Olivia's eyes slid over to Justin's sleeping figure, her heart breaking at the physical state he was in. His face was very pale, he was sweating profusely but slightly trembling from the chills that penetrated through his body under the covers, and his mouth was puffy and red. Liv bit her lip as tears threatened to fall from her eyes. She ignored Britney's question and walked to the other side of the bed, gently touching Justin's burning cheek. He rustled and a comfortable smile fell over his face, even though he was still deep in sleep. His body shifted at her touch, leaning towards her instinctively. It was like he knew her touch, he knew that someone he trusted, someone he loved, was standing there protecting him with her heart. His head snuggled up against her fingers and his hand dropped Britney's.

Britney stood up in anger. "WHO ARE YOU!?"

Olivia glared at her, putting a finger to her lips. "Shhh! Don't wake him up! He needs rest, aren't you aware of that?", she whispered. "I'm Olivia."

"Oh ... you're that friend he always talks about..."

Olivia softly ran her fingertips through his curls and looked back up at Britney, who was standing with her hands on her hips. "I'm his girlfriend.", she corrected quietly.

"......he...he doesn't have a girlfriend..."

Olivia smiled and only nodded her head. She leaned down and gently kissed his forehead. She had missed him so much, and it was unfortunate that this had happened to him, but it did have one pro ... it brought them together. She smiled again and ran her fingers along the side of his face, before taking his other hand and holding it tight.

His fingers tightened around her hand. She had been looking at their hands, but at his action, her eyes shot up to his own eyes, which were fluttering open at that moment.

Justin's blurry eyes slowly focused in on the gorgeous figure next to him, at first only expecting it to be Britney again, but as soon as he could make out the girl's features, his heart beat sped up and even though his mouth killed when he smiled, he couldn't stop the grin that lit up his entire face. He opened his mouth to scream her name, but nothing came out. But he didn't care. All he knew was that she was here, she was holding him, and he was happy.

Olivia grinned as she saw firsthand how quickly his expression changed. At the moment, he looked as if he didn't even know he was in a hospital with breathing tubes all over his body ... he looked about as genuinely happy as he had been when NSYNC's album went Platinum. His grin didn't stop expanding and his eyes glowed. He grabbed at his notepad and the pen and scribbled furiously on it. "I missed you so much!! I thought I was going to go crazy!!"

She smiled and reached down to hold him in a hug. "I missed you too. Are you feeling any better?"

He wrote something on his pad and held it up. "Not physically.... But I feel a lot better knowing that you are here now."

Olivia squeezed his hand as he continued writing. It was a longer note this time, so she took the pad from him and read it silently.

"I really wish I could talk, all this writing is getting annoying. The doctor said it should only last a few days though.... I couldn't wait until you got here!! JC said you would get here at around one or one thirty and I wanted to stay up and wait for you.... But then the clock started getting really blurry and I guess I just fell asleep. I wanted to see you come in the door, but when I woke up I found Britney next to me instead of you... God, I missed you.... Do you know why someone would do this to me Olivia? Why?"

Olivia smiled slightly, her heart breaking at his words. He was so excited to see her, yet he was so angry at whoever had done this to him that he was throwing all his jumbled thoughts together into a quick paragraph. He had jumped from not being able to talk, to wanting to see her, to the unanswerable question of 'why'. She swallowed and patted his hand comfortingly. "I don't know, baby.... I really don't know.... But, I can walk through the door again if you want to see me come in!", she chuckled.

If possible, his grin got bigger.

Olivia glanced at Britney, who was standing in the same position as before, staring at them in shock, jealousy streaking her face. Justin seemed oblivious that she was even still here ... all his attention was focused completely on Liv.

She met Olivia's eyes and sighed. "I'll leave you two alone...", she looked at Justin, who wasn't even paying attention to her. "I hope you feel better, Justin. I'll come by tomorrow to see you..." She started walking towards the door, after gathering her belongings, but stopped herself at the frame and turned back to Liv. "He's a great guy, Olivia. Don't break his heart, because then I'll have to hate you for ruining one of my best friend's lives."

Liv nodded in understanding. She felt bad for Britney... it must be hard to watch someone you care for so deeply hand over his heart to someone besides you. She sighed and looked back at Justin, whose eyes were watching every single move she made in adoration. She smiled and bent down to kiss his cheek. "Why don't you try getting some sleep now?"

He shook his head, mouthing stubbornly: "I don't want to!"

"But you NEED to. I'm going to go talk to the doctor for a minute and then probably go check in with the guys' hotel..."

