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laniew1They’d been expecting him for two days; JC had won his first bet ever because of the seemingly unexplainable delay at Justin’s arrival. Britney had scowled as she handed over the thousand bucks.
TITLE: Every Good Plan… Has An Intervention Staged by A Boyband – JC/Britney, JC/Justin UST
SERIES: Every Good Plan
Author: Melanie
DISCLAIMER: I own nothing at all, least of all those contained within.
I should never write when I’m PMSing. I know this, but yet I still do it. Which is really much more information than you really need.
The conversation with Justin took a different tone than what I had originally intended (although now I know where the next chapters idea came from) and is not as amusing as some past conversations, sorry about that ::sheepish look:: Humor should return in the next chapter.
Which will be delayed slightly because I’m in Brooklyn for the Strong Women of Sci Fi Convention this weekend.
Read these first …
Every Good Plan… Has A Beginning
Every Good Plan… Has Its Opposition
Every Good Plan… Has A First Date
Every Good Plan… Has An Intervention Staged by A Boyband
They’d been expecting him for two days; JC had won his first bet ever because of the seemingly unexplainable delay at Justin’s arrival. Britney had scowled as she handed over the thousand bucks.
They’d put the money and the time to good use.
The money had bought a pair of leather pants, which Britney insisted did wonderful things for his ass. Two shirts, although she’d refused to let him buy the pink ones in her presence (he’d gone back later on his own to get them) and a pair of kickass black leather boots which had Britney meowing at him and muttering something about kittens and petting.
He wondered where his reputation as a fluffy kitten had come from.
The additional two days gave them time to cement their ‘relationship’ within both the watchful publics’ eye and the three members of *NSYNC who seemed to have moved in overnight.
It took nine days total for Justin to arrive, nine days since JC and Britney had made their plans and told a few little white lies.
Actually Britney had told most of the lies, because even though they were ‘dating’ JC was a really bad liar when asked a direct question. Fortunately his friends were so caught up in the fact that he was seemingly with Britney voluntarily that any time it dawned on them that no one had point blank asked him if he was dating Britney he could use misdirection and hug her or touch her and they’d all growl. Britney said they were channeling their inner Justin’s and then they’d laugh, because she was right.
And for once it was kind of fun to be the one in on the prank and not the butt of the prank.
It was kind of strange that the other three were so obviously misled but JC cut them some slack, they were a little distracted by Britney’s continued presence at his side. Somehow though he didn’t think Justin would be that easily misled.
He hoped.
So for the moment, (just until Justin came to his senses Britney insisted) JC was Britney’s boyfriend. JC hadn’t had the energy to fight with her when she was dating Justin, now that it seemed she was looking out for his best interests, trying to get him what he’d always wanted he still didn’t have the energy to fight her.
He really didn’t want to and it didn’t seem worth it, especially if it got him what he wanted in the long run… he’d probably end up buying her an island somewhere as a thank you gift.
He hadn’t spent so much time with the guys since the tour had ended. It was slightly disconcerting to be the focus of all their undivided attention.
Especially since they were so blatantly obvious about the fact that they were trying to ‘break’ him and Britney up. It probably wouldn’t have been so funny if they were actually a ‘real’ couple.
They brought up every fault that Britney could ever have thought of having, reminded him at least five times a day that she’d cheated on Justin. All the while they were putting Britney down they were talking Justin up. As if JC hadn’t known him for almost half his life. It was like they were trying to convince him to give some blind date a chance before running for the hills.
Chris spent the most time with him, with them. He had seemingly, and without JC’s knowledge moved into his house. He was there all the time. When JC crawled out of bed at noon Chris was sitting in the kitchen eating whatever cold leftovers were from the night before. He’d smile, sneer at Britney who’d normally arrive around that time and then insinuate himself into whatever plans they’d made for the day. When he crawled into bed at night Chris hovered outside his door as if checking to make sure that JC hadn’t smuggled Britney into his room while he wasn’t looking. JC didn’t doubt that Chris probably crept in while he was asleep to check on just that.
Justin probably called for nightly recaps.
Lance was just as bad. JC had no doubt that if he hadn’t had his ‘something’ (and whatever that was it was bugging the hell out of all of them because Lance refused to share) to take care of that he would have been living in the room next to Chris and together they would have been tag teaming him morning, noon and night.
