Four hours, many glasses of water, and three boxes of Chinese food later, Kayla and Nick were still sitting out on the couch talking. Nick had just come to the end of a memory he had been recounting to her. After four whole hours, Kayla felt like there wasn't very much she still didn't know about him, and she was sure he felt the same way about her.

"Okay, so we've covered childhood for both of us, career for you, school for me," she said. "What else can we do?"

Nick frowned. "Um...I don't know."

Kayla thought for a minute before her face lit up with an idea. "Ooh! I know! Love life," she said, grinning.

Nick sighed. "Oh no."

She laughed. "Come on, yours can't be as bad as mine."

"Ohhh, yes it can," he said.

"Well, prove it to me," she returned.

Nick squeezed his eyes shut. "Fine," he relented. "What do you want to know?"

"Everything," she said. "How many girlfriends have you had for starters?"

"Um...let's see..."

"Okay, the fact that you even need to count means yours is more successful than mine," she cut in, laughing.

He smiled and shook his head. "I beg to differ. Okay, there was Danielle, Karen, Lisa...Ashley...Monica...Haley, and Sarah. That's seven."

"Okay, so...one by one, tell me about them."

Nick shrugged. "Basically, they're all the same. I met them at parties or clubs or even concerts once or twice, we went out a couple of times—the most was eight with Sarah—and we ended up splitting because of my career. It was always too hard to have anything going on with my being gone all the time," he explained listlessly.

"Are you serious?"

He nodded. "They were all really sweet girls, and I don't know, maybe I could have had something really amazing with one of them. But I guess I'll never know."

"So because of the Backstreet thing, you've never had a real relationship?" Kayla summarized.

Nick nodded again. "Bingo," he said glumly.

"That sucks," Kayla remarked.

"I know. Well, now that you've heard my terribly cheerful romantic history...what about yours?"

Kayla smiled and looked at the floor. "Well...okay, this is really embarrassing compared to your seven, but...I've only had three boyfriends."

He chuckled. "Well, I am two years older than you."

"Oh, yeah. But still..."

He shook his head. "So tell me about 'em."

"Okay, well, first, there was Trevor. That was..." She frowned, thinking. "That was freshman year. We went out for...oh, two weeks."

Nick laughed. "Why did you break up?"

"Oh, well, you know...we grew apart," she said, making both of them laugh.

"So who came next?"

"Next was Billy in eleventh grade. That lasted longer. Three whole months," she said wryly.

"Hey, that's more than I can say," Nick pointed out.

She smiled. "Yeah, well...turns out, he was cheating on me with two other girls the whole time, so...needless to say, I dumped his ass."

Nick grinned. "Bet he's sorry now."

She giggled. "Oh my gosh, I love saying that! Do you know how much fun I had rubbing it in Scott's face without actually saying anything?"

"Wait...Scott?"

Kayla nodded. "He's number three. Actually, we only broke up about two weeks before I had the audition," she said.

"Why?"

"Well—"

Kayla was cut off by the sound of the front door opening and Brian coming into the house.

"Helloooo!" he called.

"Hey!" Kayla and Nick both called back.

He entered the room a moment later, smiling at both of them. "How are you two doing?"

"Fine."

"Okay."

"Feeling better?" he assumed.

Kayla and Nick exchanged a pensive look and then smiled and nodded.

"So what did you do all day?" Brian wondered, sitting down in the now empty armchair and kicking his shoes off. "Ate Chinese food, I see."

"Yeah. We watched some TV, played some video games—he won every single time—and then we ordered lunch and just talked for the rest of the day," Kayla explained.

"Ohhh, so you bonded," Brian comprehended.

Kayla and Nick laughed, exchanging another look.

"You could say that," Nick agreed. "What did I miss today at work?"

Brian rolled his eyes. "Not very much, don't worry," he informed his best friend.

"And what about me?" Kayla wondered.

"Editing. Fun, fun, fun."

She nodded. "Good."

"So you two are gonna make it in tomorrow, right?" Brian asked.

"Hopefully."

"I think so."

"Good," he said. "Well, I'm gonna hop in the shower real quick, but then do you want to watch another movie? And don't worry, Kayla, nothing scary this time," he said before she could even start to object.

She smiled. "Sounds good to me."

"Yeah," Nick agreed.

"Okay, back in a few," he promised before getting to his feet and leaving the room.

"I'm actually gonna shower too, if you don't mind," Nick said when Brian was gone.

Kayla shook her head. "No, that's fine."

"Okay, now I just have to get up," he realized, laughing.

"You can do it, Nicky," Kayla encouraged, grinning.

Nick glared at her. "I'm gonna hurt you someday, you know that?"

"I'm aware," Kayla joked as he got to his feet with some effort. "Have fun, Nicky!" she called after him as he walked out of the room.

He laughed to himself, shaking his head, and ignored her.

Kayla smiled to herself as she watched him disappear around the corner. Brian was right, she and Nick had bonded today. And that made her happy.


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