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Author's Chapter Notes:
A/n: Please excuse the tons of mistakes in here, it's unedited for now :)

I know the fans especially don’t like the fact that we smoke and I personally knew that we were poisoning ourselves slowly to our death, but at the same time I found a different type of comfort from that smell. It meant that AJ is nearby.

Just like the comfort I get whenever I hear Kevin’s muffled voice in the room next door or the echoes when he passed by the corridor. To know that there’s someone I trust to make sure everything is taken care of, where I can then slip back to the back, knowing that the amount of pressure on my shoulder is now shared.

It’s the same comfort I get whenever I hear bits and pieces of whispered conversations between Howie and the person on the other line. Or the way he just kept saying ‘hmm’, ‘yes’, ‘okay’ or ‘sure’. Howie and his constant calls let me know of his presence.

It’s the same comfort I get whenever I hear the regular thumping of a basketball hitting the floor, thump…thump…thump…because with it, brings along the image of Brian sitting across the room from me, just dropping ball and catching it back until bored enough, he would let it dribble and hit my leg to get my attention. If I were too tired, I would just kick it back to Brian and see if it hit his leg and if I was game enough, we would end up playing one on one just about anywhere with decent space.

If I were to tell you about the soundtrack of my life, those sounds would be it.

Right now though, it’s the smell of tobacco that had lulled me in companionable silence. It’s like the drug I needed to just lean against the uneven wall behind me and folded my legs pretzel style without having to feel self-conscious about myself. When the smell gets too much, when I start to acknowledge the dryness in my throat, I would reach out for my tall paper cup of diet coke and take a generous sip.

“Check this out.”

I opened my eyes, blinked furiously at the unexpected glare of the evening sun and was in time to see puffs of smoke coming out of AJ’s mouth. For a while, they appeared to be hollowed donuts before they lose their shape and disintegrated into nothingness.

Looking at him sitting next to me with his knees propped up and his arms stretched out and resting on the peak point of his knees, AJ had a proud grin on his face. As if blowing Os from cigarette smokes had never been done before. As if he had founded something ground breaking and crucial in the search of a cure for cancer. I wish I could do that though, doing something as little as making Os out of smoke and feeling proud of my achievements. It gets harder when you grow up.

I never said I wanna grow up.

“It’s never a choice kid. We just have to.”

For a second there, I just looked at him, wondering if I missed something in between our lack of conversation before realising that I had said that out loud.

“I thought we always have a choice.”

He scoffed. “Some old fart came out with that saying like a gazillion years ago and then everyone else thought it’s deep or some fuck shit.” I smirked. Sometimes with AJ, nothing ever sounds vulgar. They just sound right coming from him. “If we have a choice Nick, we wouldn’t have done some of the stupid mistakes we did.”

“We learnt from them though. Mistakes are our lesson to be better, right?”

“True. That’s why we make mistakes. That’s why I guess; we did them in the first place. So it’s not really a choice, is it? Maybe things happen for a reason, like, it should happen. So in other words, why choose, we’re bound to do it anyway.”

At this point, I was lost. It had nothing to do with the fact that I’m blonde though. I cringed.

“Was that supposed to make any sense?”

“It should be…but now that you’re second guessing it, I don’t know anymore.”

I grabbed for my drink again as AJ started on his second cigarette. He passed the box to me but I declined. “I haven’t record my part yet dawg.”

“Ah yes, pardon me.”

“You know what’s cool though, being grown up and shit.”

“You probably will tell me anyway,” AJ said, smirking. “You never outgrow that for sure, irritating Kaos.”

“Hey, I’m not. I just want to make my point across cause nobody wants to take me seriously back then.”

“And you whine too, like now.”

“Cause you’re always picking on me that’s why.”

“Excuses, excuses.”

“Do you wanna hear it or not?”

“Like I said, you’re gonna tell me anyways.”

I decided to let that remark pass me by cause I really want to tell him. “For one thing, Johnny won’t come out and yell our ass off when we smoke.”

AJ almost choke on the smoke that was probably poisoning his lungs right then. “Dude, he was MAD!”

“I believe that was the first and last time you tried to smoke.” I said, recalling the time when Johnny had caught him smoking in between breaks from recording. I believed he was only 19 then. The lecture we received because of that…Johnny had expected me to tell AJ to not smoke and not just stand by him when he did it. For real, AJ always had something smart to say when Kevin grilled him; you’d think AJ would take orders from ME? All of 17 years old me?

