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The breakfast room was full with BSB and their staff and band members. They were all loading up on the fantastic breakfast buffet.

"This is sooo good," Howie mumbled while piling up another load on his plate.

"Yeah, have you tasted this?" Kevin asked his cousin while pointing onto a ham. "It´s the best ham I've tasted in a long time. Kinda makes me feel homesick."

With that the three men walked towards the table to join the rest of the band. Minus Nick.

Even AJ had graced with his presence and he was holding his girlfriend Sarah around her waist, whispering something that had the beautiful brown hair girl giggling. Knowing AJ's raunchy sense of humor, it had to be something off color.


Leighanne looked at the couple, not overly thrilled. She usually wasn´t a person that had a hard time adjusting to others, but Sarah was a person that she had a hard time liking, like Nicks former girlfriend Manda. She was still in that opinion that AJ should get his gear together with his former girlfriend Amanda again since those two were made for each other.

Turning her head to Brian she whispered "Where is Nick? Do you think that he's still sick?" Concern was evident in her voice.

Shrugging his shoulders Brian mumbled between the bites of breakfast. "Hope not," Turning to Howie he asked, "Did you wake Nick up?"

Howie nodded affirmative. "Yeah, he should be here soon."

"Where the hell is Nick???" an annoyed voice belonging to Bruce was heard in the breakfast room. Bruce was very pissed off since he had to go trough the days schedule and the blonde was late as usual.

"We can´t wait any longer", he huffed and started to tell the boys and the band about the days hectic schedule.

"First off we have a press conference and I need you," he gestured with his clipboard towards Kevin, "Kevin, you take the lead as usual," Bruce stated and then he continued with that they had to leave the hotel to do an radio interview after lunch. Afterwards they had to rush to a fan conference.

"Tonight we have a formal dinner banquet," Bruce droned on, not wanting to get into details since he knew that this wouldn´t be met in a gracious way from the boys and the rest of the staff.

"What!?" AJ's head bolted up. "A formal dinner? But me and Sarah were going clubbing…" he started, interrupted by Bruce who said in an irritated voice stating in a nonsympathetic tone, "Too bad, work comes first."

The calm of the room was soon overshadowed by several voices that were voicing their displeasure about the formal dinner. It was quite obvious that the nobody, especially the boys were too hot on the idea.

Just as Kevin was about to speak up, Nick made an dazed, sleepy entrance.

"So you´ve decided to come now" Bruce said sourly to the pale teenager. Nick said nothing and went to sit down beside Howie.


"Bruce, we're all tired, jet lagged and I really don´t think that a formal dinner is such a great idea right now." Kevin was always very strict in his way of speaking and his Kentuckian drawl had all evidence that he needed to be heard and agreed upon.

"Formal dinner?...what?" Nick asked, confused, looking at Brian to get an answer.

Kevin picked up this, as usual and he said with an slow, even tone, "Nick, if you had dragged your sorry ass in here earlier you would have known what we were talking about." He made no further attempt to inform Nick what the loud discussion was about.

"Hey!, You are here to do a job and therefore you are ALL going to this dinner, whether you like it or not. There will be some important people there, future sponsors and I want you all to do your best." He lowered his eyes, looking at Nick, "Especially you!"

"What did I do? I alwa...." Nick started, but was interrupted by Bruce.

"And remember you all have to wear Tuxedos and the women in formal attire."

If the sound in the breakfast room had been high it was nothing compared to what the level in the room was now.

"A Tuxedo??? I look like a fucking penguin!" AJ was upset, not wanting to destroy his cool image."We're popstars, not some classical freaks!"

"Too bad that you think so AJ, but you are going. Period. End of dicussion!" With that Bruce ended the meeting, leaving several upset boys behind.

"This is fucking great" AJ stood up and walked out of the room, Sarah hanging behind like a shadow.

Nick rubbed his temples. The whole discussion had made his head hurt even more and he was sure that another migraine was on it's way.

Howie and Kevin talked about the upcoming schedule while Brian paid his attention to his fellow band mate.

"Feeling any better buddy?" he asked, concern shone in his eyes.

Nick shrugged. "Yeah, he mumbled, not convincing himself, Brian or Leighanne for that matter.

"Nick, have some breakfast. We have to leave to the press conference soon." Kevin had stopped talking with Howie and was now showing his attention to the youngest member of the group.

"I´m not hungry," Nick murmured while coughing. Shit that hurt, he winced, the lump in his throat making it painful to swallow.

"You need to eat something," Howie agreed with Kevin.

"I just want something to drink."

Leighanne looked at Nick. "Do you feel sick?" she asked, reaching out her hand to feel his forehead. Nick shrugged away from her hand.

"Nah, I´m fine. Just really full from those Japanese burgers they served us yesterday," Nick lied.

"Yeah, I know what you mean," Brian gave an disgusted look.

At the meet and greet they had served Japanese hamburgers and to put it mildly, it had tasted wierd. AJ was the only one that had devoured the burgers without question, and that was only because he was so starved from eating plane food the whole trip.

As he thought about it, Nick felt like the burgers were still in his stomach, heavy like lead. His stomach was churning and there was a queasy feeling that had him feeling almost bloated.

"Here you go." Leighanne set down a plate with scrambled eggs and bacon in front of Nick, as well as some toast and orange juice.

"Thanks," Nick said trying to sound grateful, instead the quesiness was starting to increase to nausea.

Leighanne noticing the look said, "You need to get some food into your stomach and then you'll feel better"

"I hope", Nick mumbled while digging his fork into the scrambled eggs.

As always he was the last one out of the resturant. The other guys had left him after a while since they were starting to run late for the press conference and management didn´t like it when they were late.

After picking at his food, eating small bites Nick was disturbed by Howie sticking in his face trough the door.

"Nick! We have to leave now."

"Coming. Just drinking this up," Nick gestured towards his untouched glass of orange juice.

If he had known what was in store for him, he would have left it as it was.

Untouched.

Taking a quick drink, he started to choke. "FUCK!" he shouted, tears watering in his eyes.

Howie looked at Nick, startled. The boy was red in his face, grabbing his throat like he was in severe pain, tears slipping down his cheeks.


"Nick? Are you alright?" Howie came rushing to him, kneeling down in front of the distressed boy.


"Yeah, oh shit.." Nick was panting. "I..I," he had trouble regaining his voice. "I must have swollowed wrong," he managed to croak out.

Howie, not looking too convinced said in a light tone, "Ok, Nick we better get going now. You know how Kev and Bruce are if they have to wait."

Nodding, Nick stood up. The whole room seemed to spin and he had to grab a hand at the table or else he would have fallen flat on his face. Howie was already on his way towards the door and that action went unoticed. Which Nick was grateful for.