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I lay next to Nick and he had his head on my chest. I played with his hair and began talking to him softly.

“Nick, can you please tell me the last time you ate, and I mean more than a piece of fruit or salad…more than what I’ve eaten with you?”

“Like a meal?”

“Yes doll,” I continued to push back his hair.

“Probably a month ago.” I closed my eyes tight and said a silent prayer for him. Brian walked in with two water bottles and towels.

“How’s he doing?” Brian was concerned for his friend.

“He’ll be fine, he just didn’t eat lunch today,” I lied to Brian but didn’t look up at him. I felt this need to protect Nick, at least until I understood everything.

“I’ll go down and get him a sandwich, turkey okay Nick?” Nick shrugged his shoulders and I nodded my head to Brian. I whispered thank you and Brian left.

“Nick, I know you just want to rest but its best if we talk right now. I am talking to you as a friend and not a nurse right now. Nick do you think you’re fat?” He sat up in his bed and looked away from me. “Baby doll I know this is hard to talk about but please.”

“You won’t understand, the guys especially wouldn’t understand.”

“I bet I understand a lot more than you think I do. Hey, I’ll be right back, just stay here, I’ll tell everyone you’re sleeping okay?” He shrugged his shoulders and more stray tears rolled down his cheeks. I squeezed his hand, got out of his bed and quickly went to my room. I grabbed what I needed and went back to his room. Brian was sitting on the bed trying to get Nick to eat the sandwich.

“Nick you’ll feel better, just eat half,” Brian held the plate in front of Nick. Brian looked at me asking for help.

“Nick, we still need to talk but I think it would do you some good if Brian was here in the room,” I tried to get Nick’s eyes to look at me.

“No, get him out,” Nick’s voice was sharp and cold.

“But Nick, Brian’s your best friend, don’t you— “”

“NO get him OUT!” Nick’s voice raised and quivered.

“Its okay, come find me later,” Brian looked hurt as he stood up. “He trusts in you a different way, it’s really okay…” Brian squeezed my shoulder and walked out of the room. I felt bad for him but Nick did need to talk and if this were the only way then so be it.

“Nick, I want to show you something, something that I have never shown anyone,” this got Nick’s attention and he looked at me.

“A photo book?” I ran my hands over the smooth surface of the purple and green book.

“Yes, but this photo book helps me get back onto track when I start slipping…”

“What do you mean slipping?” I opened up to the first page.

“See the girl on the left, that’s me seven years old, I just won all around for level six, that next to me was my best friend…Kara. She came in second. Her and I both started gymnastics when we were one year’s old. Our Mom’s used to bring us in for gymnastics and they became best friends…Kara and I became best friends. Usually seven year olds are learning how to do cartwheels, but I was learning how to do lay outs,” I paused and laughed to myself.

“At that rate why didn’t you go to the Olympics?” Nick asked.

“That’s where I was heading…it was after that meet that mine and Kara’s coaches realized that we needed to go somewhere else…somewhere better. We went to Bela Karolyee’s ranch in Texas. Our parents moved out there and sacrificed their lives in South Carolina. Kara and I began training day and night to become some day one of the best. Kara had always been a little behind me, but it’s not because she didn’t try, it just wasn’t meant for her the way it was for me." I looked at the pictures of us being silly together hanging on the un-even bars and winning at more meets.

“The years when by quickly, and I was winning all sorts of meets. It was so much fun, hard work but fun. I mean, I would wake up at five am, go to practice five thirty until eight thirty, go to school nine until three, practice three thirty until seven and then go home do homework and pass out. During the summers, it was all day practice; we would get a three hour break for lunch and a nap and then back at the gym until eight at night. But it was what I wanted. I wanted to go to the Olympics bad, so bad I started killing myself…” I paused and took a sip out of Nick’s water bottle. Nick watched me intently and took his hand into mine.

“I started watching the older girls, the girls that were a bit better than me…watching them closely. I watched how they did their conditioning, even though I was told I was doing it just right, how they ran towards the vault, watched what pain killers they took in the locker room, and then found out what I thought at the time was the most important thing…my weight,” I paused and flipped a few pages of the photo book. Pictures of different meets, pictures of me and other famous gymnasts…pictures of Kara and I.

“Here I was 14; I was 5’4”, tall for my age and at about 110, 112 pounds. Here, at this Coca Cola Classic meet, I was 5’5” 90 pounds. Now, when you grow, you usually put on 2-3 pounds per inch…but I had to lose. If I lost the fat I had on me, I would flip faster, higher; run harder and lighter…and I told Kara that we needed to do this in order for us to make it to the Olympics. So, instead of flat out starving ourselves, we made it a game. Rule number one, tell no one. Rule number two; look out for each other’s backs. Rule number three, we had to lose two pounds per week. And rule number gout, we had to weigh 80 pounds by the time the Olympic trials were here. That was two months before we started our plan.

