Christ,
my head hurts.
Have you ever noticed how loud your thoughts can
be? Thinking seems like it should be a very quiet activity, but it’s not.
Little thoughts, some important, most not, race around and leap frog over each
other at such a pace that soon it’s a jumble, and those little thoughts grow
into boulders that collide into each other in their rush to come out on top,
causing a giant earthquake. I’m terrified of earthquakes, you know. I’d rather
fly than be in an earthquake. I always hate it when we perform in San
Francisco.
It’s
so cold in here.
It
feels like a freezer, this wall of arctic air smacking me in the face when the
door moves out of the way. I’m already cold though; this jacket is a worthless
piece of shit, so I guess it’s okay.
Somehow
it doesn’t surprise me; the entire room just looks cold. You know, how
you can look out the window and just know if you should wear long
sleeves or a t-shirt? It’s like that. Even if I’d just been staring in through
a window, I would know. Drab, unwelcoming curtains hang rigidly over the
windows; the carpet is all patchy and worn, like the grass in Brian’s yard in
Kentucky after it’s been battered by frost. Too many people traipsing over it,
day in and day out, I guess. If I squint, I can see a rut running from the twin
beds to the bathroom. The beds are cold too, thin scratchy bedspreads molded
around stiff, rickety frames that I know will creak and moan at the slightest
touch.
Funny,
I’d forgotten what cheap places like this look like. Spoiled.
The
door swings slowly closed behind me, snagging on the heel of my shoe. I jerk it
away, and the door shuts with an audible click. Aside from the dull roar
trapped in my head it’s silent, until the air conditioner comes to life with a
violent shudder. Pretty soon the sound is lost in the avalanche collapsing in
my head, it drowns everything else out, and I don’t notice it anymore. There
are a lot of things I don’t notice, it seems.
Damn,
it’s cold in here.
Where
is here, anyway? I guess it doesn’t really matter all that much. I’m somewhere.
I have a hazy recollection of a sign in the parking lot, but trying to remember
more than that doesn’t interest me. I’ll worry about it later. Things will be
better by then, and I’ll be able to think about stuff like that.
God,
if my mind would just slow down I could think. I need to think. But every time
I try my head pounds so hard and fast I think my brain might barrel right
through my skull. If I could just think, I could figure it all out. I’m good at
that, you know. People usually write me off, dumb kid and all that. I was
a dumb kid, I admit. But you can only get fucked over so many times before you
start to start to get wise to it. I’ve gotten good at landing on my feet.
What
I would really love is to just fall asleep, then wake up and realize this was
some kind of dream. Dream, nightmare, whatever. Sometimes I wonder if there’s a
difference.
I
just need to sit. Though, come to think of it, I’ve been sitting for a while.
At least, I think. Car. I’d been sitting in the car. I hope I turned the lights
off. Wait, is it dark already? Maybe that’s why I stopped. Hm. Little thoughts.
Just pebbles off the boulder-sized ones. I can put those aside, and worry about
them tomorrow.
Is this what hysterical feels like? Somehow I
don’t think so. I always thought of it as more, I don’t know, active. Something
out of control, straightjacket type behavior. This has to be something else,
like hysterical fallout. Yeah. There you go. Fallout. Bet that’s not in a medical
dictionary. It could be a new term, and since I’m the one who made the first
diagnosis, I’ll get credit in all the psychology textbooks. My fame has no
limits.
Okay, someone really needs to turn down the
air.
If I really have hysterical fallout, which I’m
pretty sure I do, I wouldn’t miss a diagnosis of my own disease, wouldn’t I
have had to suffer from actual hysteria first? Now that’s a thought. But I
wasn’t…well, unless you count slugging Brian in the face as something a
hysterical person would do, I wasn’t hysterical.
Did I really hit Brian? I wouldn’t do that.
Maybe
I should splash some water on my face. That’s supposed to help when you’re
hysterical, isn’t it? Howie talked about it once. Just shove your head in a
bucket, he said. Cool you right off. Howie’s not a liar. Neither is Brian. He
wouldn’t keep things from me.
I’ll
try it at any rate. I go into the bathroom and turn on the tap, and don’t
notice until I’ve submerged my hands that I’m still holding my leather key
chain. Fuck. It’s sopping wet. Not bothering to turn off the water, or dry off
the soaked leather, I lean around the corner and toss the keys in the direction
of the bed. I miss, and they bounce out of sight. I won’t worry about finding
them now. I’ll do it tomorrow.
