"Did it hurt?"

Tyler peered over the top of her third glass of white zin and glowered at the man currently invading her personal space.

She eyed him knowlingly. The tight jeans. The casual dress shirt, unbuttoned about three buttons from the top. The leather lace-up dress shoes that were probably the only pair of non-sneakers that he owned. His hair was slicked back with some kind of shiny gel and he not-so-graciously sported a five-o-clock shadow. Here we go again.

"Did what hurt?"

"You know, when you fell from heaven." His smile was laced with obvious signs of teeth whitener and the kind of satisfaction that only comes from really believing you just delivered a great line.

Tyler heard the snickers of nearby patrons and the sound of her wingman spitting his drink all over her shoes. She offered him a chastising smile.

"Yeah, man, so much that it left me with this fucking crack in my ass. Wanna kiss it and make it better?"

Hopping off her bar stool, Tyler shot a sympathetic look at the juicehead who was clearly still trying to decipher her rejection. She grabbed her wingman while he laughed hysterically into the arm of his sweatshirt. "C'mon Jason."

"But Ty! You aren't having fun yet?!"

This was typically how every Friday night went. Come to some dive bar and set up audio equipment, work the set for the band, switch with the next round of audio dudes and then get macked on by every guido/bro/cocky guy in the bar.

Giving Jason an unamused look, she dropped his arm and headed out the back entrance of the club.

Tonight they were working the Bowery Electric, a tiny dive-like club with a basement show room of about 100 people at capacity. The upstairs was a dimly lit and slightly cleanlier bar with fine wooden counters and quilted black leather couches. Couches that you cannot apparently sleep off a hangover on. Tyler had made that mistake more than once to the annoyance of the large and fairly attractive bouncers.

Tyler leaned up against the venue's brick wall and lit up a menthol, using a book of matches that she had snagged from her buddy Frank who was working over at The Plaza on 5th Ave as a concierage. She had no idea how he had even scored an interview...or the clothes for the interview for that matter. But he was constantly stealing her books of matches and intricate, oddly-scented soaps. Which was nothing to complain about since she couldn't usually afford lighters or a good shampoo.

The smoke tingled as she forced it through her nostrils and she grimaced noticing Jason's cheap beer already starting to stain her cherry docs. She'd had them forever but they were still her go-to shoes. Their tough leather was wearing through and probably wreaked of cheap alcohol from all the other similar situations they had witnessed.

Tyler was broke and currently residing in New York City. An obviously bad combination. Well, Brooklyn to be exact. She had a cigarette addiction, a mouth like a sailor and a degree in audio and radio production. This was just another sound gig she was working to pay the rent. She was honestly lucky to have the gigs that she got because most recently graduated audio majors were scooping ice cream or serving up french fries and living in their unsuspecting parent's newly renovated basements. You would think that being around bands all the time was the best job in the world but the groupies and the modelizers that followed them around like drooling puppies became old really fast.

Hailing originally from Boston, she was 21 and an early graduate from a communications school downtown and a "Back Bay Bitch" as she so lovingly referred to herself. She had graduated early in order to save money and to her dismay subletted her hard-earned "62 on the Park" apartment to some spoiled musical theater freshman who refused to "live in an icky dorm". Tyler's dream had always been to be around the music industry, but lacking actual musical talent made this only slightly difficult. Her favorite musicians mostly consisted of what her mother called "head-banging music" that she "had to be high" to listen to. (Not that her mother ever smoked anymore, but being a child of the 70s she made such remarks) The 70s punk and 80s hardcore variety tended to be her poison of choice. Therefore when she found out about her school's underground DIY radio station her natural inclination was to enforce her music upon the hipster-infested campus of her school. She soon discovered that she loved being on-air just as much as being in the mosh pit and quickly inserted herself as a reoccuring DJ on her school's award-winning mainstream station.

Lucky for Tyler she was falling in love with a dying art and was trying to make a career out of it with school loans looming over her head. So when her best friend from college, who had graduated a year and a half before her as a fellow audio major as well, called her from his Brooklyn apartment with a with a job opportunity at an upstart NYC-based audio prouction company she simply couldn't say no.