“The first month was pretty easy to hide from our families and coaches what we were doing. We would just wake up an hour earlier before we had to and we would run three miles each morning. And then before bed, we would spend an hour doing crunches, push ups and such in our rooms. Sometimes, if our parents would find us doing these, they told us to go to bed. So we’d set our alarms for the middle of the night, like two am, work out for an hour, and then we’d be up at five am. We would only eat the max of five bites of each meal our parents gave us, slowly so they didn’t notice it as much.

“At first we were doing so much better in the gym. Eventually it took a toll on us and we became exhausted. We made a new rule that we could eat before practices for energy, but it had to be oranges, celery sticks, things like that. And we would eat them throughout the practice, maybe one whole orange through out a four hour practice. This became harder on Kara than it did for me. I had the will power and want for the Olympics more. She discovered the miracle of binging and purging…also known as bulimia. She would stuff her face full of food and then throw it up. But she started doing this with everything she ate. Eventually the binging made her start to gain because she wasn’t throwing up all of the food she was eating. She asked for help and I told her that she just needed to make sure it was healthy stuff she put into her body. I told her to call me whenever she felt the need for binging and I would talk her out of it….” My voice began to break down and I choked back tears. Nick now held me in his arms as we looked at pictures.

“The pounds were going up, mine were still going down, I got down to 78 pounds when I was 5’5”, a week before trials…Kara was 5’3” and she was 98 pounds at this time,” I flipped through the pages pointing at the pictures of us as I spoke. "The coaches and my parents didn't seem to realize how much we were losing. Baggy clothes hid our true size and although I had more injuries; it was assumed it was because I was throwing harder skills. That was true but I had shin fractures that wouldn't heal and my body always ached." I paused for a moment. “By the time we were at the trial’s we were ready for the meet, the night before we were supposed to be sleeping, it was going to be the biggest day of our lives but we decided to go running. We snuck out at one in the morning; we ran so far….so far and so hard. She, just…oh, God, I made us go running and we wouldn’t stop until our clothes were soaked with sweat…Kara no!” I buried my head into Nick’s chest and began sobbing.

“Oh, Hailey, I’m so sorry for making you talk about this. Shh, I’m here, you’re okay.”

“I killed her Nick, she never wanted it. Her heart just stopped and she died on the side walk, the night before trials…I was too weak at the point to save her. I tried CPR but I was too weak.” I continued to cry and tried to calm myself down. “Nick, let me help you, so you don’t kill yourself please,” I eventually got out in between my cries. It became too hard to breathe because I was crying too much I started wheezing and coughing.

“Do you have asthma?” Nick asked sitting me up. I nodded my head. “Where’s your inhaler?”

“My…room….purse, on the …table,” I tried to get out. Nick ran out of the room and ran back to his. Katie, Brian, Howie and Amber were behind him when got to me.

“What’s going on Nick?” Katie asked.
“She’s having an asthma attack,” Nick grabbed my purse ran to the room and took out my inhaler and shook it. I took it into my shaky hand and took two sprays. Eventually I calmed down and looked up to a roomful of people.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~
“Well, I know why she was upset,” Amber said picking up the picture book.

“That is NONE of your business Amber,” Nick said snatching it out of her hands.

“Actually it is and I don’t know how she doesn’t remember, Kara had talked to you about me I know she did. Just like she used to bitch about you to me, you’re going to hell don’t try to forget any of this,” that Amber stormed out of the room.

“Hails?” Nick looked at me, looking for an answer.

“I don’t know, I don’t know what I did to her, I don’t know how she knows Kara, Nick!”

“Shh, don’t worry about that right now. Guys, can you give us some time please? I’ll talk to you later. Rok, you and I will talk later, I promise,” Brian smiled and everyone walked out of the room. Eventually I calmed down and went to the bathroom to compose myself.

I set my two hands on the bathroom sink and stared at myself in the mirror. The images that I used to have came to me and I shut my eyes tight to make them disappear. I turned on the cold water and let it run for a minute before I splashed my face. Taking a deep breath, I remembered that I had to help Nick and walked back out to his bedroom.

“Feel better Hails?” Nick asked with concern clearly in his eyes still.

“Yeah. Sorry, for breaking down and everything. It’s been a long time since I’ve talked about all that…actually I’ve never told anyone really besides for my family. But Nick, I can help you get through this. I just need to hear from you how this started, because the beginning is where we need to start.”

“Don’t be sorry at all, I’m really glad and touched that you opened up to me the way you did. And because you were able to conquer your sickness, or work your life through it, it’s shown that it’s only made you stronger.

