh, it will sell. I’m sorry. I guess I was just being sensitive.”
“I thought we’d already had this conversation…last week.”
Nick thought about their so-called conversations of the past couple of weeks. “Yeah, about that. Abby, I know I’ve been kind of different the last couple of weeks.”
Silence. Abby wasn’t going to deny it. He had been different. She also wasn’t going to jump in and tell him that it was okay. She wanted to hear his explanation.
“I…I’ve had some things on my mind…with the tour and all…and I know I haven’t been very good at writing.”
“That’s okay. I was a little worried, that’s all.”
“Well, I’m sorry I was such a shit. It’s a good thing you’ve got other people to talk to…like Philip Randall.”
Gap. Long, long, gap.
