Day One
I’ll admit it, I’m an eavesdropper. I know most people listen to other conversations at one time or another but I’m really bad, I do it all the time. I think it’s partially because I’ve heard people talk about me so many times. Of course it’s partially because I’m nosey too. I get really involved when I’m listening too - sometimes I have to remind myself that just because I’m listening doesn’t mean that I’m actually part of the conversation. AJ’s taken to calling me a voyeurist but I think that’s mostly because it was the word of the day on his calendar the last time he caught me at it. Although it’s not exactly polite it is a great way to kill time, especially when you’re stuck in an uncomfortable (or in some cases flat-out dead), silence with whoever you’re with. This was the situation I found myself in the first night in Detroit.
Brian was refusing to speak to me. That was funny, because usually I was the one that threw the bitch fit and gave the cold shoulder, but that night Brian decided to play my role. In a way I knew he had the right to be mad - after all, I had convinced him to leave with the promise that we were going to do something big and basically all I had delivered was an hour-long car ride that led us to nowhere but a coffeehouse in the sticks. But it wasn’t my fault that I didn’t know the area, and my feeling is that you have to figure for the bad as well as the good (OK, I figured that so that I didn’t have to take as much blame but that’s not important). So basically all I had been doing for the past ten minutes was play with my lime Italian soda and watch Brian slowly stir the whip cream of his jamocha shake into the actual ice cream while sighing. That got old pretty quickly so I decided to turn on my radar and see what conversation I could secretly invite myself into.
There were only two other occupied tables in the non-smoking section where we were sitting. One was claimed by four high school aged, pimply Magic: The Gathering players. I honed in on them for a second but I might as well have listened to a conversation in Chinese for all I understood of their game lingo. The other non-empty table was diagonal to Brian and I and held two girls, both around our age. One was a brunette with long hair and a very expressive but still pretty face, while the other was a blonde with shorter hair. She had big blue eyes and (at the risk of sounding exceptionally cheesy - although I know Brian would be a million more times so when it comes to this topic), looked almost like a living china doll. The two weren’t talking about anything too exciting - debating when to leave for something or other the next day - but anything was more appealing than the Magic boys and so I tuned in. At first they went back and forth for a bit, the brunette insisting that the blonde skip work so that the two could leave earlier while the blonde insisted that she had to go to work to pay for classes, thus have a future. Finally the brunette sighed.
“You know, Andrew, you really piss me off sometimes.”
“I’m not trying to. And don’t call me Andrew.”
“Fine, I won’t call you Andrew...if you skip work tomorrow.”
There was a laugh. “Cec, I’m sorry, I want to leave early too but I really have to go tomorrow. I’ve called off way too much lately and I need the money.”
“Yes, yes I know. For classes.”
“Don’t say it like that. I have to graduate eventually.”
“Andie you simply must adopt my philosophy. It makes life so much easier.”
The blonde - Andie - laughed again. “You mean the one where you basically give up doing anything important and wait for a celebrity to fall in love with you and take care of you?”
I smirked and held in the laugh that wanted to come out. Brian - who had also been listening intently - gave me a look. “Stop,” he said quietly, “it’s rude.”
I rolled my eyes. “Whatever, you were doing the same thing,” I accused. The two girls were laughing and so we shut up.
“It’s not unrealistic at all, but if you don’t want to believe me that’s fine. When you’re coming up to Brian and I’s country house on weekends you’ll feel differently.”
I raised my eyebrows suggestively at Brian. He feigned more interest in his jamocha shake as he tipped his hat lower. “Hey!” Andie exclaimed. “Brian’s mine, you like Nick now,” she added softly. Brian gave me back the raised eyebrows and I rolled my eyes again, adjusting my own hat self-consciously.
“Just because I find Nick vaguely attractive doesn’t mean I can’t like a-B-Rok too.”
“Don’t call him that. And yes it does.”
“No. Brian was the original. I still have a claim on him.”
“Get off my boy.”
“You get off my boy.”
“He’s mine and you know it.”
“Deal with it. He’s mine.”
The argument wasn’t serious - the two laughed through the whole thing - but it was still funny as hell. Brian and I were fighting to stay quiet and doing a pretty good job...that is, until the conversation took a turn. I was afraid to look at the girls but I had to know what exactly was going on so I shifted my line of vision just enough to see them but not look obvious. Brian did the same, and I think we were both surprised to see the brunette lean over to the Magic table.
“Hi,” she said brightly, giving them a wide smile. The four just stared at her, no doubt shocked that an attractive member of the female race was paying them even the time of day. “I’m Cecily, this is my friend Andrea,” she introduced, nodding her head back at Andie, who gave a small wave.
“Hello.”
“Anyway, I’m sure you overheard our little spat we were having just now and I was hoping you could help settle it,” Cecily continued. The guys continued to stare, dazed, until one finally nodded.
