DISCLAIMER: I don't any of the celebrities mentioned in this story. I actually know very little about any of them. (Which would explain if I have painted bad pictures of their personalities). Also, if you're not legally and morally able to read this story then, please, don't, I don't want to have to worry about it, and neither does anyone else.
When Its Over Part 7 -- This Self Destructive Dance
Jody had been to Orlando one other time. He was on tour at the time, so he missed most of the city. What he could remember about it was that the nightlife was full of teenagers and aging men that wished they were teenagers, neither of which interested him. The rest of the band had spent the entire night partying like no other, while Jody had disappeared back to his hotel room. Thinking back, most every night of the tour ended with him locked in a hotel room or hiding in his bunk. Then it had seemed like agony to face another night, now he realized he had simply been trying to face any of it. The parties, the fame, the money, he didn't want any of it. He had started with the band for an emotional outlet, and it had turned into what he so desperately been trying to avoid.
Now, sitting on the couch in Lance's living room he wondered if he really wanted to go back to it all. The non-stop touring -- feeling isolated in a crowd of thousands -- and the publicity that seemed to tear away at his soul. There were hundreds of questions about his life and music. What did it mean? How was his childhood? Did he come from a broken home? He had tried to give the answers the record company had wanted, but wasn't convincing enough. The reporters never accepted the answers and continued digging. Jody had eventually begun to let pieces of the truth fall through into his answers, and found that he almost felt clean.
Lance was on the phone with everyone it seemed. He made one phone call after another, letting everyone know he was home and safe. And for a special few he announced he had brought home a visitor. Jody watched as he wondered around the room, playing with various things as he went. His mind wandered the strange collection of memories the pair had formed since they met. From almost playing child like games, to working together and almost being friends.
Suddenly the room seemed to get too small and Jody needed some air and a cigarette. He stood up and walked to the glass door leading to the back yard as quietly as he could, hoping Lance wouldn't notice. He watched the reflection in the glass door, Lance never looked up at him. The goofy grin on his face said it all, his mom was on the phone.
Jody stood out on the overly large deck, smoking a Marlboro light and staring vacantly at the trees just over the horizon. It was hot, hotter that Jody was accustomed to after years of non-stop traveling, and the sweat was pooling at the small of his back. He felt sticky from the sweat and dirty from his long trip. He was considering taking a shower when a pair of arms lazily wrapped around his waist.
"I thought you only smoked when you had stuff on your mind." Jody only laughed under his breath as an answer. He leaned back into Lance a little, finding some comfort in his embrace, even in the heat. They stood there for a moment in silence before Lance spoke up, his voice soft and lingering. "Are you ok with this?" Jody turned and looked at Lance.
"What? You touching me?" Jody put on his best face, but the tension was visible beneath the fake smile.
"Staying here, with me."
"Yes. Why wouldn't I be?"
"I don't know, you just seemed..."
"What?"
"Distant? I guess that's a good word." Jody sighed and leaned back against the railing of the deck. He looked at Lance for a long time. Long enough that Lance felt self-conscious and looked away.
"Can I ask you something?" Lance looked up in surprise at the question.
"Yeah."
"Is this right? I mean about me going back into this business. I mean, I hated it, I really did, but when I left, I couldn't stand it."
"Does it feel right?"
"Sometimes, then sometimes I feel like I am just fooling myself. Sometimes I wonder if I did this just to be close to you."
"OK, lets retry this. When you were in the studio with Josh doing the demo, how did it feel?"
"Right."
"When you're out on that stage with a thousand people singing along with, sharing everything your going through, does it feel right?"
"Yeah." A smile played across Jody's face when he realized where Lance was going.
"Your nervous about this aren't you?"
"Before I always had three other guys out there that had as much in this as I did, now I'll be the one out there, with no one else to share the weight of it."
"Yeah, but I'll be there, and Josh and Trent, and probably a hundred thousand other people." Jody found himself playing with Lance's fingers. For a second he froze until Lance's grip tightened, telling him it was ok. "Come on, Justin and Brit want to take us out to dinner, and you look like you need a shower."
"You always say that." Lance was turning to walk away when he threw a small grin over his shoulder.
"Well, if you weren't so mangy looking." Jody smacked him on the ass, almost immediately ridiculing himself for doing it, until he saw Lance run in the house laughing, and it finally clicked. If he was going to get close to Lance, he was just going to have to let go, and quit worrying about it all.
"I don't want to go out with Justin and Brit. I want some alone time with you." Jody pulled out his best puppy dogface, only to start laughing at the devious look that ran across Lance's face.
