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Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Thirty-One



The crowd was roaring so loudly, that Jessica’s ears popped. She instinctively put her hands to her ears to try and protect her hearing. She couldn’t believe the volume that was coming all the way to the back stage.

The house lights went down and the strobe lights were cued up. The crowd again went wild. Jess even felt a little excited herself. It was hard not to get caught up in the moment.

The Star Wars was starting. Jess watched the back of the autditorium. The guys appeared from nowhere on boards and were literally soaring above the crowd. Girls were screaming and jumping up and down with excitement. Some of the girls were crying. Jess smiled to herself. She knew these guys so well that it was funny seeing girls crying when they saw them.

They landed on the stage with perfection. Nick glanced over in the direction where Jess was standing offstage and he smiled and winked at her. Jess gave him a “thumbs up” sign and smiled back.

It had taken Nick several months to get to where he was finally at now. This was the comeback concert and was Nick’s first concert since the car accident. This was a special concert for him. He had been working faithfully with his speech therapist for several months. He still was having some weakness and difficulty with his speech when he got tired, but Nick insisted that they go ahead with the concert. They cut the time down from one and a half hours to one hour. The guys told Nick if he was getting too tired to devise some type of signal that would let them know. They also were going to carry Nick if his voice was failing him. Nick would just mouth the words while they sang.

The first song went on smoothly. When it was finished, the guys introduced themselves to the crowd. Some fans listened quietly while others were still screaming. Nick was the last one to introduce himself.

“Hi, I’m Nick Carter,” Nick started quietly, screams went up. At this point, Nick would usually raise his voice to be heard, but he knew that was something that he couldn’t do.

Howie, Kevin, Brian and AJ made motions to get the crowd to quiet down. It worked, the crowd was almost too quiet and it made Nick nervous.

“Um, I want to say I have been looking forward to coming back to Orlando,” Nick spoke softly and nervously.

A group of girls screamed out, “We love you Nick.”

Nick laughed into the headset, “I love you too. I want to thank someone very special to me for helping me through this,” Nick looked off to the stage where Jess was standing. He motioned for her to come out onto the stage. Jess looked at him in horror and shook her head no. “Comeon, I want you to come out here,” Nick was persistant.

Brian walked over towards Jess, there was no way to escape. Brian grabbed her arm and put his arm around her waist. The crowd started screaming again. “This is Jessica. She has been by my side through this whole thing.” Nick turned towards her. “I love you, Jess.” He gave her a very long and passionate kiss which made the crowd go crazy. Jess stood there blushing with her mouth dropped open. Her knees felt like rubber. Nick smiled and then laughed. “Hey, Brian, I’ll be right back.” Nick put his arm around Jess and walked her back offstage. He grabbed her around the waist and gave her another kiss. “I’ll be back soon, okay?”

Jess nodded, she couldn’t say a word to him. She stood back and watched the show. It had taken Nick a long time to get where he was with his voice. There were many months of practice of trying to perfect his voice again so that the words would come out perfect. Once he got his pronounciation down pat, Nick had to work with bringing his voice out so that he could be heard without whispering. His voice still had a tendancy to become light when he was tired, but that was coming along with time.

Jess was still concerned that Nick was taking up more than he was ready for. His left leg still had some slight weakness and the doctors said that there had been some permanent nerve damage to the leg, they weren’t sure if the damage was from the car accident or from the clots caused from the fall he had taken. Sometimes Nick became off balanced and would almost fall. She watched nervously as the guys performed the dance routine to “Everybody Backstreet’s Back.” That was a very physical session. As the song was ending, Nick was drenched in sweat. His hair was soaked. Jess could see how tired he was becoming. Although his voice was starting to grow shakey, Nick was still able to give it his best shot. The fans were still screaming through the entire show, they didn’t seem to notice that anything was amiss with Nick’s voice getting weaker.

