"I can't believe you just said that." Alex said more than a little annoyed. It was the Monday after the Friday she had gone to the doctor's office. "You know how I feel about abortion. You usually feel the same way too. The only reason your suggesting it is because you're scared." Alex yelled at her now ex-boyfriend, David over the phone. "So what if I am? I think I have the right to be. I'm 22 and barely finished college, now I have to deal with this responsibility. Excuse me if I find it a little hard to handle." David replied angrily. "Oh so this is my fault? I seem to remember you being there too that night! You think this is easy for me? I'm not saying that it's going to be easy." Alex said icily. "How do I know you didn't do this on purpose?" David said. "If that's how you feel, fine. I can take care of this child myself. He or she doesn't need you and neither do I." Alex said and slammed down the phone in the receiver.
Alex and Julia's assistant chose that exact moment to pop her head in the door just as Alex pulled off the locket David had given me. "Alex are you all right?" Beth asked. "Yes fine, fine. I just can't get this damn necklace off!" Alex yelled in frustration. "Here let me." Beth soothed.
Julia and Alex were both very close to Beth, who had been like a surrogate mother to them during their time in New York. She had been there right from the time they started at TIME.
Tears began to stream down my face. Beth just looked at me with concern. "Beth, can you tell Julia, when she gets back from her meeting that I needed to go out for a bit. I will be back later. If she really needs to get a hold of me I will have my cell phone." Beth just nodded.
Alex exited the TIME building and just walked down the street. She had no idea where she was going, just that she needed to get away from the office. She ran straight into someone and feel on her butt.
"Alex? Is that you?" Nick asked as he helped the curly haired red-head to her feet.
"None other." Nick could see that something was wrong with her. "Alex do you want to come inside with me?" he asked, gesturing at the building that was JIVE's New York headquarters. Alex just nodded, feeling the burn of tears behind her eyelids. As Nick lead her into the building she squeezed her eyes shut, trying to stunt the flow of tears she knew was coming. Alex managed to get control of herself enough to ask, "Where are we going?"
"Conference room on the 7th floor." Nick replied. Alex didn't respond or say anything. Nick looked down at her worriedly and saw a scarily blank expression on her face.
They reached the conference room and before even closing the door Nick asked her "What's wrong Ali? Why are you wandering the streets of New York?" Nick asked. Alex raised her head to look into Nick's bluer than blue eyes and the concern she saw there broke the strangle hold she had on her tears. "He told me to get rid of the baby.'' she said as the tears began to run down her face. "Who did?" Nick asked, wanting to gather her in his arms and take away all the pain that he could. "My ex-boyfriend, the father of the baby." Uknown to Alex and Nick at that time the rest of the Backstreet Boys were walking past the door of the conference room when they overheard Nick and an unrecognizable female voice talking.
Nick couldn't hold himself back any longer, he drew Alex into the warm circle of his arms. "Shhh, don't worry Ali, I won't let him or anyone else hurt you." Nick soothed and rubbed his hands up and down her back. A few minutes later, Alex took a deep breath and stepped away from Nick. "Thank you. I didn't mean to break down on you like that. I just feel so mixed up." Nick nodded, "Say no more. I was just glad to be here for you." The rest of the BSB chose that moment to walk in the room.
They all said their hellos to Nick and then looked at Alex strangely. "Guys this is my new friend Alex Pierson. Alex this is Kevin, Howie, AJ, and Brian." Alex shook each of their hands and said, "Hey now I know where I recognized you from. You guys are the Backstreet Boys and you're all in the upcoming issue of TIME magazine dedicated to music from the 20th century. That's why Nick looked so familiar to me."
"How did you know that we're in the upcoming issue?" Kevin asked.
"My best firend and I work there. Did you read last week's issue covering the crisis in East Timor? Well, the picture on the front cover was taken by me. And my friend Julia wrote the article that went with it." Alex explained.
"Yeah I read that article, it really touched me. And the pictures were amazing." Kevin replied. "Thanks." Alex said with pride. "Nick is there a washroom around here somewhere?" she asked.
"Yep just down the hallway second door on the left." Nick said. Alex excused herself and headed over there.
"Nick man, she's a hottie! Where do you find them?" AJ said in congratulations. "I ran into her in Central Park. She was crying on a bench."
