****
Jordan tossed another sweater into her black suitcase before attempting to zip it shut. "Ugh!" she grunted loudly, yanking as hard as she could before finally plopping down on top and yelling for her sister.
"RACHEL!"
"You rang?" she said, peering around the corner into Jordan's room. "What happened in here? Nuclear war?" she teased, glancing around at the clothing that was strewn every which way.
"Very funny. Will you zip this for me? I can't get it to stay shut." she directed, pointing at the suitcase beneath her.
Rachel nodded and moved toward her sister to assist, pulling the zipper closed with very little effort. "If you wouldn't pack your entire room then maybe you wouldn't have such a problem." she offered as Jordan rolled her eyes and gently shoved her back out into the hallway.
"If you wouldn't stand here mocking me then maybe you'd be packed by now and we could leave on time for once." Jordan retorted, laughing.
"Oh yeah." Rachel giggled, bounding back down the hall into her own messy room.
Jordan shook her head as she lugged her suitcase off of her bed and headed down the hall with it so she could place it by the front door. Looking out the side window, she noticed their neighbors twinkling white Christmas lights. 'I can't believe it's Christmas again already...it seems like this year has flown by so quickly.' she mused, heading back down to her room to grab her journal while she waited for Rachel.
Making her way out into the mild Florida evening, Jordan turned on the patio light by the pool as she walked toward the shimmering water. Sitting down carefully, she dipped her bare feet in as she lounged on the smooth edge and then reached for her journal and began flipping through the worn pages.
Stopping momentarily on an entry dated August 1st, she skimmed the ink filled page quickly.
Tonight was the guys' last show of the first leg of their No Strings Attached Tour. All of us girls took a well deserved break from recording over in Sweden and flew home for a few days. The concert was really great, not the only show I got to attend from the tour, but definitely the one with the most energy. The guys always enjoy the last show, and the crew makes sure there are several surprises. Lance ended up dancing with someone in a gorilla suit during "Just Got Paid"...the look on his face was priceless! We'll be heading to New York again soon to do a TRL appearance and a little more recording before the Teen Choice Awards and the VMA's occur in late August/early September.
Smiling, she remembered the night of the VMA's very vividly and quickly found the entry she had written shortly after getting back to Orlando from NYC.
Wow. That's all I can think of when trying to describe the guys' VMA performance. All of us girls gave the guys a hard time about hiding their freak nasty selves from us! It was an amazing evening and getting to present for Best Dance Video was an honor as well. The afterparty that the boys held was kickin, and we're all STILL recovering. Hopefully we'll be done in the studio soon, I think we've got quite a bit of our material done and can start doing more promotions by the beginning of November."
Continuing on, she read through the entries about going to Vegas with the guys for Thanksgiving, and how Johnny had announced plans for Eternity and N Sync to do a joint concert on New Year's Eve in New York City. Then, grabbing the pen next to her, Jordan pulled her dark hair away from her face and paged to a blank sheet of paper. Thinking to herself, she smiled as she began writing about their plans once they got home for the Christmas holiday.
****
Joey drove along the Orlando freeway on his way to the house Rachel and Jordan shared. His expression strained, his heart ached as he re-lived the events that had just occured moments earlier.
***
"Come on in man..." Chris said, opening the door of his home to allow Joey in.
Stepping into the entryway, Joey frowned at Chris' baseball cap and wrinkled sweats. "You're not ready?"
Chris rolled his eyes. "Actually Joe I was thinking of going with the rumpled look this evening. Do you think I'll get any chicks?" he said sarcastically before shutting the interior door behind his friend.
Joey pointed at his watch impatiently. "We're supposed to meet Lance at 7:00. It's 6:15 right now."
"Since when have you been on time for anything?" he grumbled as Joey shot him a pointed look. "Okay! I'm goin, I'm goin, sheesh." Chris mumbled, taking off his hat and throwing it on the couch as he passed by it on his way to the shower.
Joey walked into the kitchen and grabbed a soda out of the fridge before amusing himself by looking at the bulletin board on the wall next to the phone that was full of pictures and odd notes. He laughed as he noticed a picture of Justin, his mouth distorted crazily and one eye crossed inward as the other stared straight ahead.
Shaking his head, he continued glancing at the photos scattered on the corkboard with pushpins as he drank his Mountain Dew. Suddenly hearing a noise and thinking Chris was about ready, he turned sharply, bumping the edge of the large bulletin board with his broad shoulder. "Shit!" he said frowning as he leaned down to pick up some of the papers that had fallen off and scattered onto the floor.