It had taken her all summer, working for her school's summer residency program and taking summer classes to graduate a semester early, but Tyler had packed her life up into her rotting '70 Oldsmobile Cutlass and driven the five hours to New York City. She was currently crashing on Jason's couch and paying 400 bucks a month to make up the difference for their Brooklyn loft. Jason had felt sorry for her and was giving her a deal since she technically didn't have her own bedroom and was still paying back loans. Not that he wasn't himself but he had been doing pretty well in the year and half or so since his graduation. He'd already toured with a few bands and was currently the Assistant Operations Manager for the start up audio production company branching off Three Tower Audio Inc.

"Yo, Ty!"

Tyler jumped and dropped her cigarette onto the pavement, quickly staunching it out with her boot. "Huh?"

"Don't 'huh' me. You smokin' again?"

She had tried to quit smoking when she moved to New York knowing that Jason hated it. She had hoped that living with him would help her ditch the habit and if she ever wanted to be on-air at a radio station it would be better for her voice in the long run. "No."

Cocking his head to the side Jason scoffed. "Bullshit."

"You know I'm really not drunk enough for the third degree...so either you buy me another glass of wine, big boy, or shut your mouth."

The evening was rather cold for late May anyhow so Tyler eagerly swung her arm over Jason's shoulder, giving his ass a pinch, and allowed him to pull her back inside the dark club. The headlining band was just finishing up their encore and the crowd created a roar of applause and cheering. Leaning up against the wooden bar, Tyler grabbed the glass of wine Jason set next to her and started chugging. Another one of these would make cleaning up band equipment even more of a trip. She allowed Jason to pull her up against him sloppily.

"You're going to be hungover tomorrow. Now is that how a professional roadie does it?" He chided, his own buzz making an appearance in his voice.

Tyler snorted into her drink, not even paying attention to the wine that splashed onto her favorite jeans. "Abso-fucking-lutely."

Wine drunk was always a more pleasant drunk than vodka drunk or tequila drunk. It lets you slide into inebriation slowly without even realizing that it's happened until you try to stand up to use the bathroom.

Wine hungover is a completely different ballgame.

Tyler sat up quickly and immediately wished that she hadn't. Her head was throbbing and she quickly covered her mouth as her stomach threatened to empty all of its contents into her lap.

The worst part of being hungover in general was the nausea. You got that distinct wave of stomach-sloshing bile that threatened to crawl up your throat and the annoying part being that you never actually threw up. It probably wouldn't be as bad if you did.

"Rise and shine, sleepy!"

Cringing, Tyler looked down at her lap trying to figure out exactly where she was. She was in Jason's area of the room in his real bed as opposed to her sofa-bed. That would explain the lack of coils digging into her ass. Her favorite jeans were unfortunately stained with wine and there was what appeared to be a newly torn hole in the inner thigh of her jeans inching towards her crotch.

"Fuck."

Jason snorted and plopped down on the bed with her. "I know right? I told you that you'd be mad hung over."

"Not that you asshole." Tyler glared in Jason's direction before slapping him upside the back of the head. She cringed as the impact of the blow left her head throbbing. "These are my fucking 200 dollar jeans and they've got a huge hole in them."

"That explains why you can only afford a couch in my studio..."

She ignored the comment since she was never late on a rent payment and the jeans had been a splurge for Christmas last year. They were a worn black biker-style skinny jean and they fit like a glove. If she could have found them somewhere cheaper she would have, but for some reason the styles she loved always seemed to be some off-season or quirky piece.

"Whatever. Why the fuck am I in your bed?"

Laughing, Jason gave her knee a squeeze and strode into the bathroom. "I like to take advantage of my drunk female companions in their sleep."

"Not funny, Jason." Tyler slid back down into the pile of blankets and pillows that her own sofa-bed unfortunately lacked.