The
water stings my cheeks, and I hiss. Freezing. Shit that’s cold. I prop
my elbows up on the counter and let my head rest in my hands, watching the
water drip down my nose. My fingers fist around clumps of hair- I really need
to get it cut-and I stand there for a few minutes. It’s not long before I feel
my foot starting to fall asleep, so I snatch a towel from the rack and press it
to my face, wincing at the coarse, sandpapery texture as it slides across my
skin. I think the water made things worse, because now my hand aches almost
more than my head does.
Something
about that doesn’t seem right, so I open and close my right hand a few times. Ow,
what the hell? God, that hurts. I hold the hand up in front of me, and discover
that the skin around my knuckles is cracked and bleeding, bright purple,
throbbing from the icy water. It looks like I’d rammed it into something.
I
massage them lightly with my other hand, but that hurts more. I suck on them
instead, and it feels a little better.
Oh,
God. I’d hit him. I’d hit my best friend. Christ. Kevin will kill me.
Assholes.
You know what? Let him. I don’t care. I hope it hurt. I have good hand-eye
coordination. Damn video games. I’ll bet it hurt.
God,
it’s fucking cold in here!
I’m
shivering, and this jacket sucks. I shrug out of it, drop it in a heap, and
walk over to one of the rickety beds. The blanket on it is thin, pathetic
really, but it’s got to be warmer than the jacket. The bed creaks-I knew it-as
I lie down, and before long I’m cocooned in a mess of prickly fabric. The light
is off, since I never turned it on in the first place. Good.
Bastards.
All four of them. Bastards.
It’s
a little too dark, so I roll over and face the clock. That’s better. A little
red glow. Just enough. You know, my shoes feel too tight. I wonder if they’re
even mine. I might have grabbed A.J.’s on accident when I left. No, I’m pretty
sure they’re mine. Fuck it, I don’t care. I don’t need this. I really don’t.
I’ve got a family. I’ve got a career.
Ha.
Not anymore.
I
notice a tear stab my eye out of nowhere, and it’s infuriating. Angrily, I wipe
it away with the prickly blanket. Something occurs to me then, and I squeeze my
eyes shut, but not before I whimper. I actually whimper. What the hell
is the matter with me? I’m twenty-five, not four. I should have some say in
what happens to me, to my future. I’m part of this band. I’m part of what goes
into it, I’m part of what comes out of it, I’m part of what its future
is. I’m part of them. I deserve to have some say in the end.
I should call someone. My wife would probably like
to know where I’m at, after all. Not coming home would probably bother her.
She’d want to know where I am. They would probably want to know too, but they
don’t have a right to know, not anymore. I suppress a laugh. I don’t have a
fucking clue where I am, after all, so what does it matter? Though for all I
know, my wife knows exactly where I am. She knows me better than me anyway,
something I’ve never been able to understand. At any rate, she apparently knows
me a helluva lot better than Brian does. Out of all of them, he was supposed to
be the one who knew I wasn’t a dumb kid. He should have told me.
I swear, if someone doesn’t turn down the goddamn
air I’m going to freeze to death.
It’s funny, when I think about it. I can understand
why Kevin hasn’t gotten it through his thick eyebrows that I’ve grown up. It’s
that whole ‘you’ll always be my baby’ thing that parents go through. Next thing
you know, kid’s off to college and never calls, and you can’t figure out why.
After all, how on earth could he survive without good ol’ Dad? Or in my
case, kid’s gone off and joined a band, and one day Psuedo Dad Kevin turns
around and sees that the dumb kid he’s taken under his wing (kicking and
screaming, I might add, at least at first), can sign the dotted line all by
himself, without help. I don’t hold it against him. I can’t, because it’s so
touching, in that fucked up, warped reality we’ve got going on. Doesn’t change
anything, anything, but at least I know why. In a way, I hate him more for
it, actually.
Phone. Right. Fuck, I’m thinking too fast again.
It really scares me that I can’t keep up with my own thoughts.
I reach for the phone, and in the process knock
the clock off the nightstand. I swear, loudly, though the blankets muffle it.
Clumsily I manage to dial the number, then swear again when I realize I forgot
to dial 9. I could use my cell phone, but quite honestly I haven’t the faintest
idea where it is. Tomorrow. I’ll find it tomorrow.