Joey was the only one that JC would have chosen to spend time with, and most of that was because Kelly kept him so busy with wedding plans so that he was very rarely around. He did make his appearances, but he at least tried to be nice to Britney even though he was distracted by place settings, tuxedos and flowers.
The day that Justin finally arrived JC had hidden himself away in his studio. It was either that or commit mass murder and kill them all.
Chris was driving him nuts, Lance was driving him nuts… even Britney was beginning to drive him nuts and they were working together.
He wished, not for the first time, that they’d all just leave. He hadn’t been able to get any work done since this had all started. He couldn’t even remember the last time he’d been able to write in peace
If his album wasn’t done he would have thought this was Britney’s way of making sure it never got done. But he knew it couldn’t be that because he’d sworn Britney to secrecy and let her listen to some of the demos and she was excited about them.
He heard the loud excitement of Chris’ voice, the low rumble of Lance’s about a second before Britney appeared in the doorway with a grin.
“Justin just showed up with Joey.”
“So we’re thinking boyband intervention then?” JC hit a button and winced when the whole station went black, thankfully he hadn’t been playing with anything important but…
“Well you know they’re all the rage now,” she smirked sitting in the rolling chair next to him. “You should count yourself lucky that you have friends that care about you.”
“Yeah because everyone should have friends that stage interventions to remind you that you’re gay,” JC rolled his eyes spinning in his chair.
“At least they care.”
“Chris has fed me pizza every night this week… With meat, I’ve had to pick it off.”
“Well if you’d remember to eat you wouldn’t have to eat whatever Chris orders.”
“You’re supposed to be on my side.”
“I am… but you tend to get… distracted when you’re playing down here. Chris and I have been left to stare at each other for the last two days…I’ve been killed about a hundred different times, a hundred different ways in that time...”
“How am I supposed to do this Brit? I have never successfully lied to Justin about anything… ever.”
“So don’t lie to him… tell him the truth…” Britney smiled.
“Tell him the truth? I thought…”
“The truth,” she winked at him and he wrinkled his nose. Her truth was that yes, they were currently dating. He should have been practicing this in front of a mirror.
“Jace,” Justin’s voice was soft behind them, and JC barely managed to keep from jumping. How long had he been standing there? The underlying tension in just the way he said his name was hard to miss. And wow this had to look bad if you weren’t them… as they’d been talking their chairs had inched together, their heads had bowed. They looked like they were intimately sharing secrets.
In front of him Britney’s eyes were wide, her hand reaching out to squeeze his gently before she stood.
Showtime.
“Call me later,” she said softly. She grabbed the bag that she’d tossed on the small couch in the back of the room before she crossed back to him. Bending to press a soft kiss to his lips, his hand came up to touch her hip. It looked familiar, comfortable.
They’d had a lot of practice over the last week. They ignored the steady, soft snarl emanating from the doorway.
As she smiled gently at him she moved towards the door, JC watching. It was one of the few times that he’d got to see Justin and Britney interact since their relationship had been shredded due to Britney’s infidelity.
“Justin,” her voice was civil as she waited for him to move.
“Britney,” his voice on the other hand was decidedly uncivil. JC wondered if they would brawl right here, he could almost smell the Alpha Male waves rolling off of Justin right now. Justin was ready to defend his territory, to annihilate the person trying to take his property from him.
How blind had be been that he hadn’t seen it before. Seen that Justin considered him his. He hadn’t been looking for it of course but it was so damn obvious.
No wonder Bobbi had always disliked Justin and vice versa. They’d probably been snarling and snapping at each other behind his back.
Britney smiled back at JC, he waved at her before she left. How long would it have taken him to have seen this if Britney hadn’t shown him what to look for? Would he have ever seen it?
“Aren’t you supposed to be on tour?” he asked idly with a small smile, arching a brow as he slouched in his chair. He knew of course that Justin had a two week break; Britney had looked it up on the web the day that he’d been expected and not arrived. Just in case something had happened and he’d been scheduled for concerts during that off period.
They wanted to be prepared for every contingency.
“We have a break,” Justin crossed his arms over his chest, eyes narrowing as he studied JC from head to toe. JC fought to keep from squirming under the perusal.
