Chapter Two
A few days later, Sophie is released from the hospital. When she gets home, she notices that everyone is gone. She also notices that there is a note on the table. It’s from JC. She picks it up and starts to read it.
Sophie~
I’m sorry that this didn’t work out. But I suppose it was for the best. Please forgive me. We headed off back home early this morning, but I wanted to leave you this note to say good bye.
Always,
~JC
After reading the note, Sophie scrunches it up and chucks it into the garbage.
“I can’t believe I was so stupid. I ruined my relationship.” She mutters to herself. Then she notices a tape on the end table and she picks it up and plays it.
It’s everybody saying good bye to her and at the end of the tape is Kris. She says for her to keep in touch with her. She’s had too many friendships end so suddenly and she doesn’t want her friendship with Sophie to end.
I totally broke Jayce’s heart. I want him back so badly. But I can’t ring him up at all. I’m too scared he’ll reject me.” She says to herself.
Meanwhile, JC is waiting by his phone at home trying to decide whether to call Sophie or wait for her to call.
“I can’t call him. He won’t want me to. And he’ll be busy anyway.” Sophie then walks upstairs into the bedroom.
JC, meanwhile, decides to call up Sophie. When the phone rings, Sophie just watches it ring and waits until the machine picks it up.
“Soph, it’s me. Pick u p the phone please. I need you to talk to me. Please pick up the phone. OK, I guess you’re not home then. I just wanted to say I love you and that I want to make this work no matter what. Bye.” Then he hangs up.
Sophie goes over to the phone and checks the caller ID.
“Damn, I missed his call. God, I should have picked it up." She immediately calls him back.
“Come on Jayce. Pick up the phone.” She waits while it rings.
JC finally picks up the phone.
“Hello?” he answers.
Sophie sits there silently and just breathes into the phone.
“Hello? Is anyone there?” JC asks.
Sophie is in shock because of the sound of JC’s voice.
“Sophie, is that you?”
Sophie hangs up the phone. JC goes into the other room and checks the caller ID. I was Sophie. He dials her number again.
“Why couldn’t I talk for God’s sake?” Sophie asks herself. Then she jumps as she hears the phone ring. She picks up the phone this time.
“Hello?” she answers.
“Sophie?”
“Yes, may I help you?”
“It’s me, JC. We need to talk.”
“OK JC.” She says with a worried look on her face.
“Look, I know after what’s happened it’s very hard to think right now, but just listen. I love you with all my heart and soul and I want to be with you. I don’t care what happens along the way as long as it is with you. You have to trust me on whatever happens. Please.”
“OK Jayce. I just thought I had broken your heart after I kept pushing you away. But I love you JC and I miss you with my heart, body, and soul.”
“That’s what love is all about. You have to be there for one another through good times and bad. Even if you push me away, I still love you.”
Sophie is now shaking and a quiver is visible in her voice.
“I love you JC. I want to be with you so badly. Right now I just feel alone.”
“You’re not alone. You have me. You have the rest of the guys. You have Kris.”
“I mean now. I don’t have you all now because right now I’m alone in my living room shaking.”
“Do you want me to fly over there to be with you?”
“No JC. You have work to do in the studio. I’ll be OK.”
“Are you sure?”
“Work is real important for you and anyway I have school and work to do so I’m going to be busy.”
“All right. But you know if you ever need me or anyone else, you know where to reach us.”
“OK JC. Well I have to go now.”
“OK. At least I know we’re on good terms now.”
Sophie hangs up the phone before JC gets the chance to say good bye. There is now a weight being lifted from JC’s shoulders knowing that he and Sophie are now talking again.
Sophie stares at the phone and wonders to herself, “Why the hell did I just hang up the phone? I have nothing to do.” She decides to call Kris.
“Come on Kris. Answer the phone.”
Kris runs to the phone and answers it breathlessly, “Hello?”
“Hey Kris.”
Sophie, hey. How are you doing girl?”
“I’m fine except…”
“Except what?”
“I just talked to JC and I hung up on him pretty quick saying I had stuff to do, but I don’t.”
“What did you do that for?”
“I don’t know girl. I have just been weird lately. I have been shaking a lot. What’s wrong with me?” she begins to whimper.
“I don’t know. Have you seen the doctor lately? It might be an after effect from the miscarriage.”
“He said it’s not. I just don’t know what’s wrong.” She starts to cry and it is evident in her voice.
“Sophie, don’t cry. I don’t like it when you cry.”
“I’m sorry. I just can’t help it Kris. Don’t tell JC, but I’m really quite ill.”
“OK I won’t tell him. But if worse come to worse, I’m telling no matter what. We all care about you, you know.”