Scooping up a small stack with the pushpin still holding the papers together, he stood up to put it back onto the board. Shoving the pin into place, he furrowed his brow curiously as he noticed one of the letters was signed "Love, Rach". Setting his soda down on the table next to the phone, he quickly read several of the letters in the small stack. None of them were very long, but it was obvious Rachel had kept in close contact with Chris over the course of the two group's separation.
"Whatcha readin?" Chris interrupted Joey's thoughts as he wandered into the kitchen, freshly showered, his shoes in hand. Sitting down casually at the kitchen table, he began putting on his socks and shoes as Joey stared at him in disbelief.
"Rachel wrote you? All of these?" Joey asked, holding up the stack of papers he held in his hand.
Chris looked up momentarily before nodding. "Yep."
His face registering hurt, Joey didn't know what to say. "Oh." he said simply.
"Don't get your panties in a wad Joe...she wrote me cuz she wanted to know what YOU were up to. We're just friends." the short man casually shrugged his reply.
Before Joey could reply, the phone rang shrilly. "I bet that's Lance wondering where we are..." the tall Italian trailed off as he picked up the phone and answered it, expecting his friend's deep bass voice.
"Chris baby! What's up?" Rachel said loudly into the phone.
Joey's heart sank at the sound of her voice and said coldly into the phone. "This isn't Chris...it's Joey."
Unfazed, Rachel giggled girlishly. "Okay then, Joey baby! What's up?"
"Nothing, just reading some letters here that I found."
"Come across anything good?"
"Actually I found a few that were rather interesting." he stated.
"Coolies. So what are you doin over at Chris'?" she asked brightly, not putting two and two together.
"Getting ready to go out, talking about you...ya know, the usual." he said bluntly.
"Talking about me? Um..why?" she asked, her voice growing nervous, worried that Chris may have spilled her secret.
Joey glanced over at Chris, who sat silent in his chair, a slight frown on his face. "Don't look at me, I'm Switzerland. You ain't draggin me into this anymore than you already have." he said firmly, crossing his arms over his chest.
"So I guess the charade didn't work." Joey stated flatly into the phone, not caring anymore whether Rachel knew the ridiculous lengths he had gone to in order to catch her eye.
"What the hell are you talking about Joseph?" she inquired, utterly confused.
Joey sighed, "Mo and I...we pretended to have a budding relationship so that you would maybe get jealous and realize what you were missing. I guess you did realize, and just didn't care."
"Wha-? Oh lord. This is much messier than I thought." Rachel replied, her voice sounding stressed. "This is so retarded!" she exclaimed.
Joey's eyes flashed with anger, taking her comment as an insult. "Well I guess I'm the retard then. I hope you and Chris are happy together, while I take my retarded self and find someone else." he mocked, hurt swelling within him.
"WHAT?!" Rachel screeched loudly over the phone as Chris did the same, sitting straight up in his chair, a look of bewilderment on his face.
Joey shot his groupmate a dirty look as he replied to the woman over the phone. "I don't stutter." he said plainly.
"JOEY! I was writing those letters to Chris because we're friends. I called Chris' house to talk cuz we're friends. I don't want to date him, and I never have wanted to date him. Have you lost your mind?!" she asked, her voice strained as she yelled over the phone at him.
"We're friends and you didn't write me once." Joey shot back at her.
Rachel sighed loudly in frustration as she began to completely lose her cool. "I kept in touch with Chris cuz he kept tabs on you. OKAY?"
"What?"
"I LIKE YOU. Is that what you want to hear? I. LIKE. YOU. JOEY. How's that?!? I wasn't sure if you had a thing for Mo or not. I had Chris keep an eye on things and let me know what he found out about your dating situation. Sorry I didn't run it by you first." she huffed angrily.
Her voice muffled slightly, Joey couldn't hear what was being said on the other end of the line, but before he could ask, Rachel spoke into the receiver. "I'll discuss this later, I've gotta go. Bye."
Joey sat stunned as the phone's dial tone beeped at him. Hanging up the phone, he looked at Chris, before grabbing his keys off the table and heading quickly outside to his car.
****
Pulling into the Bishop girls' driveway, Joey's heart sank as he noticed all the lights were shut off and the blinds were drawn. "Shit." he said, reaching for his cell phone and dialing quickly.
"Hello?" a friendly male voice filtered through the phone.
"Justin, I need your help."