"She seems to be doing a lot of that." Howie commented.
"I can't believe that you guys were listening to our conversation. That isn't something I would expect from you." Nick said, getting a little mad.
"All righty. Back down sparky. We didn't listen to your whole conversation just enough to know that she was crying." Brian said.
"I really don't want you guys to start raggin on her. " Nick warned them.
"How insensitive do you think we are?" AJ asked. Brian was looking at his friend assesingly. Could it be that this 22 year old was finally growing up? The boy that he had known for years was turning into a man right before his eyes. Man I am getting way too philosophical. Brian thought to himself shaking his head.
The guys just stood around talking until Alex walked back into the room a few minutes later. "Sorry that you guys had to see me all tear stained. These past couple of days have been somewhat of an emotional roller coaster. " Alex said just as her cell rang. "Sorry I have to get this." she said and opened up her phone.
"Hey Al." Julia said from the other end.
"Hey Jules. What's up?"
"Well Beth told me that you were kind of a mess when you left the office I wanted to make sure that you were all right."
"Yeah I'm fine. Just had a major fight with David over the phone. I'll fill you in later."
"All righty. And actually I had 2 reasons for calling, the second one is to tell you that we've been called for an assignment." Alex groaned, "Where to this time?"
"Russia." Julia answered.
"Russia. You're joking."
"Nope sorry. And Sal didn't leave much of a choice."
''Well I guess I've always wanted to see Red Square." Alex sighed.
"That's the spirit." Julia encouraged, "But I better get going. Are you coming back to the offic or heading right home?" Alex glanced at her watch which read 5 o'clock. "I think that I'll just head home, there's no sense going back in now. Oh just one last thing, when do we leave for Russia?"
"1 week."
Alex groaned again in response and Julia laughed, "See ya later Al." and I heard a click on the other line as she hung up.
"So you're going to Russia?" Nick asked.
''Yes in a week and thank you for listening in on my conversation." Alex teased Nick.
The other guys looked on in disbelief. "What?" Alex said.
"How old are you?" Brian asked.
"21."
"So you're younger than Nick but you are the star photographer for TIME magazine and are going to Russia." Howie said in disbelief.
"Yeah that's about the long and the short of it.'' Alex replied. The guys just shook their heads in amazement. "If it makes you feel any better, my friend is 23." Alex told them with a smile.
"So do you guys want to come over to my apartment for dinner?" Alex asked, "I was just gonna invite Nick, but since you're all here, you're all invited."
"I'm in." Nick said eagerly.
"Me too." said Kevin.
"I would love to, but I have other plans." Brian said
"Me too." Howie replied.
"Sorry I can't come either." AJ responded with regret.
"Hey that's all right. I understand about busy schedules, believe me. But I really should get going now. It was nice to meet you all." Alex said shaking each of their hands. "Kevin and Nick, I will see you in about an hour, does that sound okay?" Kevin and Nick both nodded. Alex gave Nick a hug then left.
She arrived back at her apartment about half an hour later with a bag full of stuff for cooking dinner. "Hey Jules." Alex said as she threw her keys on the hall table. "Hey Al, what's with the groceries?" she asked.
"We have 2 hot men coming over to have dinner with us tonight."
''That's not very funny. I don't like it when you joke with me."
''I'm not joking but don't worry about it. Just change out of your sweats and into a nice pair of jeans. It's very casual, that's all I'm gonna do."
"All right, me too."
Alex and Julia both went to their respective rooms. Alex changed out of her business suit into much more comfortable jean flares, with a little design on the flare part and a dark blue sweater, that wasn't tight but form fitting. She left her reddish hair in its curls and didn't bother to brush it.
Julia changed into her own jean flares, minus the design and a cropped sweater that showed her flat stomach whenever she moved. She clipped her blonde hair up and left tendrils down around her face.
They came out of their rooms at the same time and both said,"Damn! We look good!" they laughed and gave each other a high five.
"So you want to cook, or do you want to clean?" Alex asked Julia. They had this deal, one of them always cooked and whoever didn't cook had to clean up the kitchen afterwards.
"I am gonna do both." Julia said stubbornly.
"You can't do that." Alex said.
"Oh yes I can."
"Fine but at least let me help a little." Alex said.
