Chapter 17
“How’s it going in there, Nick?” Riley
couldn’t help but giggle to herself. She sat on the edge of his bed,
straightening her ball gown and trying to get it to “poof” more.
“I really hate you right now,” He
mumbled from inside the bathroom. “This is the ugliest thing I’ve ever seen in
my life. Who wears red pants?”
“Prince Charming. And now you. Hey,
just be thankful you’re not Aladdin, eh? Kev has to walk around with just a
vest on. No shirt for him tonight.”
“You’ll enjoy that, won’t you?”
“I just might.”
The door swung open and Nick appeared,
a frown on his face.
Riley snickered, covering her mouth
from him to see.
“See! You even think I look dumb.”
“No, I don’t! You look adorable.”
”Adorable? I’m not supposed to be adorable. I’m supposed to be some hot
heartthrob of a sex god. Not adorable.”
“Nick, shut up. You look great.” He
looked down at his outfit, making a face at it as though it were alive. He wore
red pants with a gold stripe down the outside of the legs and a white jacket,
lined in gold with gold buttons. “How do I look?”
She stood up and twirled for him. She
caught him off guard. He hadn’t really looked at her when he came out of the
bathroom. To him, she looked amazing. The blue ball gown fit her perfectly. She
wore a simple gold necklace with a heart locket on it, which stopped right
above the neckline of the dress. Her hair was pulled back into a bun with two
curls lining her face on either side. A blue ribbon to match her dress was used
as a headband in her dark hair.
“You look amazing.”
“Whatever.” She laughed, looking down
at the dress.
“No, really, you look really good.”
“Thanks,” She blushed, not used to
that kind of comment from him. “Like my shoes?”
She lifted the skirt of the dress to
show off her white and pink Nike shoes.
“What? No stilettos?”
“No way. I’d rather be comfortable
tonight than break my ankle.”
“Aren’t I allowed to be comfortable?”
“Come on, Nick. It’s not that bad.
It’s not any worse than some of those outfits you used to wear on stage.”
“I hate when you make good points.” He
sat down on the bed, sighing.
“You okay?” She sat beside him.
“Yeah. Just tired.”
“How can you be tired? You went to be
at ten last night and nearly slept til noon today.”
“I don’t know. I just am,” And to
prove it, he yawned.
“There’s still an hour until the
party. You can take a nap if you want. I’m going to go downstairs and help
Kristin in the kitchen.”
“Nah, I’ll be okay.”
He followed Riley downstairs to the
kitchen where Kristin was still in shorts and a t-shirt, slipping a pan of
cupcakes into the oven.
“Kris, why don’t you get dressed and
Nick and I will ice those.”
“Okay,” She look relieved as she put a
plate of cupcakes on the island beside where Nick was standing. “The icing is
already made and in a bowl in the fridge.”
Before leaving, she took a package of
cake decorations and put them beside the plate.
“Have at it,” She said. “The cupcakes
in the oven should be ready in about fifteen minutes, so when they come out,
put them in the fridge to cool before icing them.”
“Got it.” Riley said, taking two
butter knives from a drawer. Kristin left the room as Riley went to the fridge
and withdrew the icing.
“She should’ve made black icing,” Nick
said, eyeing the bowl of orange icing. “Then it would’ve made everyone’s mouth
black.”
“Are you a ten year old stuck in a
twenty-four-year-old’s body?”
“That was mean.”
“Get over it,” She sat down beside
Nick at the island and handed him a butter knife. “Do you know how to ice a
cupcake?”
“I wasn’t born yesterday.”
“Well you don’t have very many kitchen
skills, Nick.”
To prove a point, Nick dipped the
knife into the frosting and slathered it across the chocolate cupcake he held
in his hand.
“You two sound like an old married
couple.” Kevin said as he came into the kitchen. Rather than get a sarcastic
reply, they remained quiet. He looked up from his vest that he was buttoning to
see the two staring at him, their eyes dancing with laughter.
“Go ahead, get it out.” He crossed his
arms.
“Why Kev, we’re not going to laugh.
You look…”
”Lovely.” Nick said before bursting into laughter. Riley hit him in the arm and
he was quick to stop.
“Nick, you might laugh at me, but I’m
not the one wearing a red and white suit.”
The doorbell rang interrupting their
friendly banter.
Kevin excused himself to the front
door as the two remained in the kitchen, continuing to ice the cupcakes.
“Here, put these on top of the each
cupcake and I’ll get the ones from the oven.” Riley slid a package of plastic
Halloween decorations to him as she climbed off the stool. As she pulled the
muffin tins from the oven, AJ and Howie walked into the kitchen, each carrying
an armful of alcohol.