It was uncomfortable having Justin eye him like that. Like he was looking for bruises or something, anything that would prove that JC had been forcibly coerced into this liaison with Britney.
“So why are you here?” he asked, like he didn’t already know the answer.
“I think we should talk,” Justin walked into the room, closing the door behind him with a barely audible click. A flick of his wrist engaged the lock and JC gnawed on his bottom lip.
“Talk about what J?”
“How ‘bout what you’re doing with Britney.”
“I would have thought that was kind of obvious,” JC frowned, watching Justin pace back and forth before him.
“Is it a game? Something management set up because of your album, couldn’t they have chosen someone else for you?”
“Um…”
“I mean… if they’re going for the sensationalistic factor its working. Pretty much all anybody’s talking about is you and Britney.”
“Justin…” JC started, Justin continued talking over him.
“Its just if they were going to set a beard up for you I really think that it was something that we should have all talked about together… you know as a group,” Justin stopped pacing and stared down at him.
“Why should you guys have anything to say about who I do or don’t date?” And that wasn’t really the point but at least Justin had let him get in a sentence.
“Because this affects us too JC… everything each one of does affects us as a group, as a whole even when we’re not together.”
“So you’re saying that it’s okay for you to date whoever you want, but it’s not okay for me to do the same thing?”
“Okay, you’re not dating her,” JC’s eyes widened slightly because he’d known Justin would be a little upset, especially since it was Britney but he hadn’t thought that he’d be seriously freaked out about it. “I know they’ve explained the beard thing before. And no… you can’t date whoever you want, especially not when it’s Britney. They should have given you somebody else.”
“Okay I’m going to say this one last time. Britney is not my beard… and besides all that I think I’m old enough to decide who I want to date Justin,” JC waved his hand in the air. “I’ve been doing it for years.”
“But she’s a girl.”
“So…”
“Gay C,” Justin’s hands were waving now and if his eyes got any wider they were going to pop right out of his head. Wouldn’t that be fun to explain.
JC sighed, because damn were they all preparing their speeches in advance? Chris and Lance had both said identical things to him.
“She’s an attractive young woman, enough times passed that it doesn’t look to strange and we’re both a little lonely. She’s good company,” JC ignored Justin’s flinch.
“She’s good company… she’s an attractive young woman? Jesus C… Didn’t you think any of this was weird? Don’t you think she’s getting something else out of this…? I mean Britney normally goes for pretty boys, look at Wade.”
“You think women can’t find me attractive?” JC scowled, he knew that 90% of their fans were there because of what Justin looked like but he didn’t think that the rest of them were elephant men or anything.
“No… I didn’t say that JC, that’s not…” Justin frowned, rubbing at his head in confusion. Probably trying to figure out exactly how he’d lost control of the conversation and started insulting him. “You’re gay.”
“Thank you for reminding me… again,” JC snorted, rolling his eyes. “It’s not like Chris and Joey and Lance haven’t been reminding me of that fact for the last week.”
“It’s just… JC…” Justin knelt before him. Touching his knees gently, his eyes earnest. “Tell me the truth baby…”
“The truth,” JC sighed, leaned his head back and closed his eyes. He wondered if Justin even knew the endearment had left his lips, wondered what endearments he casually used on Cameron. He laid his hand over one of Justin’s and squeezed it gently.
“Help me understand this… Tell me that Britney forced you to do it… hell tell me Johnny forced you to do this…”
“Nobody’s forcing me to do anything Justin.”
Justin stared at him; while JC fought back the urge to look away. Their eyes locked together and JC got the impression that since Justin felt he wasn’t being totally honest with him that Justin was searching for the answers to his questions.
Justin knew him well enough that he could read the little nuances of every flicker of his face. If muscles twitched he was going to know what was going on. JC schooled himself to calmness, thinking of peaceful oceans, clear skies.
Was Justin even conscious of the fact that he had twisted his hand under JC’s and that they were linked together?
“I don’t believe you,” Justin finally said softly and JC winced. “There’s something going on here.”
“Justin…”
“There’s something going on here… and I’m going to figure it out.”
