Cary
It’s funny
the way time works when you’re looking forward to something. It doesn’t count down in steady increments –
or, at least, it doesn’t seem that way.
It passes slowly at first, and it feels like that big day, that special
moment, will never come. And then, all
of a sudden, it speeds up, and before you know it, that day, that moment, is
here.
Five
minutes before my first performance, I stood backstage, listening to the sound
of the crowd on the other side of the curtain and thinking, I can’t believe I’m here. I can’t believe I’m about to do this.
The
audience was noisy. I could hear the buzz
of excited voices chattering and singing along to the dance music blasting
through the theater. Even after American Idol, it still felt weird to be
back here and not out there, the performer rather than the fan. I’d performed many times before, but this was
a Backstreet Boys concert, and I was a Backstreet Boys fan. It blew my mind to think I was about to open
their show. Just like when Nick had
first called me to make his offer, the whole thing felt surreal.
I was
hyperaware of my body, my racing heart, my shaky knees, my sweating palms. I always got super nervous before a show, and
it wasn’t until I started singing that I could settle down. Up until that point, I psyched myself out
with horrible thoughts like, What if I
trip in these heels and totally faceplant
onstage? What if my fingers are too
slippery for the strings or the keys?
What if I forget my lyrics, or my voice breaks?
I was in
the middle of doing this when I felt a heavy hand press down on my shoulder,
and it startled me so much, I jumped in my heels. “Sorry,” laughed Nick from behind me. I whirled around to see him grinning. “You doin’ okay? You ready?”
He was
chewing on something. He’d been grazing
on the catered spread backstage all evening, whereas I’d been too nervous to
eat a thing. But I remembered the steak
dinner he’d taken me out for the night he’d broken the news about his cancer to
me, the night before he’d started his last cycle of chemo, and I realized he
was doing it again, packing away as much as he could in case he couldn’t keep
anything down the next day. I wondered
how he could even think about the show tonight with that looming on his agenda
tomorrow, but then, I’d managed to forget it for a time, too. I wished I hadn’t thought of it now; it made
my good-kind-of-nervous feel like a bad-kind-0f-nervous. My stomach joined the rest of my body, and I
felt almost sick. But I forced myself to
smile tightly back and reply, “I hope so.”
He squeezed
my shoulder again. “You’ll be fine. You’ll be awesome.”
“Thanks.”
He flashed
me another grin. “Go get ‘em.”
It was
time. I heard the music cut off abruptly
and a collective scream rise from the crowd, as the theater lights dimmed. It died down quickly once I walked out, but I
still got a round of polite applause as I crossed the stage. My mic stand was set up, my ukulele waiting
for me on a stool behind it. I picked it
up and boosted myself onto my perch on the stool, crossing my legs at the
ankles. I gave myself a second to take
it all in, staring out at the many rows of red-upholstered seats, many of them
still empty. Then I started strumming.
“Broken hearts are on the mend. She’s been hurt one time too many. It’s another day, another end… to the same
old story…”
I’d chosen
to open with “Sweet Sunrise” because it was upbeat. I followed it with a bluesy ballad called
“Medley” on my keyboard, then finished with the song I’d known this group of
fans would most want to hear, my version of “Just Want You to Know” from American Idol.
“I’m sure
you’ll already know this last song I’m about to do,” I said into the microphone
before my closing number. “It’s one of
my favorites, too. I performed it on
this season of American Idol, but it
belongs to the one and only BACKSTREET BOYS!”
I paused for the chorus of screams I knew would come. Grinning, I added, “Thanks, guys, you’ve been
a great audience. I’m Cary Hilst, and this is ‘Just Want You to Know’!”
The fans
cheered as I picked up my ukulele again and sang along with me. “Lookin’
at your picture, from when we first met… you gave me a smile, that I could
never forget… and nothin’ I could do could protect me from you, that ni-i-ight…”
I could
hear their collective voice like an echo of my own, and even though I knew they
were singing more out of love for the Boys than love for me, it was still
cool. When I finished, they screamed and
applauded louder than I’d heard them all night.
I didn’t want to leave the stage, but I floated off it with my head held
high, swollen with pride.
Nick was
waiting in the wings, there to meet me when I came offstage. He slapped me a high five and said, “See, I
told ya – you were awesome.”
I grinned
and felt myself blush. “Thank you. That was amazing!”
He grinned
back and nodded. “Now you get why I’m
doin’ this. I gotta go get changed… I’ll
catch ya after the show!” Before I could
even comprehend what he meant, he wandered off to his dressing room, leaving me
to come down from my performance high.
Afterwards,
I thought about what he’d said. Now you get why I’m doin’ this… I knew I could never fully understand, but
all of a sudden, I did get it, more than I had before. There was nothing like it, that feeling you
got when you were onstage, performing for a crowd, knowing that you were
entertaining people and hearing them cheer for you in return. Nick made people happy, and doing so made him
happy, too. And he deserved to be
happy. Now more than ever.