“Uh, OK, sure. What are you arguing about?”
“Well, quite simply it’s this - we’re arguing over who should get Brian,” she explained simply. Andie nodded her agreement as the guys exchanged looks of confusion.
“Um, who’s Brian?” the spokesman asked.
Cecily rolled her eyes. “Brian as in Brian Littrell. You know - a-B-Rok?”
“Why does she keep calling you that?” I whispered to Brian, who shrugged.
“I’m not quite sure who that is,” the guy admitted. Cecily let out a small laugh.
“Oh I’m sorry, I guess I just thought everyone knew a-B-Rok. He’s one of the Backstreet Boys.”
The guys looked at each other, clearly not believing that people would actually argue over this. “You two are arguing over which of you should get a Backstreet Boy?” Both Andie and Cecily nodded and the guys started to snicker. “That’s a little pathetic, don’t you think?”
Cecily gave them a slow once-over, looking disgusted, then burst into laughter. Andie soon joined her and that was it for me, I had to laugh too, as did Brian. The Magic boys looked over at us in surprise, then back at the girls, then shared a withering look. Without another word they scooped up their cards and headed downstairs and out the door.That just set Brian and I laughing harder. Little did we know the girls were quickly calming down. By the time we brought our laughter down to a random chuckle Cecily and Andie were staring at us. I wiped at my eyes and bit my lips together, mumbling a “Sorry”. Brian nodded and gave them a smile, then hid his face behind his hand, glaring at me. I looked at the girls out of the corner of my eye and saw that they were talking quietly. I looked back at Brian. He was still giving me the evil eye.
“What?” I whispered fiercely.
“Thanks for making me laugh!”
I rolled my eyes. “Oh whatever, I made you laugh.”
“You did!”
“Yeah, ‘cause without me-”
“Excuse me,” we heard, and both looked over to see Cecily and Andie looking at us as they stood by our table.
“Hey, sorry about laughing...” Brian began but Cecily shook her head.
“Don’t worry about it. We just wondered if you’d mind us joining you,” she said. Brian looked at me maybe a microsecond then started shaking his head.
“No, not at all,” he invited warmly. I just sort of smiled. The girls smiled too and took a seat.
“We thought at first you might be scared of us, but then figured you must think we’re halfway cool if you laughed,” Cecily explained with a sarcastic smile. Before I knew it both she and Andie were sitting with us and chatting away (especially Cecily). I wasn’t too bothered, it was just strange to be hanging out with two new girls. That sounds strange, I know. I had Liz, an off-and-on girlfriend at home who I usually ended up resorting to because I just didn’t have the desire (or the mentaal strength), to go out and find someone else (despite the fact that I was pretty bored). Talking to or even seeing someone else wasn’t cheating because we had never even discussed being exclusive, but I knew she would never think of seeing someone else. I did say two girls, because it was especially weird being with Brian and another girl. He had broken up with his longtime girlfriend Trisha just recently, for so many reasons that it would take days just to mention half of them. It was clear almost immediately that he had set his sights on Andie and she seemed pretty pleased about that. I knew the conversation we had “overheard” was boosting his confidence big time, but he was flirting more than usual with the little blonde. I didn’t know quite how to take Cecily - she said some of the randomest things. The fact that she was a fan was a little unnerving to me too.
I’ll admit right now that I really don’t like associating with fans. I like to hear what they have to say (when they don’t know that I’m listening and because I like to see people look stupid), and I’ll do the whole sign autographs and take pictures thing when I have to but as far as seeing them outside of a group situation? Forget it. They’re always weird or trying too hard not to be weird and I just...I can’t trust them. No, more that I won’t let myself trust them. I haven’t always had this hangup, but a few too many girls ruined it for everyone else. But Cecily...she was weird, but not the fidgetty, “Oh my God, you’re Nick Carter!” weird. She was funny, just totally sarcastic. I was hesitant to admit it, but she was actually sorta cool.
We ended up hanging at the coffee shop for almost two hours, just laughing and stuff. After awhile Cecily sighed and glanced at Andie.
“What say you we blow this popsicle stand?” she asked.
“That’s fine,” Andie replied.
Cecily looked at Brian and I. “That invite extends to you guys too.”
“Where are you two headed?” Brian asked. Andie and Cecily exchanged a look.
“We could go to the park and get yelled at,” Andie suggested. Cecily nodded.
“Cool, sounds good. You guys in?”
Brian looked at me. “I don’t have anything going - you?” he asked casually. He raised his eyebrows a little, warning me that I sure as hell better agree to go. I shrugged.
“Nah, that’s cool...but, uh, why are we going to the park to get yelled at?” I wondered as we headed downstairs to pay our bill.
“We’re not going to get yelled, we’re just going to get yelled,” Cecily clarified.
