Just Friends: Chapter 20
Just Friends: Chapter 20
***Mandy's Point of View***
“Yeah Nick?”, I asked, curious of what Nick was trying to say to me.
“Um...well, I was in the meet and greet room, and I saw....”, he said stopping taking a deep breath and continued, “Larissa.”
I was shocked. Larissa had the nerve to show up here. We weren’t friends anymore, it was over. I had practically killed myself because of her and she comes for a visit.
“Are you sure?”, I asked.
“Yeah, defenitely. She didn’t want me to tell you, but I knew that I had to. She said she wanted to see you and that was why she was here.”, Nick said as AJ walked through the door.
“Larissa’s out there you know, I didn’t let her in cuz I was pretty sure you hated her guts!”, AJ said, sounding particulary happy.
“He’s got a date that’s why he’s so happy.”, Nick said knowingly, “Why don’t you go out there and kick her ass!”, Nick said to me, getting a little riled up.
“Cat fight!!!”, AJ screamed, him and Nick immediatley started smacking each other in a girl way and pulling each others hair and screaming high pitch.
“Shut up!”, me and Leighanne said at the same time, even though we were laughing our asses off.
AJ and Nick stopped and sat down. I was debating whether or not I should go out there and talk to her. I looked at Nick, who knew what I was thinking, and nodded his head yes. So I kissed him quickly, then got up off the couch and went outside. And there was Larissa sitting down outside the door.
“What are you doing here?”, I asked.
“I came to see you! I miss you Mandy!”, she said walking towards me to give me a hug.
I stepped away, and she got the picture so she backed off.
“You made me practically kill myself and you think we’re still best friends? You called me selfish, and just totally made me hate myself. But I moved on, and got on with my life, without you, and it’s been just fine.”, I said getting ready to go back inside.
“But I’m sorry!”, she said, beginning to cry.
“Sometimes sorry isn’t good enough.”, I said, going back inside not looking back.
I walked into the room and everyone turned to look at me, no one said anything. I just continued walking and sat down next to Nick. AJ, who couldn’t stay silent very long, decided to break the silence.
“What happened?”, he asked, sitting down in front of me like it was story time.
“Nothing...”, I said, I was lying but I didn’t want to talk about it, “Well, I don’t want to talk about it.”, I said.
“Okay.”, AJ said getting up, “I’m going to the tour bus, anyone care to join me?”, he asked.
“Yeah, sure.”, I said standing up, “Nick?”
“Yeah, I’m tired.”, he said yawning.
“Don’t leave me!!”, Brian yelled in a kid like voice and jumped off his position on the couch, grabbing Leighanne, who flew up off the couch.
Kevin and Howie followed the rest of us. Before we got outside, I grabbed Nick’s hand and looked up at him and smiled. I loved him so much, I would do anything for him.
“I love you.”, he mouthed.
“I love you too.”, I mouthed back.
We shared a quick kiss, and then exited the game room. Larissa was no where to be found. I sighed out of relief, and Nick looked at me and smiled.
“I just don’t want her in my life anymore. I just want her to be gone.”, I said, as we walked to the tour bus.
“Me too, someone that hurts you doesn’t deserve to be in anyone’s life, especially yours or mine.”, Nick said as he wrapped his arms around me.
“Why didn’t we realize how good we were for each other earlier?”, I asked as we walked through the parking lot towards the tour bus.
“I think we did, but none of us said anything...”, Nick said, kind of smiling.
“Yeah, when did you realize?”, I asked.
“I dunno, I knew for sure when I picked you up from the movies after that whole Jake thing, but I think that I knew before then, I just never realized it.”, he said as we sat outside the tour bus.
“The same with me, as soon as I was in your arms I knew it. I was more upset about me realizing that I loved you more than a friend than what had happened with Jake because I was afraid to lose our friendship, but we can keep both. That’s what me and Brian talked about the day of your video shoot.”, I said.
“Yeah...wait, you told Brian you had feelings for me?”, Nick asked getting a confused look on his face.
“Of course, he’s my brother, and it’s not like I could tell you...”, I said confsued by Nick’s confusion.
“But why didn’t Brian tell me that you had feelings for me, he knew before I did that I liked you...”, Nick said still confused.
“Because I’m his sister, and he would never betray me like that and go and tell you. And he didn’t tell me that he knew that you had feelings for me because he didn’t want to betray you, his best friend.”, I said understanding Nick’s confusion.
“Oh..”, Nick said losing his confused look.
“Ahhhhhhhh!!!!!”, someone screamed from inside the tour bus.
Me and Nick quickly looked at each other and ran inside the tour bus. My heart pounded as we ran to the entertainment room, which seemed to be where the scream had taken place. Me and Nick ran through the door, and everyone on the tour bus was there, plus Larissa.
“Get out of here now Larissa.”, I said, coldly.
“Why can’t we just talk?”, she asked stepping close to me.
“Get out of here, and if I ever see you near me, Nick, Brian, AJ, Howie, Kevin, or Leighanne I will call the cops.”, I said stepping outside so she could leave.
“But I didn’t do anything!”, she said not budging.
“So hiding out in someone’s tour bur where you are not welcome is legal nowadays?”, AJ asked.
Larissa didn’t say anything, she just turned around and left. I followed behind her to make sure that she defenitely left. I turned and went back to the entertainment room.
“I don’t want to talk about it.”, was all I said as I sat down.