“I guess it started about a half year ago when we were recording this new album. The guys made comments about how I wasn’t the little brother anymore, that I have gained weight. I know that they mean it out of good fun and aren’t out to hurt me, but it got old fast and it did hurt. And then we started learning the dance moves about a month ago and they joked about it more and more and eventually I just couldn’t handle it. It made me sick to even think about eating.”

“You’re right about them not trying to hurt you purposely. They love you and you need to talk to them about how it does affect your feelings. They’re your brothers. Do you mind me asking how much you’ve lost?” I took his hands into mine.

“About 15 pounds, but now I’m just not toned you know?”

“Well, how about this. Let’s help out each other, like I said I still have set backs. We can help keep each other from slipping, and we’ll work out together. I promise to do it healthy too.”

“I would like that and it makes me feel a lot better that I’m not alone in this. I guess I’ve just never talked to the guys because this is more of a girl problem you would think,” he said in a soft voice.

“It’s more common with girls, but actually research has shown that men close to having eating disorders just as much as females. I know you want to tell Brian and I know that he will understand. I know that they all will. If you want I can talk to him with you.”

“I’ll try to talk to him by myself and if I need reinforcement I’ll call you up.”

“Sounds good. I’m going to go and give you some space and you’ll probably want to talk to Bri. I’m sure I’ll see you around later, feel better okay?” I told him looking him directly into his eyes…oh God his eyes.

“Thank you,” he whispered in my ear and kissed my cheek. I smiled back, gave him a tight squeeze and walked out.


*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ NICK’S POINT OF VIEW*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

As I watched Haily leave my room I couldn’t help but feel this overwhelming feeling of love for her. Yes, she may be a or went to school to be one or something but she is definitely a friend first which probably means she’s amazing at her job. She has to be, she’s amazing at everything else.
I reached to my night stand and took my cell phone to call Brian. I had to tell him everything that was going on, Hailey is right that it’s something I need to talk about, especially to my best friend. Brian came over to my room within minutes and I began to tell him everything…

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* Back to Hailey*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

After I left Nick’s room feeling happy that I had helped him out and that I would be able to continue to help him out, I walked to the end of the hall. Taking in a deep breath I knocked onto her door…
“What the hell do you want?” Amber sneered as she leaned against her door frame.

“I want to know what your problem is with me and how you know Kara.” I asked crossing my arms in front of me.

“You would like to know wouldn’t you?” she smirked. “Well, if you don’t remember then I guess it’s not worth bringing up old pain now is there? Now, get your anorexic ass out of here. If you stay out of my way for the rest of the tour, I will stay out of yours.” With that Amber shut the door in my face. I was so emotionally drained that I had to get some fresh air, so I decided to go for a walk.

~*~*~*~Nick’s Point of View*~*~*~*~

“…and that’s why she showed me her picture book and told me a little bit about her past. She’s only talked to her family about it, but the way she got upset I really don’t think she actually talked talked, ya know Br?” I said finishing up my story.

“Yeah I see what you mean. You know man I love you and you can talk to me about anything. Even when it seems impossible to talk to anyone else, I will always be here. And I promise I will help you out in anyway that I can and I will talk to the guys about keeping the comments knocked off. I do however feel like they should know, we’ve never kept anything from each other, especially from everything we’ve all been through together,” Brian said sympathetically. I nodded my head to Brian fiddling with my cell phone.

“So, have you asked her out yet?”

“What? Asked who out?” I asked Brian’s random question.

“Aww come on Nicky boy. We all see how you two get a long, how you look at her…how she looks at you.”

“Hails?”

“No, Amber,” Brian joked.

“Eww no way! I still don’t know how she managed to get on this tour?”

“Are you going to ask her out?”

“I-I don’t man. She and I clicked so fast, I haven’t made a move on her…not that I haven’t wanted to but she seems so…so, there’s no word to describe her.”

“You’re in love Nickolas Gene,” Brian pushed my shoulder back.

“Well, that or I’m close.”
“Ask her out, take things slow but I think you two would be great for each other. She makes you happy Nick that makes me and everyone else happy. When you get depressed, you get real depressed and I hate seeing you like that.”

“I’ll ask her out tonight for tomorrow.”

“How about we go gather the guys and go out to dinner. Just us and then you can talk to them, does that sound good?”

“Yeah, I think it would help if I told them,” Nick said standing up.

“I know it would. So, why don’t you go shower and everything and meet in Kevin’s room in an hour.” I nodded my head and walked Brian to the door.

“Thank you for understanding, it means a lot to me…I’m sorry for not telling you sooner,” I told him looking down at my feet.

“Hey you came to me when you were ready, everyone is ready at their own times. One hour don’t take forever.”

”HEY! I’m not Howie!”

“True true, alright see ya in a bit.” Brian left the room and I went to get ready.