"You'll get it, trust me."
A couple of hours later there were two couples sitting in a small Italian restaurant, all feeling quite nervous. Jody was quite aware of the looks he had received most of the night. Justin and Brittney had small grins across their faces, obviously quite happy that things had gone in their favor.
"Look you two, I wanted to apologize for the last time we talked, I was a little rude." Jody said trying hard to make eye contact with both of them. He had to say something; there was a weight of guilt on his back. He knew he had to be able to get along with Lance's friends, and they didn't have a very good beginning. He never had good beginnings with pop stars it seemed, and as the thought ran through his mind he almost laughed.
"A little! Hun', you were a flat out asshole!" Brittney laughed, winking to show him she was only joking.
"Besides, you were a little stressed out at the time if I recall." Justin added. Lance sat back, observing how his friends were trying to make Jody comfortable. He had to admit, they were charming him a little. There was a smirk forming on Jody's lips, and his blue eyes were sparkling, a true shine that Lance saw very little any more.
Discussion seemed to flourish after that. The ice was broken and Jody learned that he had more in common with these pop gods than he could ever imagine.
"Who's producing the album?" Justin asked. He had brought up the Jody's career quickly.
"Trent Reznor and Josh." Lance answered for Jody, a smile playing in his eyes.
"Really? That should be quite a new experience. Have you written any of it?" Brittney threw out the question, but it seemed to hold on Lance's face. Jody suddenly realized he had never told Lance about anything he wrote. Suddenly he remembered the first time he spoke to Justin. It was almost dream like, seemingly another world.
"Yeah, all of it. Some of it still needs some work, but from beginning to end, it's all there." Lance looked like some one had slapped him. When Nsync wrote music it was very seldom they had anything done before they hit the studio.
"Really? You have the name to?" Justin joked, obviously as amazed as Lance was.
"Uhmm. Yeah."
"What??" They all said in unison.
"Yeah. See, it's a kind of concept album, I guess. It has a story line, but I guess in a way so do all albums, but this one follows I guess that last year of my life."
"What are you planning to call it?" Lance asked. This was the first he had heard of any of this. He didn't like being left out of things when it came to business but when he saw the uncomfortable look pass over Jody's face he understood. Jody couldn't talk about his music- there was a lot of himself in it, too much.
"Isolated Endeavors."
"What's that mean?" Both Justin and Brittney had leaned over their food and Jody had their full attention. Lance on the other hand had chosen to place a comforting hand on Jody's knee and sip his wine.
"It's a line in one of the songs. I wrote the song at the height of fame, when I couldn't get along with the band or management. I'd had a fight with my best friend and we weren't speaking, so I felt completely alone. At that point it felt like I was doing all this stuff on autopilot and the only thing I seemed to feel was how bitter I was about being pushed into it all against my will. Isolated endeavors -- I wrote that one night in my hotel room, and I the song and album has just been built around it since then."
Jody finally looked up from the napkin he had been twisting his hands to see that Lance was smiling at him with some pride in his eyes. "It could be a hit."
"You think about business too much."
"And you never do, so it works out in the end." For a moment they thought they were alone.
"When do we get to read it?" Justin asked, obviously intrigued by Jody's explanation. But Jody's face turned red and his gaze fell the half eaten plate of food in front of him.
"Nobodies read it yet."
"I didn't mean to be pushy. I just was curious, I didn't mean to upset you or anything." Justin managed to force out. Everyone's eyes had fallen on Jody at this point. Most people -- no matter how hard they try to hide it -- find at least some pride in what they make. However, Jody seemed to be genuinely embarrassed by the fact that some one even wanted to read his lyrics.
"Its ok. I just... I get a little nervous about what I write. When I was with the band the drummer wrote the hits, I wrote the emotional songs between them. Nothing I ever wrote even got considered for a single, so now I'm on my own and there isn't anyone to write the hits for me, you know?"
"I think I do. I mean when we started out, hell, even when Brittney started out, some one else wrote our music, picked out our clothes, designed the image. But after a while you sort of have to take over if its going to be worth it for you, so when we started writing things for ourselves, and making decisions about our image, it was scary because we didn't know if we could do it as well, but in the end we were proud of it." Justin was trying to make Jody feel better, but Lance wondered if Jody was even listening. He was looking at Justin, and he seemed to be hearing and understanding the words, but Lance knew as well as anyone when Jody's mind started going there was no stopping it.
