NEVER SAY NEVER
By Sarah Wartman
PART ELEVEN
I grinned flirtatiously at him and said, “you should never say never.”
“Fine, I’ll tell you. I was hoping you’d like to go dance, that’s all.”
I threw him a weird look and said, “that’s what you were going to say? Why couldn’t you say that in front of Josh and Carrie.”
Joey shrugged nonchalantly and I knew that that wasn’t what he was going to say. He stood up quickly and grabbed my hand and tried to pull me up.
I quickly pulled it back and said, “excuse me?”
“Come on, let’s dance.”
"I don’t feel like dancing,” I told him, trying my best to be stubborn.
“Oh come on,” he said and I reluctantly let him pull me up and onto the dance floor. We talked as we swayed to the music. Joey wasn’t my type at all, but there was something that sparked my interest in him. I was having the time of my life. He would be the most awesome best friend.
“Nicki will kill me when I tell her about all this.”
“Who’s Nicki?” Joey asked me.
"My best friend. She’s moving up here with me in a week or so. She’s going to flip.”
"Flip huh? I think I’d like to see that,” he told me and I laughed.
All of a sudden we heard loud voices. Joey and I stopped dancing and turned to see what was going on, as well as everyone else on the dance floor.
Obviously Nick saw Lance and Ginger dancing and wasn’t happy about it. I looked up at Joey to see a worried expression on his face.
“He’s not going to do anything, is he?” I asked Joey.
“With Nick, you never know,” he whispered in my ear.
And, as if on cue, Nick punched Lance and knocked him on the ground. Ginger screamed and rushed to Lance’s side while Kristina tried to pull Nick away from Lance.
All of us rushed over to Lance. Chris and Justin pulled him up from the ground. Lance stood there, holding his face with a pained look on his face. He looked at me and I forced a weak smile at him.
“You alright man?” Josh asked him.
“No, not really.”
Something caught my eye and I turned to see Ginger standing off, by herself, looking quite upset. I leaned over and told Joey I’d be back and walked over to her.
“You okay?” I asked her.
“This is all my fault,” she mumbled.
“No it’s not Ginger.”
She nodded in disagreement. “Yes it is. He always told me if I left him he’d do something like that. He’s crazy.”
“Obviously.”
“Yeah, well, he stormed out somewhere and now I’m stranded. He was my ride; I don’t even live here. What am I going to do?”
“Where are you from?”
“Florida.”
“Oh my. Wow, well, if you like, you can always stay at my place until you figure something out.”
Ginger’s eyes lit up. “Really?”
“Yeah, sure.”
“Oh, thanks Sarah,” she said and hugged me. “I’m going to go fix my make-up,” she said and darted off to the bathroom.
I slowly stood there for a moment and looked around, still in shock as to where I was. But all of a sudden someone tapped me on the shoulder. I turned around to see a gorgeous guy standing behind me.
PART TWELVE There stood a handsome guy, with dark hair and dark eyes. His face looked so familiar, but I couldn’t place who he was.
“Hi,” he said.
“Hey!” I said, studying his gorgeous face. “Wait a second, you’re”
“Drew Lachey?” he finished.
I just nodded. “Wow, this has been quite a night.”
He just laughed softly and I fell into a trance just staring at him. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but he was one of the most attractive guys I’d ever seen. Maybe it was the way his tuxedo rested on his broad shoulders or the way his mouth curled up when he smiled. But all I knew was that I wanted to get to know him a lot better.
“You’ll have to forgive me for just coming over here like this, I’m usually not this spontaneous. I just saw you standing here all by yourself and something came over me and I just had to talk to you. Are you here with someone?” he asked me.
I pointed in the direction of the guys still in a huddle around Lance. Drew smiled and said, “ah, I see. Do you mind me asking which one?”
“Well, I kind of got tricked into coming here with Lance, but he’s found someone else he likes, so I’m just kind of hanging now.”
Drew grinned widely and said, “oh, well, their loss.”
I looked into his eyes and was lost in my thoughts. “Guess so.”
~*~*~*~
“We should get going,” Josh said to the rest of them.
“No, it’s okay, really,” Lance mustered out. Ginger walked up next to him and slipped her arm around his waist.
“Dude, it really doesn’t look all that good,” Justin said, examining Lance’s swollen face.
“Guys, just stop, okay? You’re not my mother. Where’s Sarah?”
“She did go over to talk to Ginger, but I don’t know now,” Joey said scanning the ballroom.
“There she is,” Beth said, pointed to the corner of the room.
Everybody turned to see where Beth was looking.
~*~*~*~
“So, whatever happened to you guys?” I asked Drew as we sat down at a nearby table.