His eyes widened and he jotted something down on his paper. "No, don't leave!! You just got here! "

"All right...um, let me see if the doctor will let me stay here then ... do you want me to stay here tonight?"

He nodded furiously, his curls shaking as he bounced his head up and down.

She giggled and patted his head. "Justin, calm down ... you're going to shake the tubes off your body and then you won't be able to breathe." She stood up and blew him a kiss. "I'll be back."

He watched as her body slipped through the door, her hair swishing around the corner as she walked, and sighed silently. The corners of his mouth twitched into a smile and he closed his eyes, finally falling into a long awaited peaceful and comfortable sleep -- something he had been waiting for ever since he left Orlando in December.

(next day)

The door to the hospital room burst open and Chris walked in holding a newspaper above his head. He smacked the paper down on the bed and stabbed his finger at the front cover. "Justin, you've peaked us, man! You made the cover of USA Today! Way to go, buddy!"

Justin rolled his eyes at Chris' lame attempt to make a joke and sucked down a huge gulp of water through a straw. The doctors had taken him off the IV and had ordered that he drink at least eight to ten full glasses of water a day, since lots of liquids were a main treatment. He was planning on flying back to Orlando in a day or so to rest for two weeks at home and then return to the postponed tour when his voice was back up to strength.

Olivia, who was sitting in the chair next to the bed, picked up the paper and flipped open to the article. It wasn't a long one, since not much information had been determined yet with how this came about, but basically all it said was the obvious. She smiled and put the paper on the table. "I can't imagine how many get well soon cards you'll be getting now.... on TOP of the millions of 'I love you' letters."

He smiled and patted her knee. She had stayed with him all night, probably not even sleeping a wink, because she looked as though she was ready to conk out. If someone even so much as said the word 'sleep', her eyes would have closed and she would be knocked out in a matter of seconds.

Chris was just about to make another pointless joke when the door opened again and the same officer that had been there the day before walked in.

"Good afternoon, Justin.... Chris.", he glanced at Olivia and smiled. "And you are? Were you here yesterday?"

She stood up and walked towards him, shaking his hand. "I'm Justin's girlfriend, I got here late last night." She tried to read his face, but it was expressionless. "So, do you bring good or bad news?"

"I bring you good AND bad news.", he smiled and walked to the foot of the bed so he could talk to Justin at the same time. "I'll let you decide what you want to hear first." He smiled at Justin, who held up his paper with the words 'GOOD' in huge bubble letters scrawled over it.

The police officer nodded and began to explain what information they had learned. "We have figured everything out, detail for detail, and we know who did this, we know how he did this, and we know who was involved with this.", he paused. "The BAD news is that we have yet to catch him."

"That's not all you're going to tell us, is it?", Olivia asked, putting her hands on her hips, anxious for more detail.

He smiled and pulled out a notebook from his pocket. "Of course not, what kind of cop would I be if I didn't?", he glanced at the paper and looked back up. "All right... the person that is behind all of this is someone named Brian Davis. His sidekicks were that girl that pretended to be your waitress, Bridget, and your bodyguard, Trey."

Justin's eyes were wide in anger and shock. He made a promise to himself to pound Brian into his own grave once he was back in shape, and he was shocked beyond belief that his own BODYGUARD would do something like that for someone as EVIL as Brian. His ears perked up as soon as the officer's voice spoke again.

"We have learned that Trey was paid a very hefty amount of money to slip the plant into your salad BY Brian. He turned himself in not too long after you got to the hospital because of his guilt. The jacket that you were wearing belonged to him, and obviously he was too upset with what he had just done that he didn't realize there was a HUGE load of evidence in those pockets. The bag which contained the dumbcane still had some remains of the leaf inside and we sent that to the lab to be tested. What the doctors there found was a small piece of blonde hair stuck to the leaves.... They ran DNA tests on that and traced it all the way back to find out that it belonged to Brian Davis. He must have scratched his head while he was pulling out the plant from its pot, since dumbcane IS a household plant. Also in the pocket was a small slip of paper with Brian's cellphone number on it. So, basically, the kid is busted. We have more evidence on him, than he probably has grade school memories.", he looked up once again when he finished. "Questions?"

Justin's mind was racing. Everything was so planned out ... so detailed. Why would someone piece out everything like that just to do something like this to him? What did Brian even have against him?