******************************************************************************
It had killed her waiting until the next day to find out what had happened. But JC hadn’t called and she didn’t want to be labeled the psychotic girlfriend who always had to know where her boyfriend was so she had found things to keep her occupied.
Her closet was now organized by color and she had two bags of things to donate to various charities. She’d been productive even as she’d been biting her nails down to the cuticles. The next time they went to get a manicure Carol was going to scream at her. The only thing that made her feel any better was that she didn’t think JC’s nails or fingers were in better shape.
They had a standing meeting for coffee; normally Lance (the caffeine junkie) trailed along behind JC so Britney was surprised to not see anyone behind him when he walked in.
She managed to contain herself while he sat, tapped her fingers against the table while he ordered.
“So?” She knew her voice was bubbly and overly excited. She couldn’t help it. Her love life was being vicariously lived through JC at this point. Things wouldn’t have changed that much during the previous day, Justin was many things but he wasn’t a cheater. He was still with Cameron he would have kept his hands to himself.
“He held my hand,” Britney smiled until she realized that JC’s voice was strange sounding and he looked kind of weird, the smiled faded quickly. “And he called me baby… I don’t think he realized he was even doing it though.”
“Oh sweetie,” she patted his hand, drawing it back into her lap when the waitress reappeared with their coffees and a muffin. This waitress seemed to like JC a lot, in the last five days she’d given him free food every time.
She probably like half the free world thought that JC was to skinny and had made it her personal mission in life to fatten him up.
“He’s really jealous of you… how did I not see that?”
“Because you’re blind,” she said it kindly, because it wasn’t an insult. It was a statement of fact and JC knew it.
“He thinks that you’re a set up… a beard you know… he didn’t believe me when I told him you weren’t. He thinks there’s something going on.” JC wrinkled his nose as he alternated between tearing his muffin into pieces and sipping his coffee. She snagged a piece of the muffin before he totally demolished it and chewed thoughtfully.
“Of course he does.”
“He’s not supposed to know that yet… I don’t know if I can do this… you should have seen his face,” JC’s was somber and Britney frowned. She didn’t want JC to be in pain over this, she wanted him to finally end up with Justin. “He didn’t believe me but… “
“We can stop you know… just say the word…”
“I just… he was… sad… I mean he didn’t do anything, just the handholding and the baby but…”
“It’s a start… we could use this to our advantage…” she gnawed on her bottom lip thoughtfully. “Schedule a double date or something with him and Cameron. That’d drive him nuts, move things along quicker…”
“He’d kill both of us.”
Britney just grinned, mentally running down the list of numbers in her head. She didn’t have Cameron’s but she had Jared’s. She wondered what it would cost her to get the number from him.
“How did you get out of the house without an escort? I would have thought Justin would have an ankle bracelet on you by now… you know for ease of tracking and retrieval.”
“I climbed down the trellis,” he mumbled.
“Please tell me you’re kidding.”
“I’m kidding,” he smirked at her; it seemed some of his good humor was returning at the sudden influx of coffee and muffin crumbs. “You know I’d kill myself if I tried that.”
“Yeah you’d get distracted by a floor or a weed, or some weird growth thing and you’d fall to your death… I’m sure Justin and the others would find some way to pin that on me.”
“I’ve no doubt… but everyone was still asleep so I walked right out the front door; they stayed up late talking about us…”
“And how do you know that young man?” she grinned.
“Must be your bad influence rubbing off on me… I eavesdropped, they didn’t even know I was there,” JC giggled.
“Great,” she rolled her eyes. “Something else that Justin can blame on me when this is all over with.”
“I was eavesdropping long before you… anyway, Chris thinks this is all some publicity stunt, which Justin agreed with he just doesn’t think it came from my side…”
“So he thinks my PR team came up with it?” she laughed. “My PR team couldn’t come up with that on a good day.”
“Joey thinks we might actually be dating, Justin almost killed him… and god only knows what Lance thinks… he’s distracted by his something.”
“Yeah what is up with Lance lately? He’s been acting slightly stranger then normal.”
“He’s up to something.”
“When has Lance not been up to something?”
“Yeah but normally he shares whatever it is with us so it doesn’t come as a huge shock and bite us all in the ass after the fact.”
“Well its Lance… how bad could it be?”