"Relax. You were pretty drunk so I figured you'd rather wake up hungover in a real bed as opposed that shitty thing you call a matress in the corner" Jason called from the bathroom. "And don't get too comfortable because we're leaving in twenty minutes."

"What? What do you mean 'we'? You got a mouse in your pocket?"

Ambling back into the room, Jason ran a hand through his ragged brown hair. "We, as in you and I, have a meeting with my manager at Three Tower Audio. They've got a band that just signed on to use them for their upcoming tour and the boss-man is putting together an all star team of roadies for the gig." Jason shot her a smirk and grabbed a red flannel off the ground to throw over his white t-shirt. "Say thank you, bitch."

She flung the covers off her with a groan and pulled herself out of bed. Tyler got a whiff of her shirt, flinched and pulled it over her head on her way to the bathroom. She offered Jason a smartass grin before slamming the door. "Thank you, bitch."

Twenty-five minutes later Tyler sat next to Jason on the M train headed northbound to Generation Records from their stop at Myrtle St in Brooklyn. Tyler held her head with one hand, feeling her stomach lurch everytime the subway hit a rough patch in the track and kept a death grip on her coffee with the other. She would have been excited knowing that Generation Records was the Greenwich Village spot notorious for its punk and hardcore selections if she didn't feel like she was going to lose her breakfast. Which would have been quite sad being that breakfast this morning had consisted of two salteens and three ibuprofen that were not doing the trick as proclaimed on the bottle. Jason had his headphones on and was air-drumming along to some new metal band that he had recenly discovered and wasn't paying much attention to anything around him. He nudged Tyler with his shoulder, gesturing to the coffee he had made her in order to help with the hangover.

Taking the hint from her rather pathetic look he threw an arm about her shoulders so that she could lean on him for the remainder of the ride, focusing on the threads fraying from the knee of his pants rather than the swaying floor.

Three Tower Audio had conveniently rented a vacant space on Thompson St above Generation Records for their NYC offices and sound studios. The space had previously been owned by Gen Records as well but with the ever-rising rent prices the record company had rented it out. Three Tower had snatched it up in the hopes of keeping yet another independent record company from being bought out by a corporate giant and in the process possibly accruing future clients by association.

The record store was the perfect mix of vinyl treasures, punk, hardcore and metal memoribilia and the few rare EP's that some of the best alternative rock outfits had bothered to press into CD form. Jason had to practically drag Tyler up the spiral staircase located at the back of the store as she stood around pretty much drooling and not knowing which bin to dive into first.

"We are here for a meeting."

A look of frustration crossed Tyler's features as she reluctently put down a vinyl copy of The Misfits' Static Age and followed him up the stairs.

The office was much more comforting than Tyler had expected it to be and she smirked remembering why she risked financial instability on a daily basis to pursue a career she actually loved rather than plug through a nine to five office job to have her own bedroom.

"You must be the lovely Tyler I've heard so much about."

Tyler looked up as a heavily tattooed gentleman in his late thirties with a British accent approached her with a cheeky grin.

"Yes, you. The one with the boobs" The man chuckled at Jason as he made himself comfortable on a red leather couch dropped nearly in the center of the room. The room contained not much else except for an extremely large wooden coffee table. "I thought you said she was strong, there Jay. She doesn't look like she could move an amp if her life depended on it."

The man let out an extraordinary laugh at the the angry look on Tyler's face as she was about to protest with a few belittling choice explitives. "I'm just joshing there, love. I've heard plenty about your brilliant skills in the audio production world and have no doubts about it. Don't rip my balls off."

"No promises." Tyler sneered.

"Can't say that I wouldn't enjoy it. If you're going to get action why not get it rough?" He laughed and patted the spot next to him on the couch as he took a seat.

Tyler raised an eyebrow in amusement before taking her seat.

"The name's Richard, but you can call me Dick if you'd like."

She snorted. "I was planning on it."

Luckily, Richard hooted and clapped her on the back. "You've got an attitude problem, doll. I like it. Polite women make me nervous. Prolly why I've taken a liking to dominatrixes and prostitutes over the years, eh?"