“This should be a fun party,” Riley
said, raising her eyebrows at the amount they had brought.
“Kevin asked us to bring some and he
knew what he was getting into,” AJ said with a playful smirk on his face.
Before she knew it, Riley was being picked up and squeezed into a hug. “I’ve
missed you girl. It’s been too long.”
“Gee, like an entire month,” She
teased. “Can you kindly put me down so I can get these in the fridge?”
He set her back onto the ground and
she placed the cupcakes into the fridge to cool.
“AJ, can you come help me?” Kevin
called from the other room. AJ made a face as he began to leave the room. Howie
sat beside Nick and finished icing the cupcakes Riley hadn’t finished.
“How come Howie doesn’t have to help?”
AJ whined.
“Because I trust him with my food.”
Kristin said coming into the kitchen. “Suck it up, big boy, and go help my
husband.”
Within the hour, the rest of the
cupcakes had been iced and set out in the dining room where all the food was
placed out like a buffet. The living room had been transformed into the center
of entertainment. The furniture had been moved into the den and a wooden dance
floor had been placed over the carpet of the living room. Kevin and AJ had
efficiently hung orange lights throughout the room, along with a few pumpkin
light fixtures. Once the overhead lights were out, the room simply glowed.
“Awesome.” Riley said from the doorway
as she watched AJ set up a booth in the corner. “Are you the DJ tonight?”
“Sure am. Well, sort of. I burned a
bunch of CDs so I can just pop one in and let it go for awhile.”
“What kind of music?” She asked,
sitting down on the fireplace and taking a handful of the CDS into her hand.
“Everything. I got a bunch of fun
dance songs and a bunch of those lame Halloween ones. I even got that damned
song you like so much from ‘Casper’. Figured it’d be a good one for the
couples.”
“Awww you did?”
“Yep. Just for you.” He winked.
She hugged him as she replaced the
CDS. “Thanks, J.”
“I only have one request.”
“What?”
“You dance with me during it.”
“Deal,” She hugged him again before
returning to the kitchen where everyone else sat around on stools and chairs.
“Hey you.” She sat down beside Nick.
He continued to stare into space, not paying attention to her greeting. “Earth
to Nick,”
She waved her hand in front of his
face, snapping him quickly from his trance.
”What?”
“Just said hey. Nice day dream you got
going there?”
“Yeah, something like that.”
“How do you feel? Any better?”
“I swear, if any of you ask me that
one more time-“ His reply was cut short by the doorbell.
As everyone stood to greet the people
coming in, Nick stayed seated. In truth, he didn’t feel any better. Only worse.
But he knew if he told anyone, especially Riley, then they’d make a huge deal
over nothing. Everything made sense anyways, didn’t it? The headache and
fatigue was from sleeping too much the night before. The slight dizziness he
kept feeling was from the headache. And the damn ache in his chest was
heartburn from the Mexican they had eaten for dinner the night before.
He was just fine and wanted everyone
to quit worrying. He decided to get up and walk around. Maybe that would help.
And then people wouldn’t get such a big of chance to ask ‘how are you doing?’.
Walking into the foyer, he saw Brian
and Leighanne come in through the door. Brian glanced at him before turning and
going into the living room.
“Nick!” Leighanne said, pulling him
into a hug. “It’s so good to see you.”
“Good to see you, too, Leigh.”
“You look so much better than the last
time I saw you,” She smiled. “I’ve got to go find my husband, but I’ll see you
later.”
“See you.”
He watched as she disappeared into the
living room.
“Nick, want a beer?” AJ asked as he
came into the foyer.
“Uh… sure.”
He took the one AJ offered and popped
the cap off. Putting it to his lips, he was ready to welcome the refreshing
taste, but instead, found it to be rather disgusting. He held it away and
looked at the label.
“What’s wrong?” Riley asked coming up
beside him.
“It tastes funny.”
Riley took it from his hand and sipped
it. She shrugged and handed it back.
“Tastes okay to me. Maybe it’s because
you haven’t had one in almost two months. Your tastes can change.”
“I guess. Here, you can have it.” He
gave it back to her.
“I’m going to go dance. Want to come?”
“Nah, but I’ll find you later.”
“Okay.”
She went into the living room, which
was now full of people. He walked around for a while, greeting people he knew.
He saw a few people that worked for their record company that he hadn’t seen in
awhile and got caught up into conversations with them.