“Famous last words… I’ll remind you that you said them when he takes over the world.”
******************************************************************************
TITLE: Every Good Plan… Has An Intervention Staged by A Boyband – JC/Britney, JC/Justin UST
SERIES: Every Good Plan
Author: Melanie
DISCLAIMER: I own nothing at all, least of all those contained within.
I should never write when I’m PMSing. I know this, but yet I still do it. Which is really much more information than you really need.
The conversation with Justin took a different tone than what I had originally intended (although now I know where the next chapters idea came from) and is not as amusing as some past conversations, sorry about that ::sheepish look:: Humor should return in the next chapter.
Which will be delayed slightly because I’m in Brooklyn for the Strong Women of Sci Fi Convention this weekend.
Read these first …
Every Good Plan… Has A Beginning
Every Good Plan… Has Its Opposition
Every Good Plan… Has A First Date
Every Good Plan… Has An Intervention Staged by A Boyband
They’d been expecting him for two days; JC had won his first bet ever because of the seemingly unexplainable delay at Justin’s arrival. Britney had scowled as she handed over the thousand bucks.
They’d put the money and the time to good use.
The money had bought a pair of leather pants, which Britney insisted did wonderful things for his ass. Two shirts, although she’d refused to let him buy the pink ones in her presence (he’d gone back later on his own to get them) and a pair of kickass black leather boots which had Britney meowing at him and muttering something about kittens and petting.
He wondered where his reputation as a fluffy kitten had come from.
The additional two days gave them time to cement their ‘relationship’ within both the watchful publics’ eye and the three members of *NSYNC who seemed to have moved in overnight.
It took nine days total for Justin to arrive, nine days since JC and Britney had made their plans and told a few little white lies.
Actually Britney had told most of the lies, because even though they were ‘dating’ JC was a really bad liar when asked a direct question. Fortunately his friends were so caught up in the fact that he was seemingly with Britney voluntarily that any time it dawned on them that no one had point blank asked him if he was dating Britney he could use misdirection and hug her or touch her and they’d all growl. Britney said they were channeling their inner Justin’s and then they’d laugh, because she was right.
And for once it was kind of fun to be the one in on the prank and not the butt of the prank.
It was kind of strange that the other three were so obviously misled but JC cut them some slack, they were a little distracted by Britney’s continued presence at his side. Somehow though he didn’t think Justin would be that easily misled.
He hoped.
So for the moment, (just until Justin came to his senses Britney insisted) JC was Britney’s boyfriend. JC hadn’t had the energy to fight with her when she was dating Justin, now that it seemed she was looking out for his best interests, trying to get him what he’d always wanted he still didn’t have the energy to fight her.
He really didn’t want to and it didn’t seem worth it, especially if it got him what he wanted in the long run… he’d probably end up buying her an island somewhere as a thank you gift.
He hadn’t spent so much time with the guys since the tour had ended. It was slightly disconcerting to be the focus of all their undivided attention.
Especially since they were so blatantly obvious about the fact that they were trying to ‘break’ him and Britney up. It probably wouldn’t have been so funny if they were actually a ‘real’ couple.
They brought up every fault that Britney could ever have thought of having, reminded him at least five times a day that she’d cheated on Justin. All the while they were putting Britney down they were talking Justin up. As if JC hadn’t known him for almost half his life. It was like they were trying to convince him to give some blind date a chance before running for the hills.
Chris spent the most time with him, with them. He had seemingly, and without JC’s knowledge moved into his house. He was there all the time. When JC crawled out of bed at noon Chris was sitting in the kitchen eating whatever cold leftovers were from the night before. He’d smile, sneer at Britney who’d normally arrive around that time and then insinuate himself into whatever plans they’d made for the day. When he crawled into bed at night Chris hovered outside his door as if checking to make sure that JC hadn’t smuggled Britney into his room while he wasn’t looking. JC didn’t doubt that Chris probably crept in while he was asleep to check on just that.
Justin probably called for nightly recaps.
Lance was just as bad. JC had no doubt that if he hadn’t had his ‘something’ (and whatever that was it was bugging the hell out of all of them because Lance refused to share) to take care of that he would have been living in the room next to Chris and together they would have been tag teaming him morning, noon and night.