Now it was Tyler's turn to laugh as she nearly spit out the sip of coffee she had just taken. She shot Jason a look of approval as he sat there looking quite pleased with himself. He had snagged himself quite the gig to be Assistant Operations Manager under this guy, Tyler thought.

"And she thinks I'm kidding" Richard shuffled some papers around on the table. "Now let's get down to business. I've heard all about you from Jay over there and I have to say I'm impressed. He nicked me a demo tape you did for that radio station of yours back in Boston and I have to say I've never seen such professionalism in a college produced station in many years. You definitely have the chops for audio production and sound design. My only hesitation is that you've never done a long term stint such as a tour before but hey we're all newbies once, right?"

Unsure if this was a rhetorical question, Tyler nodded.

"So really, all we've got to do is train you on our equipment and make sure you're good to go. You just have to promise me the next couple months of your life and we're peachy, eh?"

"It sounds a hell of a lot better than guessing as to whether I'm going to be able to afford to eat within the next week, does a bed come included in this deal?"

Richard shrugged. "Well, a bunk, yes."

Tyler clapped her hands together. "A step up! Where do I sign?"

"Smashing!" Richard laughed at his own use of cliche British jargon. "Great. We'll get you trained the end of this week and we're set to ship out the 28th, yeah?"

Nodding, Tyler eagerly took the pen signing her tour contract. Having a set job for the next few months was a roadie's dream and she could really care less where they sent her as long as there was a paycheck at the end of the week. Which according to the paperwork, there was.

"So, who exactly are we touring with?" She asked, fingering her worn Gaslight Anthem tank top hopefully. She hadn't heard that they were touring anytime soon, but she knew that Brian Fallon had a side project in the works for the very near future so it wasn't entirely out of the question. Not that it mattered to her, since this company was seemingly one that she would like to have on her resume either way.

"Ah, yes. You will be meeting the band soon enough. They're finishing up the European leg of this tour so unfortunately you won't be able to meet them beforehand but I assure you they are all fine gentleman." Richard smiled. "And actually you're signing on with us at a good time. I'm sure Jay here has told you that this New York chapter is a rather new chapter to Three Towers and we're looking to expand our services to a wider range musicians, make the company more accessible, you know?"

Picking up her coffee, Tyler nodded.

"With this chapter we're looking to delve into a more mainstream market I guess you could say, especially since there is so much to be explored in terms of media in New York City. We're looking to possibly get more pop artists as clients since they're so versatile. We just happen to be lucky enough to have one of our very first new groups be one of the biggest pop bands in the world. You lucky chaps will be working with none other than the Backstreet Boys!"

This time Tyler really did spit her coffee halfway across the room.

"Could you at least pretend to be excited right now?"

Jason slumped down and prodded Tyler with his boot. She was lying down lifelessly on the group of subway bench seats across the aisle.

"It's 5:30 in the morning. I'm not going to be excited about anything other than the inside of my eyelids."

Currently, Tyler and Jason were on their way to Port Authority to load onto the buses that they would call home for the next couple months of their lives. They had spent the entirety of the previous night above Generation Records packing and loading equipment into cases and then hiking it out to the transport vans in order to leave for the tour the next morning. They hadn't finished until about 2am with an order to be at Port Authority ready to head out at 6am. Tyler was currently focusing on not sliding off the subway bench and leering at the homeless man who was giving her lecherous looks from two seats away. She felt like a zombie.

It was a little over a week ago that she had embarassed herself in front of her new boss and signed away her life for the next couple months to work the Backstreet Boys US tour. Luckily Jason had been able to chalk up her coffee-spewing behavior to her being hungover from the previous evening's after-gig festivities and had been able to keep a muzzle on her until they got home.

"A boy band?! Are you kidding me?! What the fuck?!" Tyler stormed into the loft and kicked her docs across the carpet.

Rolling his eyes Jason dropped his bag to the floor. "What is your problem? I thought this was your dream career, why are you biting my head off?"

