Forty-five minutes later, the eight women who sat in the audience were
just as entranced with the five men on stage as they'd been when the rehearsal
started. There had been a lot of memory mistakes in the beginning. Then each guy
in turn had stood to the side to watch the others perform the song and dance and
then offered critiques on things that were being done differently. Joey told JC
that he was falling the wrong way at the end. Chris pointed out that Joey was
stepping with the wrong foot in the beginning. Justin saw that Lance was doing
different arms during the chorus. They were like a well-oiled machine. They were
a self-contained unit; they knew what they needed to do and didn't have to have
anyone prodding them on. The drive for excellence was deep within all five of
them.
For Jen, Heather and Janine, this was nothing new. They had seen
the guys practice many times before, had seen the true grit behind the
phenomenon that was *NSYNC and they were still fascinated by it.
For
Maddie, who was still trying to find her niche in this topsy-turvy business, it
was very informative, though she wouldn't be aware of the lesson she was
learning until much later. At the moment, she was too caught up in the magic;
she was enchanted. She felt as if Justin had cast a spell on her: everything he
did seemed to be…not perfect, but…as close to it as you could possibly get. The
way he moved, so full of grace for a man she knew had no formal dance training.
So smooth with such passion. No movement was short-changed but was given as much
strength and power as the next. To Maddie, there was nothing sexier than a man
who could dance, a man who had total control over his body to produce the fine
movements and actions that combined to become the dance. But it was his facial
expressions that were killing her. She knew it was intentional the way his eyes
kept straying to hers, the way he kept licking his lips ever-so-slowly, drawing
his tongue against his mouth. It was ironic, it was trite, it was downright
corny, but she really did feel as if Justin was singing every word to her.
He was. He was glad the house lights had been kept up. He'd spotted her
at the beginning of practice, right after Chris's comment. He knew the other
girls were there but he didn't take any note of them. Maddie's gaze was on him
and that's all he knew. He liked the feel of her eyes on him. And it was a
feeling. He felt it as surely as he felt the sweat running down the small of his
back. He was surprised he hadn't messed up. He was jumpy, nervous, anxious
knowing that in just a little bit, as soon as rehearsals were over, he'd be able
to talk to her, hold her…kiss her. That last thought caused his mind to blank as
he remembered the inferno their last kiss had created inside him. Thankfully,
his body was so accustomed to the dance at this point, it could perform it
flawlessly even when his mind was miles away. He forced himself to concentrate
on what he was doing.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Madison and the
rest of the ladies watched as they ran through the show one last time. It was
damned near flawless. When it was over, they gave the guys a standing ovation.
They made a lot of noise, considering there were only eight of them. They guys
milked it for all it was worth, bowing and hamming it up to egg the girls on.
They kept it up until the stage manager brought the lighting guy to talk to them
about the effects he wanted to use during their show.
Maddie sat back in
her seat. She was happy for them. They were going to rock. MTV had been heavily
advertising the fact that this was *NSYNC's first televised performance of It's
Gonna Be Me, not realizing or not caring how much pressure they were putting on
them to have an awesome show.
"Madison Morse?"
Maddie turned her
head to see a statuesque blonde woman in a lime green power suit standing at the
end of the row.
"Kristy?"
"Jen." The woman said the name flatly
as if it left a bad taste in her mouth. "I figured you'd be here."
"What
are you doing here?" Jen countered.
"I'm working." Her tone implied that
Jen should be like-wise employed.
Jen looked to Heather. "What the
hell?"
"Madison, may I speak with you for a moment, please?"
Maddie saw the animosity between the two women and wondered about it.
Even though she hadn't known Jen for that long and didn't really know her that
well, she still felt loyal to her and anyone who was on Jen's bad side was on
her bad side. So she wasn't especially interested in hearing whatever this
Kristy-person had to say. She shot Jen an inquisitive look as she got up to
follow Kristy. Jen shrugged her shoulders, rolled her eyes and pointedly turned
away. Maddie heard her mumbling to herself.
"I apologize for that,
Jennifer and I have a history. My name is Kristina Murray and I work for Dean
Waters."
Maddie blinked at her.
"Mr. Waters owns the firm that
Jive Records uses for advertising and some public relations work."