Joey was the only one that JC would have chosen to spend time with, and most of that was because Kelly kept him so busy with wedding plans so that he was very rarely around. He did make his appearances, but he at least tried to be nice to Britney even though he was distracted by place settings, tuxedos and flowers.
The day that Justin finally arrived JC had hidden himself away in his studio. It was either that or commit mass murder and kill them all.
Chris was driving him nuts, Lance was driving him nuts… even Britney was beginning to drive him nuts and they were working together.
He wished, not for the first time, that they’d all just leave. He hadn’t been able to get any work done since this had all started. He couldn’t even remember the last time he’d been able to write in peace
If his album wasn’t done he would have thought this was Britney’s way of making sure it never got done. But he knew it couldn’t be that because he’d sworn Britney to secrecy and let her listen to some of the demos and she was excited about them.
He heard the loud excitement of Chris’ voice, the low rumble of Lance’s about a second before Britney appeared in the doorway with a grin.
“Justin just showed up with Joey.”
“So we’re thinking boyband intervention then?” JC hit a button and winced when the whole station went black, thankfully he hadn’t been playing with anything important but…
“Well you know they’re all the rage now,” she smirked sitting in the rolling chair next to him. “You should count yourself lucky that you have friends that care about you.”
“Yeah because everyone should have friends that stage interventions to remind you that you’re gay,” JC rolled his eyes spinning in his chair.
“At least they care.”
“Chris has fed me pizza every night this week… With meat, I’ve had to pick it off.”
“Well if you’d remember to eat you wouldn’t have to eat whatever Chris orders.”
“You’re supposed to be on my side.”
“I am… but you tend to get… distracted when you’re playing down here. Chris and I have been left to stare at each other for the last two days…I’ve been killed about a hundred different times, a hundred different ways in that time...”
“How am I supposed to do this Brit? I have never successfully lied to Justin about anything… ever.”
“So don’t lie to him… tell him the truth…” Britney smiled.
“Tell him the truth? I thought…”
“The truth,” she winked at him and he wrinkled his nose. Her truth was that yes, they were currently dating. He should have been practicing this in front of a mirror.
“Jace,” Justin’s voice was soft behind them, and JC barely managed to keep from jumping. How long had he been standing there? The underlying tension in just the way he said his name was hard to miss. And wow this had to look bad if you weren’t them… as they’d been talking their chairs had inched together, their heads had bowed. They looked like they were intimately sharing secrets.
In front of him Britney’s eyes were wide, her hand reaching out to squeeze his gently before she stood.
Showtime.
“Call me later,” she said softly. She grabbed the bag that she’d tossed on the small couch in the back of the room before she crossed back to him. Bending to press a soft kiss to his lips, his hand came up to touch her hip. It looked familiar, comfortable.
They’d had a lot of practice over the last week. They ignored the steady, soft snarl emanating from the doorway.
As she smiled gently at him she moved towards the door, JC watching. It was one of the few times that he’d got to see Justin and Britney interact since their relationship had been shredded due to Britney’s infidelity.
“Justin,” her voice was civil as she waited for him to move.
“Britney,” his voice on the other hand was decidedly uncivil. JC wondered if they would brawl right here, he could almost smell the Alpha Male waves rolling off of Justin right now. Justin was ready to defend his territory, to annihilate the person trying to take his property from him.
How blind had be been that he hadn’t seen it before. Seen that Justin considered him his. He hadn’t been looking for it of course but it was so damn obvious.
No wonder Bobbi had always disliked Justin and vice versa. They’d probably been snarling and snapping at each other behind his back.
Britney smiled back at JC, he waved at her before she left. How long would it have taken him to have seen this if Britney hadn’t shown him what to look for? Would he have ever seen it?
“Aren’t you supposed to be on tour?” he asked idly with a small smile, arching a brow as he slouched in his chair. He knew of course that Justin had a two week break; Britney had looked it up on the web the day that he’d been expected and not arrived. Just in case something had happened and he’d been scheduled for concerts during that off period.
They wanted to be prepared for every contingency.
“We have a break,” Justin crossed his arms over his chest, eyes narrowing as he studied JC from head to toe. JC fought to keep from squirming under the perusal.
