Lois covered her mouth with her hand, fighting back the laughter that was threatening to engulf the room. The last thing she needed was to be caught.
Getting herself under control, she resumed her reading.
She had gotten to work in plenty of time for her eleven o'clock meeting that morning, only to find out it had been pushed back to three that afternoon. She quickly went over the plans and paperwork for that meeting, freeing up her morning.
Now, with nothing important to do with her time, she was doing was she always did when she was bored.
She was surfing the Internet.
Sure, she could probably find other projects that needed her attention. Sarah down the hall had been bugging Lois for weeks to help her out with a floor plan for a hotel lobby, but Lois had been putting it off. She had other buildings that could use some more work, but right now she needed something to completely get her mind off her troubles.
After a very long shower, she had began to feel normal again. Well, as normal as she could feel.
She was still rather concerned about the comments Lauren had made that morning regarding Joey and Rae. It was almost as if she was implying that Lois was a jealous ex or something, which was ridiculous. To Lois, anyway.
She needed time away from the real world, to escape into her own realm of reality with people she could always trust and tell everything to.
The LD crowd.
Lois had stumbled upon an online NSync message board one day while on tour with the guys. They were in Missouri at a hotel, before the next show the next day, and Lois had taken her vacation time early from work to go on the road with them.
Everyone else was asleep, but Lois was restless. So, instead of laying in her bunk reading, she pulled out Lances laptop and began surfing away.
Out of a state of complete boredom, she had typed in NSync in a search engine to see what would come up.
She enjoyed looking around at some of the fan sites dedicated to the guys. Some were actually pretty good. There were the few sites out there that were mainly teenies rambling away about how they planned on marrying Justin one day, but there was the select few that were truly dedicated to enlightening the online world on the talents of these five men.
Scrolling down the search results, she came across the link to a message board. LiveDaily. She didn't know what made her click that particular link, but it was worth a shot. She had checked out a few other message boards on the guys, but mostly it was teenies with their 'OMG's and crap. That annoyed the hell out of Lois, and she rarely bothered to read any of the rubbish posted.
She checked out a couple of pages of threads on the LD board, and even read a few. Not all the topics were on the guys. Some were just friends talking with friends. Some asking for advice with guys or work. Just general chatting. Of course, there were posts on the guys, but they were generally pretty mature. Nothing that would make her cringe.
In no time, she had signed herself up as an LD member, and was posting away. Since then, she had gotten Lauren, Crystal, Kayla, Mel, Kate, Nikki, and many of her other friends addicted to the board.
Even the guys checked it out from time to time to see what was being said about them.
JC almost died one afternoon when he was scrolling through the pages and came across a thread those title read "Is it just me or is JC gifted, and I dont mean his voice" Needless to say, the guys were still bugging him about. Lois on the other hand, thought it was the funniest thing she had ever read, and still called JC 'Gifty' from time to time.
The LD crowd had become a great group of friends to Lois. They were there for her whenever she needed someone to talk to, and even though they had no idea of her connection to NSync, she felt they knew her better than most of her friends.
Now, reading over a humor post about NSync bedtime rituals, she was fighting back her laughter. She didn't want to get caught surfing the Internet and posting on LD when she should be working. But it was too addicting to just sign off. Its not like she had anything else to do this morning, so she may as well see what everyone was up to.
Smiling at the screen, Lois signed on and posted a message complaining about her trip to the store the night before.
Moments later, several familiar screen names appeared in her thread.
LoisFatone: My Jelly, ya'll!
I got a craving for vanilla ice cream and grape jelly with a sprinkle of skittles,so I head out to walmart,right? Okay, so I get there and I like have to bitchslap the greeter lady to get a cart because she was this 7'8" burly amazon Chyna-gonnabe heifer of a woman that has an extreme and very bizarre taste for carts. I didn't even want one until I realized she wasn't going to give me one. So I snag one from behind her and I take off down to the candy aisle. They're out of Skittles! So I'm sitting there on my ass, digging around the bottom shelves looking for some sort of fruity goodness and all I find is lemonheads,which I luff, but not on ice cream! So I have to rethink my whole craving. Lemonheads rock on sherbert. Okay,so I take my lemonheads and head down the ice cream freezer aisle thing. They have allllll these wonderful ice creams, but only two flavors of sherbert--orange and raspberry. Okay, ew. So I pick the orange. Now I have to go get milk b/c I can't have orange sherbert without pouring milk over it. I go get my milk and then I head down the jelly aisle--my favorite place in the store. They only have one jar of grape!! So I grab it. After that, I go get two Fuji apples cuz I'm out and I need them for breakfast.
I'm half way to the cash registers and I remember I only brought $2.50 with me,so that sucks I can only get one thing. It was like Sophie's Choice, y'all. Have you seen that movie? So sad. I only saw that one part though. But it was a sad part. I choose the jelly b/c I luff jelly and there's so many things to do with it.
I pay for the jelly and I shove the cart at burly man-woman and I run out before her chest hair stretches out to web me.
I'm running,right? I'm running and running out to my car and I keep running b/c dammit I can't find my car. There are like seven vehicles in the lot at this time and I can't find mine. At about the third run around, I spot it and I'm running to it and I run into one of those cart rail things. You know what I'm talking about? They're the place on the parking lot where you can put your shopping carts? I ran into one of those rails. I managed to save myself, but my jelly....my jelly is gone...
I was looking forward to that jelly,too. The only thing we have to eat here is bologna and corn tortillas. We don't even have any hot sauce for the tortillas!
We do have ice cream cones,though. That rocks. I think I'll make a cone fajita.
So whatchall doin?