“What?”
Andie smiled at me. “You’ll see,” she promised. I wasn’t especially keen on getting in trouble but I didn’t have much else to do. We walked two blocks or so til we got to a big parking lot that sat right next to the water.
“Is this one of the Great Lakes?” I asked as we started strolling the boardwalk.
“No, this lovely body of water is the Detroit River.”
“Oh. Is that Canada?” I asked, pointing across the water. Cecily laughed.
“No, that’s Grosse Ile, Canada’s further up,” she corrected.
“What a name, Grosse Ile,” Brian commented from in front of us.
“Don’t let them hear you say that,” Andie warned.
“Why?”
“Because those from ‘the island’ have holier-than-thou complexes,” Cecily said.
“They think they’re better than the rest of Downriver,” Andie added.
“Downriver?” I repeated. Cecily shook her head.
“Don’t bother trying to understand, Michigan is full of regional prejudices,” she told us. I shrugged and we continued to walk. Andie and Brian gradually fell behind us, Cecily and I both having longer legs. Eventually we looked back to find that they had taken a seat on a bench a ways back and we were walking alone together. I started feeling uncomfortable, like maybe now that Cecily had me alone she’d kick into psycho fan mode.
“Hey,” she said suddenly, grabbing my arm, “wanna go play on the bouncy thing?”
“The bouncy thing?” I asked, looking around.
“Yeah, the bouncy thing,” she said again, pulling me off the boardwalk and across the small park. We stopped at this crooked bar-looking thing that was about two feet off the ground. Cecily clammored up on one side and pointed towards the other end where I did the same. It was a little shaky but not too bad.
“Now what?” I wondered. Cecily grinned.
“Now we bounce and see who falls off first,” she instructed, taking a stance. “Ready?” I nodded, sure that she’d fall way before I did - after all, as corny as it sounds dancers learn to have better senses of balance (sure I wasn’t the greatest dancer around but I’d done my share). That wasn’t the case at all. Cecily cried, “Go!”, and just as I started bouncing she jumped hard just once and next thing I knew I had landed flat on my ass. Cecily threw her arms over her head. “I rule!”
I got up, aggravated that I had fallen so quickly. “That wasn’t fair, I wasn’t even ready,” I argued as I headed back up on the bar.
“Not my fault, I asked if you were ready, you said yes.”
“But I wasn’t ready for that.”
Cecily smiled wickedly. “That is what the bouncy thing is all about, my friend.”
“Maybe that time. Now it’s on for real.”
“It was on for real a minute ago. You suck.”
I said nothing, only took a stance that mirrored Cecily’s. This time when she said go I waited until after she jumped. But this time she never jumped. She bounced, quickly and repeatedly, and just like that I was on the ground again. After that I got really pissed off - not for real pissed off, just that angry that you feel after someone beats you and beats you badly (or in my case, badly and repeatedly). We kept playing over and over. Every once in awhile I beat her, and the loud cursing she let out as she fell onto the hard ground was like music to my ears. After I had fallen for what was probably the two dozenth time a force other than Cecily knocked me off the bar.
“The park is closed!”
“Holy shit!” I cried as I tumbled to the ground, my heart racing. “What was that?”
“The cops,” Cecily answered simply, still standing on the bar. I stayed low to the ground, looking around.
“The cops? Dude, is it illegal to be here?”
Cecily shrugged. “After a certain time - ten, I think.”
I checked my watch. “It’s almost midnight!” I whispered frantically. “Shouldn’t we get out of here?”
“Why?”
I stared at her. “Why? Because the cops are yelling at us, that’s why!”
“So?”
“Look, maybe you enjoy getting arrested but I don’t,” I told her flatly.
“We won’t get arrested,” she replied, starting to bounce. “Now get back up here.”
“You get down here. Really, Cecily, I don’t want to get in trouble.”
She rolled her eyes. “We aren’t going to get in trouble, now come on and play.”
“No! Come on, we have to go!”
Cecily put her hands on her hips. “Nick,” she began patiently, “I’ve lived around here all my life. You haven’t. I wouldn’t stay if I thought we’d get in trouble.”
“I don’t know-”
“The park is closed!”
I shook my head. “This is crazy, we have to get out of here,” I said, standing up straight. Cecily laughed.
“This is what Andie and I meant by getting yelled at. Forget you two, would we come down here if we thought we’d be arrested?”
“I don’t know, people do all sorts of crazy things. Maybe you’re the type that gets a kick out of pressing your luck. Whatever, can you just humour me?” I pleaded. Cecily rolled her eyes again but finally hopped down. “Thank you,” I said, breathing a sigh of relief.
“Just for the record, I am not doing this because I’m afraid of the law,” she said.
“That’s fine, blame it on me.”
“Damn skippy I am.”
“I’m a baby.”