It was uncomfortable having Justin eye him like that. Like he was looking for bruises or something, anything that would prove that JC had been forcibly coerced into this liaison with Britney.
“So why are you here?” he asked, like he didn’t already know the answer.
“I think we should talk,” Justin walked into the room, closing the door behind him with a barely audible click. A flick of his wrist engaged the lock and JC gnawed on his bottom lip.
“Talk about what J?”
“How ‘bout what you’re doing with Britney.”
“I would have thought that was kind of obvious,” JC frowned, watching Justin pace back and forth before him.
“Is it a game? Something management set up because of your album, couldn’t they have chosen someone else for you?”
“Um…”
“I mean… if they’re going for the sensationalistic factor its working. Pretty much all anybody’s talking about is you and Britney.”
“Justin…” JC started, Justin continued talking over him.
“Its just if they were going to set a beard up for you I really think that it was something that we should have all talked about together… you know as a group,” Justin stopped pacing and stared down at him.
“Why should you guys have anything to say about who I do or don’t date?” And that wasn’t really the point but at least Justin had let him get in a sentence.
“Because this affects us too JC… everything each one of does affects us as a group, as a whole even when we’re not together.”
“So you’re saying that it’s okay for you to date whoever you want, but it’s not okay for me to do the same thing?”
“Okay, you’re not dating her,” JC’s eyes widened slightly because he’d known Justin would be a little upset, especially since it was Britney but he hadn’t thought that he’d be seriously freaked out about it. “I know they’ve explained the beard thing before. And no… you can’t date whoever you want, especially not when it’s Britney. They should have given you somebody else.”
“Okay I’m going to say this one last time. Britney is not my beard… and besides all that I think I’m old enough to decide who I want to date Justin,” JC waved his hand in the air. “I’ve been doing it for years.”
“But she’s a girl.”
“So…”
“Gay C,” Justin’s hands were waving now and if his eyes got any wider they were going to pop right out of his head. Wouldn’t that be fun to explain.
JC sighed, because damn were they all preparing their speeches in advance? Chris and Lance had both said identical things to him.
“She’s an attractive young woman, enough times passed that it doesn’t look to strange and we’re both a little lonely. She’s good company,” JC ignored Justin’s flinch.
“She’s good company… she’s an attractive young woman? Jesus C… Didn’t you think any of this was weird? Don’t you think she’s getting something else out of this…? I mean Britney normally goes for pretty boys, look at Wade.”
“You think women can’t find me attractive?” JC scowled, he knew that 90% of their fans were there because of what Justin looked like but he didn’t think that the rest of them were elephant men or anything.
“No… I didn’t say that JC, that’s not…” Justin frowned, rubbing at his head in confusion. Probably trying to figure out exactly how he’d lost control of the conversation and started insulting him. “You’re gay.”
“Thank you for reminding me… again,” JC snorted, rolling his eyes. “It’s not like Chris and Joey and Lance haven’t been reminding me of that fact for the last week.”
“It’s just… JC…” Justin knelt before him. Touching his knees gently, his eyes earnest. “Tell me the truth baby…”
“The truth,” JC sighed, leaned his head back and closed his eyes. He wondered if Justin even knew the endearment had left his lips, wondered what endearments he casually used on Cameron. He laid his hand over one of Justin’s and squeezed it gently.
“Help me understand this… Tell me that Britney forced you to do it… hell tell me Johnny forced you to do this…”
“Nobody’s forcing me to do anything Justin.”
Justin stared at him; while JC fought back the urge to look away. Their eyes locked together and JC got the impression that since Justin felt he wasn’t being totally honest with him that Justin was searching for the answers to his questions.
Justin knew him well enough that he could read the little nuances of every flicker of his face. If muscles twitched he was going to know what was going on. JC schooled himself to calmness, thinking of peaceful oceans, clear skies.
Was Justin even conscious of the fact that he had twisted his hand under JC’s and that they were linked together?
“I don’t believe you,” Justin finally said softly and JC winced. “There’s something going on here.”
“Justin…”
“There’s something going on here… and I’m going to figure it out.”
It had killed her waiting until the next day to find out what had happened. But JC hadn’t called and she didn’t want to be labeled the psychotic girlfriend who always had to know where her boyfriend was so she had found things to keep her occupied.