“Well, with all the problems ‘N SYNC had with their management and Backstreet Boys suing their record companies numerous times, we kind of got all the attention, do you know what I mean? Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t like we were taking advantage of their hard times, it just sort of happened that way. Their albums had stopped because of the problems they were having, so their losses turned into our gains. It was like that for two years maybe, and then we decided we wanted to lead our own lives so we went our separate ways. Jeff and Nick got married a little while ago and Justin’s just hanging out, enjoying his free time with his girlfriend.”
But before I could inquire about his dating status, I felt someone approach and watched Joey kneel down next to me.
“I think Josh wants to leave, Sarah, if that’s okay.”
“Oh, yeah, sure,” I said as I stood up. I turned to Drew and said, “it was nice to meet you.”
“You too,” he said, extending his hand. I took it and smiled at him, drinking in his face one last time.
I followed Joey to where the others stood and I felt like screaming on the inside. I looked up to make sure no one was watching me and was relieved no one was paying attention.
I smiled as I slowly unfolded the small piece of paper Drew had slipped into my hand….
PART THIRTEEN “What are you smiling about?” Joey asked me as we waited for the others to crawl into the limo.
“This.” I shrieked and handed him the small slip of paper with Drew’s phone number on it.
“Got the digits, way to go,” Joey said unenthusiastically and handed me back the piece of paper without even looking up. But I didn’t notice, I was too busy being giddy and happy on the inside.
We climbed into the limo and everyone stared at me because I had a huge cheesy grin spread on my face. I just looked out the window all the way back to the apartment, not even listening or paying attention to anyone else. I couldn’t wait to call Nicki and tell her about this glorious night.
The driver pulled up to the apartment complex and I looked over at Ginger, who was especially cozy with Lance.
“Do you still need a place to stay?” I asked her. I knew what the answer was going to be, but I thought I’d be polite and make sure.
“I think I’m gonna stay with Lance, thanks though.”
I smiled at her and said, “sure, no problem.”
I climbed out of the limo and saw Carrie was waiting to go upstairs with me. As we ascended the stairs, I heard someone call my name and I turned around.
“Sarah!” Joey called, sprinting up the stairs.
“Yeah?”
“I’m going to walk you to your door, hold up.”
“Joey, you don’t need to do that,” I told him.
“Yes, I do,” he said as he approached me.
I smiled at him. “No, you don’t silly.”
“Just let me a gentleman, okay?” he asked me, smiling.
“Are you sure you know how?”
“Oh, thanks,” he mumbled.
"Oh, come one you big dork,” and I laced my arm in his.
We walked up the stairs and said our good-byes to Carrie and she disappeared into her apartment complex.
“So, you like Drew, don’t you?” Joey asked me as we walked slowly back to my place.
I looked up at him like a toddler who had just received a new toy. “Is it that obvious?”
He smiled warmly and said, “yep, pretty much.”
“Well, I mean, I don’t really know him that well and all, but he seems really nice. And the fact that he’s drop dead gorgeous does help.”
“Well, I’m happy for you,” he told me as we approached my door.
I pulled out my keys and stuck them in the lock; soon realizing it was already unlocked.
“I know I locked this,” I whispered. I suddenly felt butterflies in my stomach and looked up at Joey quickly.
“You sure?” he asked.
“Yes, I’m positive.”
He stepped in front me and opened the door. It was dark, except for the small tableside lamp I had left on so I wouldn’t be walking into a dark room. Joey slowly entered and looked around. Suddenly we heard something fall from one of the bedrooms and I jumped.
“Stay here,” he whispered.
“Like hell,” I said and grabbed his arm. “If there is some psycho rapist in my apartment, I’ll damned if I’m going to stay by myself.”
“Okay,” he said and put his finger up to his lips to indicate for me to be quiet. We slowly walked down the hallway to the bedroom where the noises were coming from.
With one quick movement, Joey kicked the door opened and I screamed at what I saw.
PART FOURTEEN
“Nice to see you too, Sarah,” Nicki said once my screaming subsided.
“You stupid bitch,” I screamed as I raced across the room to hug her. “You scared me half to death.”
“Yeah, I kind of picked up on that.”
I turned to see Joey with an amused grin on his face. Nicki cleared her throat and elbowed me in the side hard.
“Oh, right. Nicki, this is Joey. Joey, Nicki.”
“So you’re the famous Nicki,” Joey said as they shook hands.
She spun on me. “Okay, what did you tell?”
I looked at Joey and said, “oh, thanks, now I’m in trouble.”
Joey chuckled and said, “nothing bad, I promise.”
“She better not have, or I’ll tell him how you got the nickname ‘valley crack whore’,” Nicki threatened.
“Valley what?” Joey asked, confused.
“Nothing,” we both said at the same time and started laughing.
“What are you doing here you little shit, you’re not supposed to be here until next week.”