"It is!" She yelled from the bathroom, where Jason head bottles being knocked over. "I joined this business for the sake of Rock and fucking Roll, not bubblegum pop tart music!"

"Well excuse me, Miss punk as fuck, as someone who believes in the music business, I would think you wouldn't be so judgemental."

Tyler returned to the room carrying an open bottle of wine. "I do. I'm someone who believes in the underdog and something different and how true musical talent is being swept under the rug due to the corporations that create these mass produced pop stars."

"For someone who supposedly believes in 'something different' I'd assume you'd be really down to give this a shot instead of listening to the same three chords all the friggen time."

"You're missing the point."

Jason crossed his arms about his chest. "Oh really and what would the point be? That you're being a pretentious bitch? You can't tell me you never listen to pop music, Mistress of the Underground. You like Michael Jackson, so what's the difference?"

She couldn't deny that, considering her Thriller poster hung crookedly on the wall behind her. "That is completely different. Michael Jackson is the freaking King of Pop aka no comparison."

"Yeah, and everyone had to get their start somewhere. AKA listening to the Spice Girls like I know you did. You need to relax. They are a group of talented and nice guys. Don't even deny it. You liked them at one point, you're a nineties kid, don't even play me."

Tyler shrugged as she swallowed her mouthful of wine. "Um, yeah, in like, middle school or something. God."

"Well, how appropriate because that's about how old you're acting now." Jason gave Tyler a meaningful glance. "Look, I'm not asking you to worship in the church of BSB or anything, just be polite okay? Seriously."

"I'm going to spend the entirety of this tour wasted off my ass, I can feel it..." She grumbled.

Jason scoffed. "As if that's news."

Finally D-Day had arrived and the two made their way to a secluded bus terminal away from the major transit lines looking ready and raring to go. Raring to go for Tyler being dragging her bag of luggage and stuffed purse along in a trance-like state before slumping against the side of the black tour bus and pulling out her pack of American Spirits.

She sighed in exasperation as she opened the pack to find that it was empty and she let her head clunk back against the side of the bus. "Great."

"Here. Happy first official tour gig out of college." Jason was suddenly standing next to her offering her an unopened pack of Djarum Blacks.

"My favorite fucking expensive cigarettes ever? what?!"

Jason shrugged, smirking at bit. "Cigars actually. The cigarettes are illegal now, but you know, the next best thing."

Tyler's eyes lit up as she dropped her luggage to eagerly tear off the paper. "What happened to you trying to get me to quit, hmm? All that 'oh, that shit will kill you' and whatnot?"

"Yeah, but the way you were chainsmoking on the walk to the subway and then the walk to the terminal and after we finished packing last night. I figured the only thing that was worse was having to listen to you after you'd run out asking the driver to make a pit stop every twelve seconds. Now that shit will kill me."

Pulling a cigar out of the package Tyler opened her mouth to retort as she spotted the sleek white limousine pulling up in front of the second (and somewhat noticably nicer) tour bus. The driver got out to open the door but was beaten to the punch by one of the car's occupants. A dusty blonde guy, who was a bit on the short side, climbed out and clapped the driver on the shoulder jovially.
"It's all good, Dave. I got hands," Brian said as his bandmates climbed out of the car. "You've done enough for us my man. Thank you."

Tyler scoffed, not really being close enough to hear the exchange. "Of course they would arrive in a limo...and get the better bus."

Shaking his head, Jason chuckled at her. "Envy isn't really the best color for you. You work for them, bro. Remember that. Besides, lookit you," He gestured toward her torn jeans that were still stained with wine and her midriff baring t-shirt. "They don't want that shit in a limo. God."

She watched him saunter away with her bag covering his mouth to hide his amusement at his own dig. Asshole. She'd get him back later.

Tyler stuck a cigarette in mouth and fumbled around in her purse for her favorite white lighter. Most people laughed at her or actually looked at her in fear when they saw it but she always found the ironic and the unlucky to be sources of amusement.

