What ravages of spirit conjured this tempestuous rage? Created you a monster broken by the rules of love and fate has lead you through it you do what you have to do and fate has led you through it you do what you have to do ~* Sarah McLachlan - "You Do What You Have To Do" ~*
````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````
He sat on the edge of the bathtub, his feet resting on the cold tile floor. He looked at the faux marble pattern and wondered how every hotel had the exact same cheesy tile in it.

Do they get some sort of rule book when they decide to build a hotel that specifies that this tile has to be in every bathroom?

He shook his head and got unsteadily to his feet, feeling the effects of the alcohol starting to play with his sense of balance. Leaning on the gaudily wallpapered wall, he made his way to the window. He rested his forehead on the cool glass and watched the palm trees sway in the breeze. It was a picture postcard scene with the palm trees and the beach just beyond, the blue foamy waves of the ocean and the sunset spraying hues of orange and lavender across the sky as the sun bid this day farewell. He clenched his eyes shut and turned away from the scene. If he was going to do this, he told himself, now is as good a time as any.

She gripped the blankets that surrounded her, the heaviness of the sadness making her feel that she couldn't breathe. He head tossed on the pillow as she tried to make it ease up on her. Her hands clawed out into the darkness as tears built up beneath her eyelids. Sweat broke out on her sleeping skin as she felt the bed spin beneath her. Oh God, she thought, let it stop. Please, let it stop.

The wind howled outside her window, adding to the melancholy that surrounded her. The soft swish of snow across the panes sounded like waves crashing on the shore of some far away beach. She tossed in the bed and caught onto the image in her mind. Concentrating on it, she imagined palm trees, a beach, the ocean and the distance, a beautiful sunset. A picture postcard in her mind. With a sigh, she relaxed against the warmth of the blankets and drifted deeper into sleep.

Sitting back on the bathtub he stared down at the dark liquid in the glass. Courage. Liquid Courage. He lifted the glass to his lips, his breath fogging the transparency of the glass as it rested there on his lips. With an unspoken toast he tipped it back and opened his lips, letting the thick liquid inside. He leaned forward, his arm outstretched, placing the glass on the edge of the sink. He stayed in that posture, leaning his temple on the crook of his elbow, staring once again at the floor. He had come full circle.

This time he would finish it. He lifted his head and brought his hand away from the glass and to the small plastic container. He brought it closer to him, cradling it to him like a jewel. With trembling fingers, he slid the lid back and reached inside delicately, pulling a rectangle of steel out between his fingers. He held it in front of him, letting the container clatter to the ground now that he had gotten his treasure from inside. It glinted in the light as he turned it around in his fingers. It was almost beautiful in it's simplicity. He peeled back the sticky paper that covered the cutting edge and let the useless strip flutter to the floor between his feet.

He readied the sharp edge over his wrist, his hand pausing as he closed his eyes and sent out a silent prayer for forgiveness to those he loved.

I'm so sorry. But I can't. Not anymore.

She felt the sadness increase, the desperation coloring the edges of it. Why couldn't she break free? Why was she being held prisoner in her mind? She knew it was useless to struggle against it. It was too powerful, she had learned that long ago. The mist of despair washed around her once again, but this time she could make out a shape in the chaos. Bent over, one hand poised above the wrist of the other hand. So intense. Concentration. But she saw the tremble of fingers, the hesitation.

She could feel the coolness of the steel like it was between her own fingertips. The rush of blood in her ears as the adrenaline started to take over. She could taste the cold metallic of fear in the back of her throat. But the fingers were not her own, as hard as she tried to stop them from their task, she couldn't

Flashes came to her, of a family, younger siblings, a girlfriend. Friends that were a surrogate family. A best friend that was the older brother so craved for in youth. There was so much love around, how could he not see it? It nearly enveloped him like a cocoon.

She knew why. A shattered heart. Pieces of it clung together loosely in his chest, ready to shatter at the slightest touch.

Panic washed over her. He had so much, why couldn't he see that? She had to let him know this was wrong, that this isn't what he truly wanted. He had too much. She couldn't let him lose it all. She'd seen it happen before, she had to make him stop. Her breath drew in, a deep gasping breath. Oh God, no.

His fingers trembled against the steel, almost silently asking him of his confidence in what he was doing. He gripped harder as a silent answer to his subconscious. He closed his eyes, taking deep breaths to calm himself.

Come on Carter, don't fuck this up. Do something right.

He took in a breath and held it in unconsciously, bringing the razor's edge to his flesh. He felt the sting of the blade sinking slowly into the tender skin. A gasp came from his lips as his fingers froze.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!"

The cry screeched through the air, scaring Nick so much, that his hand jumped and the razor blade flew out of his hand, clattering to the floor, leaving drops of blood across the tiles.

His hand clamped over his wrist, trying to stop the blood flow, the thick redness of it oozing between his fingers. A cry of pain left his lips, but it wasn't alone in his ears. Another voice, a softer cry, joined his. He could feel his own torment in that voice.

But how?

He looked around the bathroom, he was alone. He knew there was no one there, but where was that voice coming from? He could still hear it, almost like she was hovering above him. He shook his head, "I must be going crazy."

The throbbing of his wrist brought him back to reality. The oozing redness was now dripping on the tiles, his fingers not stopping the flow effectively at all. With a sudden clarity, he realized that something had stopped him from doing what he planned. Or Someone. He shook his head again and stumbled to his feet, the woozying effects of the alcohol and the blood seeping out of the deep wound on his wrist catching up to him. He leaned against the wall, steadying himself by resting his elbow on the towel rack.

The spinning of his head only seemed to intensify as he leaned more heavily on the towel rack. With a crack it gave way under the weight of his body. He started to slide down the wall, but it seemed like something had stopped him, grabbed him before he could fall all the way down.

She watched as he started to slide down the wall after the towel rack crumbled. Without thinking she reached out was surprised that she could feel the coolness of his skin. Gently pushing upwards, she managed to get him on his shaking legs again. A flash came to her and she saw a blonde man, stocky, kind blue eyes. He was nearby, she knew it. She could feel him thinking about this person, he needed to get to him. How did she make him understand that he had to go to this man? Cursing whatever fate had brought her to him, she sent her hands forward, pushing him from behind.

"Go to him. Go!"

His head snapped up, there it was again. That voice, the same one who had stopped him. But where? He knew he was alone, yet the voice wasn't in his head, it was here in the room with him. He felt a push on his back, urging him forward.

He shivered and took a halting step forward, then another, one more and he would be in the door or the bathroom. God, it seemed so far. One more step, come on Carter, you can do it. Right.........left.....LEFT! His left leg obeyed and he leaned against the door, swaying with the exertion of the journey. His wrist throbbed mercilessly and the spinning in his head was now starting a buzz in his ears.

He took a deep breath, his feet threatening to buckle underneath him. Then the push came again at his back, urging him further. He stumbled under the forward nudge and managed to scrape his feet across the rough carpet to the door. A trail of red drops, smeared from his feet, marked his trail like the breadcrumb trail in a fairy tale he remembered from his childhood. A trail to find your way back home. He shook his head again, feeling a throbbing in his ears, the rhythmic thump reminding him of his drum-set.

The door. How do I get the door open? He looked down at his blood covered hand. He would have to use that one, the other one was incapable of any movement. He slowly took his hand from the gash in his skin, hissing through his teeth as the air hit it, burning. He grasped the doorknob, trying to get a grip on it. The blood had slickened his hand, making it impossible to turn the knob. He only smudged more and more blood on the knob and the parts of the door around it. He groaned, oh please, just let me get it open, please! He could hear someone talking on the other side, he was so close. He opened his mouth, trying to call for help, but the dryness that parched his throat made sound impossible, only a weak grunt was issued forth from his lips.

He watched the blood surging from the gash in his arm, he had to get out of here. He didn't want to die right here on one side of the door while help lay just two inches away on the other side. He pressed his wrist to the material of his t-shirt, hoping it would stop the blood flow enough for him to get to Brian's room. The t-shirt! He looked down at the material and ran his hand down the front of it, the absorbent material taking the slickness of the blood off his hand. Once again he grasped the knob and this time his grip held, slowly he turned it, each inch of twist seeming to take every ounce of energy he had.

Click.

He nearly fell over in joy at that sound. He retracted his hand back towards him, still holding the knob. The fluorescent light of the hallway dazzled his eyes as the door inched open. He let go of the knob and leaned against the wall as it swung open fully. Throwing himself forward, he felt the impact of the door jamb on his chest. He looked out into the hallway, moments before there had been voices, movement. Now there was nothing. He felt moisture flood his eyes. God was punishing him for what he had tried to do. Why couldn't there have been anyone in the hallway? Because you fucked up, Carter, that's why. You couldn't even do one simple thing right.

She saw him pause in the doorway, tears slipping down his face. She could feel him weakening and she could feel herself weakening right along with him. It was like she was bound to him with an invisible cord that let her feel what he was. She had to get him to the man he was thinking of. She just had to. No matter what.

She took her hands and grasped his shoulders, straightening him, pushing forward.

"Go. You can do it."

For the first time he answered her, his voice barely a whisper, yet it seemed to scream in her ears. "I.....can't." His knees shook with the strain of keeping him upright, the throbbing in his ears slowing ever so subtly. He drew a shaky breath and started to slide down the doorway, headed for the floor.

She felt panic jolt through her and stepped up behind him until she was right behind him, her unseen arms around his waist, her phantom knees behind his. He was weak, so was she, but maybe their combined weakness could form enough strength to get him there.

He felt something behind him, holding him up, stopping him from sliding to the floor, stopping his knees from buckling beneath him. He gripped the opposite side of the doorway and pulled himself across, bringing him more fully into the hallway. He knew Brian was in the next room. He looked down the hallway, seeing the door. It looked so far away, almost mocking him. He swayed unsteadily on his feet, the blood flowing out of him weakening him relentlessly. His shirt clung too him heavily, the blood absorbing and saturating the material. He looked down the hallway again. Ten feet. He could do this. Five steps, ten at the most.

He felt the presence behind him, still holding him up. Carefully, slowly, his foot slid across the threshold of the door, stepping out into the hallway. Still leaning heavily against the door jamb, he slid his other foot out, then braced his upper body with his good arm and swung the rest of himself out into the hallway.

His breath was becoming shorter, more difficult to draw in. Sweat was forming on his brow with the exertion it had taken to get this far. He knew the longer he stood there, the less chance he had of making it there. With a grunt of pain and effort, he groped the wall, leaving a trail of red on the tasteful pattern of the paper. His foot slid forward again, never breaking contact with the carpet. As hard as he tried, he couldn't raise it enough to clear the carpet, instead sliding it along the surface. Once he had slid it far enough forward, he dug his fingers into the unyielding wall and jerked his upper body forward, sliding it against the wall. Once he had jerked himself forward enough, he brought his other leg forward, using the wall to lean into so he wouldn't fall over. One step, he had done it.

She panted behind him, feeling every part of her aching in the struggle to keep him upright, keep him propelling forward. They had done it. It was one step closer to where he needed to be. She saw the blood dripping off of his jeans, the material of the t-shirt unable to absorb any more. She gripped him harder,

"Another one. We can do it. "

He closed his eyes, it would be so easy to just sink to the ground and close his eyes. To sleep. He was so tired. His eyes blinked open, the blurriness taking longer to go away. He slid his foot forward again, a longer distance this time. With a heave, he started his upper body sliding against the wall, his hand inching along trying to prolong the momentum.

Sliding to a stop, he dragged his other leg forward until the two were side by side, feeling the leg with all his weight on it shuddering from the load. He kept the other leg sliding forward, until with a violent shake, his knee gave way, crashing him forward, his upper body sliding in an arch down the wallpaper until he was able to brace himself, his palm hitting the carpet and sliding forward, burning him with the friction, until he was able to grip the loops in his fingertips to stop the momentum.

His chest heaved, this palm burned, his other wrist surprisingly numb now. His eyes clenched shut, tears streaming from them. Please, if you can hear me, let me get there. Give me the strength to get there.

She heard his silent plea. She was shuddering under his weight. Somehow, when he had started tipping forward, she was able to pass right through him until she could feel him pressed against her from behind, his breaths panting into her shoulder. She bent her elbows and gathered her strength, he knees shaking, laying in wait.

He heard a grunt that wasn't coming from his lips as a force seemed to propel him upwards and forwards, first his lower body, raising him until his legs were under him and able to lock, then his upper body slowly arched backwards until he was standing again. What felt like a hand held him against the wall and then he felt the presence once again behind him, holding him upright. A gentle nudge behind his knee urged him forward again and he drew in a gasping breath, with this next step he could make it.

With a strength he didn't even know he had, his leg slid forward until he could move it no more, his toe resting against the door jamb to Brian's room. Then his hand gripped the wall, his fingernails gripping the cold steel of the door jamb and his the muscles tensed, slowly dragging him forward. He rested his head against the coolness of the doorway and dragged his other leg forward until he was leaning against the door. The pounding in his head was making him more dizzy as a small smile of victory graced the edges of his blue tinged mouth before sliding off, not having the strength to sustain it.

She was leaning against the door with him, all of her energy gone. She felt her breath weakening along with his. They had come this far, only one thing left. She slid her arm down his, gripping his good wrist and laying his splayed hand on the door. Slowly she slid it upwards until it was at the same level as his shoulder.

She felt the life draining out of him as the puddle of red grew beneath his feet, soaking the edge of his jeans. She leaned against him, gathering her strength for this one last action.

"What is his name?"

He panted softly, licking his lips to answer, "B...Brian."

She drew in her breath and took his wrist that she still had grasped in her hand and wrenched it away from the door, then brought it back with a force she didn't know she possessed, slapping the door with a BOOM in the quiet hallway.

"BRIAN!"

Brian sprang up in his bed, a voice screaming his name, a loud thump on his door. The voice sounded like Nick's but softer and terrified.

She didn't know how much longer she could keep him up on his feet. They were both so weak.

Suddenly the door opened and Nick swayed, nearly following the door. His hands dangled at his side, one arm dripping blood from a gash that traveled two inches up his arm towards his elbow. His shirt and jeans soaked in his own blood. His eyes met Brian's for a split second before his legs gave way a final time from underneath him, all of his strength gone.

Brian's hands shot out and grabbed his friend as he collapsed into his arms. His fingers found the open wrist and closed over it. "Jesus Christ!! Oh shit! Nick! Nick wake up!" He slapped the sides of his friend's face, noticing the blue tinge to his skin around his eyes and nose and lips. Nothing. He didn't even flinch.

"KEVIN!!! KEVIN!!!!!! SOMEBODY CALL 911. OH CHRIST SOMEONE GET HELP!!!"

His voice ripped through the hallway, the sheer terror in it rising everyone from their beds.

AJ was the first one out of his room, his door just past Brian's on the opposite side of the hall. His eyes took in the trail of blood in the hallway, the streak of it that was painted halfhazardly down the wall. Then his eyes fell upon Nick lying lifeless in Brian's arms, both of them covered in blood. His eyes widened as he nearly felt his knees give out beneath him.

He ran to where his friends lay and jumped over the two into Brian's room, grabbing a towel from the bathroom. By the time he had gotten back to them, Kevin's voice roared through the hallway. "Oh sweet Jesus!"

More doors opened as people spilled into the hallway. Kevin charged down the hallway and into Nick's room. He saw the trail of blood leading to the bathroom and saw the package of razorblades scattered on the floor and one lying away from the others, one of the edges tainted red. His eyes snapped to the half empty bottle of alcohol on the sink and he swore. How was this possible? Why hadn't he noticed? Why hadn't any of them noticed it had gotten this bad?

He ran to the phone that lay on one of the beds and picked it up, dialing the front desk. He quickly explained the situation and hung up before he got a reply.

She sat there in the hallway, unseen by anyone, watching for some sign that he would be ok. She crawled over on her weakened hands and knees and sat beside him and his friend. She didn't know what to do. She had assumed that once she had gotten him to the safety of his friend, that whatever force had brought her to him would send her back. Yet, here she was.

If she closed her eyes, she could feel the pillow behind her head, the scratchiness of the blankets around her, the comforting swish of the snow on her window. She felt as if she was stuck in a dream, yet this was no dream. He was bleeding right there by her feet and nothing was more real than that. Why am I stuck here? How do I get back to where I'm supposed to be?

She pondered the last question. If she was there, then it must be where she was supposed to be. But she had gotten him to help, she had stopped him before it was past the point of no return. Her hand reached out and touched the tips of his fingers, then slid forward until her hand was over his. The edges of his larger hand showing underneath her smaller one.

She went to slide her hand off of his, knowing he couldn't feel her anymore. But when she went to move her hand, his fingers curled between hers, moving so quickly, in a jerking fashion like a muscle spasm. To anyone else, it would look like he just curled his fingers uncontrollably, but she knew he had done it to keep her with him. He knew she was there.

Everyone was too stunned to do anything, they all stood silent and watching as Brian cried and tried to rouse his best friend, cradling the still blond head against his heart, begging him to wake up. AJ kept the towel clamped over his wrist, watching as it soaked through with blood.

Kevin ran over to them and lifted Nick into his arms, noticing how deathly pale he was. "AJ, get Brian together and follow me." He held the boy close and ran down the hallway to the service elevator. Howie was right on his heels and ran ahead to press button and hold the doors if need be.

She followed along with this tall, muscular man who was holding the man who in turn had a hold on her hand.

Kevin groaned in frustration, the service elevator was taking it's sweet time as his friend bled to death in his arms. With stream of curse words, he spun on his heel and kicked open the door to the stairs. His footsteps rang heavily in the emptiness as he descended flight after flight, going as fast as his feet would let him without falling. The footfalls of the others drummed a panicked percussion as they all followed him down, yet no one spoke, it was too much for them to comprehend all at once.

Kevin leaned closer to Nick, whispering in his ear, "You hang on, do you hear me? We can't take losing you, Nick. Please, just hang on."

She was still weak after what she had done to help Nick get to his friend, Brian. Now it seemed the speed at which this new man was going down the stairs was aimed at finishing her off. She finally jumped on top of Nick in this man's arms, knowing he couldn't feel her.

Kevin got them down to the back of the hotel, a line of people still going down the stairs behind him. Waiting for them was a an ambulance, gurney already out and at the ready. Kevin laid him down, feeling the stickiness of Nick's blood on the front of his shirt.

After Kevin placed Nick on the gurney, he let the professionals try to patch him up.

The crew and managers looked on in shock, however it was nowhere near the shock that had descended on those closest to him, his bandmates.

One of them in particular stood out from the rest. I wasn't his paleness, every person that had made the journey that descended tem into the thick, humid night was various shades of pale. It wasn't the blood that clung to his clothes, sticking the material to him and making a faint metallic smell, that is the scent of blood, rise from him. Kevin had the same blood coating him also. No, it wasn't any of these things that made him stand out from the stunned group of people huddled at the back entrance to the hotel.

It was his eyes.

The eyes that had watched Nick through ups and downs, through break-ups and make ups, through things that those on the outside of stardom couldn't begin to understand. The yes that had met up with the ocean blue ones of his best friend and saw all the pain and hopelessness in their depths before he had collapsed. Those ice blue eyes weren't the same now. All that he has witnessed this night had erased the playful joy that made them sparkle and left a dull, lost look in it's wake. The most startling of all was the color. They were no longer blue, the color seeming to have drained right out of them when the rest of his body had paled in shock. Now pools of stormy gray looked out onto the world, the blue clouded by shock and regret.

'Why didn't I realize something was wrong? I'm his best friend. I should have noticed that it was this bad.'

She sat by his feet on the gurney, watching as the two paramedics fought to save his life. Everyone was moving so frantically, the only one who looked peaceful was the one whom they were all frantic about. He lay there, oblivious to the panic around him.

"Who is going with him?"

The paramedic looked at the group and Brian felt himself being thrust forward. He looked at the uniformed man, "I am. He's my best friend."

Kevin took the medic to the side and discreetly whispered in his ear, "You may want to check him for shock too, he has a heart condition and was the one who found Nick."

The medic nodded sympathetically and took Brian to the ambulance, leading him by the hand like a small child.

Within a minute, the ambulance roared to life, the siren not springing to life until they were a block away, the wailing cry like a keening call through the night.

The silent group of people still stood out in the lot, not sure of what to do.

The stillness was broken by a stifled sob. Though it wasn't loud, it ripped through the group like a gunshot. Everyone looked for it's owner and found Kevin leaning against the wall of the building, his forehead resting on the brick.

It seemed to give everyone unspoken permission to break down. One by one, the tears flowed and the sobs wrenched their way into the night.

Brian sat quietly in the back of the ambulance, trying not to break down at the sight of his best friend strapped to the gurney and tubes running from him to machines and IV's. The medic tended to Nick and kept looking back at Brian every few seconds to see how he was holding up. Brian just stared down at the peaceful face of his friend, his eyes never wavering. Almost willing him to live through his look alone.