***
After my
set, I snuck out into the theater so I could watch the Boys. Leighanne had seats near the front, far off
to one side, and she’d saved me a spot next to her and Baylee. Leigh was hanging out backstage with James;
she would watch from the wings.
In all my
years of going to Backstreet Boys concerts, I had never been so close to the
stage. When the theater went dark, the
screen came on, and the countdown began, I was no longer a performer, but a
fan. I screamed right along with
everyone else when the four guys jumped right out of the movie screen and stood
on the platform at the back of the stage, posing epically for the hundreds of
cameras flashing like strobe lights.
When they launched into “Everybody,” I sang along, and so did
Leighanne. She must have seen this show
countless times already in the other countries they had toured, but she was
dancing and cheering for her husband with the enthusiasm of a genuine fan. It was cute to watch.
I had
always been a Brian girl, too, but this time, I found myself unable to take my
eyes off of Nick. He was like a magnet,
attracting my attention, drawing me in.
It wasn’t just concern for him that did it, either. It was the way he carried himself, the way he
performed. He was so confident, so charismatic;
his charm just radiated from him, and he didn’t even have to open his
mouth. When he did, though, it was
almost magical, the way the whole crowd reacted to him. His vocals sounded strong and clear, and his
dance moves were as smooth and sexy as they had been in rehearsal the day
before. He was on his game tonight, and
once again, he showed no sign of weakness, at least not right away.
It helped
that their set list was front-loaded with three of their up-tempo, dance
numbers first: “Everybody,” “We’ve Got
It Goin’ On,” and “PDA.” After that came
a couple of their classic mid-tempos, “Quit Playin’ Games” and “As Long As You
Love Me,” and then it slowed down with a ballad section which included, “This
Is Us,” “Show Me the Meaning,” “All I Have to Give,” “She’s a Dream,” and “I’ll
Never Break Your Heart.” At least that
gave Nick’s body a break, if not his voice.
He
absolutely killed it on “This Is Us,” his voice switching effortlessly between
his gorgeous falsetto and rich baritone, holding his notes long and strong over
the others singing the chorus. I didn’t
know if it was pure adrenaline or simply his experience and professionalism
that made him perform like that, but now I understood how he thought he could
get away with this whole scheme and fool everyone. As much as I admired his courage, it scared
me.
By the end
of the show, he was sweating buckets.
His voice was breathier, his dance moves not nearly as sharp as they’d
been in the beginning, but he made it through the encore, “Straight Through My
Heart.” As the guys took their final
bows and stepped back through the big screen, I clapped and cheered along with
the crowd around me, but I was more relieved than sad that the show was
over. It had been an amazing concert,
but I worried about Nick performing the hour-and-a-half-long show night after
night. Even if most of the heavy dancing
came at the beginning, there was choreography throughout the entire concert,
and Nick had solos in nearly every song.
It was going to push him to his limit and maybe even beyond.
I followed
Leighanne and Baylee backstage, where the guys were celebrating. They all looked sweaty and exhausted, so Nick
didn’t stand out, but I could tell he was tired. He still managed to grin when he saw me and
asked, “So how’d you like the show?”
I smiled
back. “It was awesome! I’m impressed,” I replied, giving him a
meaningful look. “You were great.”
He smirked
in a way that said, “I told you so,”
but all he said was, “Thanks. I’ma go
shower and get changed for the after party.”
I stared
after him as he retreated to his dressing room, thinking, After party? Are you kidding?
***
He wasn’t
kidding. It was after two in the morning
when we finally made it back to the hotel.
I was dead
tired myself, so I couldn’t even imagine how Nick must be feeling. I hadn’t slept well the night before, kept awake
by my nerves, but I was sure I’d sleep like a rock that night. I peeled off my clothes and pulled on a pair
of pajamas the minute I stepped into my hotel room, and I was just climbing
into bed when my cell phone went off.
Groaning, I
rolled back off the bed and dug it out of my purse. The screen was lit up with a text from
Nick. All it said was, Come over.
Right now? I sent back. Why?
The reply
was so short, it scared me: Please.
Thinking
something must be wrong, I dropped the phone on my bed, grabbed my room key,
and padded barefoot out of my room and down the hall to his. I knocked lightly, and Nick opened the door
right away. I looked him up and down as
he stepped back to let me in. He had
changed out of his club attire, too; he was wearing a pair of baggy sleep
shorts, low on his hips, and a white t-shirt.
He looked perfectly fine.
“What’s
going on?” I asked, as the door closed behind me. “Are you okay?”
He grunted
in reply and motioned vaguely over his shoulder, turning away from me. I followed him further into the suite and saw
that he had spread his chemotherapy supplies out across his bed. I blinked in surprise.
“Now? You want to do this now?”
