Title: Trying To Remember
Author: Granitite Stone, granitite@yahoo.com
Disclaimer: If they were mine, would I be writing fanfiction? There is no malicious intent in this story, I know nothing about these men's real lives.
Rating: R
Summary: AJ attempts to recover a lost memory.

Howie had that look on his face. That well-fucked look that AJ was coming to hate. It was driving him nuts. Who was he always talking to? This was the last straw. "I'm going to chuck that cell right out the window if you don't hang up, D."

He looked up, and noticed that AJ was serious. "Gotta go, man. See you in a few?" He smiled again, and hung up. "Okay, what crawled up your ass?"

"Who is she?"

"She who?" Howie seemed genuinely confused.

"The girl you fly in or out to ever few weeks, but I never see. The one you're always on the phone with! The one the guys give me funny looks about when I ask her name, that's who!"

Howie laughed. "AJ, do you remember the month of April at all?"

Silence. "No."

"Oh." Howie had the good grace to turn red. "You walked in on us. More than once."

"I don't remember that?" AJ started shifting through the fragments.

"You claimed that I had not only scarred you for life, but that I was betraying the group. When you said that in front of Nick, he broke his hand trying to break your face. I think he misunderstood what you meant, but personally, you needed that black eye."

The black eye he remembered, but hadn't they been arguing about... He couldn't remember. "Howie, I can't imagine you doing anything could scar me."

"Actually, I think it was what he was doing to me that shocked you."

"He?" It was official, AJ had walked into the twilight zone.

"When you started ranting about how wrong it was, Nick had no idea it was the guy you didn't like, not the fact that he was a guy." Howie wondered if he'd broken AJ.

"He?" AJ shook it off. "He who?"

"After what we went through the first time? No way, AJ, you figure it out yourself." Howie pulled back the curtain separating them from the driver. "Mr. McLean is going back to his own bus now."

"What if I never figure it out?"

"Thirty days. You figure it out, I buy you dinner. You don't, I'll tell."

It was someone in the industry, that much was obvious. Someone most likely in their own genre, or else he wouldn't have called Howie a traitor. It was driving him nuts, and the other guys thought it was hilarious. They refused to even give him a hint, saying it violated the bet. Yeah, they were getting some big laughs off him. AJ forgot who his best friend's screwing. Ha fucking ha.

Someone from 98^o? No, they weren't at all the award ceremonies where Howie had come home smug. Maybe he was wrong, maybe it was someone outside of pop. Of course, everyone had been at the VMA's so that was no help.

Currently, he was hiding on Nick's bus, getting his ass handed to him at video games. Nick's cell started ringing. "Answer that for me?" His eyes were glued to a race.

"Sure. Hello?" Before he could get another word out, the man on the other end took off.

"Nick, man. Howie isn't answering his phone, so I need some info from you. I got a free day tomorrow. What city are you going to be in?"

AJ mumbled the answer, in shock. He'd never even considered... He hung up the phone, and turned to Nick. "You've got to be kidding me."

Nick finished in first place. "Who was it?"

"Howie's man."

"He's gonna kill me." Nick groaned.

"Not if I get to him first. What the hell is he thinking? How long has this been going on?"

"Since I was old enough to be told Howie wasn't exactly as straight as an arrow."

"Couldn't he have done better than.. than..."


"Than Chris Kirkpatrick?" AJ shuddered. "God, I'd prefer he was doing Marylyn Manson."

"Now that's a scary picture. AJ, they've been together on and off since college. They broke up when we dragged him off to Europe, but after Nsync hit the states they hooked back up again. Come on, tell me you don't see them at the award shows."

"I must be fucking blind." AJ just shook his head in disbelief. "Chris Kirkpatrick."