She still sat on the end of his gurney, watching everything that was going on, her hand still locked in his. She studied the man sitting on the other side of the ambulance, he looked like his whole world had come crashing down on his shoulders. The sadness in his face was almost unbearable to look at. Yet, she couldn't look away. Slowly she got up and knelt between the gurney and Brian, placing her hand on his, trying to comfort him even though she knew he had no idea she was there.

Brian felt something. It was calming, comforting. There was the faintest touch on his hand, almost not enough to make out. He closed his eyes and bowed his head, whispering. "If you are here to take him, please, don't. Take me, I have the heart condition, it makes more sense for me to go."

She looked up at him in shock, the whisper was too low for anyone but her to hear. He felt her. She knew he did. But how was that possible?

The ambulance came into the hospital entrance, screeching to a stop at the doors to the ER. Mass confusion reigned as information was shouted back and forth, the gurney was taken in and Brian was ushered into a waiting room away from everyone else.

She ran watched the chaos around her as they worked on him. His wrist was cleaned and a surgeon called in to stitch up the special case. His clothes and body were inspected for other injuries, finding none, they concentrated on his wrist, knowing they could easily stitch up what was physically wrong with him, but emotionally it was going to be a lot harder.

His vitals were starting to become thin, he had lost too much blood. He was on the thresholds of human tolerance for blood loss. A rallying cry was made out and she watched as a new line was inserted into him, a long thin tube of red snaking into his arm.

The maelstrom around him subsided as his wound was closed and the machines around him were left to do their work. Through it all, not a glimmer of a reaction had passed over his face, not to pain, not to the life blood that was now being injected into his veins, nothing.

She heard the whispers around them. Coma.

She looked at him, studying his face. He was beautiful in a boyish sort of way. Getting up, she went to closer to the head of the bed, looking at him. Her fingers reached out and traced over his still face, not feeling anything, but it was comforting to her. "I don't even know your name."

"My name is Nick."

Her head whipped up and she found the exact image of the man lying in the bed standing next to it, his blue eyes looking into hers.

She let out a startled cry and stumbled backwards a little. Catching herself from falling.

He looked at her and then down at himself lying still on the gurney. "Am I dead?"

She looked up at him, willing herself to talk, "N..no. You are alive. Barely, but you are."

He nodded and looked at her, "You were the one helping me get to Brian, weren't you? You were the one that screamed and made me stop from cutting deeper."

She nodded, refusing to look up at him. What was she supposed to do now? He could see her, he could talk to her, yet there he was in that bed, in a coma, at the same time.

She felt a hand under her chin and he tipped her head back to look at him, "What is your name?"

She just looked at him, still in wonder that he could see her, no one else had been able to. And his touch, she could actually feel it. It wasn't just a feeling of what should be there, it was an actual touch. It had been so long, the sensation of it leaving her reeling.

He waited for her answer, but it didn't come. He shook his head slightly, his blonde hair swinging a little over the sides of his face, "Of course you don't have a name. Angels don't have names, do they?"

She shook herself out of it, "Katarina."

His eyes flicked up to hers in surprise, "What?"

"Katarina, but everyone calls me Katya. And I'm not an angel."

He raised an eyebrow, confusion in his eyes, "You aren't? Then are you......." He trailed off as he looked downwards, chewing nervously at his lower lip.

She caught his meaning, "No! Oh god no! I'm not from there either!"

He seemed relieved. A silent sigh coming from his lips, the weight of it releasing the tension in his shoulders. "You aren't here to take me with you?"

She shook her head, heaving a sigh herself, but hers from frustration. I don't know what I'm doing here. Last thing I remember was listening to the snow against my window, lying in bed, next thing I know, I'm in that hotel room with you. Seeing what you see, feeling what you feel. Watching you slice your wrist open and knowing all the reasons why you shouldn't."

He looked down at the bloodstained sheets, letting her continue, "I thought I was there to stop you, but I did that and still there I was. Then I though I was there to get you to......" She trailed off, not remembering his name.

"Brian."

She nodded, "Yes, him. It nearly killed both of us but we got there, yet still there I was. Every time I think I've found the reason I'm here, it's wrong."

He watched her as she spoke, looking at her face, the expressions on it. Most of all he saw the sadness in her eyes, the same sadness that he saw every time he looked in the mirror. She looked like she was on the verge of tears, yet nothing in her expression agreed with that, it was only in her eyes. Without thinking, he reached out and placed a hand on the side of her face.

She stared at him, stunned by the sudden touch. It felt like lightening crackling across her face and through every nerve in her body. It was too much for her, it had been too long. She backed away like a frightened child, "Don't! Please, it's too....."

His hand jerked back to his side like he had been burned, "Okay. I'm sorry." He looked down at his feet, wishing he hadn't acted on the impulse he'd had.

She watched him look at the floor, guilt washing over her. She slowly approached him, her hand tentatively reaching out for the strands of blond hair obscuring his down turned face from her. A gasp left her lips as she felt the strands sliding through her fingers. So soft. She sunk her fingers more deeply into the strands and felt his forehead. It was warm, soft.

He slowly lifted his head, trying not to startle her. He realized with a wash of sympathy that she wasn't used to being seen, or touched. She wasn't used to touching other people. He could tell by the child-like expression of wonder on her face.

Her fingers started to explore his now upturned face, feeling the softness of his skin under her fingertips, the rough texture of his eyebrows. The velvety bristles of his eyelashes that almost tickled her fingers as she traced over the edges of his closed eyelids. Her fingers slid over the slope of his nose and traced the fullness of his lips, feeling them part slightly, his warm breath skimming over her fingertip. Their eyes met and held each other in their gaze. She reluctantly pulled her fingers away, not wanting to break the contact.

She tried to open her mouth, to make it express what that had meant to her, but her body would not obey.

He smiled shyly, his gaze never breaking from hers, reading exactly what she was trying to say behind the sadness in her eyes. "You're welcome." He reached out and slid some wayward strands of hair behind her ear, "How long has it been since you've touched someone?"

She closed her eyes, thinking. "I don't remember. Everything seems so far away. Like another lifetime."

He looked at her, "Is that why you are fading away?"

She looked at him, shocked and confused, "Fading away?"

He nodded, "The only part of you I can see clearly is your head, the rest of you keeps shifting in and out of focus, like you are fading away. Am I like that too?"

She tried to look down at herself, but just like every other time, all she saw was nothingness. She looked at him and saw him in crystal clear clarity. She shook her head, "No. Maybe it happens with time, maybe it's because I don't know my purpose here. I don't know. I just don't know."

He looked saddened, wanting to help, but not sure how to. "Well what do we do now? Are we supposed to go somewhere?"

She looked down at the form on the bed, lying there peacefully, "You need to go back. That much I do know." She sat on the end of the bed, looking at the peaceful face lying there.

He sat on the other side of the bed, looking down at himself also. "And what if I don't want to go back?"

She looked up at him, shrugging her shoulders. "Then you stay like this forever. Neither here nor there."

They both looked up when a figure appeared in the doorway, it's presence made known by a soft noise of footfalls. Light beamed around the figure, obscuring who it was.

Silently, slightly awed, they watched.

The figure moved further into the room and a gasp fell from Nick's lips. The figure was Brian, but he had an aura of light round him that was almost blinding. Nick stood and walked the space between them in two quick steps, "Brian!"

Brian had his gaze fixed on the still figure on the bed, almost not believing it was his best friend. Nick was never this still, even in sleep he was kicking around or softly talking, even sometimes singing, much to his amusement when the two of them shared a room.

Nick was still standing in front of Brian, looking in his eyes, "Brian? Brian, please answer me!" Nothing. Just the same lost look in his friend's eyes as Brian looked at the shell of a person laying on the bed.

Brian moved forward, needing to be closer to his friend, to let him know that he was there. His first step forward was hesitant. He almost felt a resistance holding him back. He shook it off and continued to the bed.

Nick saw Brian start to move and as he stepped forward Nick thought that Brian had seen him. He realized that this wasn't true as Brian kept moving forward. Nick cried out in shock and horror as Brian's body came closer and closer to him, suddenly he felt a surge through his legs. He looked down and saw Brian's leg walking through the middle of his shin. It felt as if the cells in his leg were warping and moving to let his friend pass through him. Brian's foot fell to the floor and he leaned forward, his body unconsciously moving forward as his knee locked as it hit the ground, sending his torso right through Nick's.

Nick could only whimper as every part of his body felt like it was shifting, moving to let Brian's solid human flesh move through it. He watched in paralyzing fear as Brian's face moved closer and closer to his, until they collided. Nick tried to close his eyes, but it was impossible. He watched his vision become warped and sounds fill his ears, the steady beating of a heart, the hiss of air being drawn into his lungs and the sound of blood surging through veins all sang a newly discovered symphony in Nick's ears. As each part passed through him, the song changed, keeping time with the shifting and movement of his form around Brian's body.

As the last part of Brian passed through Nick, the aura of light that surrounded Brian passed through Nick. This time a different sound met his ears. It was the sound of millions upon millions of voices singing. Holding one note, signing in perfect and excruciatingly beautiful harmony. As soon as the sound flooded his ears, it was gone as Brian's figure moved away to the hospital bed.

Nick stood there, shaking and reeling. Nothing could have prepared him for what had just happened. Nothing. It was all too much. With a cry of equal parts horror and wonder, Nick fell to the floor.

When he woke up, he was still on the floor, but his head was resting on something. He opened his eyes to see blurred legs under him. He shook his head and rose, "Katya?"

When she saw he was up, she stood up herself. Nick looked around and realized that they were in a different room now, not the ER. Brian was still sitting beside the bed, the glow around him, but now Kevin, Howie and AJ were in the room, the same glows around them, but not as intense as Brian's.

Nick looked at Katya, "Why does everyone have that glow around them?"

Katya looked at them, "It's their spirit."

Nick kept quiet, hoping for more of an explanation.

She went over to Brian and looked at him, "It's what makes you what you are. Your feelings, your emotions, your characteristics like kindness and generosity, the love you give and the love you receive, it's all there."

Nick nodded, "Everyone has one?"

Katya nodded, "From what I've noticed, yes." She took his hand and led him into the hallway. They both stood there and watched the busy hallway. Around most of the people were lights shining from within them. Some were brighter than others, but almost everyone had one.

Nick saw several people without any light around them. "Why don't they have any?"

Katya looked at them and moved her hand in a wave, they waved back. "They are like we are. They are spirits without a home. They are waiting."

Nick looked at them and noticed they were looking right back, they truly could see him. "Waiting for what?"

"To go back or move on." She looked him straight in the eyes, "Not everyone gets a choice, Nick."

Without another word, she turned back into the room. He looked after her for a moment and then followed her back in. He wanted to understand as much about this as possible, it was as if a whole new world had opened up to him and he wanted to know everything about it. "No one can see the lights when they are....?"

She smiled a little, "Most people won't."

He raised an eyebrow, "Can't or won't?"

"Won't."

She turned to look at Brian. "There are those that can see us. Who can see the lights. But they are rare. Most that can see, don't realize that they can. It's just flashes of light that fade before they can understand what they see."

Nick gasped, it was like she was looking through his eyes. Seeing what he had been seeing as far back as he can remember. "But...."

She nodded, "You are one of them Nick, you just didn't know." She turned to Brian, watching as he bowed his head, closing his eyes. "So is Brian. Why do you think you two understand each other so well?"

Nick was floored. If she had said that he had a lizard named Maurice that was actually his twin brother, he didn't think it would cause him to blink an eye at this point. It was a lot to take in all at once and it left him reeling.

Nick was so lost in thought that he didn't notice what was going on around him. Kevin, AJ, Howie and Brian were standing around the hospital bed, hands linked together, Kevin and Brian's free hands resting lightly on top of his body's still ones, heads bowed.

Katya sat on a chest of drawers in one corner of the room, watching.

Nick came out of his reverie when he felt an odd sensation washing over him. He heard a sound...it was faint, but getting louder. He looked down at himself and saw a silver glow emanating from him, getting brighter as he watched. As the glow increased, the sound got louder until every sense was awash in it. It was the same sound he had heard when Brian's light had passed through him. The heartbreakingly beautiful sound of all those voices harmonizing in one single everlasting note.

A startled gasp left his lips as he felt the light start to radiate into him, filling every part of him with a feeling of peace and so much love he thought his heart would burst. He looked over to where his body lay and saw the backs of his friends gathered around the bed. The light coming off of them was almost blinding, yet he found he couldn't look away. Their individual lights had seemed to join into one halo of light that filled the room with it's brightness. The brighter their light got, the brighter his seemed to glow and the more intense the sensations were that spread throughout him. Nick looked up at Katya, "What's happening? Why does it feel so good?" He sounded almost scared, but at the same time lost in an ecstasy that he couldn't even comprehend.

Katya's eyes seemed to be even more filled with sadness, she looked at Nick's friends and then back at him, "They are praying for you."

Just when Nick felt he couldn't take the euphoria any longer, it started to dissipate.

The circle was broken. One by one, the four friends around the bed retreated back to their places in chairs and sitting on edges of dressers. The only one who remained was Brian. He sat silently, holding the still hand between his.

The light around Nick softened and the chorus filling his ears faded until it was a whisper, but didn't disappear completely. He knew that Brian was still praying for him. He looked at Katya sitting on the other side of the room, all by herself. He wondered if the reason why she looked so sad as his friends prayed for him was that she had never been prayed for like that. She intrigued him. If she wasn't an angel, she sure did seem to know the ropes. He knew there was a story behind her and he wanted to find out what it was. But, he knew if he asked, that she would not answer him. She needed to tell it in her own time.

She noticed his eyes on her and rose from where she was perched on the chest of drawers. "Walk with me. I have something I'd like to show you." She saw him hesitate and a small smile caressed her features for a brief instant, "Don't worry, Brian will still be here when you return, and so will your body. It's not like it's going anywhere without you."

He gave one last look at his friends and followed her out into the hallway. It was just as busy as before, people rushing from one place to another. Nick kept behind Katya, staying out of the way of people walking towards him. After his experience with Brian, there was no way he was going to through it again with a total stranger. Katya moved ahead, people passing through her, and she seemed to take no notice.

She led him through the corridors of the hospital, his eyes watching everyone, noticing that those people who were in the hospital as patients seemed to have lights that shone a little brighter than everyone else. Like the light was trying to do it's part to strengthen the sick bodies they surrounded. Nick thought to how bright the light was around Brian, so much more brilliant than anyone else's. Maybe it was the strength of his faith in something greater being out there, he didn't know.

Katya slowed as she approached a set of doors, waiting for Nick to catch up. When he did, she simply stepped right through the doors and looked at him from the other side.

Nick just stood there, afraid of what would happen. He didn't want the same thing to happen with the door that happened with Brian. Or worse yet, getting stuck in the door somehow.

Katya felt his reluctance and reached through the door, yanking him through it before he could react.

Nick let out a sigh of relief, it was nothing. Like walking through air. Katya looked over her shoulder, "It's only the flesh and blood things that do that, Nick. Man made things have no soul."

She started walking again and Nick looked around at the quiet ward. He read a sign that designated it as the Palliative Care Unit, for those that were here for long term care or who were dying of terminal diseases. Nick followed Katya. He looked into the open doors as he passed them. Some of them had the glow around their bodies as they laid in their beds, others he saw standing beside their mirror image, waiting.

The glow around all of them was brighter than normal. Normal. That word made him smile. He was actually getting used to this if things like ethereal glows around people were starting to seem normal. Katya was ahead of him a little and she stopped in front of one door, standing there watching what was going on inside.

Nick stopped beside her and looked in. There lying on the bed was a boy not much younger than him. He was gaunt and it was apparent that he had been sick for quite some time, but he was hanging on for all he was worth to life. The glow around him was unnaturally bright. Something about it made Nick uncomfortable, like something was nagging at his mind.

Katya watched the boy, staying quiet. Nick watched as the glow got brighter and small orbs of light seemed to rise to the ceiling from him. Katya watched them, "You've heard that saying "Go into the light" ?"

Nick nodded, not moving his eyes from what was unfolding in front of him, "Yeah."

She shook her head slowly. "It's not quite right. What happens is you see your soul, your light, for the first time. You become your light When you are your light, you have no need for the shell that you've been in since birth. The weight is dropped and you are free. It's why babies cry when they are first born, their souls are not used to being in a shell."

Nick nodded, watching as the light got brighter and the orbs of light left more quickly until suddenly the light was gone. He was dead. He leaned against the doorway, surprised that he didn't fall right through it. They both stood silent and still for a few moments, taking in what they had just witnessed.

The silence was broken by Nick, "Do they hear it when they die?"

Katya shrugged, the sadness back in her eyes, "I don't know, Nick."

"Have you ever heard it, Katya?"

She looked up at him, looking at him, staring almost, before she slowly shook her head.

"Let's go back."

Nick nodded and walked beside her. Now more intrigued than ever what her story was.

They walked slowly, each lost in their own thoughts. Nick looked into each door as they passed again, trying to figure out what was so unsettling about the lights around everyone in this ward. He mulled it over in his mind and suddenly his feet stopped dead. His heart, if he'd been in his body would have stopped cold.

He now knew what was so unsettling about the light in this place, it was the same intensity as the light that surrounded Brian.

Katya felt a breeze blow past her and saw a blond head racing down the hallway. She gave a confused look and followed. Something had obviously upset him.

Nick ran back to his room, not caring who or what he ran through, just needing to get back to Brian. He ran around the corner and jumped right through the wall and into his room. Brian was in the same spot as Nick had left him. He was sitting by the bed, his hands sandwiching one of Nick's, his head bowed in prayer. The only difference was the trails of fresh tears that spilled over his cheeks.

Nick faltered and stood silent watching Brian. For the first time he realized how much he had devastated his best friend.

Katya walked in, her eyes scanning the room, missing nothing. She saw the three figures sprawled out uncomfortably on chairs, tear stains on their faces and she saw Brian by the bed, still in the midst of his tears. She looked at Nick, "He could feel me in the ambulance with you. He looked so lost that I put my hand on his, just hovering it on top and he felt it. He said that if I was there to take you, that he wanted me to take him instead. That he had a heart condition and it made more sense for him to go."

Nick's shoulders slumped, "Are you here to take him? Maybe that's the reason you are here, to take Brian instead of me." He turned around and looked at her, a look in his eyes she'd never seen before, "But, if they want to take him, you'll have to go through me first.  I see the light around him. It's the same light that was around all those people that were in that ward. They are not taking him away from me. Either I go back and Brian stays exactly where he is, or if one of us has to go, then it's me." He paced the floor getting more agitated by the second, "Is that why you brought me there? To let me see the lights and realize they are the same ones that are around Brian?"

Katya stopped his pacing and in a gesture that surprised her as much as it did him, she pulled him to her embrace and wrapped him securely in her arms. "Nick, I didn't do that....I brought you there because you seemed to want to know everything about the lights you have been seeing your whole life. I just wanted to help you understand. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

Nick relaxed in her arms and lifted his eyes to look at her, "I'm sorry too. I didn't mean to get mad at you. I.....Brian means the world to me. I couldn't bear it if something happened to him."

Katya released him and stepped away, "How do you think Brian feels Nick? Is it any easier for him to lose you?"

Her words seemed to cut Nick to the quick, he looked at his friend and shook his head, "It's tearing him apart, I can tell just by looking at him."

Nick kept looking at Brian, lost in his own thoughts. Katya sat back on the chest of drawers she was on earlier and did some thinking of her own.

With a gasp, she jumped down from the chest and startled Nick. She was actually smiling a little, something Nick hadn't seen much of on her face. "What is it?"

She went over to Brian, "He has a heart condition right?"

Nick nodded, "Yes. He died when he was five, but they brought him back. He always says that he lived five years of his life and the rest has been grace."

Katya clapped her hands, even though the blurred transparency of them made no noise. She just couldn't hold in her a-ha! moment. "That's it! The light around him is not bright like that because he's dying like those people in the ward we were in. It's grace!"

Nick was having a heard time following her. "Grace?"

She nodded, "Grace. That's the one thing he has in common with those people. They are all living on grace too. They have diseases that are killing them, but they are still living, still taking it day by day. It's grace. Their period of grace. They are nearing the end of theirs, but there is no telling how long Brian's period of grace is. The grace makes their light that little bit brighter to let the powers that be know to keep an eye on them, to let them know they are special cases in need of special care. Do you understand?"

Nick looked at the light around Brian and nodded, "Grace. That's it. It has to be. " He went over to Brian's chair and knelt beside it, looking up at him. "Bri? I'm sorry for putting you through this. I couldn't see past my own pain. I'm so sorry."