Her closet was now organized by color and she had two bags of things to donate to various charities. She’d been productive even as she’d been biting her nails down to the cuticles. The next time they went to get a manicure Carol was going to scream at her. The only thing that made her feel any better was that she didn’t think JC’s nails or fingers were in better shape.
They had a standing meeting for coffee; normally Lance (the caffeine junkie) trailed along behind JC so Britney was surprised to not see anyone behind him when he walked in.
She managed to contain herself while he sat, tapped her fingers against the table while he ordered.
“So?” She knew her voice was bubbly and overly excited. She couldn’t help it. Her love life was being vicariously lived through JC at this point. Things wouldn’t have changed that much during the previous day, Justin was many things but he wasn’t a cheater. He was still with Cameron he would have kept his hands to himself.
“He held my hand,” Britney smiled until she realized that JC’s voice was strange sounding and he looked kind of weird, the smiled faded quickly. “And he called me baby… I don’t think he realized he was even doing it though.”
“Oh sweetie,” she patted his hand, drawing it back into her lap when the waitress reappeared with their coffees and a muffin. This waitress seemed to like JC a lot, in the last five days she’d given him free food every time.
She probably like half the free world thought that JC was to skinny and had made it her personal mission in life to fatten him up.
“He’s really jealous of you… how did I not see that?”
“Because you’re blind,” she said it kindly, because it wasn’t an insult. It was a statement of fact and JC knew it.
“He thinks that you’re a set up… a beard you know… he didn’t believe me when I told him you weren’t. He thinks there’s something going on.” JC wrinkled his nose as he alternated between tearing his muffin into pieces and sipping his coffee. She snagged a piece of the muffin before he totally demolished it and chewed thoughtfully.
“Of course he does.”
“He’s not supposed to know that yet… I don’t know if I can do this… you should have seen his face,” JC’s was somber and Britney frowned. She didn’t want JC to be in pain over this, she wanted him to finally end up with Justin. “He didn’t believe me but… “
“We can stop you know… just say the word…”
“I just… he was… sad… I mean he didn’t do anything, just the handholding and the baby but…”
“It’s a start… we could use this to our advantage…” she gnawed on her bottom lip thoughtfully. “Schedule a double date or something with him and Cameron. That’d drive him nuts, move things along quicker…”
“He’d kill both of us.”
Britney just grinned, mentally running down the list of numbers in her head. She didn’t have Cameron’s but she had Jared’s. She wondered what it would cost her to get the number from him.
“How did you get out of the house without an escort? I would have thought Justin would have an ankle bracelet on you by now… you know for ease of tracking and retrieval.”
“I climbed down the trellis,” he mumbled.
“Please tell me you’re kidding.”
“I’m kidding,” he smirked at her; it seemed some of his good humor was returning at the sudden influx of coffee and muffin crumbs. “You know I’d kill myself if I tried that.”
“Yeah you’d get distracted by a floor or a weed, or some weird growth thing and you’d fall to your death… I’m sure Justin and the others would find some way to pin that on me.”
“I’ve no doubt… but everyone was still asleep so I walked right out the front door; they stayed up late talking about us…”
“And how do you know that young man?” she grinned.
“Must be your bad influence rubbing off on me… I eavesdropped, they didn’t even know I was there,” JC giggled.
“Great,” she rolled her eyes. “Something else that Justin can blame on me when this is all over with.”
“I was eavesdropping long before you… anyway, Chris thinks this is all some publicity stunt, which Justin agreed with he just doesn’t think it came from my side…”
“So he thinks my PR team came up with it?” she laughed. “My PR team couldn’t come up with that on a good day.”
“Joey thinks we might actually be dating, Justin almost killed him… and god only knows what Lance thinks… he’s distracted by his something.”
“Yeah what is up with Lance lately? He’s been acting slightly stranger then normal.”
“He’s up to something.”
“When has Lance not been up to something?”
“Yeah but normally he shares whatever it is with us so it doesn’t come as a huge shock and bite us all in the ass after the fact.”
“Well its Lance… how bad could it be?”
“Famous last words… I’ll remind you that you said them when he takes over the world.”
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Date: 2003-08-20 11:00 pm (UTC)