Maddie continued to silently regard the woman.
Kristy realized
that her enmity towards Jen might make for bad relations with Madison. "OK, so,
Jive has come up with some concepts to promote your new tour. I've already
spoken with your manager and he told me to ask you-"
"Tour?" Maddie
broke her silence.
"Yes, I know you haven't made a definite decision
about who to tour with and when and that's what I wanted to talk to you about.
Nothing has to be decided today, we just wanted to pitch this to you guys, give
y'all a chance to think about it. "
"Y'all?"
"Yes, this involves
both you and *NSYNC."
"Mmhmm." Maddie pursed her lips as she thought.
"So basically you want me to tour with *NSYNC?"
"You're touring with
us?" Maddie jumped at the unexpected sound of Joey's voice behind her. She'd
been so caught up in the drama of Kristy's arrival and announcement had caused
that she hadn't noticed when they left the stage. "That would so be the bomb!"
"Right on," Chris seconded. "But I thought you didn't wanna tour with
us."
"It's not me, it's her."
"Kristy?" Chris' voice rose about
two octaves in his shock. "What are you doing here?"
"Wait, how do y'all
know her?" Maddie demanded.
"This is JC's ex-girlfriend."
"Ah.
So the plot thickens."
"What?"
"I had a…run in with Jen."
"Yeah, she was pretty pissed at you for a while, the way you just left
one day."
"She was pissed off at me? SHE was pissed at ME? She stole MY
boyfriend and she had the nerve to be pissed?" Kristy's face grew more and more
red with each word she spoke.
"Whoa, calm down. The way I remember it,
you and JC were long broken up before they hooked up."
"Whatever, I'm
not going to argue with you. Can you pry JC away from there long enough for me
to do what I came here to do?"
"Where is the old boy?" Chris turned to
look over his shoulder.
JC was holding Jen in his arms, smiling down at
her. The expression on his face was tender, poignant. It was a look of love. He
leaned down and pressed a slow, sweet kiss to her lips. Chris smiled as he
turned back to Kristy. He was an easy-going guy but she'd pissed him off.
"That's gotta hurt."
Kristy glared at him through narrowed eyes, turned
and marched away.
"What the hell was that all about?"
"I have no
idea, she was saying something about ideas they had for us touring." As she
talked, Madison's eyes roamed the room. She spotted Lance sitting next to
Kristina. She smiled at her friend's obvious happiness; Lance's hand was on her
knee. Kendra kept sneaking glances at them, moreso at Lance than Kris. Vontrésa
openly studied JC. Jen watched Von watching him. It was obvious that Von was
finding the reality to be as good as the dream. Heather was talking on her cell
phone and absently tracing a pattern on her denim-clad knees with her
fingertips. Wendy was splayed out on the floor, writing in a tablet that Maddie
knew was her journal.
"Looking for Justin?"
At Maddie's nod,
Joey continued, "He had to go talk to our wardrobe mistress, something was off
with his costume. But anyway, I thought you didn't want to tour with us."
"I don't." Maddie plopped down into the seat she had vacated earlier.
"Y'all would drive me to insanity in less than twenty-four hours."
"Yup.
We've done it before," Chris grinned then leaned down to greet Heather with a
kiss.
Maddie slouched down and closed her eyes. She relaxed as the
conversation and laughter flowed around her. Chris was telling them about a
story he'd found about them on the Internet and how scary it was how close the
story came to the truth about certain things.
"Hey." She heard Wendy's
voice in the seat next to her but didn't open her eyes. "Have you heard from
Romero?"
"Nope."
"Aren't we up next?"
"Yup."
"And we're still waiting for those other dancers?"
"Yup."
"And you're not the least bit worried that they're not here yet?"
"Nope."
"Maddie." Wendy's voice head that lilt to it that let
Maddie know the she was dangerously close to the breaking point. With her eyes
still closed, she instructed, "My cell is in the front pocket of my bag, Romero
is programmed, he's number seven."
She felt Wendy get up to go make the
call. It was relatively quiet in the auditorium. Maddie sighed, knowing that
this was just the calm before the storm.
A few minutes later, the air
stirred as someone sat in the seat next to her.
"What'd he say?"
"What'd who say?"
