~*~AJ’s point of view~*~

“That’s a dumb suggestion,” Nick said.

“Well, I don’t see you coming up with anything better,” Howie retorted.

Wow. Even Howie was on edge today. Brian and I exchanged looks.

“I just think that the album title should make it clear that we don’t need Kevin anymore,” Nick continued.

“What?” I said, before Howie could respond. “That’s a little immature, don’t you think?”

Brian crossed his arms, thinking it over. “You know…”

“Oh, not you, too!” I groaned.

“No, just listen,” Brian said. “You aren’t taking it the right way…”

But I didn’t want to listen. I wasn’t the most rational person today. “Not taking it the right way? Carter wants to freaking name the album Kevin Quit- Woohoo.” I took on the voice of the media. “’The Backstreet Boys’ follow-up to Never Gone ironically celebrates the fact that Kevin is just that: gone.’”

“Does have a certain ring to it,” Nick laughed.

“Smart ass,” I muttered.

Thank goodness it was Friday. We certainly needed the weekend. Not for the first time, either. But I could only imagine how dinner was going to go tonight. From the studio today, we were going to meet Kevin at a restaurant downtown.

As if we weren’t already having difficulties naming the album, everyone was thinking about him today. Nick wanted the title to represent moving on, but we continued to prove that we hadn’t done so yet.

Brian was thinking about dinner, too. “Could we at least pretend tonight that we’re getting along?”

“Yeah,” Nick said quickly. He obviously wanted to show Kevin what he wanted to show the world with an album title: he didn’t need Kevin anymore.

“Whatever,” I shrugged. I actually thought Brian had brought up a good point, but I refused to be agreeable at this point.

“So where do we stand on a record title?” Howie asked, almost timidly.

“The same place we stood an hour ago,” I said. I leaned back in my head and closed my eyes for a second. “Nowhere.”

“Are you okay?” Brian asked, tilting his head and looking at me as if he were seeing me for the first time today.

“Peachy.”

We went through some more CD title possibilities. All were rejected by one or more of us. We were about to have another flair-up when Howie stood up.

“I’m going to get a drink. Anyone want anything?”

“I’ll come with you,” Nick said, seeming thrilled to have an excuse to stand up and get out of the room for a few minutes. They headed to the drink machine one floor up.

“So, seriously, AJ. What’s up?” Brian asked. He’d apparently realized that there was more to my bad mood than titles and Kevin’s visit.

“Nothing,” I shrugged.

Nick came back in. “Forgot my wallet,” he smiled sheepishly.

“Are you sure?” Brian continued our conversation.

“I’m fine,” I said tersely.

“Have you still not talked to Michelle?” Nick asked.

I glared at him.

“Oops,” he made a face. Holding up his wallet, he said, “Coming Howie!” he called, though he hadn’t heard anything. He hurried back out of the room.

“What happened with Michelle?”

“Nothing.”

Brian gave me a look. I could tell he wasn’t going to let this subject pass easily. “You guys have a fight?”

“Sort of.”

“You want me to just ask Nick?”

I groaned. Yeah, he’d probably find out one way or another. “She showed up here earlier this week.”

“And…?” Brian asked, not seeing the dilemma.

“And Nick and I were about to go out with Cheryl and her friend. I didn’t realize Michelle was coming by…”

“Ohh…” He groaned. “AJ.” His tone was reprimanding.

“What? We weren’t exclusive!” I felt like that phrase should be my next tattoo.

He rolled his eyes. “For someone who dates a lot of women, you don’t know much about them, do you?”

“Well thanks so much for you help,” I said, sarcastically.

“Call her.”

“And say what? I can date whoever I want.”

“Why were you out with Cheryl again, anyway? I thought you didn’t want to call her back. You chose Michelle over her…”

“That’s the point. I don’t have to choose,” I said, exasperated. “I can date whoever I want to. As many people as I like. If Michelle is going to get mad, then that’s her problem.”

Brian tried to read my face. “I just don’t get…”

“What? There is no way,” Howie came in laughing about whatever he and Nick were talking about.

“You calling me a liar?”

Howie laughed again. “So we going to keep this discussion going or move on…”

“Move on,” I said quickly, not just to Howie’s CD question. I glanced at Brian, pointedly. “It’s almost time to get out of here anyway. We aren’t going to come up with a name today.”

Brian sighed. “Everyone keep brainstorming.” He glanced at his watch. “Maybe we should just call it a day. Get there a little early.”

We all agreed. For the first time today, it seemed. I grabbed my keys and pushed the button to unlock the doors of my Porsche.

“We all riding separately?” Howie asked, retrieving his own keys.

“Yeah. I don’t want to have to come back here afterwards to drop anybody off,” I said. And Kevin was staying at my house tonight. I’d invited him when he’d started mentioning hotels. I’d almost forgotten he didn’t have a home in Orlando anymore. I hadn’t thought about where he’d be staying when he came to town.

He’d spend some time with me, and then probably with Howie. Brian would open his home to him if need be. They were family, after all. And August was looking forward to seeing him. But since it wasn’t need-be, I didn’t see Kevin spending much time at Brian’s home.

And Nick’s place was out of the question.

“Don’t let Kevin find out,” Nick said.

“Find out what?”

“That we all took separate cars. Wasting all that gasoline, causing global warming…”

He was knocking Kevin’s environmental activism. As well as Kevin’s SUV that he had a hook-up in his garage for so that it didn’t need to run on gasoline.