I don’t even realize when the ringing stops and
her voice picks up. I’m too preoccupied with the god-awful design crisscrossing
the wallpaper by my head. Man, whoever decorated this place should be shot.
It’s seriously bad.
“Hello? Hello?”
Oh yeah. Shit.
“Hey,” I mumble, pushing my stringy hair away from
my forehead.
“Nick? Oh, God, Nicky, is that you?”
Howie and my wife are the only ones who still call
me Nicky.
“Yeah,” I reply. Interesting, I have completely
forgotten what it is I want to tell her.
“Dammit, are you okay? Where are you?”
“’m fine.”
The tone she’s got in her voice is one I don’t
think I’ve ever heard, from her anyway, and I pause a moment to think about it.
If I didn’t know better I’d say it bordered on hysteria, but that’s not
possible because…because she’s not fucked up the way I am. I’m the screw up.
Her only screw up in life was me.
“Nick, where are you?”
I laugh, because the question is so preposterous.
“I’m in bed,” I reply, because I know that for sure. “Got tired of driving.” Or
it got dark. Not really sure which, but I’ll keep that to myself.
“Where? Where are you, Nick? Are you still in
Orlando?”
You know, there was some number on the sign out
front. Mighta been a six. Maybe an eight. But really that’s not the issue,
because I suddenly remember what it is I want to tell her. “Look…listen. You
shouldn’t, um, worry. About me.” I’m really not worth it.
“Honey, if you can tell me where you are I’ll come
get you, okay? Brian called me; I know what happened. It’s ok, Nicky. I’ll come
get you.”
Bastard. Shoulda known he’d stick his nose
in and try to save the fucking day. Well I can do that just fine on my own,
without his goddamn help. I just need to get to tomorrow and I’ll be able to
take care of things just fine.
“Fuck Brian!” I shout. “Hear me? He can go to
hell. It’s where he belongs.”
“Nick!”
This was a bad idea.
“I gotta go.”
“Nick, wait. No.”
Man, she’s upset. I didn’t mean to do that. This
was a very bad idea.
“’S ok,” I tell her. “Really. I’ll figure it out
tomorrow. Just…just give me ‘til tomorrow. Tomorrow it’ll be fine.”
“Don’t hang up the phone. Baby, please. Don’t hang
up the phone.”
“Love you.”
“Nick!”
“Bye.”
I place the phone somewhere on the nightstand, off
the hook. My heart is pounding in my chest, and I finally realize that I’m
scared. Not just mildly frightened, but bone chillingly terrified, to the point
where I can’t think straight. Maybe that’s my problem. Suddenly I feel very
claustrophobic, so I throw the covers off and get out of the bed. No good. I
pace for a few minutes, but that just makes things worse. That and I’m still
freezing. I’ll bet I could see my own breath if I tried.
You know, I remember this one time. God, it was
years ago. Like, before the record deal. We hadn’t been together very long,
touring malls and shit. I think we were in St. Louis, because I remember
pouting about not getting to go up in the Arch. I was starting to goof off more
and more with Brian, which drove Kevin up the wall. Brian and I were
sharing a room in whatever hotel it was, and we got keyed up and hyper so we
snuck out. It was one of those hotels where the doors opened up to the outside,
like this one, so we ran up and down the “hallways,” climbing around on the
staircases and in general being idiots. The temperature had taken a dive, and
we made a big deal about being able to see our breath. At least I was. It
wasn’t anything new to Brian, but I thought it was cool. We got busted
for doing it, mostly because we made a lot of noise and people complained. We
didn’t care though. In fact, less then an hour later we recruited A.J. to help
us prank call all the rooms. Now that was fun. At least until we
accidentally called Kevin’s room and woke him up. But we still managed to laugh
about that for weeks, even after the lecture we got. That was a fun day. We had
a lot of fun days then. Before everything. Before all the shit.
Before this.
Unable to stand it anymore, I grab my coat and
head for the door. I can’t be in here anymore. The walls are invading my
personal space and it’s too goddamn cold. I’m going to go for a walk. I follow
the staircase down to the ground floor and hang a right out of the parking lot
onto a sidewalk, walking like my life depends on it.
If it’s less cold outside I don’t notice. I’m more
interested in putting as much distance between that memory and all the ones
like it as possible. I’d much rather find something else to think about.
Something that has nothing to do with Brian, or A.J., or any of the others.