Looking back on what she had written, Lois almost laughed at herself. She really did ramble a lot. Drumming her fingers on her desk, she waited for someone to reply.
*Krazy*4*Kaos* : Mmkay, Im not gonna laugh.............
not gonna laugh.......not gonna laugh.......not gonna laugh.......not gonna laugh.......not gonna laugh.......not gonna laugh.......not gonna laugh.......not gonna laugh.......not gonna laugh.......not gonna laugh.......not gonna laugh.......not gonna laugh.......not gonna laugh.......not gonna laugh.......not gonna laugh.......
*lmao*
Mmkay, I sowy, but you tell the funny sheot!
*hands Lois a jar of jelly*
Lois laughed, before typing in her reply.
LoisFatone: *cradles the jar of jelly*
Jellllllllllllly. I luff you,jelly.
Thankee,Krazy Girl
After talking about jelly for a while, and complaining that she was now having yet another craving, Lois decided to check out some other topics.
Scanning the list of current users, Lois grinned.
Typing quickly, she chuckled to herself as she watched the screen.
LoisFatone: Lala, you focker
Waiting patiently for Lauren to reply, Lois smiled at herself. It didn't take long for Lauren to come back with a simple reply.
Just*Njoying*Nsync: Focker
That was all it took. Moments later, Lauren, Lois, Nicki, Nikki, Kayla, Suzy, and Mel were all calling each other fockers.
On LiveDaily, swear words were starred out, so this was their way of being able to swear at each other without the annoying presence of stars.
LoisFatone: Nikki, shouldn't you be working?
rockstar3388: So? Nothing exciting is going on here. You know who isn't around for me to pinch his fine ass
Lois laughed out loud as she replied.
LoisFatone: Lala, did you get J out of the house this morning?
Since none of the LD crowd knew that Lois was associated with the guys, it was better to talk to those of them that did know the guys using code names. Nikki, Lauren, Lois, Kayla and Mel all frequently visited the board, and sometimes talked about the guys. Using different names, it kept the other members from knowing who they were talking about.
But truthfully, who would believe them anyway? Like a friend of NSync would really be visiting and online message board dedicated to them. Whatever.
*Just*Njoying*Nsync: Nope, hes reading over my shoulder. :rollseyes:
Moments later, Lauren posted again.
*Just*Njoying*Nsync: Shut up Lolo! I made you breakfast and didn't even burn it or anything! Focker!
This caused Lois to burst out laughing in hysterics at the thought of Justin typing away angrily at the computer under Laurens screen name. It made her wonder how many times Justin did that without Lauren knowing.
Suddenly, a new user came into the conversation.
MafHoney: Lois, pick up line two
Lois smirked at the screen as she typed.
LoisFatone: Crystal, get off and get back to work!
MafHoney: Like you are right now?
Lois could hear Crystal laughing on the other side of her office door, and quickly signed off of LiveDaily after assuring everyone she would be able later that night.
The moment she signed off, her office door opened and Crystal entered the office with a knowing smile on her face.
"I knew as soon as I heard you laughing in here that you were on LD, you sneak." she grinned.
"So? What else do I have to do this morning? Nothing." Lois pouted. "Focker."
"So, Justin made you breakfast, huh?" Crystal asked as she sat in the chair in front of Lois' desk.
"Yeah. It wasn't bad. He didn't burn anything, so I guess thats a plus." Looking over at her phone, she realized that line two was still tied up. "Who is on line two?" she asked.
Crystal grinned evilly. "Brian." she stated.
Lois couldn't help her eyes from popping out of her head just a little. "What does he want?"
"To talk to you, I presume." Crystal grinned as she stood up from the chair and headed back towards the door. "Oh, and tell Justin to stop PMing me and asking me what color I use to dye my hair!"
Lois only grinned in response, her eyes still locked on the tiny light signally the occupied line.
Reaching out, she picked up the receiver and pushed the button for line two.
"Hello?" she called through the line.
"Hey, Lois." Brians cheerful voice answered. "Are you busy?"
"Not really." she replied, leaning back in her chair. "Just going over a few papers." she lied.
"Oh." There was a short silence before Brian spoke up again. "Listen, I was wondering if you wanted to catch lunch again today? I know its kind of short notice, but it was worth a shot."
Lois grinned at the nervous tone in his voice. The fact that he was actually nervous that she would say no made her smile even larger.
"Of course. I would love to go to lunch again." she smiled back.
If it was at all possible, she could have sworn she could see him smile through the phone.
"Great." he responded quickly. "Pick you up in an hour?"
"Sure."
Saying their good byes, Lois hung the phone up and leaned back further in her chair.
She had spent the majority of her night last night thinking of Joeys date with Rae. It had made her feel anxious and upset, but she couldn't seem to figure out why. Maybe it was because he seemed to be getting further along on his side of the bet, and that was what was bothering her?
Deep down, she didn't really believe this theory, but right now it was all she had and the best thing she could come up with, so she was rolling with it.
So, if that was the case, then she better get working harder on her side of the bet.
Even if she didnt really believe her current assumption as to why she was feeling upset, it gave her incentive. If she focused more on Brian and her side of the bet, then she wouldnt have time to think of Joey and his actions. It was something to distract her mind, and keep her from thinking things she didnt really want to be thinking about in the first place.
It was the only thing to keep her sane. As if she wasnt already insane after spending as much time with Justin as she did.
Never the less, she knew what she had to do.
Smiling over to the picture of Joey on her desk, Lois sighed.
She had to keep her mind off him. Because the last thing she wanted was to actually have to feel what she was beginning to think she was feeling.