Katya shook her head with a sad smile, "He won't hear you."

Nick nodded, "He can. You don't understand us. He can hear me, I know he can!" He leaned closer to Brian, "Frick! I know you can hear me. I know somewhere deep down you can hear me. I want you to know how sorry I am. I didn't understand how much this would hurt everyone around me, especially you. I'm sorry. Brian, please tell me you can hear me." Nick's voice cracked as he begged for his friend's forgiveness, "Brian, please, try and hear me. I'm afraid to go back, but if you want me to, I will. I'll do it for you. I'll take the consequences of what I've done to all of you. Brian, just tell me you forgive me and you want me back. Please?"

Nick watched for any sign that Brian heard him.

Nothing. No flicker of understanding, nothing.

Nick fell to the floor, sobs wrenching out of his lips. The realization of everything that had happed came crashing down on him. Causing so much pain to his best friend tortured his soul, causing an agony worse than a thousand razor blades slicing through him. His mind was flooded with the images of his life, his family, his friends. He whimpered and held his head in his hands, curling into a ball. The pain was unbearable, all the emotional pain he had caused in everyone he knew was now a physical pain inside of him. It felt as if he was being torn apart from the inside out. He writhed on the floor, lost in the agony that he had caused.

Katya could only watch. She knew this moment would come, he had invited it by saying that he would take the consequences. There was nothing she could do for him. It was his moment of reckoning. Only one thing could stop it. Forgiveness. She closed her eyes, hearing Nick's whimpers turn to full blown howls of torture. She would give anything to spare him from it, but it wasn't her forgiveness he needed.

Nick saw flashes of everyone close to him at the moment when they had heard what he'd done to himself. He felt their shock, he felt their pain, he felt it all at once. He saw Kevin crying against the cold brick of the hotel. He saw AJ's ashen face as he'd opened the door to see Nick lying lifeless in Brian's arms. He saw Howie flashing back to his sister's funeral. Reliving seeing her deathly still face in the casket when he saw Nick lying in Brian's embrace. So many more faces, so much more pain. Nick arched off the floor, cry after cry leaving his lips as he tried to hang onto his sanity.

Nick couldn't take any more. He was at the breaking point. He couldn't hold on any more. It was too much, he had to let go. He just had to.

"Nick?"

It was Brian's voice.

Nick tried to call out over the chaos that surrounded him, "Brian! Brian Please!"

"I forgive you."

"I forgive you."

With those words, as fast as the maelstrom had appeared, it withdrew, leaving Nick on the floor, curled in a ball and shaking from the intensity.

Katya looked at him, if had been in his body, he would have been bruised and bloody, almost battered beyond recognition. She could tell what he had been through had shaken him to the core. He was so weak he could barely move. She saw him try to get up, only to collapse to the floor again as his shaking arms couldn't support him.

He whimpered and Brian's head whipped in his direction, "Nick? Is that you?"

Nick tried to raise his head, but couldn't. His voice was weak and hoarse as he talked, "Y..yes."

Brian squeezed his eyes shut, willing the tears not to fall. "I wish I could see you."

Nick managed to pull himself up from the floor a little, "No you don't, I look pretty bad right now. But Brian you can if you really want to. You just have to see."

Brian kept his eyes closed and concentrated on Nick. On the sound of his voice, the friendship he had with him, on his desire to see him. He opened his eyes and looked over the room. It was as if he had opened his eyes for the first time. The flashes of light that he had always seen around people for as far back as he could remember were now staying.

He looked in wonderment at his band mates who were sleeping a few feet away. Each of them had a halo of light around them. It blew his mind. He turned to look at his friend's body on the bed and saw that he had no light. But why was that? Did it mean that Nick couldn't come back? Did it mean his friend was dead?

He heard a whimper and looked down on the floor beside his chair. There was a heap of pure light. Looking more closely, Brian saw that the light was in the shape of Nick. He reached his hand out tentatively, reaching for Nick's shaking shoulder. A startled gasp left his lips as his hand went right through his friend.

Nick moaned as Brian's hand passed through him, the sound of his blood moving and his pulse throbbing filling Nick in the split second it took for the hand to pass through his illuminated form. He lifted his head and met Brian's eyes, "I'm so sorry, Brian. I'm so sorry." He slumped back to the floor, too weak to hold himself up any longer.

Brian fell to his knees on the floor by Nick's spirit in a panic, trying to pick him up, to hold him, to help him in some way, but he couldn't get a hold on him.

Katya watched. Nick was getting weaker. He needed to go back or soon he wouldn't have the strength to. She slid down from where she had perched herself and silently treaded over to where Nick and Brian were. She crouched on the other side of Nick, opposite of Brian.

Brian seemed to notice her for the first time and his mouth fell open. She reached over to him and concentrated on making contact with his solid flesh. Her hand slowly slid his jaw closed. Without a word to him, she looked down at the shaking form between them and lifted Nick's head until he was looking at her, "You need to go back now. Any longer and you'll be too weak."

Nick looked at her and nodded, "How?"

She placed his head on her lap again and stroked his hair, "Just close your eyes and concentrate on being back in your body. Just have the desire to be there and you will be. You just have to concentrate on being in your body. Not on the beach, not in any other place, only your body."

He nodded weakly, "What if I get lost?"

She brushed a wayward strand of hair off his forehead, she'd miss this. It had been so long since she had touched anyone and now he was going and bringing touch with him. She truly would miss it. "Focus on something. Something in your body or a sound that you can only hear through the ears of your body, something you can only feel with your skin."

Nick sighed softly, "Brian?"

Brian looked down at him, "Yah Nick? I'm still here."

Nick sat up with help from Katya, "Sing for me. Hold my hand and sing for me. I'll follow your voice. Please Brain, I'm so scared of getting lost."

A tear slid from Brian's eye and made a trail down his cheek, "Ok Nick, you just come back alright? When you do, I'm going to hug you so hard that they are gonna have to keep you an extra day to recover."

Nick smiled a little, "I think I need to go now. I...don't feel so well."

Brian and Katya watched as his light seemed to be flickering a little. They met eyes and Katya held tighter to Nick as Brian sat back up on the chair and held the lifeless hand in his, "Ok Nick, now." Brian closed his eyes and started to sing.

Somewhere there's a river looking for a stream Somewhere there's a dreamer looking for a dream Somewhere there's a drifter trying to find his way Somewhere someone's waiting to hear someone say

I believe in you, I can't even count the way that I believe in you And all I want to do is help you to Believe in you

Nick looked up at Katya and she smiled down at him, "I'll still be here. Just believe you can hear me and you will. Believe you can see me and you will."

That seemed to settle his mind and he closed his eyes and concentrated on Brian's sweet voice singing softly in the room. He knew that Brian was trying to give him support and strength, meaning every word he was singing.

Somewhere there's an angel trying to earn it's wings Somewhere there's a silent voice Learning how to sing Some of us can't move ahead We're paralyzed with fear And everybody's listening But we all need to hear

Katya closed her eyes and willed all her strength to Nick, as if her will alone could get him back to where he belonged. She felt Nick starting to shift in her arms and opened her eyes just in time to see him looking up at her as he faded away.

I believe in you I can't even count the ways that I believe in you And all I want to do is help you to Believe in you

I will hold you up I will help you stand I will comfort you when you need a friend I will be the voice that's calling out

Nick felt himself travelling for what seemed like miles and miles, a whooshing sound filling his ears as he seemed to go so fast that he almost felt like he was free falling. Still he concentrated on Brian's voice, knowing that it would get him where he needed to go. Brian had never let him down, he knew that he wouldn't start now.

The wind in his ear faded as he came to a stop and warmth cocooned him and the steady beat of his own heart provided back beat to Brian's singing. He knew he was back in his own body. It felt different after having no body at all. He now knew what Katya meant about babies crying because they weren't used to having a shell. He felt like crying himself. After the freedom, this felt paralyzing. But the thought of what he'd done to everyone who loved him cemented in his mind that he had made the right decision. He laid there, listening to Brian's voice, listening to the words he was singing.

I believe in you I can't even count the ways that I believe in you And all I want to do is show you I believe in you And there are just so many ways that I believe in you What else can I do but believe in you? All I want to know is if you Believe in you.

As Brian's voice faded, he felt a movement on his hand and opened his eyes. He saw the clear blue eyes of Nick's looking back at him.

Without a word between them. Brian scooped Nick into his arms and crushed him in his embrace, his shoulders heaving with silent sobs. Nick held onto Brian just as tight and felt the tears sliding down his own cheeks. He lifted his head just enough to whisper two words in Brian's ear.

"Thank you."

*song used is Believe In You - Amanda Marshall ~from the CD Tuesday's Child*

Brian kept hold of Nick like he was afraid if he let go, he'd lose him forever.

Nick grunted and spoke in a croaked voice, "Brian? I can't breathe."

Brian let him go and smiled, "I told you that I was going to give you a big hug."

Nick rubbed his ribs, "I think you broke something. Damn, you weren't kidding." Nick's attention was drawn by the white bandages that were swathed around his wrist to halfway to his elbow. He stared at it, wiggling his fingers and wincing in pain.

Brian noticed and took the maimed arm in his hands, "Nick, how did it get this bad? Why couldn't you talk to me about it?"

Nick heard the pain in Brian's voice and couldn't even look him in the eye. "I'm sorry. I just.....it was too....." He heaved a sigh and picked at the blanket spread over him, at a loss to explain what had happened.

Brian saw that Nick wouldn't look at him and he sat on the bed next to him, wrapping him in his arms, "You can tell me anything Nick, anything. I know it's hard to get out, but when you are ready, I'll be here.

Nick just sat in Brian's arms, still and quiet. He needed to tell someone, it was ripping him apart inside. He tried to get his voice to co-operate, but when he opened his lips, all that came out was a quiet sob.

That quiet little sound just about killed Brian inside. Nick was young, yes, but he was so much stronger than people gave him credit for. For something to be tearing him apart like this, affecting him so deeply, it had to be bad. He just held nick tighter as he cried against Brian's chest.

Katya watched as Nick cried quietly in his friend's arms. Her heart went out to him, in some ways dying was easier than going back and facing what had driven you to desperation in the first place. She knew Nick was strong, but right now he was more fragile than glass, both physically and emotionally. She could only pray that nothing would happen to shatter him into a million pieces before Brian, and Nick's other band mates, could start to rebuild the foundation of strength that had crumbled beneath him tonight.

The other three that were sleeping on the chairs scattered around the room slipped back into consciousness as they heard muffled sobs in the room. Kevin was the first to his feet, thinking it had become too much for Brian. When he cleared the sleep from his eyes, he was astonished to see Nick curled up in Brian's arms, crying.

He walked over quietly and sat on the bed, trying not to startle Nick. Brian's eyes met his and without a word between them, Kevin wrapped his arms around the two of them.

Another second later, two more pairs of arms came around Nick, enveloping him in caring. Kevin tightened his arms around Nick, "That's it Buddy, let it all out."

That was it for Nick. He let loose with a deep sob and unabashedly bawled his eyes out. The eyes of the other four met over top of Nick's head in concern. It was obvious that something was tearing Nick apart, but none of them knew what it was. He seemed to cry himself out and the five of them kept the embrace, letting Nick get himself together.

When Nick had quieted to the occasional halting breath and soft sniffle, one by one they all pulled away. AJ was the last to let go, "Junior, you scared me." He softly and playfully cuffed the younger man on the back of the head, "Don't ever do that again!"

Nick looked up at him and nodded, "I'm sorry, AJ."

AJ hugged him again, "No need to apologize, Nick. Just know that I'm here and I'm a great listener if you need a shoulder, ok?"

Nick nodded again and kept his eyes down on the blanket, picking at it some more, "It's just too hard right now."

AJ gave him an understanding look and turned to the door when they heard the sound of it opening.

Brian, Kevin and Howie joined AJ on their feet as they saw Jane and Bob Carter standing in the doorway. They all smiled to greet them when they heard Nick's voice from behind them, hard as nails. "Get out."

Jane's face fell and Bob's seemed to harden to stone. "But Nick...."

Nick's face was as stony as well but the fire in his eyes let everyone in the room know just how enraged he was. "Get out! GET OUT NOW!!!"

The other four in the room stood watching the exchange slackjawed in shock. None of them had ever seen Nick so angry.

Nick was now shaking with rage and the heart monitor they had him attached to was registering more and more beats per minute, looking like a graph of an earthquake. He was sitting ramrod straight in the bed, his hands balled into fists and the strain on the stitching on his slashed wrist causing crimson to rise to the surface of the bandages swaddling his arm.

An alarm went off on the monitor above Nick and Brian ran to him, "Nick, calm down! You are going to send yourself right back into a coma!"

Kevin looked at the obviously distraught state Nick was in and then at his parents, who seemed to be the trigger for it. Looking back at Nick who was pale and shaking and then back at the Carters, "I think maybe you should go into the waiting room. Nick's still very....I don't think this is good for him at all." He pleaded with his eyes for them to understand.

Jane's eyes flooded with tears, "O...ok. We'll be down the hall. Just tell him we love him."

Before Kevin could say another word, Brian's startled cry made him wheel around just in time to see Nick standing beside his bed, weaving uncontrollably, his eyes still shooting hateful looks, "GET OUT OR I'LL THROW YOU OUT MYSELF!!! GET THE FUCK OUT NOW!"

Katya could feel the anger rolling off of Nick in waves. Hitting her almost like a blow, even though it wasn't directed at her. She quickly made her way over to where Nick was weaving and trying to untangle himself from the I.V. tubes running into his arm in an attempt to either get them out or get out of the room himself, at this point Katya wasn't sure which one it was.

The door opened again and several nurses and a doctor rushed into the room just as Nick crumpled to the floor, the heart monitor accelerating wildly before flatlining.

Brian was sure his heart stopped with Nick's as he stood there in shock. The doctor lifted Nick off the floor as one of the nurses shooed them all out of the room. Brian stood at the door, refusing to completely leave the room. The nurse pushed him gently past the threshold and shut the door.

All of them were too stunned to do anything. Brian stood at the door, peering in through the little window, watching the doctor and nurses rushing around his friend. Kevin looked at Jane and Bob, "What in the world happened that the sight of the two of you would do that to him?"

Jane's eyes flooded with tears, "Maybe we should all sit down and everything can be out in the open."

Kevin nodded, prying Brian away from the doorway and motioning for the other two to follow him. Once they were in the waiting room, Jane took a halting breath and started to explain.

Katya watched the doctor as he listened to Nick's chest with his stethoscope. The nurse readied an injection of something and they stood back a little as Nick came around. They didn't know how he would be when he came around, so they stood back and watched.

Nick put his good hand to his forehead, "Ugh. What happened?"

The doctor inspected the new bump on his forehead, "Something upset you greatly. Do you remember what it was?"

Nick thought about it and remembered the faces at the door, then just seeing red from there on out. "Yes. The man and woman that were in here, I don't want them back in. Ever."

The doctor nodded, "You need to take it easy, you lost a lot of blood tonight and that little performance split some of your wrist back open. When we came in we thought you had gone into cardiac arrest, luckily it was just the heart monitor feed that had fallen off of your chest, but Young Man, you were certainly on your way there. I'm going to restrict visitors tonight. You need rest right now, not more stress. From the looks of what you tried to do to yourself last night, more stress is the last thing you need. "

Nick nodded, "The rest of them can come back tomorrow though?"

The doctor nodded, "Yes, but for the rest of today and tonight you are going to rest. If you hadn't harmed yourself, you would have been in here in a few days anyway, you were on the borderline of exhaustion." He took Nick's arm and stabbed the needle into it, bringing a hiss from Nick. Soon the arm was numb and a nurse started to cut the bandages off of his wrist.

When the bandages were pulled away, Nick looked down at what he had done to himself. Some of the stitches were stretched or broken. It looked painful, but thanks to whatever they had put into his arm, he didn't feel anything. He laid back onto the pillows and looked away as the doctor went to work on sutures. He concentrated on the lights surrounding the nurses and the doctor around him. The lights didn't flicker and fade away like before, now they stayed. He swept his eyes over the room, looking for Katya. He couldn't find her. Then he remembered her words. "If you want to see me, you will. If you want to hear me, you will." He closed his eyes and concentrated on seeing her, hearing her. When he opened his eyes again, he saw her standing beside the bed, her hand resting on his, concern in her eyes as she looked down at him. He met eyes with her and turned his hand over on the bed, laying his palm against hers. She smiled a little and he smiled back.

The doctor finished his work and stood up, "Ok, all fixed. Now let's hope this is the last time I have to do this. Give the names of the people you want to be able to see you to the nurse and we'll make sure anyone that isn't on that list is kept out. "

Nick nodded and looked at the nurse, waiting with a pad and pen. Nick rattled of the names of his bandmates and his brother and sisters, even though he knew they wouldn't be coming. That was really all the people he wanted to see. She nodded when he finished and adjusted his pillows and straightened his covers. She went over the call procedures if he should need any help and then left.

When she went out the door, Nick looked up at Katya. The tears welled up in his eyes again and he curled in a ball on the bed. Katya knew she wouldn't be able to feel anything, but Nick would and that was all that mattered to her as she crawled into the bed behind him and wrapped her arms around him. She did all she could do, she held him and was there for him until he was ready to talk about it.

He turned to her almost an hour later, wiping the tears from his eyes, "I need to tell someone. Can I tell you?"

Katya brushed his hair from his eyes and nodded, "You can tell me anything."

He cuddled closer to her, needing to feel a connection with someone, no matter how tenuous. With a deep breath he started in on what had driven him to suicide.

Jane and Bob Carter faced the four tired and strained faces in front of them. They grasped hands with each other and Jane looked at Bob, "I don't even know where to begin."

Howie smiled a little at her, "We find that the beginning is a great place."

Jane nodded and tried to smile, but failed. She looked older to them all, like she had aged ten years since the moment she set foot in Nick's room. "It all fell apart when Nick needed some papers for his passport. It had been ten years since he had gotten his last one and it was time for it to be renewed. I was on the road with Aaron and Bob had flown out to visit for a week with the kids, for their spring break. He knows where all the family papers are and didn't think anything of going to get what he needed. He didn't know what he would need besides his birth certificate and pulled out the folder with his name and started going through it too see if there was something else he should bring with him.

Nick took a shaky breath, "I started reading over my birth certificate. You know, name, birth date, where I was born, the time, the county, the city, all the normal stuff. Until....."

He stopped and Katya stroked her hand over his hair, knowing it would calm him, "Until?"

He sniffled a little before continuing, "In the space where the names of the mother and father was.....it wasn't Jane Carter.

Howie, Kevin, Brian and AJ all gasped, "What?!"

Jane looked down at her hands, clasping each other tightly. "It gets worse."

Bob stepped in, "The name that was under mother was one he knew. A person he's known all his life. But he knew her as Aunt Shauna. Nick is my sister's child."

Nick sobbed, reliving the moment over again, "The woman who I had only known as my aunt all my life is my mother. And the woman who I had called my mother my whole life is really my aunt and only by marriage!" Bitterness scorched his words, "And my father...."

Bob looked at Brian, considering the question he had asked, "We don't know who Nick's father is. Shauna would never tell who it was. The only thing listed on the birth certificate is "Unknown". We begged her to at least give us the name in an envelope, so if, god forbid, something happened to Nick, we would have some way of tracing him down as a donor or for genetic history. She refused. To this day she still won't tell us."

Nick's face twisted in grief for all he had known that had crashed down around him, "It was like she couldn't even be bothered to at least take a guess at who my father was. And my brother and sisters? We're cousins. They don't know about all this, but Aaron, who looks so much like me, is nothing more than a cousin. We don't even share one parent in common."

Kevin felt so bad for Nick. Everything he was hearing was blowing his mind, he couldn't imagine being the one going through it. "So how did you end up being the ones to raise him?"

Jane sniffled into her kleenex, "Shauna announced to us as soon as she knew she was pregnant that she was giving it up for adoption. Bob and I were shocked that she was pregnant, but not really surprised, she was a wild child back then. But we couldn't let her give the baby to complete strangers. That baby was a Carter, at least halfway, and Jane and I talked about it. If Shauna couldn't handle raising it, we wanted her to give us the baby. After a lot of convincing, she gave in. We raised him as our own, in every way but biologically he is our firstborn. We were there when he took his first breath and showed the famous Carter lungs off to the doctor. We were there for his first everything. It was part of the deal with Shauna that we never tell Nick she was his mother. Even though it didn't seem right to us, we agreed because we didn't want to see Nick go to strangers when we were perfectly willing to raise him ourselves.

He called us when he found the birth certificate and adoption papers and he was nearly hysterical. He was sobbing so hard we could hardly understand him."