AJ nodded. “When the man barks, he really barks.”

“And he’s always nice when our mothers were around.” I pointed out.

“Yeah, but moms are worst than him.” AJ said. “We can’t do anything.”

“And if mothers weren’t around, we have Kevin breathing on our back.”

AJ blew another O. “Man, I was always angry at Kevin.”

“WE were always angry at him. I tell you one thing though, him being 24 then and having to look after a sixteen year old me…I can’t see anyone else doing that but Kevin.”

AJ looked at me with an eyebrow raised. I wonder what it was I said that had gained me that honour. “What?”

“You’re living it right now Nick, what the fuck are you talking about? Not just a 16 year old, but two of them too. TWINS. The worst case scenario.”

“Aaron and Angel? I’m not living it man, I’m not even with them for long.” And I don’t think I’m doing a good job either. My brother is smoking and drinking and going to clubs that shouldn’t have admitted him in the first place. Just cause I’m Nick Carter, they let him in. What did I do about it? Nothing. Cause I don’t want him to go against me, too many things are going against me, I can’t face myself if my own brother pushes himself away from me. I’m leaving Angel to her sisters, I can’t handle woman right now. I just don’t get them.

“You tried bro. That’s the best you can do.”

“Kevin and Howie did good then, cause we grow up okay, didn’t we?”

“When you put it that way, it sounds like we were brought up by a gay couple.”

“Don’t let Howie hear that.” I said. Howie might be gentle and nice, but never provoke the man. “As a matter of fact, don’t let Kevin hear that too.”

AJ laughed and drew another long breathe of the smoke. “Yeah, they did good. We all did good at the end of the day. We’re no angels, we fucked up but I think we’re good people.”

“I wish people know that though. That we’re good people.” He was silent for a long time, and I grabbed for the paper bag by my side, my lunch from Arby’s. Biting into it, I heard the start of an engine somewhere and cars honking a few blocks down the road. For some reason, these noises scare me lately. I would normally retreat into the studio when I got uneasy, hiding from mental images of some street guys coming up to me with a baseball bat, wanting to beat me up on the back alley screaming they don’t want woman beater in their neighbourhood. Today however, I didn’t get up and leave. The tobacco smell kept me calm.

“It won’t be easy and you’re gonna start doubting yourself for a long time but if you take time to find yourself, you’ll overcome this.”

Somehow, with that being said, I couldn’t take another bite of my lunch even if I wanted to. I wished we don’t have to go down that road. I just wanted everything to be normal. The way it used to be.

“I’m trying J, trust me, I’m trying real hard.”

“And that’s all you’re able to do for now. Forget the rest man, it’s your battle with yourself, not with anyone else.”

“What if I can’t do it? What if this album and the touring are too much for me? I don’t want to cause anymore problems with us.”

“Then you tell us. Don’t wait until the very people you love turn their back on you before you ask for their help. We’re here bro, we can help you, but we wouldn’t know what you’re thinking if you tell us shit. Don’t become another me. I’ve put them through too much hell already. I’ve put you through hell too.”

I decided the conversation was going too intense and lunch breaks in between recording sessions should be relaxing. “I think I put Kevin through hell a lot back then.”

“I think we all did.” AJ laughed.

“What did he do to deserve all that?”

“I think we just love to see him get so worked up.”

“What’s the first thing you remember of those time right now?” I asked. I have to say, that the uneasy feeling was fast disappearing. I could trust my stomach to eat again.

“Probably that one time when we all decided to go missing.”

I frowned, unable to put my finger on the memory. For one thing, I couldn’t see Kevin agreeing to do something like that. Or Howie even.

“Remember Johnny said we had to go back to the studio at night just to practise the damn dance moves and we decided that we don’t want to?” He searched for some recognition in my eyes but I offered none. “And then Kevin said he had a plan to get us out of the practise and then we switched off the lights and locked the doors and windows and went down to the basement?”

We had a little slumber party down there, dressed in our PJs and armed with thick blankets and pillows and torch lights. I was too tired to go for the practise that I agreed to anything Kevin wanted, forgetting the little detail about the dark. Everything went great until Johnny dropped by and let himself in the house with the extra key and was furious when he realised we were missing.

I guess I had said that out loud cause AJ nodded. “And then we had to switch off the lights and kept very still, so we don’t get our ass caught. You were almost in tears.”