“Oh please, like I’m going to sit at home with my mother doing the dishes while you’re here meeting all these people. And famous people, at that,” Nicki told me.
Joey laughed and said, “well, guess you need to meet the rest of the gang sometime.”
“Guess so,” Nicki answered and smirked at me.
“Um, Joey?” I asked as a thought occurred to me.
“Yes?”
“Aren’t they waiting for you?”
Joey smacked himself and said, “oh shit. How about I catch you later. Does Josh have your phone number?”
“I don’t know, but Carrie has it.”
“Okay cool. It was nice to meet you Nicki,” Joey said and I followed him to the door.
“Well, thanks for everything, it was a lot of fun,” I told him as I opened the door to let him out.
Joey leaned down next to me and whispered, “you haven’t seen nothing yet, sweetheart.”
I giggled and sucked in my breath when I felt his breath on my face. He kissed my cheek quickly and left. My hand slowly went up to my cheek were his lips just were and I turned to see Nicki grinning mischievously.
“Are you getting play without me?” she asked, crossing her arms.
I grinned and said, “a girl never tells her secrets.”
“Oh please, the day you keep a secret….”
I picked up a pillow off a nearby chair and chucked it at her. “Be nice!”
“Only if I must. But I must say, you do look good.”
“Thanks. Geez Nicki, I had so much fun. Man, I wish you were there, it was…..words can’t even describe it.”
Nicki took my arm and pulled me into her room where she was still unpacking. She nodded towards the bed and I sat down. She started folding some shirts and said, “you don’t move an inch until I hear every little detail of what happened. And which guys are single?” she asked with a grin.
PART FIFTEEN “Oh geez, where do I start?” I mumbled.
“The beginning is usually a pretty good place,” Nicki responded.
“Okay smart ass. Can I at least change first?”
“No, I told you, I want all the details. Don’t you dare move.”
I sighed loudly and cleared my throat. “Okay, first off, the single ones. Chris is married and Justin has a girlfriend named Beth. She’s pretty cool. Let’s see, Lance was single, but I think that’s going to change.”
“Why’s that?” Nicki asked as she put some clothes into her dresser drawers.
“He hooked up with a girl named Ginger at the party tonight.”
Nicki spun around quickly. “But he was your date.”
“So? It’s not like we’re married. She’s really cool Nicki, and I didn’t mind,” I told her, remembering Drew.
Nicki noticed the look in my eyes and walked around her bed and sat down next to me, staring into my face.
“I know that look SJ. You met a guy, didn’t you?”
“Yeah, I did. But I’m not finished, be patient!”
She sighed and got up, “fine.”
“And Josh and Joey are single,” I finished and she looked up.
“Oh, I like the sound of that. If I remember correctly, Josh was pretty hot.”
“Oh, he still is,” I told her, grinning.
“He’s mine,” she called, throwing one of her stuffed animals at me. “Don’t you dare go for him.”
“Geez Nickers, possessive much? I don’t even want him.”
“Yeah, I can tell.”
I looked up at her and asked, “what’s that supposed to mean?”
“Hello! It’s so obvious you have a thing for Joey!”
“That thing? Not even Nicki, he’s really cool, but no. He’s one of those best friend types.”
“Obviously he doesn’t think so,” Nicki said, smirking at me.
“You’re interrupting me again. Do you even want to hear about the guy I met?” I asked her.
“Of course!”
“Then shut up already. Okay, well, Lance and Ginger were dancing and stuff, right? Well, Nick Carter walks right up and punches Lance.”
“Ew, Nick Carter? Does he weigh like four hundred pounds now?”
“Pretty close.”
“Why did he hit Lance?”
“Because Ginger was his date. Okay, now, Ginger gets upset so I follow her across the room and talk to her. I cheer her up and she goes off to the bathroom to fix her make-up and I’m just standing there. And this guy taps me on the shoulder. Oh Nicki, you would have died if you were there.”
“Well, who was it?” she screamed impatiently.
“Drew Lachey.”
“You’re kidding,” she said, sitting down next to me.
“Nope. And he looked so good too….”
“I bet he did. So, what happened?”
“We talked for a little bit, but Josh wanted to get Lance home and stuff, so I didn’t get to talk to him for very long.”
“Oh, that sucks,” she added.
“No, not really,” I said and dug in my purse to find his phone number.
“You got a number? You’re such a slut,” she said, grabbing the number from me.
“You’re one to talk,” I shot back.
Quickly, Nicki jumped off the bed and came back into the room, phone in hand. I watched in horror as Nicki dialed Drew’s number.
“Nicki, you stupid bitch, what are you doing?”
She didn’t say anything, just smiled and stuck her tongue out at me.
“Yeah, hi, is this Drew?” she asked.
TO BE CONTINUED