Jess quickly backed out of the way as the guys ran past her to change hasitly for the next session. As Nick ran by her, he intentionally smacked her shoulder with his hand. Nick was still being the playful soul, as he always was.

Jessica looked at her watch to see how much longer the concert would be. She could tell that Nick was starting to get more fatigued and she wasn’t sure if he would be able to hold on much longer. She was starting to worry when she found that they had over another thirty minutes before it would end, provided that they didn’t do an encore song.

After they were ready for the next session, they stood by her waiting for everyone to regroup. Nick was the last one out and walked towards them this time instead of running. He was still sweaty and his face looked flushed.

Brian looked at Nick, “You gonna be okay, dude?”

Nick nodded at Brian. He didn’t want to disappoint the fans if he didn’t come back out. Nick knew he only had to make it for 30 more minutes. As the band was starting the intro to the next song, the guys put their headsets back on and prepared to run out onto the stage. Unfortunately for Nick, the song was one that he had all the primary parts. Jess could see the worried look on his face as he ran past her. The band started playing “Quit Playing Games.” Nick took a deep breath as he ran out to the cheering audience. He was hoping that they would scream loud enough that they wouldn’t hear the inconsistencies in his voice.

Jess held her breath when Nick started singing. She knew that he was worried about how he was starting to sound. By the audience reaction to the song, she could tell that they didn’t notice any difference to Nick’s voice. He could have talked his way through the song and they wouldn’t of cared at all.

The guys were watching Nick a little more closely when they did the final song, I Want it That Way. They could see that Nick was exhausted and was getting weak singing his part, it was barely audible. They skipped doing anytype of dance moves and had told Nick before hand that they wouldn’t because they knew he would be beat by the end of the hour.

Thankfully, the song ended without anything happening. Nick and the guys bowed, and where they would usually run off the stage, Brian and AJ walked on either side of Nick to support him. Jess made sure she stayed out of the way and followed them to their dressing room. The fans that had backstage passes had to be honored with their tickets so the show wasn’t actually over yet. Jess forgot about the backstage passes.

Brian and AJ led Nick to a couch so he could sit back and relax. Jess looked at Nick’s face and could see how exhausted he was. His face was red from the heat. Nick motioned for her to sit next to him. Jess complied without any hesitation. She handed a water bottle to him as she sat down. Nick looked as if he had a hard time uncapping the bottle. After he finally got it opened, he drank nearly 3/4 of the bottle without stopping. Jess got up and grabbed another bottle before Nick would have to ask for one.

“How ya doing, buddy?” AJ asked Nick as he walked past the couch.

Nick didn’t respond, he just smiled. The fans that had the passes were starting to file into the room. Jess leaned close to Nick.

“Are you up to this?” She whispered in his ear.

“Got no choice, have to be.” Nick whispered back.

Some of the girls flocked around the couch where Brian had sat down next to Jess. Brian sat back and guzzled his bottle of water, he was hot and sweaty like Nick.

The girls stood in awe of Nick and Brian, they did not say a word but appeared to be taking in every move the guys made, every word they spoke. Jess always thought the backstage stuff was weird, the guys pretty much carried on as if no one different was in the room. If the fans asked them questions or wanted pictures taken or autographs signed, they complied without any questions.

Finally a girl directed a question to Jess. “Are you Brian’s girlfriend, Leighanne?”

Brian chuckled. Jess elbowed him in the side.

“And what would be so funny about that?” She asked Brian.

Brian wasn’t expecting her to elbow him while he was drinking his water and some of the ice cold water spilled out onto his chest.

“Um, nothing, sorry?” Brian looked at Jess and then decided to wink to seal the appology.

“No, sorry, wrong girl.” Jess answered.

“She belongs to Nick.” Brian offered the answer to the girls. Jess hated the way that sounded, it made her feel like a clothing item.