It was really dark. And there was this eerie noise that no one else heard that I swear, was there!

“And you almost gave us up when you heard Johnny on the phone with Jane, freaking her out cause you’re missing.”

She had plenty to say the next day. I believed I hurt my eardrums.

“She drilled you yes, but the moment she left, you were grinning so wide, I swear I saw thorns on your head.”

“Even said that we should do it again sometimes.”

“Of course Kevin said it was a one time deal only. That we shouldn’t pull such a prank again in the future if we want to make the group work.”

“It did, didn’t we? Make it huge. Live our dreams.”

“Yeah. In fact, I remember that day, when Johnny caught me smoking…we were doing this too, sitting outside a studio in Orlando, me smoking and you coughing, whining as always. Remember that?”

“I wasn’t whining. I was telling you about our future.”

“Yeah well whiny boy, you said if we become famous, you’re gonna open up an arcade with Brian and marry some biker chick in leather.”

I cringed.

“You said you wanna open up a tattoo parlour.” I pointed out.

“Hey, thanks for reminding me that, should put that in my to do list.” I groaned.

Whatever happened to biker chick in leather though? I should find me one. That’d be in my to do list. Or not.

“I don’t think biker chick and Leighanne will be good friends. It’ll affect our business if the missus don’t get along.”

“That wouldn’t be good, yes.” AJ laughed, flicking his cigarette butt. It landed on the road in front of us. “Hey, whatever happened to Backstreet Motel? Remember that one? We’re gonna invest our money on one and each room will have a jukebox playing only BSB material, and the swimming pool as huge as a lake and everybody must wear purple bikinis…”

“Howie’s odd.”

“Well you made it a law that everyone buy a gremlin and carry it everywhere to get discounts on our stuff.” I pointed out.

“It’s better than Brian’s idea anyway.” AJ defended himself. Of course, according to Brian, everybody must attend his workshop while in Backstreet Motel. To appreciate and understand the language of Donald Duck. Go figure.

“Kevin put a law for silence after 9pm, I mean what’s up with that? That will definitely ruin our business. Who sleeps at 9pm anyway?”

“Only Kevin.” I said. “But he’s a jerk anyway. And people would probably abide to his rule cause he’s…Kevin.”

“What was your rule?” AJ asked, frowning. I shook my head. “Can’t remember.”

“What do you mean you can’t remember? Come on help me out here…”

“Probably something stupid.” I said.

“That’s a given Nick.” AJ said, laughing. “Man, I know we all said yours was the best idea, what was it?”

And then it hit me, out of nowhere. I started laughing out loud until I cried. AJ was pushing me to stop laughing and tell already. I couldn’t get a word out, until AJ threatened to leave me there on my own. Which I didn’t want to. The honking of cars came back and that sickening feeling on my stomach was growing back. So I stopped laughing and told him.

“I said, each person must give me 3 M&M and a promise that there will be no monsters under their bed at night.”

AJ’s eyes widen. “That’s IT! And Brian asked why 3? And you said 3’s enough cause we’re gonna have like millions visitors a day. You didn’t think you could eat that many chocolate.”

Howie said I was smart cause I was the only one who got something out of the visitors. Free chocolate.

“Told you guys I’m gonna share them with you.”

We calmed down and AJ started on another smoke and I finished my lunch. In the distant, I heard a car pulled to a halt and doors opened and slammed. I took a deep breath of the tobacco, counting backwards from ten and mentally told my butt to stay put on the ground.

I heard Kevin’s muffled voice first, unable to understand what he was saying. Howie’s ‘sure’ ‘okay’ ‘yup’ came next followed by the thump…thump…thump…of a basketball until Kevin yelled ‘Brian my car, damn it!’ and Brian saying ‘Opps!’

I saw Brian’s legs first, minus the ball; probably it went under the car. He stopped midway and gasped, eyes wide open. “You guys, come quick!” Kevin and Howie came rushing, Howie was already off the phone.

“What?” Kevin asked.

“I used up my cash for lunch, you guys have any small change? Poor runaways, they couldn’t be any older than 18.”

AJ caught the joke first and gave him the finger. “Fuck this dude.” Kevin and Howie laughed at our expense and I took another sip of my diet coke and breathed everything in. It’s not everyday that I get to hear the impromptu acapella version of my soundtrack. It sounds beautiful.