Surely I’ve got some memories that don’t involve Backstreet.
I stop walking, because then it hits me. For a
frozen moment I imagine I can see my breath crystallize in front of my face,
before vanishing into nothingness.
I don’t have any. Not any that matter, anyway.
Backstreet’s all I’ve got. All I’ve ever had. It’s my life. My existence. Even outside
of it, the “real” Nick Carter that I try to be always ties back to it somehow.
So now what happens, when it’s suddenly gone?
Gone, just like that. What happens to me? What if I lose myself right along
with the band?
Maybe Kevin’s right after all.
I’m walking again, a little faster now, not
entirely sure where I’m walking to. Maybe if I can walk fast enough or far
enough, I can hold onto whatever it is I’m losing. Howie told me once that
running doesn’t solve anything, it’ll only catch up, but I don’t believe him
anymore. I don’t believe any of them anymore.
This is over my head. I can’t be like this. I just
can’t.
Out of nowhere I trip over something, a crack in
the sidewalk, I don’t know, and go sprawling. My hands skid painfully over the
concrete and my knee hits with thud. I swear out loud, the sound of my voice
swallowed up by the dark and the trees towering over my head. A car streaks by
on the road, and I watch remorsefully as it disappears around a corner. Tears
sting the corners of my eyes, and I look at the palms of my hands, scraped and
tender. I touch the knee of my pants with the tip of my finger, and pull it
away with a drop of blood. A scream wells up in my throat and I throw myself to
my feet. I teeter for a moment, frantically trying to keep my balance, and then
break into a dead run. I limp at first, my knee is killing me, but soon it’s
forgotten and I just fly.
It’s not fair. None of it’s fair. I hurt for Alex
when Tasha died, I sat next to him and cried and mourned and swore I’d always
be there. I’ve done that for all of them. Why won’t they do it for me? How
could they just throw away the only thing I’ve ever known without even asking
me?
I’ve got my wife and my daughter, but who gave
them to me? Backstreet. I’ve got four brothers that I love more than life
itself, but who gave them to me? Backstreet. I’ve made every dream I’ve ever
had into reality, but what made that possible? Backstreet. Backstreet.
Backstreet. Backstreet. The word echoes throughout my brain in a dull roar, chanting
at me like the crowd used to do when I stood on stage and gave everything I am
and ever will be to the very thing that has now brought me to my knees.
Another car hurries past and I go even faster,
trying to outrun it. It’s futile and I know it, but I push myself harder, my
breath coming in fits and gasps, refusing to give up until the taillights
disappear from sight. I let up, slamming to a near stop within a step or two.
The glaring white light of a streetlamp cuts into my eyes, and I turn my head away
from it and face the street. I can’t win. I never could.
Forcing air into my aching lungs, I jog into the
street and stop. All right, Howie. I won’t run. I’m done running. You’re right.
It’ll always catch up to me in the end.
In the distance I can see a pair of headlights
headed in my direction. Suddenly I feel calm, calmer than I’ve been since I
took off in the first place. I straighten up, secure on my feet, hands jammed
deep into the pockets of my coat. My lungs hurt; running like that in the cold
will do that to you, but it doesn’t matter because I’m done running.
The car keeps drawing closer and I smile, though
I’m not really sure why. There’s a breeze blowing, and it carries with it the
sound of the horn blaring. I stand my ground. It could go around me. Left,
right. Straight. Whatever way, I won’t run. My hands keep trying to creep out
of my pockets, to brace myself or be prepared in case I run, but I shove them
determinedly in place. The headlights blind me, much like the streetlamp, and I
blink into them, trembling just a little. Why isn’t it swerving?
I can see it now, really see it. It’s blue, Ford
Taurus. Florida plates. Well, it’s nice to know that I really am still in
Florida. There’s another sound from behind me, and I suddenly realize why the
car’s path hasn’t changed. There’s another one coming from the other direction.
There’s nowhere to go, except up on the sidewalk and into the light post. For a
moment I can imagine that I taste motor oil in my mouth, and I cringe at the
bitter taste.
He’s slammed on the brakes, I can hear them
squeal, but it’s not soon enough. He really thought I would move. In the last,
horrifying second I jerk my hands free from my pockets and fling myself towards
the sidewalk, twisting away from the street and the car. I can feel the
scorching wind from its passage, and the bumper narrowly grazes me as I hit the
sidewalk and roll into the grass. I come to a stop on my side but roll onto my
back and stare up at the stars. The car keeps going, satisfied that it has done
no wrong. I’m so stunned at what I just did that I don’t even realize I’m
crying until I’m sobbing so hard I can’t breathe.