There was a myth that came along with white lighters being bad luck since crack addicts used them in order to make sure their lighters didn't become stained with the residue of the drug. And of course her real reason for carrying one was that Kurt Cobain had died with a white bic in his pocket. She loved spooky stories like that.

She found the bic and held it up to her Djarum, grimacing when the stupid thing only sparked.

"Are you shitting me?" The girl grumbled to herself as she proceeded to search her pockets and her purse for a spare. Of course there wasn't one to be found. This morning only kept getting better. Leaning her head back against the bus, Tyler sighed and let the cigarette hang limply between her lips. It was too friggen early for this shit.

"You need a light?"

"No, I'm just chewing on this for shits and..." She looked up in the direction of the voice and fumbled to catch her Djarum as it fell from her lips. Tyler caught the thing in her hand nearly squashing it as she gazed at the owner of the voice. Attractive and tall, a guy with piercing blue eyes and neatly spiked blonde hair offered her his dark green bic. Nick Carter stood there with a look of amusement on his face as he waited for the girl to take it.

"You don't wanna use that one anyway. It's bad luck." He chuckled and Tyler closed her mouth, pressing her lips and taking the lighter.

"Thanks."

Nick shrugged and pointed to Tyler's shirt as she took a deep inhale of her clove. "I dig the shirt."

She looked down at herself forgetting what she had on and remembering she had on a cropped shirt she snorted. "Yeah. Uh huh. Thanks."

"I uh...meant the band." He smirked, running a hand through his hair, looking embarassed for Tyler's assumption that he was checking her out.

She took another drag and pointedly blew the smoke out in his direction. "Nirvana?" She rolled her eyes. "They don't really quite seem like your style. No offense."

At this proclamation Nick laughed sarcastically and shook his head. "Oh...oh okay. Well then. I should probably be heading to the bus." He pocketed the lighter as she handed it back to him. "What did you say your name was?"

"I didn't. It's Tyler."

He nodded, hiding a smirk of amusement. "Alright then, Tyler. It was uh..nice to meet you." Nick turned with a snicker and headed in the direction of his bus.

"Yep." Tyler continued to smoke her cigarette, shaking her head. Like he actually listened to Nirvana. What a player. Despite that he wasn't terrible to look at, Tyler thought, giving his backside an appreciative once over.

"Oh hey, Tyler?" Nick called over his shoulder, watching as the girl regarded him with disinterest. "I don't have the passion anymore, and so remember, it's better to burn out than to fade away."

Nick chuckled as he watched this Tyler character nearly choke on her cigarette smoke. Quoting the last line of Kurt Cobain's suicide note was definitely the last thing she'd expected from him. Little did she know they were one his favorite childhood bands. Nick headed onto the bus where the rest of the boys were waiting.

Jason hopped down the steps from the roadie's bus to find Tyler gagging. "It's really too early in the game for you to be dying, you alright?" He asked as Tyler diverted her gaze from the Backstreet Boy's tour bus.

"Yeah, I'm fine."

Jason took her cigarette and staunched it out beneath his boot. "Good. Oh and Tyler? You got a little something right there..." He touched the side of his own bottom lip insuating she was drooling and sprinted back into the bus.

Tyler growled and follwed him up the steps. "Shut the hell up."

Four hours later the group of buses had pulled into the private parking lot of the 1st Mariner Arena in Baltimore. The morning was still young and the sun had finished rising, bathing the lot in a pleasant glow. Everyone was still napping since they had to be up so early in order to get on the road. At least the band still was since they didn't have to get to sound check until around noon. The crew was up getting ready to set up the stage and make some magic happen.

"Can you turn that down?"

Jason watched as Tyler moshed around the kitchen area of their bus waiting for the coffee to finish brewing. She was headbanging and nearly knocked over her thermose as she belted out the chorus to Bad Religion's "Twenty-first Century Digital Boy".

"What!?" She yelled, continuing to thrash about and grabbing a fork to sing into.

Jason sighed. "Can you turn that thing down?!"

"My daddy's a lazy middle class intellectual! My mommy's on valium so ineffectuallll!" Tyler sang loudly, and rather poorly.

