CHAPTER 21 


“Josh—” 


“Was that Liz, Sadie? Your roommate?” 

Sadie sat back on her heels in the tub. The water felt suddenly cold. 

“Josh—” 


“Does she have a cell phone? Why don’t you call her up so I can have phone sex with her, too, like you promised?” 

“I never promised her that, I’m sorry, let me explain—” 

He stood up in the tub, towering over her, almost six feet of dripping wet, sculpted muscle. Even in his fury, he looked beautiful, like a Greek statue. 


And frightening, like a wrathful Greek god. 

“Nothing to explain.” 


He splashed out, his soaked briefs clinging to him, and Sadie stood up after him, gripping the wall. 


“She was just kidding, Josh, she doesn’t know—” 

He whirled around, a towel draped around his waist. “Don’t call me that.” 


Tears leaped into Sadie’s eyes. 


He hated her. 


He dried himself in furious strokes, yanking on his pants as though he wanted to tear them to shreds, silent, not meeting her eyes. 

“Josh—” 


He paused, one hand on the buckle of his belt, eyes cast at the wall. “I told you not to call me that,” he said, and pulled his shirt over his head. She heard the purr of ripping seams, and he lifted his head to meet her eyes. He crossed his arms. 

“So, Sadie,” he purred, his eyes the same deep cold blue of Tahoe she’d mentioned earlier. “You’ve been having fun, I hope? Telling all your little friends about how you almost got JC Chasez in the sack?” 

“I wouldn’t do that.” 


“Really? What, did you record our little conversation, too?” 

“No!” 


“So I guess I’m going to be on an MP3 tomorrow, right, so everyone finally knows what JC Chasez sounds like when he fucks a girl, right?” 

“Stop it.” 


“Stop it? STOP IT? When did you plan to ‘stop it,’ Sadie?” He sneered at her and crossed the bathroom in a few steps, leaning into her face. “After we slept together a few times?” Sadie flinched. “After you got pictures of us together? After you got enough material to fill a few gossip zines?” 


“I wouldn’t do that,” she whispered, and recognized the small, weak sound of her voice, and she hated it. She hated herself. 

“I suppose you recognized me from the start, right? That’s why you choked on that olive, isn’t it?” 


Sadie stared at him, hot tears burning her cheeks. He gripped her damp arms, leaving welts in her biceps, and shook her. 

“ISN’T IT?” 


“Yes!” she choked out, and burst into tears. A flash of recognition crossed his face for a moment, regret, and he released her arms immediately. Sadie felt tears splash on her breasts, and realized how naked, how cold and wet and vulnerable she was, and knew that she would gladly walk down Market Street in San Francisco, among all the winos and drug dealers, in cold, wet underwear and nothing else, if he would stop looking at her like that. 


“Put some clothes on,” he said, a disgusted note in his voice, and threw a towel at her. She draped it around her shoulders like a child and fought to cover her nakedness as he shoved his feet into his shoes. 

Sadie stared at the tile wall of the bathroom, watching as a single drop of water gathered speed and rolled toward the floor. 

“I did recognize you right away,” she said, her voice hoarse and soft. He looked up sharply. “How could I not? I don’t live under a rock, you know.” The water droplet grew, collected strength from the drops around it. She watched it, fascinated. “I actually followed your hat into that club like a teeny and then I lost you. But you found me.” 

The water splashed into the tub. Sadie looked up and met his eyes, those ice-blue eyes that no longer reflected anger or lust or anything; they looked blank as a foggy day. “But I guess I lost you again, didn’t I?” 

JC stood up and opened the door to the bathroom, letting in a draft. Sadie shivered.  


“I thought you were different.” He slammed the door behind him. 

And without warning, rage rose up in Sadie’s stomach, a firewall of anger and frustration. She flung open the door and ran after him. “Me? Who the hell do you think you are? Would you have talked to me if I did say I knew you? Would you have asked me to dance or done shots or taken me for a drive or any of those things if I was another teeny? Jesus, what the hell do you want from me? It’s not like you were up front, either! I don’t remember you telling me what you did for a living!” 

“You don’t know what it’s like.” 


“And thank fucking god for that.” 

“You’re right,” he said, closing the distance between them. “Thank fucking god for that. Because you don’t know what it’s like to have millions of people think they know you and think they should marry you or fuck you because they know your favorite color. You’ve never had someone walk all over you because she wanted fame, or use you for your money, or just so she can tell her friends she had a good fuck in a club with a superstar.” 


JC turned away from her and put on his jacket. “You don’t know what it’s like for people to lie to you.” 

“I didn’t mean to lie to you,” Sadie said, fighting the lump in her throat. He turned and looked over his shoulder, not meeting her eyes. 

“No one ever does.” 


She gasped at the steel edge in his voice, the hard, cold knife of it, and her stomach sank further as he approached the door. His hand on the handle, his voice echoed against the steel of the door. “Tell me something, Sadie,” he hissed, and she stared at the wet curls on the back of his head, the rigid posture of his shoulders, and she longed to run up behind him, touch him, run her hands along his arms and make that horrible, glacial stoniness go away. “Did you giggle about me with your friends? Am I everything the magazines said I’d be? Was I your favorite?” 

Tears welled in her eyes again, despite the chuckle that somehow bubbled out of her throat. “Yes. JC Chasez was always my favorite Nsyncer,” she said.  


“But, Josh… everything else…”  


Something in her voice must have made him turn then, face her with that icy, icy statement. She smiled wanly, tears rolling down her cheeks. 

“Oh, god, Josh, it’s always been you.”  

And for just a moment, she saw something else—something very much like pain—cross his features. 


Then he left. 


Sadie collapsed. 

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