Most of the people decided to get back on the plane, the rest stayed outside. "Lets make a fire," suggested Nick. Kevin and AJ rolled a few fallen logs over beside the plane in a circle while everyone else collected wood. They piled all the wood in a stack and started a fire. Then they sat down. Everyone was quiet until the father of the three kids spoke up and broke the silence. "How about we all introduce ourselves and say why we're here." A few peope nodded in agreement. "My name is Thomas and this is my daughter Lara and my sons Shane and Zack. We're from North Carolina and we were in California on vacation." "I'm Stephanie and this is my mother Anna," said the woman sitting next to them. "We were on vacation too and we're going back to Florida." "I'm Kevin." "Nick." "I'm AJ." "We're on our way to Florida to finnish our tour," said Kevin. "Tour?" asked Shane. "Us three, and Brian and Howie are the Backstreet Boys," explained Kevin. "Oh great, we're stuck here with the Backstreet Boys," mumbled Shane so only Lara could hear. She punched him in the arm. "What was that for?" whined Shane. "Leave them alone, their cool." Lara looked up and realized everyone was watching them.
"Let's get something to eat," suggested Rachel, saving Lara from further embarrasment. "Good idea," said Elyse. "I'm starving," said Shane." "Me too," pipped up Zack. "Your always hungry," said Shane. "So what," said Zack. Everyone laughed.
After they ate Lara got her journal out of her bookbag and started writing about what happened. She'd always kept a journal even though she only wrote in it a few times a month. She opened it up to the last blank page and started writing. "Guess who is on the plane with us? The Backstreet Boys! Brian and Howie went with the pilot and some girl to find help. There's a bunch of people here, one's this old lady named Anna and her daughter Stephanie who's like 27. There's this woman named Mirriam and her daughter Allison who's 7. Then there's these two brothers named Stephen and Travis. Stephen is 16 and Travis is 13. Their parents are divorced and their going to live with their dad. I didn't meet the rest of the people, besides Kevin, AJ and Nick." Lara stopped to think of what else to write. Her thoughts were interupted when she realized someone was standing in front of her. She looked up and saw Nick standing in front of her. She closed her journal and set it next to her.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to interupt you," said Nick. "No, its okay." She moved over and motioned for him to sit down. "I wasn't doing anything important." "It's Lara right?" "Yeah." "Nice to meet you," said Nick. "Same here," said Lara. "Are you still in school?" "No, I graduated last year. I'm going to UNC this fall." "I wish I had gone to college," said Nick. "You could still go back if you wanted to," said Lara. "Yeah I know. I want to go back and play basketball, but I'm not sure where I want to go." They sat quiet for a minute. Nick broke the silence. "I was talking to your dad earlier, he's a really nice guy." "He's alays ben real friendly, except for last year..." He voice trailed off and she looked down at her hands. Nick leaned down and tried to look at her. "What about last year?" Lara pulled her knees up and burried her head in her arms. Nick rubbed her back. "Its okay, you don't have to tell me."
After a minute Lara lifted her head up and looked at Nick. "I probably should tell you." she sat up and looked at Nick. He looked at her with concern in his eyes. A strand of his blond hair fell over his right eye and he casually brushed it out of the way. A few years ago... my mom went to the doctor for a checkup..." She paused and cleared her throat. "They found out she had Breast Cancer. She had a surgury but it didn't help at all." She stopped again. "She... died last year." Nick was speechless. "I... I'm so sorry," he stammered. He hugged her and held her in his arms. "It's okay..." said Lara. "It hurt my dad worse than me, he was really devestated. He stopped talking for a while, he didn't eat much. It hurt me to see him that way, it was scary. My aunt and uncle came and stayed with us. They convinced him to get help. He went to counsling for a while. After a while he went back to his normal self. He went back to work, he started coaching Zack's little league team and he was happy again."
"What about you, how did you handle it?" asked Nick. "My friends helped me get through it. I couldn't have done it without them." Nick listened to her intently, with true compasion in his eyes. Lara looked at him and for the first time realized how beautiful he was, not only in looks, but his personality too. She had always had a secret crush on him, but in her most vivid dreams she never imagined that he was so caring, so sweet. She snapped out of her thoughts and realized she was staring at Nick. She half smiled and picked up her journal. She stuffed it in her bookbag and when she did a magazine fell out. Nick picked it up and looked at it. It was the Teen People with the Backstreet boys on the cover. He opened it up to the first page of the artical, the part about Brian. "You know what? I never knew exactly what Brian had to go through until I read this artical, I almost cried when I read it. It really gave me a lot more respect for him." "I know," said Lara. "When he was about to have his heart surgury last year he was pretty scared, even though he tried to hide it. We were all pretty scared too, but I think we knew he would get through it okay."