"I asked them why they had kept this from me for so long. Why I was lied to my entire life. Why the woman I called my aunt and now knew was my mother didn't want me. I was so confused and mad. I couldn't let go of the fact that I had been lied to all my life. From the first breath I took it's all been a lie."

Katya watched as seemed to have cried himself out. Her heart ached for him. To have your whole life be nothing but lies and secrets....she shook her head, he deserved so much better than that.

Nick rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling, "Katya, I feel so alone. I have no mother, I have no family, no brothers and sisters, no father, nothing. Everything I had has been ripped away from me. I just feel so alone."

Katya watched as a fresh batch of tears pooled in the corners of his eyes and slid down the side of his face, over his temple and burying themselves in his hair. She wrapped her arms back around him and just let him cry for all he'd lost.

The other four Backstreet Boys sat stunned in the hard plastic chairs of the waiting room, still trying to comprehend everything they had heard. Brian was openly crying, "Oh god, poor Nick. How did he keep this to himself all this time? How long has he known?"

Jane looked at the floor, almost too ashamed to look at them. "Six months."

AJ's shoulders were shaking as he turned away from the others, trying to compose himself. He felt a hand on his shoulder and turned around to see Howie. Compassion and sympathy shone in his big brown eyes. He knew this was pulling up some powerful emotions that AJ had long buried.

AJ let Howie keep his hand on his shoulder. He looked at Jane and Bob, "I can't even pretend to know fully what he is going through. But I can give you a little insight. He probably feels so alone right now. I know what it's like to have a father who doesn't want you. There is a hole in you that can never be filled in. Like a piece of you is gone and you'll never get it back. But to have the word Unknown as your father.....at least my father has a name, even if that's the only way he'll ever be a father to me, I still know his name. The pain of being unwanted by one parent is enough...but two....my god."

He could empathize with Nick so much, he could almost feel the pain like it was in his own body. "He doesn't know who he is anymore. He may be Nick Carter, Backstreet Boy, but at the end of the day when he steps off the stage? He's got nothing. No family, the people he knew as brothers and sisters are nothing more than cousins, an aunt he's known his whole life is his mother and now he knows every time he looks at her that she never wanted him. That's what he's been living with for the last six months. That would cause anyone to crack under the weight of it all."

Katya held Nick tightly as she watched him fight to stay awake, he was physically and emotionally exhausted. She stroked his hair and the side of his face, calming him. "Go to sleep, Nick. You are so tired. Don't fight it."

Nick sniffled, "I need to tell you....the rest...I went to see her."

Katya put a finger to his lips, "Tomorrow. Right now you rest."

His eyes struggled to remain open, the exhaustion clouding the blueness of his eyes to almost a navy color. "Will you still...."

She stroked the side of his face, "I'll still be here. I'll be right here." She kept stroking his face and hair until he lost the fight and closed his eyes.

Katya watched him sleep for hours. If she closed her eyes and cleared her mind, she could feel herself in her own bed, still hear the snow on the windows, still feel the blankets on her. The last thing she remembered was going to sleep, but she had thought it over and she knew this wasn't a dream, everything had been too real. Dreams don't bleed, dreams can't reach out and touch you, you can't reach out and touch a dream.

Not for the first time since this whole mess happened, she closed her eyes and asked why she was there, hoping for some answer to fall into her lap. Just like every time before, none came. With a sigh she opened her eyes and realized several hours had gone by. Nick was still clinging to her like a life line, his peaceful face showing none of the strain and stress of the last six months.

As she looked down at him, his eyes fluttered open and he smiled when he saw her still there. "I guess my first good night's sleep in six months wasn't your purpose either huh? You're still here." He smiled at her and she couldn't help to smile back.

"Well if it was sleep you needed, they could have sent Mr. Sandman to bring you a dream. And make her the cutest that you've ever seen..."

He groaned and plugged his ears with his fingers. "Dammit, now that song will be in my head all day. I hope you're happy!"

She stood up and sat in a chair by the bed, "Yup." A self satisfied smirk on her face.

Before another word could be said, a new doctor came in, "Good Morning, Mr. Carter!"

Nick raised his head, "Nick. Just call me Nick. Mr. Carter is my fa.... well Mr. Carter is someone else."

The doctor looked at him closely and nodded, "Well Nick it is then! How are you feeling this morning?"

Nick shrugged, "Less out of it. My wrist still hurts. But I guess that's to be expected huh?"

The doctor nodded, "Ok now the we have the physical out of the way. How about the rest of you?"

Nick eyed the doctor warily, "You're a shrink, aren't you? Did my parents send you?"

The doctor shook his head, "Yes and no. I am a shrink, but your parents did not send me. It's hospital policy with cases like yours that they have a hospital psychologist talk to you before discharging you."

"Your name?"

The doctor raised an eyebrow in confusion and then his mouth dropped open as he lightly slapped himself on the forehead, "Oh, in all the pleasantries, I forgot to introduce myself. I'm Sterling. Sterling Davies. And before you ask, no money does not shoot out my rear end when I laugh. My mother watched too many soap operas. I narrowly escaped being called Brick or Stone or Granite or something equally ridiculous."

Nick looked at the man going on, his hands flying around as he spoke and realized he reminded Nick of Brian. They had the same exuberance. 'I think I'm going to like this guy.' Nick smiled, the first genuine one to someone other than Katya in a long time. "It could have been worse you know."

Sterling raised an eyebrow, "Do tell."

"Seymour, Horace, Deuteronomy....."

Sterling dropped his clipboard on the bed in recognition, "You watch Mad About You too? Doody-on-a-you...."

"Deuteronomy!" they both said at the same time.

Sterling laughed and sat on the edge of Nick's bed, "Yup that would have been hell as a child. At least nothing rhymes with Sterling."

"Hurling."

Sterling laughed, "I was before the times of Hurl, Nick. Thank goodness." He wiped imaginary sweat off of his forehead.

Nick smiled, "So did they tip you off on who I am?"

Sterling shook his head, "Who you are?"

Nick nodded, "I thought they would have. I'm one of the Backstreet Boys. I used to be known as the cute one, now it's probably the crazy one."

Sterling shook his head, "From what I've seen so far, you seem to be quite normal. The Backstreet Boys huh? What do you sing?"

Nick raised an eyebrow, "You really haven't heard of us?"

Sterling shook his head again, "No, can't say as I have. I'm more of a classic rock kinda guy."

Nick smiled, "Journey?"

Sterling nodded, "Oh yes. The Guess Who, Ted Nuggent, all of that kind of music. Keeps me going. So what do you sing?"

Nick shook his head, "I think I like it that you don't know who I am. You don't expect anything from me."

Sterling shrugged, "Ok then. You will just be Nick Carter, fellow Journey fan. Ok with you?"

Nick nodded enthusiastically, he liked talking with this guy, "More than ok."

Sterling tapped his pen on Nick's wrist, "So fellow Journey fan, did Steve Perry drive you to this?"

Nick shook his head, "No."

Sterling nodded, "Well what did?"

Nick looked over Sterling's shoulder at Katya, who was watching the two of them from across the room.

Katya had watched the doctor and Nick interact and she knew that Nick could trust him, she could just feel it about him, his light gave that away. She knew Nick needed to talk to someone before the weight of it all drove him mad. She looked back at Nick and nodded her head, giving her vote for him to talk to the doctor. He'd been keeping this to himself for too long.

Nick took a deep breath and held it, trying to size up the man in front of him. Could he be trusted?

Sterling looked at him, "Nick, what you say stays here with me. It doesn't leave this room. "

Nick closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He started the same story that he had told Katya the night before, finding once the words started coming out of his mouth it became impossible to stop them.

He told him about finding the papers and finding out his mother was really his aunt and vice versa, he told him about burying himself in his work, not letting himself think about it. About avoiding his brother and sister, because he knew if he saw them he would have to build upon the lies that they had all been fed their entire lives.

He told Sterling about the book his mother had written, The Heart And Soul of Nick Carter, and that it now made him sick, the lies had spread further than their family now, it had become world wide. "All of the things she wrote about being pregnant, she must have taken from being pregnant with my....cousins."

"Just because they aren't biologically your siblings now, doesn't mean they aren't your brother and sisters. Nick, they are just as innocent in all of this as you are. They are just as much victims of all of this. But you are their big brother, their protector, and that goes way beyond any biological claims."

Nick sighed, "Will they see it that way though?"

Sterling nodded, "When you and their parents decide to tell them, you need to be there to tell them that you will always be their big brother, that nothing will take you away from them. Give them the security of knowing that nothing is going to change between you and them. And mean it, Nick. You can't avoid them. They need you just as much as you need them."

Nick nodded, "I do need them. Oh god, I miss them so much!"

Sterling smiled, "Then call them. Call your brother and let him know you are thinking of him, from the way you talk about him, he seems to be the one you miss the most."

Nick smiled at the mention of Aaron, "I will. He's probably pretty hurt that I haven't talked to him in so long."

"Kids are resilient, as long as you are sorry for it, they'll forgive you almost anything. Just give him the love and attention you've been holding back on and he'll eat it right up."

Nick nodded and fell quiet. Sterling looked at him and knew there was more to the story. Something Nick needed from him to be able to continue. "Nick? What is it?"

Nick was looking down at his hands, which rest in his lap. He seemed as still as a statue. Sterling put a hand on his shoulder and Nick looked up, tears streaking down his cheeks and his lower lip trembling as he tried to control his emotions enough to speak, "Am I...a..mi...mistake God made and couldn't take back?"

Sterling looked at him, "A mistake? No, Nick. No child is ever a mistake. If you truly weren't meant to be here, you wouldn't be. It's that simple. Who told you otherwise?"

Nick's shoulders heaved with stifled sobs, "My mothe........the woman who gave birth to me."

Katya looked up in surprise, this is what he had been trying to get out when he had fallen asleep. How could a mother tell her son something like that?

Sterling sat beside him on the bed and wrapped a fatherly arm around the younger man, "You went to see her?"

Nick nodded, "I wanted to know why she didn't want me. Why I had been lied to my whole life. She moved away years ago, got married and has kids. Three of them, all boys. My half brothers, I guess."

Sterling nodded, "Understandable that you would want to know why. What did she say?"

Nick sighed, "She wasn't happy to see me at all. I think she could tell by the way I was looking at her that I knew. She wouldn't even let me in the house. She made me sit out on the porch until she put the boys down for their naps. When she came back out, I asked her point blank why she didn't want me. She told me she was 18 years old, had her whole life in front of her and didn't want a baby ruining it for her. I don't know what answer I was looking for, maybe that she was a baby herself and that she thought Jane and Bob could raise me better, but it was all about her and how much I would ruin her life."

Sterling nodded, "As harsh as it sounds, maybe you were better off with Jane and Bob, if that is the kind of attitude she would have had towards raising you. That attitude could have led to abuse and neglect."

Nick stared down at his fingers, "I know. As much as I hate them right now, they did raise me well. I was loved and protected and had everything I could have ever wanted. But it was all lies. That's what I can't forgive or forget, that my whole life is a lie."

Sterling squeezed the arm that was around Nick's shoulders, silently showing his understanding of Nick's emotions. "What else did you discuss with her?"

Nick's look became more pained and Katya walked over to the two of them, feeling Nick's torment as if it was her own. She knew it was painful for him to relive all of this. She sat in front of Nick and placed her hands on his, holding them. Nick looked up and his eyes held hers for a minute, almost like he was drawing strength from her gaze. He looked away but kept her hands on his, "I wanted to know who my father was."

Sterling nodded, "And did she tell you?"

Nick shuddered, "She told me everything I never wanted to know about the way I came into this world."

"What do you mean?"

"She said that she couldn't give me a name. I took that to mean that she did know, but she just wouldn't tell me. I said that he had a right to know that he had a child out in the world. She just lost it. She told me he had no right to anything. She said that the reason that she couldn't give me a name was because she was raped and became pregnant. She told me that she wanted to abort me from the minute she found out, that I was the spawn of evil and now that evil was part of her body. She wanted nothing more than to have an abortion but she couldn't. She would have to tell everyone she had been raped and she knew that her family would believe she had somehow asked for it. She said that they would believe she got knocked up more than they would believe that she was raped.

When she told the family that she wanted to give the baby up for adoption that they wouldn't hear of it and Jane and Bob basically forced her to give me to them so I would stay in the family. She told me for the next nine months she wished that she would miscarry or that she could somehow rip me out of her body. She didn't eat right, she drank whenever she managed to get by herself, she didn't take her vitamins, she even took medications that would cause birth defects to try to get rid of me. But I just stubbornly refused to die like she wanted.

She said that the sight of me when I was born made her sick. And that it still did. That I was nothing but a mistake that was around all the time and kept reminding her of the life she left behind when she left Jamestown and the Carter Family. She said she was never more happy then when Jane and Bob and I moved to Florida, because it meant she never had to see me ever again.

But then I had to go and get famous on her and now she can't even watch TV or listen to the radio without hearing or seeing me. She told me that she wished I had never been born. She told me that right to my face. That I was the biggest mistake God ever made on the face of the earth and that she never wanted to see me again, never wanted to hear from me except for the happy news that I had finally died and she could leave me as a worthless memory where I belonged. "

Sterling looked at him, stunned speechless by the words his own mother had hurled at him. "Oh Nick...."

Nick looked up at him, tears sliding down his cheeks, his eyes bloodshot and it seemed like the life had drained out of him. It had been so hard to force the words out of his mouth. Every single one of them ripped into his soul. But when they were out a kind of relief came. Now that the words where out there, now that they weren't bottled inside of him, he felt a little better. But what little relief he had been afforded was eclipsed by the pain of having to relive the memory of her, to see her face so cold and vicious as she told him she wished he would die.

Katya was stunned by everything she had heard. She leaned forward and wrapped her arms around Nick, feeling him lean into her and start to cry. Harsh, heaving sobs left him as he crumpled before the eyes of Katya and Sterling.

They could do nothing but hold him. Each one not aware of the other, but both needed by Nick at this moment more than they could ever know.

Nick cried, his body racked with huge, gasping sobs, the kind that sound almost like your soul is cracking from the force of them. All sterling and Katya could do was hold him and pray that this all hadn't been too much for him to talk about.

Kevin, Brian, AJ and Howie stood at the door to Nick's room, watching him break down right before their eyes. It was almost too much for them to bear. One by one they left, it was too much to watch. The last one standing there was Brian. He leaned his forehead against the glass, his fingertips on the image of Nick through the pane. Tears coursed down his cheeks as he whispered softly, "Forgive me."

He slowly turned away from the door and walked down the hall to the waiting room where the other three sat, silent and trying to grasp just how bad it truly was. They knew instinctively there was more to the story than they were being told. So the four of them sat, lost in their own thoughts.

Brian sat away from the others, still trying to wrap his brain around what he had witnessed in Nick's room the night before. It seemed that everywhere he went, he saw lights off of everyone. But the ones that threw him the most were the lights with no people attached to them. They seemed so lost. Kind of like how he felt right now. Nick was almost like his other half and he felt like he was wandering around trying to find something he'd lost but didn't know how to get back, or even where to look. He sighed and buried his head in his hands, willing himself not to cry. It didn't work.

Katya had seen the four men in the window, feeling their presence long before she looked up and saw them there, then she saw them leave one by one. Brian lingering longest. She felt so bad for him. Seeing Nick like this was killing him inside. He looked so lost. She turned her attention back to Nick as his sobs died down. For a long while, he just sat silently in the arms of Katya and Sterling, needing something he couldn't verbalize, but it was something he felt with the two of them supporting him.

Nick wiped his eyes and sat up. He looked at Katya and then at the door. Katya understood that he needed to be alone with Sterling. She nodded and got up, kissing Nick on the forehead and walking silently out of the room.

Nick watched her go, marveling that she understood him so easily. She knew what he wanted almost before he knew he wanted it. He looked at Sterling, seeing the sympathy shining from his eyes. Nick folded his hands in his lap, sat up straight and looked Sterling in the eyes, "I need to get out of here. "

Sterling noticed the change in his demeanor and simply nodded. He sat and listened while Nick talked. Then, together, they struck a bargain.

Katya wandered blindly through the halls of the hospital, not knowing where she was going. There was so much pain and sadness in Nick's heart that it weighted down her own even more than it already was. She would gladly give up whatever existence this was if she could take away all the pain inside him. But she knew she couldn't. It frustrated her, she knew what she couldn't do, but what she could do, what she was there to do, was a mystery to her.

She felt her feet stop and came crashing back into the reality that she had been thrust into and saw a door in front of her. It was open and inviting, calling for her, but she hesitated. Afraid what would happen to her if she went inside.

She stood there, watching as a few people shuffled out. The glow of candles beckoned her, offering her sanctuary. With a heart full of trepidation, she slowly moved forward. Her hand reaching out to the plaque beside the door that simply read "Chapel" .

The familiar scent of incense and melting candle wax surrounded her. But it wasn't from here, no the sights and sounds that surrounded her belonged to a memory. She shook her head and the memory receded, leaving her in the small hospital chapel, the glow of candles and the soft strains of music replacing the memory that had enveloped her.

Silently she treaded closer to the altar that shone under a light, the statues of holy men and a lone woman paying silent watch to her. Before reaching the cold marble of the altar, she seemed to be pulled by some force beyond her to one of the statues. It looked down upon her in love and understanding, the sculptor taking painstaking care to make the features as life like as possible. His arms were open, inviting. His upturned palms almost begged you to put your burdens in them.

Katya felt a splash on her arm and looked down, not realizing that tears had started to fall from her eyes. She hadn't even known that she was able to cry anymore. She looked back up at the statue, imploring it with her sadness filled eyes, silently begging for a reason why she was here. But she knew there would be no answer.

Despair filled her, the sadness swirled around her heavying her heart even more. As much as she tried to bury it, to not face it, it was always there. She could run all she wanted, but there was no hiding from it. It followed her like the weight of a thousand chains everywhere she went.

She fell to her knees in front of the statue, leaning forward until her forehead rested on the cool stone of the man's feet as she wept. Sobs that no human could hear, but traveled right into the hearts of the heavens came from her lips. Shaking, she looked up at the silent stone face once again, her voice barely above a whisper, "Forgive me."

She continued to weep, her face buried in her hands at the feet of the statue once again, not noticing the tears that silently coursed down the smooth stone cheeks, crying with her, for her.

Nick watched as Sterling left his room, on his way to talk with Brian, Kevin, AJ and Howie, then to set their bargain in motion. He laid down on the bed, physically and emotionally drained. He thought of all that his band mates were about to hear and what he had to do. He closed his eyes and silently prayed that they would understand. "Forgive me."

Kevin, AJ and Howie had been reduced to tears by what Sterling had told them. They couldn't imagine anyone being that cruel to their own. No wonder Nick had fallen apart.

Brian sat there, staring ahead. His head was spinning. All of this he had held in. He never said a word. 'I'm a horrible friend, I should have noticed. I should have caught this before it got out of control. I...I don't deserve to have him as a friend. I'm too selfish.'

He stood up and was halfway to the door before Sterling's voice stopped him, "You aren't a horrible friend and there is no way you could have known or stopped this. Nick hid it well and now he's paying for that. Brian, he needs you to be there for him, not caught up in your own self pity and blame."

That stopped Brian in his tracks. "Well that just proves it doesn't it? I'm a bad friend. I should have known something was this wrong with him. I should...."

Sterling shook his head, "All the should in the world are not going to do anything Brian. The fact is it did happen and another fact is that he is going to need you now more than ever. Hell, he's so afraid of what you think of him now. I don't think he could survive it if you walked away from him too."

Brian's eyes flooded with tears, "I would never walk away from him. Never. I just don't know how he can still call me a friend when I failed him so badly."

Sterling stood up and took Brian by the shoulders and pointed him towards Nick's room. "Go to him. He's waiting for you. Brian, he feels like he failed all of you, not being able to handle this on his own. Talk to him."

Brian nodded and walked to Nick's room. He didn't know what to say when he got there. How to act. God, this all was so hard. He stood out in the hallway for a minute, watching people go by, seeing the lights radiating off of them. This had never happened until he saw Nick like that, but what did they mean? He gripped his head in his hands. He just wanted to go back to when things were simple. Touring. Singing. Everyone was healthy and happy and no one was in the hospital, no weird lights, no mysterious girls made of light around Nick, none of it. With a sigh he straightened and walked through the door into Nick's room.

Nick was standing by the window, looking out over the hospital grounds. Brian didn't want to disturb him, he looked so peaceful standing there. He sat on the bed and waited for Nick to notice he was in the room.

"Stop looking at my butt, Bri."

Brian actually almost choked on the breath he was drawing in, then recovered, "Well I can't help it, Nick. That hospital gown looks particularly fetching on you. Makes your ass look like a girl's."