Jason groaned and got up, turning off the radio.

"Hey!" Tyler stopped in the middle of her grand dance routine, the fork poised by her mouth. "I was listening to that!"

"Yeah, you and the people two towns away. Can you go put some clothes on?"

Tyler gave him a look, putting her hands on her hips. She definitely wasn't shy which would account for the fact that she was moshing around in her underwear.

"You've seen my tits before, what's your malfunction?"

"Yea. That doesn't mean everyone else needs to. Be professional, will ya? Besides we have to head over to the stadium in less than an hour."

She scoffed at Jason's typical overprotective demeanor. "I haven't had my coffee yet, leave me be."

Tyler grabbed the brown flannel shirt she had packed, that was probably Jason's, and put it on. She gave him a pointed look before grabbing her coffee and pack of cigarettes and stepped outside.

The morning was beautiful. Still a bit colder than she'd like for May but the sun was shining and Tyler stood admiring the bright reflections the light made against the glass of the few high rises that surrounded the area. She had always had a love of urban architecture. She smiled as she heard "Hopeless Romantic" by The Bouncing Souls playing out of their bus. Jason must have turned the radio back on.

"Oh, now you want to listen to the radio, huh?!"

Jason flipped her the bird through the window of the bus. "Fuck you." She mumbled, suppressing a laugh. She lit up a clove, enjoying the taste of it mingled with the flavor of her hazelnut coffee. She tapped her bare feet on the pavement to the beat of the song and closed her eyes. Tyler had seen the Souls live once in Cambridge at the Middle East nightclub. It was a basement of a place with a bar and a stage that was really nothing more than a ledge cut-out in the back wall. The bands that night had been rad and she'd marveled at the amount of white boys attempting to put a rhythm to slam dancing. The floor had only become packed during the Souls though. She hadn't been twenty-one at the time and her girlfriend had bought her a Coors Light that she proceeded to mostly slosh over anyone within a two foot radius. Running back to the T she must have looked like a drowned rat covered in sweat and cheap beer, her clothes sticking to her like she'd just pulled herself out of the neighbor's pool.

Tyler found herself getting caught up in the memory of the music and dancing along to the track alone in the parking lot.

"I'm a hopeless romanticccc! You're just hopeless!!" She gave her favorite line a suggestive hip pop accompanied with a thrust of her free hand into the air. "whoahhh-oh-oh!"

"Oh really now?"

Tyler yelped, coming out of her reverie dance party and dropped her coffee thermose on the ground in surprise. She whirled around to the find the four members of the Backstreet Boys having left their tour bus to enjoy the warm morning, possibly having been disturbed by her rather off-key crooning.

Nick stood leaning against the side of their tour bus with his own mug in hand. "Good morning to you too." He laughed.

Tyler quickly pulled the large flannel tightly about herself, realizing that she was still wearing only her underwear. She bent down to scoop up her thermose that was drizzling the remainder of her coffee across her toes. "Uh hi...I mean, morning" She said standing up. "I didn't mean to wake you all."

"Nah, it's cool." AJ smirked, taking in her dissheveled state with amusement. "We were awake. We just thought we'd come out to be sure we hadn't missed the concert. You the opening act?"

The guys laughed as Tyler blushed a shade of red that complimented her bra. This was one way to meet to the band.

"Ha...yea...no."

"Good thing. I was about to be worried." AJ chuckled and walked over to her, offering his hand. "I'm just messing kid. I'm AJ. Nice to meet you. And those bozos are Howie, Nick and Brian."

"Tyler." She took his hand tightening her grip on the flannel with the other one. "As if I didn't know who you all are."

"I see London, I see France." Nick coughed loudly to cover up his comment as Brian laughed.

"Excuse me" Tyler growled defensively. "This ain't a free peep show."

Brian laughed at her comment, giving Nick a shove for being a smartass. "You'll have to excuse him, he isn't really used to seeing the moon out at this time of day."

