Justin’s eyes kept their stare directly on the crescent moon that hung high in the dark sky. He had been watching it closely since the group had gotten back to the hotel after that evening’s ‘disastrous’ show. He had gotten lectured and glared at enough that night to last him the rest of the year. It wasn’t a bad night in his book.
He was off, yeah. He knew that. The guys knew that. The fans, they didn’t have a clue. They probably all got a few good laughs over his trip, a few quick shots with the camera, moved on... they didn’t know his mind wasn’t on the show after that. Not after he saw her.
The moon glowed brightly, even from behind the thin clouds that were beginning to roll in, and he sighed deeply, letting the thick summer air fill his lungs. He always watched the moon, in moments like this, in the privacy of his hotel room. He always sat and wondered... Where was she? What was she doing? Was she staring up at the moon too? Maybe they were sharing this moment and didn’t even know it.
Another tear rolled over the lids of his eyes, and he let it be, trailing down its path. He had seen her. After all his searching, after all the pain and trials, he had found her again, and didn’t know what to do.
“Jay?” a voice called from inside his empty hotel suite.
Justin tore his eyes away from the sky and looked down at the tattered photograph he held delicately in his hands. Two young faces smiled up at him happily, and his heart ached to know that again. He brought it up to his lips, kissing it lightly before tucking it deep into his back pocket.
“I’m out here.”
Moments later Chris’ head appeared through the sliding door of the balcony, pass the long cream curtains that were blowing lightly in the soft breeze. “Hey, man,” he said softly, noticing his friend’s tear stained cheeks, but not wanting to mention it. “Me and Lance brought you some tea. Little bit of lemon, lots of honey, just the way you like it.”
“Thanks,” he half smiled, following the older man into his room. Lance handed him the glass mug carefully.
“It’s hot. Be careful.”
“You guys should be pissed at me right now. I screwed up the show. Why you being so nice?”
“Well,” Lance began, “I saw you freeze out there when you saw that girl. You’ve never done that. Just stopped, singing, dancing, possibly thinking...”
“My thoughts were on overdrive.”
“We’re worried.”
“Need somebody to talk to?” Chris asked.
Justin sighed again, falling back into the plush leather chair that sat in the corner of the bedroom. “It was her.”
“Did you know her?”
“I can’t even believe this,” he said, choking back a fresh set of tears. “It was HER.”
“Her as in...”
“Chloe,” he nodded, looking up at his friends through blurred vision. “The girl in the audience, the one I saw and froze, was Chloe.”
“Chloe?” Chris said softly. “Jay, are you sure? I mean, it’s been ten years since you’ve seen her, and...”
“It was probably just your imagination,” Lance interrupted. “It’s the end of the tour, you’re tired, we’re all tired, and you just thought you saw her.”
“Don’t you guys get it?” he said, throwing his arms up in frustration, possibly desperation. “I would know it was her even if I was blind.”
“Justin...” Lance began.
“It was her,” he said firmly. “Even before the show, I could feel something, right? Like I knew something was happening. I pushed it aside as much as possible thinking it was just nerves, concentrated on the show, but it just kept growing, and...” He paused momentarily, running his hands over his short hair and face. “I looked over and there was this girl, and she was laughing lightly to herself. I just couldn’t take my eyes away. It’s gonna sound lame, but my heart knew right away. Then she turned to look at me and... those eyes.”
“Wasn’t that girl blond?” Chris said, scratching the coarse hair on his chin. “I thought Chloe had brown hair.”
“She did,” he responded, adjusting slightly and pulling his picture back out. “But then again, back then so did I.”
“People’s hair color does change over the years,” Lance said. “It changes naturally, and then there’s dye...”
“What the hell is she doing is Virginia?”
“I don’t know,” Justin whispered, tracing over the image that had captivated him for the millionth time. “I don’t know.”
“Justin? Are you going to be alright?”
“I just don’t know what to do,” he exclaimed, his disappointment showing in his voice. “I’ve imagined the moment when I would see her again thousands of times over these past ten years, some joyous reunion of sorts, but she just stared at me. She just stared at me like I was crazy for staring at her. I just stared at her.”
“You were in shock.”
“But now she’s gone again. I have no way of finding her. I should have just jumped off the stage when I saw her.”
“You’d be in deep shit if you did that,” Chris laughed.
“But what am I going to do now?”
“Actually,” Lance began. “If I recall correctly, she was sitting where we put all the radio winners. You should call the station and…”
“Say hey, this is Justin Timberlake… They’d never believe it was me.”