“Kris, the doctor says I’m going to die in a few years.”
“From what?”
“I have a blood clot on my brain which they can’t operate on.”
“How long have you known about it?”
“About six months. That’s what caused me to faint and lose the baby.”
“Six months!? Why didn’t you tell us sooner?”
“Because I couldn’t. I didn’t know how to tell you all.”
“You could’ve told us straight off. We would’ve understood. As I said before, we all care for you.”
“I couldn’t. I’m sorry Kris. Please don’t tell them. I don’t want them to know. I’ll be careful and look after myself.”
“Did you want the others to wonder why you were sick all the time or why you suddenly died?”
“Yeah, let them.”
“Why would you want to do that?”
“Fine. Tell them if you want. But I don’t want them to help me. I want to be left alone.”
“We’re not going to leave you alone. We’re going to spend as much time with you as possible. JC especially you know.”
“No. I want to be left alone. I don’t want them to help me.”
“Why not?”
“Because Kris, I hurt them all and I don’t want to hurt them some more so it’s best if them don’t know.”
“You’re going to be hurting them more if they aren’t told about it.”
“Fine. Tell them. Then see if they can trust me because Kris, I have been lying to them for six months and this baby was going to be the only part of me left in this world once I am gone.”
“Yeah and the baby could’ve killed you too.”
“Yeah I know. But Kris, I can’t tell them.” She begins to cry. “I JUST CAN’T OK.” She said raising her voice and cries some more.
“OK, fine. But JC is going to be the most hurt because you didn’t tell him. He loves you and he wants to look after you.”
Sophie is still crying.
“Kris, I really need someone here and I keep pushing JC away. Could you come over here?”
“Yeah. I’ll be over as soon as I can.”
“OK.” Then they hang up the phone as Sophie cries away the rest of her tears.
Kris arrives at Sophie’s house a few days later. She takes a taxi to Sophie’s house and Sophie lets her in. Kris walks over to Sophie and gives her a big hug and she hugs back.
“Kris, how am I going to tell them?” Sophie mumbles.
“I don’t know. But we’ll think of something. Have you talked to JC at all since we left?”
“Nope. He’s called but I haven’t answered.”
“The thing I don’t understand is why do you keep pushing him away when I know you both love each other?”
“Because if he knew that I have been lying to him he wouldn’t love me anymore.”
“Is it because he doesn’t like people who lie?”
“Yeah he hates them. He thinks that they are fakes.”
“Would it help if I talked to him?”
“So I guess I’m a fake. He would think that I was faking loving him.” There is a long pause before she continues. “It might help. You can talk to him if you want.”
“Well we could tell him that the reason why you didn’t tell him before was because you didn’t know how to tell him but you were planning to tell him.”
“But Kris, that’s a lie. I wasn’t planning on telling him.”
“Well, it was just a thought.”
“OK, so why should I tell them?”
“Because if you don’t tell them, you’d be lying to them.”
“I already have lied to them so what’s the point? Do the guys know you’re here?”
“Why would you want to carry it on? Only Chris does. But I just told him that I was coming over to check on you.”
“I’m doing this because they would hate me for lying to them for six months.”
“Yeah, but if they had any sense they would forgive you.”
There is a long pause before Sophie speaks again.
“So just Chris knows and none of the others? Have you thought that he may have told JC that you’re here and he might be worrying? What if he has? Will you phone him to check that he hasn’t told the others?”
“I made Chris pinkies swear that he wouldn’t. He’d never go back on his word.”
“But what if Chris is worrying? How long did you say you were going to be here?”
“I know he is. But he still won’t tell. I told him that I’d be here for a few days. He won’t let me off work for more than that.”
“Will you ring Chris and tell him to get the guys in the room and to put the speaker phone on so we can talk to them all. I think that’s the best thing to do right now.”
“OK.” Kris picks up the phone and calls Chris. He gets all the guys in the same room and puts the speaker phone on.
“Are you all there?” Sophie asks.
“Yeah, we’re all here. What’s up Soph?” Chris answers.
“I’m being dead serious here. I have to tell you something that I have kept secret for six months.”
“What’s wrong Sophie?” Joey asks.
“Well Kris is the only person I’ve told this to. You guys have to promise not to freak out.”
“We won’t.” all the guys say.
“Guys, I have a blood clot on my brain which they can’t operate on.” There is silence on the guys’ end of the phone.
“I’m sorry you guys.” Sophie continues. “Well, I better go now. I guess you all don’t want to talk to me because you want to think about what I have told you all.”
“Whoa whoa, what makes you say that?” JC speaks up.
