Swollen Issues - Chapter 21
Bang... Bang
The knocking on Nicks door was pounding at the same rate as his headache. Persistent
and loud.
"Hold your horses," Nick mumbled while sitting on the toilet. Heīd woken up a while ago
with a terrible hangover. The nausea wasnīt that bad, instead cramps had wracked his
body and he was forced to spend some time on the toilet.
Maybe it was really a case of food poison after all, Nick decided. At least it was a bad case
of the flu, if anything else, that was for sure. But scenes were haunting him. He had a
vague memory that heīd been pissed drunk last night at the dinner party. He had no real
memory over what had been going on. All he remembered was singing, being sick and
then bawling his eyes out.
"God, I hope that I did nothing that I will regret," he sighed loudly. He knew that this PR
tour was important for the boys. A gut feeling told him that heīd really made an ass of
himself. He just knew it.
The presistent knocking, rather, banging on the door continued, followed by a loud
"NICK"
"Iīm coming... Iīm coming," Nick flushed the toilet, washed his hands and moved over to
the door clad only in his boxers. His head hurt like a bitch and as he walked he was
starting to wonder what the hell had been in his drink. Could it have been spiked? The way
he felt it could be a safe bet, that or food poisoning.The latter he had tried and that was no
picnic.
"Jeezez, canīt a man take a shit in peace?" he blurted out as he was opening the door.
Bruce was standing outside, newspaper in hand, fuming." Nick!!", he growled.
"Yeah, shhhh," Nick opened up the door a crack so that Bruce could slip in then he
walked as careful as he could back to his bed, laying down covering his face with an arm.
He felt like hell. His throat was bothering him too, at his neck was sostiff that he had
trouble laying down.
"You better drop that attitude Carter," Bruce shouted, "That could have been a fan for
crying outloud."
"Yeah..but it wasnīt," Nick defended himself, squinting as he tried to block out the
daylight. " ould you keep it down?" he murmured. If yesterdays headache been bad this
was nothing compared to what he felt today.
Nicks words made Bruce throw a fit. And quiet was not the word to describe the
volume."What the fuck are you saying? You little shit, take a look at these headlines and I
wanna see if you are being such a smart ass!" With that Bruce threw the papers on Nick.
"I will later on, Bruce donīt yell. I donīt feel too good," Nick winced, grabbing his head in
the process.
"No wonder you were totally wasted not to mention that you completely screwed up.
Read the headlines!" Bruce was so angry that Nick was expecting his eyeballs to start
glowing any second.
"Yeah, yeah.. Nick tried to sit up. Everything hurt so bad. Even his balls. Oh especially
his balls. He grabbed the paper and started to read the headlines, getting paler as he read
on.
"Oh my God," Nick whispered, covering his mouth. He couldnīt believe it. There he was
in his worst or maybe best form and all over the page. Not on one, but several papers.
Pictures of him. Bad ones!
"Iīm so sorry, so sorry," he murmured silently, tears glistering in his eyes as he read on.
Gone was the boy with the cocky attitude. Found was a young boy, looking positively ill,
shaking his head slowly, ready to weep.
Even if Bruce had worked up a temper coming up to Nicks room he couldnīt help to calm
down when he saw the miserable state that Nick was in. He was as white as a sheet, his
throat was twice as big and he looked like he was in severe pain. He was shivering slightly
even if he was once again covered underneath the sheets.
Pushing his human side away he continued to scold Nick, " Have you any idea what this
will do to the band?. Now youīre getting your ass up and do the schedule as you are
suppose too!
"Bruce, I really donīt feel too good," Nick whimpered.
"That you should have thought of when you had all those drinks." No mercy was shown
by Bruce as he continued. "And eleven oclock we have a press conference and donīt
think that you can skip it. There we are going to deny that youre using drugs and we say
that you had an allergic reaction. That would count for your behavoir as well as that
strange swelling that you have on your neck," Bruce stated as he pointed at Nickīs neck.
"And," he continued, " We can even throw in that you ate something bad too. Letīs hope
that the press will buy this or else your ass is gonna burn like hell! That, Nick Carter, I will
personally see too!"
Nick sat in silence. Nodding. Listening to what his PR manager had to say. He couldnīt
deny anything since he didnīt remember a shit from last night. Yet he was smart enough to
understand the seriousness in these kind of headlines. It was bad publicity and that was
something that the management hated.
"And Carter. You better do something about that weight. It looks like you have eaten a
basketball!"
Ok Bruce, rub it in. Nick felt so bad hearing Bruce scolding him like he was some kind of
kid. Still, he had no strength to take up the fight, besides he knew when to be quiet. And
this was such a time!
"Now get dressed and be down in the breakfast room within five. Understand?" Bruce said
shortly and then he left the room as quickly as he had came.
Shit Shit Shit!!!! Nick moaned. " How the fuck could I be so stupid?" Nick shouted,
imediately regretting the volume of his voice. He banged his hand against his head. Only
adding more pain to his already bad headache. But he didnīt care. Pain. He deserved pain!
Now he was not only jeapordizing his own carrier, but also the bands. His fellow band
members. His brothers and that was something that he couldnīt forgive himself. Nick had
always been very caring about the boys. He wanted them to be well and when AJ had
admitted that he had a drug problem this had really shook up him. And when Brian was
going through surgery Nick had become really depressed. Everything that hurt the band
also effected Nick. In a deep way.
And now something was about to hurt the band.Something that he was his fault. Lately
Nick had wanted to drop out of the band. Being sick and tired of the road life. Traveling
from city to city, country to country. Never relaxing. Always being on the edge, the edge
to his own sanity.But as the band was heading towards new problems Nick could feel that
he really didnīt want to drop out .After all, the boys were his family. His older brothers
and he loved them so much.
Nick groaned as he sat up in bed. Everything ached and it felt like he was starting to run a
fever. The shivering was pretty bad and he couldnīt contribute it all to having a hangover.
Something was wrong with his health. He just knew it.
As he was getting into his black jeans, he yelped from pain. His testicles hurt so much that
he had to skip that part of clothing. Instead he threw on his black nike sweat pants.
What the hell did I do last night?, he wondered, thinking that he had made a score with
some chick not remembering it. It felt like that in his balls. Shivering he put on a black
hooded sweater over his T-shirt and the dragged a comb through his hair. Staring in the
mirror he jerked. Shit, he looked like crap. Sheer and utter crap!
He stroked his hand over the swollen neck, feeling that it was pretty stiff. It reminded him
that when he had that bad case of strep throat over in Texas. It had been so bad that he
couldnīt eat for a whole week and he recognized that feeling.
Shit, not strep throat!!! When would this misery end???
As if he wasnīt hurt enough Nick could feel his stomach cramp up again and he had to run
to the bathroom once more. "Shoot me now," he mumbled, holding his head in his hands
while his stomach was doing flip flops.This was bad and Nick had a feeling that this was
just the beginning.
Chapter 22