"Well if you really have to."
About 10 minutes after they started cooking Nick and Kevin knocked on their door.
"I'll get it." Alex said and headed over to the door.
Nick and Kevin were very smartly dressed, casual but sexy. Nick was wearing cargo pants and a white sweater, while Kevin had on dark jeans and a dark shirt.
"We come bearing gifts." Nick said, holding out the flowers he had. Kevin held out a bottle of wine.
"Well thank you boys, you have now bought a ticket into the apartment." Alex said and stepped aside to allow them through the doors.
"See." Nick said to Kevin, "That's how you get into people's apartments." Kevin nodded, pretending that he was seriously agreeing.
"I see that we are in silly mood tonight." Alex said and decided to take them on a tour of the apartment/ loft.
"This is the bathroom." "I can tell." Nick said, Alex jabbed him in the ribs. They walked further down the hallway, "This is my room. As you can see I am not very neat at all." All over Alex's room there's was clothes hanging off of furniture and books piled everywhere.
"You know what this reminds me of?" Kevin said, "Nick's room on tour." he replied.
"Hey!" Nick protested, "Even I am not that bad."
Then we went to Julia's room, her's was much neater than Alex's.
After they saw the entire apartment, Nick, Kevin and Alex all walked back to the kitchen where Julia was still busy at the stove. "Guys, this is my best friend and business partner, Julia Summers. Julia this is Nick Carter and Kevin Richardson."
"Holy Jesus Alex, we have Backstreet Boys in our apartment." Julia said, she often used her mouth before thinking it entirely through. Kevin and Nick just laughed. Nick shook her hand and Kevin went to do the same. They held hands together entirely too long, though, and the immediate attraction between them could be felt in the room.
"Hey guys, do you want to be alone?" Nick said, this was enough to break the spell. Kevin and Julia shook their heads and Julia finally said, "Well supper is on it's way. I finished preparing it but now it has to cook in the oven for half an hour to an hour. Alex wanted to help me cook, but the last time she tried to cook she nearly burnt the house down, so I thought that it would be best if I did it." Nick and Kevin started to laugh, and Alex said in defense of herself, "Lies! A stinking pack of lies!" This just made Nick and Kevin laugh harder.
Finally everyone managed to calm down a bit and the all went into the livingroom to sit and talk, while they were waiting for dinner to cook. "So who wants wine?" Alex asked.
They all said they did so Alex went into the kitchen and poured 3 glasses of wine and one glass of chocolate milk, all in champagne flutes.
During the time Alex was in the kitchen, Julia put on the new Savage Garden CD, Affirmation and they had all seated themselves comfortably around the room. Alex handed each of them a glass and sat down beside Nick on the couch.
"Don't you like the wine I chose?" Kevin asked.
"No. I just don't feel like drinking right now." Alex replied, choosing not to say anything to Kevin about her pregnancy, she just didn't feel that comfortable with him and if he stuck around and got to know Julia, like she thought he would, he would find out soon enough.
They all struck up a great conversation and Alex could tell that something was developing between Kevin and her best friend.
"So that's when our teacher walks by, and when he sees that Jules here has her head stuck in the arm of a statue he put his hand up to the side of his face and muttered; those are not my students." Alex said entertaining the guys with stories of her and Julia's childhood antics. They'd had Nick and Kevin laughing so hard that their sides hurt, for about half an hour. Suddenly the oven timer went off and Julia and Alex headed off to the kitchen to set everything up.
"You guys can go sit at the dining room table to wait while we set everything up." Julia said to Nick and Kevin. They went and sat down at the table and Alex kept coming out and setting things on the table while Julia rattled around in the kitchen. Finally everything was ready and the sat down for their meal.
The rest of the evening went really well. After dinner everyone had a coffee and they all sat around talking for about 2 more hours after dinner.
"So give me a call tomorrow." Alex said to Nick as he and Kevin were walking out the door. Nick nodded and with that they were gone.
"So you really like Kevin don't you?" Alex teased.
"Was it that obvious?"
"Yes but it was also obvious that he liked you a lot." Alex said and smiled as Julia started blushing.
They talked a more about Nick and Kevin and about their upcoming trip to Russia. Both Alex and Julia went to bed that night with a sense of peace and happiness.
