Date: Sat, 22 Jun 2002 01:32:00 -0700 (PDT)
From: Chica
Subject: I Need You Tonight-Chapter 12

Guess who's back? Guess who's back?? (LOL, too much of that new Eminem
song). Well, I'm back, and I'm wrapping up The Next Day. But don't worry!
After this is through there is still a whole other story left. Hey, next we
hear from Brian! Don't get sad at the end of this! Instead, get
excited...(in the good way)

DISCLAIMER: Whoops, not mine. I think I should return them, I haven't seen
the Backstreet Boys in a while now, and I think people want them
back... ::pokes Brian and Nick making out in closet and forces them to
leave::


Chapter 11


"Nick, we have a problem..." My heart thudded disturbingly in my chest as
Kevin's voice floated over the line, and I knew that something terrible had
happened, otherwise someone else would have called.

"What happened man?" I asked in a heated rush, my mind doing a complete
spin, leaving me feeling like I could hit the floor. "Did someone die?"

"Well, no one died, but some shit is going down."

"Did AJ get arrested again?" I asked quickly, placing a hand on my hip
before promptly yanking it down to my side. Sometimes I was too girly for
my own good.

"No, Nick, and you should be one to talk. At least AJ covers his arrests
well, unlike someone I know..." I blushed as hard as I possibly could, and
my face burned.

"Well, what is it."

"We found LeighAnne in a room, sleeping with another man." I didn't know
whether to be mad at this or jumping up in down in triumph.

"So why did you call me? It's not my wife."

"Well, I figured if any of us would be more glad to rid Brian of LeighAnne,
it was you..."

"I refuse to be some sort of bitch bait."

"Ah, back to your old attitude. At least join us for the...'bitch
baiting'. Howie has already dragged Brian down there.

"Fine, I'll tag along." I hung up the phone, shaking my head at everything
that was happening. It had only been a couple of minutes since Brian's
visit to my room and I was completely on edge already. The usual questions
bombarded my head, with `why did he do it' at the very top of the
list. With no explanation or even some kind of clue, I was as lost as a
duck in the desert. I walked from my room, off to witness what I had been
predicting for months. Yet as I walked toward fate, I realized that I
wasn't as happy as I felt I should be. Perhaps it was the kiss, or maybe
just the fact that I was damn tired of all the drama in my life. Yep, that
was probably it. Then again, I still could feel Brian's strong lips on
mine, so I had a feeling that it might unconsciously be the culprit.

I soon caught up with everyone outside of a small single room on the second
floor. The floor was in hiatus. People were hanging curiously out of their
doors (one guy even in a towel only) and the first thing I could hear was
yelling, mostly by Kevin and Brian. I carefully made my way onto the scene,
prepared for the worst. The worst was what I received. Clothes were strewn
all over the cheap room, and two men were still on the bed talking to
themselves. It was even too much for AJ as he stared open mouthed at an
open briefcase of sex toys. Of course for someone like me, I was downright
shocked. I then quickly realized that if AJ and I were shocked, then
Brian...

"I can't believe you'd do this to me! When they told me, I didn't listen. I
wanted to believe you, my wife...I can't believe this!" Brian was in an
uproar, pacing about the room and staring at it as if it was a sin to even
gaze upon its contents. At one point, he reached down and scooped up a
still-running vibrator, holding it in his hands in disgust. He started
yelling at LeighAnne's bed sheet-clad body again and now brandished the
dildo at her like a sword.

"Our marriage is over! It says...In the Bible, the holy fucking book...You
can only divorce if your partner is unfaithful to you..."

"Yeah, and it always says that being a butt-fucker is a sin too." LeighAnne
spat, tired of Brian's yells and screams. Brian merely looked at her in a
cold hatred before throwing the dildo at one of the men on the bed. I had
to fight back a small laugh as the dildo bounced off his head.

"Hope you got some sort of pleasure out of that, LeighAnne!" Brian yelled
at her before pushing past a few of us mingling at the door. I hesitated
for a moment, torn between rubbing in LeighAnne's misery and going after
Brian. One look at Kevin's encouraging face sent me flying from the room,
trying to get past more people who came to watch. I finally found Brian
sitting on a bench outside the hotel, his head in his hands. Before I had a
chance to even make myself known, Brian spoke with his head still obscured
from sight.

