Chapter
9
“Goodnight and thank you Minneapolis,”
AJ announced as he and the Boys were lowered under the stage for the final
time, still singing their harmony for “I Want It That Way.”
“That was good,” Howie said with a
smile, “What say we all go out together and celebrate?”
“Go out where?” Brian asked, “Please
don’t say clubbing. I hate clubs, you know this.”
Howie hid his grin, “Yeah, I do, but I
am itching to go dancing tonight. Ok, AJ, Kev? How about you guys?”
AJ looked eager, “Yeah, we haven’t
gone clubbin’ together in a while.” AJ laughed, “In fact almost a year!”
Howie grinned, and looked to Kevin,
“No Howie… Unlike you two, I actually have a girlfriend.”
“What?” four mouths dropped open.
“Her name’s Kristen. I’ve known her
forever, and we finally hooked up before the tour,” Kevin was positively
glowing.
“This must be love,” Brian sang, a
chord from Brian McKnight’s song “This Must Be Love.”
“Shut up Bri,” Kevin said, but smiled,
“I’m just gonna go back to my room and give her a call tonight. I told her I
would, so she’s probably waitin’.”
“Oooh la la…” Nick and Brian cooed.
“Shut up Evil Twins,” Kevin said with
a laugh, “What are you two gonna do tonight?”
“Video game tournament,” Brian said,
“Kaos here seems to think he’s the video game champion of the world, and I have
to set him straight before he tries to tell that to someone else and gets
laughed at.” Brian grabbed Nick in a headlock, and started tickling him.
“Brian!” Nick complained. Kevin
stepped back as the two began wrestling each other.
”Well, I guess we had better get on
the bus,” Howie said, “Come on Tweedle Dumb and Tweedle Dumber.”
“What’re you taking?” Brian asked Nick
curiously as he spread out across the bed unpacking Nick’s Dreamcast.
Nick’s eyes trained over to Brian as he sat down a glass of water and
tucked the pill bottle away in his pocket, “Migraine tablets.”
He sat down on the bed and helped
Brian unpack the Dreamcast.
Brian frowned and looked at his friend
with concern, “Maybe we shouldn’t play then. You should get some sleep.”
Nick blinked, “Brian, you challenged
me…”
“Yeah, but I didn’t know you didn’t
feel well, Nick. Get some sleep, we can play games in the morning,
ok?” Brian looked at him expectantly.
“Yeah, yeah ok,” Nick shrugged, he
watched as Brian began repacking his Dreamcast, “You don’t have to, you can
just leave it.”
Brian glanced at him sharply, and was
suddenly suspicious of him, “You’re not gonna rig this thing up after I leave,
are you?”
Nick laughed, “No… no, I’ll go to bed.
My head’s killing me.”
Brian eyed him for a few more seconds
before biding him goodnight and leaving.
Nick watched him go, and sat down on
his bed. Goodnight Brian…
“Ok, now that last one was definitely
a man,” AJ commented dryly to Howie who was licking salt off his wrist and
getting ready to take another shot, “Man AJ, I don’t know what it is with
you and attracting them. I told you not to dye your pink.”
“Man, Howie, my hair looks cool,” AJ
protested.
“Sure it does,” Howie laughed, “I’m
sure that he-she over there thinks so too, she’s eyeing you.”
“Man!” AJ hopped off the bar stool,
“That’s it, I’m moving to the other side of the bar. Maybe there will be
girls over there!”
Howie snickered as he watched AJ
trooping further and further away from the bar.
“Hello? I’ve been watching you from
across the bar…”
UGH! With AJ gone the he-she girls had
come to call on him. He threw back his drink and sucked the lime, then
excused himself to find a bathroom. Now where did AJ go? Something
familiar caught his eye, and it wasn’t AJ.
“Howie,” AJ had appeared behind him
and grabbed his elbow, “You see who I see over there?”
Howie squinted, “Yeah, yeah I do…” And
he was in trouble. There was a lot of yelling, and Nick was in the center
of it, shooting his mouth off. A thin girl was draped across his arms,
apparently instigating the fight on. A swing was aimed and that’s when the
chaos broke out. Howie and AJ pushed their way to the center of it
ducking and dodging punches to get to Nick. AJ got there first and got a
good grip on him as he and Howie then proceeded to drag him out of the fight.
No one noticed three Backstreet Boys leaving the club. Blue and red
lights alerted them that the authorities were making the scene, and they
couldn’t leave it fast enough. Howie and AJ sat up front with Nick in
back rambling about how he wanted to go back and kick “that guy’s lyin’ ass.”
It was like he couldn’t get his words out fast enough, his mouth was
moving at a mile per minute.
AJ kept glancing back in the backseat
with an odd look on his face, “Nick, are you on something man?”
Howie glared daggers at AJ, how dare
he ask Nick such a question, “Have you been drinking Nick?” Howie smoothed over
AJ’s question.
Nick stopped his rambling to stare up
at the two in the front of the car, “Drinking? Well, yeah, but only
a few, I promise.” Nick looked sorry enough about it.
“Yeah, well you’re gonna feel real
sorry about it in the morning,” Howie commented, still shooting AJ hard looks.
AJ ignored him for the duration of the
drive back to the hotel.
***
