Chapter Two: ** See You Again **

A couple minutes later, AJ finally snapped out of his shock and then hurriedly bolted through the front doors of the building, ran across the lobby past the receptionist who barely had time to look up before he past her.  Not wanting to wait for the elevator, he shoved the stairwell door open and began running up the stairs to the fifth floor. He burst into the conference room on the fifth floor. He found the girl he’d been talking to on the streets before, she was laughing and something Nick had said, but she’d changed a bit. 

 She’s taken of the large jacket to reveal a red tank top, her black pants were loose and hung low on her hips, showing off her abs, and she’d taken the cap off and let her long black wavy hair tumble down.

Brian, Kevin, Howie Nick and Debelah all looked over when he came bursting in the room.

“You’re late,” Kevin stated, automatically.

“Why are you out of breath?” Howie asked.

Debelah looked at him,” You should really quit smoking.  It ruins your lungs and, obviously, you don’t have enough breath to run up five flights of steps.”

“AJ!” Kevin yelled.  AJ automatically hung his head. “I thought you quit!”

“I did!” AJ insisted and then shuffled his feet, muttering”….I just haven’t quit today yet.”

Debelah was smiling again and she walked towards him. “ You’re….AJ, right?” she asked, as though she was confused, but AJ saw the devilish smile on her lips that only he could see now that she had her back turned to the other guys.

“Yeah, and you’re...Debelah,” he said, a twinge of embarrassment in his voice and he was glad that his sunglasses hid his eyes from her seeing the embarrassment in there, too.

 Debelah turned around and winked at the rest of the guys and then turned back to AJ and charged at him.  She jumped on him, wrapping her legs around his waist, her arms around her neck, and gave him a tight hug. He stood there for a second with her in his arms before wrapping his arms around her back and started to laugh.

“Damn, girl, now THAT’S a greeting!” he exclaimed, as she let go and jumped off of him, a wide smile on her face.

“Well, a handshake seemed kind of out of place, coming from that interesting conversation we had earlier,” she said, stressing the word ‘interesting’.

“Yeah, about that…”  AJ said, rubbing the back of his neck.  The other guys looked on, amused and confused. A man sitting in a chair nearby cleared his throat loudly to get everyone’s attention.

“Debelah,” he said in a condescending tone,” I would advise against you showing those displays in public.  Rumors, you know.”

Debelah tilted her head to the side as she turned around to look at him. “Great, then that means I’ll get Backstreet fans AND N'sync fans after me. Thanks for the info, Mikey,” she teased him.

“I have asked you repeatedly to call me Michael.  Now, on with these papers-“he looked down at the stack in front of him. Debelah  turned to the guys and mockingly mouthed ‘I have asked you repeatedly to call me Michael’, making faces and hand motions behind Michael’s back,  as she made her was over to the table.   The guys laughed and walked towards the table as well.

They went over the tour schedule, the bus arrangement (Debelah would be sharing a bus with the guys), and everything else.  When they were done, Michael put the papers in his briefcase, told Debelah to be at the venue tomorrow early to run through everything for the concert tomorrow night, and left. Debelah had already been working with the choreographers and recorded her songs before she met the guys.  The first concert of their tour would be in the city they were already in, tomorrow night

Debelah grabbed her coat, draping it over her arm and put her cap on backwards and hugged all of the guys goodbye, who smiled and hugged her back, already taken with the little spitfire. 

She hugged AJ last, whispered in his ear,” Careful when you talk to strangers, AJ.  You never know who you might run into.”

And she walked out of the door, leaving him staring at her back.