Still, as the bus pulled away and she sat down on her bunk, she could not shake the terrible sensation she was feeling about this trip. Here she was, on tour with the Backstreet Boys, every girl’s dream, but she wasn’t happy. Oh, well. It was too late to back out now, not that she would have been able to back out at any time. When her editor got an idea in his mind, he assigned a reporter to it, and if that reporter didn’t do it, he or she was basically screwed. It wouldn’t have done her any good to turn this assignment down. Now she realized she might as well make the best of it, so she shoved any negative feelings to the back of her mind.
“Hey, Liz,” Nick said, plopping down next to her on the bed and interrupting her train of thought. “Sorry to bother you, but I need some advice from a girl.”
“Ooh, Nick Carter is having girl problems, and he’s coming to me for help,” she teased. “No problem. What do you need?”
“Remember, I told you about that dancer, Andrea?” he asked. “And how I have a date with her on Friday during the day?”
“Yeah, I think you mentioned something about that.” Suddenly, an incredible feeling of disappointment flowed through her at the thought of him dating another girl. But then, before she even managed to figure out what it was, it disappeared as quickly as it showed up.
“Where should I take her? I wanna do something romantic, but appropriate for a first date.”
“Hmmm…I would say a picnic. That’s something cute to do on a first date if the weather’s nice. If the weather’s not nice, then you could just take her to lunch.”
“You really think so?”
“I don’t know. I’m not good at this date stuff. That would make me happy. That was what Joel and I did on our first date, I mean, the picnic thing, not just going out to lunch.” Suddenly, she seemed to go into a trance, but she quickly came back to reality.
“You really miss him, don’t you?” Nick asked.
“I guess so. I don’t know. I feel like something’s missing in my life – possibly from my relationship, but I’m not sure. I’m wondering if maybe I’m missing love. Maybe I’m not actually in love with him, but I never noticed it before when he was around. I don’t know. Something’s not there.”
“You’re probably just missing having him with you.”
“You’re right, I’m sure. I love him. I know I do.”
A call from Brian in the other room interrupted them. “Hey, Frack, you wanna play Nintendo?”
“Yeah, sure, I’ll be there in a minute!” Nick replied. He looked at Liz. “Thanks for the advice. I’ll see you later!”