Nick kept facing the windows, but Brian knew there was a smile on his face. "Yah, like you would know what a girl's ass looks like, Choir Boy."

Brian's answer to that was the soft thud of a pillow hitting the window just above Nick's head. Nick grabbed the pillow and spun around, the smile falling off of his face when he saw the misery on Brian's. "Oh Brian, I know what you are thinking and you are wrong."

Brian shook his head, "Why wouldn't you tell me all this? Why did I have to find out from two different people the whole story?"

Nick came and sat down next to Brian, "It was too painful. It still is. Just telling Sterling was hard enough, but telling you.....I don't think I could bear it, Brian. I just knew you would blame yourself, you always do that. It's not your fault Brian. I held it all inside because I didn't want anyone to know, including you. If I told you, I would have to relive that day and all the awful things that she said. I just couldn't. I still can't. But I need to learn how to deal with it, because we all see what holding it in does." Nick raised his bandaged wrists up.

Brian shook his head, "I still should have known something was this wrong. I should..."

Nick stopped him with a hand over his mouth. "You did know something was wrong, Brian. But you didn't push me and for that, thank you. If you had pushed it would have cracked me faster than I did. I couldn't deal with it, you just treated me normal, like I was the same Nick you had always known and I needed that. You still treat me the same, even after everything you've seen and heard in the past two days. That can't be easy."

Brian shook his head, "Why wouldn't I treat you the same?"

Nick sighed and hugged the pillow to him, "Because I'm not the same Nick Carter I was before. Nothing is the same. I can't even tell you who I am anymore."

Brian grabbed the pillow out of Nick's arms and hauled him into his arms, hugging him close, "Let me tell you who you are then. You are the Nintendo champion of the world. You are the light of Aaron's life, his big brother and a complete and utter god in his eyes. You are kind to everyone Nick, even when it's hard. You are the energy that keeps up going. You are stronger than anyone gives you credit for. You are also more sensitive than you let on. You have a gift that makes people be comfortable around you, and that's pretty rare. You have so much success around you that you could be stuck up, but you aren't, you stay the same sweet kid we've always known. You are smart, Nick, way more than any of the guys or the media gives you credit for. But above it all you are my best friend, my brother and that has nothing to do with what your last name is or whose body you came from, it has everything to do with who you are in here." Brian tapped his fingers on Nick's chest over his heart.

"Everything around you may have changed, but in here you are still the same. In there is what makes you who you are, not who your mother is or who your father is. In there is the Nick I know, the rest of it is just window dressing."

Nick looked up at Brian, "Thank you. You don't know how much I needed to hear that."

Brian hugged him fiercely, "You don't know how much I needed to say that. I love you, Nick and nothing is ever going to change that."

Nick held on to Brian for dear life, "Brian? I need to tell you something."

Brian nodded, "Ok. What is it?"

Nick pulled away and gulped, "I need to leave the Backstreet Boys."

Brian's jaw dropped, "You need to leave the Backstreet Boys?! NO! Absolutely not. Without you there IS no Backstreet Boys!!"

Nick put a hand over Brian's mouth, "Let me finish."

Brian nodded from behind Nick's hand.

"I need to leave the Backstreet Boys for a little while. Not forever. I just need to get myself straightened out. I'm no good to anybody like this."

Brian calmed down, seeing Nick's point. "Well then, we postpone the rest of the tour and use the time to write songs and get ourselves renewed and ready to go back to work when you are. My god, Nick. We get a vacation! Whatever shall we do? I don't think we'll be able to handle it, it may be too much for us."

Nick smiled, "You'll work, you know you will Bri. Write a song for me?"

Brian nodded, "I'll try. Only if you'll sing it for me when you get back."

Nick held out his hand and they shook on it, "Deal."

Brian sighed, "Where are you going?"

Nick shrugged, "Sterling is going to find somewhere for me. Where no one is going to know who I am and somewhere I can get over this and get on with my life."

Brian could hear the strength in his voice and watched as the light around him seemed to strengthen at the same time. He didn't know why, but it made him feel better.

Nick saw him looking strangely at the air around him and knew what his friend was looking at, "You are looking at the light aren't you?"

Brian looked surprised, "How did you..."

Nick smiled a little, "You've been seeing glimpses of them your whole life, you just didn't know what they were."

"Yeah."

Nick nodded, "I have so much to tell you. Katya explained it all to me. She told me that you can see the lights too, that's why we seem to gravitate towards one another."

Brian raised an eyebrow, "Katya?"

Nick looked around the room and didn't see her, "The one that you saw when I was on the floor. Brian, I owe my life to her. She's the one who stopped me from cutting deeper than I did. She's the one who practically carried me to your room."

Brian closed his eyes remembering something, "Was she the one that yelled my name when you were at my door?"

Nick nodded, "That was her. She was the one in the ambulance too. She's been by my side the whole time."

Brian took all of it in. "Ok, so tell me about the lights."

Nick and Brian talked for a long time, Nick telling Brian everything that had happened to him and what he had learned from Katya. When he was done, to say Brian was stunned would be an understatement. He tried to open his mouth and talk a few times only to close it again.

Towards the end of it, Katya came silently back into the room and stood by the doorway, not sure if Nick wanted her back in. She listened as he explained about the lights around those who were living on grace and how Brian had that light.

Brian finally got his speech back, "So I was right about the grace thing? How cool is that!" He became a serious, "Were you scared Nick?"

Nick nodded, "Only when everything came down on me at once, when I felt like I was being ripped into pieces. Brian, if you hadn't called out when you did......I couldn't hang on any more. I would have...."

Nick trailed off and Brian nodded in understanding, lifting Nick's face with his fingers under his chin, "But I did. Let's not think about what would have happened."

Nick nodded slowly and looked up to see Katya standing at the door. "It's ok Katya."

She came closer and stood at the foot of the bed, looking at Brian, who was looking at her in wonder. He stood up, "Thank you. If I could hug you, I would. I owe you so much."

Katya was a little taken aback, and a lot confused, "Owe me? Why?"

Brian looked at Nick, "If he had...." He trailed off and Katya knew what he was getting at, "I wouldn't have survived it. He's my best friend and I owe you a lot for saving him. Thank you. It's not much, but it's all I can think of to say."

Katya didn't know what to say to that. She had only been doing what instinct told her to do, not for thanks.

Brian smiled at her, "Man you certainly earned your wings watching after Nick, he's a handful."

Nick shook his head, "Oh no! Now you've done it! She's not an angel. Trust me, I asked. Got a very firm answer on that one. She is not an angel!"

Katya had to smile at his teasing tone. "I'm not Nick. Not even in my wildest dreams."

Brian sat back down on the bed, "Well then, what is your story?"

Katya sat on the other side of the bed, "My story?"

Brian nodded, "Everyone has one, What's yours?"

Her forehead wrinkled in concentration as she closed her eyes, "I don't remember. When I close my eyes I can feel a bed below me and blankets and I can hear the wind and snow on a window pane, but that's all I can remember. "

Nick held her hand, "You can't remember anything before that?"

Katya shook her head, "Just little bits that don't make any sense at all. It seems so far away, like I'm looking at the bits that I do remember from a long distance."

Brian cocked his head to the side, "What are in the bits?"

Before Katya could answer, Sterling came in the room with a smile. "I found a place."

Nick and Brian looked up and Nick raised an eyebrow, "Already?"

Sterling nodded, "It has everything you asked for and an open space that they are holding for you."

Nick smiled, it wasn't quite up to par with the smiles Brian was used to from Nick, but then again, none of them had been for a long time. That was when he would know Nick was truly better, when his smile came back.

Sterling took the smile as his thanks and continued, "They can take you tomorrow. So we'll have you on a plane tomorrow morning."

Brian's head snapped up, "P-plane? What do you mean plane? How far away is he going?"

Sterling looked at Nick for permission to tell Brian and Nick nodded. Sterling sat on the bed, almost on top of Katya, who got out of the way. "Montana."

Nick nodded in approval, "Do they have snow?"

Brian looked at him like he had lost it completely, "Snow?"

Nick nodded, "I miss snow. Sterling asked for preferences of where to go, what I wanted. I asked for snow. " He looked at Sterling, "Do they have snow?"

Sterling nodded with a smile, "A foot and a half and expecting more."

Nick nodded again, "Good. What else?"

Sterling looked at all the information he had written down, "Well, they have a great reputation. They deal exclusively with people who have attempted suicide and they specialize in the issues that go along with it. They have short term and long term patients, a world renowned staff and something I think you will really love about it. They are pioneers in the area of art therapy."

Nick's smile got just a tiny bit bigger.

Sterling patted his hand, "I thought you would like that." He handed Nick a bag, "Kevin gave me this to give to you."

Nick looked inside and found a long sleeved sweatshirt, some tear-aways, boxers, socks and shoes. It was just like Kevin to think of something practical like this, he knew Nick would be itching to get out of the hospital gown.

Nick set the bag down on the bed and looked at Brian, "Can you tell the guys what's going to happen?"

Sterling stood up, "No, Brian can't. But you can. They have been sitting out there worried sick about you, they deserve to her from you what is going on. You need to do this, Nick."

Nick sighed, he knew he couldn't avoid facing the music any longer. "Ok, let me get changed. I'm not going out there with my butt to the breeze for all the world to see."

Brian sat down on the bed and grabbed the brochure of the place Nick was going that Sterling had put on the bed, "Ok, I'll wait. Don't fall in."

Nick rolled his eyes and went into the little bathroom. He took his time changing, pulling out all the clothes and laying them on the edge of the sink. Folded in his sweatshirt he found a note,

"Nick,

Sterling told us what happened to you. I'm so sorry that had to happen to you. I'm more sorry that maybe something I did made you not feel you could come talk to me about this. Whatever it is that I did, I'm sorry.

I may be way out of line and making things worse, but I know you feel like you have no mother or father, like you have no one who will take care of you. You do, Nick. I've always cared about you and looked out for you. If you need someone to look up to, like a big brother or a father figure, let it be me. We've been together so long, you and I, that I feel like I've practically raised you. You've always been like a brother to me and I've always felt like I want to protect you from the world like a father would a son. Heaven knows I've been hard enough on you like a father would, but it's only because I see so much potential in you, Nick, and I want to see you grow into the man I know you can be. And when you do make it through this, and you will, I know I will be as proud of you as I would be of my own child.

I understand if you don't want this. Just don't bring it up and I'll know to leave it alone, but I just wanted you to know how I feel.

Whether you take me up on this or not, you'll always have me in your corner,

Kevin"

Nick leaned against the wall, feeling the tears sliding down his face. But for the first time in a long time, they were tears of gratitude. Someone wanted him, not because they had to, but because they wanted to. He felt like he was blind not to have seen that he had a family, it may not be biological, but it was all the family he had right now and maybe all the family he needed to see him through this.

He dried his tears, washed his face, brushed his hair and teeth and changed, feeling almost human again. It was such a relief to be out of that contraption they called a hospital gown. He took a few deep breaths and walked out of the small room, the note from Kevin firmly held in his hand.

Nick stopped short when he saw that the room was a lot more full than when he left. Sterling looked at him, "I thought in here would be more private."

Nick nodded and looked at his friends, no his family. They all looked like hell and he imagined he didn't look much better. Then his eyes fell on Kevin. The light pouring off of Kevin was incredible, it seemed to reaching out for him shining with love and understanding. It felt wonderful to be wanted simply because of who he was on the inside, not because he was family and had to be kept that way, not because he was Nick Carter, Backstreet Boy. No, just because he was Nick.

Kevin was looking at him with an expression anxiety and hopefulness, praying he hadn't done anything to make Nick worse.

Without a word, Nick walked over to Kevin and stood in front of him, shyly looking down at his feet, only to quickly look up at Kevin and then back down at his feet.

Kevin knew the next move was up to him. He held open his arms and the next time Nick looked up, he saw Kevin waiting with open arms for him. His bottom lip quivered as he threw himself in the older man's arms and held on for dear life as Kevin wrapped his arms around Nick, tears in his eyes.

Everyone watched Nick and Kevin obviously having a moment, but not knowing the circumstances that had caused it. Kevin smoothed his hand over Nick's blond locks and held him close, rocking them both slightly in an effort to calm the young man in his arms.

Nick fought back the tears that were threatening to spill over his cheeks. He needed to keep himself together. He sighed against Kevin's chest, feeling safe and protected, like nothing could hurt him in Kevin's arms. He felt the light that was radiating off of Kevin surround him in it's warmth. It was exactly the way he felt in...before.... He shut off that thought with a shake of his head. That was the past now and he needed to get to work on his future.

Nick indulged himself in another moment in the safety of Kevin's arms before pulling out of the embrace. He raised his eyes to look into Kevin's, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to....I just didn't know what else to do, It hurt so much."

Kevin's eyes shone with unshed tears, "You don't need to apologize to me or anyone else. We should be apologizing to you for letting you down. Nick you aren't alone in this, you have all of us to see you through."

Nick looked over to see Howie and AJ nodding in agreement. AJ stepped forward and pulled Nick into a hug, "I know what it's like to have a parent turn their back on you, Nick. It's happened to me too and it hurts. There is no pain like that in the world. I'm not going to lie to you and tell you it goes away completely, but it does get better."

Nick looked into AJ's eyes and saw the empathy and sincerity shining out of them. But behind that he could see the pain of having someone who is supposed to love you unconditionally turn their back on you. It was the same look he saw when he looked in the mirror.

Nick felt like a fool for not realizing that AJ would understand more than anyone what he was going through. Instead he had shut them all out. Now, more than ever, Nick knew he was doing the right thing. He needed to get himself well again, whole again, he owed them all that. He owed it to himself.

Howie hugged him next and all he could offer was sympathy. Nick sighed as he hugged Howie back, he may not know what he was going through, but just knowing he was there to support him, no matter what, was comforting. It helped more than he knew how to express.

Brian cleared his throat and Nick pulled away from Howie, turning around. Brian patted the bed, "I think it's time you told them, don't you?"

Nick nodded and sat on the bed, facing the line of chairs of his four bandmates. "I've already told Brian this, I hope you'll all be as understanding as he is. I need you to hear me out without interrupting. Can you do that for me?"

Everyone looked at AJ and he looked right back at them, "What?! I am capable of being quiet, I just usually choose not to be!"

Nick rolled his eyes and continued, "I need to leave the Backstreet Boys...." He heard the intake of breath and put up his hand to stop the three of them from speaking, "Wait a minute! For a while. Not forever. You four are the best thing to ever happen to me, Backstreet Boys is the best thing in my life and I will never walk away from it. But I need to get my self back. I need to figure out who I am, because everything I knew or thought I knew has turned out to be lies and deception and finding out the circumstances of the way I came into the world.....I just need time to take it all in and learn to deal with it. I need to get my life back."

They all sat in silence until AJ looked up, "Where will you go?"

"Sterling found this place in Montana that sounds like just what I need. They are well known and specialize in people like me that have.....done what I tried to do to myself. They are pioneers in art therapy. It sounds like the perfect place for me, and they even have snow. I miss snow."

Howie looked at him strangely, "You miss snow? Ocean Boy misses snow?"

Nick pouted, "Hey! I wasn't always an Orlando kid, I lived in New York state until I was eight. It's been a long time since I've seen a winter with snow. I think the change of scenery will do me good. Less to remind me."

Kevin leaned forward and took the brochure off of the bed, looking it over with a critical eye. After all, this was the place that he was entrusting his Nick to. They had better be good. Damn good. He looked up at Sterling, "In your professional opinion, is this the best place for Nick to be?"

Sterling nodded, "Yes, it's the best in the country for dealing with issues like Nick's. My concern was to get him the best possible care and everything else on his wish list came second. This is the best possible place he could be knowing his strengths and weaknesses and his love of art and drawing. It's a perfect match."

Kevin nodded, "Can we visit him?"

Sterling nodded, "There is a visiting day once a week, they understand the value of not cutting their clients off from their friends and family as long as they are not the problems that are facing the client. I know just from interacting with you that it's not the case here and they will have no problem with any of you visiting."

They all nodded and looked over the brochures with Nick and pointed out things that they liked about the place.

Katya watched silently from her corner, the amount of support that surrounded Nick was amazing. If only everyone in the world could have that much love and support behind them. But Katya knew that it came at a high price for Nick. He almost had to lose it all before he realized what he had.

She was truly happy for Nick, he seemed to be getting his life back on track. But why was she still here? The uneasiness in her spirit churned, she had helped in some small way to get him back on the journey he was destined to travel, but yet still here she was.

Katya came out of her reverie to see Brian casually standing in front of the dresser she was sitting on, pretending to study the card on the flowers that sat there. "Are you staying with him? Will you watch out for him?"

Katya knew he was talking to her, his voice was too low for him to be speaking to anyone else. She looked up to meet Brian's eyes and nodded, "I will Brian. As best I can. I hate to see him hurting."

He nodded and reached out his hand, laying it on Katya's shifting one, "I think you are good for him. I think he's also good for you."

She only nodded as the shrill ring of the telephone breezed through the air in the room. Nick looked up from the brochures and reached over to grab it without a second thought. "Hello?"

"Can't you do anything right?"

Nick froze as he heard the voice that froze his heart. The same voice that had rang in his ears when he drove the razor through his arm, urging him on, taunting him. The voice of the woman who gave birth to him. His throat closed over and he was unable to say a word.

That was ok, she had plenty to say, "How hard is it to cut your wrists, Nick? It must be pretty hard for you to screw it up. Either that or you are too stupid to handle it, just like your father, a coward. All your life you have brought me nothing but pain and repulsion at the sight of you and you had one moment where you could make up for it and you blow it! Why can't you just die and stop tormenting me? I WANT YOU DEAD, WHY CAN'T YOU UNDERSTAND THAT??!!!"

The phone slipped from Nick's numb fingers, all blood drained from his complexion as he started to shake. It wasn't like a shiver from the cold, or a shudder, it was as if every fiber of his being had come together and clenched and released every part of his body in perfect synchronicity and rapid repetition. Kevin dove for him and managed to catch him on the downfall, sparing him the impact of the floor. A horrible noise came from Nick's lips, like a low, long scream. What it lacked in volume, it made up for in the sheer terror it struck the hearts of everyone in that room.

They all watched wide-eyed as Nick broke down right before them, clutching onto Kevin like if he let go the very air around him would come in and attack him further.

Kevin swept the younger boy up into his arms and cradled him against his chest as he sat down on the bed. Nick was hanging onto him so tight that he thought his shoulders would crush from the vice grip, but he didn't mind the pain. He was more concerned about Nick.

Nick was shaking like nothing any of them had ever seen before. Brian dove at the phone and was greeted by the dial tone, but he knew who it was. There was no doubt in his mind. Brian felt his eyes filling with tears, watching Nick lose it. That same low scream was still coming out of his mouth, like a flat tone that seemed never-ending. The sound of it brought shivers up his spine and clenched his gut.

Katya was frozen to the spot, watching Nick drift further and further away. She pulled herself together and made her way to him, grabbing his face in her hands and looking right in his eyes, forcing him to look at her, "You hang on! Do you hear me? You hang on, dammit! Do not let go, Nick. Don't let go! It's not easy to get back, hang on!"

She watched his eyes and saw the light in them die. She swore softly, he had let go.

The sound coming from Nick faded away into silence. Everyone looked down at him, but he just stared, unseeing, somewhere over Kevin's shoulder. Kevin just sat there and held him, not sure what else to do. Usually Kevin was not very forthcoming with his physical affections, but somehow Kevin sensed that it was what Nick needed now more than anything.

Sterling rushed over and looked at Nick. He looked into his eyes and then flashed a penlight into them, swearing. There was no response that he could see. Nick had retreated into a place no one could hurt him any more, but also no one who cared for him could reach him either. He had let go of his hold on reality.

There was so much hope before, but it was now shattered into a million tiny pieces. He had so much love and support around him, but Sterling feared not even that could save him now. All that was left before him was a shell. The real Nick had gone somewhere deep inside of himself and seeing the dead look in Nick's eyes, he wasn't very optimistic that Nick would ever be back among them. Sometimes they just found the fight too hard to come back and the safety of their inner world too inviting to leave. He hoped and prayed like hell that would not happen to Nick.

Sterling tried to move Nick back to examine him more but Kevin yelped, "Sterling, he's got a death grip on me. I don't think he wants to be moved right now."

Sterling looked at Nick's hands and there were clamped tightly around Kevin's arm and waist. He knew better than to push the idea of examining him and instead put his hand on Nick's head, "Nick, I'm going to talk to your friends in the hall and we're going to get everything ready for your move in the morning. I'll keep Kevin here and talk to him later. Ok?" Sterling didn't wait for a response, he knew one wasn't coming.

