[ - ]
Table of Contents [Report This]
Printer Chapter or Story Microsoft Word Chapter or Story
- Text Size +
Tampons!

Nick knew what they were, of course, but he didn’t really want to talk about them…or even think about them. 

He was just beginning to get his head around having a girl…woman, he corrected himself, sarcastically…on tour and now this.  That was the kind of thing that made him uncomfortable, embarrassed.  He didn’t know why. 

It had been an endless source of amusement to the guys when they were on tour.  Hey, Nicky!  Look what’s on TV, every time there was one of ‘those ads’.  AJ told him he figured the reason Nick’s relationships never lasted long, was because Nick wanted to get out of it before the girl got her period. Nick had blushed at the word ‘period’ and that had sent the other four into gales of laughter, and they had tormented him for the rest of the day.

Nick sighed.  There were days when he missed the fellas terribly.  But then there were days… Nick threw down the controller for his x-box and headed for bed.  He lay awake for awhile, propped up on his pillows with his arms behind his head, trying to make sense of his life.

Did he like where he was right now?  Yes, yes he did.  He was very proud of the new album.  Don’t Call Me Nicky.  The more he thought about the title, the more he liked it.  And he was happy that Rafe hadn’t been the one to think of it.  The less Rafe had to do with anything, the better Nick liked it.

Rafe Ariando was an interfering asshole, but at least, he had been smart enough to lay off the music.  He had hired experts to take care of that.  Nick guessed that was what Rafe did…hired experts.  He’d gotten the best musicians for the tour, that was for damned sure.  Nick just wished that he didn’t always have the feeling that Rafe was surrounding him with all these experts because he thought Nick was going to screw up!

It would be better when they actually started to perform.  Even the rehearsal time would be wonderful. And then getting out on the road.  Getting with the fans.  That was always great.  Of course, then you had all that personal interview shit that had to be got through.  And this time, they wouldn’t ask him about the group every friggin’ time.  At least, he hoped not.  If they did, he was just going to say, Backstreet’s gone…get over it!  He wondered how many teenyboppers would commit suicide on the Internet if he did that.

Nick’s hand wandered down under the sheet, and he caressed himself idly.  When would Tamara be back?  Friday, he thought.  What day was it today?  Wednesday.  So a couple of days.  Then they would have the weekend.  Then rehearsals started on Monday.  Nick grinned.  Back to making music. 

And he still hadn’t answered Murray’s question about “guests on tour”.  Nick didn’t want Tamara around for the first couple of weeks, he knew that.  Not until they got going.  But then maybe… He’d have to ask her about her schedule.

Nick had been seeing Tamara Vance for a couple of months now.  She was a model, tall and slim, with long blonde hair and ice-blue eyes.  Nick smiled.  He’d had a couple of people ask him if she was his sister.  He wasn’t sure how to define this relationship.  He thought maybe they were friends first, and lovers second.  He laughed.  He knew how Tamara defined it.

They’d met during Awards Season.  That’s how Nick thought of it, like it was one of the seasons in a year.  In late winter and early spring, there was a flurry of award shows for different media – movies, music, charity things, etc. There seemed to be one every week.  Publicists loved to get their clients out there on the red carpet and, if not there, then at least seen at the various parties that preceded and followed the events.  Having your client present an award was considered a coup, and if he or she were actually asked to perform, well then, your job was secure for quite some time.

Nick hated it.  He wasn’t good at impromptu speaking and he always seemed to get blindsided.  When they were the Backstreet Boys, it was no problem.  Kevin answered everything anyway.  All Nick had to do was smile and wave to the fans.  But now…

Nick sighed.  Nope, he told himself, not going there.  I’m happy on my own.

He hadn’t been happy the night he’d met Tamara.  It had been a last-minute thing.  He was into recording, and he didn’t want the distraction, but his publicist pushed him into doing it.  Nick didn’t know that Howie was going to be there, and Howie didn’t know about him.  It was a big mob, and it was quite some time before either realized that the other was in the room.  They realized it when the reporters started asking them why they were ignoring each other. 

Nick looked around the room in confusion.  Howie was here?  Cool.  He loved seeing Howie.  When Nick finally found him, he scooped him up in his arms in a bear hug.  Howie laughed and said, “Put me down, you big idiot, and feinted a punch at his arm.  They laughed and shared a drink and then went their separate ways. 

An hour later, Rafe Ariando appeared before him, his face stony.  “What the fuck is going on?” the Spaniard hissed through pinched lips.

“What?”  Nick was already sick of Rafe treating him like shit, and they had barely started working together.

“Your fight with Howie,” he said.  “It’s all over the room.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” said Nick.  “I didn’t have a fight with Howie.  I hugged him.” 

Rafe had heard a whisper here and a rumor there.  Howie and Nick had ignored each other.  They weren’t speaking.  Then when Nick spoke to Howie, Howie wouldn’t talk to him.  And then he took a swing at him.  Rafe put two and two together and got seventy-eight.

Rafe was still suspicious.  “Howie didn’t punch you?”

Nick fell apart laughing.  “Howie punch someone?”  

Rafe Ariando was not a man who liked to be laughed at.  And he did not like to be wrong.  He gave Nick a little lecture on behaving himself and appearances being important and blah, blah, blah…  Nick stopped listening. 

When Rafe paused to draw breath, Nick moved away from him.  “Why don’t you go fuck up someone else’s life for awhile?” he snarled, “I’m here to party.”

He walked away from Rafe and headed out of the ballroom.  He strode across the lobby to a small dark bar and perched on a stool.

Two drinks later, he heard, “Don’t you think you ought to at least breathe between drinks?”

Nick looked sideways.  “Wow!” he said, without thinking.  There was a seriously beautiful girl sitting beside him.  Seriously beautiful.  And serious.  She was not smiling.