"I was wrong, you were right, are you happy?" I furrowed my eyebrows at
him, nearly crying myself as I caught sight of tears flowing down his
face. I screwed up my face in concentration, knowing that this was one of
those moments in life where saying the wrong thing was not acceptable.

"No, I'm not happy. I don't enjoy being right and rubbing it in people's
faces." Brian still refused to look up at me and just continued to whimper
into his hands as he talked.

"That's bullshit." He said in a choked voice. "You would rag on Kevin for
days if he so much as missed a dance step."

"Yeah, but that's Kevin. And his wife isn't...um..." I couldn't even think
of an appropriate word to describe the horrors yet make it pleasant enough
where he wouldn't remember it too much. "Banging around." Oh, good going
Carter. Now you got him crying harder. I put an arm around him, ashamed at
even myself for what I was doing. `You're enjoying this, aren't you? You
sadistic bastard!' My head shouted, but I ignored it as usual and smelled
what Brian's shirt smelled like. Ew, I think that was from the bedroom
scene we just went through...

"Nick, I just thought that maybe I could just live happy, you know. Have a
good wife, a couple of kids, friends, family, all that good Brady Bunch
stuff."

"Trust me, life isn't like the Brady Bunch. I can bet you anything those
people are doped up on drugs all the time. No one is that happy."

"Yeah, and Mrs. Brady wasn't turning dildos on other men...Oh God..." Brian
moaned, and I held him again as I knew he must be remembering what had
happened. I patted his shoulder, feeling awkward at this point. I myself
have never been good at the whole comfort and love thing, unless it was in
a romantic way. In a platonic way it felt completely like the Twilight Zone
and I was currently forcing myself not to think of Brian turning a dildo on
me...

"Nick, I should have believed you." Brian had stopped crying and was now
starting to wipe tears and snot away.

"Brian, if I were you I wouldn't have believed me, and if you were me, you
would have believed me because I had seen it, and I would have been you and
I wouldn't have believed you, but I might have since I already know." Brian
looked up at me, sniffling.

"Nick, that just made no sense." We both sat there for a minute before
laughing loudly, hugging each other.

"Well, I try my best. Besides, I'm not the one going into other people's
rooms and kissing them, am I?" I started to laugh before I realized what I
had said. I could have readily accepted a bolt of lightening striking me at
that moment. Brian had stopped laughing and stared at me as if I was an
alien pod person ready to siphon his brains.

"Nick..."

"Brian..."

We both started, and then stopped, waiting again for one to speak.

"I didn't mean to bring that up..."

"No, Nick, it's ok." He sat there for a second, ignoring me, perhaps hoping
I'd change the subject. I wasn't that naïve.

"Well, since it's ok, what the hell was that?" I asked, staring at
him. Brian tried to speak but nothing came out. I waited patiently,
noticing how incredibly sexy he looked while he was thinking deeply.

"I just...I just wanted to see what it was like just one more time." I sat
there, not daring to believe my ears. I had expected him to say `it was
nothing' or `I was on drugs', not this. I wasn't prepared for this answer
that was so...truthful. I stared at him and he looked away, staring at the
ground. Gathering up my courage, I grabbed his chin, turning his face
towards me.

"Then if that's the case, I'll refresh your memory properly." I leaned
forward and pressed my lips to his, letting myself fall into that briefest
of kisses. We stayed like that for a minute before I broke off, licking my
lips slightly as if to find something else there.

"Nick, I still just want to be friends..."



"And we will be, of course. What do you think I am, a vulture or
something?" Brian suddenly started to laugh loudly, and I was afraid that
he'd wake up the whole city with his laughs.

"What?" I asked, getting a bit unnerved by his relentless torrents of
laughter.

"It's just...I've never heard of someone being a vulture." I stared at him
before laughing myself, mostly at how really great it was to lighten the
mood, the other part wondering why the hell he thought that being a vulture
was so funny. We continued to laugh, enjoying the momentary peace before we
had to traipse back into the hotel and tie loose ends, so to speak. After a
few minutes we left, side by side, off to end the brief marriage chapter in
Brian's life and starting my new chapter where I didn't have to be anyone
but Nick. Just plain old Nick that was Brian's friend. Things were back to
normal, just as they had been before we had dated. Except now I knew what
he looked like naked and the occasional thought of returning him to that
state...


THE END


There's the last of The Next Day. Get ready for The Space Between, the
third part and final part of this trilogy. Now we get to see what Brian is
thinking through all of this.