Kevin stroked the side of Nick's face that wasn't pressed to his chest in a gentle, soothing motion and rocked them both slowly back and forth.

Sterling took the other three out into the hall and looked at their concerned faces. They all seem to have aged five years in one night. Brian was nearly fit to be tied. The other two were literally the only thing that was holding him up.

He shook his head, it was never easy to tell friends and family something like this and this group of boys seemed unusually close. "This is a huge setback for Nick. I'm not going to sugarcoat it for you. Whatever was said on that phone was the catalyst that made Nick break down like that. Both emotionally and mentally. He's let go of his grasp on reality and turned inside himself. He can't take being hurt anymore by those that have been hurting and lying to him, but that also means that he's cut off all of the people who support and love him. It's called Hysterical Catalepsy. Where someone goes into a trance like state after a psychological shock or trigger. There is no medical reason for it, so there is nothing medically that can be done to take him out of it. We can only help him psychologically as much as we can in the state he's in. I've seen this before and I can tell you what to expect. He won't talk, but you can talk to him, any stimulation is good. I'll have to examine him more closely, but depending on the depth of it, he may be able to do menial things like dressing, brushing his hair when asked to do it, but it will be within this trance state. It will be done in an orderly fashion and once he's started, he won't stop until finished and then will retreat back further into himself again."

Brian swallowed loudly, "How long will this last?"

Sterling looked in the door at Nick laying in Kevin's arms, staring off into space as Kevin rocked him and stroked his face. "There is no telling. Sometimes people come out of it within a day, some it takes months or even years." He turned to look at them, "Some never come out of it. They find the fight it takes to get back to reality too hard. They don't want to leave the safety of their own world."

Howie, AJ and Brian all sank down into the chairs in the hallway, stunned. AJ looked up, "Is there anything we can do to help him?"

"Just be there for him, talk to him, tell him everything that is going on that won't upset him further. He just needs time to sort this all out in his mind."

Brian nodded and looked up at Sterling, "Why is Nick clinging to Kevin like that? Kevin's never been one for showing a lot of affection."

Sterling took a piece of paper from his pocket, it was Kevin's note. "Kevin wrote a note to Nick, I think he found it in the bag of clothes. Nick is lost right now and he needs a guidance figure, someone who wants him just because he's Nick, not because he's a Backstreet Boy, not because he's family and must be kept in the family, just because he's Nick, plain and simple."

He looked at the note, "Kevin was always that to Nick, I think. This note just solidified it. When Nick was speaking to me about all of you, he talked of you three as his brothers, but there was a difference in the way he spoke about Kevin. He spoke of Kevin like someone would speak about their father, with a mixture of respect and annoyance at having to follow their word."

Sterling put his hand on Brian's shoulder, "He's not turning away from you, Brian. He just needs a father figure right now, someone that he feels safe with. It's not something better than what you can give him as his best friend, just different."

Sterling left them to absorb all that he'd said and went back into the room. Kevin was now singing softly to Nick, still rocking the younger boy in his strong arms. Sterling sat on the edge of the bed and looked at the two of them. He met Kevin's eyes and saw the fear in them. He was afraid for Nick and what this was going to do to the younger boy. Sterling leaned forward and put his hand on Nick's arm, "Nick, I need to look you over to make sure you are ok to travel tomorrow. Kevin is going to stay right here, you can hold his hand the whole time if you want to, but I need you let go of him so I can look you over. We have to make sure you are ok to hit the land of snow, ok?"

Kevin felt Nick's grip on him loosen and the hand that was wrapped around his arm slid downwards until Nick's hand rested in his. Kevin squeezed it gently and turned Nick around to let Sterling look at him.

All Sterling could do was make sure there was nothing physically wrong with him that would stop him from travelling. He had a nurse draw some blood and asked Nick to wash his face and brush his teeth, much like you would remind a child to do. Nick stood and hesitated, still gripping onto Kevin's hand.

Katya knew that he didn't want to leave Kevin, or rather the safety of Kevin. So she walked over to Nick and offered her hand for his. She could only hope that he felt as safe with her as he did with Kevin.

Slowly his hand released Kevin's and moved to his side, where Katya's was and grabbed it. Katya stood in front of Nick and wrapped her other arm around his shoulders, and kissed his forehead before hugging him. She was getting used to this touching other people thing. She didn't feel any sensation, but just the realization that he did and it helped in some way was enough for her. She followed him into the bathroom off of his room and watched as he mechanically picked up a toothbrush and started to brush his teeth. She sat on the counter and watched him. "Nick, I know you can hear me. I just want you to know that what she said, it her problem, not yours. She is the one that needs help, not you. Do you think for one moment that if you were as evil and such a mistake as she says that you would have been so blessed in your life to have four friends that are right here for you every step of the way, or the career that you were telling me about?

I heard every word she said and she's wrong, Nick. But if you give up like this, if you keep in this little world your in right now, you are proving her right on one thing."

Katya saw his eyes snap over and look at her, really look at her. She looked right back at him, "If you keep hiding like this from everything, you will prove her right that you are a coward. She could never know how much strength it took to not cut deeper, to get to Brian's room and get help, to choose to come back and face the consequences of what you had done, to face your life. But if you keep hiding, you are a coward."

Nick looked at Katya for a full minute, his eyes pleading with her to understand. She held his gaze and suddenly she could hear his voice in her head, she could hear his thoughts, 'Please, I just need time. I have to figure all this out. Please understand.'

Katya nodded her head in an indication that she understood and answered him back, "Ok, Nick. But don't take too long. The longer you hide, the harder it is to come back." She put her hand on the side of his face, "And the more you hurt them."

Nick's blue eyes filled with storm clouds as he looked away from her and into the mirror. He stood there staring into space as Katya felt him retreat further and further away from her.

Katya felt a twitch go through her. Tension seemed to hang thick around her and she knew it was coming from Nick. She shuddered. He hadn't figured out yet that his moods, his tension, his sadness all affected her. She was bound to him in a way that even she didn't understand.

The knot of tension and anger inside of Nick kept growing bigger and tighter. 'Why do I have to be like this? Why was I ever born if I was so unwanted the whole time? Why can't she just try to love me?' His head was spinning with all of the questions whirling through it. He felt like his head was going to split in half, his temples throbbing violently. An anger unlike anything he had ever known surged through his veins like acid, consuming everything in its wake.

Katya felt like she was stretched to the limit and if one more thing happened, she would shatter into a thousand pieces. Yet her tolerance was stretched further. This was the only time she could ever feel sensations and she didn't like it, not one bit. She felt everything is if she was in his body, the heaviness of the anger, it burning through his veins, his heartbeat thundered in her ears like it was her own. A whimper escaped her lips as she doubled over in physical pain, even though she had no body; Nick's pain.

Out in the room, Kevin and Sterling continued to talk softly, blissfully unaware of what was taking place only a short distance from them. Unaware of the anger radiating off of Nick in waves, unaware of the way it was consuming him like a plague, leaving cinders of his former self in it's wake. It was all happening so close to them, but yet a million miles further than they could reach inside of Nick.

Brian, Howie and AJ were still in the hall. Brian felt an uneasiness, like something was gnawing at the pit of his stomach. He sighed, 'I'm probably getting an ulcer from all of this. Lovely.' He crossed his arms over his stomach, gripping his sides and shifted lower in the seat, trying to ease the feeling inside of him.

I didn't work, the feeling only got worse. Brian squirmed, getting more and more uncomfortable. He didn't know what the hell was going on with him. 'Oh god, don't let it be my heart. Please, don't let it be my heart.' He squeezed his eyes closed and felt his whole body tense up, like he was preparing to fight. It kept getting worse and worse, a whimper filling his ears. Katya. His mind raced. Nick! until he bolted up from his seat, scaring Howie and AJ.

Katya was almost in the fetal position on the floor, the pain almost too much to bear. She saw Nick raise his hand and draw it back into a fist. Despite the pain ripping through her she stood and tried to grab his hand.

As she reached for him, she felt herself slammed back against the wall, his anger not letting anything penetrate it, not even her.

Brian ran for the door to the room, passing a stunned Howie and AJ. He swung open the door, "Nick, no! NO!"

Nick's fist shot forward and made contact with the mirror. The silver backed glass resisted moving at first, then gave under the persuasive force of the flesh barreling at it and shattered with a bang that echoed throughout the room.

Katya felt the fist as if it was aimed at her. She felt the anger behind it and she felt her own form resisting like the glass of the mirror, but was overpowered like the reflective glass. With a silent scream that was only heard by Brian and somewhere deep down by Nick, her form shattered into shards of light that streaked out of the doorway of the bathroom like a sunburst. The shards of light came to rest in the air, hanging thickly like a blanket of stars up near the ceiling.

Kevin's head snapped to the door when it flew open and Brian yelled Nick's name and the word no, then it swung the other way when he heard a shattering sound and an incredible blast of light filled his eyes for a brief second. When it cleared, he rubbed his eyes and opened them again. He was seeing stars. Thousands and thousands of stars sparkling in the room.

He looked at Sterling and found him staring up at the air around them also. Then he looked at Brian, who had been thrown to the floor feeling the impact like it was an explosion, clutching his stomach, in unbearable pain. He too was looking at the light. Only the look on his face was not one of wonder, it was one of complete horror.

Kevin rubbed his eyes again, no it was definitely there. He could see it, Sterling could see it and Brian seemed to be horrified by it. He didn't have time to think about it. That shattering sound had come from the bathroom and so had the light. Nick. Oh god, Nick.

He heard the sound of water running and ran to the bathroom to see the mirror shattered and it lying in pieces all around, and in, the sink. Nick was gazing ahead like it was still there, one of his hands bloodied from the confrontation with the looking glass and a washcloth in the other. Nick was readying himself to wash his face like nothing was wrong. Kevin saw him stop the water and start the journey to dunk the washcloth in the sink that was filled with water and shards of mirror. His hands got closer and closer to the dangerous jumble of liquid and glass in the sink.

With a start, Kevin grabbed Nick, wrenching him away from the sink.

Nick just stood there, staring ahead, his hand bleeding and the washcloth hanging from the other. If it wasn't for the devastation in the small room, Kevin would have questioned if Nick had done anything. Nick turned in to face him and stood close to Kevin, his arm clamping back around the older man's waist and his head resting on Kevin's chest.

With a sigh of confusion, Kevin wrapped his arms around Nick and fell into the rocking motion that Nick had started swaying to.

Brian, Sterling along with Howie and AJ, who were in the doorway, jaws hanging, all looked up the lights that seemed suspended in the air near the ceiling. Then one by one the lights started to twinkle and free fall slowly downwards, flickering out before they reached the floor.

Brian watched it all and knew that they weren't stars at all. He knew the light was Katya. The mask of horror still affixed to his face, he brought his hand to his stomach, where the feeling had suddenly subsided as quick as it came. Softly, under his breath, half in wonder, half in horror he whispered, "My God, Nick. What have you done?"

"My God, Nick. What have you done?"

Brian felt drained, like all of his energy had been sucked out of his body. He laid his forehead on the coolness of the floor, trying to regain his breath. His mind became clouded, his eyelids drooping as he couldn't resist the siren song calling to him any longer. His body relaxed as his eyes closed.

Howie, AJ and Sterling were all still staring up at the ceiling, not really sure they had seen what they thought they had. AJ looked at Howie, "D, did you see that?"

Howie looked back at him, his voice hesitant, "Depends, what did you see?"

AJ looked up at the ceiling again and then slowly lowered his eyes towards the floor, following the path that the lights had made before fading away. Howie nodded, "Yes. I saw them. I have no idea...."

AJ shook his head in wonder, "Me either, D. Me either."

Kevin took the washcloth from Nick's hand and wrapped it around his other one, letting the cotton absorb the blood seeping from the cracks in his skin caused by the shards of mirror that had embedded themselves. He kept rocking the both of them the entire time, it seemed to relax Nick, so he continued.

Sterling had no clue what to make of what he had just seen. It was unexplainable. Everything that had been drilled into his head in school, the science of medicine, the science of the brain and psychiatry, none of it could explain this. And that scared him. It rocked everything he believed in, everything he thought was stable and unchanging.

One thing that he did know was that the five men in this room had a connection to each other that was unusually strong. Especially that between Brian and Nick. Brian. The thought hit him, he remembered seeing Brian run into the room screaming Nick's name and the word no. Sterling blinked out of his reverie and looked around. He didn't see Brian anywhere. His eyes drifted to the floor and saw a pair of legs, the rest of the view blocked by the end of the bed. "Brian!"

The physician side of him kicked in and he raced to Brian's side, kneeling by the younger man's prone body.

The cry of their friend's name brought Howie and AJ out of the thoughts that they were lost in. They cried out as they registered the fact that Brian was lying on the floor, falling to their knees beside Sterling. The three of them carefully rolled Brian over so he was lying on his back and Sterling bent over him, placing a stethoscope on his chest.

Howie looked down at Brian's still face, chewing his bottom lip, "He has heart problems. He had surgery last year."

Sterling nodded and gently patted the side of Brian's face, "Brian! Brian, come on, guy! Wake up!"

They all watched for some sort of response and let out a breath they didn't know they had been holding when Brian's face scrunched up and he tried to pull covers that weren't there over his face. When he realized that he wasn't in a bed, his eyes flew open and saw the concerned faces of AJ and Howie over him. He shot up, his head nearly colliding with Sterling's on the way through. "Nick!" He stumbled to his feet and the sudden movement made his head spin. His knees turned to jello and slid out from under him, sending him to the floor again. Howie managed to shoot to his feet and grab Brian before he hit the unforgiving linoleum of the floor.

Sterling sent AJ for a nurse and worked to bring Brian back around again.

Kevin looked down at the blond head nestled on his chest, still staring at something that only he could see. He closed his eyes and wished that this was all a dream, that when he opened his eyes that Nick would have covered his face with shaving cream or some other prank and the world would be back to normal. He opened his eyes again and sighed, everything was still the same.

Sliding an arm under Nick's knees, he lifted the younger man into his arms and carried him into the other room. It wasn't until he set Nick down on the bed that he noticed his cousin lying on the floor, with Howie, AJ and Sterling trying to revive him. "Brian?!"

Sterling took the stethoscope from Brian's chest, "He's ok. He just seems to be exhausted. My guess is he hasn't slept or ate since Nick was brought here. Am I right?"

AJ nodded, "Yeah, that's about right. I managed to get him to choke down some coffee this morning so he didn't fall over. He hardly slept at all last night, he kept waking up with nightmares of Nick dying halfway to his room or catching him as he fell at his door, but it was too late, he was already dead. We ended up having to stay with him last night."

Sterling nodded and looked up at the nurse who had come into the room, "I'll need four cots in the room and a suture tray please." The nurse nodded, being too professional to question the odd request.

Sterling looked up at Kevin, "How bad is his hand?"

Kevin looked startled, "It's bleeding. There is mirror stuck in it. I had to stop him from washing his face with water that was full of mirror pieces."

Sterling didn't look surprised. He knew that sometimes outburst of extreme emotion were common with Hysterical Catalepsy and wasn't surprised that Nick had gone for the mirror. It represented himself and it was a rather dramatic way of breaking ties with who he used to be. But the light....Sterling sighed, the light was going to be hard to explain, even to himself.

The nurse returned with the cots and the suture tray, setting the cots up and leaving as silently as she had come. Brian was laid on a cot and with a stern look and an order from Sterling, Howie and AJ were lying down also, asleep before Sterling had walked back to Nick's bed.

Kevin held Nick, turning his head away from his bloody hand, not knowing if Nick was registering that he was bleeding, but not wanting to take the chance. Sterling picked the glass out of Nick's hand while Kevin stroked his hand over Nick's hair in a calm slow motion, more for his own good than for Nick's. He just had to do something, anything to not look at his hand. How could he be bleeding and cut like that and not notice? No reaction, nothing.

When Sterling finished, he wrapped Nick's hand and looked up to see both Kevin and Nick sleeping, the older man cradling the younger close to him and the younger with his head resting on the large, strong chest of the older.

Sterling cleaned up the tray, not having to stitch anything, and quietly left the room. A few minutes later an orderly came in to clean up the mirror mess and then all was quiet in the room.

Katya shook her head to clear the cobwebs. Where was she? It was so dark. She rose slowly, not knowing if the forces that held her up before would still work. Once she was right side up, she looked around her. Blackness. It was black and dark as far as the eye could see, surrounding her on all sides. Nothing below her, nothing above her, nothing anywhere around her. Then through the silence she heard a small sound of a sob.

The sound sounded close to her and far away all at once. Following it, she seemed to walk for miles before reaching the source of the sound. She found someone curled up in a corner, crying. Their head was buried, hidden, in the arms folded on the knees that were drawn up under the person's chin.

She walked closer and sat down beside the person, not knowing what to do or say. She was so lost in trying to figure out what to do, she didn't notice the sobs had softened. She came out of her thoughts to see a pair of blue eyes looking at her. The blue eyes belonged to a face she knew well.

With a gasp, she reached her hand out and made contact with the side of his face, stroking it softly like she had seen Kevin do. "Nick?

Nick nodded a little and started to cry again.

Katya kept stroking the side of his face and held him to her, letting him cry. She knew where she was now. She was inside of the place Nick had retreated to. She looked around at the darkness and shook her head. She knew this place well.

Morning came quickly and Sterling walked in the room to see three of them sleeping, Nick standing at the window and Kevin sitting on the bed watching him. Sterling sat on the bed beside Kevin, "How much sleep did he get?"

Kevin shrugged, never taking his eyes off of Nick, "I don't know. I woke up four hours later and he was already up and standing at the window exactly like that. He hasn't moved."

Sterling nodded and made a few more notations on Nick's file. He shook Kevin's shoulder to get his attention, "I want you to bring Nick to Montana."

Kevin looked at him in shock, "Why me? Shouldn't you bring him?"

Sterling shook his head, "No, Nick trusts you and I doubt if he would leave without you at this point. I'll be going with you, but I want you with him. It will keep him calm and we need that."

Kevin nodded, "Give me an hour to get these guys back to the hotel and a bag packed, ok?"

Sterling nodded and watched as Kevin quietly woke everyone up and they all hugged Nick, even though he have no response, and walked out of the room. Sterling watched Nick and for the entire hour that they were gone Nick didn't move. It fascinated him, watching Nick stare into nothingness. He wished he could go to where Nick had gone and try to understand it, to somehow bring the young man back that had been there before that phone call.

Katya pulled back and made Nick look at her, "Nick, go back and let them help you. They want so badly to help you, but you are shutting them out. You are shutting out the good right along with the bad."

Nick sniffled, "I...I don't want to hurt anymore."

Katya wrapped her arms around his torso, letting him lean his head on her shoulder again, "Well being hurt is part of life, Nick. But so is being loved and you have a lot of that surrounding you. I can see it around you, Nick. It's very strong and it comes from those five guys in your room with you. It comes from your brother and sisters. It comes from all those people that you touch with your music. The love is so strong around you, Nick, it's almost blinding."

Nick started to rock back and forth, "It's so much easier this way."

Katya grabbed his shoulders and looked into his eyes, "No, it's not easy. This is forever, Nick. This is nothing but blackness for the rest of your life. This is no touch, none. This is forgetting who you are and why you are here. This is losing everything that makes you human. This is gaining everything that makes you the living dead. This is taking a wonderful human being away from the world that needs him. This is being nothing but a coward, Nick."

Katya got up and looked down at him, disappointed. "I can't watch you go through this, Nick. It's too hard watching you waste everything that you have been given. I can't watch a strong man become a coward."

She started to walk away, not knowing if she could even leave, but she was going to try.

Nick scrambled to his feet, his blue eyes blazing. "I am not a coward!"

Katya looked over her shoulder at him, "Yes, you are. You let her win. You proved her right. You are a coward, Nickolas Carter."

With two angry steps he had his hands on her shoulders and spun her around. "I AM NOT A COWARD!"

She scoffed at him, "Please, if she was in front of you right now, you would be able to do nothing. You would just turn your tail between your legs and skitter away. " She shook her head at him, sing songing her next word. "Coward!"

He pushed her away and she stumbled backwards as his face twisted in anger, "What the hell would you know about any of this. You and your perfect angel life that never had any pain in it at all. You don't have a fucking clue!"

Katya grabbed him, her hands closing around the top of his head and all these images took over his mind. He saw Katya as a human. He saw painfully familiar scenes, he saw the razor blade, he saw the alcohol, he also saw pills. He saw the blood. He saw her fall to the floor, only no one was there to help her to safety, no one was there to stop her. Then he saw her again, this time on a bed, hooked up to machines that were monitoring everything that happened in her body. He saw the healed over scars on her wrists.

My god, how long had she been like this? he thought.