After what feels like an eternity I sit up, cold,
miserable, and alone. I climb painfully to my feet, satisfied that I haven’t broken
anything. Defeated, I begin to walk back to where I came from. For the rest of
the night I sit in the ratty chair in my hotel room, staring out the window and
waiting for dawn, wrapped in a blanket. I don’t dare think about what has just
happened. I’m not ready to.
Somewhere around three am someone raps on the
door. I don’t get up. They rap louder, more insistently, and then call my name.
It’s Brian. I pull the blanket a little tighter around me and stay in my chair.
Eventually he gives up. I should probably wonder how he found me, but I don’t.
The sun finally peeks over the horizon, streaking
the sky with pale hues that laugh away the dark. It’s been a long time since
I’ve watched the sun rise. Stretching a little, I get up and drop the blanket
in a head on the bed. I feel tired all the sudden, and want to go home. I drop
to my knees and fish around until I find my keys. Then I reach for my coat,
once again in a heap on the floor. I’m tempted to leave it behind, it’s crappy
to begin with and now it’s torn in several places, but I sling it over my arm
anyway.
When I undo the lock and turn the doorknob, it
swings inward so fast it almost hits me in the face, depositing a rather large
lump onto my feet. It takes me a moment to figure out what it is.
Brian.
The jackass had been sitting in front of the door, and by the looks of it had been sound asleep when it opened. He blinks in surprise, and upon seeing me his eyes widen. He scrambles to his feet. I say nothing, just stared at him. An ugly, purplish bruise paints the left side of his jaw. I’d hit him all right. Good aim, too. Just like I’d thought.
“Nick?” he asks, struggling to get my name out.
“Nick are you, I mean, Jesus you look like shit! What happened? Is everything…”
Before he can finish I brush past him, trying not
to limp.
“Wait…Nick! Wait a second.” He jogs to keep up
with me, still babbling. “Nick look at me.” His hand drops on my
shoulder and he spins me around. “Are you okay? I knocked on your door last
night, I think you were asleep. We’ve been so worried…”
“I was awake,” I interrupt.
This catches him off guard, and he stutters even
more. “You…you were?”
I nod.
“Oh…okay. Look, um…we were scared. You scared Sue
half to death; she wanted to come looking for you but we wouldn’t let her
drive. We thought…Christ, I don’t know what we thought. What happened to you?”
I jerk away from him and walk down the stairs,
fumbling with my car keys.
“Nick!” He catches up again, and snatches the keys
from my hands. I turn on him, livid.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” I
demand.
“You look horrible and haven’t slept at all. Let
me at least drive you home.”
Bastard. “I don’t want to talk to you,” I say, “I
don’t even want to look at you. Give me my keys.”
He hesitates. That hurts him, and I’m glad. “I
know,” he says, slowly, and with more caution. “And I probably deserve it. But
please, don’t drive home. Not like this. I’ll drive you to my house, you can
shower and change, and then I’ll take you home. Please? Don’t go home to her
like this.”
I look him square in the eye, and he shrinks back
a little. “I jumped in front of a car last night,” I find myself saying. “But I
got out of the way before it could hit me.”
I have no idea why I’m saying this. I didn’t want
to tell him; I didn’t want to tell anyone. The words just came out. He looks
shocked, then horribly guilty. I actually feel a little bad, because I don’t want
him to feel guilty. That’s not why I said it. I just…someone had to know, other
than me.
He exhales harshly. “Nick. I’m sorry. I’m so
sorry.”
I shake my head.
“I-” he begins, then breaks off and sniffles. When
he speaks again it’s barely above a whisper. “I’m sorry.”
I turn away and continue towards the parking lot,
but stop beside his car rather than mine. Wordlessly he comes up and unlocks
it. I slid into the front seat and stare ahead, clutching my jacket to my
chest. Brian starts the car and backs out of his spot.
The ride back into Orlando is silent. Not even the
radio is on. He’s afraid to speak, and since I don’t want him to anyway I don’t
reassure him. By the time we get to his house I’m a little better, and by the
time I get out of the shower, a little more human.
I don’t even wait for Brian to take me home. I
leave without saying goodbye, and walk.