Maddie's eyes flew open and she sat straight
up in her seat. "Justin."
"That's my name, don't wear it out," he smiled
down at her.
She smiled back. "Hi."
"Hi."
The silence
stretched as the continued to regard each other.
"I like your hair."
"I like yours, too. You got it straightened?"
"Yeah." Her hand
went up to smooth her hastily thrown together hair, surprised that he'd noticed
such a mundane thing. Earlier, she hadn't cared what she'd looked like. Now she
wished she'd taken the time to curl her hair and put on some make-up. "Y'all
looked good up there."
"Thanks. I'm looking forward to seeing you."
'I refuse to read more into that than there is,' Maddie chanted to
herself. Then she looked back at him. 'Who am I kidding? Why is this so awkward?
We're already established that we're attracted to each other, that's the hard
part. So why is this so weird?'
"Hey, what are you guys doing tonight?"
Kendra asked. Maddie didn't like the glance she'd cast her way.
"We got
stuff til about eight and then we're free," Lance supplied.
"Yeah, but
we can't go anywhere," Chris added bitterly, "we're on house arrest."
"Don't you mean hotel arrest?" Joey kidded.
"Don't pout, it's
your own damned fault," Heather scolded. "You knew better than to take Justin to
that bar."
"We were bored!" Chris said as if that were the answer to
everything.
"The reason I was asking is cause Maddie taped Celebrity
Diary a few weeks ago and it airs tonight at ten."
"Oh no, just kill me
now," Maddie whined. "Ken-Doll, why are you doing this to me?"
"Y'all
are staying at the Four Seasons, right?" Von asked, trying her damnedest not to
stare at JC, considering that he had a gal and all and that she actually liked
Jen, but she was not having a good time of it.
"Yeah, forty-fifth
floor," Justin answered. His eyes were on Maddie. 'She's so cute when she's
embarrassed.' He shifted so that his elbow rested on the armrest next to
Maddie's.
Instantly, her body went on red alert. It was if a colony of
fire ants were doing parade drills up and down her arm. She knew without looking
that the hairs on arms were standing up.
Justin was feeling pretty much
the same way. He'd debated that move silently in his mind since he'd sat down.
'It shouldn't be this hard, ' he'd thought. 'We've already kissed. Hell, I've
got the imprint of her body on mine permanently seared into my memory.' And
then, when he wasn't thinking about anything at all, his arm made the decision
for him. He felt energized, despite the grueling practice he'd just gone
through.
"OK, cool, we meet in Maddie's room at nine-thirty," Kristina
stated, her hand in Lance's.
Justin smiled. 'Yes.'
(Later that night, 9:05 PM)
(Four Seasons Hotel, Room 4510)
Maddie hummed softly to herself as she ran her fingers under the water
flowing from the tap. She adjusted the temperature, flipped the switch that
re-routed the water to the showerhead and adjusted the curtain as she stepped
back. She continued to hum her nameless tune as she shed her clothing. Gathering
her shampoo, conditioner and soap, she stepped under the gentle spray. As she
washed herself, she thought back to the events of the day.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
“Ouch!” What the hell?” Maddie jerked
as she felt a sharp pain at the back of her head. Her hair fell around her face
in a silken curtain. She reached up to feel what she already knew. “Dammit, my
hair thing broke.”
“I have an extra,” Kristina was digging around in her
bag even as she spoke.
Justin stared. “You never wear you hair down,
I’ve never seen it down before.” He raised his hand to run his fingers through
the soft strands.
“Damn, your shit is thick, girl,” Jen commented.
“I know,” Maddie said thickly, barely able to talk. The insistent
pressure of Justin’s fingers tangling in her hair created a sweet warmth within
her. She loved it when guys played in her hair but this was different. It was
more…more…she didn’t know what but she felt it all the way down to her toes.
Heather sent Jen and Janine a knowing glance. “Puddle much?”
“Yeah really,” Jen snorted.
Janine ran a hand over the rich red
fabric of the seat beneath her. “Have these been reupholstered lately?”
“What?” The guys looked on in confusion as all the girls except Maddie
laughed. She turned bright pink.
“Oh man,” Joey moaned. “I think I get
it. I don’t want to but I get it.”