“I think you all should just think about what I said because I know you don’t want to talk to me now because I’m a liar and a fake. I completely lied to you all.”
“Sophie, I know we all have a lot of information to absorb, but we also would like details on the situation. What did the doctor say to you when you found out?” Chris says.
“Ask Kris because I have to go to work.”
“OK.”
“If I’m late again I’ll be left with no job, then I will have no where to go.”
“Go to work then. We’ll talk to Kris about it.”
“I know one person who won’t want to talk to me after I hurt him when I left him for Chris.”
“Who did you leave for Chris?” Kris urges.
Sophie gets up to quickly and starts to rush around.
“Sorry Kris, I’ll tell you later. I have to go.” She suddenly stops and puts her hand to her head. “Whoa, my head. I need to sit down.”
Before she gets the chance to sit down, she falls to the floor.
“Damn it! You guys she just collapsed.” Kris says into the speaker phone. Then she turns toward Sophie. “Sophie, are you OK?”
Sophie starts to stir and wakes up. “Huh? What happened? What am I doing on the floor?”
“You collapsed.”
“What? When? How long have I been out?”
“Not long. I’m taking you to the doctor to get you checked out. This is too much. And no fussing either. You’re still going.”
“No Kris. Please don’t. I’ll be fine. Just let me go to work. Do you want me to be left on the streets?”
“Not if you keep doing that you aren’t. If you do that at work, your boss will be the one taking you to the hospital.”
“I won’t do it at work. I just got up too quick and rushed around and blood went to my head.”
“Yeah, well it might. Soph let her do it. She’s worried about you.” JC says from the phone.
“I don’t care if she’s worried. I’m fine.”
“Sophie, quit being so stubborn. You need to get to the doctor before it gets any worse.” Kris steps in.
“I didn’t mean it like that Kris. I just need to get to work to get money to pay for this house.”
“I’ll call your boss and tell him what’s going on. If he fires you, then we’ll figure out a way to help you keep the house.”
“Sophie, I’ll help you pay for the house if that happens.” JC offers.
Sophie looks at Kris with pleading eyes.
“Please let me go.” She starts to cry. “JC, I don’t want your money. You need it.” She continues.
“Yeah and I can do whatever I want with it, right? Well, I want to help you. And I’m going to do it no matter what so just let Kris take you to the doctor and no complaining.”
Sophie gets up and walks upstairs and goes into the bathroom and locks the door.
“She just went upstairs and locked herself in the bathroom.” Kris tells the guys on the phone.
Sophie is in the bathroom talking to herself. “I’m not going. I’m just fine and I will be with or without their support I’m not going to go and she can’t make me.”
Kris goes upstairs and talks to Sophie through the door.
“Sophie, all the guys and myself care about you and we want you to be well. Why can’t you see that? Don’t you want to be around with us and be able to hang out and be friend with us, or are you just going to sit there and be stubborn and feel sorry for yourself?”
“Kris, I’m scared OK. I’M SCARED! I don’t want to know what’s wrong in case it is bad OK. Go tell the guys that’s why I’m being stubborn.” She screams.
“Do you want us to find out what’s wrong with you through an autopsy? I know you’re scared, but we’re here to help you get through it.”
“No Kris. Only you’re here to help me get through it and once you go back home I’ll be on my own again.”
“What if the guys came here to help you too?”
“No they have to do work in the studio. I don’t want to take them away from that. Have you told the guys I’m scared?”
“No. They’re still on hold downstairs.”
“Go tell them.”
“Do you want me to go get the cordless?”
“Yeah. Tell them on that OK.”
“OK.” Kris goes back downstairs and tells the guys what Sophie just said. She brings the cordless back upstairs.
“JC says he wants to talk to you.” Kris says when she gets back to the bathroom door.
“No. I can’t tell him. I’m not coming out to talk to him.”
Kris tells JC what Sophie just said and waits for a response.
“He says that the studio time can wait. They’re recording the album at his house this time and they can work on it later. They said that being here for you is more important than working on the album.” Kris relays to her.
“No. He has to do the album. The fans are waiting. I’m not going to have them come here and if they do, I’m not going to be here when they get here. I don’t want them here.”
“I heard that from here. Sophie, we’re coming over whether you like it or not. The album can wait. The fans have waited two years for an album, so they can wait a little while longer. Right now you’re more important. And you are going to be there when we do even if Kris has to lock you in a room where you can’t get out until we get there.”
“No I’m not because I’m going out the window as I say this to you.”
Kris grabs the key to the bathroom and opens it.
“Damn, she left. Guys you have to come over here so we can find her.”
| Chapter One | Chapter Two | Chapter Three |