“We have tomorrow morning free. Go to the station. I don’t think it’s very far from here. Just make sure you’re back in time for the sound check.”
An optimistic smile appeared on Justin’s face for this first time that night. “I go in, ask to see the list of winners, find Chloe, get the number, address, whatever. It’s perfect.”
“Just say a few prayers tonight that it works,” Lance added. “And don’t get your hopes up. It might not even be her.”
“No, it was her. I know it was her.”
The sound of his cell phone woke Justin up the following morning. His eyes slowly opened allowing the morning light to assault his vision. Groaning, he reached over the edge of the bed, blindly looking for his pants that were thrown on the floor the night before. His fingertips felt the soft material under them, and he reached into the pocket to find the ringing demon.
“Ello?” he mumbled, quickly pulling the sheets over his head, burying himself in the softness of the pillows.
“So, I go online this morning, and right in the middle of the entertainment news section on the home page it reads ‘’NSync’s Justin Timberlake has fallen off the top... literally.’”
“Trace,” he groaned. “What the hell are you calling me this early for?”
“Man, it’s nine. Time to get your lazy ass out of bed.”
“It was a long day yesterday, and...”
“’NSync continued their Pop Odyssey tour yesterday in Virginia. It was a flawless show except for Timberlake’s trip and fall accident on stage.”
“I know what happened. You don’t need to remind me.”
“Timberlake froze after apparently forgetting the words to their song ‘Up Against the Wall’...”
“I didn’t forget the words!” he exclaimed, sitting up fully in bed and flinging the blankets to a jumbled pile on the floor. “I just... stopped singing them.”
“After regaining his senses, the pop icon turned, promptly running into one of the group’s dancers, the two of them falling to the floor,” Trace continued reading, barely able to get the words out through his hysterical laughter.
“Shut up, Trace. I don’t want to hear any of the comments I know you have floating around in that head of yours.”
“I printed the article out. It’s hanging on my fridge.”
“Fuck you.”
“So, Mr. Pop Icon, what gives?”
“Nothing,” he sighed, climbing out of bed and walking to the balcony doors to close the curtains. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“So you just froze out there on stage?”
“What part of me not wanting to talk about it didn’t you understand?”
“Okay, so you don’t want to confide in you best friend. I understand. It’s not like I haven’t known you forever. It’s not like we didn’t grow up together...”
“That’s the problem,” Justin mumbled, though Trace didn’t hear him. He was continuing laying out the guilt trip for Justin.
He pulled the picture he had been staring at off the table next to him, and looked at it carefully. A ten year old version of himself stared up at him happily, his arms wrapped around the waist of a small girl with big brown eyes and long brown hair. She had one arm wrapped around Justin’s shoulder, the other wrapped around a third person’s unseen body, the same person who’s shoulder her head was leaning against gently.
He unfolded the crease that had been present for years, the picture finally revealing the third person to the party. Trace’s smiling face gazed adoringly at the girl, and the image was suddenly changed to something bittersweet. He couldn’t tell him yet. He couldn’t tell him that he had found her.
“Justin!” Trace yelled into his ear.
“What?” he snapped, switching the ear his phone was pressed against.
“Have you heard anything I just said?”
“Yeah, man. You were saying something about confiding in you cause we grew up together.”
“Okay, so that was like awhile ago. What the hell is going on with you? Is Brit there or something? Is that why you’re so distracted?”
He tried not to laugh at the mention of his girlfriend who was the furthest thing from his mind at the moment. It came out as a snort. “Nah, man. You know Britney’s in Florida getting ready for her tour.”
“Yeah,” he said slowly. “I must have forgot.”
“Listen, buddy, I have to get going to the radio station. Thanks for the wake up call.”
“No problem. I, uh, thought you had the morning off. I remember you saying something about it yesterday. You seemed stoked about it.”
“We do. I just have some errands that I really need to take care of today before tonight’s show. So I’ll talk to you later, right?”
“Right.” There was a short pause before Trace continued. “You’d tell me if something was really bugging you, right?”
“You know I would,” Justin sighed, guilt creeping into his system.
“Cause I’m only a phone call away if you need to talk or anything. Remember that.”
“I know, man. I’ll call you later.”
“Alright. Talk to you soon. Bye, Jay.”