Seeing Maddie’s discomfort, Heather
changed the subject. “That’s the one thing I hate about my hair cut. It’s so
short Justin can’t braid it anymore.” She ran her hand over her feathered cut.
Wendy grinned. “Aw hell, you shouldn’ta told Maddie that. She’ll have
him—“
“Why is she back?” Janine had paused in her mini make out session
with Joey to move her purse from where it had been digging into her hip.
“Can y’all chill on the PDL?” Chris asked, disgust in his tone.
Von turned to him. “PDL?”
“Public displays of lust,” he answered
then turned to see what everyone else was looking at.
Kristy was
carefully making her way down the aisle, a manila folder in her hand.
All eyes turned to Jen.
“What? I’m cool, I’m just gonna ignore
the bitch.”
“Damn, when did she become the bitch?” Justin wanted to
know. He was still playing in Maddie’s hair, rolling the strands between his
fingers.
“Earlier today when she tried to clown me.”
“For real?”
The group fell silent as the woman in question reached them. She ignored
the rest of the people there and concentrated on her job: to get the guys of
*NSYNC and Maddie to consider the possibility of touring together. This would be
different, she explained, from other tours because cameras would follow them
around everywhere to record the things they saw and did. She went on to say that
the idea had been tossed around first for a video for Maddie and then one for
*NSYNC; then someone had the brainstorm to have them tour together to sort of
kill two birds with one stone. She told them that she had approached both
management teams and that the *NSYNC crew was on board as long as the guys were
okay with it but that Romero had said that he couldn’t say yes or no until he
talked to Maddie. From then on, she’d concentrated solely on Maddie, knowing
that she was going to be the tougher sale. From past experience, she knew that
the *NSYNC guys were down for just about anything. She’s pointed out all the
‘supposed’ advantages to touring with *NSYNC and showed her the projected sales
figures for a video of this sort. It was to be an ‘all-inclusive, Real
World-ish’ kind of thing, taking the fans where they had never been before.
Maddie listened quietly and thought for a moment before she spoke. “That
sounds good and fine but I don’t want to tour with these guys.”
“Why,
what’s wrong with us?” JC wanted to know.
“Yeah, we don’t got cooties,”
Chris said then went back to nibbling on Heather’s neck. She was in her
customary place on his lap.
“Nothing’s wrong with y’all, I just don’t
want to ride on your coattails.”
Janine smirked. “Why not, Britney did.”
“Nuh uh.”
“Actually she did,” Kristy corrected. “Whenever her
album sales would start to drop or if she had concert tickets going on sale, we
let some rumor about her ‘slip’.”
“What kinda rumors?” Von asked,
intrigued and horrified at the lengths some people would go to for money and
fame.
“Usually something about her and some unknown guy and people would
automatically assume it was Justin and print that.”
Madison was
astonished. “Are you serious?”
Wendy turned to Justin. “You let them use
you like that?”
Justin shifted in his seat. “It wasn’t like that.”
“Yeah,” Chris came to his aid, “we were just using our fame to help a
friend.”
“But you gotta admit, she let all that get to her head,” Lance
commented.
“Yeah, she did,” Justin agreed. “But they don’t do that
anymore, right, Kristy?”
Almost too quickly, Kristy answered. “Right.
The stuff people come up with now is all on their own.”
Maddie sighed.
“Did you ever stop to think that the backlash Britney got when she was just
rumored to be with Justin would be worse for me because we actually are?”
The room got really quiet. Not the ‘you could hear a pin drop’ kind but
damned close.
Justin sat very still. He almost wasn’t breathing. He felt
for sure that his heart has stopped. “Are we?”
Maddie twisted in her
seat. Her eyes met his and her entire visage softened. “I don’t know what we are
but…this could get really bad.”
He shook his head. “Nope.”
“No?”
“I won’t let it.” He flashed her a smile so sweet, so
sincere, so…Justin. She smiled back and leaned in to him. His eyes focused on
her lips as he lowered his head.
“Um, hello? Member us?” Joey’s wry
voice intruded.
Maddie blushed and sat back in her seat. Justin sighed
as he regarded the smiling Joey. “Why you blockin’? Aiight, I see how it’s gon’
be.”