Katya let him go and he reeled backwards, "Don't have a clue huh? How do you think I know everything you are going through, Nick? It's because I've been there. It's because I'm still there. This..." She threw her arms out to take in their surroundings, "is where I was pulled from when I was sent to you. This is where I have been for so long I didn't remember touch, how to feel, how to love anything. This is where I forgot what life was like because I could never have it back again."

She stared him down, "My god, Nick. You have a choice to leave this place. Some of us are given no choice. Some of us do such a good job of trying to leave life that when we do realize that we want to live, in those last moments when the panic of what you've done sets in, it's too late. It's too late because you've done such a good job with your body that it no longer wants to let you back in."

"Then you are sent here. There is nothing but blackness. Nothing but emptiness and nothing to do but sit here and think about what you gave up. What you would give anything to have back. This is forever for me, Nick. This is all there is for me for the rest of eternity." She grabbed Nick's face in her hands and looked in his eyes, "You don't get it, do you? This isn't a safe place. This isn't an easy place. This is just an eternity of nothingness, sucking the humanity out of you until you are nothing." She shook him a little, "This is hell."

Nick looked at her in shock. She was just like him. Only she couldn't go back. Nick felt like the wind had been knocked out of him. No wonder she had done everything she could to make him leave here. She knew what he was going through. She knew that he was one of the few with a chance to go back and she didn't want to see him waste it.

He pulled away from her hands, "I....I'm sorry. I don't know what to say."

Katya looked at him, "Don't say anything. Just do all of us who are stuck here a favor. Take the gift you are being given, Nick. Take it for all of us who aren't going to get the choice to leave."

Kevin stood at the door of Nick's room. For a month now, Kevin had been coming here every Sunday for Visitor's Day. For a month he had been watching Nick standing at the window staring aimlessly. They had even moved themselves to Montana to record, to be closer to Nick, in hopes that them being around more than once a week would bring him back to them. They each took turns coming in every day, even if it was only for 15 minutes, but Sunday's were always Kevin's day.

Nick never moved from the window, hardly ever slept. The only time he seemed to sleep was when Kevin was there and sat with him in a rocking chair in the room, set in front of the window. Kevin had the chair brought in, because all the rocking Nick did was getting hard on Kevin's back as he tried to keep up with the motion. This way he could sit them both in the chair and rock Nick for hours while he slept and still be able to stand straight at the end of it all.

The room was littered with drawings. Pictures were hung on every available surface, walls, chairs, doors. Most of them were of people around him, like Brian and AJ and Howie, Aaron, all his sisters and there were a fair amount of him too. The ones that had everyone intrigued though were the ones of a woman none of them knew. Well, Brian made like he didn't know who it was, but everyone had heard his gasp when the first picture of her came off of Nick's fingers. The woman always looked so sad. Nick never drew her with a smile on her face.

Drawing was the only thing that could get Nick's attention. He would be in the same trance state all of the time, until someone placed a piece of paper in front of him and curled his fingers around a pencil, then he seemed to come alive. All of Backstreet, including Kevin had sat in a chair in front of Nick and watched as he looked at them carefully, never saying a word, and started to draw. Sometimes he would draw what he saw in front of him, other times, when they would talk to him about things that had happened to them, or some memory from the past, they would be amazed to see that Nick had drawn it in detail on his paper. Somewhere he was listening. If only they could reach him enough to want to come back.

Kevin gripped something in his hand and walked in the door. He sat in the rocking chair and popped the tape he had in his hand in the boom box that was sitting on the table beside him. He pressed play and looked at Nick standing in front of the window, "Nick, Brian told us he owed you a song. Well, I hope you don't mind, but the rest of us helped him with it and we want you to hear it. We mean every word of it."

Nick heard Kevin's voice reaching him. It made him feel safe. Then he heard something new. He heard music. Katya heard it too. They both stopped and listened. Brian's voice reached their ears and the other three came in with him on the choruses.

(this is an actual BSB song, I have just changed some of the words and singular to plural to make it fit the story it's under their copyright and that of the songwriter and in no way am I purporting that I wrote it. *the author*)

Don't say a word I understand you want to know if I'm still your friend

Nick can't you tell by the touch my hand I'm gonna be there for you every way that I can

Chorus: We'll hold you love you We'll never let you go for always We'll stay just look in our eyes and you'll know

We'll be there for you wherever you go whatever you do We've got forever inside for all of your life We'll be there for you

Don't ever doubt your trust in me I'll give you my heart so honestly deep in my soul you'll find the truth I'll never change I promise you

Chorus: We'll hold you Love you Never let you go For always I'll stay Just look in my eyes and you'll know

We'll be there for you wherever you go whatever you do We've got forever inside for all of your life I'll be there for you

Nothing and no one can tear us apart you'll always be here inside of my heart and just as sure as the stars shine above no matter what happens you can count on us

Chorus: We'll be there for you wherever you go whatever you do We've got forever inside for all of my life We'll be there for you

We'll be there for you (when the morning comes) wherever you go (when the evening falls) whatever you do oh yah for all of your life We'll be there for you

Kevin let the song finish and looked for any reaction in Nick. He just still stood there at the window, staring forward. He sighed, this was their last ditch effort to get him to respond. Kevin stood up and walked to the door, trying to hold in the tears of disappointment.

Suddenly, the tape started playing again. It was the last chorus. Then it stopped again and played once more. Kevin slowly turned around, almost afraid of what he would see. He saw Nick standing there with his eyes closed, listening. His breath caught in his throat.

When it finished again, Nick opened his eyes and turned towards the windows again, staring out of them.

Kevin bit back the sigh of disappointment and looked down at the floor trying to hold back the tears for the second time.

"Kevin?"

His head whipped up so fast, Kevin thought that it would tumble clear off his shoulders.

That was Nick's voice! It was soft and a little hoarse from disuse, but it was Nick's voice. His own voice was shaking from the emotions running through him. "Yes, Nick?"

Nick turned around and looked right at Kevin for the first time in a month. "You are flat."

Kevin nearly whooped in joy but managed to contain himself, "I'm what?"

Nick went back to the tape deck and rewound the song and played the last chorus again, "There. See, you are flat."

Kevin listened and damned if he wasn't flat like Nick said! Kevin chuckled and smiled at Nick, "I meant to do that. It was a whole ruse to get you to talk to me. It worked."

Nick's face fell out of the stone mask of indifference it had been in and a smile graced his features for a brief second, "Sure, Kev. Whatever."

Nick turned back towards the windows and reached one of his hands out to touch the cold glass, "Can we go for a walk outside? I want to walk in the snow."

"Can we go for a walk outside? I want to walk in the snow."

Kevin managed to swallow his urge to let out a yell of joy and nodded calmly, "Ok. We brought you some winter stuff, you know, just in case. But first there is something I want."

Nick looked at him and Kevin opened his arms wide. Nick smiled and hurled himself into Kevin's arms, nearly knocking him over. Kevin smiled and wrapped his arms around the younger boy, feeling Nick's arms squeezing him tightly. Kevin kissed the top of the blonde head tucked under his chin, "Welcome back, Nick. I missed you, buddy."

Nick smiled against Kevin's chest and laid his ear flat against it. When Kevin went to pull away, Nick held him still, "Wait."

Kevin stopped and looked down at Nick's head on his chest, "What are you doing?"

Nick sighed, "When you would hold me and rock me, letting me sleep against you, I would listen to your heart until I fell asleep. I could still hear it where I was. It was the only thing I could hear."

Kevin smiled softly, "I always wondered why you put your head in the same spot all the time."

Nick lifted his head and stepped away, "How long was I away?"

Kevin put his hand on Nick's head, "A month, almost exactly."

Nick looked shocked and sank back on the bed, sitting on it. "Wow. It felt like I was only there for an hour, maybe even less. A month?"

Kevin nodded, "A month." He went to the closet and pulled out a coat and some boots and gloves and a hat, then laid them on the bed beside Nick. "Alright, get your gear on and we'll go."

Nick quickly slid on the coat, boots and all the other stuff he needed to go outside and waited while Kevin got himself all geared up. Kevin held out his hand and Nick grabbed it, "Just make like you're following blindly behind me, as soon as they realize that you've come out of it, they are going to be all over you and there goes our walk."

Nick nodded and followed along behind Kevin, staring at the back of Kevin's hat. They managed to get out of the building with Kevin greeting the nurses and doctors he met along the way and explaining that he was just bringing Nick for a walk and they would be back soon.

Before they walked out of the door, Kevin popped a pair of sunglasses on Nick and then on himself. Kevin led them out of the door and down a shoveled out path until they were out of the eyesight of anyone in the building.

Nick breathed in the clean, crisp Montana air and let it out on a sigh. "I like this."

Kevin smiled, "Being a southern boy, I thought I would not like this at all, but since we've been down here, I've been a lot calmer and we've all been writing like fools. We've even started to like the cold. This was a good choice, Nick. I know it was made for you, but it's worked wonders on us all."

Nick smiled back at Kevin. "Well remind me to go out of my mind more often."

Kevin cuffed Nick on the back of his head softly, "You weren't out of your mind, you just took a little time off from thinking, that's all. You had a really long blonde moment!"

Before the comment was fully out of Kevin's mouth, a hastily formed snowball was smushed in Kevin's face. Kevin stood there in shock and wiped the slush off his face with his gloves, "Ok, that one was free. The next time you die."

Nick only smirked and kept walking. They walked in silence for a while until they came to a gazebo that had been cleared of snow and sat down. Kevin had to smile when Nick sat next to him and leaned against him. He put a fatherly arm around the younger boy and looked at him in the sunlight, "Nick, what happened to make you leave us like that?"

Nick sighed and closed his eyes for a second, "That phone call was the last straw, I think. When I heard her on the phone and saying all those awful things....I just snapped. I wanted to go somewhere where she couldn't hurt me any more. So I did. I needed time to think without anyone hurting me any more."

"What made you come back?"

Nick kicked the snow off the tips of his boots and snuggled more into his coat, "It was pointed out to me that by hiding like this, I was exactly what...that woman...called me. A coward. I wasn't hurting her by doing this, instead I was hurting everyone I cared about. But it just seemed so easy to stay where I was, to not have to fight battles anymore, to just stay in the calmness. But that was before I knew where I was."

Kevin leaned closer, his concentration focused on what Nick was saying, "Where were you Nick?" He felt Nick shudder and thought he was cold until he spoke.

"I was in Hell, Kevin. Hell isn't all fire and brimstone. It's inside of you, where there is no touch, no love, no humanity, there is just silence and stillness and an eternity to think about what you gave up on. Especially for people that did what I did."

Kevin was knocked speechless for a full minute before he could continue,"But...but didn't you say that it was easy to stay there? How could it have been hell if it was easy to stay?"

Nick smiled, "You don't realize that it's hell until you've been there for a while, you forget who you are, who you loved, you forget how to be human. Those few like me that get a choice of staying or going back lose the will to go back. It's too inviting to not have to deal with anything, to not face the consequences of what you've done. To not have to deal with all the bad things in your life. Kevin, it seemed so easy to stay there and not have to deal with anything. It seduces you into believing that you are safe when it's really taking everything away from you."

Kevin nodded, it was too much to comprehend all at once. "I'm glad you came back, Nick. We all missed you. It was hell for us seeing you like that."

Nick looked up at him, "I know. I'm sorry."

Kevin hugged him, "Don't be. Just get better. That's all we want for you."

Nick nodded into Kevin's shoulder, "I'll do my best."

Kevin smiled and released the younger boy, standing up, "Let's get back inside. I'm nearly frozen through."

Nick nodded, "Face it, we're Florida wusses."

Kevin laughed and they started walking down the trail to the main path back to the building. They were nearly to the main path when they heard voices, familiar voices. They saw the forms of Howie, AJ and Brian coming towards them. Nick looked at Kevin and grabbed a handful of snow, then whipped it at the three guys, hitting Brian squarely in the chest. The look on Brian's face was priceless and Howie and AJ started laughing.

He looked up the path and mock glared at Kevin, "Cuz, there are easier ways of getting my attention, you know."

Kevin shook his head, "It wasn't me, man"

Brian rolled his eyes, "I suppose you are going to blame it on Nick, right?"

Kevin didn't know what to say, his jaw opened and closed a few times before a new voice spoke.

"You always were suckass at dodging snowballs, Brian."

Three jaws plummeted to the snow bank as they stared at Nick in astonishment.

AJ, Howie and Brian all stood there, dumbfounded and speechless.

Kevin had to smile at the sight.

A whoop brought him out of his thoughts as he saw Nick surrounded and the life nearly being hugged of him. Nick smiled and hugged them back, but someone was missing. Nick looked up and saw Brian still standing on the sidewalk looking at him. A thousand emotions seemed to be skittering across his face too fast to be read.

Nick untangled himself from AJ and Howie's embraces and tentatively walked over to Brian, "Frick?" Nick reached out his arms to embrace his friend, his brother, when he was met with resistance in the form of Brian's hands meeting up with his down jacket enclosed chest and pushing him away roughly.

The motion caused Nick's shoes to skid on the ice encrusted concrete below his feet and he stumbled to keep from falling, losing the fight and sprawling backwards into the snow, the breath being knocked from him.

The other three looked at Brian in amazement. Of all the reactions to Nick coming around again, this was not one they had foreseen. Brian just stood there, looking down at Nick laying sprawled in the snow, no expression on his face. Then he blinked. A second later, all that could be seen of Brian was his back as he walked away without a word to any of them.

Nick sat up in the snow, shaking his head to rid it of the dizziness the fall had produced. He watched as Brian walked away and felt his eyes burning, begging to release the tears that lay in wait just below the surface. He bit his lip until the salty warmness of his blood awakened his tastebuds. Without a word, he struggled to his feet and by the time Kevin, Howie and AJ had pulled themselves out of shock enough to look after Nick, they could only see the far off outline of his back as he ran from them. They all looked at each other, not knowing who needed them most at the moment.

Brian walked through the snow, looking at his hands, which were stretched out in front of him, almost like he wanted to get them as far away from the rest of his body as possible. 'I pushed him. I made him fall.' He kicked at the snowdrift near his foot, 'I sing that I'll be there for him no matter what and then what do I do when he comes around? I push him and walk away. I'm a moron. He probably thinks that I hate him. Oh jeez, I have to find him.' He stuck his hands in his pockets, feeling the warmth of his body seeping into the cold flesh of his fingers. He almost knew the ground of the clinic better than the people who worked there a started towards where he knew Nick would wander to eventually, knowing Nick as well as he did.

Nick kept walking and walking, his head lowered and his hands shoved into his pockets, making the lower half of his face the only visible part of him. He didn't understand why Brian had pushed him away. 'Maybe he's tired of you being a needy retard!' The cold, hard voice in his head wouldn't let him be. 'Maybe he liked it better when you were off in your own world and you weren't there to bother him.' Nick shook his head, softly speaking to the voice in his head, "No, Brian loves me. I know he does."

"You're right. I do."

Nick stopped walking and slowly looked up to see he was in front of a frozen over lake. Brian stood a few feet away from him.

Nick didn't know what to do. He had no desire to be pushed away again by the most important person in his life again. Nick just stood there, wrapped up in his thoughts.

Brian chewed his lip nervously and stepped closer to Nick, "Can we try this again? Here's what I should have done, but I was so overwhelmed I don't even know what I was doing." He reached out and pulled the younger boy in his arms and held him close.

Nick stood in his arms stiffly, making Brian afraid that his insensitive treatment of Nick had sent him right back into the arms of madness. But then Nick's posture softened and he leaned into Brian's arms, wrapping his arms around the older man and sniffling softly into the soft shoulder of Brian's coat.

Brian held onto Nick tightly and steered the both of them towards a bench that sat facing the lake.

When both of them were sitting, Brian reached out and lifted Nick's face so that he could see it, wiping the warm tears off of Nick's cold cheeks with his thumbs. "What made you come back, Nick?"

Nick closed his eyes, drawing in a cold breath, feeling it prickle his lungs before the chill of it was absorbed by his body, "It was pointed out to me that I was being a big coward, that I wasn't hurting.....that woman....I was only hurting myself and everyone who loves me."

Brian raised an eyebrow, "Katya?"

Nick simply nodded.

"She was there with you?"

Nick nodded again, it hurt to think about her spending eternity there. She deserved so much better.

Brian sighed, "Nick, talk to me. If anyone would understand all this, it would be me."

Nick bit his lip, chewing on the fullness of it for a second. "I was in Hell, Brian." The whole story spilled out of him about how it tempted you with the comfort of not having to feel any more, he told Brian about Katya and the countless others who were trapped there, not given the choice of leaving like he was.

Brian told him of what he had done in the bathroom that night almost a month ago, the last time Brian had seen Katya. He told nick of the explosion of light and the tiny pieces that seemed to hang from the ceiling like stars.

Each friend was equally stunned and moved by the stories that were shared.

Brian looked over the lake, seeing the sun glinting over the hard skin of ice on the surface of the water, "Is she here now? Can I see her?"

Nick shook his head, his eyes filling once again with tears, "No. I.."

Brian put his hand on Nick's shoulder in a gesture of comfort, "It's okay, just tell me in your own time."

Nick took a halting breath and the story started.

Both Katya and Nick listened to the music that seemed to surround them. The words wove strings of love and friendship through the air and it seemed to encircle them.

Nick felt an odd sensation working through him and it felt almost like it he was moving yet he was standing in the same spot.

Katya watched Nick and saw the light around him get brighter and brighter. She also saw Nick fading in and out of focus, sometimes fading completely so only a halo of light was left where he had been. The light spilling off of him seemed to fill the space they were in. She knew what was happening to him. "It's calling you back."

Nick looked at her, "What is calling me back?"

She closed her eyes for a minute, a flicker of pain splashing across her face before being swallowed by the mask of indifference Nick was so used to seeing. "Love, Nick. It's what has given you the gift of having a choice. It's what we are born to learn about. It's what can kill you when you are without it. It's what you would kill to feel again when you are trapped here." She brought her hand to the side of his face and caressed it, "Go back. Get help and become the strong, smart man I know you is just under the surface. Do it for me as much as you do it for you, Nick."

Nick looked at her, "You sound like this is goodbye. Aren't you coming back with me?"

Katya shook her head, the sadness in her eyes intensifying until her eyes seemed to made of liquid glass. "It is goodbye, Nick. I don't know how I know, but I know I can't go back with you. Whatever it was that I needed to do for you has been accomplished. My work is done."

Nick shook his head and clung to Katya, afraid to let her go, "No! I need you. I can't do this by myself, I need you with me!"

Katya smiled gently and cupped Nick's face in her hands, "I'll be with you in spirit, Nick. Always watching over you. You just won't see me any more. And you can do this. You've been doing all of this yourself, I've just been nudging you in the right direction. Nick you are strong, you will get through this and you will be even stronger because of it."

She paused and the words to the song that Nick's band members were singing filled the room, words of comfort and reassurance. Words that Nick needed badly at this moment. Katya could feel the shift in him and knew the decision had been made to go back and she felt the relief wash through her, "Good decision, Nick."

He held her tightly for a minute, trying to memorize the way she felt in his arms. Trying to memorize every detail about this moment. Then, he let her go. He felt her step away for a little, then his eyes flew open when he felt a pair of lips on his. If he had a heart in this form, in this place, it would have been beating out of his chest. He knew this was her way of saying goodbye and wrapped his arms back around her, kissing her back before they both stepped away and looked at each other in silence as Nick faded away before her eyes.

Nick finished and sat silently looking out over the ice and snow in front of him. "She gave me the courage to go back, Brian."

Brian nodded, unable to speak from all the emotions running through him.

Nick stood up, "Let's get back inside, Florida has spoiled me. I'm now too much of a wuss to take this cold."

Brian smiled and the two of them walked side by side back to the building where their other friends and some anxious doctors awaited them.

She wanted to hate him.

Oh did she want to hate him. But she just couldn't. It was something that she just wasn't capable of doing. It wasn't his fault and she knew that. Whatever fate had decided to send her to him was the cause of all this. Just like the situation Nick was in the middle of, he was an innocent.

It was cruel. If she thought this place was bad before, it was unbearable knowing what she did now. To be able to love again, to be able to touch and be touched...then to have it ripped away from you. She didn't want to lose this. The memory of touch and feel, the memory of his lips against hers. The memory of feeling love again. She would hold onto it with everything she had until time wrenched it from her.

There was a difference in her hell this time. Although she couldn't be at Nick's side, she could see him and always tell when he was thinking of her. For the past two months, she had been watching over him by concentrating on the memory of his touch and she would be able to see everything going on with him. She saw the drawings of her that were piled on the table in his room, the drawings of everyone close to him scattered around the room. She saw Nick working through the anger at the situation he was in. She knew he could never fully forgive his biological mother for all she had done, but he was learning how to move on.