“Bye, Trace.” He flipped his phone shut, and sat down in the chair, rubbing his fingers over his tired eyes. He felt like shit lying to Trace. He tried telling himself that he just needed to be sure that he could find Chloe again before he told him about her, but deep down he knew that it was his own selfish reasons that kept it to himself.
Justin tapped the tips of his fingers impatiently along the edge of the long metal table he was seated at. Sighing, he adjusted the headset that weighed heavily against him. He should have guessed Doc would pull something like this.
“Just a few questions, Jay,” he said, his sleazy smile spreading across his face like oil spill. “Just a few quick ones, then I’ll help you find that name.” It was the same typical bullshit he had grown to hate about his job: tell me what you can do for me, then maybe I’ll help you...
Doc cleared his throat before adjusting the microphone in front of him and flipping one of the many switches that laid to his left. “Well that was the great new song from Destiny’s Child called ‘Survivor.’ And I’m still here with the survivor of a trip and fall accident at last night’s ‘NSync show, Justin.”
Justin glared hard at him while pushing aside his growing annoyance with this man. “Hey, Doc,” he said as pleasantly as he could muster.
“Hey, we’re glad you’re still here. You and JC sure did take on a lot of writing responsibility on this new record. I wanted to ask you about that.”
“It was really important to us that we did our own music this time around.”
“You’re getting awesome reviews about your ballad, ‘Gone.’ I heard it live last night; it’s amazing.”
“Thanks.”
“Now where do you get the inspiration for something like that? Is it about your girlfriend, Britney?”
“Britney?” Justin asked, shaking his head in disbelief. He was beginning to think people were absolutely losing all common sense, especially concerning his love life. “No, how would that make sense? It’s about a person you’ve lost. We’re still very much together.”
“So, it would be about?”
The thought of what he was doing there flashed through his mind briefly. “A girl I used to know. Let’s leave it at that.” He slid his headphones off and pushed his chair back slightly, signaling he was finished with the interview. Doc caught the message.
“Thanks, Justin. It’s always great to have you here. This is Doc, signing off at 103.7, the Liz. Holly’s up next.”
Justin waited until the ‘On Air’ sign was no longer glowing before he got up from his chair. “Are you going to help me now or what?”
“A girl you used to know? Does this have to do with why you’re...”
“I need to see the list of winners for last night’s show,” he sighed, feeling his patience wearing out on him.
“Sure thing, J-man. Just call me your genie in a bottle.” Doc jumped up from his chair and began shaking his hips back and forth in a way no large man ever should. Justin winced at the sight and let himself out of the studio and down to Doc’s office.
“The name’s Chloe McCormick,” Justin informed once Doc joined him.
“Chloe McCormick,” he repeated, leafing through a manila folder sitting on his desk. He finally pulled out the piece he was looking for, a typed list of names and addresses titled Pop Odyssey 2001.
Justin held his breath unconsciously as he watched Doc’s eyes gaze over the paper excruciatingly slow. Finally the DJ’s eyes rose to meet his.
“Not here.”
“Not even a Chloe?” He breathed deeply, trying to calm his racing pulse down.
“No Chloe, no Cara, Kelly... closest thing here is a Colleen. And I’m not even going to try to pronounce that last name.”
“Oh,” he sighed, letting himself sink into a chair. He rubbed his hand over his head in frustration, trying not to let his disappointment show to a guy like Doc. Unfortunately he had gotten his hopes up, just as Lance had warned against. “It had to be her,” he mumbled into his hands.
“Jay?”
He looked up quickly to see Doc hide an obnoxious smile. “What?”
“Do you think you could sign some CD’s before you go?”
Justin glared at him again. “I’m going to ignore the fact that you’re a selfish bastard for one second and ask you one more question. Answer quickly too; my patience is wearing thin, and if I don't leave soon, you will be hurt. Do you know where any of these people’s seats were? It’s not listed, but the girl I’m looking for was sitting right by the walkway, about third of fourth row.”
“The feisty one? Tall? Blond? Wa-bam!” Doc exclaimed, waving his arms in front of him.
“Which one was it?” Justin asked, pointing to the list.
“She was with this one, Katherine Hamilton. Man, she was a hand full, not that I wouldn’t mind taking her around the...” His voice trailed off with the threatening look directed at him.
“Don’t expect us to come back to do your show anytime soon.” Justin finished copying down Katherine’s information, and turned to the door. “Asshole,” he murmured, walking into the lobby where Lonnie sat waiting for him. He took one last look at the paper in his hands before shoving it deep into his back pocket. He prayed Katherine would lead him in the right direction.