My birthday candles had melted down to wax lumps in the frosting by the time I was off the phone.
"So was it worth ruining the cake?" Nate, my friend and Alex's on-again-off-again boyfriend, asked as I walked out to the back yard.
I ignored his comment and walked over to Alex, my hands shaking. "I-I won."
"Excuse me?"
"I won the date with `NSYNC. We're going to New York City in, like, three weeks."
"Are you serious?"
"That was just Lance on the phone."
"Lance? Lance Bass?"
"The James Lance Bass."
"OH MY GOD!" she screamed, wrapping her arms tightly around me. "We're going on a date with `NSYNC!"
After the excitement died down, and I filled my guest in on all our date information (not to mention a word by word replay of my phone conversation in which I got beat when she found out that I had actually talked to Justin), people began to spread out. Some of my friends were talking by the bomb fire that was burning brightly while others were dancing by the radio. The only thing I could bring myself to do was sit on my deck and daydream. I was finally about to meet the group that I had obsessed over for nearly two years. I was finally going to be up close, not a football field away like the concerts (they may have been nosebleed seats, but with binoculars you could almost tell who was who and that was good enough for me). My birthday wish had come true before I had even had the chance to make it.
With my mind floating far away, I didn't notice Scott sneaking up behind me. He slowly slid his hands over my eyes. "Guess who."
"Gee, this is a hard one. Could it be..." I picked the first guy I could think of. "Eric? God, Eric. I told you, you have to be more careful. We don't want Scott to find out about our little affair..."
"You would think you'd be able to recognize my voice by now," he said sadly.
I turned around and gave him a sly look. "So you don't care about the affair I'm having?"
"Oh you know I care."
"Come here, baby," I smiled, taking off his baseball hat and pulling him into me for a sweet kiss.
"Uh-oh! They're at it again!" Nate hooted from his lawn chair. "Let's get it on." He began singing, attempting to impersonate Marvin Gaye.
Scott and I had pulled away from each other with red faces. You could say that Nate's `special talent' was embarrassing the two of us to no end. He always managed to look at the exact time we were doing something- anything- and brought it to the attention of anyone who happened to be near.
"Ignore that clown," Scott whispered to me, taking my hand. "Come with me out front. I want to give you your gift without these guys around."
Scott and I walked around the house to the huge willow tree. We had christened this place as `our spot'. It was there that we decided we wanted to take our six-year friendship to the next level; it was there that we first kissed, and he first told me he loved me.
I curled into his arms as we sat back and watched the stars twinkling in the sky. "It's been a wonderful year, hasn't it?" I sighed.
"Yeah, it really has."
"You know, I'm gonna miss you so much when I go down to Florida in the fall."
"Liz, why can't you stay and go to college here in Michigan like me?"
"Don't get into this again, Scott. I've already told you, I'm not going to change my mind. I've wanted to go to Central Florida ever since I was a little girl. I want to get out of Michigan."
"I'm going to miss you, that's all." He lightly kissed the top of my head before reaching into his pocket and pulling out a small box with a big blue bow on it. "Happy Birthday."
I took the box into my hands and slowly opened the lid. Inside a tiny sapphire star shined gently on a delicate silver chain. "Oh, Scotty."
"Let me help you." He moved my long brown hair away from my shoulders and connected the tiny clasp.
"Thank you. I love it," I smiled.
"Elizabeth?"
"Yeah?"
"Can- can I ask you a question?"
"Of course."
"It may sound stupid, but, uh, you're not going to try to hook up with any of those `NSYNC guys are you, like that Lance guy you like?"
I sat for a moment trying to imagine actually dating an `NSYNC member. It passed through every fan's "fantasy land" no matter how much they claimed it was all about the music. The chances of it actually happening, however, were slim to none.
"No, of course not. I have you to come home to, don't I?"
"Yeah."
"But if you weren't in the picture, maybe..." I laughed.
"I would be lying if I said I wasn't jealous."
"There is absolutely no reason for you to be jealous, Scott."
"It's just that I really do love you, Elizabeth, and I don't like the idea of another guy out on a date with you."
I closed my eyes and sank back into him. "Don't worry. I love you too." -
"How about this one?" Alex asked as we continued our two week search for the perfect date dresses.
"No," I said, shaking my head. "Too long on you."
"Yeah, I was thinkin' the same thing." She turned back into the dressing room to try on her last choice. She emerged a moment later wearing a simple pale blue sundress.
"Oh, Alex. You look beautiful."
She smiled to herself in the mirror, obviously pleased. "Perfect."
"I'm sure Justin will fall head over heals in love when he sees you."
"Wouldn't that be nice?" she laughed, a devious smile playing on her lips. "Now we just need to find you a dress," she called, changing back into her shorts and t-shirt.
"I know. I know."
"You need to stop being so picky, Elizabeth." We had already been to three malls, six stores in this one alone, and I still hadn't found I single thing I liked.
"Before we continue our quest, let's get something to drink. I'm famished!"
"Smoothies?"
"Perfect."
After buying her dress and a twenty minutes conversation with the salesgirl on why she needed it, Alex and I headed to the food court and got our usual- two medium strawberries.
"Hey, Alex," I began as we sat down at a table. "Can I ask you something?"
"Mmmhmmm," she mumbled, sucking a piece of fruit through the straw. "What's up?"
"Well, by any chance is Nate jealous of this date thing?"