Brian knew that Nick missed Aaron beyond anyone else, so with special permission from the doctors, he arranged for Aaron to be sent to Montana and Brian brought him to Nick. That one gesture did more to bring Nick happiness than anything else. When they saw each other, the only thing that existed was the other. Aaron and Nick hugged for a half hour straight after Aaron ran in the room yelling Nick's name and for the rest of the three days he was there, he hardly ever let go of Nick. Nick didn't mind, because he didn't want to let go of Aaron either. Aaron brought letters from his sisters for Nick and a thick letter from Jane and Bob Carter. He read the letters from his sisters and answered them back with letters of his own promising to come see them as soon as he could. The letter from Jane and Bob.....he tried to open it. He just couldn't. Time after time he tried, but he just wasn't ready. For now it laid in a drawer in the cabinet beside his bed. Someday, he promised himself. Someday he would be able to read it.

Nick still didn't sleep a lot. He spent most nights roaming the halls of the clinic. He knew almost every hall like the back of his hand. There were some places in the clinic he didn't go, like the staff areas and the wing where the long term patients were. He'd tried to go there, gone down the hallway and looked in a few of the rooms, but the thought that it could have been him was too overwhelming to him. What scared him the most though was that no one in there had light around them. They were just shells and Nick knew better than anyone just where they were. He just couldn't make himself face what almost happened to him.

Katya watched Nick struggle through sessions with his assigned counselor, still trying to hide what he was going through. The only time he couldn't hide was during his art therapy, there every emotion he had was there on the canvass for the world to see. Only when there was something in his hands did he open up.

It tore Katya apart. She knew that if he didn't open up and soon, it would destroy him.

During another session of the counselor trying to coax Nick out of his shell and Nick fighting him all the way. "Nick, pretend I'm your mother. Yell at me, curse, do what you would do to her if she was standing here." Katya couldn't take it any more. She ran headlong into the darkness surrounding her and kicked and tore and pushed at it until it bled into Nick's reality.

She knew she didn't have much time before she would be sucked back into oblivion, but she was going to make her time worth it. In a flash of light, she dove into the human form in front of her, that of the counselor.

Nick was looking down at his hands and trying not to look up at the idiot that was trying to get him to play make believe. He snorted, what a waste of time. This was not going to help him at all. None of this was.

"Coward."

Nick's head snapped up and a cry of horror left his lips. There standing in front of him was his worst nightmare. It was the monster who had brought him into this world. She was smiling that cruel smile of hers as she looked at him, "You are pathetic, do you know that? You think any of this hurt me? NEWS FLASH, Nick. I don't care. It doesn't hurt me, in fact it makes me happy. The more miserable your life is, the happier I am. And I must say, you've made me very happy lately. Not only are you miserable, but you've made everyone around you miserable. I win all around. You are just like your bastard of a father, bringing misery to everyone around you like the coward that you are."

Before Nick could bite it back, he clenched his fists by his side, his eyes blazing in anger. " I AM NOT A COWARD!!! You are the coward, you bitch! You are too fucking scared to have any feelings for anyone but yourself. NONE OF THIS WAS MY FAULT!!! I was only a baby, I didn't ask to be born to a coldhearted bitch! So you were raped! Other people in this world are too! Other people get pregnant from something that horrible too! But there is a difference between them and you! They didn't blame an innocent child for the sins of it's father. They did something that took more courage than you've ever had in your pathetic life! They got over it and put the blame where it belonged, on the sick bastard that did this to them!

Did you ever stop thinking about yourself long enough to realize that if everything you tried to get rid of me didn't work, than there must be a reason for me to be here?! That whatever power is out there had a plan for me." He shook his head and scoffed in disgust, "And one thing I am sure of, more than anything, that plan doesn't include you. I don't think I'm ever going to be able to forgive you for what you've done to me, but there is one thing I will be more than glad to do!

I can forget you."

By the time Nick was done, his chest was heaving for breath and he sank to the floor, exhausted but relieved to have all of it out of him instead of balled deep inside. He looked up and his eyes widened as the image of the monster that was his mother started to shift and contort until Katya stood before him. She smiled, the first real one that Nick had seen, and reached out to cup his face. She just looked at him for a minute and then she too started to fade, leaving him staring into the face of his counselor. He knew that Katya had done this to get him to open up and finally start to heal. The relief of not carrying around the heaviness of the hate inside him was immense and it felt so good to be free of it that he was left with tears streaming down his face.

The counselor pulled Nick close and let him cry, letting him get it all out of his system.

Katya watched with a smile on her face, despite the overwhelming exhaustion what she had done had caused. She hadn't even known it was possible until she had done it and now she knew why it wasn't done often. She laid down in the darkness and closed her eyes, knowing that Nick was going to be ok, she had made sure of that.

Day by Day, Nick seemed to be pulling himself together, growing stronger in who he was and what he needed to be happy.

Right now what he needed to be happy was what he had around him. Three friends who were closer than brothers to him and then there was Kevin. Kevin was his savior. Nick knew if it wasn't for Kevin giving him something to hold on to, someone that wanted him just for the simple fact that he was Nick, that he would still be lost in the wilds of his tortured mind.

Ever since he had come out of his "really long blonde moment" as the guys liked to call it, Kevin had been there for him at every turn. And if Kevin wasn't physically there, Brian was. More than ever the three of them were family and it would have been just fine with Nick for him to be known as a Richardson or Littrell. The name Carter didn't seem to suit him anymore, even the mention of his last name brought up the feelings of betrayal that were going to take a long, long time to fade.

The therapy sessions with his counselor were hard on Nick. He came out of them walking almost like an old man, dragging his feet, his shoulders slumped as if the weight of the world was on them. But he knew it was part of getting over this and getting better. The session that Katya had taken control of had been a turning point for Nick. As much as he hated to talk about the whole situation, he was finding the more he talked about it, the easier it got to deal with. When he held it inside, it seemed to grow larger until it started to eat him alive, but talking about it took the power away from it and it didn't seem so enormous and destructive any more. Howie, Kevin, Brian and AJ watched in awe as the defeated and bitter nick blossomed into a new, confident young man.

At first his bandmates didn't know what to make of the new Nick, but when they saw that the playfulness and utter craziness that was the essence of Nick was still there, they learned to adapt and accept the more serious and well....grown up side of Nick too. He was still the same guy they all knew and loved, but something in his eyes, if you knew to look for it, told you that the new found maturity had cost him dearly in pain and suffering.

The doctors and staff at the clinic were thrilled with Nick's progress and he had them as well as most of the female population of the clients wrapped around his finger. He had always been something of a charmer, but with the vulnerability that had been exposed by all he had gone through only seemed to add to his charm and it gave hours of amusement to his bandmates as the rode him about it until Nick was begging for mercy.

He worked long and hard at overcoming his demons and though the work was the most grueling and painful thing he'd ever undertaken, it was also the most worthwhile. He felt for the first time in his life that he knew who he was. The hard work was rewarded by his doctors when they started allowing him to leave the clinic to be in the studio with the rest of Backstreet. Music had been the one thing absent from his life since coming to the clinic. Singing was absolutely forbidden as was any reference to the band. Nick balked at the ridiculousness of it, but as time went on he understood the logic.

The doctors knew Nick was hiding behind the identity he had in the band, convincing himself that Nick the Backstreet Boy was all he was and all he ever would be, but slowly, over time, without having that to fall back on as who he was, Nick started discovering who he truly was without all that. He knew now that when the roar of the crowd faded and the lights went down, that he wouldn't feel as empty and lost as he had before, because he knew that Nick the BSB and Nick the person were two very different people that just happened to cohabitate in his life.

Nick stood at the window to his room and thought over all he had discovered about himself in the past year, both good and bad and knew that his life was never going to be the same, but now that he was on the road to overcoming all that had been thrust at him, that his life would be different, yes, but better. And it would start tomorrow when he was released from the clinic.

He sighed, as much as his life was coming together now, there was one thing that was missing. It was Katya. He wanted to see her one more time, to let her know how much she meant to him, how much she had helped him. Without her....without her he wouldn't have a life to put back together. She had risked herself time and again for him and beyond anything else, he wanted to make her proud of him. To make her know that all she had taught him and sacrificed for him was worth it and that he wouldn't ever take the gift of his life so lightly again.

Nick was brought out of his thoughts when his door banged open and a breathless and agitated Brian stood there. He caught his breath and looked at Nick, "I found her Nick."

Nick jumped, "What...how? Katya?"

Brian nodded, "I know where she is. I saw her."

Nick stood there, stunned, almost afraid to believe that he would see her again.

Nick followed Brian without a word. Brian took his wrist, being careful not to grab the one that had been sliced and guided him. They reached the main desk and Brian looked at him, "Close your eyes."

Nick opened his mouth to argue, but the look on Brian's face told him not to question it. He closed his mouth and his eyes and felt Brian leading him again. Several twists and turns later, he felt himself stop and Brian stood behind him.

"Ok Nick, open your eyes."

Nick opened them slowly, not know what to expect. He saw a normal clinic room, but it was a lot more sparse than his, no flowers, no balloons, no cards. His eyes fell on the bed and he looked at the sleeping form lying there and tried to figure out why she looked so familiar. With a sickening thud of realization inside him, he realized that he was looking at Katya.

Instead of an essence of light like he was used to seeing her, she lay before him in the flesh. He swallowed hard as his eyes roamed over her still figure. He auburn hair lay limply on the pillow surrounding her pale face, her lips were even pale as they lay pressed together, as still as the rest of her. He saw the IV lines running to her arms, then his eyes slid further down to her wrists. There he saw the unmistakable lines of the scars crossing her wrists, raised from her skin like an emotional Braille.

Nick softly walked closer, almost like he was afraid if he made so much as a sound that he would wake her. His finger reached out and trailed over the raised scar on the wrist closest to him. She had been right here all along, right in the same building and he hadn't known it. He closed his eyes and bit back the tears that were threatening to spill over his cheeks. How long had she been here like this? How long had she been stuck in the place he had been?

"Three years."

Nick looked up from his reverie and turned to look at Brian, "What?"

Brian walked closer and put a hand on Nick's shoulder, "She's been here three years. I was wandering yesterday and found her. I'd never been this far down the long term wing before, I couldn't stand it, because in every bed I would see what could have happened to you, but something was calling me down here and before I knew it, I was standing in this room. I asked the doctor and he said that she's been here for three years. She was brought here like this and she's never woken up and she never will Nick."

Deep down Nick knew this, but it didn't make hearing it any easier. He hung his head and squeezed Katya's hand, trying to find some way to draw strength. "Never?"

Brian nodded, "She's dead in every way but physically, Nick. The doctor said that if she were to ever wake up, she would be a vegetable. She lost so much blood and had three different kinds of prescription drugs in her body when they found her. They were able to save her physically, Nick, but everything else is gone. They've nearly lost her a few times, but she stubbornly keeps holding on, it's like she's waiting for something and won't leave until she's ready."

Nick shook his head, clarity raining upon him in that moment. "She wasn't waiting for something, Brian. She was waiting for somebody. Me."

Brian watched as Nick caressed the side of Katya's still face. "She was waiting for you?"

Nick nodded, "Me. How else do you explain all of this? There must have been hundreds, maybe thousands, of people doing what I was about to do that night, but she ended up in that hotel room with me and stopped me. She guided me back to you, back to life. She saved me." He looked up at Brian, his blue eyes meeting that of his friend, "We were connected from the first minute by something neither of us understood and now I think I know what that is."

Nick and Brian were so caught up in their discussion that they didn't notice they weren't alone in the room. From the corner of the room, a man walked towards them, dressed simply in a linen suit, his shoulder length hair shining as it rested against his collar. Both boys turned to face the stranger and were immediately stunned by the overwhelming light coming off of him.

He smiled at them both and looked at Nick, "You do know what your connection is, Nick. It's redemption."

Nick nodded, too stunned to say anything.

The stranger walked over to Katya and placed his hands in hers, lightly holding them. The glow around him got brighter and brighter until Nick and Brian both had to turn away for fear they would be blinded.

Nick chanced taking a peek and saw Katya's body begin to glow and the stranger started to lift his hands and the Katya he was used to seeing started to rise from the body lying on the bed. Nick's jaw fell open as he hit Brian on the arm and watched in wonder. In a matter of seconds, Katya was standing beside the stranger, looking more beautiful to Nick and Brian than anything they had ever seen and she was in crystal clear focus, every radiant part of her.

The stranger smiled even more at their wide eyed reaction. "She was waiting for you, Nick. Even if she didn't know it. You are each other's redemption. She showed you the way to fight for your life, your happiness, to redeem yourself for having so little regard for your life and everything that has been handed to you, and you gave her the opportunity at redemption for upsetting the life plan that had been laid out for her to accomplish. "

He looked at the two of them, "And you both have accomplished your redemption with the help of the other, just like we had hoped you would. Nick, you've learned the value of the gift of life and Katya, you've learned that love was something you always had inside, you just were too blinded by your own misery to see it." He turned and faced Katya, cupping her radiant face in his glowing hands, "Come child, let's get you home."

Katya nodded and looked over at Nick, running to him and hugging him fiercely, her senses alive with the feel and smell and sight of him.

He wound his arms around her and held her close, knowing it would be the last time he would hold her like this. He breathed in the scent of her, wildflowers, and memorized the feel of her against him, in his arms. She pulled away a little and looked at Brian, smiling at him, "Take care of Nick for me, ok?"

Brian smiled and nodded, "Always."

Katya looked back at Nick and ran her hand down the side of his face, "You are strong enough to stand on your own Nick, never doubt that. And the times you can't stand alone, you have four brothers to lean on. They are in your life for a reason Nick, and not just singing, it may have been what brought you together, but it's not what keeps you together."

Nick nodded, knowing if he spoke, the sobs that were welled up in his throat would be the only thing to come out.

Katya leaned forward and kissed him softly. Nick closed his eyes and savored it, knowing that the first true love of his life was about to leave him.

When Katya pulled away, Nick opened his eyes and looked into her green ones. She leaned close again and kissed his forehead, "Nick, can you do me one last thing?"

He nodded, his voice barely a hoarse whisper with all the emotion choking it, "Anything for you."

She smiled and mussed his hair a little, "Sing for me. I've never heard you sing. Sing me home, Nick."

Nick bit his lip and nodded. For an audience of only three, this was the most important performance of his life. He closed his eyes carefully choosing the song and opened them when he had made his choice.

Falteringly at first,

I will remember you

will you remember me?

Then with each word his voice got stronger.

don't let your life pass you by

weep not for the memories

remember the good times

that we had

we let them slip away from us

when things got bad

clearly I first saw you

smiling in the sun

wanna feel your warmth upon me

I wanna be the one

I will remember you,

will you remember me?

don't let your life pass you by

weep not for the memories

I'm so tired,

but I can't sleep

standing on the edge of something

much too deep

it's funny how I feel so much

but I can not say a word

we are screaming inside oh

but we can't be heard

I will remember you,

will you remember me?

don't let your life pass you by

weep not for the memories

so afraid to love you

more afraid to lose

clinging to a past

that doesn't let me choose

once there was a darkness

a deep and endless night

you gave me everything you had

oh you gave me life

And I will remember you,

will you remember me

don't let your life pass you by

weep not for the memories

weep not for the memories

As he sang, Nick watched Katya and the stranger look at each other and then at the wall in front of them. Suddenly the room was flooded with light and Katya was walking into it with the stranger.

The last words lingered on his lips as the light swallowed Katya and the stranger and they were left in the clinic room, the only light was that of the rising sun poking through the blinds on the window.

Brian and Nick both had tears streaming down their faces without realizing it and reached out for each other, hugging at the end of the bed that cradled the shell of their friend. The both faced the window and felt the warmth of the rising sun on their faces. They had spent the entire night there and today was the day that Nick was to be released from the clinic.

Nick left Brian's embrace and leaned over to kiss Katya's still lips softly, "Welcome Home Katya."

Silently Brian and Nick walked the long hallway back to his room and waited for their bandmates to come, an unspoken agreement between the two of them to someday tell their story when the other three were ready to listen.

As Nick was walking out of the clinic later that morning, the staff in the clinic were all abuzz. It wasn't because of the five famous friends that had just left them. No, it was because of the patient at the end of the hall in the long term wing. The girl who stubbornly clung to life had finally lost the fight, but that wasn't what had them talking.

It was the smile on Katya's face.

Never, in three years, had anything garnered a reaction from her, but now a smile played eternally about her lips the and secret of what had brought it on locked inside two souls on opposite sides of a great divide who would one day meet again.

It was a beautiful day in May as Nick sat on the dock that stretched out into the ocean from his house. His golden hair shone in the sun, no longer in the bowl like cut that he had made famous, it was shorn more closely to his head and revealed that behind the boyish hair, Nick had grown up while no one was looking. His feet were submersed up to his ankles as he slowly swung his legs back and forth creating small waves among the bigger ones working their way in from the horizon.

The cd was finished and was only waiting now for it's release date. Their first single, "I Want It That Way" was burning up the airwaves and Nick was enjoying the last few days of calm before the chaos of the record release took over his life.

The Florida sunshine warmed his shoulders and arms, the flesh not used to being exposed to the elements. Ever since being released from the clinic, he had to be careful to always wear long sleeved shirts or have an armband or something around his wrist to hide the scar that creeped up his arm from his wrist. He raised his arm and looked at the thin embossed line of pink flesh that was the still healing scar. He smiled as he let his arm down. Kevin had been dragging him to the gym lately and he had to smile at the irony of working so hard to get his body in the decent shape it was in and then not being able to even bare his arms because of the scar on his wrist. He chuckled at the thought of the theories going around about why he was so reluctant to show some skin. There was the Brian influence ones, but by far his favorite was the one that was going around saying he refrained from all drinking, sex and even bare arms because he was going to enter the priesthood after the next BSB album was released. He rolled his eyes at the thought. "If they only knew."

He looked out over the ocean lost in his thoughts. He started humming to himself one of the songs off their new cd and then abruptly stopped when he realized what it was. The Perfect Fan. Merely the thought of the song drove a sharp pain through his heart. Even though it had been written before Brian had known of the whole mess that Nick's family life had turned into, Brian had offered to pull the song from being considered for the cd.

Nick just couldn't let him do that, he knew how proud Brian was of it, even going back to Kentucky to record a choir as the backup vocalists on the song. Instead of pulling the song, Nick and management struck a compromise. The song would go on the cd, but under no circumstances was Nick to do vocals for it. Instead, the producers had him recording I Need You Tonight as it was easily the most popular and requested of the solo songs that each Backstreet Boy had performed during the last tour. (author's note: Go get your copy of Millennium and you will see that Nick truly is nowhere to be found on the song The Perfect Fan) For the three days that the other four recorded the song, Nick couldn't even go inside the studio during playbacks, it just upset him too much.

The slap of paper against skin brought him back from his thoughts and he looked down into his hands seeing the envelope gripped in his hands. He closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths to calm the icy fingers that seemed to be poking at his gut from the inside. He opened them again and slowly slid the folded paper from where it had lain untouched for months now.

It was time. There would never be a day he was truly ready to face this, but the sunlight on his arms and the gentle sounds of the ocean gave him the courage that he lacked. His hands shook slightly as he unfolded the paper and Jane Carter's handwriting attacked Nick with memories of childhood notes to the teacher excusing absence and of gift tags on birthday presents.

He smiled softly as he remembered her hands as she soothed away childhood scrapes and bruises and the way those hands would always make him feel better by just holding him close and rubbing over his back or smoothing his hair. He remembered the birthday parties where her writing was on the tags of the colorfully wrapped presents and where every cake, every year was made with lots of chocolate and lots of love.

He looked down at the paper in his hands and carefully folded it back up and put it back in the envelope, unread. With a breath slowly drawn in and let out, he got to his feet and walked back up the dock to the house, leaving the sunshine behind him. Someday, Nick thought, but not today.

There was silence. Stunned silence. All eyes were on him and he was at a loss for what to do. Then he remembered what was in his hands. He thrust his hand forward, bearing a sunflower.

Another hand came out to meet his and took the offering from it, hesitantly.

Before the hand could be withdrawn, he gripped it tightly in his own and pulled the owner of the arm closer to him. He wrapped his arms around what had always meant comfort to him and sighed.

There was a lot to be worked out, a lot of talking and listening to do, but right now something needed to be said above all else.

"Happy Mother's Day, Momma."

Jane Carter's eyes dripped tears onto the shoulder of Nick, the son she thought she had lost forever, as she held him so tight that her shoulders ached. One by one, every member of the Carter family joined the embrace, starting with Bob and ending with Angel.

Jane's hands rubbed over his back and smoothed down his golden hair in a gesture that comforted both of them and together they started again, a new beginning.

THE END