His thoughts were interrupted when Olivia's voice rang out in the room. His eyes shot over to where she stood, a confused expression planted on her face. She stood with her arms crossed, her hip out to the side, and her foot tapping impatiently, like she didn't understand something. "Okay, but HOW did Brian know what restaurant they were at, the exact TIME they would be there, that Justin was even going to BE there, and all that perfect timing stuff? He can't know everything about them like that, he's not God!"

The officer smiled at her frustrated expression. "That's why he paid Trey so much money... Trey kept in touch with him and told him where, when, and that Justin was there. Remember, Trey was the one that had the plant the whole time. Brian only gave it to him and the rest was on his shoulders. Provided Bridget did her part to distract the other two, which she did. Are you following me?"

Liv's eyebrows lowered. "So Bridget was in on all of this the whole time too?"

"Well ... that's something else. Actually, Bridget didn't really have a CLUE as to what Brian had up his sleeve. You see, Bridget is ... shall we say... a little um, ... well, not smart.", he smiled. "Brian brought her along, telling her that she would get to meet *NSYNC if she did what he told her. Obviously, it worked because look at poor ol' Justin over there."

Olivia's eyes bulged. "WHAT!? THAT BASTARD WAS USING HER!? WHAT IS HE MADE OF? PURE EVIL OR SOMETHING?", she practically screamed.

"Calm down, sweetheart. We still have to talk to her and Trey some more, and once we get Brian we'll be talking to him a WHOLE lot.", his walkie talkie buzzed and he checked his watch quickly. "Are there any more questions because I have to get going in a few minutes... Justin, any queries?"

Justin shook his head slowly, still comprehending everything that was just revealed to him. A thought struck him and he grabbed Olivia's arm.

"What is it?", she asked, worry glazing over in her eyes.

He wrote quickly on his paper. "Tell him about your threats."

She gave him a look, not wanting to bring that up, but Justin only urged her with his eyes. She sighed and turned back to the officer. "There's something you should know, officer."

"I'm all ears."

She sighed again and spoke. "Well, lately I've been getting ... um, threatening letters from Brian."

The cop looked up instantly at her words, his attention focused entirely on what she was saying. He waited for her to continue, and when she didn't, he asked curiously, "Threats? What kind of threats? How do you know it's him? Do you have evidence? I need all the information you know on this, you two. For me to do anything involving this situation, you need to be one hundred percent positive that it is him for sure that has been the culprit in this."

Olivia nodded. "Yes, we're positive it's him. We have a ton of evidence but it's at Justin's house in Orlando. I can mail it to you when we go home, though. We know that it isn't only Brian that was behind my threats, but also my ex-boyfriend who just happens to be his cousin. AND, both of them hired their UNCLE to KILL my best friend last May. I don't know if what just happened here to Justin has anything to do with what happened last year, but I'm more than willing to help you figure that out..."

Justin scribbled down a few sentences and gave it to the officer, taking another big gulp of water out of his "#1 Patient" drinking mug. "Brian threatened me before I left for tour, too. He said that I was the one who had better watch out because I had no idea what he was capable of. I guess he was right because I had no CLUE that he could do something like THIS."

"Oh yeah! That was after he showed up at my house, grabbed me by the arms and was holding me so tight I thought my circulation was going to be cut off.", Olivia added.

Justin nodded in agreement.

The police officer's eyebrows raised in shock and he shook his head in disbelief. "Wow, that kid is in deeper than I thought. Let me get this straight: he threatened you, hired his uncle to kill your best friend, grabbed you violently, and not only threatened but poisoned your boyfriend?", he wiped his forehead in exaggeration. "Whew. I can't wait until we catch this one."

Olivia smiled. "We can't wait either."

He nodded and tipped his hat. "Well , I've got to be going now, but thanks for all your help and have a safe flight back home. I'll get in touch with some of our officers in Orlando so they can also talk with you and keep us updated on anything else that goes on down there. Have a nice night."

When he finally left, Liv smiled down at Justin and ruffled his hair while he drank his water to soothe his aching throat. She watched as his eyelids slowly closed and then opened again quickly when her small hand brushed against his cheek, she smiled at the determined look on his face as he fought to swallow the water, and she loved the way he tried SO hard to make it look like he was feeling just fine when really, he was just barely bearing the excruciating amount of pain he was in.

His hand came up from under the covers to entwine with hers, and he forced out a smile to push away the saddened look in her eyes, telling her with a simple squeeze of the hand that he'd be okay.

And that was it for her. Words didn't even need to be spoken, because with that one small gesture and the magnificent sparkle in his deep blue eyes, she knew. She knew that what they had was real ... what they had was so special that only one word could come to mind...

What they had, was love.