“Fuck yeah you are! You’re a total baby!” she agreed. I didn’t mind, I was just happy that the police wouldn’t be yelling at us anymore. Boy band members being thrown in jail isn’t looked on favorably, especially by teenyboppers. I almost said that to Cecily, then thought it might make things weird by bringing up the whole I’m-a-boy-bander issue. We approached Brian and Andie’s bench and Cecily grabbed my arm and put it in the air.
“Can you guys guess who this is?” she asked loudly. There were still a few stragglers standing around the boardwalk and I was hoping that she wouldn’t answer her question with the obvious.
“I have a few choice guesses,” Brian said.
“I’m sure you do, but tonight’s answer is the biggest baby alive,” Cecily replied. This time I rolled my eyes.
“Yes, that’s right, I’m the biggest baby alive because I get a little edgy out when cops yell at me,” I said in response. Cecily gave me a look.
“A little edgy? You damn near shit your pants!”
“Gee, exaggerate much?” I was about to say more, but the park closed message blared again and I jumped. Brian and Andie laughed and Cecily patted my back.
“Nice way of supporting your point there,” she congratulated me. I pushed her a little.
“Shut up.” I looked at Brian. “You ‘bout ready to head back? I’m kinda beat.”
Cecily put her arm around me. “Yeah, he’s had a hard night of getting his ass kicked.” I nodded.
“Yeah, that’s it.”
“Did you make him play on the bouncy thing?” Andie asked. Cecily nodded happily.
“Yep - beat him, too.”
Andie looked at me, surprised. “She’s a klutz - all you had to do was two jumps in a row,” she informed.
Cecily gave her a dirty look. “Thanks, Andrew, give away my weakness.”
“Where were you when I needed you?” I asked, smacking my hand against my forehead. Andie laughed. I turned to Brian again. “Ready?”
Brian gave me a look. “You’re really that tired?” I saw in his eyes that he wasn’t exactly thrilled with the idea of leaving. I myself had actually been having fun, too, but I didn’t want to stick around too long and wear out the magic. Plus I really was tired - I had played my new Playstation game a good portion of the night before and had been running on about three hours of sleep all day.
“Yeah, I really am.” I knew he’d rail me out in the car but too bad. Reluctantly Brian stood, as did Andie.
“Well, then, I guess I better go put the little one to bed,” he said, looking mostly at Andie.
She nodded. “Yeah, we should probably get home and check on the dog,” she agreed.
“Damn fuzzball rat,” Cecily muttered and I laughed - aside from the fuzzball part she sounded like me talking about Brian’s dog.
“Don’t call it a rat,” the other two said in unison. Cecily grabbed Andie.
“OK, that was just scary - no more time with the bad man.”
Brian laughed. “Where’re y’all parked?” he asked.
“Right across from the coffeehouse,” Andie answered.
“Cool, so are we.” We walked to the parking lot together, still laughing and joking. We stopped at Andie’s car.
“Thanks for all the fun,” Andie said, looking more at Brian than at me.
“Yeah, thanks for making me feel coordinated,” Cecily added, smiling at me. I grinned.
“No problem.”
“Maybe we could...I don’t know, do this again? We have a lot of free time while we’re here,” Brian said, looking mostly at Andie again, who nodded.
“Sure, that’d be fun.”
“We’ll set it up tomorrow,” Cecily said.
“Oh yeah,” Brian said, then smiled at me. “They’re gonna be at the fan conference tomorrow.”
I was surprised, and not in a good way. “Oh really?” Cecily and Andie nodded. “That’s cool,” I said, trying to sound neutral.
“I can tell you’re just stoked,” Cecily said, grinning. I shrugged.
“No, it’s cool.” It wasn’t, really, but I wasn’t going to make it an issue. Brian nodded resolutely.
“OK then, tomorrow it is.” He hugged Cecily, then Andie, then looked at me. I did the same quickly then started for the car.
“Bye baby,” Cecily called. I turned and waved a little but kept walking. A minute later Brian was next to me.
“Dude, what’s your deal?”
I looked at him. “I wonder.”
We got to the car and I tossed the keys to Brian. We started away, driving in silence for a few minutes til Brian glanced at me again. “So how are things going with Cecily?”
“There are no ‘things’. We just hung out while you and Andie talked.”
“Seems like you had fun.” I shrugged. “Damn, Nick, are you getting all weird about them being at the fan conference?”
“No. I don’t really care.”
“Whatever.”
“I don’t.” But I did. I was just starting to forget the fact that Cecily was a fan and then I found this out. People didn’t just stumble on fan conference passes - you had to either be a crazy fan and do something above and beyond, pay a shitload of money or have big connections. Based on the conversation we had first overheard I couldn’t help but assume that she fell into the first - and least desirable - category. Which, in my book, pretty much sealed the deal that any potential that may have been there was long since lost.
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