He
shrugged. “I wanna get it over
with. This first shit takes twenty-four
hours, so the sooner we start it, the sooner it’s out of my system.”
I looked
over the chemo schedule his doctor had typed up. The first day of this cycle was intense: two thousand milligrams of methotrexate, given intravenously over twenty-four hours,
along with two fifty-milligram doses of a steroid called methylprednisolone. The huge dose of methotrexate
was so potent that I’d have to spend the next three days pumping him full of
other drugs that would counteract its side effects and prevent it from damaging
his organs along with the cancer cells it was killing.
I
sighed. “I get that, but it’s two a.m.,
Nick. I’m tired, and so are you. We both had a few drinks at the club – which,
by the way, probably wasn’t such a good idea.
Chemo and alcohol – not a good combination. Let’s just wait till morning.”
“No,” he
persisted, stubborn as ever. “If we
wait, I’ll feel like shit all day and
all night and wake up still feeling shitty on the day of the show. If we start it now, I’ll still feel like shit
the rest of the day, but I can sleep it off and hopefully feel okay by Monday.”
My
exasperation with him turned to sympathy.
He seemed to have resigned himself to feeling like crap over the next
day or so, which was a change from his usual denial. “Was it bad the last time?” I asked, and he
nodded. I couldn’t help but wonder
aloud, “What would you do if we had a show tomorrow?”
Nick
shrugged. “I dunno. Doesn’t matter; we don’t.”
He was just
lucky it had worked out that way. We had
most Sundays off, so even though the tour had just started, the next show
wasn’t until Monday night in Clearwater.
We could sleep in at the hotel before boarding the tour buses for the
five-hour drive north later in the day.
“Alright,”
I finally agreed, sighing to show him I wasn’t exactly thrilled about it. I looked around the room. “Where do you wanna do this?”
“Right
here’s fine,” said Nick. He stripped off
his t-shirt and stretched out flat on the other side of the bed. He folded his arms behind his head and closed
his eyes. He looked totally relaxed at
first, but when I came around to his side, I could see the lines of tension in
his face.
“You know,
if I was still working in a hospital, I’d be suspended for working on a patient
with any trace of alcohol in my system,” I remarked, as I got set up. “You sure you want me to do this?”
“It’s not
like you’re doin’ surgery on me,” he replied, without opening his eyes. “Just don’t pierce my heart with that needle
or nothin’.”
“Just don’t
sue me if I do,” I shot back, hardly missing a beat. Finally, his eyes flew open. I smirked at the flicker of fear I saw in
them. “Kidding.”
“Not
funny,” he said, smirking back. “Just
get that sucker in, or I’ll do it myself.”
“Now that’s
a scary thought,” I laughed. I would
never have attempted any procedure more involved than this after a couple of
drinks, but really, hooking up the IV was simple, and I felt completely fine,
not even buzzed. If anything, the liquor
made me more relaxed than usual. My hand
was steady as it inserted the needle into his port. I checked and double-checked all the labels
on his medications before I administered them – a sodium bicarbonate tablet to
help flush the chemo through his kidneys, an injection of Zofran
to help with nausea, and finally, the chemo drip itself.
When the
portable pump was up and running, I fit it into the little pouch I had made
him, the one that looked like a Nintendo controller, and set it on the bedside
table. “There,” I said. “You’re all set.”
“Good,”
Nick mumbled. His eyes were closed
again. “Hopefully I can fall asleep
before it hits.”
“Want me to
tuck you in?” I asked jokingly.
“Sure,” he
replied, sounding completely serious. He
didn’t get up, but rolled over onto his side so that I could turn down the
covers on that side of the bed. So, I
did. He rolled back over, and I wrangled
the sheet and bedspread out from under his long legs and pulled them up over
the top, taking care to make sure they didn’t get tangled with the thin IV line
as I smoothed them over his chest.
“There, big
guy,” I said, feeling like a true nurse again.
“Are you comfortable?”
He
nodded. “Thank you.”
“You’re
welcome.” I hesitated. “If you don’t mind, I better stick around for
a few minutes and make sure everything’s okay.”
I was afraid to go off and leave him alone. What if the line clogged, or he had a bad
reaction?
“Sure,
whatever,” he said. He folded his arms
over the top of his covers, as if he were hugging himself. He never opened his eyes. Looking down at him, I was filled with
tenderness and sympathy. Gone was the
charismatic performer who sexed up the stage with his moves and his vocals and
his sultry little smirks. Tucked into
bed like this, with his eyes closed and his arms crossed, he looked like a
little boy, worn out after a long day of playing.
I settled
quietly back into a chair, watching him.
I’d hoped he would sleep through the night, like he had wished, while
the chemo slowly poisoned his body. But
within half an hour, he was already up and out of bed, barricaded in the
bathroom. I stood outside the closed
door, feeling helpless as I listened to the sounds of him getting sick on the
other side.
***