“You know,” Brian pointed out, “you’re supposed to be the other environmentally friendly Backstreet Boy.”

“Not if it puts me on a team with him.”

I sighed, but didn’t say anything.

“So,” Brian laughed. “How about that dinner where we pretend everything’s fine?”

We arrived early, but went ahead and got a table. Although we requested the one in the back corner of the restaurant, we were spotted by different groups of some fans and signed autographs until Kevin got there. Their faces lit up when he arrived, and they came back over wanting more pictures. I guess they’d thought the five of us would never be together again or something.

Not for the first time, I wondered what their reaction would be to this CD. To a quartet group instead of a quintet.

“Hey guys,” Kevin said.

I finally had a chance to give him a hug. “It’s good to see you, man.”

He sat down between me and Howie. There was an awkward silence as we scanned our menus and waited to place our orders.

Kevin looked about the same, although his hair was a little shorter. The time suddenly didn’t seem as long as it had. I almost wanted to ask his opinion on our current CD issue. I had to remind myself that he wasn’t a Backstreet Boy anymore.

“So, how are things in Kentucky?” Brian asked.

“Good. It’s been nice to relax. You know, stay at home and not have to worry about scheduling.”

I glanced at Nick and saw that he’d already lost interest in the conversation. He was staring at a cute waitress, taking drink orders several tables down. I returned my attention to Kevin.

After several seconds of appreciation. Like I said, she was cute.

Then an image of Michelle popped into my head. Now it was really time to focus on what Kevin was saying.

“… seeing this girl for a few weeks now. She’s really nice. Her family actually owns a horse farm, so we get to go riding occasionally.”

“Sounds like you’re having a nice vacation,” Howie nodded.

“So. How’s the album going?”

“Great,” Nick’s attention suddenly returned to our table. “Best album ever.”

Kevin looked at him. He was still good at that brooding stare. Although it was apparent he had more on his mind, he simply said, “That’s good to hear.”

“We’re almost done, actually,” Brian said, proudly. “We collaborated on several of the songs ourselves.”

Kevin nodded. “Can’t wait to hear them.”

I couldn’t quite tell if he was sincere or not. The tension became a little more evident with each album comment. Luckily, the restaurant wasn’t too crowded. Service was quick, and we were soon eating our food.

“This is really good,” Kevin said. “I miss this place.” He took another bite.

I agreed. “I don’t think I’ve been here since you left.”

“Howie, how’s Dianna? She’ll be around this weekend, right?”

Howie nodded. “Yeah, you’ll see her tomorrow or Sunday. She’s doing well. Working too hard, as usual.”

“Because you’re not a workaholic, too?” Kevin joked. He turned to Brian. “And August? I talked to her… a few weeks ago. But it wasn’t a long conversation.”

“She’s good. A little frustrated today. I think she wanted to come to dinner tonight. And she’s just a little cranky. She caught the flu or something earlier this week. Wasn’t feeling too well… but she’s over it now. You’ll have to come by for dinner or something. I know she wants to catch up with you.”

“Sounds good,” Kevin nodded.

The conversation lulled again after that.

“So, AJ, we really need to finish you’re song next week,” Nick said.

I groaned inwardly. This topic hadn’t been successful earlier in the night, what made him think it would go differently now? But he seemed intent on bringing the album up as much as possible.

We had the chorus we’d worked on. Howie had helped us one day when we were working on the verses. They were incomplete but getting there. I was getting skeptical about whether or not it’d be done in time to make it on the album, though.

“Oh, you’re working on a song right now?” Kevin turned to me. “How’s it going?”

“Good. It’s getting there. Still in the rough stages, though. We’ve kind of been working on it off and on.”

“What’s the hold-up?” Kevin asked.

Howie held up a hand to his mouth in mock whisper. “The girl it’s written about.”

“It’s not about anyone in particular…” I said. Well, that wasn’t true. But Nick had been the one who’d brought her into it, with the “she never even looks my way” line. Not me.

“Ohh,” Kevin shoved my shoulder. “There’s a girl in the picture right now?”

“When is there not?” I smirked, trying to move the conversation along as quickly as possible. It seemed like everyone was talking in circles today. We were the Backstreet Boys, for goodness sakes. Did we not have anything more interesting in our lives to talk about?

“But just the one?”

“No. And… it’s not important.”

He started to joke again. “Sounds like she’s something, if she’s got you…”

“I said I don’t want to talk about it,” I said, more loudly this time.

Kevin raised his eyebrows, realizing this was a touchy subject. He backed off immediately, and I lightened my expression to let him know I wasn’t mad at him. He hadn’t meant anything by it.

“In a lot of ways, making this album has gone more smoothly than any other,” Nick said, pointedly, steering the discussion back to where he wanted it.

Aside from the initial start-up and the current title issue, I realized that that was actually somewhat true. Huh. But I still didn’t like the way he was speaking to Kevin.

Kevin sighed. “Nick, if you have something to say to me, then just say it.”

Nick shrugged. “Just wanted to make sure you knew we were doing fine and dandy without you.”

“Nick,” Howie said, ready to mediate.

I was shocked he’d been so blunt. Brian stayed quiet. But, as usual, his silence spoke volumes. He was thinking of his own issues towards Kevin.

“Well, Howie, it’s true,” Nick said. He turned back to Kevin. “Maybe you should’ve left the group even sooner.”