“Would you like a drink?” he asked.

“Oh, are you willing to share?” she said.  “I thought maybe you wanted it all for yourself.”  Then she smiled and held out her hand.  “Tamara Vance.”

“Nick Carter,” he said, shaking her hand.  He’d seen her picture on magazine covers.  She was just as gorgeous in person.

“You okay?” asked Tamara.  She’d watched Nick storm from the room, and when he hadn’t come back after a few minutes, she’d gone looking for him.

Nick nodded and grimaced.  “Yeah.  Just p.o.’d at management.”

Tamara smiled.  “I hear you on that one.  I didn’t even want to come here tonight.  Which one is it tonight?  Favorite Cat Awards?”

“Yeah,” said Nick, laughing.  “I’d rather be bowling.”

“Me too,” laughed Tamara.

“Not in those shoes,” said Nick, motioning to her stiletto heels.

Tamara examined her feet.  “Hmmm…I guess not.  But I thought they provided the shoes.”

“You wearing socks?” laughed Nick.  “They don’t provide those.” 

They each thought for a moment about sticking their bare feet into used bowling shoes.  Then they grimaced together.  “Yuck!”

They talked for awhile and then went back to the party.  They danced a couple of dances and then were absorbed into different groups.

The next day, Nick had flowers sent to her with a pair of sports socks tucked into the arrangement.  Tamara called to thank him, and they began seeing each other.  They started with bowling and moved up to movies and dinner.  It was very casual and very spread out.  Tamara was all over the country doing modeling, and Nick was back and forth to New York finishing up the CD.  Whenever they were in town together, they would do something. 

One night, the something they did was to rent a movie at her place and make out on the sofa.  It was friendly, and it was fun, and neither one was sure they wanted it to go any further.  Except that they both did, and so they went into the bedroom and made love.

The next morning, all Tamara could talk about was her ex-boyfriend and how she was just getting over that relationship and she didn’t want to get into another one and she really liked having Nick for a friend.  

Nick couldn’t believe it.  Did people really say that?  “Let’s just be friends.”  He thought that was only in the movies.  He was just deciding whether or not he should get his feelings hurt when Tamara added, “Friends that fuck, of course.”

Nick was taken back.  He wasn’t a prude, far from it.  At least, he hadn’t thought he was.  But this was a little blunt for him.  Tamara shrugged at the shocked look on his face and said, “Or we can just stick to bowling, if you’d like.”

Nick decided that bowling didn’t have the same appeal as sex, and so they began “seeing” each other. They were on each other’s speed dial, and they emailed on a regular basis.  But Tamara took someone else to the West Coast Fashion Benefit, and Nick went dateless to the Humanitarian Distinction Awards.  They had their picture taken together a couple of times and answered the inevitable question with, “We’re just friends.”  Nick was afraid that Tamara might tag on the ending to that, but thankfully, she didn’t.

Nick wasn’t really sure how ‘friends that fuck’ would translate in the close confines of a tour.  He thought back to the Black and Blue tour.  Leighanne and Kristin had visited here and there, but they’d put almost as many years into Backstreet as the Boys had, and the appeal of a tour was not there for them.  They knew that being on tour meant hard work for the Boys, and they didn’t like to interfere.  Sarah had been there with AJ at the end, and that had been crazy, but no one was going to say anything.  The drive to get AJ through the tour alive was what kept them all going, and if Sarah Martin was what it took, then so be it.  Howie had brought a girl along on the Japan leg at the end, but she didn’t fit in all that well.  Of course, mused Nick, by the time they were finished with Japan, they were all sick of each other.

Nick thought about the other people on this new tour.  Blaine had a steady girlfriend, but she had a real job, something not in the business.  She would be able to come and see him occasionally for the weekend.  Rashad was married and had two little kids.  His wife wouldn’t bring them anywhere near the tour.  Nick laughed to himself.  Big, hulking Rashad turned into the meekest man when his wife was in the room.  Talk about whipped…  Nick wondered if the new keyboardist would be single.  He might be looking to hook up.  Maybe he and Nick could do some clubbing together.   And what about Ms. Jones, he wondered.  Did she have anyone?  Nick pictured her in his head for a moment. 

Nick couldn’t really get a handle on Melody.  One minute, she was polite, and the next minute, she was snarky.  Nick was still smarting from her Boybandland comment.  But she had said he should sing all the songs he wrote.  So she knew he wrote them.  But then she said they weren’t really rock songs.  
And like today…they’d been jamming and goofing around...and in one of the breaks, he’d asked her what she would wear for performing.  He didn’t care…he was just making conversation …he’d hated the whole coordinated look of BSB because it always emphasized how much bigger he was than the others, so now he wore whatever the hell he wanted and so did the band.  Melody had looked him up and down and said, “Well, not The Little Rascals look, that’s for sure.”  Rashad had busied himself with his guitar, but Blaine had laughed out loud.  Nick felt like he was ten years old.

As Nick thought about it now though, he decided that maybe Melody had a point.  Not that he was going to start dressing in those pants with the razor-sharp creases that Rafe sported, but maybe he should give a little more thought to wardrobe…especially for so-called business meetings.  Yeah, if you’re not allowed to call me Nicky, maybe I’d better stop acting like him. 

Nick’s thoughts turned back to Melody.  The jeans and t-shirt that she had on today would be cool for touring.  Maybe he’d suggest it.  Yeah, right, give your head a shake, he told himself.  Don’t suggest anything to her!  At least, not until you know her a lot better than you do now.

Nick rolled over and pulled a pillow down under his head.  He was going to make music again.  That was all he really cared about.  He closed his eyes and went to sleep with a smile on his face.