Tyler ignored them as the pair high fived and covered up their snickering. She turned back to AJ. "You know you guys look just as great as you did when I was in middle school..." She marveled without thinking.

"Ouch. Middle school?" AJ put his hands over his chest in faux hurt. "Way to make me feel old."

Howie put on an air of offense. "Gawd, middle school, are you even old enough to smoke?"

"What's it to ya?" Tyler smirked, taking a drag on her clove and offering AJ her pack seeing him eyeing the cigarette.

He pulled one out of the pack. "I'm trying to quit."

Offering up her lighter, she rolled her eyes. "Yeah, me too. As of four years ago when I started."

"Boy, do I got you beat."

Tyler took in AJ with interest in her amber eyes. She had honestly expected every single one of the four remaining Backstreet Boys to be like pretty boy puppets. She had grown out of her Disney-kid phase a long time ago. In fact, it would be difficult to say that she had ever had one. The only thing she had wanted to be when her parents took her to Disney World when she was seven was a cow girl. Despite her mother's wishes that she get a nice princess costume, Tyler had ended up with clunky cow boy boots and a red squined skirt in which she would gallop about, sporting her stick horse for hours on end. Tyler was pleasantly surprised to find that these boys had more to them that met the eye.

AJ for instance, was covered in ink. She hadn't remembered that from middle school. She marveled at his rocker-esque get up and was completely overjoyed when she spotted the silver hoop in his left nostril.

"Dude, I totally don't remember you having your nose pierced!" The girl shifted uncomfortably. "Not that I would remember because I've never met you but..you know what I'm saying. So rad. I dig the ink too."

AJ chuckled. "Thanks. You're not too shabby yourself."

He gestured to Tyler in reference to the two silver rings that looped out of the right nostril on her own nose. They had been her first piercings when she first moved to college. Her mother had been pissed, especially since she wasn't fond of her daughter's penchant for alternative body modifications in the first place and then she'd come home with two. Tyler had shrugged it off, figuring go big or go home, right?

"Thanks."

"No prob." AJ winked before letting out a loud laugh and clapping her on the shoulder. "Man, you gotta quit being so nice to me. My fiance will get jealous."

Tyler smirked shyly and took a drag on her cigarette so her hands would have something to do.

Brian reached his hand in his jeans pocket feeling his cell phone ring. "That's probably the crew calling to say they need us for staging checks. We'd better get going."

"Boo. And just when things were getting interesting." Tyler mused.

"Well, just think, you're stuck with us for the next couple of months" AJ said "Things just get better from here."

With that AJ and the boys headed off in the direction of the stadium.

"Joy." Tyler took a drag before staunching out the remainder of her clove. At least one of them seemed to be remotely intriguing. In all actually they weren't that bad. And, hey, she was getting paid.

"So how much then?"

Tyler jumped at the sound of Nick's voice not noticing that he had disappeared back into his bus to put away his coffee mug before heading over to rehearsal. She pulled her flannel shirt tightly about herself again. "Excuse me?"

"You said this ain't a free peep show, so how much?" Nick smiled slyly, taking joy in the mortified look on her face.

Narrowing her gaze, Tyler scoffed. "Two hundred up front. Three hundred per lap dance and an extra one fifty per hour. And I don't do anything weird or from the behind."

Nick raised his eyebrows at her.

"What? You're the only one allowed to be clever around here?" She asked innocently. "I'm allowed to walk around here dressed however I so choose."

"I didn't say you weren't. No need to go all Rosie the Riveter on me. But if you're going to dress to attract attention, don't expect people not to look." Nick gave her a once over as she scowled at him to cover up her embarassment. "I would've pegged you as a thong kind of girl though, nice call on the boy shorts."

"So you're a connoisseur of women's underwear are you?" She chided.

"Well sure, I mean when you spend as much time around women as we do...and I usually get a glimpse at what women's lingere looks like before it ends up on my floor."

Nick laughed at his own joke before jogging away to catch up with the guys.

Perhaps Tyler had found someone, that given her attitude, would give her a run for her money.