The dizziness that had left him for
the previous part of the party had suddenly returned. He realized he hadn’t
eaten much that day except for lunch, so went into the dining room. Grabbing a
plate, he put a few chips and vegetables on it before slipping out the back
door onto the deck. He welcomed the cool LA air. It was nothing like Florida’s,
but it was refreshing at the moment. The deck was dark except for the light
streaming through the windows, but it wasn’t much. He found the stairs and sat
the top, resting his legs a few levels down.
“I thought I was the only one that
needed out of there.” A voice said from behind, startling him. “Sorry, didn’t
mean to scare you.”
He could see the silhouette of what
used to be his best friend.
“Why start apologizing now?” Nick
asked, setting the food down, no longer hungry.
“Look… I’m not sorry for what I’ve
done the past few months. I am sorry for hurting my friends and family because
of it. I’ve been an ass to all of them-“
“But you haven’t been an ass to me,
huh?”
“Can I finish?”
Nick shrugged, turning his face away
from Brian and looking at the city lights over the fence.
“I don’t blame you for keeping it from
us for a while, but what you did… was incredibly stupid and selfish. And for
that, I can’t ever forgive you. You risked the life of my own son because you
were afraid of being shut out. I’m not sure what the hell happened to your mind
that you would’ve thought we would’ve shut you out. But anyways… I
can’t go back to having it the way it used to be. I can’t be a friend with you
like that anymore. But I also can’t just ignore you because that would end up
ruining the band and showing to the public and I don’t want that.”
”So you just want to be an acquaintance?”
“Basically, yes. I know on TV or in concert
we’ll have to act like we’re still friends, but I can’t do it in reality, Nick.
I’m sorry.”
Looking down at the grass, Nick
couldn’t speak. He didn’t know what to say if he could. He heard the door shut
from behind him and turned to see that Brian had gone back inside. Throwing the
remainder of the food into the yard, Nick stood and went back indoors.
Tossing the plate into the overflowing
trash, he made his way into the living room and found Riley.
“Hey! Having a fun?” She asked,
stepping off the dance floor.
“A blast.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. I won’t let it ruin my
night.”
“We’ll talk about it later, though?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay. Come on, let’s dance.”
Before he could protest, she had him
on the floor. Kristin and Kevin soon found them and they ended up dancing in a
big group with other friends.
“All right everybody. I’m going to
slow it down a bit now. This next song is a favorite by one of my favorite
girls. I promise Casper won’t show up, though.”
He out from behind the booth and made his way towards Riley.
“Excuse me, Nicky, but she promised me
a dance.” AJ said, taking Riley into his own arms.
“Nick, come here. Kevin left me.”
Kristin put her arms around Nick’s
neck as the song started.
“Are you having fun?” She asked.
“Yeah,” He lied. “You guys pulled off
a great party, Kris.”
The floor had become less populated as
everyone took the song as a break for food or a drink, though couples still
remained.
Every now and then
We find a special friend
Who never lets us down
“Thanks for playing this, AJ,” Riley
said, her head resting against his chest.
“You’re welcome, babe.”
Who understands it all
Reaches out each time we fall
You’re the best friend that I’ve found
Nick glanced around the room as
Kristin and he danced. He saw Leighanne holding tightly onto Brian as they
danced. Shaking his head, he grasped Kristin’s hand tighter.
“You okay?” She asked, looking up at
him.
I know you can’t stay
A part of you will never ever go away
Your heart will stay
“Nick?” Kristin asked again. His face
had paled and he looked as though he might be sick.
“Yeah,” He mumbled. The room had begun
to spin slowly, but he figured it was heat in the room. It felt like someone
had turned the furnace on full blast.
I’ll make a wish for you
And hope it will come true
If life will just be kind
To such a gentle mind
The room spun faster. The ache in the
chest became worse. It was like someone was sucking the air out of him.
“Nick? Let’s sit down. Come on.” He
felt Kristin take his hand and begin to lead him off the dance floor. He
stopped suddenly, feeling unable to breath at all, and the world became black
around him.
If you lose your way
Think back on yesterday
Remember me this way
“Nick!” Kristin screamed as he
collapsed.
AJ’s eyes widened as he saw his friend
lying on the floor.
”What?” Riley asked, turning around. She felt her legs become shaky as she ran
to his side.
“Someone call 9-1-1!”
I don’t need eyes to see me
The love you bring to me
No matter where I go
And I know that you’ll be there
Forever more a part of me and everywhere
I’ll always care
[Song is “Remember Me This Way” by Jordan Hill off the “Casper”
soundtrack.]
***