"No, not at all. Why?"
"It's just that Scott said he'd be lying if he said he wasn't."
"Oh," she said quietly.
"Yeah."
"Well, I guess that's pretty understandable. You guys have been together for over a year now; he's not used to sharing you with other guys, especially foxy ones like our `NSYNC boys."
"I guess."
"Does it really bug you that much?"
"Here's my train of thought. Okay? We'll be in New York for two weeks, right?"
"Yup."
"And the date is only going to last a couple of hours. And the chances of anything serious happening between the boys and us are low. So he's jealous of two innocent hours."
"What's your point?"
"What's going to happen when I leave for college? That's a lot longer than two weeks, a lot more than five guys, and a lot farther away. Long distance relationships are hard, and they rarely work out. And if he's not going to trust me enough that I'm not going to cheat on him, and he's gonna get jealous..."
"Gonna do the friend thing, huh?" Alex nodded, understanding where I was coming from.
"Exactly. I think I may break up with Scott before I leave."
"Elizabeth?" an all too familiar voice asked.
"Scott?" I turned around to find him and Nate standing behind me. "W-what are you doing here?"
"You wanna break up with me?" he asked, stunned.
"No, not at all. You didn't hear the entire conversation. Not now." I jumped up to explain as panic settled over me. There was no way this could be happening.
"Not now, huh? But before you leave for your little date?"
"No, no, no. I was talking about later, much, much later."
"Hey, Nate. Let's go," Alex said, grabbing her bags and his hand. She smiled sympathetically as they scurried away.
"I don't believe you, Elizabeth," he continued angrily. "You're actually planning in advance when we're breaking up."
"No..."
"Really? That's not what you just said. Why?" He paused. "You know what? Forget it. I don't wanna know."
"Please calm down, Scott," I begged, putting my hand on his shoulder to calm him down. "Let's not do this here."
"Whatever," he said, shrugging my hand off of him. I let it fall limply to my side. "If you don't want to go out with me anymore, then fine. We're through."
"Don't say that. Let's go somewhere and talk about this. I'll explain everything."
"I don't wanna hear it, Liz. It seemed you knew exactly what you wanted a few minutes ago."
"No, please don't," I said desperately as tears began to burn my eyes.
"It's over." He turned around and stomped off down the corridor, leaving me all alone.
"Don't do this to me," I whispered silently to myself as the guy I loved walked away. "Please don't leave me, Scott."
"Who gets three weeks off? We get three weeks off!" Chris sang happily as he bounced around Justin's living room.
JC walked into the room carrying a large bowl of popcorn, ready to settle down and watch Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. "Calm down, Chris."
"Leave him alone, C. He's just happy that we don't have to do anything for the next three weeks."
"That's not exactly true," I began. "We have that date next week."
"Oh yeah." Chris sat down next to JC and began shoveling popcorn into his mouth. "I forgot about that."
"I think that girl wants you, Lance."
"Excuse me?"
"She wants you," he repeated slowly as he came into the room carrying a huge bowl of cereal.
"You're pulling things out of your ass, Jay."
"No, no. I'm serious."
"Why in the world do you think this?"
"Because she was all like `Can I talk to Lance please...'"
"You were bugging her about why she entered. Do you really blame her?"
"There was something else there. Trust me on this one."
"Anyway," I began, changing the subject. "We have the date, and we also have to stop by TRL later on that same week. Do you guys just wanna chill in New York in between?"
"Leave it to Lance to have the schedule down," laughed JC.
"What schedule? We have three weeks off!"
"Shut up, Chris."
"This is weird," an unusually quiet Joey said from the floor.
"What?" Justin asked.
"It's just that I have the strangest feeling that something is gonna happen between one of us and those girls..."
"Joey, get girls off the brain for ten minutes, will ya?"
"I'm dead serious."
"Don't be ridiculous," JC said. "We're only going to be with them for, like, two hours. That's not nearly enough time to establish any sort of serious anything."
"So, it's just this feeling I have."
"Yeah, and what's her name..."
"Elizabeth."
Justin shot me a strange look before he continued. "Elizabeth wants Lance, so who knows what may happen."
"We never know. They could be big, scary, stalker girls. What are we getting ourselves into? What if they kidnap us, and then we'll die and be dumped in the woods. When they find us we'll be chopped up into a million pieces, and they'll be selling Jay's hair on E-bay..."
"Wait," Joey interrupted. "We'll be dumped in the WOODS of New York CITY?"
"Maybe we should call Big D up and tell him security can't have a vacation..."
"Whatever, Chris."
"It's not gonna happen. She sounded really sweet," I defended.
"See, I could be right," smiled Joey.
"When are you ever right?"
"When it comes to girls, I'm..."
"Those tramps you bring back don't count, Joe," Chris laughed.
"I know he's not right," I said, speaking up.
"How?"
"She has a boyfriend." They all began to stare at me. "What?"
"I don't think that was one of the questions you were supposed to ask her," JC said.
"He answered the phone."
"Yeah, baby. A little sumpin' sumpin' gonna happen between those two."
"How can you say that when we don't even know this chick? Honestly, nothing's gonna happen."
"Damn, boy. Don't get your panties in a bunch," Justin laughed. "We're just joking around."
"I know."
"Okay, we'll drop it."
"Thank you."
"Say that she breaks up with her boyfriend, would you consider it then?"
"Joey!"
"Sorry!"