"But, you sold millions upon millions of records. I will never have that. To me, in the `rock genre'" his voice was dripping with sarcasm on the last words, almost to the point of making fun of himself, "its more about can I make an album that a few hundred thousand people will buy, and the critics will respect, and I can make enough money to put on another tour and make another album, you know?"
"No, I have no idea. I don't even listen to rock most of the time." The joke, as bad as it may have been seemed to loosen the tension in Jody's voice and remind him that he was around friends and he didn't have to drown himself in it all yet. There was still some high ground to hold on to.
The rest of the evening seemed to fly past Jody in a big blur. They all shared horrid stories from the road, laughed at each other, and even managed to drink 3 bottles of wine. It was a couple of hours later before they even attempted to leave. Between the large meal and the time they spent talking the alcohol in their systems didn't seem to bother any of them. When Lance and Jody finally managed to convince Justin and Brittney they had to go -- but not before promising all to come to Justin's for a big cook out -- it was nearly midnight. They were both exhausted from the trip and the long evening with little physical activity seemed too much for either of the to handle.
When they arrived at Lance's house they had both past the point of exhaustion and were a little on the silly side. They found themselves laughing at anything and to be honest Jody liked it. He enjoyed the feeling that he could be silly and laugh and not have to worry whether he was going to be betraying someone's expectations of him.
After a few minutes trying to find the right key Lance finally let them in the front door. Jody immediately went to the couch where his backpack was still sitting. He sat down and started to open when he noticed Lance looking at him with a confused look on his face.
"What?"
"I thought you were tired."
"I am." He was frantically throwing things from his hastily packed bag.
"You know, if you were a little more organized when you packed, you wouldn't turn my living room into a disaster when you were looking for something." Lance moved over closer to the couch, leaning so he could see in the bag and maybe figure what Jody was looking for. He nearly fell over when Jody finally yanked something from the bag.
"Found it, finally."
"Your notebook?" Lance was confused. Earlier Jody wanted some time with just the two of them, now he was planning to write in his notebook, which always meant he wanted to be completely alone.
"Yeah. This is kinda hard to explain. There is one other person who has read this. Josh, and that was only because I had to let him, you know how hard it is to tell him no." Jody looked shy. His eyes were burning holes in the carpet and his face and neck were red with embarrassment. "Anyway, I realized earlier that if this, you and me, us, was ever going to work, I was going to have to let go, and just let it happen."
"Sounds reasonable."
"This notebook has me in it. Everything is dated. It pulls double duty even. It is where I write all my songs and is my journal. For most dates there is an entry talking about my life at that point, and usually some form of song, I guess to emphasize what I'm saying. Am I making sense?"
"Mostly, but I'm still not sure what your saying."
"Ok. I'm not an easy person to get to know. I hide behind things; I don't let people get close. I even do it with you sometimes, and I don't know how to stop myself from doing it. But, I ran out of pages in this thing when we were in New Orleans. I bought a new one, but I wasn't sure what to do with this, I mean I need it still, but I don't want to take it everywhere with me all the time. So I thought, that since you want to know more about me, and I have trouble telling you, I might let it tell you..."
"You're going to let me read the notebook. Wow."
"I'm sorry, bad idea." Lance reached over and took the notebook from Jody's hands and carefully laid it in his lap. He was slightly weary of seeing the contents, but his curiosity didn't take long to win the battle in his mind. He opened it to the first page - it was dated exactly two years ago to the day.
Jody simply leaned against his shoulder and closed his eyes. He was closing in on sleep quickly and Lance was obviously very engrossed with the notebook. "The first laugh I hear and I'll find new management." His voice was heavy with sleep and sounded more like a groan on some syllables.
"Only constructive criticism, I promise."
"It's a journal, you can't be constructive with some one else's journal."
"Sure I can. Like right here, you forgot a comma."
Jody, with great effort, lightly slugged Lance on the shoulder.
"Seriously though, thank you. It means a lot that you would trust me enough to do this."
"Trust doesn't play in to it as much of fear of fucking this up, and that, I would do anything to avoid."
And with that Jody let sleep overtake him. He slept for several hours on Lance's shoulder, snuggling closer every so often, while Lance read his journal from the past two years. And neither of them felt uncomfortable with the situation, truth be told, Jody had never felt so safe as he did now with Lance, and that was the best part of it.
OK. I know it's a little short, but this was really hard for me to write because I have to move away from my "outline" of the story so that I can get to the next part. I am actually planning to start the next chapter now, so it should be along soon. This just seemed like a good place to stop this one. The next chapter should be much better (I hope). Big plans: first date, and maybe a few other firsts. Feedback is always welcome: downlikeastone@msn.com. Thanks