Nick didn’t say a word, he was still busy drinking his water. Jess glanced over at him. He seemed to be okay but she could tell how tired he was. Jess silently prayed that this would be finished soon so she could take him home to rest.

As the fans milled about the room, all of the guys carried on conversations amoungst themselves. AJ and Howie were talking about going golfing tomorrow and Kevin said that sounded good to him and that they should call him before they decide to leave.

Nick was trying very hard to keep awake. It was getting more and more difficult with each passing minute. Jess leaned over and whispered into his ear, “Is there anyway we can just leave?”

Nick shook his head no. As much as he wanted to say yes, he knew he couldn’t do it.

Jess decided to ask Brian if he could do something about the lingering fans. She leaned over to Brian and whispered into his ear, “Brian, Nick is getting so tired and I am getting worried, is there anything you can do to hurry the fans along?”

Brian listened to Jess as he was drinking his water. “Yeah, I can talk to Steve.” Brian got up off the couch and walked over to one of their body guards. After Brian sat down, the body guard clapped his hands several times and announced that it was time for the fans to leave.

All of the girls seemed to sound down and didn’t want to leave. They had been backstage with the guys for over an hour and felt that they were entitled to more time with them.

After the last girl left the room, Nick threw his head back and stared at the ceiling. He didn’t know how or if he would be able to get up off the couch.

“Nick, are you alright?” Jess asked with a concerned tone in her voice.

Nick didn’t answer, he just kept looking up at the ceiling.

“Hey dude, I’m talking to you!” Jess spoke up.

Nick finally looked over to Jess. He still didn’t answer. Jess looked at his droopy eyelids.

“Nick old boy, are you ready to go home?” Brian asked.

Nick smiled faintly. He really would have preferred to sleep where he was.

“Comeon, we’ll help you out to the car.” Brian suggested to Nick.

Nick reluctantly pulled himself up off the couch. When he stood up he took a couple of off balanced steps to the side. If no one knew better he looked like he had been drinking the way he stood. Brian quickly came to the rescue and stood on one side of Nick and AJ came over to the other side.

“Nick, put your arms around our shoulders,” AJ directed.

Nick complied without hesitation. Jess followed them walking towards the garage where their vehicles were parked. She noticed that Nick’s left leg was dragging behind him almost as bad as before he had his surgery. The concerts had always physically drained Nick in the past, but with him just recovering from all that had gone on with him that summer, she knew it was too much for him to handle.

Jess recalled that Nick hadn’t spoke in quite awhile. That was starting to concern her as well. “I’ll just wait until we get in the car,” Jess thought to herself.

The walk to the car seemed to take forever. Thankfully, it was a secured garage so there weren’t any paparrazzi waiting to ambush the group.

Brian and AJ walked Nick over to the passenger side of the green durango. Jess clicked the car alarm on her key ring to unlock the doors. Nick sat in the seat and had to pick his left leg up and put it into the vehicle before he could turn and face the front.

“Thanks guys.” Jess said as she prepared to close Nick’s door.

“Jess, are you driving straight home or what?” Howie asked.

“What do you want to do Nick?” Jess didn’t know if he felt up to the almost two hour ride home or not.

Nick hadn’t even thought about it. They had reservations to spend the night in Orlando at the Disney Resort, the trip home would be long and he could still be in pretty rough shape and need help getting into the house.

“Hey, it’s your call, what do you want to do?” Brian asked.

Nick looked at Brian and then at Jess. He licked his lips to speak outloud. His voice was very hoarse, “Stay.” He didn’t have to try and say it again because Jess automatically told Brian she would follow him to the hotel.

As Jess followed the car out of the garage, she asked Nick how he was feeling. Nick had the seat tilted back and his baseball cap was pulled down over his eyes. He didn’t answer her but put his hand on her leg and patted it as if to reassure her.

“I hope you feel better in the morning, this doesn’t look good.”

Nick managed to whisper back to Jessica faintly, “Me too.”

Chapter 32

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