I wasn’t in a bad mood or anything, I just didn’t feel like talking about it tonight. We all sat down and watched TV for a little while. Nothing good just some re-runs of the Real World on MTV. Me and Nick were sitting on the floor, Leighanne, Brian, and AJ were on the couch, and Howie and Kevin were each in chairs.
***Nick’s Point of View***
“Mandy, we all love you and we’re all here for you. We know that you’re hurting inside and keeping it inside really isn’t going to help you.”, Howie said, basically out of nowhere.
He was right though. No one else really had the guts to say it I guess, except for Brian and me but we knew that she would tell us privately. I looked at Mandy to see her response, but all I got was a blank stare.
“You used to be so open about things Mandy, now all of a sudden everything stays inside, it’s not healthy. You’ve got six people here who really care about you, and you know you can tell us anything, just like we can tell you anything.”, Howie said getting up from the chair and sitting next to her.
“I know you guys all care about me, I just don’t feel like I know you. I know that sounds weird, I practically grew up surronded by you guys but I still feel like we don’t have that deep connection. You know what I’m saying?”, Mandy said, losing her blank stare.
“Well, lets get that deep connection. How about everyone goes around and says the worst thing that has ever happened to them?”, AJ suggested, everyone nodded in agreement.
“I’ll start.”, I said, “The worst thing that ever happened to me was when I first started the band, and going on that first tour. Sure I was having fun, but I was so homesick. I would cry myself to sleep every night. I was away from my dad, Leslie, BJ, Aaron, Angel, my best friend...”, I said looking over at Mandy, “I had my mom, which defenitely made things better, but it just wasn’t the same.”, I finished my eyes filling up with tears.
Brian nodded sympathetically remembering back to all the nights he would stay up with me and try to get me to back to sleep. Kevin’s eyes filled up with tears, probably remembering the big fight we had about how I was too immature to be in the band and that if I couldn’t deal with being homesick maybe I should just go home. I got so upset that night. I seriously told my mom to take me home, and I had two tickets booked for the next day. I guess he never realized how upset I was. AJ and Leighanne both had sad looks on their face, and Mandy just wiped away my tears and squeezed my hand.
“When I got that first letter from my dad when the Backstreet Boys first became famous.”, AJ said staring off into space, “He left me when I was so young, and he just started becoming close to me so he could get some money from me. I was so hurt reading that letter. And I hurt just as much everytime there was another letter, or a phone call. It was just so horrible.”, AJ said as Leighanne placed a friendly arm around his shoulder.
“When my dad died.”, Kevin said, “It was just as if something had been ripped out of me. The worst part was that my parents had hid it from me for so long. They knew for practically six months that he had cancer and didn’t tell me. If I had known earlier, that would have been six months more I could have spent with him. Six months worth of more memories, more times together, more happiness, more everything...”, Kevin said as his face became so sad.
“My sister’s funeral. Just seeing all those people there, so sad, and especially my mom. I’ve never seen someone so upset before. Parents aren’t supposed to go through losing their own child. She hurt the most out of all of us.”, Howie stated, he seemed the most comfortable talking about it for some reason.
“Having my surgery as a young child and hearing the doctor telling my parents to start looking into funeral plans. I started bawling my eyes out once I heard that. I was only five years old and I was going to die. I knew I had to live through it, and thank god I did.”, Brian said, Leighanne took Brian’s hand in hers and placed her head on his shoulder.
“I’ve never told anyone here about this, except for Brian,” Leighanne said looking up at him, “But when I was 13 my dad was having a party thing and all of his co-workers were there and his boss. I was upstairs in my room doing my homework, when there was a knock at the door, it was my dad’s boss. He came into the room and sat on the bed, he told me to sit next to him, so I did, I was so scared. He started rubbing my back and..”, Leighanne paused for a second as tears began to fall down her face.
“Sweetie, you don’t have to finish...”, Kevin said.
“No it’s okay...and he was telling me how beautiful I was and I just sat there. Then he took off his shirt and his pants, he was only in his boxers, he placed me down on the bed and took off all my clothes and I was completely naked, then he put my hand down his boxers and told me to rub his penis, so I did, then after a little while, he removed my hand and his boxers, and then he raped me. I was so scared I just took it, I didn’t know what to say or do. After he was done he told me that if I told anyone he would fire my dad, and my dad really loved that job so I promised not too. Eventually I told them when my mom found a pregnany test box in the garbage. He’s in jail now.”, Leighanne said, hysterical at this point.
Basically everyone was silent, at this point everyone was on the floor, and AJ and Brian, who were on either side of Leighanne, were holding her. I would never think that someone could do that to someone, especially someone as sweet as Leighanne. I had really gotten to know her over the tour, and I know that her and Brian were perfect for each other. Mandy seemed extremely sad, and at that moment I knew she had been hiding something from all of us. Something worse than what had happened to Leighanne. I tried to make eye contact with her, but she wouldn’t look me in the eye. I looked over at Brian who had noticed Mandy as well, he looked over at me with a look in his eyes saying ‘Oh my god’. I put my arm around Mandy, but she still wouldn’t look at me. By this point everyone had noticed Mandy’s odd behavior, and Leighanne had stopped crying.
“Mandy, you can tell us...”, I said as she began to cry.
“I..I..I don’t know...where to start...”, she said softly through her tears.
“Just start from the beginning.”, Brian said moving next to her.
“Okay...”, Mandy began...