Joey grinned wider and gathered Janine closer.
“Anyway,
Madison, please think about it. We’re looking at the possibility of a
fall/Christmas tour. Here’s my card, have your manager call me when you’ve
reached a decision.” Kristy’s eyes swept over the group, lingered on JC, flashed
angrily at Jen. When she looked back to Maddie, her face was blank, unreadable.
“Call me.”
Jen followed her progress as she left. As Kristy passed
Jacob, Jen noticed him for the first time. “Uh, guys, don’t look but there’s
this really creepy guy and he’s staring at us.”
All twelve heads turned
to see.
Jen groaned. “I said don’t look.”
“Oh, that’s Jacob,”
Kendra informed them. She had been uncharacteristically quiet all morning.
“Jacob?” Lance turned to her, a questioning look in his eyes.
When Kendra turned bright red, Maddie knew the reason for her silence.
She motioned for Jacob to join them. “He’s my bodyguard.”
“Bodyguard?”
It was Joey’s turn to question.
“Yeah, some of the fans are getting a
little too friendly.”
“And a little too weird.” Kendra was able to speak
now that Lance’s eyes weren’t trained on her.
Jacob reached them and
Maddie made the introductions. Lance turned to her.
“You haven’t gotten
any more of those letters, have you?”
“What letters?”
“Wendy
told Justin that—“
Maddie turned to Wendy. “What letters?”
Wendy
glared at Lance who shrugged his shoulders sheepishly. “Oops.”
"Wendy
Lou-"
Before Maddie could begin her diatribe, Romero's voice rang out.
"Ay, mami, estamos aqui! Por fin! It only took forever, but that's okay. This is
gonna be great!"
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Maddie stepped out of
the shower and reached for a towel. "I gotta remember to ask Wendy about that,
the dancers showed before I could.'
Her thoughts were interrupted by a
knock at the door. Maddie hastily threw the towel around her body, walked over
to the door and threw it wide open. "'Bout time you got-oh! I thought you were
Wendy!"
Justin had been looking at a kissing couple down the hall that
looked a lot like Janine and Joey. He wasn’t sure; they were too far away. He’d
been staring intently, trying to figure it out and so was unprepared when the
door flew open. He was even more unprepared for the sight that greeted him.
The ivory smoothness of her bare feet contrasted with the lavender
carpeting. Her pale pink toes stood out. Droplets of water glistened along her
well-formed leg. The bottom of the towel barely reached to mid-thigh. The stark
whiteness of the cotton enhanced the dusky hue of her skin. Her hair was in a
messy tangle piled on top of her head, some wet tendrils clinging to her neck.
His eyes followed a bead of water as it flowed from her temple down to her jaw
to caress her neck before it was absorbed into the towel covering her bosom. He
swallowed thickly and said the first thing that came to mind. “Got anything to
drink?”
Maddie backed away from the door, her breathing erratic, her
heart racing. She felt hot and achy all over. Never in a million years would she
have imagined that a look, one look, from a man could create such a tumult
inside her. She babbled in her nervousness. It did not help matters that Justin
matched her step for step: for every step she took backwards, he took one
forward, like a predator stalking its prey. “The fridge is fully stocked and
there’s even a wet bar so you an have anything you want. To drink! I mean, you
can have anything you want to drink and I should probably shut up now cause I
know I sound like an idiot and—“ Her chatter ceased when she tripped over the
suitcase she’d left in the middle of the floor.
Instinctively, he
reached out to catch her.
It took a minute for her heartbeat to settle
from the suddenness of her near fall. It re-accelerated as she took note of
their position.
He was standing so close to her she could feel his
breath fanning her face. His hands spanned her waist and hers gripped at his
arms. Their eyes met. He leaned down as she reached up.
The first kiss
was tentative. The second was exploratory. The third was explosive, a wild
meshing of tongues and arms and frantic breathing. It was also short-lived.
“Damn, y’all don’t waste any time, do you?” Janine asked as she and Joey
stepped into the room.
Face flushed, Maddie excused herself and fled to
the bathroom.
As she was closing the door, she heard Justin moan, “Do
you know how much your timing sucks?”
The door clicked shut as a very
satisfied smile spread across Maddie’s face.
