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Jess had left the hospital to take a break and get a few
things for herself and for Nick. As she was standing in the
checkout lane at the store, her eyes scanned the magazines.
She stopped abruptly when she saw The National Enquirer.
Pasted on the front cover, actually it was the front cover,
was a picture of Nick as he was lowering himself into the
wheelchair. Under the picture was the captioning: Nick
Carter, Backstreet Boys, will they be able to handle it
without him?



Jess grabbed the magazine and decided to buy the
copy. She was angry when she looked at that picture and was
trying to figure out when it was taken. As she looked
closer at the picture, she saw that Nick was wearing his
Miami Dolphins jersey and realized that this was when they
did the MTV interview. Someone had taken that picture
during a commercial break. The media was allowed in that
room but someone took the privledge one step further and
intruded on his privacy.



As the cashier was scanning the magazine, she made
an idle comment to Jessica, “Isn’t that a shame about that
boy?”


Jess simply smiled at the cashier. She didn’t
feel the need to respond. She paid her and left the store.
When Jess got into her car, she pulled the magazine out of
the bag and thumbed through it until she got to the article
about Nick. While she read it, she was shocked to find all
of the lies that were laced through it:



Nick Carter of the Backstreet Boys was critically
injured in a car accident early in June. The other driver
was killed when he ran a stop light and struck Carter. Nick
was rushed to the hospital and was in a coma for more than a
week. Once he awoke from his coma, doctors determined that
he had irreversible brain damage. His career with the
Backstreet Boys has been shattered since the accident has
left Nick paralyzed from the chest down.



Jess felt sickened reading the article. It had so
many lies in it. There were pictures of Nick in the article
of him laying in the hospital bed with the tubes in his
mouth, “How did they get that?” Jess wondered. It bothered
her to think that people at the hospital would do anything
for the glory of money. They had pictures of Nick with the
group and more pictures of Nick at the interview and it
looked like they enhanced the bruises on his eyes. “I hope
Nick doesn’t see this.” Jess thought to herself.



She decided to drive over to Brian’s and see what
he was up to. It felt good to be away from the hospital for
a while. Nick insisted that she go out and take a break
while he went to physical therapy. It looked like such a
nice day outside, it didn’t take much to convince her to do
so.



Back at the hospital, Nick was finished with his
physical therapy for the day. It was an especially
difficult session for Nick. The occupational therapist was
teaching him how to do normal day to day tasks in a hospital
room that was set up like a house. The one task he had to
try to do that hit him hard was practice getting himself in
and out of a car. They had a “car” on the therapy floor and
Nick had to practice moving himself from the chair to a car
seat and then back again. It upset him to think that he
would have to learn how to do something like that. He was
planning on walking out of the hospital.



“Oh, by the way, Nick, you will be getting your
chair delivered to your room today, maybe it will be here by
the time we get back.” The therapist sounded a little too
happy about the chair.



Nick tried to figure out what she was talking
about. He didn’t order anything special, he decided to just
blow off what she was talking about, he figured that she was
just rambling on about nothing.



“Ah, here we are, room 6265.” The female orderly
said as they walked past the security guard. “My, you sure
do have a lot of nice flowers. I don’t think I’ve ever seen
this many in a room at one time.”



“Yup.” Nick didn’t feel like being sociable.



“Are you okay here or did you want help back
into----”


“I’m fine.” Nick cut her off. He was getting
irritated about being helped to do this and that.



“Okay, have a nice day.” As she turned her back
to Nick, he wagged his hand back and forth as if to help her
out the door. He sat in the chair for a moment and looked
around the room. His eyes fell on the unfamiliar sight of
the new chair the therapist had talked about. It was a
modified wheelchair, it didn’t have armrests so it was more
accessible to use your arms to move the wheels.



“Well, isn’t that just special.” Nick sputtered.
He decided to lay down. He started to let his mind wander.



Well, um that’s been postphoned right now
indefinately. We were to start touring the first of July in
Amsterdam, but Nick would not be able to tour right now, so
we’ll have to wait until he gets better.......The tour would
be too much of a strain on Nick?..........Oh, by the way
Nick, you’ll be getting your new chair today.......This is
the way you need to scooch yourself to get from the chair
into the car....


The tears were flowing down his cheeks and
stinging his eyes. “I am holding my friends back, what am I
thinking? I’m never going to get better. I’m never going
to dance or sing again. I’m nothing.”


Nick turned the television on hoping that it would
clear his thoughts. The newsprogram American Journal was on
and ironically, it was showing The Backstreet Boys on stage.
Nick turned the volume up:



The Backstreet Boys have been riding high on the
charts and have recently released their new album,
Millenium. Tragically, on June 19, Nick Carter was involved
in a car accident that claimed the life of another driver.
Nick has been hospitalized since the accident, but yesterday
was with the group when they were interviewed by MTV.


As the woman was talking, they were showing
pictures of the group, the accident scene and the MTV
interview with Nick and the guys. The next picture they
showed stunned Nick while he listened to the announcer:



No one is sure when or if Carter will ever be able
to tour with the group again. The accident has left him
paralyzed and unable to use his legs.


The picture that was on the screen was Nick during
a break on the MTV interview moving from the wheelchair and
into the chairs they had set up for the song.



His voice shaking while he sang with the group,
Carter was visibly nervous. We will keep you updated when
we find out more about this Backstreet Boy.



Nick shut the television off. He pressed his
nurse call button and waited for her to come into the room.



“Can I help you?” It was Tiffany, his afternoon
nurse.



“Can I get something for pain?” Nick asked.



“How bad is it?” The nurse asked as she
approached his bedside.


“I want a shot, no pills, I waited too long to ask
for something and now it hurts bad.” Nick lied to her. He
wasn’t hurting that badly, he just wanted the shot.



“Okay, I’ll check your chart and be back in a
second.” She left the room.



Nick reached over to his bedstand and grabbed his
glass of icewater. Slowly he opened the drawer to the table
and pulled out a tissue that was wadded up into a ball. He
unwrapped the tissue and exposed a handful of twelve pain
pills he had stashed aside. Without hesitation, he put them
in his mouth and swallowed them with a mouthful of water.
Just as he set the cup down, Tiffany came back into the room
with a syringe.



“You haven’t had an injection in a few days, this
may make you a little sleepy.” Tiffany said as she inserted
the needle into Nick’s thigh.



“That’s what I’m hoping for.” Nick smiled at her.
Tiffany, unknowing what he had done smiled back at him.


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